GOETHE'S SONGS. 



SOME idea of the merits of Goethe may be formed by a glance at 

 the list of his multitudinous works. These consist of lyrical poems 

 of different descriptions ; natural, sentimental, and caustic epigrams ; 

 songs of a light and cheerful description ; others full of the most pro- 

 found feeling, hiding under a thin veil the most earnest seriousness ; 

 elegies after the ancient and modern taste ; odes which deserve to be 

 reckoned among the loftiest productions of that kind of writing ; 

 romances and ballads, some gay and some sad ; Idylls, full of grace, 

 tenderness, and depth of feeling ; three romances, each in a different 

 tone, style, and spirit : Werther, lyrical and sentimental ; Wilhelm 

 Meister, natural and epic ; the Apprenticeship, tragical ; tragedies, 

 in each of which a different inspiration pervades, and which it is dif- 

 ficult to imagine the productions of the same mind : Gotz von Ber- 

 lichingen, full of true-hearted ancient German simplicity, but also 

 strength and dignity; a Shakesperian composition, wild as the 

 German mountain, yet with a unity of design and effect like the 

 straggling domes and spires of Strasburgh cathedral; Egmont, 

 breathing more of the south, seeming at times to overstep all truth 

 and nature, and to wander into the fantastic ; Clavigo, in his bour- 

 geois sphere, transplanted from the French tragic theatre ; Iphigenia, 

 full of Grecian ideality ; Tasso, of Italian warmth and mildness, of 

 grace and tenderness, and yet not devoid of power and dignity ; 

 Eugenia, with its polish and metaphysical analysis; Faust, in which 

 he is supposed to have reached the summit of his power ; The Acces- 

 sory ; The Humour of Lovers, so true to the French comic stage ; 

 Stella, with its southern glow ; the Sisters with their German cor- 

 diality; Erwin and Elmira, with their romantic flights; The Triumph 

 of Sentiment, with its wit and wonderful force of truth ; The Fan- 

 tastical Lila ; the singular Claudine von Villa Bella ; The Pastoral, 

 Serand Vatchj ; The Artist's Pilgrimage and Apotheosis, so unpre- 

 tending, and yet so deep and full of meaning ; Palseophron and 

 Eoterpe, &c. He has left specimens of the drama in all its forms, 

 and yet as an epic writer Goethe is by no means contemptible ; as 

 witness, in addition to his three romances above-mentioned, his 

 Homeric epic, Herman and Dorothea, or the Fragment of Achilleis, 

 or his smaller poetical tales and descriptions in the manner of Hans 

 Sachsen. That no field of poetry might remain unattempted by him, 

 he next appears as a didactic poet, in his epistles after the manner of 

 Horace. Such and so various has Goethe been as a poet ; but what 

 has he not also done for art and its improvement in his several 

 writings, more especially in his Appendix to Benvenuto Cellini's 

 Memoirs ; his strictures upon Winkelman and his times ; in his letters 

 from Italy ; and in his correspondence with Meyer as a Weimar 

 amateur ! Among his heterogeneous labours he has a work upon the 

 Metamorphoses of Plants, and a valuable treatise upon Optics and 

 Colours. That he should have written upon a legal subject was by 



