Page:The Works of J. W. von Goethe, Volume 5.djvu/105

Rh whom they might hope the best: they would willingly, not to delay the affair, allow me to dispute on theses. I could afterward publish my treatise, either in its present condition or more elaborated, in Latin, or in another language. This would everywhere be easy to me as a private man and a Protestant, and I should have the pleasure of an applause more pure and more general. I scarcely concealed from the good man what a stone his discourse rolled from my heart: at every new argument which he advanced, that he might not trouble me nor make me angry by his refusal, my mind grew more and more easy, and so did his own at last, when, quite unexpectedly, I offered no resistance to his reasons, but, on the contrary, found them extremely obvious, and promised to conduct myself according to his counsel and guidance. I therefore sat down again with my repetent. Theses were chosen and printed: and the disputation, with the opposition of my fellow boarders, went off with great merriment, and even with facility; for my old habit of turning over the Corpus Juris was very serviceable to me, and I could pass for a well-instructed man. A good feast, according to custom, concluded the solemnity.

My father, however, was very dissatisfied that the little work had not been regularly printed as a disputation; because he had hoped that I should gain honour by it on my entrance into Frankfort. He therefore wished to publish it specially; but I represented to him that the subject, which was only sketched, could be more completely carried out at some future time. He put up the manuscript carefully for this purpose, and many years afterward I saw it among his papers.

I took my degree on the 6th August, 1771; and on the following day Schöpflin died, in the seventy-fifth year of his age. Even without closer contact, he had had an important influence upon me; for eminent contemporaries may be compared to the greater stars,