Goethe's World View
GA 6
Part I.4: Goethe and the Platonic World View
[ 1 ] I have described the development of thought from Plato's time to Kant's in order to be able to show what impressions Goethe had to receive when he turned to the results of the philosophical thoughts to which he had recourse in order to satisfy his powerful need for knowledge. For the innumerable questions to which his nature urged him, he found no answers in the philosophies. In fact, every time he delved into the world view of some philosopher, an antithesis manifested itself between the direction his questions took and the thought world from which he sought counsel. The reason for this lies in the fact that the one-sided Platonic separation of idea and experience was repugnant to his nature. When he observed nature, it then brought ideas to meet him. He therefore could only think it to be filled with ideas. A world of ideas, which does not permeate the things of nature, which does not bring forth their appearing and disappearing, their becoming and growing, is for him a powerless web of thoughts. The logical spinning out of lines of thought, without descending into the real life and creative activity of nature seems to him unfruitful. For he feels himself intimately intertwined with nature. He regards himself as a living pan of nature. What arises within his spirit, according to his view, nature has allowed to arise within him. Man should not place himself in some corner and believe that he could there spin out of himself a web of thoughts which explains the being of things. He should continuously let the stream of world happening flow through himself. Then he will feel that the world of ideas is nothing other than the creative and active power of nature. He will not want to stand above the things in order to think about them, but rather he will delve into their depths and raise out of them what lives and works within them.
[ 2 ] Goethe's artistic nature led him to this way of thinking. He felt his poetic creations grow forth out of his personality with the same necessity with which a flower blossoms. The way the spirit brought forth a work of art in him seemed to him to be no different than the way nature produces its creations. And as in the work of art the spiritual element is inseparable from its spiritless material, so also it was impossible for him, with a thing of nature, to picture the perception without the idea. A view therefore seemed foreign to him which saw in a perception only something unclear, confused, and which wanted to regard the world of ideas as separate and cleansed of all experience. He felt, in every world view in which the elements of one-sidedly understood Platonism lived, something contrary to nature. Therefore he could not find in the philosophers what he sought from them. He sought the ideas which live in the things and which let all the single things of experience appear as though growing forth out of a living whole, and the philosophers provided him with thought hulls which they had tied together into systems according to logical principles. Again and again he found himself thrown back upon himself when he sought from others the explanations to the riddles with which nature presented him.
[ 3 ] Among the things which caused Goethe suffering before his Italian journey was the fact that his need for knowledge could find no satisfaction. In Italy he was able to form a view for himself about the driving forces out of which works of art come. He recognized that in perfect works of art is contained that which human beings revere as something divine, as something eternal. After looking at artistic creations which particularly interest him, he writes the words, “The great works of art have at the same time been brought forth by human beings according to true and natural laws, as the greatest works of nature. Everything that is arbitrary, thought up, falls away; there is necessity, there is God.” The art of the Greeks drew forth this statement from him: “I suspect that the Greeks proceeded according to precisely those laws by which nature itself proceeds and whose tracks I am pursuing.” What Plato believed he found in the world of ideas, what the philosophers were never able to bring home to Goethe, this looked out at him from the works of art of Italy. In art there reveals itself to Goethe for the first time in a perfect form what he can regard as the basis of knowledge. He sees in artistic production one kind, and a higher level, of the working of nature; artistic creating is for him a heightened creating of nature. He later expressed this in his characterization of Winckelmann: “... inasmuch as man is placed at the pinnacle of nature, he then regards himself again as an entire nature, which yet again has to bring forth within itself a pinnacle. To this end he enhances himself, by imbuing himself with every perfection and virtue, summons choice, order, harmony, and meaning, and finally lifts himself to the production of works of art ...” Goethe attains his world view not on a path of logical deduction but rather through contemplation of the being of art. And what he found in art, this he seeks also in nature.
[ 4 ] The activity by which Goethe takes possession of a knowledge about something in nature is not essentially different from artistic activity. Both merge into one another and extend over one another. The artist must, in Goethe's view, become greater and more decisive when, in addition to having “talent he is a trained botanist as well, when, starting with the roots, he knows what influence the various parts have upon the growth and development of the plant, what they do and how they mutually affect each other, when he has insight into, and reflects upon, the successive development of flowers, leaves, pollination, fruit and new seed. He will thereupon not merely reveal, through what he selects from the phenomena, his own tastes, but rather through a correct presentation of individual characteristics, he will also make us feel wonder and teach us at the same time.” According to this, a work of art is all the more perfect the more there comes to expression in it the same lawfulness that is contained in the work of nature to which it corresponds. There is only one unified realm of truth, and this comprises art and nature. Therefore the capacity for artistic creativity can also not be essentially different from the capacity to know nature. Goethe says about the style of the artist that it “rests upon the deepest foundations of knowledge, upon the being of things, insofar as we are permitted to know it in forms we can see and grasp.” The way of looking at things which comes from Platonic conceptions taken up in a one-sided way draws a sharp line between science and art. It lets artistic activity rest upon fantasy, upon feeling; scientific findings should be the result of the development of concepts free of any fantasy. Goethe pictures the matter differently. When he turns his eye upon nature, there results for him a. number of ideas; but he finds that, within the individual object of experience, its ideal component is not closed off; the idea points beyond the individual object to related objects, in which it comes to manifestation in a similar way. The philosophizing observer holds fast to this ideal component and brings it to expression directly in his thought creations. This ideal element also works upon the artist. But it moves him to shape a work, in which the idea does not merely work as it does within a work of nature but rather comes to direct manifestation. That which, in the work of nature, is merely ideal and reveals itself to the spiritual eye of the observer, becomes real in the work of art, it becomes perceptible reality. The artist realizes the ideas of nature. But he does not need to bring these to consciousness for himself in the form of ideas. When he contemplates a thing or an event, there then takes shape immediately within his spirit something else, which Contains in real manifestation what the thing or event contains only as idea. The artist gives us pictures of the works of nature which transform the idea content of these works into a content of perception. The philosopher shows how nature presents itself to thinking contemplation; the artist shows how nature would look if it openly brought the forces working in it not merely to meet thinking but also to meet perception. It is one and the same truth which the philosopher presents in the form of thought, the artist in the form of a picture. The two differ only in their means of expression. [ 5 ] The insight into the true relationship of idea and experience which Goethe acquired in Italy is only the fruit from the seed which lay hidden in his natural predisposition. His Italian journey brought him that warmth of sun which was able to bring the seed to maturity. In the essay “Nature,” which in 1782 appeared in the Tiefurt Journal, and whose author was Goethe (see my indication of Goethe's authorship in Volume 7 of the publications of the Goethe Society), there are already to be found the seeds of the later Goethean world view. What is here dim feeling later becomes clear definite thought. “Nature! We are surrounded and embraced by her—unable to take ourselves out of her, and unable to enter more deeply into her. She takes us up, unasked and unwarned, into the orbit of her dance and drives herself on with us, until we are exhausted and fall from her arms ... she (nature) has thought and muses continuously; but not as a human being, rather as nature ... She has no language nor speech, but she creates tongues and hearts, through which she feels and speaks ... I did not speak of her. No, what is true and false, everything, she has spoken. Everything is her fault, everything is to her credit!” As Goethe wrote down these sentences, it was still not yet clear to him how nature expresses her ideal being through man; but he did feel that it is the voice of the spirit of nature which sounds in the spirit of man.
[ 6 ] In Italy, Goethe found the spiritual atmosphere in which his organs of knowledge could develop themselves, as they, in accordance with their predisposition, would have to if he were to become fully satisfied. In Rome he “discussed art and its theoretical demands a great deal with Moritz”; as he traveled and observed the metamorphosis of plants, a method, in accordance with nature, took shape within him which later proved itself to be fruitful for gaining knowledge of all organic nature. “For as the vegetation presented its behavior to me step by step, I could not go wrong, but, while letting it be, I had to recognize the ways and means by which it can gradually help even the most hidden condition to develop to perfection.” Only a few years after his return from Italy he succeeded in finding a way of looking at inorganic nature also, born of his spiritual needs. “During physical research the conviction forced itself on me that, in any contemplation of objects, our highest duty is to search out exactly every determining factor under which a phenomenon appears and to aim for the greatest possible completeness of phenomena, because the phenomena are ultimately constrained to connect themselves to each other, or rather to reach over into each other, and they do form, as the researcher looks at them, a kind of organization; they must manifest their whole inner life.”
