984 
 
THEODORE H. HITTELL. 
 
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year e : ghteen hundred and 
 seventy-two, 
 
 BY THEODORE H. HITTELL, 
 In the Offica of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. 
 
UNIVERSITY 
 
 GOETHE'S FAUST. 
 
 OF all modern literary productions, 
 Goethe's Faust is entitled to be 
 called the most remarkable and the great- 
 est. It is the master-piece not only of a 
 great poet, but of a great nation ; not only 
 of a nation, but of an age : it is the repre- 
 sentative of an era in the history of human 
 progress. Like the master-pieces of former 
 ages like the Iliad of Homer, the Divine 
 Comedy of Dante, the Dramas of Shakes- 
 peare it has in its peculiar sphere no pro- 
 totype. Like them it may be followed by 
 many imitations ; but like them it seems 
 to have preoccupied its own sublime re- 
 gion of poesy. It shines there in the bright- 
 ness of immortality, and no successor can 
 be expected to share its preeminence or 
 dim its unapproachable splendor. 
 
 This wonderful composition was the work 
 of a lifetime ; and of a life which not only 
 stretched beyond the ordinary limits, but 
 was one of the most varied in all the pas- 
 
4 GOETHE S FAUST. 
 
 sions and experiences of human existence. 
 The idea of writing it was first conceived 
 by its illustrious author about the year 
 1775, while he was -still comparatively but 
 a youth ; and he did not finish it till the 
 year 1831, at the advanced age of 82. 
 During all the intervening years, includ- 
 ing those of his wayward but industrious 
 youth, those of his sober-minded manhood, 
 and those of his ripe old age; embracing 
 the intellectual periods which found their 
 expression in the passionate sorrows of 
 young Werther, as well as those which 
 produced the calm Wilhelm Meister; those 
 which brought forth the classic Iphigenia, 
 the philosophical Metamorphoses of Plants 
 and the Theory of Colors; those which 
 were passed in tlje hermitage of his own 
 study; those which were enjoyed amongst 
 the 'arts and artists of Italy, and those 
 which were spent as a literary dictator at 
 the most learned court of Europe, and as 
 a minister among and a participator in the 
 most stirring scenes of modern politics - 
 during all these years, and from all these 
 different provinces, the author was assid- 
 uously collecting materials for this, his 
 " mystic, unfathomable song." It seems 
 never for any length of time to have been 
 absent from his mind. Though he may 
 have been laboring upon the other, and 
 different, and widely separated, subjects 
 
GOETHE'S FAUST. 
 
 which enrich his voluminous works; though 
 he may have been investigating abstract 
 scientific propositions, or playing a part in 
 exciting political revolutions ; the Faust 
 was ever present, forming and maturing, 
 in the depths of his comprehensive soul. 
 It was with him in his studies of the an- 
 cient classics; it accsmpanied him through 
 the monkish chronicles of the dark ages ; 
 it strode by his side through his vast read- 
 ing of mediaeval literature ; it went hand 
 in hand with him through all the wide 
 ranges of modern intellect ; it came up to 
 him in the visions of the night; it became 
 and was a part of himself in the thoughts 
 and deeds of the day. All art, all science, 
 all human knowledge seem to have been 
 
 o 
 
 put under contribution Jbr this magnifi- 
 cent work; and we find it the voice and 
 expression of the most advanced degree 
 to which human culture has yet arrived. 
 
 The main scope of the poem, as we un- 
 derstand it, is the poetical representation 
 of the struggle of the superior or cultivated 
 human intellect against the barriers with 
 which mere earthly existence hems it in. 
 The argument is essentially the same 
 which the great poets and moralists of al- 
 most every age have, under diverse forms, 
 made their theme the encounter between 
 Free Will and Fate; the fight between the 
 aspiring soul and the iron limits of neces- 
 
O GOETHE S FAUST. 
 
 sity. It is the same great problem which 
 formed the substratum or basis upon which 
 many of the significant fables of ancient 
 mythologies were raised ; the same which 
 in later times, and particularly after the in- 
 vigorating and awakening influence of the 
 Reformation, assumed such gigantic pro- 
 portions in theological polemics. In Faust, 
 under the plastic hands of a Goethe, we 
 have it in an entirely new and original 
 form. Instead of drawing down a demi- 
 
 O 
 
 god, as /Eschylus did his Prometheus, to 
 be the hero in the sublime story, Goethe 
 takes the scholar of modern times one 
 who is neither raised above nor sunk be- 
 low us ; one whom we feel to be our like 
 and equal. Instead of the vague abstrac- 
 tions of the metaphysicians, the poet has 
 thrown the whole into the concrete form ; 
 and the result has been this admirable, all- 
 embracing dramatic poem ; this master- 
 piece, as it may well be called, of the eight- 
 eenth and nineteenth centuries. 
 
 The old German legend of Faust, or, as 
 it is more familiarly known, The Devil and 
 Doctor Faustus, was in a few of its main 
 features well suited to the purposes of 
 the poet in his magnificent undertaking. 
 Where it was deficient, he rejected it ; and 
 with the high prerogative of genius, he 
 made many radical changes : much in the 
 same way that Shakespeare took the re- 
 
GOETHE S FAUST. 7 
 
 port of a bloody crime out of Saxo Gram- 
 maticus and transmuted it into the philo- 
 sophical story of Hamlet. Goethe gives 
 the legend an entirely new purport; he 
 adds breadth and range to it ; he clothes 
 it in entirely new adornments, and totally 
 changes its conclusion and signification. 
 That he has done so is one of his great 
 merits; one of his titles to our admiration 
 of him as a creator, a complete master of 
 his subject, who could mold and fashion it 
 to his will. Nor is it any the less a merit 
 that it was natural for him to do so. He 
 was one of the boldest and most successful 
 of innovators. His works abound with in- 
 stances in which he exercised his privilege 
 with an effect elsewhere unparalleled in 
 modern literature. In his Iphigenia, for 
 example, he gave an entirely new reading 
 to a celebrated oracle of the Delphic shrine, 
 and constructed upon such reading a poem, 
 which might well take its place as one of 
 the Greek classics; different from the class- 
 ics, but the most genuinely classic in spirit 
 of all modern works. Again, in science 
 he pushed aside with an unsparing hand 
 many of the long cherished and appar- 
 ently well established theories of preced- 
 ing philosophers, and opened up new and 
 untold fields for investigation and discov- 
 ery. He was the first to call in question 
 the theory of Newton respecting the nat- 
 
5 GOETHE S FAUST. 
 
 ural philosophy of light : and though the 
 controversy which he thus originated is 
 not yet ended, and his views may not be 
 adopted, it is admitted that he brought to 
 bear upon the intricate subject a greater 
 degree of intelligence and sagacity than 
 any other since Newton. He was the first 
 to enunciate and develop the great theory 
 of transformations, upon which the mod- 
 ern system of botany may be said to be 
 founded ; upon which, it seems probable, 
 all science pertaining to organic forms will 
 yet be based thus exhibiting a grasp and 
 power of intellect which entitle him worthy 
 an equal rank with the most comprehen- 
 sive and subtle minds known in the annals 
 of the human race. 
 
