Page:The Works of J. W. von Goethe, Volume 12.djvu/21

Rh introduced to better pieces of art, he one day, not without a most mysterious look, took me to a case, which, being opened, displayed a life-size Danae receiving in her lap the golden shower. I was amazed at the splendour of the limbs, the magnificence of the posture and arrangement, the intense tenderness and the intellectuality of the sensual object; and yet I did but stand before it in silent contemplation. It did not excite in me that rapture, that delight, that inexpressible pleasure. My friend, who went on descanting upon the merits of the picture, was too full of his own enthusiasm to notice my coldness, and delighted to have an opportunity of pointing out to me in this painting the distinctive excellences of the Italian school.

But the sight of this picture has not made me happy: it has made me uneasy. What! said I to myself,—in what a strange case do we civilised men find ourselves, with our many conventional restraints! A mossy rock, a waterfall, rivets my eye so long that I can tell everything about it,—its heights, its cavities, its lights and shades, its hues, its blending tints, and reflections: all is distinctly present to my mind, and, whenever I please, comes vividly before me in a most happy imitation. But of that masterpiece of Nature, the human frame, of the order and symmetry of the limbs,—of all this I have but a very general notion, which, in fact, is no notion at all. My imagination presents to me anything but a vivid image of this glorious structure; and, when art presents an imitation of it to my eye, it awakens in me no sensation, and I am unable to judge of the merits of the picture. No, I will remain no longer in this state of stupidity. I will stamp on my mind the shape of man, as well as that of a cluster of grapes, or of a peach-tree.

I induced Ferdinand to bathe in the lake. What a glorious shape my friend has! How duly proportioned all his limbs are! what fulness of form! what