[ 7 ] Goethe did not find enlightenment anywhere. He had to enlighten himself. He sought the reason for this and believed to have found it in his lack of an organ for philosophy in the real sense. The reason, however, is to be sought in the fact that the Platonic way of thinking, grasped one-sidedly, which held sway in all the philosophies accessible to him, was contrary to his healthy natural disposition. In his youth he had repeatedly turned to Spinoza. He admits, in fact, that this philosopher had always had a “peaceful effect” upon him. This is based on the fact that Spinoza regards the universe as a great unity and thinks of everything individual as going forth necessarily out of the whole. But when Goethe let himself into the content of Spinoza's philosophy, he felt nevertheless that this content remained alien to him. “But do not think that I would have liked to subscribe to his writings and profess them literally. For, I had already all too clearly recognized that no one understands another, that no one, in relation to the same words, thinks the same thing that another does, that a conversation or a reading stimulate different trains of thought in different people; and one will certainly tryst the author of Werther and Faust, deeply aware as he is of such misunderstandings, not to harbor the presumption of perfectly understanding as a man who, as student of Descartes, has raised himself through mathematical and rabbinical training to the pinnacle of thinking; who, right up to the present day, still seems to be the goal of all speculative efforts.” But what made him for Goethe a philosopher to whom he still could not surrender himself completely was not the fact that Spinoza was schooled by Descartes, and also not the fact that he had raised himself through mathematical and rabbinical training to the pinnacle of thinking but rather his purely logical way, estranged from reality, of dealing with knowledge. Goethe could not surrender to pure thinking free of experience, because he was not able to separate it from the totality of what is real. He did not want, merely logically, to join one thought onto another. Rather, such an activity of thought seemed to him to lead away from true reality. He had to immerse his spirit into experience in order to come to the idea. The reciprocal working of idea and perception was for him a spiritual breathing. “Time is ruled by swings of the pendulum, the moral and scientific world by the reciprocal movement of idea and experience.” To regard the world and its phenomena in the sense of this statement seemed natural to Goethe, because for him there was no doubt about the fact that nature follows the same procedure: that it “is a development from a living mysterious whole” to the manifold particular phenomena which fill space and time. The mysterious whole is the world of the idea. “The idea is eternal and single; that we also use the plural is not appropriate. Everything of which we become aware and about which we are able to speak is only a manifestation of the idea; concepts are what we speak, and to this extent the idea itself is a concept.” Nature's creating goes from the whole, which is ideal in character, into the particular given to perception as something real. Therefore the observer should “recognize what is ideal within the real and allay his momentary discontent with what is finite by raising himself to the infinite.” Goethe is convinced that “nature proceeds according to ideas in the same way that man, in everything he undertakes, pursues an idea.” When a person really succeeds in raising himself to the idea and, taking his start from the idea, succeeds in grasping the particulars of perception, he then accomplishes the same thing that nature does when it lets its creations go forth out of the mysterious whole. As long as a person does not feel the working and creating of the idea, his thinking remains separated from living nature. He must then regard his thinking as a merely subjective activity, which can sketch an abstract picture of nature. As soon as he feels, however, how the idea lives and is active within his inner life, he looks upon himself and nature as one whole, and what appears as something subjective in his inner life has objective validity for him as well; he knows that he no longer confronts nature as a stranger but rather feels himself grown together with the whole of it. The subjective has become objective; the objective has become entirely permeated with spirit. Goethe is of the opinion that Kant's basic error consists of the fact that he “regards the subjective ability to know as an object itself and, sharply indeed but not entirely correctly, he distinguishes the point where subjective and objective meet.” The ability to know appears subjective to a person only so long as he does not heed the fact that it is nature itself that speaks through this ability. Subjective and objective meet when the objective world of ideas arises within the subject and when there lives in the spirit of man that which is active in nature itself. When that is the case, then all antithesis between subjective and objective ceases. This antithesis has significance only so long a person maintains it artificially, only so long as he regards ideas as his thoughts, through which the being of nature is mirrored but in which this being itself is not at work. Kant and the Kantians had no inkling of the fact that, in the ideas of our reason the being, the “in-itself” of things is experienced directly. For them everything of an ideal nature is merely something subjective. They therefore came to the opinion that what is ideal could be necessarily valid only when that to which it relates, the world of experience, is also only subjective. The Kantian way of thinking stands in sharp opposition to Goethe's views. There are, it is true, isolated statements of Goethe's in which he speaks approvingly of Kant's views. He tells of having been present at many conversations on these views. “With a certain amount of attentiveness I was able to notice that the old cardinal question was being revived as to how much our self and how much the outer world contributes to our spiritual existence. I had never separated the two, and when, in my way, I philosophized about things, I did so with unconscious naivety and really believed that I saw my conclusions before my very eyes. But as soon as that dispute arose in the discussion, I liked to range myself on the side which does man the most honor, and fully applauded all the friends who maintained, with Kant, that even though all our knowledge begins with experience, still it does not for that reason all spring from experience.” In Goethe's view the idea also does not stem from that part of experience which presents itself to mere perception through the senses of man. Reason, fantasy, must be active, must penetrate into the inner life of beings in order to take possession of the ideal elements of existence. To that extent the spirit of man partakes in the coming about of knowledge. Goethe believes it does man honor that within his spirit the higher reality which is not accessible to his senses comes to manifestation; Kant, on the other hand, denies the world of experience any character of higher reality, because it contains parts which stem from our spirit. Only when he first reinterpreted Kant's principles in the light of his world view could Goethe relate himself favorably to them. The basic elements of Kant's way of thinking are in sharpest opposition to Goethe's nature. If he did not emphasize this opposition sharply enough, that is certainly only due to the fact that he did not involve himself with these basic elements because they were too alien to him. “It was the opening part (of the Critique of Pure Reason) which appealed to me; I dared not venture into the labyrinth itself: sometimes my poetic gift hindered me, sometimes my common sense, and nowhere did I feel myself changed for the better.” About his conversations with the Kantians Goethe had to confess, “They certainly heard me but had no answer for me nor could be in any way helpful. It happened to me more than once that one or another of them, with smiling wonderment, admitted that what I said was analogous to the Kantian way of picturing things, but strange.” It was, as I have shown, in fact not analogous but rather most emphatically opposite to the Kantian way of picturing things.
[ 8 ] It is interesting to see how Schiller seeks to shed light for himself upon the antithesis between the Goethean way of thinking and his own. He feels what is original and free in the Goethean world view, but he cannot rid his own spirit of its one-sidedly grasped Platonic elements of thought. He cannot raise himself to the insight that idea and perception are not present within reality in a state of separation from each other but rather are only artificially thought to be separated by an intellect which has been led astray by ideas steered in a false direction. Therefore in contrast to the Goethean way of thinking, which Schiller calls an intuitive one, he sets up his own way, as a speculative one, and declares that both ways, if they only work strongly enough, must lead to one and the same goal. Schiller supposes of the intuitive spirit that he holds to the empirical, to the individual, and from there ascends to the law, to the idea In the case where such a spirit is a genius, he will recognize what is necessary within the empirical, the species within the individual. The speculative spirit, on the other hand, supposedly goes in the opposite direction. The law, the idea, is supposedly given to him first, and from it he descends to the empirical and the individual. If such a spirit is a genius, then he will, in fact, always have only species in view, but with the possibility of life and with a well-founded connection to real objects. The supposition that there is a particular way of thinking, the speculative in contrast to the intuitive, rests upon the belief that the world of ideas is thought to have an isolated existence separate from the world of perception. Were this the case, then there could be a way for the content of ideas about perceptible things to come into the spirit, even if the spirit did not seek it within experience. If, however, the world of ideas is inseparably bound up with the reality of experience, if both are present only as one whole, then there can only be an intuitive knowledge which seeks the idea within experience and which also grasps the species along with the individual. In truth there is also no purely speculative spirit in Schiller's sense. For the species exist only within the sphere to which the individuals also belong; and the spirit absolutely cannot find them anywhere else. If a so-called speculative spirit really has ideas of species, then these stem from observation of the real world. If one's living feeling for this origin, for the necessary connection of species with the individual is lost, then there arises the opinion that such ideas can arise in our reason even without experience. The adherents of this opinion label a number of abstract ideas of species as content of pure reason because they do not see the threads by which these ideas are bound to experience. Such a delusion is most easily possible with respect to the most general most comprehensive ideas. Since such ideas encompass wide areas of reality, much in them is eradicated or dimmed which is attributable to the individuals belonging to this or that area. A number of such general ideas can be taken up from other people and then believed to be innate in man or to be spun out of pure reason. An individual succumbing to such a belief may consider himself to be speculative. But he will never be able to draw from his world of ideas anything more than what those people have put there, from whom he has received these ideas. When Schiller maintains that the speculative spirit, if he is a genius, always creates “only species, but with the possibility of life and with a well-founded connection to real objects” (see Schiller's letter to Goethe of August 23, 1794), he is in error. A really speculative spirit, who lived only in concepts of species, could not find in his world of ideas any well-founded connection to reality other than the one which already lies within it. A spirit who has connections to the reality of nature and who in spite of this calls himself speculative, is caught up in a delusion about his own being. This delusion can mislead him into neglecting; his connections with reality, with his immediate life. He will believe himself able to dispense with immediate observation, because he believes himself to have other sources of truth. The result of this is always that the world of ideas of such a spirit has a dull and faded character. The fresh colors of life will be lacking in his thoughts. Whoever wants to live in association with reality will not be able to gain much from such a world of thoughts. The speculative way cannot be regarded as a way of thinking which can stand with equal validity beside the intuitive one but rather as an atrophied way of thinking, impoverished of life. The intuitive spirit does not have to do merely with individuals; he does not seek within the empirical for the character of necessity. But rather, when he turns to nature, perception and Idea join themselves together directly into a unity for him. Both are seen as existing within one another and are felt to be a whole. While he can ascend to the most general truths, to the artiest abstractions, immediate real life will always be recognizable in his world of thoughts. Goethe's thinking was of this kind. Heinroth made an apt statement in his anthropology about this thinking which pleased Goethe mightily, because it gave him insight into his own nature. “Dr. Heinroth ... speaks favorably about my being and working; he even describes my way of going about things as an original one: that my ability to think, namely, is active objectively, by which he means that my thinking does not separate itself from the objects; that the elements of the objects, one's perceptions, go into thinking and become most inwardly permeated by it; that my perceiving is itself a thinking, my thinking a perceiving.” Basically Heinroth is describing nothing other than the way any healthy thinking relates itself to objects. Any other way of going about things is an aberration from the natural way. If perception predominates in a person, then he gets stuck at what is individual; he cannot penetrate into the deeper foundations of reality; if abstract thinking predominates in him, then his concepts seem insufficient to understand the living fullness of what is real. The raw empiricist, who contents himself with the individual facts, represents the extreme of the first aberration; the other extreme is given in the philosopher who worships pure reason and who only thinks, without having any feeling for the fact that thoughts, by their very nature, are bound to perception. Goethe describes, in a beautiful picture, the feeling of the thinker who ascends to the highest truths without losing his feeling for living experience. At the beginning of 1784 he writes an essay on granite. He goes out upon a mountaintop of this stone, where he can say to himself, “You rest here directly upon a ground that reaches into the deepest places of the earth; no newer layers, no ruins, heaped or swept together, have laid themselves between you and the solid ground of the primeval world; you do not walk here, as in those fruitful valleys, upon a continuous grave; these peaks have brought forth no living thing and have devoured no living thing; they are before all life and above all life. In this moment, when the inner attracting and moving powers of the earth are working as though directly upon me, when the influences of the heavens are hovering around me more closely, I become attuned to higher contemplations of nature, and just as the human spirit enlivens all, so there stirs in me also a parable, whose sublimity I cannot withstand. So lonely, I say to myself as I look down this completely bare peak and scarcely make out in the distance at the foot a meager moss growing, so lonely, I say, does the mood of a man become, who wants to open his soul only to the oldest, first, and deepest feelings of truth. Yes, he can say to himself: here, upon the most ancient, eternal altar, which is built directly upon the deeps of creation, I bring an offering to the being of all beings. I feel the primal and most solid beginnings of our existence; I look out over the world, upon its more rugged and more gentle valleys and upon its distant fruitful meadows; my soul rises above itself and above all, and longs for the heavens nearer it. But soon the burning sun calls back thirst and hunger, his human needs. He looks back upon those valleys from which his spirit had already soared.” Only that person can develop within himself such an enthusiasm of knowledge, such feelings for the oldest sound truths, who again and again finds his way out of the regions of the world of ideas back into direct perceptions.