 But it is in Faust more particularly that 
 this gigantic genius has shown his greatest 
 boldness and exhibited the sublimity, or, if 
 we may be allowed the expression, the very 
 perfection of innovation. He has taken 
 the vulgar legend from where he found it, 
 among the superstitions of the people, and 
 with his mighty hand transformed it into 
 a drama of the whole circle of human des- 
 tiny; a circle which commences in the 
 eternity before time, and leads through 
 time into the eternity after time; or, as 
 expressed in the poem, from Heaven, 
 through the Earth, to Hell. The more 
 we contemplate the extent and character 
 
GOETHE'S FAUST. 9 
 
 of his attempt, the more are we awed with 
 the magnitude of his daring. It almost 
 appears like the endeavor of a modern 
 Titan to scale the province of omnipo- 
 tence ; and there are some minds minds 
 which are too narrow to comprehend, or 
 too bigoted to appreciate who have 
 branded it as impious. 
 
 Faust, according to the legend, was a 
 
 ~ c5 
 
 learned doctor and professor, who lived 
 about the beginning of the sixteenth cen- 
 tury, and taught at the City of Witten- 
 burg, in Germany. He was born at Kund- 
 lingen, in the province of Weimar, the son 
 of a poor husbandman ; but was adopted 
 and educated by a rich uncle, who sent 
 him to the university. He progressed 
 there so rapidly in the study of divinity, 
 to which he was devoted, that when the 
 examinations came on before the rectors 
 and masters, it was found that none of his 
 time were able to argue \vith him, or " for 
 the excellence of his wisdom to compare 
 with him." With universal consent, there- 
 fore, he was made Doctor of Divinity ; or, 
 as it would be expressed in modern phrase, 
 he graduated with the highest honors. 
 But, continues the legend, a short time 
 after he obtained his degree, he fell into 
 such fantasies and deep cogitations that 
 he became the object of mockery, and was 
 called by the students " The Speculator," 
 
io GOETHE'S FAUST. 
 
 or, as we would now say, " The Visionary." 
 In his vagaries he would sometimes throw 
 the Scriptures from him, as though he de- 
 spised and contemned his profession ; and 
 by degrees he began to lead a most un- 
 godly life. He made acquaintances among 
 and formed friendships with such as prac- 
 ticed devilish arts, and such as had the 
 Chaldean, Persian, Hebrew, Arabian and 
 Greek tongues. In connection with these 
 he learned to use figures, characters, con- 
 jurations, incantations, and many other 
 ceremonies belonging to the infernal arts 
 of necromancy, charms, soothsaying, witch- 
 craft and enchantment. He took so much 
 delight in their books and words and names 
 that he studied them night and day; till 
 at length he could no longer abide being 
 called a Doctor of Divinity, but waxed a 
 worldly man, and named himself an astro- 
 logian and a mathematician. For a pre- 
 tense sometimes he called himself a physi- 
 cian, and did cures with herbs, roots, wa- 
 ters, drinks and receipts. " And without 
 doubt," says the conscientious chronicler, 
 " he was also passing wise and excellent 
 perfect in Holy Scriptures ; but he that 
 knoweth his Master's will and cloeth it not, 
 is worthy to be beaten with many stripes." 
 The legend goes on to state, at great 
 length and with great particularity, that 
 Faust, after falling from one grade of 
 
GOETHE S FAUST. I I 
 
 naughty wickedness to another, at last be- 
 gan to commune with the lower world it- 
 self, and finally conjured up one of the 
 imps of the Prince of Darkness, named 
 Mephistopheles. It graphically describes 
 how this devil appeared ; first in the form 
 of a dragon, hovering, like the witches of 
 Macbeth, in the foul and filthy air; then 
 as a flash of lightning ; then as a globe of 
 fire ; then as a beast ; and finally as a 
 monk, in which shape he held converse 
 with Faust. With like particularity the 
 legend sets forth how Faust, in the de- 
 pravity of his heart, wished to know the 
 secrets of Heaven and Earth ; and how, 
 being otherwise unable to accomplish his 
 purposes, and forgetful of his soul's sake, 
 ana contemning the commands of the 
 Holy Mother Church, he entered into that 
 infernal compact which has made his name 
 immortal. By the terms of this famous 
 stipulation, Mephistopheles was for twenty- 
 four years to be Faust's servant ; bring 
 everything he wanted ; do everything he 
 required ; at all times appear at his com- 
 mand in what form or shape soever he 
 wished, and accomplish all his desires to 
 all points in full. On the other hand, 
 Faust bound himself at the end of the 
 twenty- four years to belong body and soul 
 to Lucifer; and, for confirmation of the 
 agreement, he executed a bond to" that 
 
 UHI7BRSIT7 
 
12 GOETHE S FAUST. 
 
 effect, written in blood and a copy of the 
 identical document is duly preserved in 
 the history. As it presents, so far as we 
 are informed, the only specimen of this 
 branch of the law of contracts in exist- 
 ence, it may not be uninteresting to the 
 curious to hear it. Having opened a vein 
 and placed his blood in a saucer on warm 
 ashes, Faust deliberately wrote as follows : 
 
 " I, John Faustus, Doctor, do openly ac- 
 knowledge with mine own hand, to the 
 great force and strengthening of this let- 
 ter, that since I began to study and specu- 
 late the course and nature of the elements, 
 I have not found, through the gift that is 
 given me from above, any such learning 
 and wisdom that can bring me to my de- 
 sire ; an$ for that I find that men are un- 
 able to instruct me further in the matter: 
 Now have I, Dr. Faustus, to the hellish 
 Prince of Orient, and his messenger Meph- 
 istopheles, given both body and soul, upon 
 such conditions that they shall teach me 
 and fulfill my desires in all things, as they 
 have promised and vowed unto me, with 
 due obedience unto me, according to the 
 articles mentioned between us. 
 
 " Further, I do covenant and grant with 
 them, by these presents, that at the end of 
 twenty-four years next ensuing the date of 
 this present letter, they being expired, and 
 I in the meantime during these said years 
 
GOETHE S FAUST. I 3 
 
 being served of them at my will, they ac- 
 complishing my desires to the full in all 
 points as we are agreed; that then I give 
 them all power to do with me at their 
 pleasure to rule, to send, to fetch or car- 
 ry me or mine, be it either body, soul, flesh, 
 blood or goods, into their habitation, be it 
 wheresoever : and hereupon I defy God 
 and his Christ, all the host of Heaven, and 
 all living creatures that bear the shape of 
 God ; yea, all that live. And again I say 
 it, and it shall be so. And to the more 
 strengthening of this writing, I have writ- 
 ten it with my own hand and blood, being 
 in perfect memory; and hereupon I sub- 
 scribe to it with my name and title, calling 
 all the infernal, middle and supreme pow- 
 ers to witness of this my letter and sub- 
 scription. 
 
 " John Faustus, approved in the ele- 
 ments and the spiritual doctors." 
 
