CHAPTER VIII.

GOETHE AND MORITZ.

"Cheer up, my friend! Grumble no longer! Rejoice in life and throw off the burden of your cares! Open your eyes and behold the beauties of the world created by the Almighty Spirit of the Universe! We have studied and worshipped the immortal gods and immortal arts in Rome--we have been living with the ancients; now let us live for a few days with eternal youth, with ever-fading, ever-blossoming Nature! Let us live like God's children in His glorious world!"

It was Goethe who spoke these words--not Goethe, the secretary of legation, who, at the end of the year 1786, had secretly withdrawn from his friends, and even from his beloved Madame von Stein, and fled to Italy, the land he so ardently desired to visit. No, it was not that Goethe, who, during the last months of his sojourn in Weimar, had eschewed his youthful exuberance of feeling, his exaggerated manner, and his Werther costume, and had assumed the grave dignified air which he deemed becoming in a high official! No, he who spoke these words, was the poet Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe, the poet who was once more himself, now that he sojourned under Italy's glorious skies--the poet whose soul glowed with enthusiasm, and on whose lips inspiration trembled--the poet who sought the essence of the Divinity in the least flower, and who saw the glory of his Maker reflected in the countenance of each human being.

This Goethe it was who spoke these cheering, encouraging words. He addressed them to Philip Moritz, with whom he had been living in Rome, and other parts of Italy, for the last two years, and with whom he had rejoiced and sorrowed in many pleasures and vicissitudes. They had both come to Italy to make new men of themselves. Goethe, to become himself again--to become the original, creative genius. Moritz, to heal his heart-wounds, and refresh his mind with the wonders of art and nature that abound for every man, who has eyes to see, in Italy--this land of art and poetry. Philip Moritz had eyes to see, and the woman he loved had begged him not to close them, not to shut out from his vision the treasures which the God of creation and the gods of art had so plentifully bestowed upon this favored land.

Marie von Leuthen was the woman of his love, and she it was who had entreated him to go to Italy, that he might recover from the wounds life had inflicted, his grief be healed, and hope restored to his heart.

"Go," she had said to him, "Italy and art will be a healing balm for your wounds. Recover from them, and return after two years, renewed in mind and constant in heart, and I will give you a joyful answer if you then ask me if I love you."

Philip Moritz had journeyed to Italy as she bade him. On arriving in Rome he learned that Goethe had been in the city for some time. Moritz at once sought out his adored poet, and since then they had been close comrades. He admired and worshipped Goethe, who tenderly loved the friend (who was often so gloomy, and whose merriment was often exaggerated), in spite of his peculiarities. Together they visited the treasures of art in Rome; together they made excursions to the neighboring villages and places of interest, on foot or on horseback, as the case might be. On an excursion of this kind to Frascati, Moritz had been thrown from his horse, and had his arm broken. Goethe had nursed him like a brother; for long days and weeks he had been the sufferer's only consoler and associate.

"I have just left Moritz," he wrote on one occasion to Madame von Stein. "The bandages were to-day removed from his arm, and it appears to be doing well. What I have experienced and learned at the bedside of this sufferer, in the last two weeks, may be of benefit to us both in the future. During this period he was perpetually alternating between the greatest misery and the highest delight."[35]

This "greatest misery" the poor hypochondriac had borne in silence. The "highest delight," he had shared with his happier friend, with Goethe, the favorite of the gods.

In the autumn they had both left Rome, and gone out to Castel Gandolfo, to pay a visit to the house of a hospitable friend. Many eminent poets and artists were sojourning at this charming place at that time. Gayety and merriment was the order of the day. It was in vain that Goethe endeavored to draw his friend Moritz into this magic circle of enjoyment. It grieved him deeply to see his friend brooding over his studies, to see the sad and gloomy expression that rested on his features. Goethe's entreaties and exhortations were at times successful in arousing him from this condition; but, after a short interval of forced gayety and mocking merriment, he would relapse into his ordinary state of silent melancholy.

"Let us live as God's children in His glorious world!"

Moritz raised his pale countenance from the book over which he had been brooding, and looked tenderly, and yet sadly, at Goethe.

"Happy, enviable man," said he. "But who can feel and think as you do?"

"You can, Moritz, if you only try," cried Goethe. "But, above all, tell me what burden is resting on your soul, and what these wrinkles on my friend's brow mean."

"They mean that I have a sad presentiment," replied Moritz, with a sigh, as he threw his book aside and rose from his seat. "I am angry with myself on this account, and I have sought to dispel this presentiment, but all to no purpose! The skies of Italy are no longer serene, the whole world seems like a huge grave; of late, even Rome's works of art have appealed to me in vain; my ear has been deaf to their sublime language."

