Page:The Works of J. W. von Goethe, Volume 7.djvu/19

 INTRODUCTION xi

in his drama before us as vividly as could have been done by the chisel of Phidias or the pencil of Titian. We are grateful for the rich series of pictures which he has passed before our eyes, but they leave no im- pression on our heart like the ineradicable pang of one such stroke of pathos as Margaret's

"Bin ich doch noch so Jung, so jung! Und soil schon sterben!"

Again, for those who seek in the "Faust" a solution of the great problem of life, the result at which Goethe seems to arrive is, we venture to think, neither very startling nor very novel. It is no more than the truth, which wise men of all ages have preached, that by those who aspire beyond the enjoyment of selfish tastes, intellectual or sensual happiness is only to be reached through active beneficence, through the application of knowledge and power to the welfare of mankind. While Faust pored in his study over musty volumes of medicine, jurisprudence, and theology, the accumu- lation of such knowledge as they taught brought only bitterness of heart, and a feeling that it satisfied none of the higher aspirations of his nature. When Faust, in his old age, takes to reclaiming land from the sea, to building harbours, and making hundreds of his fellow creatures happy, then the cravings of his heart are for the first time satisfied. With the prospect before him of the good to follow from his philanthropic schemes, he sees the moment at hand, which in his study he had not believed could ever come, when he should say to it —

"Verweile doch! du bist so schon!"

and be content to die. It is not Mephistopheles, but Faust's own internal development, that has wrought