 Immediately after the execution of the 
 bond, Faust entered upon the enjoyment 
 of his privileges, and made the circuit of 
 physical gratifications. He fared delicate- 
 ly ; he wore costly apparel ; he reveled in 
 earthly and sensual delights ; he became 
 the companion of princes and emperors ; 
 and wherever he appeared was recognized 
 as the gloss of fashion and the mold of 
 form, the observed of all observers. He 
 traveled through all the kingdoms of the 
 
14 GOETHE S FAUST. 
 
 world, and even as far as Paradise, upon 
 whose walls he saw standing the angels 
 with flaming swords. He also visited the 
 sun and planets; and, in all his rambles, 
 the spirits of the air, the spirits of the 
 earth, and the spirits of the places under 
 the earth, were all equally subservient to 
 his will. Even space and time were as 
 nothing to his desires; a dragon or a magic 
 cloak was ever ready to annihilate one, and 
 from the other he could call up at will the 
 beings of any age. At one time the lovely 
 Thais, the mistress of Alexander of Mace- 
 don, reappeared and ministered to his 
 pleasures ; and at another Helen, whose 
 beauty fired the ancient world and caused 
 the fall of Ilion. At all times and in all 
 places, Mephistopheles was ever at his side 
 and ever obedient to his wishes infinite 
 in expedients, inexhaustible in resources. 
 However seemingly impossible the de- 
 mands, however seemingly desperate the 
 attempt, the devil kept his contract to the 
 letter. 
 
 Had it not been for his conscience, Faust 
 could not have been otherwise than happy; 
 but in all his carousals, that silent but pow- 
 erful monitor was constantly upbraiding 
 him. With every worldly wish gratified to 
 the full, he lived a miserable and wretched 
 life. He would willingly have repented, 
 but his repentance was like that of Cain 
 
GOETHE S FAUST. 15 
 
 and Judas; his sin was greater than could 
 be forgiven : when he looked to Heaven, 
 he could see no hope ; nothing presented 
 itself to his contemplation for the future 
 but hell and the pains thereof. In answer 
 to his inquiries he was informed that as 
 the flint-stone in the fire burns red hot 
 but consumeth not, so his immortal soul 
 was condemned to everlasting pain. And 
 when, in terror of his approaching end, he 
 demanded of the fiend if there was indeed 
 no hope, he was rebuffed with a foresight 
 of his terrible doom. " Know, .Faustus," 
 replied the' evil spirit, "that the condemned 
 have neither end nor time appointed in the 
 which they may hope to be released. If 
 there were even hope that by throwing 
 one drop of water out of the sea each day 
 until it were dry ; or if there were a heap 
 of sand as high as from the earth to the 
 heavens, that a bird carrying away but one 
 corn in a day if even at the end of this 
 so incalculable labor they might yet hope 
 God would have mercy on them, they 
 would be comforted ; but there is no hope 
 that God ever thinks of them, or that 
 their howling will ever be heard. Yea, it 
 is as impossible for thee to escape the 
 wrath to come as it is impossible for thee 
 to remove the mountains, or to empty the 
 sea, or to count the drops of rain that have 
 fallen from heaven unto this day, or tell 
 
1 6 GOETHE'S FAUST. 
 
 what there is most of in the world. Yea, 
 and as impossible as it is for a camel to go 
 through the eye of a needle, even so im- 
 possible it is for thee, Faustus, and the 
 rest of the condemned, to come again into 
 the favor of God ; and thus, Faustus, thou 
 hast heard my last sentence, and, I pray 
 thee, how dost thou like it ? " 
 
 As the appointed term drew nearer and 
 nearer toward its close, the unhappy Faust 
 became, in the quaint words of the legend, 
 "like a taken murderer or thief, the which, 
 finding himself guilty in conscience before 
 the Judge, fears every hour to die. He 
 was grieved, and in wailing spent his time; 
 he went talking to himself, wringing of his 
 hands, sobbing and sighing ; his flesh fell 
 away and he became lean and haggard, 
 and kept himself close; neither could he 
 abide, see or hear of Mephistopheles any 
 more." At last, when the full time was 
 about to expire, he repaired to a public 
 house in the village of Rimlich, a half mile 
 from Wittenburg; and, after calling his 
 student friends about him, and bidding 
 them all farewell, " it happened," says the 
 legend, " that between twelve and one of 
 the clock at midnight there blew against 
 the house a mighty storm of wind, as 
 though it would have blown the founda- 
 tions thereof from their places. Hereup- 
 on the students began to fear, and left 
 
BESIT7 
 
 GOETHES FAUST. 17 
 
 their beds ; but they would by no means 
 stir from their chambers, though the host 
 ran out of doors, thinking the house would 
 fall. The students, who lay next the hall 
 wherein Dr. Faustus was, soon heard a 
 mighty noise and hissing, as if it had been 
 full of snakes and adders ; and presently 
 the hall door flew open and they heard 
 Faustus imploring for help, and crying 
 murder ! murder ! ! but it was with a smoth- 
 ered voice, and very hollow; and shortly 
 afterward it died away, and they heard him 
 no more. In the morning, as soon as it 
 was light, they plucked up courage to go 
 into the hall, where they had left Faustus ; 
 but he was not there. Instead of him, 
 they found the floor sprinkled with his 
 blood, and his brains cleaving to the walls. 
 The devil had beaten him from one side 
 against another : in one corner lay his 
 eyes, and in another his teeth a fearful 
 and pitiful sight to behold." 
 
 Such was the plot of the old legend of 
 Faust. It is easy to see that it was a 
 monkish or priestly invention ; originating 
 in the age of the Reformation, at a time 
 when the spirit of inquiry was becoming 
 dangerous to the established order of 
 things, and evidently intended to repress 
 it. It was the thirst of knowledge which 
 is represented as misleading Faust ; not 
 ambition, nor avarice, nor lust, nor inner- 
 
1 8 GOETHE'S FAUST. 
 
 ent vice. It is also worthy of remark that 
 the scene of the tragedy was Wittenburg, 
 with its schools and professorships, cele- 
 brated for ages as the foster mother of phi- 
 losophy. It will be recollected that Ham- 
 let, the most philosophic of Shakespeare's 
 characters, had studied in Wittenburg ; 
 and Horatio, whose philosophy had ap- 
 parently attempted all things, both of heav- 
 en and earth, is repeatedly asked, " And 
 what ma'\e you from Wittenburg, Horatio?" 
 Thus the legend of Faust, however it may 
 have originated, had a didactic purpose. 
 It was, so to speak, the expression of the 
 religious conservatism of the age against 
 the supposed heretical spirit of reawakened 
 inquiry, which was gradually overturning 
 the regime of the old dogmas. It was 
 essentially a religious lesson ; and there 
 can be no doubt that it was implicitly be- 
 lieved by the superstitious of those days. 
 The common people, among whom it 
 passed current and who shuddered over 
 its descriptions of the place of torments, 
 were not intelligent enough to perceive its 
 grossness and inconsistencies. The un- 
 pardonable sin which it portrayed, was the 
 thirst of knowledge ; a thirst which we of 
 this age would term one of the most com- 
 mendable of human desires. The Meph- 
 istopheles was the old-time fire and brim- 
 stone imp, with forked tail and cloven 
 
GOETHE S FAUST. 19 
 
 foot; the incidents were low and insignif- 
 icant; Faust a vulgar voluptuary, almost 
 brutal in his sensualities; and the catastro- 
 phe a mere jumble of blood and murder; 
 striking on account of the horrible picture 
 it presented to the imagination, but absurd 
 in all its connections and antecedents. As 
 a whole, the legend was a creature of the 
 most debased superstition ; an offspring of 
 the old night, which brought it forth and 
 to which it properly belonged. 
 