"But, speak out, growler, monster," cried Goethe, impatiently, "what northern spleen has again penetrated your northern heart? what is the matter with you? What imps have taken up their abode in your brain? What crickets are fiddling in your ears, and transforming the author, the linguist, and the sage into a miserable, grief-stricken old woman, who shuffles along through God's beautiful world, and burrows in the ground like a mole, instead of soaring upwards to the sun like an eagle?"

"Corpo di Bacco!" cried Moritz, striking the table so furiously with his fists that he sent the books flying in every direction, and upset the ink-bottle, flooding his papers with its black contents. "Corpo di Bacco! Enough of your ridicule and abuse! How dare you call me a miserable old woman, how dare you compare me with a mole? How dare you make yourself merry over my northern heart? You, above all, whose heart is a lump of ice, an extinguished coal, that even the breath of a goddess would fail to enkindle! If one of us is an iceberg, it is you, Mr. Johann Wolfgang Goethe! You are an iceberg, and your heart can never thaw again, but will remain coffined in an eternal winter. What do you know of the sufferings of a man who loves the fairest, the best, and the noblest of women, and who, tormented by terrible forebodings of her death, tears his own flesh with the serpent's tooth of care, and who is blinded by his grief to all the beauties of God's world!"

"That is it," said Goethe, heartily, "then I have attained my object. With the iron hammer of my abuse I have beaten on the anvil of your obdurate temperament until I have made the sparks fly and kindle a fire. That was all I desired, you overgrown, harmless child; I only called you an old woman in order to awaken the man in you, and I now beg your pardon a thousand times for this abuse. He who has seen the old shrews that infest the neighborhood of St. Peter's, and has suffered from their visitations in the Chiesa Maria della Pace, knows how terrible a creature such an old fright is, and how offensive it is to be compared to such a personage. I humbly beg your pardon, Philip Moritz, professor, sage, connoisseur of art, and first-class etymologist. But as for your presentiments and your fears that some evil may have befallen your sweetheart, permit me to say that they are only the vagaries of a lover who blows soap-bubbles into the air, and afterward trembles lest they should fall on his head as cannon-balls. Why, in the name of all the saints, do you give vent to your yearnings in trumpet tones, and afterward consider them the death-song of your love? Was it not agreed upon between you two lovesick children of affliction that these two years of your sojourn in Italy should be a trial of your love and fidelity? Was it not understood that you were not to exchange a single letter during this period?"

"Yes, that was our agreement," replied Moritz. "Marie would have it so; she wished to try me, to see whether I would remain faithful and constant in love, even among the glories of Italy."

"Well, then! What is it that oppresses you? What do these lamentations signify? What are you afraid of?"

"Do not laugh, Goethe," murmured Philip Moritz. "I will tell you, a dream has tormented and alarmed me; a dream that has returned to me for three successive nights. I see Marie lying on her couch at the point of death, her cheeks pale and hollow, her eyes dim and fixed; old Trude kneels at her side wringing her hands, and a voice cries in my ear in heart-rending tones: 'Philip, my beloved Philip, come! Let me die in your arms.' This is the dream that has haunted me for three nights; these are the words that have each time awakened me from sleep, and they still resound in my ear when I am fully aroused."

"Dreams amount to nothing," said Goethe, shrugging his shoulders, "and your faith in them proves only that Cupid transforms even the most sensible men into foolish children, and that the wanton god can make even sages irrational."

"I would he made you so, you mocker at love and marriage," rejoined Moritz, grimly. "I would like to see you a victim of this divine madness. I trust that Cupid, whom you deride, will send an arrow into your icy heart and melt it in the flames of infinite love-pains and heaven-storming longings! I hope to see you, the sage who has fled from all the living beauties, from all the living women here in Italy, as though they were serpents of Eden--I hope to see you compelled by one of them to eat of the apple, and experience the dire consequences! I hope--"

"Hold, rash mortal!" said Goethe, interrupting him, with a smile. "You know that children and fools often speak the truth, and that their prophecies often become realities. It is to be hoped an all-kind Providence will preserve me from a new love, from new flames. No, the fires of love have been extinguished in my heart; in the warm ashes of friendship that still remain, a spark may sometimes glimmer sufficiently to enable me to read the name of my beloved friend, Charlotte von Stein, engraven therein."

"Warm ashes of friendship, indeed!" observed Moritz, in mocking tones. "A sorry tenant for the heart of the poet of Werther."

"Really," cried Goethe, "I believe this fellow would be capable of imploring the gods to visit a 'Werthercade' upon me."

