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WILHELM MEISTER’S
APPRENTICESHIP AND TRAVELS.
TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN OF GOETHE.
By THOMAS CARLYLE.
COMPLETE IN TWO VOLUMES.
VOLUME II.
NEW YORK:
A. L. BURT, PUBLISHER.
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MEISTER’S APPRENTICESHIP.
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BOOK VIII.
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CHAPTER I.
Felix skipped into the garden; Wilhelm followed him with rapture: a lovely morning was displaying every thing with fresh charms; our friend enjoyed the most delightful moment. Felix was new in the free and lordly world, nor did his father know much more than he about the objects concerning which the little creature was repeatedly and unweariedly inquiring. At last they joined the gardener, who had to tell them the names and uses of a multitude of plants. Wilhelm looked on nature as with unscaled eyes: the child’s new-fangled curiosity first made him sensible how weak an interest he himself had taken in external things, how small his actual knowledge was. Not till this day, the happiest of his life, did his own cultivation seem to have commenced: he felt the necessity of learning, being called upon to teach.
Jarno and the abbé did not show themselves again till evening, when they brought a guest along with them. Wilhelm viewed the stranger with amazement; he could scarce believe his eyes: it was Werner, who likewise, for a moment, hesitated in his recognition. They embraced each other tenderly: neither of them could conceal that he thought the other greatly altered. Werner declared that his friend was taller, stronger, straighter; that he had become more polished in his looks and carriage. “Something of his old true-heartedness I miss, however,” added he. “That, too, will soon appear again,” said Wilhelm, “when we have recovered from our first astonishment.”
The impression Werner made upon his friend was by no means so favorable. The honest man seemed rather to have retrograded than advanced. He was much leaner than of old; his peaked face appeared to have grown sharper, his nose longer; brow and crown had lost their hair; the voice, clear, eager, shrill, the hollow breast and stooping shoulders, the sallow cheeks, announced indubitably that a melancholic drudge was there.
Wilhelm was discreet enough to speak but sparingly of these great changes; while the other, on the contrary, gave free course to his friendly joy. “In truth,” cried he, “if thou hast spent thy time badly, and, as I suppose, gained nothing, it must be owned thou art grown a piece of manhood such as cannot fail to turn to somewhat. Do not waste and squander me this, too, again: with such a figure thou shalt buy some rich and beautiful heiress.”--“I see,” said Wilhelm, smiling, “thou wilt not belie thy character. Scarcely hast thou found thy brother after long absence, when thou lookest on him as a piece of goods, a thing to speculate on and make profit by.”
Jarno and the abbé did not seem at all astonished at this recognition: they allowed the two to expatiate on the past and present as they pleased. Werner walked round and round his friend, turned him to this side and to that, so as almost to embarrass him. “No!” cried he, “such a thing as this I never met with, and yet I know that I am not mistaken. Thy eyes are deeper, thy brow is broader; thy nose has grown finer, thy mouth more lovely. Do but look at him, how he stands; how it all suits and fits together! Well, idling is the way to grow. But for me, poor devil,” said he, looking at himself in the glass, “if I had not all this while been making store of money, it were over with me altogether.”
Werner had got Wilhelm’s last letter: the distant trading-house, in common with which Lothario meant to purchase the estates, was theirs. On that business Werner had come hither, not dreaming that he should meet with Wilhelm on the way. The baron’s lawyer came: the papers were produced; Werner reckoned the conditions reasonable. “If you mean well,” said he, “as you seem to do, with this young man, you will of yourselves take care that our part be not abridged: it shall be at my friend’s option whether he will take the land and lay out a portion of his fortune on it.” Jarno and the abbé protested that they did not need this admonition. Scarcely had the business been discussed in general terms, when Werner signified a longing for a game at ombre; to which, in consequence, Jarno and the abbé set themselves along with him. He was now grown so accustomed to it, that he could not pass the evening without cards.
The two friends, after supper, being left alone, began to talk and question one another very keenly, touching every thing they wished to have communicated. Wilhelm spoke in high terms of his situation, of his happiness in being received among such men. Werner shook his head, and said, “Well, I see, we should believe nothing that we do not see with our eyes. More than one obliging friend assured me thou wert living with a wild young nobleman, wert supplying him with actresses, helping him to waste his money; that, by thy means, he had quarrelled with every one of his relations.”--“For my own sake, and the sake of these worthy gentlemen, I should be vexed at this,” said Wilhelm, “had not my theatrical experience made me tolerant to every sort of calumny. How can men judge rightly of our actions, which appear but singly or in fragments to them; of which they see the smallest portion; while good and bad take place in secret, and for most part nothing comes to light but an indifferent show? Are not the actors and actresses in a play set up on boards before them; lamps are lit on every side; the whole transaction is comprised within three hours; yet scarcely one of them knows rightly what to make of it?”
Our friend proceeded to inquire about his family, his young comrades, his native town. Werner told, with great haste, of changes that had taken place, of changes that were still in progress. “The women in our house,” said he, “are satisfied and happy: we are never short of money. One-half of their time they spend in dressing, the other in showing themselves when dressed. They are as domestic as a reasonable man could wish. My boys are growing up to prudent youths. I already, as in vision, see them sitting, writing, reckoning, running, trading, trucking: each of them, as soon as possible, shall have a business of his own. As to what concerns our fortune, thou wilt be contented with the state of it. When we have got these lands in order, thou must come directly home with me; for it now appears as if thou, too, couldst mingle with some skill in worldly undertakings, thanks to thy new friends, who have set thee on the proper path. I am certainly a fool: I never knew till now how well I liked thee;--now when I cannot gape and gaze at thee enough, so well and handsome thou lookest. That is, in truth, another form than the portrait which was sent thy sister, which occasioned such disputes at home. Both mother and daughter thought young master very handsome indeed, with his slack collar, half-open breast, large ruff, sleek, pendent hair, round hat, short waistcoat, and wide pantaloons; while I, on the other hand, maintained that the costume was scarce two finger-breadths from that of harlequin. But now thou lookest like a man; only the cue is wanting, in which I beg of thee to bind thy hair; else, some time or other, they will seize thee as a Jew, and demand toll and tribute of thee.”