Goethe und die platonische Weltsicht
[ 1 ] Ich habe die Gedankenentwickelung von Platos bis zu Kants Zeit geschildert, um zeigen zu können, welche Eindrücke Goethe empfangen mußte, wenn er sich an den Niederschlag der philosophischen Gedanken wandte, an die er sich halten konnte, um sein so starkes Erkenntnisbedürfnis zu befriedigen. Auf die unzähligen Fragen, zu denen ihn seine Natur drängte, fand er in den Philosophien keine Antworten. Ja, es zeigte sich, so oft er sich in die Weltanschauung eines Philosophen vertiefte, ein Gegensatz zwischen der Richtung, die seine Fragen einschlugen und der Gedankenwelt, bei der er sich Rat holen wollte. Der Grund liegt darin, daß die einseitig platonische Trennung von Idee und Erfahrung seiner Natur zuwider war. Wenn er die Natur beobachtete, so brachte sie ihm die Ideen entgegen. Er konnte sie deshalb nur ideenerfüllt denken. Eine Ideenwelt, welche die Dinge der Natur nicht durchdringt, ihr Entstehen und Vergehen, ihr Werden und Wachsen nicht hervorbringt, ist ihm ein kraftloses Gedankengespinst. Das logische Fortspinnen von Gedankenreihen, ohne Versenkung in das wirkliche Leben und Schaffen der Natur erscheint ihm unfruchtbar. Denn er fühlt sich mit der Natur innig verwachsen. Er betrachtet sich als ein lebendiges Glied der Natur. Was in seinem Geiste entsteht, das hat, nach seiner Ansicht, die Natur in ihm entstehen lassen. Der Mensch soll sich nicht in eine Ecke stellen und glauben, daß er da aus sich heraus ein Gedankengewebe spinnen könne, das über das Wesen der Dinge aufklärt. Er soll den Strom des Weltgeschehens beständig durch sich durchfließen lassen. Dann wird er fühlen, daß die Ideenwelt nichts anderes ist, als die schaffende und tätige Gewalt der Natur. Er wird nicht über den Dingen stehen wollen, um über sie nachzudenken, sondern er wird sich in ihre Tiefen eingraben und aus ihnen herausholen, was in ihnen lebt und wirkt.
[ 2 ] Zu solcher Denkweise führte Goethe seine Künstlernatur. Mit derselben Notwendigkeit, mit der eine Blume blüht, fühlte er seine dichterischen Erzeugnisse aus seiner Persönlichkeit herauswachsen. Die Art, wie der Geist in ihm das Kunstwerk hervorbrachte, schien ihm nicht verschieden von der zu sein, wie die Natur ihre Geschöpfe erzeugt. Und wie im Kunstwerke das geistige Element von der geistlosen Materie nicht zu trennen ist, so war es ihm auch unmöglich, bei einem Dinge der Natur die Wahrnehmung ohne die Idee vorzustellen. Fremd blickte ihn daher eine Anschauung an, die in der Wahrnehmung nur etwas Unklares, Verworrenes sah und die Ideenwelt abgesondert, gereinigt von aller Erfahrung betrachten wollte. Er fühlte in jeder Weltanschauung, in der die Elemente des einseitig verstandenen Platonismus lebten, etwas Naturwidriges. Deshalb konnte er bei den Philosophen nicht finden, was er bei ihnen suchte. Er suchte die Ideen, die in den Dingen leben, und die alle Einzelheiten der Erfahrung als hervorwachsend aus einem lebendigen Ganzen erscheinen lassen, und die Philosophen lieferten ihm Gedankenhülsen, die sie nach logischen Grundsätzen zu Systemen verbunden hatten. Immer wieder fand er sich auf sich selbst zurückgewiesen, wenn er bei andern Aufklärung suchte über die Rätsel, die ihm die Natur aufgab.
[ 3 ] Es gehört zu den Dingen, an denen Goethe vor seiner italienischen Reise gelitten hat, daß sein Erkenntnisbedürfnis keine Befriedigung finden konnte. In Italien konnte er sich eine Ansicht bilden über die Triebkräfte, aus denen die Kunstwerke hervorgehen. Er erkannte, daß in den vollendeten Kunstwerken das enthalten ist, was die Menschen als Göttliches, als Ewiges verehren. Nach dem Anblicke von künstlerischen Schöpfungen, die ihn besonders interessieren, schreibt er die Worte nieder: «Die hohen Kunstwerke sind zugleich als die höchsten Naturwerke von Menschen nach wahren und natürlichen Gesetzen hervorgebracht worden. Alles Willkürliche, Eingebildete fällt zusammen; da ist Notwendigkeit, da ist Gott.» Die Kunst der Griechen entlockt ihm den Ausspruch: «Ich habe die Vermutung, daß sie (die Griechen) nach eben den Gesetzen verfuhren, nach welchen die Natur selbst verfährt und denen ich auf der Spur bin.» Was Plato in der Ideenwelt zu finden glaubte, was die Philosophen Goethe nie nahe bringen konnten, das blickt ihm aus den Kunstwerken Italiens entgegen. In der Kunst offenbart sich für Goethe zuerst das in vollkommener Gestalt, was er als die Grundlage der Erkenntnis ansehen kann. Er erblickt in der künstlerischen Produktion eine Art und höhere Stufe des Naturwirkens; künstlerisches Schaffen ist ihm gesteigertes Naturschaffen. Er hat das in seiner Charakteristik Winckelmanns später ausgesprochen: «... indem der Mensch auf den Gipfel der Natur gestellt ist, so sieht er sich wieder als eine ganze Natur an, die in sich abermals einen Gipfel hervorzubringen hat. Dazu steigert er sich, indem er sich mit allen Vollkommenheiten und Tugenden durchdringt, Wahl, Ordnung, Harmonie und Bedeutung aufruft und sich endlich zur Produktion des Kunstwerkes erhebt...». Nicht auf dem Wege logischer Schlußfolgerung, sondern durch Betrachtung des Wesens der Kunst gelangt Goethe zu seiner Weltanschauung. Und was er in der Kunst gefunden hat, das sucht er auch in der Natur.