"I not only would be capable of doing so, but I really will do so," rejoined Moritz. "I entreat the gods to bless and curse you with a heaven-storming, bliss-conferring and annihilating love, for that is all that is wanting to drive the last vestiges of humanity out of you, and make of you a demi-god with a halo of love-flames around your semi-divine head. Yes, Wolfgang Goethe, poet by the grace of God, to whom the immortal have vouchsafed the honor of creating an 'Iphigenia' and an 'Egmont'--yes, I hope that a glowing, flaming, and distracting love, may be visited upon you!"

"That you should not do," said Goethe, gently, "let me make a confession, Moritz: I believe that I am not capable of such a love--am not capable of losing my own individuality in that of another. I am not capable of subjecting all other thoughts, wishes, and cravings, to the one thought, wish, and craving of love. Perhaps this was at one time my condition, perhaps my Werther spoke of my own life, and perhaps this tragedy was written with the blood of my heart, then bleeding for Charlotte Kästner. But you perceive that I did not shoot myself like Werther. I have steeled my heart since then to enable it to rely on its own strength, and to prevent its ever being carried away by the storm of passion. I am proof against this, and will ever be so!"

"To be in Rome!" exclaimed Moritz, "in Rome, with a heart void of all save the ashes of friendship for Charlotte von Stein, and to remain cold and indifferent to the most beautiful women in the world!"

"That is not true, that is calumny!" said Goethe, smiling. "My heart is not cold, but glows with admiration and love for the noblest and loveliest woman, for the goddess of beauty, chastity, and virtue. She was my first love in Rome, and will be my only love. I yearned for her until she at last yielded to my entreaties, and took up her abode in my poor house. Yes, I possess her, she is mine! No words can give an idea of her, she is like one of Homer's songs!"[36]

"I would like to know," cried Moritz, in astonishment, "yes, really, I would like to know of whom you are speaking!"

"I am speaking of her," said Goethe, pointing to a colossal bust of the Juno Ludovisi, that stood on a high pedestal in a corner of the room. He approached the pedestal, looked up into the proud and noble countenance of the chaste goddess, and greeted her with a radiant smile.

"I greet you, mysterious goddess, on whose brow love and chastity are enthroned! When I behold you I seem to hear words of revelation, and I then know that you reflect all that the fancy of the poets, the researches of the learned, and the piety of priests, ever thought or depicted that is sublime and beautiful. You are the blessing-dispensing Isis of the Egyptians, the Venus Aphrodite, and Mother Mary, all in one, and I stand before you in pious awe, adoring, loving and--"

"Holy Mary! Holy Januarius!" screamed a voice from the doorway, and a woman, in the picturesque dress of an Italian peasant, rushed into the room. "Signori, signori, a wonder, a miracle!"

"What do you mean, Signora Abazza?" asked Goethe, laughing, as Moritz, alarmed by the old woman's screeching, withdrew hastily to the window recess.

"What do I mean?" repeated the old woman, as she sank breathlessly into a chair. "A miracle has occurred, Signori! My cat is praying to God the Father!"

"How so, signora?" asked Goethe, while Moritz had abandoned his retreat and was slowly approaching the old woman, curiosity depicted in his countenance.

"I mean just what I say, signori! I went to your bedchamber to make up the bed, and the cat accompanied me as usual. Suddenly I heard a whining and mewing, and when I looked around, supposing she had hurt herself in some way, I saw her--but come and look yourselves. It is a miracle, signori! A miracle!" She sprang up, rushed to the door of the bedchamber, opened it, looked in, and beckoned to the two friends to approach. "Softly, softly, signori; do not disturb her!"

Goethe and Moritz walked noiselessly to the door, and looked into the adjoining room. There, on the antiquated wardrobe, opposite Goethe's bed, and illumined by the sunlight that poured in through the broad window, stood the colossal bust of the almighty Jupiter. In front of this bust, full of beauty and regal composure, stood Madame Abazza's gray cat, upright on her hind feet. She had laid her forepaws on the god's broad breast, and stretched her neck so that she could gaze into his majestic countenance, and touch with her tongue the lips with their godlike smile, and the beard with its curling locks. She kissed his divine lips ardently, and zealously licked his curly beard, stopping now and then to gaze for a moment at his royal countenance, and to utter a tender, plaintive mew, and then renewing her attention to beard and lips.

Goethe and Moritz looked on with smiling astonishment, the old woman with pious dismay.

"Come to me, pussy," cried the signora at last; "come to me, my little pet, I will give you some milk and sugar; come!"

