CHAPTER XI.

YOUTH VICTORIOUS.

Charlotte von Stein sat in her garden pavilion, anxiously awaiting him for whom it had never been necessary to wait in former days. She had already given him three invitations to pay her a morning visit in the little pavilion in which his protestations of love had so often resounded. But these tender invitations had not been accepted. He had always found some pretext for avoiding this _tête-à-tête_ in Charlotte's pavilion; he was too busy, had commenced some work which he desired to finish without interruption, or was troubled with toothache.

But Charlotte would not understand that he made these excuses in order to give the dark cloud that hung over them both time to pass away. With the obstinate boldness so often characteristic of intelligent women who have been much courted, and which prompts them rather to cut the Gordian knot with the sword than to unravel it slowly with their skilful fingers, Charlotte von Stein had for the fourth time entreated him to grant the desired interview, and Goethe at last consented.

Charlotte was now awaiting him; she gazed intently at the doorway, and her heart beat wildly. But she determined to be composed, to meet him in a mild and gentle manner. She knew that Goethe detested any exhibition of anger or violence in women. She was also well aware that he was very restive under reproach. Charlotte knew this, and was determined to give him no cause for displeasure. She desired to see this monarch bound in her silken toils once more; she desired to see the vanquished hero walk before her triumphal car as in the past. "I cannot break with him," said she, "for I feel that I still love him; moreover, it would be very disagreeable to be spoken of by posterity as the discarded sweetheart of the celebrated poet! No, no! I will be reconciled to him, and all shall be as it was before! All! And now be quiet, my heart, be quiet!"

She took a book from the table before which she was sitting, regardless of what it might be; her object was to collect her thoughts, and compel her mind to be quiet. She opened the book, and looked at it with an air of indifference. It was a volume of Voltaire's works, which Goethe had sent the day before, when she had written him a note requesting him to let her have something to read. She remembered this now, and also remembered that she had as yet read nothing in the volume. Perhaps she would still have time to make good this omission; Goethe might ask her about the book. She read listlessly, in various parts of the work; suddenly this passage attracted her attention:

"Qui n'a pas l'esprit de son âge De son âge n'a que la malheur!"[54]

Strange words these! She felt as if a chilly hand had been laid on her warm, quivering heart. Was the spirit of her age wanting in her? was nothing but its unhappiness portrayed in her faded countenance? With an angry movement she threw the book aside, arose from her seat, and went to her mirror.

"Am I really old? Is the unhappiness of old age really depicted in my countenance, while the spirit of youth and love is at the same time burning in my heart?"

She anxiously scanned her features in search of the handwriting of this inexorable enemy of women, who stalks pitilessly behind their youth and beauty, is their invisible companion on all the rosy paths of life, and who, when he at last becomes visible, drives away all those who had loved, adored, and done homage to their beauty. Charlotte sighed; she recognized this handwriting; the enemy was becoming but too plainly visible! She sighed again.

"Yes, it is written there that I am forty-six years old, and every one can read it! He, too--alas! he, too!" But after a short pause her countenance grew brighter. "Charlotte, you should be ashamed of yourself--you insult your friend and lover! He loves you for your beauty of heart and mind, and not for your outward beauty. It was your mind that attracted him, your heart that enchained him, and they have not undergone any change, have not grown older. He loves you for the eternal youth that glows in your heart and mind, and he cares not for the mask with which age has covered your countenance! Yes, thus it is, and thus it always will be, for Goethe is not like other men; he cares not for outward appearances, he looks at the inmost being. This it is that he loves, and ever will love in me, for this is and ever will be unchanged! Be joyous, Charlotte, be happy! Do not dread the unhappiness of old age. Voltaire was wrong, and I will take the liberty of correcting Voltaire. His sentence should read:

"Qui n'a pas l'esprit de la jeunesse N'aura que le malheur de la vieillesse."

"Yes, thus it should read: 'Who does not bear the spirit of youth within himself, to him old age brings nothing but unhappiness!'"

As her dear friend soon afterward entered the pavilion, Charlotte advanced to meet him with the reflection of enduring youth resting on her brow, and a glad smile on her lips.

But he did not observe it, his countenance was grave and earnest. He came with the conviction that the thunder storm that had been long gathering overhead would now burst upon them in all its fury. He had come armed for the fray with this outward sternness of manner, while his soul was filled with grief and tenderness.

"Goethe," she murmured, extending both hands to greet him, "Goethe, I thank you for having come."

"Charlotte," said he, gently, "how can you thank me for doing what is as gratifying to me as to yourself?"

"And yet I was compelled to entreat you to do so for the fourth time. Three times you excused yourself with pretexts," she cried, forgetful of her good resolutions, and carried away by her sensitiveness.