[ 4 ] Die Tätigkeit, durch die sich Goethe in den Besitz einer Naturerkenntnis setzt, ist nicht wesentlich von der künstlerischen verschieden. Beide gehen ineinander über und greifen übereinander. Der Künstler muß, nach Goethes Ansicht, größer und entschiedener werden, wenn er zu seinem «Talente noch ein unterrichteter Botaniker ist, wenn er, von der Wurzel an, den Einließ der verschiedenen Teile auf das Gedeihen und das Wachstum der Pflanze, ihre Bestimmung und wechselseitige Wirkung erkennt, wenn er die sukzessive Entwicklung der Blumen, Blätter, Befruchtung, Frucht und des neuen Keimes einsieht und überdenkt. Er wird alsdann nicht bloß durch die Wahl aus den Erscheinungen seinen Geschmack zeigen, sondern er wird uns auch durch eine richtige Darstellung der Eigenschaften zugleich in Verwunderung setzen und belehren.» Das Kunstwerk ist demnach um so vollkommener, je mehr in ihm dieselbe Gesetzmäßigkeit zum Ausdruck kommt, die in dem Naturwerke enthalten ist, dem es entspricht. Es gibt nur ein einheitliches Reich der Wahrheit, und dieses umfaßt Kunst und Natur. Daher kann auch die Fähigkeit des künstlerischen Schaffens von der des Naturerkennens nicht wesentlich verschieden sein. Vom Stil des Künstlers sagt Goethe, daß er «auf den tiefsten Grundfesten der Erkenntnis ruhe, auf dem Wesen der Dinge, insofern uns erlaubt ist, es in sichtbaren und greifbaren Gestalten zu erkennen.» Die aus einseitig erfaßten platonischen Vorstellungen hervorgegangene Weltbetrachtung zieht eine scharfe Grenzlinie zwischen Wissenschaft und Kunst. Die künstlerische Tätigkeit läßt sie auf der Phantasie, auf dem Gefühle beruhen; die wissenschaftlichen Ergebnisse sollen das Resultat einer Phantastereien Begriffsentwicklung sein. Goethe stellt sich die Sache anders vor. Für ihn ergibt sich, wenn er das Auge auf die Natur richtet, eine Summe von Ideen; aber er findet, daß in dem einzelnen Erfahrungsgegenstande der ideelle Bestandteil nicht abgeschlossen ist; die Idee weist über das einzelne hinaus auf verwandte Gegenstände, in denen sie auf ähnliche Weise zur Erscheinung kommt. Der philosophierende Beobachter hält diesen ideellen Bestandteil fest und bringt ihn in seinen Gedankenwerken unmittelbar zum Ausdrucke. Auch auf den Künstler wirkt dieses Ideelle. Aber es treibt ihn ein Werk zu gestalten, in dem die Idee nicht bloß wie in einem Naturwerke wirkt, sondern zur gegenwärtigen Erscheinung wird. Was in dem Naturwerke bloß ideell ist und sich dem geistigen Auge des Beobachters enthüllt, das wird in dem Kunstwerke real, wird wahrnehmbare Wirklichkeit. Der Künstler verwirklicht die Ideen der Natur. Er braucht sich aber diese nicht in Form der Ideen zum Bewußtsein zu bringen. Wenn er ein Ding oder ein Ereignis betrachtet, so gestaltet sich in seinem Geiste unmittelbar ein anderes, das in realer Erscheinung enthält, was jene nur als Idee. Der Künstler liefert Bilder der Naturwerke, welche deren Ideengehalt in einen Wahrnehmungsgehalt umsetzen. Der Philosoph zeigt, wie sich die Natur der denkenden Betrachtung darstellt; der Künstler zeigt, wie die Natur aussehen würde, wenn sie ihre wirkenden Kräfte nicht bloß dem Denken, sondern auch der Wahrnehmung offen entgegenbrächte. Es ist eine und dieselbe Wahrheit, die der Philosoph in Form des Gedankens, der Künstler in Form des Bildes darstellt. Beide unterscheiden sich nur durch ihre Ausdrucksmittel.
[ 5 ] Die Einsicht in das wahre Verhältnis von Idee und Erfahrung, die sich Goethe in Italien angeeignet hat, ist nur die Frucht aus dem Samen, der in seiner Naturanlage verborgen war. Die italienische Reise brachte ihm jene Sonnenwärme, die geeignet war, den Samen zur Reife zu bringen. In dem Aufsatz «Die Natur», der 1782 im Tiefurter Journal erschienen ist, und der Goethe zum Urheber hat (vgl. meinen Nachweis von Goethes Urheberschaft im VII. Bande der Schriften der Goethe-Gesellschaft), finden sich schon die Keime der späteren Goetheschen Weltanschauung. Was hier dunkle Empfindung ist, wird später klarer deutlicher Gedanke. «Natur! Wir sind von ihr umgeben und umschlungen - unvermögend, aus ihr herauszutreten, und unvermögend, tiefer in sie hineinzukommen. Ungebeten und ungewarnt nimmt sie uns in den Kreislauf ihres Tanzes auf und treibt sich mit uns fort, bis wir ermüdet sind und ihrem Arme entfallen... Gedacht hat sie (die Natur) und sinnt beständig; aber nicht als ein Mensch, sondern als Natur... Sie hat keine Sprache noch Rede, aber sie schafft Zungen und Herzen, durch die sie fühlt und spricht... Ich sprach nicht von ihr. Nein, was wahr ist und falsch ist, alles hat sie gesprochen. Alles ist ihre Schuld, alles ist ihr Verdienst! -» Als Goethe diese Sätze niederschrieb, war ihm noch nicht klar, wie die Natur durch den Menschen ihre ideelle Wesenheit ausspricht; daß es aber die Stimme des Geistes der Natur ist, die im Geiste des Menschen ertönt, das fühlte er.
[ 6 ] In Italien fand Goethe die geistige Atmosphäre, in der sich seine Erkenntnisorgane ausbilden konnten, wie sie es ihren Anlagen gemäß mußten, wenn er zur vollen Befriedigung kommen sollte. In Rom hat er «über Kunst und ihre theoretischen Forderungen mit Moritz viel verhandelt »; auf der Reise hat sich in ihm bei Beobachtung der Pflanzenmetamorphose eine naturgemäße Methode ausgebildet, die sich später für die Erkenntnis der ganzen organischen Natur fruchtbar erwiesen hat. «Denn als die Vegetation mir Schritt für Schritt ihr Verfahren vorbildete, konnte ich nicht irren, sondern mußte, indem ich sie gewähren ließ, die Wege und Mittel anerkennen, wie sie den eingehülltesten Zustand zur Vollendung nach und nach zu befördern weiß.» Wenige Jahre nach seiner Rückkehr aus Italien gelang es ihm, auch für die Betrachtung der unorganischen Natur ein aus seinen geistigen Bedürfnissen geborenes Verfahren zu finden. «Bei physischen Untersuchungen drängte sich mir die Überzeugung auf, daß, bei aller Betrachtung der Gegenstände, die höchste Pflicht sei, jede Bedingung, unter welcher ein Phänomen erscheint, genau aufzusuchen und nach möglichster Vollständigkeit der Phänomene zu trachten: weil sie doch zuletzt sich aneinanderzureihen, oder vielmehr übereinanderzugreifen genötigt werden, und vor dem Anschauen des Forschers auch eine Art Organisation bilden, ihr inneres Gesamtleben manifestieren müssen.»