Felix, in the mean time, had come into the room; and, as they did not mind him, he had laid himself upon the sofa, and was fallen asleep. “What urchin is this?” said Werner. Wilhelm at that moment had not the heart to tell the truth, nor did he wish to lay a still ambiguous narrative before a man who was by nature any thing but credulous.
The whole party now proceeded to the lands, to view them, and conclude the bargain. Wilhelm would not part with Felix from his side: for the boy’s sake, he rejoiced exceedingly in the intended purchase. The longing of the child for cherries and berries, the season for which was at hand, brought to his mind the days of his own youth, and the manifold duties of a father, to prepare, to procure, and to maintain for his family a constant series of enjoyments. With what interest he viewed the nurseries and the buildings! How zealously he contemplated repairing what had been neglected, restoring what had fallen! He no longer looked upon the world with the eyes of a bird of passage: an edifice he did not now consider as a grove that is hastily put together, and that withers ere one leaves it. Every thing that he proposed commencing was to be completed for his boy: every thing that he erected was to last for several generations. In this sense his apprenticeship was ended: with the feeling of a father, he had acquired all the virtues of a citizen. He felt this, and nothing could exceed his joy. “O needless strictness of morality!” exclaimed he, “while Nature in her own kindly manner trains us to all that we require to be. O strange demands of civil society! which first perplexes and misleads us, then asks of us more than Nature herself. Woe to every sort of culture which destroys the most effectual means of all true culture, and directs us to the end, instead of rendering us happy on the way!”
Much as he had already seen in his life, it seemed as if the observation of the child afforded him his first clear view of human nature. The theatre, the world, had appeared before him, only as a multitude of thrown dice, every one of which upon its upper surface indicates a greater or a smaller value, and which, when reckoned up together, make a sum. But here in the person of the boy, as we might say, a single die was laid before him, on the many sides of which the worth and worthlessness of man’s nature were legibly engraved.
The child’s desire to have distinctions made in his ideas grew stronger every day. Having learned that things had names, he wished to hear the name of every thing: supposing that there could be nothing which his father did not know, he often teased him with his questions, and caused him to inquire concerning objects which, but for this, he would have passed without notice. Our innate tendency to pry into the origin and end of things was likewise soon developed in the boy. When he asked whence came the wind, and whither went the flame, his father for the first time truly felt the limitation of his own powers, and wished to understand how far man may venture with his thoughts, and what things he may hope ever to give account of to himself or others. The anger of the child, when he saw injustice done to any living thing, was extremely grateful to the father, as the symptom of a generous heart. Felix once struck fiercely at the cook for cutting up some pigeons. The fine impression this produced on Wilhelm was, indeed, erelong disturbed, when he found the boy unmercifully tearing sparrows in pieces and beating frogs to death. This trait reminded him of many men, who appear so scrupulously just when without passion, and witnessing the proceedings of other men.
The pleasant feeling, that the boy was producing so fine and wholesome an influence on his being, was, in a short time, troubled for a moment, when our friend observed, that in truth the boy was educating him more than he the boy. The child’s conduct he was not qualified to correct: its mind he could not guide in any path but a spontaneous one. The evil habits which Aurelia had so violently striven against had all, as it seemed, on her death, assumed their ancient privileges. Felix still never shut the door behind him, he still would not eat from a plate; and no greater pleasure could befall him than when he happened to be overlooked, and could take his bit immediately from the dish, or let the full glass stand, and drink out of the bottle. He delighted also very much when he could set himself in a corner with a book, and say with a serious air, “I must study this scholar stuff!” though he neither knew his letters, nor would learn them.
Thus, when Wilhelm thought how little he had done for Felix, how little he was capable of doing, there arose at times a restlessness within him, which appeared to counterbalance all his happiness. “Are we men, then,” said he, “so selfishly formed, that we cannot possibly take proper charge of any one without us? Am I not acting with the boy exactly as I did with Mignon? I drew the dear child towards me: her presence gave me pleasure, yet I cruelly neglected her. What did I do for her education, which she longed for with such earnestness? Nothing! I left her to herself, and to all the accidents to which, in a society of coarse people, she could be exposed. And now for this boy, who seemed so interesting before he could be precious to thee, has thy heart ever bid thee do the smallest service to him? It is time that thou shouldst cease to waste thy own years and those of others: awake, and think what thou shouldst do for thyself, and for this good being, whom love and nature have so firmly bound to thee.”
This soliloquy was but an introduction to admit that he had already thought and cared, and tried and chosen: he could delay no longer to confess it. After sorrow, often and in vain repeated, for the loss of Mariana, he distinctly felt that he must seek a mother for the boy; and also that he could not find one equal to Theresa. With this gifted lady he was thoroughly acquainted. Such a spouse and helpmate seemed the only one to trust one’s self to in such circumstances. Her generous affection for Lothario did not make him hesitate. By a singular destiny, they two had been forever parted: Theresa looked upon herself as free; she had talked of marrying, with indifference, indeed, but as of a matter understood.
After long deliberation he determined on communicating to her every thing he knew about himself. She was to be made acquainted with him, as he already was with her. He accordingly began to take a survey of his history; but it seemed to him so empty of events, and in general so little to his credit, that he more than once was on the point of giving up his purpose. At last, however, he resolved on asking Jarno for the Roll of his Apprenticeship, which he had noticed lying in the tower: Jarno said it was the very time for that, and Wilhelm consequently got it.