"Pretexts?" repeated Goethe.--"Well, if you will have it so, I must admit that they were pretexts, and this should convince you, Charlotte, of my anxiety to avoid offending you; for to any one else I would plainly and openly have said: 'I will not come.' It will be better for us both if we avoid any further explanation. It would perhaps have been wiser, my dear Charlotte, if you had endeavored to master this irritation in silence, instead of bringing about the explanations which it would have been better for us both to have avoided."

"I have nothing to avoid; I can give every explanation. I can lay bare my heart and soul to you, Wolf, and give an account of my every thought and deed. No, I have no cause to avoid explanations. I love you and have always been true to you, but you, you--"

"My love," he said, interrupting her, "do not reproach me again; my soul's pinions are already drooping under the weight of reproaches that retard the flight of my imagination!"

"Now you are reproaching me!" cried Charlotte. "I am to blame that the pinions of your soul are drooping! O Wolf, how can you be so cruel! To reproach me!"

"No, Charlotte, I do not reproach you, and how could I? If you have to bear with me in many things, it is but right that I, too, should suffer. It is much better to make a friendly compromise, than to strive to conform to each other's requirements in all things, and, in the event of our endeavor being unsuccessful, to become completely estranged. I would, however, still remain your debtor in any agreement we might make. When we reflect how much we have to bear from all men, my love, it will teach us to be considerate with each other."[55]

"Then we are no longer to endeavor to live together in happiness, but only in an observance of consideration toward each other?" cried Charlotte.

"I had hoped that consideration for each other's weaknesses would lead us back to happiness. I, for my part, will gladly be indulgent."

"I was not aware that I stood in need of your indulgence," said Charlotte, proudly.

"I will, however, be indulgent, nevertheless. And I will gladly say--that is, if you care to hear it--that your discontent and many reproaches have left no feeling of anger in my heart, although they inflicted great pain."

"This is surely to be attributed to the fact that candor compels you to admit that my reproaches are just, and my discontent, as you call my sadness, but natural under the circumstances. Tell me, Wolf, what reproaches have I ever made that were not fully warranted by your changed manner and coldness?"

"There it is!" cried Goethe, beginning to lay aside his kindly manner, and to resent Charlotte's haughtiness; "therein lies the reproach, and, I must say, the unmerited reproach. This is the refrain that I have been compelled to listen to ever since my return. I am changed, I love you no longer. And yet my return and my remaining here, are the best and most conclusive proofs of my love for you! For your sake, I returned--for your sake I tore myself from Italy, and all the beauties that surrounded me, and--"

"And also from the beauty who had entwined herself around your faithless heart," added Charlotte.

He did not notice this interruption, but continued in more animated tones: "And for your sake have I remained here, although I have felt that this life was scarcely endurable ever since my return. I saw Herder and the duchess take their departure; she urged me to take the vacant seat in her carriage, and journey to Italy in her company, but I remained, and remained on your account. And yet I am told, over and over again, that I might as well have remained away--that I no longer take an interest in my fellow-man, and that it is no pleasure to be in my company."[56]

"That I have never said."

"You have said that and much more! You have called me indifferent, cruel, cold-hearted! Ask all my other friends if I am indifferent to them, less communicative, or take less interest in all that concerns them, than formerly. Ask them if I do not belong more completely to them and to society than formerly."

"Yes, indeed, so it is! You belong more to them and society, because you belong less to me; you have abandoned our intimate, secret, and peculiar relation, in order to devote yourself to the world in general. This relation is no longer pleasant, because all confidence is at an end between us."

"Charlotte," cried he, in angry tones, "whenever I have been so fortunate as to find you reasonable and disposed to converse on interesting topics, I have felt that this confidence still existed. But this I must admit," he continued, with increased violence, and now, that the floodgates were once opened, no longer able to repress his indignation; "this I must admit, the manner in which you have treated me of late is no longer endurable. When I felt disposed to converse, you closed my lips; when I was communicative, you accused me of indifference; and when I manifested interest in my friends, you accused me of coldness and negligence. You have criticised my every word, have found fault with my manner, and have invariably made me feel thoroughly ill at ease. How can confidence and sincerity prosper when you drive me from your side with studied caprice?"[57]

"With studied caprice?" repeated Charlotte, bursting into tears. "As if my sadness, which he calls studied caprice, were not the natural result of the unhappiness which he has caused me."

"I should like to know what unhappiness I have caused you. Tell me, Charlotte; make your accusations; perhaps I can succeed in convincing you that you are wrong."

"It shall be as you say," cried Charlotte, passionately. "I accuse you of being faithless, of having forgotten the love which you vowed should live and die with you--of having forgotten it in a twofold love, in a noble and in an unworthy one."