[ 7 ] Goethe fand nirgends Aufklärung. Er mußte sich selbst aufklären. Er suchte den Grund dafür und glaubte ihn darin zu finden, daß er für Philosophie im eigentlichen Sinne kein Organ hätte. Er ist aber darin zu suchen, daß die einseitig erfaßte platonische Denkweise, die alle ihm zugänglichen Philosophien beherrschte, seiner gesunden Naturanlage widersprach. In seiner Jugend hatte er sich wiederholt an Spinoza gewandt. Er gesteht sogar, daß dieser Philosoph auf ihn immer eine «friedliche Wirkung» hervorgebracht habe. Diese beruht darauf, daß Spinoza das Weltall als eine große Einheit ansieht, und alles Einzelne mit Notwendigkeit aus dem Ganzen hervorgehend sich denkt. Wenn sich Goethe aber auf den Inhalt der Spinozistischen Philosophie einließ, so fühlte er doch, daß dieser ihm fremd blieb. «Denke man aber nicht, daß ich seine Schriften hätte unterschreiben und mich dazu buchstäblich bekennen mögen. Denn, daß niemand den andern versteht, daß keiner bei denselben Worten dasselbe, was der andere, denkt, daß ein Gespräch, eine Lektüre bei verschiedenen Personen verschiedene Gedankenfolgen aufregt, hatte ich schon allzu deutlich eingesehen, und man wird dem Verfasser von Werther und Faust wohl zutrauen, daß er, von solchen Mißverständnissen tief durchdrungen, nicht selbst den Dünkel gehegt, einen Mann vollkommen zu verstehen, der als Schüler von Descartes, durch mathematische und rabbinische Kultur sich zu dem Gipfel des Denkens hervorgehoben; der bis auf den heutigen Tag noch das Ziel aller spekulativen Bemühungen zu sein scheint.» Nicht der Umstand, daß Spinoza durch Descartes geschult worden ist, auch nicht der, daß er durch mathematische und rabbinische Kultur sich zu dem Gipfel des Denkens erhoben hat, machte ihn für Goethe zu einem Element, an das er sich doch nicht ganz hingeben konnte, sondern seine wirklichkeitsfremde, rein logische Art, die Erkenntnis zu behandeln. Goethe konnte sich dem reinen erfahrungsfreien Denken nicht hingeben, weil er es nicht zu trennen vermochte von der Gesamtheit des Wirklichen. Er wollte nicht einen Gedanken bloß logisch an den andern angliedern. Vielmehr erschien ihm eine solche Gedankentätigkeit von der wahren Wirklichkeit abzulenken. Er mußte den Geist in die Erfahrung versenken, um zu den Ideen zu kommen. Die Wechselwirkung von Idee und Wahrnehmung war ihm ein geistiges Atemholen. «Durch die Pendelschläge wird die Zeit, durch die Wechselbewegung von Idee und Erfahrung die sittliche und wissenschaftliche Welt regiert.» Im Sinne dieses Satzes die Welt und ihre Erscheinungen zu betrachten, schien Goethe naturgemäß. Denn für ihn gab es keinen Zweifel darüber, daß die Natur dasselbe Verfahren beobachtet: daß sie « eine Entwicklung aus einem lebendigen geheimnisvollen Ganzen» zu den mannigfaltigen besonderen Erscheinungen hin ist, die den Raum und die Zeit erfüllen. Das geheimnisvolle Ganze ist die Welt der Idee. «Die Idee ist ewig und einzig; daß wir auch den Plural brauchen, ist nicht wohlgetan. Alles, was wir gewahr werden und wovon wir reden können, sind nur Manifestationen der Idee; Begriffe sprechen wir aus, und insofern ist die Idee selbst ein Begriff.» Das Schaffen der Natur geht aus dem Ganzen, das ideeller Art ist, ins Einzelne, das als Reelles der Wahrnehmung gegeben ist. Deshalb soll der Beobachter: «das Ideelle im Reellen anerkennen und sein jeweiliges Mißbehagen mit dem Endlichen durch Erhebung ins Unendliche beschwichtigen». Goethe ist überzeugt davon, daß «die Natur nach Ideen verfahre, ingleichen, daß der Mensch in allem, was er beginnt, eine Idee verfolge». Wenn es dem Menschen wirklich gelingt, sich zu der Idee zu erheben, und von der Idee aus die Einzelheiten der Wahrnehmung zu begreifen, so vollbringt er dasselbe, was die Natur vollbringt, indem sie ihre Geschöpfe aus dem geheimnisvollen Ganzen hervorgehen läßt. Solange der Mensch das Wirken und Schaffen der Idee nicht fühlt, bleibt sein Denken von der lebendigen Natur abgesondert. Er muß das Denken als eine bloß subjektive Tätigkeit ansehen, die ein abstraktes Bild von der Natur entwerfen kann. Sobald er aber fühlt, wie die Idee in seinem Innern lebt und tätig ist, betrachtet er sich und die Natur als ein Ganzes, und was als Subjektives in seinem Innern erscheint, das gilt ihm zugleich als objektiv; er weiß, daß er der Natur nicht mehr als Fremder gegenübersteht, sondern er fühlt sich verwachsen mit dem Ganzen derselben. Das Subjektive ist objektiv geworden; das Objektive von dem Geiste ganz durchdrungen. Goethe ist der Meinung, der Grundirrtum Kants bestehe darin, daß dieser «das subjektive Erkenntnisvermögen nun selbst als Objekt betrachtet und den Punkt, wo subjektiv und objektiv zusammentreffen, zwar scharf aber nicht ganz richtig sondert.» (Sophien-Ausgabe, 2. Abteilung, Bd. XI, S.376.) Das Erkenntnisvermögen erscheint dem Menschen nur so lange als subjektiv, als er nicht beachtet, daß die Natur selbst es ist, die durch dasselbe spricht. Subjektiv und objektiv treffen zusammen, wenn die objektive Ideenwelt im Subjekte auflebt, und in dem Geiste des Menschen dasjenige lebt, was in der Natur selbst tätig ist. Wenn das der Fall ist, dann hört aller Gegensatz von subjektiv und objektiv auf. Dieser Gegensatz hat nur eine Bedeutung, solange der Mensch ihn künstlich aufrecht erhält, solange er die Ideen als seine Gedanken betrachtet, durch die das Wesen der Natur abgebildet wird, in denen es aber nicht selbst wirksam ist. Kant und die Kantianer hatten keine Ahnung davon, daß in den Ideen der Vernunft das Wesen, das Ansich der Dinge unmittelbar erlebt wird. Für sie ist alles Ideelle ein bloß Subjektives. Deshalb kamen sie zu der Meinung, das Ideelle könne nur dann notwendig gültig sein, wenn auch dasjenige, auf das es sich bezieht, die Erfahrungswelt, nur subjektiv ist. Mit Goethes Anschauungen steht die Kantsche Denkweise in einem scharfen Gegensatz. Es gibt zwar einzelne Äußerungen Goethes, in denen er von Kants Ansichten in einer anerkennenden Art spricht. Er erzählt, daß er manchem Gespräch über diese Ansichten beigewohnt habe. «Mit einiger Aufmerksamkeit konnte ich bemerken, daß die alte Hauptfrage sich erneuere, wieviel unser Selbst und wieviel die Außenwelt zu unserm geistigen Dasein beitrage. Ich hatte beide niemals gesondert, und wenn ich nach meiner Weise über Gegenstände philosophierte, so tat ich es mit unbewußter Naivität und glaubte wirklich, ich sähe meine Meinungen vor Augen. Sobald aber jener Streit zur Sprache kam, mochte ich mich gern auf diejenige Seite stellen, welche dem Menschen am meisten Ehre macht, und gab allen Freunden vollkommen Beifall, die mit Kant behaupteten: wenn gleich alle unsere Erkenntnis mit der Erfahrung angehe, so entspringe sie darum doch nicht eben alle aus der Erfahrung.» Die Idee stammt auch, nach Goethes Ansicht, nicht aus dem Teile der Erfahrung, welcher der bloßen Wahrnehmung durch die Sinne des Menschen sich darbietet. Die Vernunft, die Phantasie müssen sich betätigen, müssen in das Innere der Wesen dringen, um sich der ideellen Elemente des Daseins zu bemächtigen. Insofern hat der Geist des Menschen Anteil an dem Zustandekommen der Erkenntnis. Goethe meint, es mache dem Menschen Ehre, daß in seinem Geiste die höhere Wirklichkeit, die den Sinnen nicht zugänglich ist, zur Erscheinung komme; Kant dagegen spricht der Erfahrungswelt den Charakter der höheren Wirklichkeit ab, weil sie Bestandteile enthält, die aus dem Geiste stammen. Nur wenn er die Kantschen Sätze erst im Sinne seiner Weltanschauung umdeutete, konnte Goethe sich zustimmend zu ihnen verhalten. Die Grundlagen der Kantschen Denkweise widersprechen Goethes Wesen aufs schärfste. Wenn dieser den Widerspruch nicht scharf genug betonte, so liegt das wohl nur darin, daß er sich auf diese Grundlagen nicht einließ, weil sie ihm zu fremd waren. «Der Eingang (der Kritik der reinen Vernunft) war es, der mir gefiel, ins Labyrinth selbst konnte ich mich nicht wagen: bald hinderte mich die Dichtungsgabe, bald der Menschenverstand, und ich fühlte mich nirgends gebessert.» Über seine Gespräche mit den Kantianern mußte sich Goethe eingestehen: «Sie hörten mich wohl, konnten mir aber nichts erwidern, noch irgend förderlich sein. Mehr als einmal begegnete es mir, daß einer oder der andere mit lächelnder Verwunderung zugestand: es sei freilich ein Analogon Kantscher Vorstellungsart, aber ein seltsames.» Es war, wie ich gezeigt, auch kein Analogon, sondern das entschiedenste Gegenteil der Kantschen Vorstellungsart.