It is a feeling of awe and fear which seizes on a man of noble mind when conscious that his character is just about to be exhibited before him. Every transition is a crisis, and a crisis presupposes sickness. With what reluctance do we look into the glass after rising from a sick-bed! The recovery we feel: the effects of the past disease are all we see. Wilhelm had, however, been sufficiently prepared: events had already spoken loudly to him, and his friends had not spared him. If he opened the roll of parchment with some hurry, he grew calmer and calmer the farther he read. He found his life delineated with large, sharp strokes; neither unconnected incidents, nor narrow sentiments, perplexed his view; the most bland and general reflections taught, without shaming him. For the first time his own figure was presented to him, not, indeed, as in a mirror, a second self, but as in a portrait, another self: we do not, it is true, recognize ourselves in every feature; but we are delighted that a thinking spirit has so understood us, that such gifts have been employed in representing us, that an image of what we were exists, and may endure when we ourselves are gone.
Wilhelm next employed himself in setting forth the history of his life, for the perusal of Theresa: all the circumstances of it were recalled to memory by what he had been reading; he almost felt ashamed that to her great virtues he had nothing to oppose which indicated a judicious activity. He had been minute in his written narrative: he was brief in the letter which he sent along with it. He solicited her friendship, her love if it were possible: he offered her his hand, and entreated for a quick decision.
After some internal contest, whether it were proper to impart this weighty business to his friends,--to Jarno and the abbé,--he determined not to do so. His resolution was so firm, the business was of such importance, that he could not have submitted it to the decision of the wisest and best of men. He was even cautious enough to carry his letter with his own hand to the nearest post. From his parchment-roll it appeared with certainty enough, that in very many actions of his life, in which he had conceived himself to be proceeding freely and in secret, he had been observed, nay, guided; and perhaps the thought of this had given him an unpleasant feeling: and he wished at least, in speaking to Theresa’s heart, to speak purely from the heart,--to owe his fate to her decision and determination only. Hence, in this solemn point; he scrupled not to give his overseers the slip.
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CHAPTER II.
Scarcely was the letter gone, when Lothario returned. Every one was gladdened at the prospect of so speedily concluding the important business which they had in hand. Wilhelm waited with anxiety to see how all these many threads were to be loosed, or tied anew, and how his own future state was to be settled. Lothario gave a kindly salutation to them all: he was quite recovered and serene; he had the air of one who knows what he should do, and who finds no hinderance in the way of doing it.
His cordial greeting Wilhelm could scarcely repay. “This,” he had to own within himself, “is the friend, the lover, bridegroom, of Theresa: in his stead thou art presuming to intrude. Dost thou think it possible for thee to banish, to obliterate, an impression such as this?” Had the letter not been sent away, perhaps he would not have ventured sending it at all. But happily the die was cast: it might be, Theresa had already taken up her resolution, and only distance shrouded with its veil a happy termination. The winning or the losing must soon be decided. By such considerations he endeavored to compose himself, and yet the movements of his heart were almost feverish. He could give but little attention to the weighty business, on which, in some degree, the fate of his whole property depended. In passionate moments how trivial do we reckon all that is about us, all that belongs to us!
Happily for him, Lothario treated the affair with magnanimity, and Werner with an air of ease. The latter, in his violent desire of gain, experienced a lively pleasure in contemplating the fine estate which was to be his friend’s. Lothario, for his part, seemed to be revolving very different thoughts. “I cannot take such pleasure in the acquirement of property,” said he, “as in the justness of it.”
“And, in the name of Heaven,” cried Werner, “is not this of ours acquired justly?”
“Not altogether,” said Lothario.
“Are we not giving hard cash for it?”
“Doubtless,” replied Lothario; “and most probably you will consider what I am now hinting at as nothing but a whim. No property appears to me quite just, quite free of flaw, except it contribute to the state its due proportion.”
“What!” said Werner. “You would rather that our lands, which we have purchased free from burden, had been taxable?”
“Yes,” replied Lothario, “in a suitable degree. It is only by this equality with every other kind of property, that our possession of it can be made secure. In these new times, when so many old ideas are tottering, what is the grand reason why the peasant reckons the possession of the noble less equitable than his own? Simply that the noble is not burdened, and lies a burden on him.”
“But how would the interest of our capital agree with that?” said Werner.
“Perfectly well,” returned the other; “if the state, for a regular and fair contribution, would relieve us from the feudal hocus-pocus; would allow us to proceed with our lands according to our pleasure: so that we were not compelled to retain such masses of them undivided, so that we might part them more equally among our children, whom we might thus introduce to vigorous and free activity, instead of leaving them the poor inheritance of these our limited and limiting privileges, to enjoy which we must ever be invoking the ghosts of our forefathers. How much happier were men and women in our rank of life, if they might, with unforbidden eyes, look round them, and elevate by their selection, here a worthy maiden, there a worthy youth, regarding nothing further than their own ideas of happiness in marriage! The state would have more, perhaps better citizens, and would not so often be distressed for want of heads and hands.”
“I can assure you honestly,” said Werner, “I never in my life thought about the state: my taxes, tolls, and tributes I have paid, because it was the custom.”
“Still, however,” said Lothario, “I hope to make a worthy patriot of you. As he alone is a good father who at table serves his children first; so is he alone a good citizen who, before all other outlays, discharges what he owes the state.”
By such general reflections their special business was accelerated rather than retarded. It was nearly over, when Lothario said to Wilhelm, “I must send you to a place where you are needed more than here. My sister bids me beg of you to go to her as soon as possible. Poor Mignon seems to be decaying more and more, and it is thought your presence might allay the malady. Besides telling me in person, my sister has despatched this note after me: so that you perceive she reckons it a pressing case.” Lothario handed him a billet. Wilhelm, who had listened in extreme perplexity, at once discovered in these hasty pencil-strokes the hand of the countess, and knew not what to answer.
