"
The early seers and poets had not attained to this sublime
superciliousness of self-contempt; for this, of course, is a fruit to be
borne only by the "progress of the species." They are still weak enough
to believe in gods and godlike men, in spirit and inspiration, in the
ineffable fulness and meaning of a noble life, in the cosmic
relationship of man, in the _divineness_ of speech and thought. In their
books man is placed in a large light; honor and estimation come to him
out of the heavens; what he does, if it be in any profound way
characteristic, is told without misgiving, without fear to be
superfluous; he is the care, or even the companion, of the immortals. To
go forth, therefore, from our little cells of criticism and controversy,
and to enter upon the pages where man's being appears so spacious and
significant,--where, at length, it is really _imagined_,--is like
leaving stove-heated, paper-walled rooms, and passing out beneath the
blue cope and into the sweet air of heaven.
Quite this epic boldness and wholeness we cannot attribute to Goethe.
Pages:
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240