 In the poem of Goethe, on the other 
 hand, the story assumes an entirely new 
 aspect, and bears with it a significance of 
 which anv version of the old legend would 
 
 J 
 
 have appeared incapable. As Shakespeare 
 raised Hamlet into the highest regions of 
 what may be called concrete philosophy, 
 so Goethe elevated the gross and coarse 
 legend of Faust from its native bed on the 
 lower stratum of popular superstition to 
 the summit of intellectual greatness. The 
 process was much the same in both works ; 
 but Goethe, whose plan was more compre- 
 hensive, found it necessary to remodel the 
 popular story in almost all its details ; to 
 prune it of its grossness and to infuse into 
 it a spirit altogether unknown to the leg- 
 end itself. Little of the legendary char- 
 arteristics remains in the poem, except the 
 names of the chief personages and the 
 idea of a compact with the spirit of dark- 
 
2O GOETHE S FAUST. 
 
 ness. This fragmentary skeleton the poet 
 has enlarged; turned to new purposes; add- 
 ed new members ; clothed with the weav- 
 ings of his own genius: and thus changed, 
 he presents it to us in the form and with 
 the merits of a new creation. Of all the 
 great works which the moderns have pro- 
 duced there is perhaps no other so entirely 
 original, so completely the product of its 
 author alone. 
 
 Under the hands of Goethe, Faust be- 
 comes, instead of the vulgar voluptuary 
 and sensualist of the legend, the repre- 
 sentative of the aspiring human soul ; 
 hemmed in by untoward circumstances, 
 but manfully struggling for light and free- 
 dom. And Mephistopheles, instead of the 
 sooty imp of Lucifer, becomes the genu- 
 ine, veritable devil of the times ; the spirit 
 of evil in the shape in which he now 
 appears. The modern devil has discarded 
 horns, claws, tail, fire and brimstone ; and 
 he now wears the dress and has the man- 
 ners of a gentleman. Upon him too has 
 the progress of culture had its influence ; 
 so much so that, in his new and improved 
 condition, even his own creatures do not 
 at first recognize him. The only thing 
 that indicates his relationship with the 
 old-time devil is the cloven foot, which he 
 cannot lay aside; but, that this may not 
 offend or injure his prospects in society, 
 
GOETHE S FAUST. 21 
 
 he wears false calves and stuffed shoes. 
 He objects to being called Satan ; this 
 name, he says, has been too long written 
 in the story books. He prefers the title 
 of Baron ; and he claims to be a cavalier 
 like other cavaliers : in other words, he is 
 now a man of the world, and whatever may 
 be the fashion of the time he will wear its 
 garb. 
 
 Not only are the characters changed, 
 but the scope, intent and object of the 
 legend are transformed. Instead of de- 
 scriptions of the infernal regions, and their 
 different wards and compartments; instead 
 of inventories of the various fiends and 
 their manner of tormenting the condemned ; 
 instead of flat, stale and unprofitable con- 
 versations, which there needs no ghost 
 come from the grave to tell us ; and in- 
 stead of unmeaning journeys through the 
 air we have, in the poem, a most sublime 
 statement of the great, the all-important 
 questions of human destiny ; and a devel- 
 opment and working out of the problem 
 in a manner so masterly that few as yet 
 have been able to recognize, and perhaps 
 none to fully appreciate its real grandeur. 
 Some of the most intelligent readers have 
 entirely misunderstood it. Coleridge even 
 used the expression, " transcendental non- 
 sense and magic-lantern pictures," in ref- 
 erence to it. But a faithful study of the 
 
 TJJTI7BRSIT7 
 
22 GOETHE S FAUST. 
 
 poem, and a disposition to look beneath 
 the surface, indicate that the poet had a 
 great meaning; and when the key of in- 
 terpretation is properly applied, the whole 
 structure arises before the mind in magnif- 
 icent proportions and matchless symmetry. 
 Little less indeed could have been expect- 
 ed of a work of which Carlyle well said, 
 " it was matured in the mysterious depths 
 of a vast and wonderful mind, and bodied 
 forth with that truth and curious felicity of 
 composition in which Goethe is generally 
 admitted to have no living rival." 
 
 To properly interpret and understand 
 the poem, it should be recollected that 
 Goethe himself wrote a short criticism, or 
 rather explanation, of Hamlet; one of the 
 briefest but certainly the most sensible of 
 the thousands of pages written on that 
 subject. He there points out the key 
 which at once opens the significance of 
 Hamlet, and at the same time affords an 
 example of the manner in which great 
 poems should be studied. It is impossible 
 to read that criticism without feeling that 
 Goethe heartily approved of Shakespeare's 
 plan of working out his play upon the basis 
 of one or more fundamental ideas; and we 
 may be certain that in his own work he not 
 only had a great purpose underlying the 
 whole, but also that he placed the key or 
 keys to unlock and explain it in the poem 
 
GOETHE S FAUST. 23 
 
 itself. Indeed, the idea of locking up the 
 secrets or meanings of things, to be opened 
 only by those who procured the keys, was 
 a favorite of Goethe's. He looked upon 
 Nature as a great secret locked forever to 
 those who could not read her language, 
 but open to all who used the proper key. 
 Again, in his Wilhelm Meister, a strange 
 casket, which is found locked and which 
 cannot be opened until the lost key be 
 found, plays an important part. Even in 
 this poem, a key leads Faust the way that 
 he should go through the nether regions. 
 And so throughout all that class of his 
 writings, which admit of such a treatment, 
 we find that Goethe requires the reader to 
 search beneath the surface. And that the 
 diligent inquirer will be amply repaid, any 
 one may answer who has ever understood 
 a page of him who "never wrote a line 
 without a meaning, or many lines without 
 a deep and true meaning." 
 
 When we come to examine Goethe's 
 Faust in this spirit, we notice that it is a 
 dramatic poem not intended for the stage, 
 and much of it not adapted for visual rep- 
 resentation. The action extends over the 
 period commencing with Faust's first in- 
 cantations, or calling of spirits from the 
 vasty deep, and ending with the ascent of 
 his soul into Heaven. The scene is laid 
 variously at Wittenburg, Leipsic, the Hartz 
 
24 GOETHE S FAUST. 
 
 Mountains, the Alps, the moving court of 
 a wandering Emperor, and the Ocean 
 beach : but, by a sort of magic annihila- 
 tion of time and space, and by means of 
 interludes, we are also called upon to thread 
 the mazes of mythological Hades, classic 
 Hellas, the regions of Gothic romance ; 
 and at last we have a glimpse of Paradise, 
 and hear the hymns of the seraphic choirs 
 in the beatific Presence. This vast circle 
 of subject is amazing to contemplate, and 
 it would seem an almost impossible thing 
 to embrace its distinct and various parts in 
 one complete whole. To understand how 
 this has been done, and why such an im- 
 mense field has been presented, we must 
 endeavor to find the main purpose or great 
 underlying idea. 
 