[ 8 ] Es ist interessant zu sehen, wie Schiller sich über den Gegensatz der Goetheschen Denkweise und seiner eigenen aufzuklären sucht. Er empfindet das Ursprüngliche und Freie der Goetheschen Weltanschauung. Aber er kann die einseitig erfaßten platonischen Gedankenelemente aus seinem eigenen Geiste nicht entfernen. Er kann sich nicht zu der Einsicht erheben, daß Idee und Wahrnehmung in der Wirklichkeit nicht getrennt vorhanden sind, sondern nur künstlich von dem durch falsch gelenkte Ideenrichtung verführten Verstand getrennt gedacht werden. Deshalb stellt er der Goetheschen Geistesart, die er als eine intuitive bezeichnet, die eigene als spekulative gegenüber und behauptet, daß beide, wenn sie nur kraftvoll genug wirken, zu einem gleichen Ziele führen müssen. Von dem intuitiven Geiste nimmt Schiller an, daß er sich an das Empirische, Individuelle halte und von da aus zu dem Gesetze, zu der Idee aufsteige. Falls ein solcher Geist genialisch ist, wird er in dem Empirischen das Notwendige, in dem Individuellen die Gattung erkennen. Der spekulative Geist dagegen soll den umgekehrten Weg machen. Ihm soll zuerst das Gesetz, die Idee gegeben sein, und von ihr soll er zum Empirischen und Individuellen herabsteigen. Ist ein solcher Geist genialisch, so wird er zwar immer nur Gattungen im Auge haben, aber mit der Möglichkeit des Lebens und mit gegründeter Beziehung auf wirkliche Objekte. Die Annahme einer besonderen Geistesart, der spekulativen gegenüber der intuitiven, beruht auf dem Glauben, daß der Ideenwelt ein abgesondertes ,von der Wahrnehmungswelt getrenntes Dasein zukomme. Wäre dies der Fall, dann könnte es einen Weg geben, auf dem der Inhalt der Ideen über die Dinge der Wahrnehmung in den Geist käme, auch wenn ihn dieser nicht in der Erfahrung aufsuchte. Ist aber die Ideenwelt mit der Erfahrungswirklichkeit untrennbar verbunden, sind beide nur als ein Ganzes vorhanden, so kann es nur eine intuitive Erkenntnis, die in der Erfahrung die Idee aufsucht und mit dem Individuellen zugleich die Gattung erfaßt, geben. In Wahrheit gibt es auch keinen rein spekulativen Geist im Sinne Schillers. Denn die Gattungen existieren nur innerhalb der Sphäre, der auch die Individuen angehören; und der Geist kann sie anderswo gar nicht finden. Hat ein sogenannter spekulativer Geist wirklich Gattungsideen, so stammen diese aus der Beobachtung der wirklichen Welt. Wenn das lebendige Gefühl für diesen Ursprung, für den notwendigen Zusammenhang des Gattungsmäßigen mit dem Individuellen verloren geht, dann entsteht die Meinung, solche Ideen können in der Vernunft auch ohne Erfahrung entstehen. Die Bekenner dieser Meinung bezeichnen eine Summe von abstrakten Gattungsideen als Inhalt der reinen Vernunft, weil sie die Fäden nicht sehen, mit denen diese Ideen an die Erfahrung gebunden sind. Eine solche Täuschung ist am leichtesten bei den allgemeinsten, umfassendsten Ideen möglich. Da solche Ideen weite Gebiete der Wirklichkeit umspannen, so ist in ihnen manches ausgetilgt oder abgeblaßt, was den zu diesem Gebiete gehörigen Individualitäten zukommt. Man kann eine Anzahl solcher allgemeiner Ideen durch Überlieferung in sich aufnehmen und dann glauben, sie seien dem Menschen angeboren, oder man habe sie aus der reinen Vernunft herausgesponnen. Ein Geist, der einem solchen Glauben verfällt, kann sich als spekulativ ansehen. Er wird aus seiner Ideenwelt aber nie mehr herausholen können, als diejenigen hineingelegt haben, von denen er sie überliefert erhalten hat. Wenn Schiller meint, daß der spekulative Geist, wenn er genialisch ist, «zwar immer nur Gattungen, aber mit der Möglichkeit des Lebens und mit gegründeter Beziehung auf wirkliche Objekte» erzeugt (vgl. Schillers Brief an Goethe vom 23. August. 1794), so ist er im Irrtum. Ein wirklich spekulativer Geist, der nur in Gattungsbegriffen lebte, könnte in seiner Ideenwelt keine andere gegründete Beziehung zur Wirklichkeit finden, als diejenige, die schon in ihr liegt. Ein Geist, der Beziehungen zur Wirklichkeit der Natur hat und sich dennoch als spekulativ bezeichnet, ist in einer Täuschung über seine eigene Wesenheit befangen. Diese Täuschung kann ihn dazu verführen, seine Beziehungen zur Wirklichkeit, zum unmittelbaren Leben zu vernachlässigen. Er wird glauben, der unmittelbaren Beobachtung entraten zu können, weil er andere Quellen der Wahrheit zu haben meint. Die Folge davon ist immer, daß die Ideenwelt eines solchen Geistes einen matten abgeblaßten Charakter trägt. Die frischen Farben des Lebens werden seinen Gedanken fehlen. Wer im Bunde mit der Wirklichkeit leben will, wird aus einer solchen Gedankenwelt nicht viel gewinnen können. Nicht als eine Geistesart, die neben der intuitiven als gleichberechtigt anzusehen ist, kann die spekulative gelten, sondern als eine verkümmerte, an Leben verarmte Denkart. Der intuitive Geist hat es nicht bloß mit Individuen zu tun, er sucht nicht in dem Empirischen den Charakter der Notwendigkeit auf. Sondern wenn er sich der Natur zuwendet, vereinigen sich bei ihm Wahrnehmung und Idee unmittelbar zu einer Einheit. Beide werden ineinander geschaut und als Ganzheit empfunden. Er kann zu den allgemeinsten Wahrheiten, zu den höchsten Abstraktionen aufsteigen: das unmittelbar wirkliche Leben wird in seiner Gedankenwelt immer zu erkennen sein. Solcher Art war Goethes Denken. Heinroth hat in seiner Anthropologie ein treffliches Wort über dieses Denken gesprochen, das Goethe im höchsten Grade gefiel, weil es ihn über seine Natur aufklärte. «Herr Dr. Heinroth ... spricht von meinem Wesen und Wirken günstig, ja er bezeichnet meine Verfahrungsart als eine eigentümliche: daß nämlich mein Denkvermögen gegenständlich tätig sei, womit er aussprechen will, daß mein Denken sich von den Gegenständen nicht sondere; daß die Elemente der Gegenstände, die Anschauungen in dasselbe eingehen und von ihm auf das innigste durchdrungen werden; daß mein Anschauen selbst ein Denken, mein Denken ein Anschauen sei.» Im Grunde schildert Heinroth nichts als die Art, wie sich jedes gesunde Denken zu den Gegenständen verhält. Jede andere Verfahrungsart ist eine Abirrung von dem naturgemäßen Wege. Wenn in einem Menschen die Anschauung überwiegt, dann bleibt er an dem Individuellen hängen; er kann nicht in die tieferen Gründe der Wirklichkeit eindringen; wenn das abstrakte Denken in ihm überwiegt, dann erscheinen seine Begriffe unzureichend, um die lebendige Fülle des Wirklichen zu verstehen. Das Extrem der ersten Abirrung stellt den rohen Empiriker dar, der mit den individuellen Tatsachen sich begnügt; das Extrem der andern Abirrung ist in dem Philosophen gegeben, der die reine Vernunft anbetet und der nur denkt, ohne ein Gefühl davon zu haben, daß Gedanken ihrem Wesen nach an Anschauung gebunden sind. In einem schönen Bilde schildert Goethe das Gefühl des Denkers, der zu den höchsten Wahrheiten aufsteigt, ohne die Empfindung für die lebendige Erfahrung zu verlieren. Er schreibt im Anfang des Jahres 1784 einen Aufsatz über den Granit. Er versetzt sich auf einen aus diesem Gestein bestehenden Gipfel, wo er sich sagen kann: «Hier ruhst du unmittelbar auf einem Grunde, der bis zu den tiefsten Orten der Erde hinreicht, keine neuere Schicht, keine aufgehäuften, zusammengeschwemmten Trümmer haben sich zwischen dich und den festen Boden der Urwelt gelegt, du gehst nicht wie in jenen fruchtbaren Tälern über ein anhaltendes Grab, diese Gipfel haben nichts Lebendiges erzeugt und nichts Lebendiges verschlungen, sie sind vor allem Leben und über alles Leben. In diesem Augenblicke, da die innern anziehenden und bewegenden Kräfte der Erde gleichsam unmittelbar auf mich wirken, da die Einflüsse des Himmels mich näher umschweben, werde ich zu höheren Betrachtungen der Natur hinaufgestimmt, und wie der Menschengeist alles belebt, so wird auch ein Gleichnis in mir rege, dessen Erhabenheit ich nicht widerstehen kann. So einsam, sage ich zu mir selber, indem ich diesen ganz nackten Gipfel hinabsehe und kaum in der Ferne am Fuße ein gering wachsendes Moos erblickte, so einsam, sage ich, wird es dem Menschen zumute, der nur den ältesten, ersten, tiefsten Gefühlen der Wahrheit seine Seele eröffnen will. Ja, er kann zu sich sagen: Hier, auf dem ältesten, ewigen Altare, der unmittelbar auf die Tiefe der Schöpfung gebaut ist, bring ich dem Wesen aller Wesen ein Opfer. Ich fühle die ersten, festesten Anfänge unsers Daseins; ich überschaue die Welt, ihre schrofferen und gelinderen Täler und ihre fernen fruchtbaren Weiden, meine Seele wird über sich selbst und über alles erhaben und sehnt sich nach dem nähern Himmel. Aber bald ruft die brennende Sonne Durst und Hunger, seine menschlichen Bedürfnisse, zurück. Er sieht sich nach jenen Tälern um, über die sich sein Geist schon hinausschwang.» Solchen Enthusiasmus der Erkenntnis, solche Empfindungen für die ältesten, festen Wahrheiten kann nur derjenige in sich entwickeln, der immer und immer wieder aus den Regionen der Ideenwelt den Weg zurückfindet zu den unmittelbaren Anschauungen.
Goethe and the Platonic world view
[ 1 ] I have described the development of thought from Plato's to Kant's time in order to be able to show what impressions Goethe must have received when he turned to the precipitation of philosophical thought to which he could adhere in order to satisfy his so strong need for knowledge. He found no answers in the philosophies to the innumerable questions to which his nature urged him. Indeed, as often as he immersed himself in a philosopher's view of the world, there was a contrast between the direction his questions took and the world of thought from which he sought advice. The reason for this was that the one-sided Platonic separation of idea and experience was contrary to his nature. When he observed nature, it presented him with ideas. He could therefore only think it filled with ideas. A world of ideas that does not permeate the things of nature, that does not bring forth their emergence and decay, their becoming and growth, is for him a powerless web of thought. The logical continuation of series of thoughts, without immersion in the real life and creation of nature, seems unfruitful to him. For he feels intimately intertwined with nature. He sees himself as a living part of nature. What arises in his spirit has, in his view, been created in him by nature. Man should not place himself in a corner and believe that he can spin a web of thought out of himself that will shed light on the nature of things. He should allow the stream of world events to flow through him constantly. Then he will feel that the world of ideas is nothing other than the creative and active power of nature. He will not want to stand above things in order to think about them, but will burrow into their depths and extract from them what lives and works in them.