“Take Felix with you,” said Lothario: “the little ones will cheer each other. You must be upon the road to-morrow morning early: my sister’s coach, in which my people travelled hither, is still here; I will give you horses half the way, the rest you post. A prosperous journey to you! Make many compliments from me, when you arrive: tell my sister I shall soon be back, and that she must prepare for guests. Our grand-uncle’s friend, the Marchese Cipriani, is on his way to visit us: he hoped to find the old man still in life; they meant to entertain each other with their common love of art, and the recollection of their early intimacy. The marchese, much younger than my uncle, owed to him the greater part of his accomplishments. We must exert all our endeavors to fill up, in some measure, the void which is awaiting him; and a larger party is the readiest means.”
Lothario went with the abbé to his chamber; Jarno had ridden off before; Wilhelm hastened to his room. There was none to whom he could unbosom his distress, none by whose assistance he could turn aside the project, which he viewed with so much fear. The little servant came, requesting him to pack: they were to put the luggage on to-night, meaning to set out by daybreak. Wilhelm knew not what to do: at length he cried, “Well, I shall leave this house at any rate; on the road I may consider what is to be done; at all events, I will halt in the middle of my journey; I can send a message hither, I can write what I recoil from saying, then let come of it what will.” In spite of this resolution, he spent a sleepless night: a look on Felix resting so serenely was the only thing that gave him any solace. “Oh, who knows,” cried he, “what trials are before me! who knows how sharply by-gone errors will yet punish me, how often good and reasonable projects for the future shall miscarry! But this treasure, which I call my own, continue it to me, thou exorable or inexorable Fate! Were it possible that this best part of myself were taken from me, that this heart could be torn from my heart, then farewell sense and understanding; farewell all care and foresight; vanish thou tendency to perseverance! All that distinguishes us from the beasts, pass away! And, if it is not lawful for a man to end his heavy days by the act of his own hand, may speedy madness banish consciousness, before death, which destroys it forever, shall bring on his own long night.”
He seized the boy in his arms, kissed him, clasped him, and wetted him with plenteous tears.
The child awoke: his clear eye, his friendly look, touched his father to the inmost heart. “What a scene awaits me,” cried he, “when I shall present thee to the beautiful, unhappy countess, when she shall press thee to her bosom, which thy father has so deeply injured! Ought I not to fear that she will push thee from her with a cry, when a touch of thee renews her real or fancied pain?” The coachman did not leave him time for further thought or hesitation, but forced him into the carriage before day. Wilhelm wrapped his Felix well; the morning was cold but clear: the child, for the first time in his life, saw the sun rise. His astonishment at the first fiery glance of the luminary, at the growing power of the light; his pleasure and his strange remarks,--rejoiced the father, and afforded him a glimpse into the heart of the boy, before which, as over a clear and silent sea, the sun was mounting and hovering.
In a little town the coachman halted, unyoked his horses, and rode back. Wilhelm took possession of a room, and asked himself seriously whether he would stay or proceed. Thus irresolute, he ventured to take out the little note, which hitherto he had never had the heart to look on: it contained the following words: “Send thy young friend very soon: Mignon for the last two days has been growing rather worse. Sad as the occasion is, I shall be happy to get acquainted with him.”
The concluding words Wilhelm, at the first glance, had not seen. He was terrified on reading them, and instantly determined not to go. “How?” cried he, “Lothario, knowing what occurred between us, has not told her who I am? She is not, with a settled mind, expecting an acquaintance, whom she would rather not see: she expects a stranger,--and I enter! I see her shudder and start back, I see her blush! No, it is impossible for me to encounter such a scene!” Just then his horses were led out and yoked: Wilhelm was determined to take off his luggage and remain. He felt extremely agitated. Hearing the maid running up stairs to tell him, as he thought, that all was ready, he began on the spur of the instant to devise some pretext for continuing: his eyes were fixed, without attention, on the letter which he still held in his hand. “In the name of Heaven!” cried he, “what is this? It is not the hand of the countess: it is the hand of the Amazon!”
The maid came in, requested him to walk down, and took Felix with her. “Is it possible,” exclaimed he, “is it true? What shall I do? Remain, and wait, and certify myself? Or hasten, hasten, and rush into an explanation? Thou art on the way to her, and thou canst loiter? This night thou mayest see her, and thou wilt voluntarily lock thyself in prison? It is her hand; yes, it is hers! This hand calls thee: her coach is yoked to lead thee to her! Now the riddle is explained: Lothario has two sisters; my relation to the one he knows, how much I owe to the other is unknown to him. Nor is she aware that the wounded stroller, who stands indebted to her for his health, if not his life, has been received with such unmerited attention in her brother’s house.”
Felix, who was swinging to and fro in the coach, cried up to him, “Father! Come, oh come! Look at the pretty clouds, the pretty colors!”--“Yes, I come,” cried Wilhelm, springing down-stairs; “and all the glories of the sky, which thou, good creature, so admirest, are as nothing to the moment which I look for.”
Sitting in the coach, he recalled all the circumstances of the matter to his memory. “So this is the Natalia, then, Theresa’s friend! What a discovery! what hopes, what prospects! How strange that the fear of speaking about the one sister should have altogether concealed from me the existence of the other!” With what joy he looked on Felix! He anticipated for the child, as for himself, the best reception.
Evening at last came on; the sun had set; the road was not the best; the postilion drove slowly; Felix had fallen asleep, and new cares and doubts arose in the bosom of our friend. “What delusion, what fantasies, are these that rule thee!” said he to himself. “An uncertain similarity of handwriting has at once assured thee, and given thee matter for the strangest castles in the air.” He again brought out the paper; in the departing light he again imagined that he recognized the hand of the countess: his eyes could no longer find in the parts what his heart had at once shown him in the whole. “These horses, then, are running with thee to a scene of terror! Who knows but in a few hours they may have to bring thee back again? And if thou shouldst meet with her alone! But perhaps her husband will be there, perhaps the baroness! How altered will she be! Shall I not fail, and sink to the earth, at sight of her?”