 In looking for this we observe that the 
 poem consists of two parts, and that it is 
 preceded by a short prelude and a pro- 
 logue. In the prelude the poet, with a 
 few masterly touches, indicates the nature 
 and difficulties of his undertaking, and the 
 vastness of his scheme. In the prologue 
 the scene is changed from earth to Heav- 
 en, and the reader is prepared for the mo- 
 mentous questions to be presented by the 
 introduction of the Archangels and the 
 Lord holding converse with Mephistoph- 
 eles. The hint of this sublime scene is 
 taken from the book of Job ; and the ex- 
 
GOETHE'S FAUST. 25 
 
 change of a few words shows us, not only 
 that the same God conceived by the divine 
 author of Job is meant, but that Mephis- 
 topheles is the same spirit of evil repre- 
 sented in that by Satan. Times have 
 changed, but the devil is the same, differ- 
 ing only in the disguises which he finds it 
 convenient to assume. In Job, it will be 
 borne in mind, Satan sneeringly asks, 
 " Doth Job fear God for naught ? Hast 
 thou not made an hedge about him, and 
 about his house, and about all that he 
 hath, on every side ? Thou hast blessed 
 the work of his hands, and his substance 
 is increased in the land." { In Faust we 
 find the same sneering disposition of the 
 evil spirit ; but the subjects of his fault- 
 finding are different. Instead of the sim- 
 ple days of the patriarchs, we have now 
 the complications of modern civilization. 
 Faust is a modern Job, a faithful servant 
 of the Lord ; but, like the man of Uz, he 
 too must go through the furnace of suffer- 
 ing and temptation. The Lord of Job 
 said to Satan, " Behold, he is in thine hand ; 
 but save his life." The Lord of Faust 
 says to Mephistopheles, " So long as he 
 lives upon the earth it is not forbidden 
 thee to mislead him." And here we have 
 the fundamental argument of Faust : the 
 dark strivings of the earnest modern soul 
 under the machinations and seductions of 
 
26 GOETHE'S FAUST. 
 
 the modern spirit of evil ; or, in other 
 words, of the devil of an advanced period 
 of civilization. We observe also that this 
 modern Satan is not only not forbidden 
 the presence of the Lord, but, like the 
 Satan of Job, is made use of for a pur- 
 pose he is a part of the vast plan of a 
 beneficent God. In reality, Mephistoph- 
 eles is only the obverse side of the char- 
 acter of Faust, just as the ghost is a part 
 of the character of Hamlet; but for the 
 purposes of the poets it was necessary to 
 represent them by distinct forms. To 
 properly understand either Faust or Ham- 
 let, this great fact of the metaphysical 
 identity, so to speak, of the main person- 
 ages, distinct, yet the same or parts of the 
 same, must be borne in mind. In Job the 
 idea is similar; but the nature of that sub- 
 lime production did not admit of the visi- 
 ble separate appearance of Satan in the 
 presence of the suffering patriarch; and 
 accordingly, though the whole argument 
 of the Sacred Book is the struggle against 
 Satan ; and though we continually feel 
 what powerful assaults he is making in all 
 that Job says, yet Satan himself, as a dis- 
 tinct personage, except in the first two 
 chapters nowhere appears. 
 
 With this explanation of the great un- 
 derlying idea of Faust, as dimly indicated 
 in the prologue, we proceed to the poem 
 
GOETHE S FAUST. 2/ 
 
 itself, and seek the reason why it is divid- 
 ed into two separate parts. We observe 
 that these distinct parts are so different in 
 style, purport and character, that at first 
 sight they seem to have no relation to or 
 connection with each other. The first part 
 is generally considered plain enough, hav- 
 ing a regular plan, and the different parts 
 fitting together and forming a consistent 
 and easily comprehended whole. It makes 
 a story, and a very fine story, of itself; and 
 if the author had intended nothing more 
 than a mere play for the sake of the play 
 alone, Faust would have ended with it. 
 But Goethe did not intend a mere play ; 
 he had a magnificent plan, a portion of 
 which (that which he developed in the first 
 part) could be struck off with comparative 
 rapidity; but the other portion, that which 
 is shadowed forth in the second part, was 
 the most difficult of all literary undertak- 
 ings. It did not appear completed, as 
 we said before, until nearly sixty years 
 after the plan of the whole was formed, 
 and more than forty years after the first 
 part had been given to the world. And 
 when it did appear, and from that time to 
 this day, it has been a matter of conten- 
 tion with many critics even in Germany, 
 whether, with all its brilliant passages, it is 
 not in general a tissue of mysticism and 
 absurdity. 
 
28 GOETHE'S FAUST. 
 
 The difference of the two parts is hint- 
 ed at very early in the poem by the ex- 
 pression of Faust that two souls dwell in 
 his breast, which strive to separate one 
 from the other ; the one binding him to 
 the world, the other struggling above the 
 things of earth. And again, when Faust 
 and Mephistopheles are about to set forth 
 in company to examine and see and feel 
 what the life of man really is, Mephistoph- 
 eles promises to show Faust first the little 
 and then the great world. It is the first 
 of these, the little world, the world of the 
 senses and feelings the story of that one 
 of his two souls which binds him to physic- 
 al existence that is bodied forth in the 
 first part of the poem. In the second part 
 we have the story of the second soul that 
 which lifts itself above the senses into the 
 world of intellect and art. To borrow the 
 language of German metaphysics, the form- 
 er is the subjective, the latter the objective 
 world. In the first part there is exhibited 
 the most terrible passion ; in the second, 
 merely intellectual enthusiasm. In the 
 first part Faust woos and wins and ruins 
 Margaret, the purest and fairest of her sex, 
 the representative of earthly or physical 
 beauty and affection ; in the second he 
 woos the mere shade of the Grecian Hel- 
 en, which is conjured up out of the classic 
 world of the past, and which stands here 
 
GOETHE S FAUST. 29 
 
 as the type of spiritual or intellectual beau- 
 ty. In the first part Faust's interests and 
 endeavors are confined and limited ; the 
 theme is chiefly love and sorrow, subjects 
 comparatively easy of representation ; in 
 the second part Faust appears almost an- 
 other being, and in an entirely different 
 sphere ; the range of his interests and en- 
 deavors stretches out to the infinite ; the 
 sun rises as it were upon another world ; 
 everything is exalted and betokens a high- 
 er sort of existence ; and instead of Faust's 
 study and Margaret's chamber, and the 
 witches of the Brocken, we have the court 
 of the Emperor, the Thessalian fields, the 
 demi-gods of the classical and romantic 
 worlds, and the boundless ocean. In the 
 first part Faust's desires would seem to 
 have extended little beyond his passion for 
 Margaret; in the second part he not only 
 calls upon the whole world of art to min- 
 ister to his desires, but he even seeks to 
 lay down laws for nature. In the first part 
 Mephistopheles is all-powerful to destroy 
 and embitter; in the second he finds him- 
 self out of his element and can only play 
 a subordinate role ; and in the end, instead 
 of the beating out of brains which plays 
 so important a figure in the legend, Faust's 
 soul entirely escapes him, and rises puri- 
 fied and disenthralled into Heaven. 
 
 In the first part Faust is introduced in 
 
3O GOETHE S FAUST. 
 
 his narrow Gothic chamber, summing up 
 his causes of dissatisfaction with life in 
 somewhat the same style as Hamlet in his 
 famous soliloquy. Like Hamlet, he con- 
 templates suicide as a convenient mode of 
 making his quietus, and in fact raises the 
 poisoned chalice to his lips; but it happens 
 to be Easter morning, and the Christian 
 hymns which he hears celebrating the ris- 
 ing of the Savior of mankind, arrest his 
 purpose and awaken new hopes in his 
 bosom. Hitherto he has been a recluse 
 and a student; but now he goes forth to 
 witness the festivities of the people who 
 enjoy themselves, each according to his 
 own fancy, in the Easter season. Faust 
 would also fain enjoy, but he cannot: the 
 recluse and the student still hang about 
 him ; and as he turns away in the dusky 
 evening to return dissatisfied to his cham- 
 ber, he becomes aware of the presence of 
 a strange black dog, which frisks around, 
 joins him, follows him home, stretches 
 behind his fireplace, and finally swells out 
 and transforms himself into his true nature 
 of Mephistopheles, the evil spirit, the spirit 
 that denies and misleads. It will be ob- 
 served that this impersonation of evil is 
 not conjured up like the devil of the leg- 
 end; but comes of his own accord, as Satan 
 crept unbidden into Eden. As has been 
 intimated before, he is the reverse side of 
 
GOETHE S FAUST. 3 I 
 
 Faust's own character, the impersonation 
 of a principle which exists only in the 
 mind, or at most operates only through 
 the mind. 
 
