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Untitled Article
tefnper of Herder Would not permit him to spare nnty of the aberrations of his young acquaintance , while the rtiore tolerant nature of Goethe , and his ready faculty of discerning and appre-i ciating powers not his own , kept him aloof from jealousy and
envy . lhis acquaintance led however , in the sequel , to the establishment of Herder at Weimar , where he died . During the life of both , they continued to observe that respectful courtesy which each could require of the other ; but it was still , to the last , intimacy without cordiality .
Here , too , Goethe connected himself with a less distinguished religious enthusiast , Jung , whose Theory of the World of Spirits ' is an amusing illustration of the fact , that religious enthusiasm is a disease from which not even a sceptical age is exempt . . Under the name of Heinrich Stilling he published his life , and the first volume is hardly inferior to the Life of John Woolman , one o £ the most delightful specimens of autobiography in our language *
In this volume there is not a sentence which outrages good taste * and the style is a model of idyllic sweetness . ; . but all the succeeding volumes are full of absurd puerilities and tasteless extra-, vagance . Goethe conceived an attachment to the simple-hearted , and upright enthusiast * protected him against the jeers and insults of the anti-religious students ; and the manuscript of the firsfc volume , entitled , Heinrich Stilling ' s Jiigend-jahr—H . S . ' s Youth r —^ was corrected by Goethe for the press .
While pursuing his studies here , Goethe laboured unremittingly to subdue the constitutional infirmities under which he laboured . Being subject to a dizziness when on high places , he made it a practice to mount the lofty Straaburg spire , and tp sit there by the hour together until he became quite insensible to the peril of his situation . In the like manner , by continual exertion , he sub-: dued the repugnance which all , at first * feel towards the smell of putrid bodies , and visited hospitals till he was hardened to the
endurance of the sight of human suffering . In the meanwhile he pursued the course of his desultory studies and manifold literary exercises , occasionally aided by the assistance of Herder , and occasionally obliged to continue his labours in defiance of his sometimes unfriendly opposition . Of the former class we will mention one—> an Essay on the early German , that is , Gothic , architecture , which Herder adopted into a miscellany ^ published by him * ., A residence at Strasburg , of necessity , brought Goethe in . close contact with French literature and philosophy ; and it is worthy .
This reminds us of the motto to the second volume of the autobiography , — * what we wish for in youth we have a plenty of in old age , ' and of the beautiful commentary of Goethe on the proverb , — ' In' my youth I was nearly the only one who had any sense of the worth of the Gothic architecture } now it has become a national taste , and there are innumerable persons who surpass me ' , in insight and ; critical knowledge . We should continually find our proverb verified were we but accustomed to fir our wishes on trtselffoh and impersonal objects—he whose aspira * tiona are tfor . the wellbeing q £ society will suffer no disappointment * . ' . . ..,
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Goethe . 29 &
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), May 2, 1832, page 295, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1812/page/7/
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