Yet a faint hope that it might be his Amazon would often gleam through these gloomy thoughts. It was now night: the carriage rolled into a court-yard, and halted; a servant with a link stepped out of a stately portal, and came down the broad steps to the carriage-door. “You have been long looked for,” said he, opening it. Wilhelm dismounted, took the sleeping Felix in his arms: the first servant called to a second, who was standing in the door with a light, “Show the gentleman up to the baroness.”
Quick as lightning, it went through Wilhelm’s soul, “What a happiness! Be it by accident or of purpose, the baroness is here! I shall see her first: apparently the countess has retired to rest. Ye good spirits, grant that the moment of deepest perplexity may pass tolerably over!”
He entered the house: he found himself in the most earnest, and, as he almost felt, the holiest, place that he had ever trod. A pendent, dazzling lustre threw its light upon a broad and softly rising flight of stairs, which lay before him, and which parted into two divisions at a turn above. Marble statues and busts were standing upon pedestals, and arranged in niches: some of them seemed known to him. The impressions of our childhood abide with us, even in their minutest traces. He recognized a Muse, which had formerly belonged to his grandfather, not indeed by its form or worth, but by an arm which had been restored, and some new-inserted pieces of the robe. He felt as if a fairy-tale had turned out to be true. The child was heavy in his arms: he lingered on the stairs, and knelt down, as if to place him more conveniently. His real want, however, was to get a moment’s breathing-time. He could scarcely raise himself again. The servant, who was carrying the light, offered to take Felix; but Wilhelm could not part with him. He had now mounted to an ante-chamber, in which, to his still greater astonishment, he observed the well-known picture of the sick king’s son hanging on the wall. He had scarcely time to cast a look on it: the servant hurried him along through two rooms into a cabinet. Here, behind a light-screen, which threw a shadow on her, sat a young lady reading. “Oh that it were she!” said he within himself at this decisive moment. He set down the boy, who seemed to be awakening; he meant to approach the lady; but the child sank together, drunk with sleep; the lady rose and came to him. It was the Amazon! Unable to restrain himself, he fell upon his knee, and cried, “It is she!” He seized her hand, and kissed it with unbounded rapture. The child was lying on the carpet between them, sleeping softly.
Felix was carried to the sofa: Natalia sat down beside him; she directed Wilhelm to the chair which was standing nearest them. She proposed to order some refreshments; these our friend declined: he was altogether occupied convincing himself that it was she, closely examining her features, shaded by the screen, and accurately recognizing them. She told him of Mignon’s sickness, in general terms; that the poor child was gradually consuming under the influence of a few deep feelings; that with her extreme excitability, and her endeavoring to hide it, her little heart often suffered violent and dangerous pains; that, on any unexpected agitation of her mind, this primary organ of life would suddenly stop, and no trace of the vital movement could be felt in the good child’s bosom; that, when such an agonizing cramp was past, the force of nature would again express itself in strong pulses, and now torment the child by its excess, as she had before suffered by its defect.
Wilhelm recollected one spasmodic scene of that description; and Natalia referred him to the doctor, who would speak with him at large on the affair, and explain more circumstantially why he, the friend and benefactor of the child, had been at present sent for. “One curious change,” Natalia added, “you will find in her: she now wears women’s clothes, to which she had once such an aversion.”
“How did you succeed in this?” said Wilhelm.
“If it was, indeed, a thing to be desired,” said she, “we owe it all to chance. Hear how it happened. Perhaps you are aware that I have constantly about me a number of little girls, whose opening minds I endeavor, as they grow in strength, to train to what is good and right. From my mouth they learn nothing but what I myself regard as true: yet I can not and would not hinder them from gathering, among other people, many fragments of the common prejudices and errors which are current in the world. If they inquire of me about them, I attempt, as far as possible, to join these alien and intrusive notions to some just one, and thus to render them, if not useful, at least harmless. Some time ago my girls had heard, among the peasants’ children, many tales of angels, of Knecht Rupert, and such shadowy characters, who, they understood, appeared at certain times in person, to give presents to good children, and to punish naughty ones. They had an idea that these strange visitants were people in disguise; in this I confirmed them: and, without entering into explanations, I determined, on the first opportunity, to let them see a spectacle of that sort. It chanced that the birthday of two twin-sisters, whose behavior had been always very good, was near: I promised, that, on this occasion, the little present they had so well deserved should be delivered to them by an angel. They were on the stretch of curiosity regarding this phenomenon. I had chosen Mignon for the part; and accordingly, at the appointed day, I had her suitably equipped in a long, light, snow-white dress. She was, of course, provided with a golden girdle round her waist, and a golden fillet on her hair. I at first proposed to omit the wings; but the young ladies who were decking her insisted on a pair of large golden pinions, in preparing which they meant to show their highest art. Thus did the strange apparition, with a lily in the one hand, and a little basket in the other, glide in among the girls: she surprised even me. ‘There comes the angel!’ said I. The children all shrank back: at last they cried, ‘It is Mignon!’ yet they durst not venture to approach the wondrous figure.
“‘Here are your gifts,’ said she, putting down the basket. They gathered around her, they viewed, they felt, they questioned her.
“‘Art thou an angel?’ asked one of them.
“‘I wish I were,’ said Mignon.
“‘Why dost thou bear a lily?’
“‘So pure and so open should my heart be: then were I happy.’
“‘What wings are these? Let us see them?’
“‘They represent far finer ones, which are not yet unfolded.’
“And thus significantly did she answer all their other childlike, innocent inquiries. The little party having satisfied their curiosity, and the impression of the show beginning to abate, we were for proceeding to undress the little angel. This, however, she resisted: she took her cithern; she seated herself here, on this high writing-table, and sang a little song with touching grace:--
“‘Such let me seem, till such I be:
Take not my snow-white dress away!