[ 2 ] His artistic nature led Goethe to such a way of thinking. With the same necessity with which a flower blossoms, he felt his poetic products grow out of his personality. The way in which the spirit in him produced the work of art seemed to him to be no different from the way in which nature produces its creatures. And just as in a work of art the spiritual element cannot be separated from spiritless matter, so it was impossible for him to imagine perception without the idea in a thing of nature. He was therefore alienated by a view that saw only something unclear and confused in perception and wanted to view the world of ideas separately, purified from all experience. He felt something contrary to nature in every world view in which the elements of one-sidedly understood Platonism lived. That is why he could not find what he was looking for in the philosophers. He was looking for the ideas that live in things and that make all the details of experience appear to grow out of a living whole, and the philosophers provided him with thought shells that they had combined into systems according to logical principles. Again and again he found himself turned back on himself when he sought enlightenment from others about the riddles that nature presented him with.
[ 3 ] It was one of the things that Goethe suffered from before his Italian journey that his need for knowledge could not find satisfaction. In Italy he was able to form a view of the driving forces from which works of art emerge. He realized that perfect works of art contain what people worship as divine, as eternal. After seeing artistic creations that particularly interested him, he wrote down the words: "The high works of art are at the same time the highest works of nature produced by men according to true and natural laws. Everything arbitrary and imaginary collapses; there is necessity, there is God." The art of the Greeks elicits the following statement from him: "I have the suspicion that they (the Greeks) proceeded according to the very laws that nature itself follows and that I am on the trail of." What Plato believed to find in the world of ideas, what the philosophers were never able to bring Goethe closer to, he saw in the works of art of Italy. For Goethe, art first reveals in perfect form that which he can regard as the basis of knowledge. He sees in artistic production a kind and higher stage of the workings of nature; artistic creation is for him a heightened creation of nature. He later expressed this in his characterization of Winckelmann: "... By being placed on the summit of nature, man sees himself again as a whole nature, which in itself has to produce another summit. To this end, he increases by imbuing himself with all perfections and virtues, calling upon choice, order, harmony and meaning and finally elevating himself to the production of the work of art...". Goethe arrived at his world view not by logical deduction, but by contemplating the essence of art. And what he found in art, he also sought in nature.
[ 4 ] The activity through which Goethe acquires a knowledge of nature is not essentially different from the artistic one. Both merge into one another and overlap. In Goethe's opinion, the artist must become greater and more decisive if, in addition to his "talent, he is also an instructed botanist, if he recognizes, from the root, the influence of the various parts on the flourishing and growth of the plant, their purpose and reciprocal effect, if he understands and considers the successive development of flowers, leaves, fertilization, fruit and the new germ. He will then not only show his taste by choosing from the appearances, but he will also astonish and instruct us at the same time by a correct representation of the characteristics." The work of art is therefore all the more perfect the more it expresses the same lawfulness that is contained in the work of nature to which it corresponds. There is only one unified realm of truth, and this encompasses art and nature. Therefore, the ability of artistic creation cannot be essentially different from that of recognizing nature. Goethe says of the artist's style that it "rests on the deepest foundations of knowledge, on the essence of things, insofar as we are permitted to recognize it in visible and tangible forms." The view of the world that emerged from one-sidedly grasped Platonic ideas draws a sharp line between science and art. Artistic activity is based on the imagination, on feeling; scientific results are supposed to be the outcome of an imaginative development of concepts. Goethe sees things differently. For him, when he turns his eye to nature, the result is a sum of ideas; but he finds that in the individual object of experience the ideal component is not complete; the idea points beyond the individual to related objects in which it appears in a similar way. The philosophizing observer captures this ideal component and expresses it directly in his works of thought. This ideal also has an effect on the artist. But it drives him to create a work in which the idea does not merely work as in a work of nature, but becomes a present appearance. What is merely ideal in the work of nature and reveals itself to the observer's mind's eye becomes real in the work of art, becomes perceptible reality. The artist realizes the ideas of nature. But he does not need to bring them to consciousness in the form of ideas. When he looks at a thing or an event, another one is immediately formed in his mind, which contains in real appearance what that one contains only as an idea. The artist provides images of works of nature which transform their idea content into a perceptual content. The philosopher shows how nature presents itself to thinking contemplation; the artist shows how nature would look if its active forces were open not only to thinking but also to perception. It is one and the same truth that the philosopher presents in the form of thought and the artist in the form of image. Both differ only in their means of expression.
[ 5 ] The insight into the true relationship between idea and experience that Goethe acquired in Italy is only the fruit of the seed that was hidden in his natural disposition. The Italian journey brought him the warmth of the sun that was suitable for bringing the seed to maturity. In the essay "Nature", which appeared in the Tiefurter Journal in 1782, and which has Goethe as its author (cf. my proof of Goethe's authorship in Volume VII of the Schriften der Goethe-Gesellschaft), the germs of Goethe's later world view can already be found. What is a dark sentiment here later becomes a clear and distinct thought. "Nature! We are surrounded and enveloped by it - unable to step out of it and unable to get deeper into it. Uninvited and unwarned, she takes us into the cycle of her dance and drives us along until we are weary and fall from her arms... She (nature) has thought and thinks constantly; but not as a human being, but as nature... She has no speech nor language, but she creates tongues and hearts through which she feels and speaks... I did not speak of her. No, what is true and what is false, all she has spoken. Everything is her fault, everything is her merit! -" When Goethe wrote these sentences, he did not yet realize how nature expresses its ideal essence through man; but that it is the voice of the spirit of nature that resounds in the spirit of man, he felt.
[ 6 ] In Italy, Goethe found the spiritual atmosphere in which his cognitive organs could develop, as they had to according to their nature if he was to achieve full satisfaction. In Rome, he "discussed art and its theoretical demands a great deal with Moritz"; during the journey, while observing plant metamorphosis, he developed a natural method that later proved fruitful for the knowledge of all organic nature. "For as vegetation demonstrated its process to me step by step, I could not err, but had to recognize, by letting it do so, the ways and means by which it knows how to gradually promote the most enveloped state to perfection." A few years after his return from Italy, he also succeeded in finding a method born of his spiritual needs for the observation of inorganic nature. "In physical investigations, the conviction forced itself upon me that, in all observation of objects, the highest duty is to seek out exactly every condition under which a phenomenon appears and to strive for the greatest possible completeness of the phenomena: because they are ultimately forced to line up, or rather to interlock, and must also form a kind of organization before the researcher's gaze, manifesting their inner overall life."
