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- j GOETHE'S WORKS .-No . 6 .
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"y ^ ot . xii . - ^ P qustus . ( pAiikT eine Tragodie—not TrauertyieU ike proper Gfpfman . woycl for tragedy , which would , navfe heen most improperly applied here ; but we are not reconciled even to tlie Greek appellation . ) When we , thirty years ago , became first
acquainted with the marvello us fragments which are found in the first collection of our author ' s writings , we persuaded tfufselves , ihat if it were ever completed , ( ndw it has both a beginning and a middle , —and , according to report , an end also , which exists in inanuscript , ) Goethe would condescend id borrow a title , irom one of his inost illustrious predecessors , and call it a t ) ivine Comedy . The epithet ' divine' is , by common usage , applied to the matter , not the form of a work ; and Faust treats of all those
awful conditions of existence which absorb the deepest thoughts , and concern the highest interests df man ;—the scene reaches to the heavens above ; the characters are the most tremendous which the imagination df man h&s ever attempted to cbnceive—the heavenly hierarchy and the powers of Hell . Tft £ acti 6 ti , Ho les& awful tnan that of the permitted attempt of IHe iiifcriidl SpiHt td fix in disobedient ^ to tits God a * riian who hks ventured to {
respass beyond the limits of humanity . Whatever be the issue , the struggle is tragic , and the matter divine , if anything can be , that concerns mankind . Comedy , nevertheless , is the drama * that essentially in its style . Critics . have ; disputed the propriety of Dante ' s application of tne word ib his divine poem , on the ground that the style is , in g eneral , too elevated , and the state err mind which it excites too earnest . In both of these particulars ,
no one cari d&ny that * comedy' would be here the only appropriate tentf ; for it is this -which distinguishes F ^ usttis from every work of imagination with which we are acquainted ;—that , \ VhiIe the matter is the most awful , dreadful , and pathetic that can be conceived , the form ik in such direct contrast , that we know of but one appropriate epithet , which , joined to the Greek denomination of the class of poem , would express the peculiar character of the individual work . It is a grotesque tragedy ; and it will be found
that this grotesqueness is no accident ; it a ' rises necessarily out of the very idea of the work . No other style is possible ; and in this necessity lies its justification , its good taste , aye its morality in the highest sense of the word . The seeming incongruity , as soon as the author ' s drift and purpose are clearly understood * will
resolve itself into strict propriety . That purpose we shall endeavour to explain to our readers , which , being understood , they will be better able , whenever , the opportunity offers , to appreciate the execution . We wish it were also in our power to furnish specimens enow from which they might , with no other knowledge ^ form
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Nov. 2, 1832, page 742, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1824/page/22/
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