Soon from this dusk of earth I flee
Up to the glittering lands of day.
There first a little space I rest,
Then wake so glad, to scenes so kind:
In earthly robes no longer drest,
This band, this girdle, left behind.
And those calm, shining sons of morn,
They ask not who is maid or boy:
No robes, no garments, there are worn;
Our body pure from sin’s alloy.
Through little life not much I toiled,
Yet anguish long this heart has wrung;
Untimely woe my blossom spoiled:
Make me again forever young.’
“I immediately determined upon leaving her the dress,” proceeded Natalia, “and procuring her some others of a similar kind. These she now wears; and in them, I think, her form has quite a different expression.”
As it was already late, Natalia let the stranger go: he parted from her not without anxiety. “Is she married, or not?” asked he within himself. He had been afraid, at every rustling, that the door would open, and her husband enter. The serving-man, who showed him to his room, went off before our friend had mustered resolution to inquire regarding this. His unrest held him long awake: he kept comparing the figure of the Amazon with the figure of his new acquaintance. The two would not combine: the former he had, as it were, himself fashioned; the latter seemed as if it would almost new-fashion him.
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CHAPTER III.
Next morning, while all was yet quiet, he went about, viewing the house. It was the purest, finest, stateliest piece of architecture he had ever seen. “True art,” cried he, “is like good company: it constrains us in the most delightful way to recognize the measure by which, and up to which, our inward nature has been shaped by culture.” The impression which the busts and statues of his grandfather made upon him was exceedingly agreeable. With a longing mind he hastened to the picture of the sick king’s son, and he still felt it to be charming and affecting. The servant opened to him various other chambers: he found a library, a museum, a cabinet of philosophical instruments. In much of this he could not help perceiving his extreme ignorance. Meanwhile Felix had awakened, and come running after him. The thought of how and when he might receive Theresa’s letter gave him pain: he dreaded seeing Mignon, and in some degree Natalia. How unlike his present state was his state at the moment when he sealed the letter to Theresa, and with a glad heart wholly gave himself to that noble being!
Natalia sent for him to breakfast. He proceeded to a room where several tidy little girls, all apparently below ten years, were occupied in furnishing a table; while another of the same appearance brought in various sorts of beverage.
Wilhelm cast his eye upon a picture hung above the sofa: he could not but recognize in it the portrait of Natalia, little as the execution satisfied him. Natalia entered, and the likeness seemed entirely to vanish. To his comfort, it was painted with the cross of a religious order on its breast; and he now saw another such upon Natalia’s.
“I have just been looking at the portrait here,” said he; “and it seems surprising that a painter could have been at once so true and so false. The picture resembles you, in general, extremely well; and yet it neither has your features nor your character.”
“It is rather matter of surprise,” replied Natalia, “that the likeness is so good. It is not my picture, but the picture of an aunt, whom I resembled even in childhood, though she was then advanced in years. It was painted when her age was just about what mine is: at the first glance, every one imagines it is meant for me. You should have been acquainted with that excellent lady. I owe her much. A very weak state of health, perhaps too much employment with her own thoughts, and, withal, a moral and religious scrupulosity, prevented her from being to the world what, in other circumstances, she might have become. She was a light that shone but on a few friends, and on me especially.”
“Can it be possible,” said Wilhelm, after thinking for a moment, while so many circumstances seemed to correspond so well, “can it be possible that the fair and noble Saint, whose meek confessions I had liberty to study, was your aunt?”
“You read the manuscript?” inquired Natalia.
“Yes,” said Wilhelm, “with the greatest sympathy, and not without effect upon my life. What most impressed me in this paper was, if I may term it so, the purity of being, not only of the writer herself, but of all that lay round her; that self-dependence of nature, that impossibility of admitting any thing into her soul which would not harmonize with its own noble, lovely tone.”
“You are more tolerant to this fine spirit,” said Natalia, “nay, I will say more just, than many other men to whom the narrative has been imparted. Every cultivated person knows how much he has to strive against a certain coarseness, both in himself and others; how much his culture costs him; how apt he is, after all, in certain cases, to recollect himself alone, forgetting what he owes to others. How often has a worthy person to reproach himself for having failed to act with proper delicacy! And when a fair nature too delicately, too conscientiously, cultivates, nay, if you will, overcultivates, itself, there seems to be no toleration, no indulgence, for it in the world. Yet such persons are, without us, what the ideal of perfection is within us,--models, not for being imitated, but for being aimed at. We laugh at the cleanliness of the Dutch; but would our friend Theresa be what she is, if some such notion were not always present to her in her housekeeping?”
“I see before me, then,” cried Wilhelm, “in Theresa’s friend, the same Natalia whom her amiable relative was so attached to; the Natalia, who, from her youth, was so affectionate, so sympathizing, and helpful! It was only out of such a line that such a being could proceed. What a prospect opens before me, while I at once survey your ancestors, and all the circle you belong to!”
“Yes,” replied Natalia, “in a certain sense, the story of my aunt would give you the faithfullest picture of us. Her love to me, indeed, has made her praise the little girl too much: in speaking of a child, we never speak of what is present, but of what we hope for.”
Wilhelm, in the mean time, was rapidly reflecting that Lothario’s parentage and early youth were now likewise known to him. The fair countess, too, appeared before him in her childhood, with the aunt’s pearls about her neck: he himself had been near those pearls, when her soft, lovely lips bent down to meet his own. These beautiful remembrances he sought to drive away by other thoughts. He ran through the characters to whom that manuscript had introduced him. “I am here, then,” cried he, “in your worthy uncle’s house! It is no house, it is a temple; and you are the priestess, nay, the Genius, of it: I shall recollect for life my impression yesternight, when I entered, and the old figures of my earliest days were again before me. I thought of the compassionate marble statues in Mignon’s song: but these figures had not to lament about me; they looked upon me with a lofty earnestness, they brought my first years into immediate contact with the present moment. That ancient treasure of our family, the joy of my grandfather, I find here placed among so many other noble works of art; and myself, whom nature made the darling of the good old man, my unworthy self I find here also, Heavens! in what society, in what connections!”