[ 7 ] Goethe found no enlightenment anywhere. He had to enlighten himself. He sought the reason for this and believed he found it in the fact that he had no organ for philosophy in the proper sense. But it was to be found in the fact that the one-sided Platonic way of thinking, which dominated all the philosophies accessible to him, contradicted his healthy natural disposition. In his youth he had repeatedly turned to Spinoza. He even confesses that this philosopher always had a "peaceful effect" on him. This was based on the fact that Spinoza regarded the universe as a great unity and that everything individual necessarily emerged from the whole. However, even when Goethe became involved in the content of Spinoza's philosophy, he felt that it remained alien to him. "But do not think that I would have subscribed to his writings and literally professed them. For I had already realized all too clearly that no one understands the other, that no one thinks the same thing with the same words that the other thinks, that a conversation, a reading, provokes different trains of thought in different people, and the author of Werther and Faust can be credited with this, that he, deeply imbued with such misunderstandings, did not himself cherish the conceit of fully understanding a man who, as a pupil of Descartes, through mathematical and rabbinical culture, elevated himself to the summit of thought; who to this day still seems to be the goal of all speculative endeavors. " It was not the fact that Spinoza had been trained by Descartes, nor that he had risen to the summit of thought through mathematical and rabbinical culture, that made him an element for Goethe to which he could not completely devote himself, but his purely logical way of treating knowledge that was alien to reality. Goethe could not devote himself to pure, experience-free thinking because he was unable to separate it from the totality of reality. He did not want to link one thought to another merely logically. Rather, such mental activity seemed to him to distract from true reality. He had to immerse his mind in experience in order to arrive at ideas. For him, the interaction between idea and perception was a spiritual breathing space. "Time is governed by the swing of the pendulum, the moral and scientific world by the alternating movement of idea and experience." Viewing the world and its phenomena in terms of this sentence seemed natural to Goethe. For for him there was no doubt that nature observes the same process: that it is "a development from a living mysterious whole" to the manifold particular phenomena that fill space and time. The mysterious whole is the world of the idea. "The idea is eternal and unique; that we also need the plural is not well done. All that we become aware of and can speak of are only manifestations of the idea; we express concepts, and in this respect the idea itself is a concept." The creation of nature proceeds from the whole, which is of an ideal nature, into the individual, which is given to perception as something real. Therefore, the observer should: "recognize the ideal in the real and appease his respective discomfort with the finite by elevating it to the infinite". Goethe is convinced that "nature proceeds according to ideas, and likewise that man pursues an idea in everything he begins". If man really succeeds in elevating himself to the idea and in grasping the details of perception from the idea, he accomplishes the same thing that nature accomplishes by allowing its creatures to emerge from the mysterious whole. As long as man does not feel the working and creation of the idea, his thinking remains separated from living nature. He must regard thinking as a merely subjective activity that can create an abstract image of nature. But as soon as he feels how the idea lives and is active within him, he regards himself and nature as one whole, and what appears as subjective within him is at the same time regarded as objective; he knows that he is no longer a stranger to nature, but feels himself to be one with the whole of it. The subjective has become objective; the objective is completely permeated by the spirit. Goethe is of the opinion that Kant's fundamental error consists in the fact that he "now regards the subjective faculty of knowledge itself as an object and distinguishes the point where subjective and objective meet, sharply but not quite correctly." (Sophien-Ausgabe, 2. Abteilung, Vol. XI, p.376.) The faculty of cognition appears to man as subjective only so long as he does not realize that it is nature itself that speaks through it. Subjective and objective meet when the objective world of ideas comes to life in the subject, and that which is active in nature itself lives in the spirit of man. When this is the case, then all opposition between subjective and objective ceases. This opposition has meaning only as long as man maintains it artificially, as long as he regards ideas as his thoughts, through which the essence of nature is represented, but in which it is not itself active. Kant and the Kantians had no idea that in the Ideas of Reason the essence, the Ansich of things is directly experienced. For them, everything ideal is merely subjective. Therefore they came to the opinion that the ideal could only be necessarily valid if that to which it refers, the world of experience, is also only subjective. Kant's way of thinking stands in sharp contrast to Goethe's views. There are indeed individual statements by Goethe in which he speaks of Kant's views in an approving manner. He tells us that he attended many a conversation about these views. "I noticed with some attention that the old main question was renewing itself, how much our self and how much the outside world contribute to our spiritual existence. I had never separated the two, and when I philosophized in my own way about objects, I did so with unconscious naivety and really believed that I saw my opinions before my eyes. But as soon as that controversy came up, I liked to take the side that did man the most honor, and gave complete approval to all friends who, with Kant, claimed that even if all our knowledge began with experience, it did not all spring from experience." Nor, in Goethe's view, does the idea originate from that part of experience which presents itself to mere perception through the human senses. Reason and imagination must become active, must penetrate into the inner being in order to take possession of the ideal elements of existence. In this respect, the spirit of man has a share in the realization of knowledge. Goethe thinks that it is a credit to man that the higher reality, which is not accessible to the senses, appears in his spirit; Kant, on the other hand, denies the world of experience the character of higher reality because it contains elements that come from the spirit. Only when he reinterpreted Kant's propositions in terms of his world view could Goethe agree with them. The foundations of Kant's way of thinking contradict Goethe's nature in the sharpest possible terms. If he did not emphasize the contradiction sharply enough, it was probably only because he did not engage with these foundations because they were too foreign to him. "It was the entrance (to the Critique of Pure Reason) that appealed to me, but I could not venture into the labyrinth itself: sometimes the gift of poetry hindered me, sometimes common sense, and nowhere did I feel better." Goethe had to admit about his conversations with the Kantians: "They heard me well, but could neither answer me nor be of any help. More than once I encountered one or the other admitting with smiling astonishment that it was, of course, an analog of Kant's way of thinking, but a strange one." It was, as I have shown, not an analogy either, but the most decided opposite of the Kantian mode of conception.
[ 8 ] It is interesting to see how Schiller seeks to clarify the contrast between Goethe's way of thinking and his own. He feels the originality and freedom of Goethe's world view. But he cannot remove the one-sidedly grasped Platonic elements of thought from his own mind. He cannot rise to the insight that idea and perception do not exist separately in reality, but are only artificially thought separately by the intellect seduced by the wrong direction of ideas. He therefore contrasts Goethe's way of thinking, which he describes as intuitive, with his own as speculative and claims that both, if they are powerful enough, must lead to the same goal. Schiller assumes of the intuitive mind that it holds to the empirical, the individual, and from there ascends to the law, to the idea. If such a mind is ingenious, it will recognize the necessary in the empirical, the genus in the individual. The speculative mind, on the other hand, should take the opposite path. It should first be given the law, the idea, and from this it should descend to the empirical and the individual. If such a spirit is ingenious, it will always have only genera in mind, but with the possibility of life and with a well-founded relationship to real objects. The assumption of a special kind of mind, the speculative as opposed to the intuitive, is based on the belief that the world of ideas has a separate existence from the world of perception. If this were the case, then there could be a way in which the content of ideas could enter the mind via the things of perception, even if the mind did not seek it out in experience. But if the world of ideas is inseparably connected with the reality of experience, if both exist only as one whole, then there can only be an intuitive cognition that seeks out the idea in experience and at the same time grasps the genus with the individual. In truth, there is also no purely speculative spirit in Schiller's sense. For the genera exist only within the sphere to which the individuals also belong; and the spirit cannot find them elsewhere. If a so-called speculative mind really has generic ideas, these originate from the observation of the real world. If the living feeling for this origin, for the necessary connection between the generic and the individual, is lost, then the opinion arises that such ideas can also arise in reason without experience. The advocates of this opinion describe a sum of abstract generic ideas as the content of pure reason, because they do not see the threads by which these ideas are bound to experience. Such a deception is most easily possible with the most general, comprehensive ideas. Since such ideas embrace wide areas of reality, much is erased or blotted out in them which belongs to the individualities belonging to this area. One can absorb a number of such general ideas through tradition and then believe that they are innate to man, or that they have been spun out of pure reason. A mind that falls prey to such a belief can regard itself as speculative. But he will never be able to get more out of his world of ideas than those from whom he has received them. If Schiller thinks that the speculative mind, when it is ingenious, "always produces only genera, but with the possibility of life and with a well-founded relation to real objects" (cf. Schiller's letter to Goethe of August 23, 1794), he is mistaken. A truly speculative mind that lived only in generic concepts could find in its world of ideas no other founded relation to reality than that which already lies in it. A mind that has relations to the reality of nature and yet calls itself speculative is caught up in a delusion about its own essence. This delusion can lead it to neglect its relationship to reality, to immediate life. He will believe that he can dispense with direct observation because he thinks he has other sources of truth. The consequence of this is always that the world of ideas of such a mind has a dull, pale character. His thoughts will lack the fresh colors of life. Whoever wants to live in union with reality will not be able to gain much from such a world of ideas. The speculative mind cannot be regarded as a way of thinking on an equal footing with the intuitive mind, but rather as a stunted way of thinking that lacks life. The intuitive mind does not merely deal with individuals, it does not seek the character of necessity in the empirical. Rather, when it turns to nature, perception and idea unite directly to form a unity. Both are seen in each other and perceived as a whole. He can ascend to the most general truths, to the highest abstractions: the directly real life will always be recognizable in his world of thought. Such was Goethe's way of thinking. In his Anthropology, Heinroth spoke an excellent word about this thinking, which Goethe liked to the highest degree because it enlightened him about his nature. "Dr. Heinroth ... speaks favorably of my nature and activity, indeed, he describes my way of proceeding as a peculiar one: namely, that my thinking faculty is objectively active, by which he means to say that my thinking does not separate itself from the objects; that the elements of the objects, the views, enter into it and are most intimately permeated by it; that my viewing itself is a thinking, my thinking a viewing." Basically, Heinroth describes nothing but the way in which every healthy thinking relates to objects. Any other way of proceeding is a deviation from the natural way. If a person is dominated by his view, then he remains attached to the individual; he cannot penetrate into the deeper reasons of reality; if abstract thinking predominates in him, then his concepts appear insufficient to understand the living fullness of reality. The extreme of the first aberration is represented by the crude empiricist who is content with individual facts; the extreme of the other aberration is given in the philosopher who worships pure reason and who only thinks without having a sense of the fact that thought is by its nature bound to perception. Goethe describes in a beautiful picture the feeling of the thinker who ascends to the highest truths without losing his feeling for living experience. At the beginning of 1784, he wrote an essay on granite. He places himself on a peak made of this rock, where he can say to himself: "Here you rest directly on a ground that reaches to the deepest places of the earth, no recent layer, no heaped up, washed together debris has come between you and the solid ground of the primeval world, you do not walk over a lingering grave as in those fertile valleys, these peaks have produced nothing living and devoured nothing living, they are before all life and above all life. At this moment, when the inner attracting and moving forces of the earth act directly on me, as it were, when the influences of heaven hover closer around me, I am attuned to higher contemplations of nature, and just as the human spirit animates everything, so too a parable is stirred in me, the sublimity of which I cannot resist. So lonely, I say to myself, as I look down at this completely naked peak and barely see a little moss growing at the foot in the distance, so lonely, I say, does it feel to the man who only wants to open his soul to the oldest, first, deepest feelings of truth. Yes, he can say to himself: Here, on the oldest, eternal altar, which is built directly on the depths of creation, I make an offering to the essence of all beings. I feel the first, most solid beginnings of our existence; I survey the world, its more rugged and gentler valleys and its distant fertile pastures, my soul is elevated above itself and above everything and longs for the nearer heaven. But soon the burning sun calls back thirst and hunger, his human needs. He looks around for those valleys beyond which his spirit has already soared." Such enthusiasm for knowledge, such feelings for the oldest, most solid truths can only be developed by those who repeatedly find their way back from the regions of the world of ideas to the immediate views.