"Charlotte, consider well what you say; weigh your words lest they offend my soul."

"Did you weigh your words? You have offended my soul mortally, fearfully. Or, perhaps, you suppose your telling me to my face that you had loved another woman in Italy, and had left there in order to flee from this love, could not have inflicted such fearful pain."

"Had left there in order to preserve myself for _you_, Charlotte; to remain true to _you_."

"A great preservation, indeed, when love is already lost. And even if I admit that the beauty of the charming Italian girl made you for the moment forgetful of your plighted faith, what shall I say to what is now going on here in Weimar? What shall I think of the great poet, the noble man, the whole-souled, loving friend, when he finds his pleasure in secret, disreputable intercourse with a person who has neither standing nor education, who belongs to a miserable family, and who, in my estimation, is not even worthy to be my chambermaid? Oh, to think, to know, that the poet Goethe, the privy-councillor Goethe, the scholar Goethe--that he steals secretly to that wretched house in the evening to visit the daughter of a drunkard! To think that _my_ Goethe, my heart's favorite, my pride, and my love, has turned from me to a person who is so low that he himself is ashamed of her, and only visits her clandestinely, anxiously endeavoring to avoid recognition!"

"If I did that, it was for your sake," cried he, pale with inward agitation, his lips quivering, and his eyes sparkling. "If I visited her clandestinely, I did so because I knew that your noble perception was dimmed, and that you were no longer capable of looking down upon these petty, earthly relations from a more exalted stand-point. If you were wise and high-hearted, Charlotte, you would ignore a relation that lies entirely out of the sphere in which we both live. Of what nature is this relation? Upon whose rights does it trespass? Who lays claim to the feelings I bestow upon this poor creature? Who claims the hours that I pass in her company?"[58]

With a loud cry of anguish, Charlotte raised her arms toward heaven, "O God, he admits it! He admits this fearful relation!"

"Yes," said he, proudly, "he does, but he also entreats you to aid him in preventing the relation you so greatly abhor, from degenerating--to aid him in keeping it as it is. Confide in me again, look at this matter from a natural point of view, permit me to reason with you on the subject, and I may still hope to bring about a good understanding between us."[59]

"Not I!" she cried, with a proud toss of her head. "No good understanding can exist between us while this person stands in the way--this person who makes me blush with shame and humiliation, when I reflect that the hand which grasps my own has, perhaps, touched hers; that these lips--oh, Wolf, I shudder with anger and disgust, when I reflect that you might kiss me after having kissed her a short time before!"

"There will be no further occasion for such disagreeable reflections," said he, gruffly, his countenance deathly pale. "Out of love I have endured much from you, but you have now gone too far! I repeat it, you will never again have to overcome the disgust of being kissed by me, and while I, as you observed, have perhaps kissed another but a short time before! And as for this other woman, I must now confess that you were quite right in reproaching me for visiting her clandestinely, and making a mystery of our relation. You are right, this is wrong and cowardly; a man must always avow his actions, boldly and openly; and this I will do! Farewell, Charlotte, you have shown me the right path, and I will follow it! We now separate, perhaps to meet no more in life; let me tell you before I go that I owe to you the happiest years of my life! I have known no greater happiness than my confidence in you--the confidence that has hitherto been unbounded. Now, that this confidence no longer exists, I have become another being, and must in the future suffer still further changes!"[60]

He ceased speaking, and struggled to repress the tears that were rushing from his heart to his eyes. Charlotte stared at him in dismay and breathless anxiety. Her heart stood still, her lips were parted, but she repressed the cry of anguish that trembled on her lips, as he had repressed his tears. A warm, tender, forgiving word might perhaps have called him back, and all misunderstanding might have vanished in tears, remorse, and forgiveness; but Charlotte was too proud, she had been too deeply wounded in her love and vanity to consent to such a humiliation. She had exercised such great power over Goethe for the past ten years, that she perhaps even now believed that he would return, humble himself before her, and endeavor to atone for the past. But the thought did not occur to her that a man can forgive the woman who mistrusts his love, but that he never will forgive her who wounds his pride and his honor.

Charlotte did not speak; she stood motionless, as in a trance, and saw him take up his hat, incline his head, and murmur: "Farewell! dearest, beloved Charlotte, farewell!"

Then all was still, and she saw him no longer! She glanced wildly and searchingly around the room, and when the dread consciousness that he had gone, and that she was surrounded by a terrible solitude, dawned upon her, Charlotte sank down on her knees, stretched out her arms toward the door through which his dear form had vanished, and murmured, with pale, quivering lips: "Farewell! lost dream of my youth, farewell! Lost delight, lost happiness, lost hope, farewell! Night and solitude surround me! Youth and love have departed, and old age and desolation are at hand! Henceforth, no one will love me! I shall be alone! Fearfully alone! Farewell!"