The girls had, by degrees, gone out to mind their little occupations. Natalia, left alone with Wilhelm, asked some further explanation of his last remark. The discovery, that a number of her finest paintings and statues had at one time been the property of Wilhelm’s grandfather, did not fail to give a cheerful stimulus to their discourse. As by that manuscript he had got acquainted with Natalia’s house; so now he found himself too, as it were, in his inheritance. At length he asked for Mignon. His friend desired him to have patience till the doctor, who had been called out into the neighborhood, returned. It is easy to suppose that the doctor was the same little, active man whom we already know, and who was spoken of in the “Confessions of a Fair Saint.”
“Since I am now,” said Wilhelm, “in the middle of your family circle, I presume the abbé whom that paper mentions is the strange, inexplicable person whom, after the most singular series of events, I met with in your brother’s house? Perhaps you can give some more accurate conception of him?”
“Of the abbé there might much be said,” replied Natalia: “what I know best about him, is the influence which he exerted on our education. He was, for a time at least, convinced that education ought, in every case, to be adapted to the inclinations: his present views of it I know not. He maintained, that with man the first and last consideration was activity, and that we could not act on any thing without the proper gifts for it, without an instinct impelling us to it. ‘You admit,’ he used to say, ‘that poets must be born such; you admit this with regard to all professors of the fine arts; because you must admit it, because those workings of human nature cannot very plausibly be aped. But, if we consider well, we shall find that every capability, however slight, is born with us; that there is no vague, general capability in men. It is our ambiguous, desultory education that makes men uncertain: it awakens wishes when it should be animating tendencies; instead of forwarding our real capacities, it turns our efforts towards objects which are frequently discordant with the mind that aims at them. I augur better of a child, a youth, who is wandering astray on a path of his own, than of many who are walking aright upon paths which are not theirs. If the former, either by themselves or by the guidance of others, ever find the right path, that is to say, the path which suits their nature, they will never leave it; while the latter are in danger every moment of shaking off a foreign yoke, and abandoning themselves to unrestricted license.’”
“It is strange,” said Wilhelm, “that this same extraordinary man should likewise have taken charge of me; should, as it seems, have, in his own fashion, if not led, at least confirmed, me in my errors, for a time. How he will answer to the charge of having joined with others, as it were, to make game of me, I wait patiently to see.”
“Of this whim, if it is one,” said Natalia, “I have little reason to complain: of all the family I answered best with it. Indeed, I see not how Lothario could have got a finer breeding: but for my sister, the countess, some other treatment might have suited better; perhaps they should have studied to infuse more earnestness and strength into her nature. As to brother Friedrich, what is to become of him cannot be conjectured: he will fall a sacrifice, I fear, to this experiment in pedagogy.”
“You have another brother, then?” cried Wilhelm.
“Yes,” replied Natalia: “and a light, merry youth he is; and, as they have not hindered him from roaming up and down the world, I know not what the wild, dissipated boy will turn to. It is a great while since I saw him. The only thing which calms my fears is, that the abbé, and the whole society about my brother, are receiving constant notice where he is and what he does.”
Wilhelm was about to ask Natalia her opinion more precisely on the abbé’s paradoxes, as well as to solicit information about that mysterious society; but the physician entering changed their conversation. After the first compliments of welcome, he began to speak of Mignon.
Natalia then took Felix by the hand; saying she would lead the child to Mignon, and prepare her for the entrance of her friend.
The doctor, now alone with Wilhelm, thus proceeded: “I have wondrous things to tell you, such as you are not anticipating. Natalia has retired, that we might speak with greater liberty of certain matters, which, although I first learned them by her means, her presence would prevent us from discussing freely. The strange temper of the child seems to consist almost exclusively of deep longing: the desire of revisiting her native land, and the desire for you, my friend, are, I might almost say, the only earthly things about her. Both these feelings do but grasp towards an immeasurable distance, both objects lie before her unattainable. The neighborhood of Milan seems to be her home: in very early childhood she was kidnapped from her parents by a company of rope-dancers. A more distinct account we cannot get from her, partly because she was then too young to recollect the names of men and places, but especially because she has made an oath to tell no living mortal her abode and parentage. For the strolling-party, who came up with her when she had lost her way, and to whom she so accurately described her dwelling, with such piercing entreaties to conduct her home, but carried her along with them the faster; and at night in their quarters, when they thought the child was sleeping, joked about their precious capture, declaring she would never find the way home again. On this a horrid desperation fell upon the miserable creature; but at last the Holy Virgin rose before her eyes, and promised that she would assist her. The child then swore within herself a sacred oath, that she would henceforth trust no human creature, would disclose her history to no one, but live and die in hope of immediate aid from heaven. Even this, which I am telling you, Natalia did not learn expressly from her, but gathered it from detached expressions, songs, and childlike inadvertencies, betraying what they meant to hide.”
Wilhelm called to memory many a song and word of this dear child, which he could now explain. He earnestly requested the physician to keep from him none of the confessions or mysterious poetry of this peculiar being.
“Prepare yourself,” said the physician, “for a strange confession; for a story with which you, without remembering it, have much to do, and which, as I greatly fear, has been decisive for the death and life of this good creature.”
“Let me hear,” said Wilhelm: “my impatience is unbounded.”
“Do you recollect a secret nightly visit from a female,” said the doctor, “after your appearance in the character of Hamlet?”
“Yes, I recollect it well,” cried Wilhelm, blushing; “but I did not look to be reminded of it at the present moment.”
“Do you know who it was?”