 Mephistopheles soon makes himself 
 known ; shows that he has been invisibly 
 present with Faust in all his discontent 
 and despair; convinces him of his genu- 
 ine diabolic character, and finally proposes 
 and procures the infernal compact, by the 
 terms of which he is to become the serv- 
 ant of Faust and minister to all his desires 
 in this life, in consideration that in the 
 after life Faust shall be his bondsman. 
 The bargain being struck and properly 
 nominated and authenticated in the bond, 
 Faust hurries away from the scenes of his 
 sorrows, and he and Mephistopheles go 
 forth to make the best of existence as the} 7 
 shall find it. They dress in courtly style, 
 with plumes in their caps and swords at 
 their sides ; and as a means of locomotion 
 Mephistopheles spreads forth his cloak, 
 upon which, with the ease of wishing and 
 the rapidity of thought, they are carried 
 through the air whithersoever they will. 
 
 They make their first study of human 
 life in a famous drinking cellar in Leipsic, 
 where Mephistopheles plays magical tricks 
 upon the assembled topers, and soon sets 
 them together by the ears : a broad vein of 
 humor runs through the scene ; but this 
 
32 GOETHE'S FAUST. 
 
 phase of life, this low kind of sensual en- 
 joyment, this spectacle of the play of the 
 grosser appetites, is distasteful to Faust- 
 it could not well have been otherwise ; and 
 with a feeling of disgust he hurries away 
 from it. 
 
 The next study is of that higher kind of 
 sensual life, to the influence and power of 
 which all men are more or less subject- 
 love, the tender passion. To render Faust 
 the more susceptible, he is induced to 
 drink a juice, brewed by a disgusting hag, 
 a potion well known to the tempter, and 
 which has evidently availed for the devil's 
 peculiar purposes many times before. The 
 property of this potion is to make every 
 woman appear a Helen in Faust's eyes ; 
 and thus prepared, he meets Margaret 
 the pure, guileless, innocent and lovely 
 Margaret whom he wooes, wins, and 
 wrongs. The scenes in which the lovers 
 
 O 
 
 appear, exhibiting the rise and progress of 
 their passion, and the deepening of the 
 colors of this part of the story, from the 
 rosy tints of the first confessions of affec- 
 tion into the blackness of utter and hope- 
 less despair, are among the most powerful 
 of tragic delineations. And with the de- 
 noument of this entirely earthly or sensual 
 passion of Faust's, the first part of the 
 poem ends. It is observable that there is 
 no division of this part into separate acts : 
 
GOETHE S FAUST. 33 
 
 the scenes follow one another as parts of 
 one and the same great act, except the 
 concluding spectacles, where Margaret, 
 under condemnation of death for infanti- 
 cide, is represented in prison, a maniac ; 
 and where her final salvation, and a life 
 and love beyond what we have witnessed, 
 is significantly foreshadowed this takes 
 the form of a dream and is given as an 
 interlude. 
 
 In the second part Faust appears to 
 have entered into an entirely new exist- 
 ence, in which all that has preceded seems 
 to be forgotten or ignored, as if it had had 
 no lasting effect upon him. The sun rises 
 upon the morning twilight of a new world; 
 and Faust, who awakens as if from a Le- 
 thean dream, is surrounded and ministered 
 upon by a chorus of delicate spirits, of 
 whom the nimble Ariel is the chief. This, 
 as we understand it, is the introduction 
 into an intellectual world totally distinct 
 from the sphere of the first part. We de- 
 tect this also in the words of Faust, which 
 indicate the transposition from the sub- 
 jective to the objective condition: in other 
 words, Faust now begins to live not so 
 much in himself as in the outer world. 
 The scene very appropriately opens among 
 the Alps ; in those sublime regions where 
 nature displays herself in her grandest 
 manifestations, and man most readily feels 
 
34 GOETHE S FAUST. 
 
 his insignificance. Here Faust gives him- 
 self up to the influences of the spectacle ; 
 beholds the coming on of the sun, the 
 light of the world, and watches its rays 
 gilding one after the other the far 
 mountain-tops and gradually descending 
 into the valleys, until all are bathed in the 
 glories of the new-born day. This mag- 
 nificent picture forms a grand opening for 
 the new scenes of the drama. 
 
 We are next presented (and here the 
 plot of the second part begins) with the 
 court of an Emperor. It is, however, not 
 the Charles V. of history, but a mere tyro 
 in the art of government. It is one who 
 little regards the welfare of his people ; 
 turns a deaf ear to the disorders of his 
 empire ; seeks his own pleasures ; wishes 
 only to be amused, and listens rather to 
 the jests of his fool than the complaints of 
 his subjects. It is a picture of the greater 
 world ; the world as it is, thrown into this 
 form only because most convenient for the 
 purposes of the poet. Not that the Em- 
 peror becomes an important personage in 
 the drama ; but his weakness and love of 
 shows afford an opportunity for the de- 
 velopment of the story, and the visible 
 representation, by way of masquerades, 
 spectacles and interludes, of what other- 
 wise could not have been dramatically ex- 
 pressed. 
 
GOETPIES FAUST. 35 
 
 We have already adverted to the very 
 marked differences between the two parts 
 of the poem : the statement of those dif- 
 ferences implies that there are some simi- 
 larities. And here we notice in the first 
 act of the second part, as a counterpart of 
 the Easter festivities which figure at the 
 beginning of the first part, the introduc- 
 tion of the Carnival, with its eccentricities 
 and masquerading extravagances. The 
 Emperor in his love of amusement gives 
 himself up to the spirit of the hour; and 
 Mephistopheles, who finds means to as- 
 sume the guise and place of the court 
 fool, soon manages to ingratiate himself 
 into favor, and to take rank at the impe- 
 rial court as a chief friend and counselor, 
 a worthy minister of such a monarch. 
 
 Mephistopheles being thus established 
 in* the royal household, introduces his 
 master Faust, first as a spectator, and 
 then as an actor in the Carnival. We are 
 now presented with a series of magnificent 
 spectacles, commencing with those in which 
 the more primitive species of purely intel- 
 lectual manifestations are represented un- 
 der various symbolical and mythological 
 forms ; then running through different sta- 
 ges of intellectual or poetical progress, and 
 ending with the unequaled interlude, called 
 the Helena, which constitutes the entire 
 third act. The manner in which, out of 
 
 K* Of THE -3 
 
 TJITIVBRSITT; 
 
36 GOETHE'S FAUST. 
 
 the Emperor's luxurious ease and love of 
 amusement, the desire to behold the fa- 
 mous Helen of Greece takes its rise ; and 
 the means made use of to conjure up the 
 lovely shade ; the powerlessness of the 
 modern Mephistopheles to deal with the 
 creations of the ancient classic world ; the 
 descent of Faust into the nether regions 
 of mythology; his success; the appearance 
 of Helen in pantomime ; and the effect of 
 it all upon Faust, who much to the dissat- 
 isfaction of Mephistopheles is carried away 
 by a suddenly conceived passion for this 
 royal, all-famous beauty of the world all 
 are delineated with the most consummate 
 art. 
 