While Charlotte was wailing and struggling with her grief, Goethe was pacing restlessly to and fro in the shady little retreat in the park to which he had so often confided his inmost thoughts in the eventful years that rolled by. When he left the park, after hours of struggling with his own heart, an expression rested on his noble and handsome countenance that had never been observed there before. An expression of mingled gloom and determination was depicted in his features. His eyes were luminous, not with their usual glow of enthusiasm, but with subdued and sudden flames. "Descended into hell, and arisen again from the dead!" murmured he, with a derisive smile, as he walked on through the streets to the wretched little house in which Christiane Vulpius drunken father and his family lived.

She came forward to greet him with an exclamation of joyous surprise, for it was the first time Goethe had visited, in the light of day, the little house in which she lived. She threw herself into his extended arms, entwined hers around his neck and kissed him.

Goethe pressed her lovely head to his bosom, and then raised it gently between his hands. He gazed long and tenderly into her large blue eyes. "Christiane," murmured he, "Christiane, will you be my wife?"

A dark glow suffused itself over her face and neck, and then a clear ringing peal of laughter, like the joyous outburst of a feathered songster, escaped her coral lips, displaying two rows of pearly teeth. "I, your wife, my good friend? Why do you jest with poor little Christiane?"

"I am not jesting, Christiane. I ask you in all earnestness, Will you be my wife?"

"In all earnestness?" repeated she, the gaze of her large, soft eyes fastened with an expression of astonishment on Goethe, who stood regarding her intently, his countenance radiant with a tender smile.

"Give me an answer, Christiane."

"First, give _me_ an answer, my good friend. Answer this question. Do you love me? Am I still your pet, your singing-bird, your little love, your fragrant violet?"

"You still are, and will ever remain my pet, my singing-bird, my little love, and my violet."

"Then let me remain what I am, my dear sir. I am but a poor little girl, and not worthy to be the wife of a gentleman of high rank; I would cut but a poor figure at your side, as the wife of the mighty privy-councillor, and you might even suppose I had only accepted your love because I had seen the altar and this magnificence in the background."

"I could not think so, my darling; I know that you love me."

"Then I wish you to understand, good sir, that I must remain as I am, for you are pleased with me as I am. Let me still remain your violet, and blossom in obscurity, observed by no one but you, my good friend and master. I will serve you, I will be your maid-servant, and will work and sew and cook for you. For this I am suited; but I cannot become a noble lady worthy to bear your celebrated name. If I were your wife, you would often have cause to blush for me; if I remain your love, I can perhaps amuse you by my little drolleries, and you would have no cause to be ashamed of the ignorant girl who craved nothing except to be near you, and to have you smile on her sometimes."[61]

"Christiane, you shall ever be near me; I will always smile on you!" protested Goethe, deeply moved.

"Always near you!" repeated Christiane, in joyous, exulting tones. "Oh, do let me be with you, good sir! Let me be your servant--your housekeeper. I will serve and obey you, I will honor you as my master, and I will love you as my dearest friend!"

"And I," said Goethe, laying his hand on her golden hair, "I swear, by the Eternal Spirit of Love and of Nature, that I will love you, and that your happiness shall be the chief end of my life. I swear that I will honor you as my wife, protect and cherish you as my child, and be to you a husband and father until death."

He stooped and kissed her shining hair and fair brow, and gazed tenderly into her lustrous eyes. "And now, my pet, get ready and come with me!"

"To go where? You cannot intend to walk with me through the public streets in the broad light of day?"

"Through the public streets, and in the broad light of day, at your side!"

"But that will not do," said she, in dismay. "It would not be proper for a noble, celebrated gentleman to be seen in public with a poor, humble creature like myself. What would the world say?"

"Let the world say what it will! Come, my violet, I will transplant you to my garden, and there you shall blossom in the future."

She no longer resisted, but threw her shawl over her shoulders, covered her golden tresses with the hat adorned with roses of her own manufacture, stepped with Goethe from beneath the roof of her father's wretched house, and walked at his side through the streets to the stately mansion on Market Square, henceforth destined to be her home.

Goethe conducted her up the broad stairway, through the antechamber, and into his reception-room. Both were silent, but the countenances of both were radiant with happiness.

With a gentle hand he relieved her of her shawl and hat, pressed her to his bosom, and then, with upturned eyes, he cried, in loud and impressive tones: "Oftmals hab' ich geirrt, und habe mich wieder gefunden, aber glücklicher nie; nun ist dies Mädchen mein Glück! Ist auch dieses ein Irrthum, so schont mich, ihr klügeren Götter, und benehmt mir ihn erst drüben am kalten Gestade."[62]