But call and entreat as she would, the cat would not allow herself to be disturbed in her devotions, not even when Goethe walked heavily through the room and stepped up to the wardrobe. She continued to kiss the god's lips and beard, and to utter her plaintive mews. Signora Abazza, who was standing in the door-way, with folded hands, now protested that the cat sang exactly like Father Ambrose when he officiated at the morning mass, and that her heart, the signora's, was filled with pious devotion.

"I must, however, bring this cat-mass to an end," cried Goethe, laughing, "for if the cat continues her devotions much longer, another miracle will take place: the divine locks will dissolve, and the lips, so expressive of wisdom and majesty, will be nothing more than shapeless plaster. Halloo! father cat, away with you! You shall not transform the god into a lump of plaster!" With threatening tones and gestures he frightened the cat down from the wardrobe, and drove her out of the room. Goethe and his friend then returned to the parlor.

"Wonders are the order of the day," said Moritz, thoughtfully, "and we are surrounded by a mysterious atmosphere of dreams and tokens."

"Only when we are dreamers," cried Goethe, laughing. "To the unbiassed there is nothing miraculous, to them all things seem natural."

"How can you explain the cat's rapturous devotion?"

"In a very prosaic, pitiful manner," replied Goethe, smiling. "You know, exalted dreamer, that this bust was moulded but a few days ago, and you also know that grease was used to prevent the plaster from adhering to the form. Some of this grease remained in the cavities of the beard and lips; the cat's fine sense of smell detected its presence, and she was endeavoring to lick it off."[37]

Philip Moritz raised his arms, and looked upward with comic pathos: "Hear this mocker, this cold-hearted materialist, ye eternal, ye sublime gods! punish the blasphemer who mocks at his own poetic genius; punish him by filling his cold heart with a lost passionate love! Cast down this proud poet in the dust, in order that he be made aware that he is still a mortal in spite of his poetic renown, and that he dare not attempt to hold himself aloof from human love and human suffering!--Venus Aphrodite, pour out the lava streams of your passion on this presumptuous poet, and--"

"Hold, hold!" cried Goethe, laughing, as he seized his friend's arms, and forcibly drew them down. "You remind me of Thetis invoking the wrath of the great Zeus upon the head of the son he believed to be guilty, and to whom the god granted his cruel prayer."

"Signori, signori!" cried Signora Abazza from the outside.

"Come in, come in, signora! What is the matter this time?"

"Signore Zucchi has arrived from Rome with his divine signora," said the old woman, appearing in the doorway, "they inquired at the post-office for your letters and papers, as they promised to do, and here is the mail Signora Angelica has brought you."

Goethe hastily opened and examined the sealed package which she had handed him. "Newspapers! newspapers!" exclaimed he, throwing the folded papers on the table. "I am surrounded by living Nature, what care I for lifeless newspapers."

"You will not read them?" said Moritz. "You have no desire to learn what is taking place in the German empire, to learn whether the emperor has undertaken another campaign against presumptuous Prussia or not?"

"No, I wish to know nothing of war," said Goethe, softly. "I am a child of peace. I wish eternal peace to the whole world, now that I am at peace with myself."[38]

"Then permit me, at least, to interest myself in these matters," said Moritz, taking one of the papers from the table and opening it. With a cry of joy Goethe picked up the three letters that fell to the floor.

"Two letters for me! A letter from my Charlotte, and one from my dear friend, Herder! And here is a letter for you, friend Moritz."

"A letter for me!" said Moritz, clutching and hastily opening the letter Goethe held in his extended hand. "Who can have written to me?"

"Read, my friend, and you will see. I will first read Herder's letter, it probably contains his opinion of my 'Egmont,' which I sent him some time ago."

He seated himself at the little table, opposite Moritz. Both were soon busily reading, and Goethe was so completely absorbed in his letter that he did not notice how pale Moritz had become, and how the letter trembled in his hands; nor did he hear the deep sighs that escaped his lips.

"I knew these fault-finders would not understand my Clärchen; they demand another scene, explaining her relation to Egmont. Another scene! Where am I to introduce it? Where?"

"Goethe," said Moritz, rising and handing the letter, which he had read again and again, to his friend, "Goethe, read this, and then laugh at my dreams and presentiments, if you can."

"What is it?" asked Goethe, looking up. "But what is the matter with you, my friend? How pale you are, and how you tremble! Tears in your eyes, too! Have you received bad news?"

"I have," groaned Moritz. "Marie is ill. Read!"