“I do not! You frighten me! In the name of Heaven, not Mignon, surely? Who was it? Tell me, pray.”
“I know it not myself.”
“Not Mignon, then?”
“No, certainly not Mignon; but Mignon was intending at the time to glide in to you, and saw with horror, from a corner where she lay concealed, a rival get before her.”
“A rival!” cried our friend. “Speak on: you more and more confound me.”
“Be thankful,” said the doctor, “that you can arrive at the result so soon through means of me. Natalia and I, with but a distant interest in the matter, had distress enough to undergo before we could thus far discover the perplexed condition of the poor, dear creature, whom we wished to help. By some wanton speeches of Philina and the other girls, by a certain song which she had heard Philina sing, the child’s attention had been roused: she longed to pass a night beside the man she loved, without conceiving any thing to be implied in this beyond a happy and confiding rest. A love for you, my friend, was already keen and powerful in her little heart; in your arms, the child had found repose from many a sorrow; she now desired this happiness in all its fulness. If at one time she purposed requesting it as a favor, at another a secret horror would hold her back. At last that merry night and the excitement of abundant wine inspired her with the courage to attempt the adventure, and glide in to you on that occasion. Accordingly she ran before, to hide herself in your apartment, which was standing open; but just when she had reached the top of the stairs, having heard a rustling, she concealed herself, and saw a female in a white dress slip into your chamber. You yourself arrived soon after, and she heard you push the large bolt.
“Mignon’s agony was now unutterable: all the violent feelings of a passionate jealousy mingled themselves with the unacknowledged longing of obscure desire, and seized her half-developed nature with tremendous force. Her heart, which hitherto had beaten violently with eagerness and expectation, now at once began to falter and stop; it pressed her bosom like a heap of lead: she could not draw her breath, she knew not what to do; she heard the sound of the old man’s harp, hastened to the garret where he was, and passed the night at his feet in horrible convulsions.”
The physician paused a moment: then, as Wilhelm still kept silence, he proceeded, “Natalia told me, nothing in her life had so alarmed and touched her as the state of Mignon while relating this; indeed, our noble friend accused herself of cruelty in having, by her questions and management, drawn this confession from her, and renewed by recollection the violent sorrows of the poor little girl.
“‘The dear creature,’ said Natalia, ‘had scarcely come so far with her recital, or, rather, with her answers to my questions, when she sank all at once before me on the ground, and, with her hand on her bosom, piteously moaned that the pain of that excruciating night was come back. She twisted herself like a worm upon the floor; and I had to summon all my composure, that I might remember and apply such means of remedy for mind and body as were known to me.’”
“It is a painful predicament you put me in,” cried Wilhelm, “by impressing me so vividly with the feeling of my manifold injustice towards this unhappy and beloved being, at the very moment when I am again to meet her. If she is to see me, why do you deprive me of the courage to appear with freedom? And shall I confess it to you? Since her mind is so affected, I perceive not how my presence can be advantageous to her. If you, as a physician, are persuaded that this double longing has so undermined her being as to threaten death, why should I renew her sorrows by my presence, and perhaps accelerate her end?”
“My friend,” replied the doctor, “where we cannot cure, it is our duty to alleviate; and how much the presence of a loved object tends to take from the imagination its destructive power, how it changes an impetuous longing to a peaceful looking, I could prove by the most convincing instances. Every thing in measure and with purpose! For, in other cases, this same presence may rekindle an affection nigh extinguished. But do you go and see the child; behave to her with kindness, and let us wait the consequence.”
Natalia, at this moment coming back, bade Wilhelm follow her to Mignon. “She appears to feel quite happy with the boy,” observed Natalia, “and I hope she will receive our friend with mildness.” Wilhelm followed, not without reluctance: he was deeply moved by what he had been hearing; he feared a stormy scene of passion. It was altogether the reverse that happened on his entrance.
Mignon, dressed in long, white, women’s clothes, with her brown, copious hair partly knotted, partly clustering out in locks, was sitting with the boy Felix on her lap, and pressing him against her heart. She looked like a departed spirit, he like life itself: it seemed as if Heaven and Earth were clasping one another. She held out her hand to Wilhelm with a smile, and said, “I thank thee for bringing back the child to me: they had taken him away, I know not how; and since then I could not live. So long as my heart needs any thing on earth, thy Felix shall fill up the void.”
The quietness which Mignon had displayed on meeting with her friend produced no little satisfaction in the party. The doctor signified that Wilhelm should go frequently and see her; that in body as in mind, she should be kept as equable as possible. He himself departed, promising to return soon.
Wilhelm could now observe Natalia in her own circle: one would have desired nothing better than to live beside her. Her presence had the purest influence on the girls, and young ladies of various ages, who resided with her in the house, or came to pay her visits from the neighborhood.
“The progress of your life,” said Wilhelm once to her, “must always have been very even: your aunt’s delineation of you in your childhood seems, if I mistake not, still to fit. It is easy to see that you never were entangled in your path. You have never been compelled to retrograde.”
“This I owe to my uncle and the abbé,” said Natalia, “who so well discriminated my prevailing turn of mind. From my youth upwards, I can recollect no livelier feeling than that I was constantly observing people’s wants, and had an irresistible desire to make them up. The child that had not learned to stand on its feet, the old man that could no longer stand on his; the longing of a rich family for children, the inability of a poor one to maintain their children; each silent wish for some particular species of employment; the impulse towards any talent; the natural gifts for many little necessary arts of life,--were sure to strike me: my eyes seemed formed by nature for detecting them. I saw such things where no one had directed my attention: I seemed born for seeing them alone. The charms of inanimate nature, to which so many persons are exceedingly susceptible, had no effect on me: the charms of art, if possible, had less. My most delightful occupation was and is, when a deficiency, a want, appeared before me anywhere, to set about devising a supply, a remedy, a help for it.