 The pantomime of Helen, which may 
 be likened in some respects to the dumb- 
 show preceding the interlude in Hamlet, 
 introduces the element of Faust's newly 
 awakened passion. He becomes enrap- 
 tured with the form which for a moment 
 coquettes in her immortal beauty before 
 his eyes ; and he is now possessed with 
 the all-absorbing desire and determination 
 to recall the real Helen, in the spirit as 
 well as in the form, from the far depths of 
 the Profound. It was only to amuse the 
 Emperor that she was in the first place 
 evoked; now Faust seeks her for himself. 
 It was the mere shade that appeared be- 
 fore; now the real Helen must be resur- 
 
GOETHE S FAUST. 37 
 
 reeled. But in this new undertaking 
 Mephistopheles is even less potent than 
 in the pantomime scenes; and a new spirit, 
 the Homunculus, a demon resembling the 
 Diable Boiteaux of Le Sage, has to be cre- 
 ated to lead the way through the classical 
 Hades to the eternal abode of the daugh- 
 ter of Jove. The composition of Homun- 
 culus in the laboratory ; his interpretation 
 of Faust's dream of Leda and the swan, 
 or the origin of Helen ; his taunting 
 speeches to Mephistopheles ; his descent 
 with Faust and Mephistopheles into the 
 classic infernal world ; their meeting with 
 the griffins and sphinxes, which favor 
 Faust but frown upon Mephistopheles ; 
 Faust's communications with Chiron, the 
 centaur, who was teacher of the Argo- 
 nauts, and who describes from actual 
 knowledge the characteristics of those 
 demi-gods ; the conversations with the old 
 Greek philosophers, Thales and Anaxago- 
 ras, representatives of the Neptunic and 
 Plutonic theories of cosmogony ; the visit 
 to the grim Nereus, the sea god ; the un- 
 masking of the inconstant Proteus; and 
 the coming of the well-beloved Galatea, 
 drawn upon her chariot of shell through 
 the ocean waves all these various scenes, 
 which represent the progress of Faust's 
 intellectual culture, are portrayed with a 
 delicacy, and yet a strength and meaning, 
 
38 GOETHE'S FAUST. 
 
 which are in vain sought in any other mod- 
 ern reproductions of mythological subjects. 
 Faust has now advanced far enough in 
 his objective cultivation to appreciate and 
 enjoy the highest culture ; and this is pre- 
 sented before us in the living, breathing, 
 speaking form of Helen ; and thus we see 
 her in the celebrated interlude of the Hel- 
 ena. She makes her appearance before 
 the palace of Menelaus, in Sparta, at the 
 time of the return of the Greeks from the 
 siege and overthrow of Troy. Mephis- 
 topheles, however, who has borrowed the 
 form of Phorcyas, one of the classical 
 witches soon induces her to believe that 
 she has been devoted by the Greeks to a 
 bloody sacrifice ; and under this apprehen- 
 sion she consents to fly from the threat- 
 ened doom. No sooner has she spoken 
 her willingness to escape than, by a sud- 
 den change of scene, she and a chorus of 
 captive Trojan women, who accompany her 
 as attendants, are transported to Faust's 
 castle, a structure of the middle ages, situ- 
 ated behind the northern mountains. Here 
 she is offered protection, and a kingdom 
 in other words : at the revival of learning 
 after the lapse of the dark ages, the classic 
 culture is welcomed with open arms. And 
 now we have Faust's high-toned courtship 
 of the royal beauty; their union; the birth 
 of Euphorion, or romantic poetry; his 
 
GOETHE S FAUST. 39 
 
 mounting of the heights ; his attempts to 
 fly, and his Icarian fate ; and finally, as a 
 conclusion of this long series of pictures, 
 the departure of Helen, who with a fare- 
 well kiss, embracing Faust, disappears, leav- 
 ing her garments in his arms. These gar- 
 ments at once dissolve into clouds ; sur- 
 round Faust ; lift him into the ether, and 
 bear him away with them ; while Mephis- 
 topheles lays aside the mask of Phorcyas 
 and steps forward as if to comment and 
 moralize upon the play. 
 
 In the beginning of the fourth act for, 
 as we said before, the Helena constitutes 
 the entire third act we are supposed to 
 have left the classical world behind us. 
 We now behold a strange cloud, which is 
 seen to come over toward the pinnacle of 
 a mountain, where it rests for a moment, 
 opens its folds, and Faust steps forth; after 
 which, again rising, it floats off, assuming 
 different shapes, and finally settles in the 
 far east, formless and magnificent like a 
 distant iceberg. This significant cloud, as 
 can easily be gathered from the plot, was 
 once the garments of the Grecian Helen ; 
 in other words, it represents the rhetoric 
 of the classic culture, all that Helen left 
 when she returned again into the bosom 
 of the Past. 
 
 As Faust stands upon the mountain 
 and here, as has been already intimated, 
 
40 GOETHE S FAUST. 
 
 we have evidently arrived at a much newer 
 degree of culture a seven-leagued boot 
 gropes its way up toward him, and pres- 
 ently a second one follows ; they bring 
 Mephistopheles, who descends from them ; 
 after which the boots hurry away and are 
 seen no more. After they have served the 
 purposes of the skeptic doubt and denial, 
 these monsters and all they represent van- 
 ish. The scene, which now takes place 
 between Faust and Mephistopheles, resem- 
 bles the temptation described by the Evan- 
 gelist ; the evil spirit points out and offers 
 all the kingdoms of the world, and the 
 glory of them ; but Faust, cultivated as he 
 now is, rejects the offer and suddenly be- 
 comes animated with the new and magnifi- 
 cent idea of restraining the inroads of the 
 ocean, which he beholds encroaching upon 
 the land, and winning for himself a realm 
 in the reclaimed territory a poetical con- 
 ception pregnant with meaning and unsur- 
 passed for sublimity. To prepare the way 
 for this grand project, the Emperor is again 
 introduced, but in an altered condition from 
 that in which we first saw him.' Since that 
 time his concerns have fared badly. In the 
 beginning of his intercourse with Mephis- 
 topheles, being sadly in want of the where- 
 withal to maintain his authority and sup- 
 port his expensive love of shows, the latter 
 invented paper money, the appearance of 
 
GOETHE S FAUST. 41 
 
 value without the substance ; and for a 
 while all went well. But this scrip, this at 
 that time new invention of the devil, was 
 soon found not to be a genuine circulating 
 medium; there was no gold in the impe- 
 rial exchequer to redeem it ; the cheat and 
 delusion was soon exposed ; everything has 
 again fallen into disorder ; and, to make 
 all worse, a new Emperor has now been 
 chosen ; rebellion stalks abroad, and loyal 
 and disloyal forces confront each other in 
 the imminent deadly field. This conjunct- 
 ure of affairs presents the proper moment 
 for the adventurers, Faust and Mephistoph- 
 eles, to advance : they offer their services 
 to the Emperor; enter the lists on his 
 side ; fight his battles and overthrow his 
 enemies. The spoils are immense ; and 
 in the distribution of them, Faust, as the 
 reward of his assistance, receives a grant 
 of the ocean strand, which thus becomes 
 his own to reclaim and possess. 
 
