Page:The Works of J. W. von Goethe, Volume 5.djvu/30

16 vex me, but made me feel uncomfortable. Yet since I knew how to value highly everything that contributed to my own cultivation, and as I had often given up former opinions and inclinations, I soon accommodated myself, and only sought, as far as it was possible for me from my point of view, to distinguish just blame from unjust invectives. And thus no day passed that had not been, in the most fruitful manner, instructive to me.

I was made acquainted by him with poetry from quite a different side, in another light than heretofore, and one, too, which suited me well. The poetic art of the Hebrews, which he treated ingeniously after his predecessor Lowth,—popular poetry, the traditions of which in Alsace he urged us to search after; and the oldest records existing as poetry,—all bore witness that poetry in general was a gift to the world and to nations, and not the private inheritance of a few refined, cultivated men. I swallowed all this; and the more eager I was in receiving, the more liberal was he in giving, so that we spent the most interesting hours together. The other natural studies which I had begun, I endeavoured to continue; and as one always has time enough, if one will apply it well, so amongst them all I succeeded in doing twice or thrice as much as usual. As to the fulness of those few weeks during which we lived together, I can well say, that all which Herder has gradually produced since was then announced in the germ, and that I thereby fell into the fortunate condition that I could completely attach to something higher, and expand all that I had hitherto thought, learned, and made my own. Had Herder been methodical, I should have found the most precious guide for giving a durable tendency to my cultivation; but he was more inclined to examine and stimulate than to lead and conduct. Thus he at first made me acquainted with Hamann's writings, upon