Poetry and Philosophy of Goethe (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1887 Excerpt: ... becomes one with the movement of mankind. This idea was caught by Goethe distinctly from his study of Nature, out of which he transported it into Literature. But it has been the driving-wheel of all Occidental civilization in contrast with Oriental fixity. Its first expression is in the Greek Theogony, in which time after time, a system of higher Gods supplants a system of lower Gods, so that in oldest Hellas Theology was a progressive science, which it has hardly been since. But its completest spiritual expression is found in German Philosophy, from Leibnitz to Hegel, to the last of whom, verily the last German Philosopher, this idea was the all-in-all, the soul of his dialectic, and the world was simply the unfolding of the idea into reality. Hegel is indeed in many ways the philosophic counterpart of Goethe. It is true Goethe disclaimed being a philosopher, and declared that he had "no philosophical organ;" still, as W. Von Humboldt told him, and as Schiller intimates, he was a philosopher, only his manner of philosophizing was different from the ordinary way, and the abstract metaphysical method was repugnant to him. Who can read his books and not see that he is a great thinker and is occupying himself with the profoundest problems of thought? Metaphysical cobwebs, spun for the sake of spinning, or to catch some wandering insect he took no delight in, nor does any earnest healthy human soul. He is the poet of culture by virtue of his thought; he is no Burns, singing native wood melodies like the bird on the branch, which sounds so delightful to the ear of the passing traveler; but one gets tired of bird-music, however sweet, and in fact one has not the time to listen to it long. Far different is the Faust strain of Goethe, it is the choral an...