 Between the end of the fourth and the 
 beginning of the fifth act, a great space of 
 time is supposed to have intervened, dur- 
 ing which Faust has succeeded in dyking 
 out the ocean and reclaiming his territo- 
 ries. From the balconies of his palace, 
 which he has built in his newly made 
 ground, he looks abroad over a wide pros- 
 pect of land and sea, and can call it all his 
 own all except the cottage, chapel and 
 
 6 
 
42 GOETHE S FAUST. 
 
 garden of Philemon and Baucis, a poor 
 and pious old couple, which impede his 
 prospect and are an eye-sore to him. The 
 ringing of their chapel bell is particularly 
 annoying, as it reminds him that the con- 
 tinuity of his possessions is not unbroken. 
 He would willingly purchase, but the old 
 couple will not sell ; and it seems that 
 nothing will induce them to give up their 
 patriarchal possessions and beloved linden 
 trees. And now, like Ahab, King of Sa- 
 maria, who lusted after the vineyard of his 
 neighbor Naboth, Faust lusts after the 
 garden of Philemon ; and like Jezebel, the 
 wicked Queen, who caused Naboth to be 
 stoned till he died, and presented her lord 
 with the coveted estate, Mephistopheles 
 finds means to burn the cottage of Phile- 
 mon to the ground, and presents to his 
 master the unobstructed view. But here 
 the parallel ceases; here Faust rises in the 
 majesty of his manhood and the perfec- 
 tion of his culture ; for, however much 
 annoyed he has been by the neighborhood 
 of the uncompromising old couple, he in- 
 dignantly disowns the robbery and curses 
 the wanton destruction of their posses- 
 sions. Here he stands justified before us, 
 a noble spectacle, a just man. To this ex- 
 cellence has his intellect advanced that 
 it has reached and assimilated the highest 
 and noblest principles of morals as a part 
 
o ^ 
 
 UFI7IESITT 
 
 GOETHE'S FAUST. 
 
 of itself. Farther than this, man can not 
 go ; it is the last step of intellectual prog- 
 ress ; and accordingly, his work of devel- 
 opment being done, Faust's term of exist- 
 ence draws on apace. The ailments of 
 extreme age beset him, and Care blows her 
 withering and blinding breath ; but he still 
 takes an animated part in the labors of 
 firmly establishing the new realms, which 
 he has gained from the ocean; and he 
 fondly looks forward to the time when 
 they shall become the free and happy home 
 of future millions, to whom he devotes 
 them. All this constitutes a sublime pic- 
 ture of benevolence and humanity, the 
 bloom and flower of all the objective cul- 
 ture, whose strange history we have thus 
 been following. 
 
 We now come to the last, dread, inevita- 
 ble hour. It will have been observed that, 
 in the compact with the evil spirit, accord- 
 ing to the poem, there was no term of life 
 agreed upon, as in the legend ; the condi- 
 tion simply was that Mephistopheles might 
 claim his pledge when Faust should say to 
 the passing moment. " Stay, thou art beau- 
 tiful !" in other words, whenever he should 
 feel a pleasure and enjoyment in life. And 
 here, at last, in the fruition of his strivings; 
 in the contemplation of the conquests he 
 has made from the ocean, the emblem of 
 the infinite ; in the joyful and glorious an- 
 
44 GOETHE S FAUST. 
 
 ticipation of the immortal reward of his 
 widely benevolent and humane undertak- 
 ings here, at last, he feels that he enjoys; 
 and he exclaims to the moment, " Stay, 
 thou art fair!" And with these words, 
 which Mephistopheles, with all his prof- 
 fered pleasures, could not wring from him, 
 and which are called forth only by the en- 
 joyment of what of good and great he has 
 himself accomplished, he expires. 
 
 In all this second part of the poem, 
 which, as we observed before, is an attempt 
 to represent under visible forms intellect- 
 ual or spiritual culture, everything neces- 
 sarily takes a symbolical or allegorical form ; 
 and the story, or series of stories, illustra- 
 tive of the character and purposes of art, 
 science and morals, are shadowed forth in 
 the most subtle but masterly pictures. To 
 adequately describe in prose, if they could 
 at all be described in prose, the number- 
 less meanings that are conveyed to the 
 studied mind by this matchless poetry, 
 would require commentary after commen- 
 tary. It is with a lavish hand that the poet 
 has scattered the treasures of his gigantic 
 genius through every scene, and through- 
 out the whole poem kept steadily in view 
 the sublime conclusion. For, from the be- 
 ginning to the end, the general plan and 
 purport of the whole was ever present to 
 the- poet ; and every part has been worked 
 
GOETHE S FAUST. 45 
 
 out in view of the final justification and 
 salvation of the soul. From the begin- 
 ning of the poem, indeed, it might have 
 been anticipated that Faust's end would be 
 far different from the bloody catastrophe 
 depicted in the legend. It might have 
 been foreseen that in the providence of 
 the Lord, described in the prologue, the 
 struggling soul would in the end rise supe- 
 rior to the spirit of evil. Tried in the hot- 
 test fires of tribulation, the earnest soul is 
 destined for immortality, not death. And 
 here, accordingly, when Faust expires, 
 happy in the consciousness and satisfac- 
 tion of his good works ; though, by the 
 strict letter of his compact, Mephistoph- 
 eles may claim him, and marshals his min- 
 ions to seize the soul as it issues from its 
 mortal frame, his efforts are in vain. All 
 are crowded aside by the angels of light, 
 in the midst of whom his spirit, divested 
 of all earthliness, rises into a blessed eter- 
 nity. The gates of Heaven are thrown 
 open ; and the kindred spirit of the pure 
 and angelic Margaret comes forward to 
 welcome and minister forever upon the 
 noble but sorely-tried character which in 
 life she loved. The power of poetry seems 
 to have reached its acme in these scenes 
 at the close of the poem. Nothing per- 
 haps in the whole range of poetic litera- 
 ture excels the last few pages, particularly 
 
46 GOETHE'S FAUST. 
 
 the grateful outpourings of the spirit of 
 Margaret in Heaven, the poetical repre- 
 sentation, if we may so term it, of Chris- 
 tian redemption. 
 
 It will thus be seen, even from this brief 
 and necessarily imperfect sketch of the 
 poem, that the subject, as Goethe has treat- 
 ed it, is one of the most deeply interesting 
 and important within the who'e scope of 
 human endeavor. As it has been some- 
 where said that there is nothing that the 
 mind of man can conceive, however shad- 
 owy, which literature will not attempt to 
 describe or portray, however difficult ; so 
 we look upon this magnificent poem as 
 the attempt, and we believe the successful 
 attempt, to represent this most shadowy 
 and difficult of subjects the struggle of 
 the soul of man in its aspirations toward 
 spiritual light. It is a subject which can 
 be adequately represented only by poetry, 
 and perhaps only by poetry of symbolical 
 or figurative character. It is the attempt 
 to represent by poetic figures and light, 
 delicate suggestive symbols, great moral 
 and metaphysical truths truths toward 
 which morals and metaphysics, as sciences, 
 tend and point, and for the sake of which 
 alone they are valuable ; but truths which, 
 as mere sciences, they fail and must ever 
 fail to express. 
 
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