Goethe took the letter and hastily glanced over it. It was from Professor Gedicke in Berlin; he announced that Marie Leuthen had been ill for some time; that she had, at first, concealed her illness, but now admitted it, and expressed an ardent desire to see Moritz. The physician had given it as his opinion that a reunion with her lover after so long a separation would have a beneficial effect on his patient, and infuse new life into her being; it was therefore considered desirable that Moritz should speedily return to Germany and Berlin, to restore health and happiness to his beloved. "Strange, truly strange!" said Goethe. "Your dream is being fulfilled, your presentiment has become reality."

"Fearful reality!" groaned Moritz. "Marie will die, I shall not see her again!"

"No, oh no," said Goethe, endeavoring to console him. "You take too gloomy a view of things; your fancy conjures up horrible visions. You will see her again. The magical influence of your presence, the heavenly fire of your love, will save her. Women are generally such sensitively constituted beings that all ordinary laws are set at defiance when they love. They die of love, and they live on love. Marie is ill because she longs to be with you; she will recover when she once more beholds you, and reads love and fidelity in your countenance."

"Marie will die!" groaned Moritz. "God grant that I may, at least, arrive in time to kiss the last death-sigh from her lips!"

"You are then about to take your departure? You will leave Italy and return to Germany?"

Moritz shrugged his shoulders. "Truly, Goethe, in this question I see that your heart is cold and loveless. I leave here within an hour!"

Goethe extended both hands, and his eyes shone with deep sympathy, as he gazed lovingly into his friend's pale countenance. "Moritz, I am not cold and not loveless. I understand you. I appreciate your grief. I know that you must leave me, and must answer this call. Do not misunderstand me, my friend, and when I subdue the holy flames, that glow in your soul and my own, with the prose of every-day life, remember that I have eaten much bitter fruit from the tree of knowledge, and that I anxiously avoid being poisoned in that manner again. But a blasphemer I am not, and be it far from me to desire to shake your resolution. Love is the holy god who often determines our thoughts and actions, and love it is that calls you! Go, my friend, answer this call, and may love console and give you heavenly delight. Go! I will assist you in getting ready! We will go to work at once! The stage leaves here for Rome in a few hours, and you will arrive there in time to take the mail-coach for Milan this evening."

Goethe assisted his friend in preparing for his departure with such tender solicitude that Moritz's eyes filled with tears at the thought of separation from his dear companion.

Angelica Kaufmann, the celebrated painter, who had now been married to the artist, Tucchi, for some months, sent twice to her friend Goethe inviting him to take a walk, but in vain. It was in vain that a merry party of artists, who were sojourning in Castel Gandolfo, sang beneath Goethe's window, and entreated him to join them in an excursion to the mountains, where they proposed to draw, paint, and amuse themselves till evening.

Goethe let them go without him and remained with his friend, endeavoring to console and encourage him. When the trunk was entirely packed, Goethe quietly slipped a well-filled purse into the tray, hastily locked the trunk, and handed the key to Moritz. "All is now ready, my friend. Listen how our friend, the stage-driver, is cracking his whip and giving vent to his impatience, at the delay we have caused, in his charming Italian oaths. We will promise him a gratuity, as an incentive to make him drive rapidly, to ensure your arriving in Rome in time for the mail-coach."

"May heaven grant that I arrive in Berlin in time to find Marie still living! this is all I crave! You see life has made me humble and modest; my life has been rich in misfortunes and poor in joys. I found two beautiful blossoms on my journey: Marie's love and Goethe's friendship. But I will lose them both; death will tread the one of these blossoms under foot, and life the other."

Goethe laid his hand gently on Moritz's shoulder, and gazed into his countenance in deep emotion. "What fate has determined concerning the blossom of your love, that we must await with composure and resignation, for death is an almighty king, before whom the haughtiest head must bow in reverence. But the blossom of friendship which we have so tenderly nurtured, and which has so often cheered and refreshed our hearts--that blossom we will preserve and protect from all the storms of life. You may be right in asserting that the flames of love are extinguished in my heart, but the light of friendship is still burning brightly there, and will only expire with my death. Be ever mindful of this, and, although you suppose me to be a cold lover, you shall never have cause to consider me a cold friend. Let this be our farewell; ever bear this in mind."

"This thought will console and encourage," said Moritz, his eyes filling with tears. "All that I have enjoyed in these last few years that was good and beautiful, I owe to you, and have enjoyed with you alone! Farewell, my Pylades! I feel that, like Orestes, I am being pursued by Furies, and driven out into the world, to death and to despair! Farewell, Goethe!"

They clasped each other in a long embrace, and then Goethe led his friend down to the stage in silence. He gave the angry driver a gratuity, and pressed his friend's hand warmly in a last farewell.