The Story of My Life
GA 28
Chapter XIV
[ 1 ] For an indeterminate length of time I again faced a task that was given me, not through any external circumstance, but through the inner processes of development of my views of life and the world. To the same cause was due the fact that I used for my doctor's examination at the University of Rostock my dissertation on the endeavour after “an understanding of human consciousness with itself.” External circumstances merely prevented me from taking the examination in Vienna. I had official credit for the work of the Realschule, not of the Gymnasium, though I had completed privately the Gymnasium course of study, even tutoring also in these courses. This fact barred me from obtaining the doctor's degree in Austria. I had grounded myself thoroughly in philosophy, but I was credited officially with a course of study which excluded me from everything to which the study of philosophy gives a man access.
[ 2 ] Now at the close of the first phase of my life a philosophical work had fallen into my hands which fascinated me extraordinarily – the Sieben Bücher Platonismus 1Seven Books of Platonism. of Heinrich von Stein, who was then teaching philosophy at Rostock. This fact led me to submit my dissertation to the lovable old philosopher, whom I valued highly because of his book, and whom I saw for the first time in connection with the examination.
[ 3 ] The personality of Heinrich von Stein still lives in my memory – almost as if I had spent much of my life with him. For the Seven Books of Platonism is the expression of a sharply stamped philosophical individuality. Philosophy as thought-content is not taken in this work as something which stands upon its own feet. Plato is viewed from all angles as the philosopher who sought for such a self-supporting philosophy. What he found in this direction is carefully set forth by Heinrich von Stein. In the first chapters of the book one enters vitally and wholly into the Platonic world conception. Then, however, Stein passes on to the breaking into human evolution of the Christ revelation. This actual breaking in of the spiritual life he sets forth as something higher than the elaboration of thought-content through mere philosophy.
[ 4 ] From Plato to Christ as to the fulfilment of that for which men have striven – such we may designate the exposition of von Stein. Then he traces further the influence of world conceptions of Platonism in the Christian evolution.
[ 5 ] Stein is of the opinion that revelation gave content from without to human strivings after a world-conception. There I could not agree with him. I knew from experience that the human being, when he comes to an understanding with himself in vital spiritual consciousness, can possess the revelation, and that this revelation can then attain to an existence in the ideal experience of man. But I felt something in the book which drew me on. The real life of the spirit behind the ideal life, even though in a form which was not my own, had set in motion an impulse toward a comprehensive exposition of the history of philosophy. Plato, the great representative of an ideal world which was fixed through its fulfilment by the Christ impulse – it is the setting forth of this which forms the content of Stein's book. In spite of the opposition I felt toward the book, it came closer to me than any of the philosophies which merely elaborate a content out of concepts and sense-experiences.
[ 6 ] I missed in Stein also the consciousness that Plato's ideal world had its source in a primal revelation of the spiritual world. This (pre-Christian) revelation, which has been sympathetically set forth, for example, in Otto Willmann's Geschichte des Idealismus2History of Idealism. does not appear in Stein's view. He sets forth Platonism, not as the residue of ideas from the primal revelation, which then recovers in Christianity and on a higher level its lost spiritual form; he represents the Platonic ideas as a content of concepts self-woven which then attained life through Christ.
[ 7 ] Yet the book is one of those written with philosophical warmth, and its author a personality penetrated by a deep religious feeling who sought in philosophy the expression of the religious life. On every page of the three-volume work one is aware of the personality in the background. After I had read this book, and especially the parts dealing with the relation of Platonism to Christianity, over and over again, it was a significant experience to meet the author face to face.
[ 8 ] A personality serene in his whole bearing, in advanced age, with mild eyes that looked as if they were made to survey kindly but penetratingly the process of evolution of his students; speech which in every sentence carried the reflection of the philosopher in the tone of the words – just so did Stein stand before me when I visited him before the examination. He said to me: “Your dissertation is not such as is required; one can perceive from it that you have not produced it under the guidance of a professor; but what it contains makes it possible that I can very gladly accept you.” I should now have been extremely glad to be questioned orally on something which was related to the Seven Books of Platonism; but no question related to this; all were drawn from the philosophy of Kant.
[ 9 ] I have always kept the image of Heinrich von Stein deeply imprinted on my heart; and it would have given me immeasurable pleasure to have met the man again. Destiny never again brought us together. My doctor's examination is one of my pleasant memories, because the impression of Stein's personality shines out beyond everything else pertaining to it.
[ 10 ] The mood in which I came to Weimar was tinged by previous thorough-going work in Platonism. I think that mood helped me greatly to take the right attitude toward my task on the Goethe and Schiller archives. How did Plato live in the ideal world, and how Goethe? This occupied my thoughts on my walk to and from the archives; it occupied me also as I went over the manuscripts of the Goethe legacy.
[ 11 ] This question was in the background when at the beginning of 1891 I expressed in some such words as the following my impression of Goethe's knowledge of nature “It is impossible for the majority of men to grasp the fact that something for whose appearance subjective conditions are necessary may still have objective significance and being. And of this very sort is the ‘archetypal plant.’ It is the essential of all plants, objectively contained within them; but if it is to attain to phenomenal existence the human spirit must freely construct it.” Or these other words: that a correct understanding of Goethe's way of thinking “admits of the possibility of asking whether it is in keeping with the conception of Goethe to identify the ‘archetypal plant’ or ‘archetypal animal’ with any physically real organic form which has appeared or will appear at any definite time. To this question the only possible answer is a decisive ‘No.’ The ‘archetypal’ plant is contained in every plant; it may be won from the plant world by the constructive power of the spirit; but no single individual form can be said to be typical.3In the essay on “The Gain to Our View of Goethe's Natural-Scientific Works through the Publications of the Goethe Institute,” in the twelfth volume of the Goethe Year Book.
[ 12 ] I now entered the Goethe-Schiller Institute as a collaborator. This was the place into which the philology of the end of the nineteenth century had taken over Goethe's literary remains. At the head of the Institute was Bernhard Suphan. With him also, I may say, I had a personal relationship from the very first day of the Weimar phase of my life. I had frequent opportunities to be in his home. That Bernhard Suphan had succeeded Erich Schmidt, the first director of the Institute, was due to his friendship with Herman Grimm.
[ 13 ] The last descendant of Goethe, Walther von Goethe, had left Goethe's literary remains as a legacy to the Grand-duchess Sophie. She had founded the archives in order that the legacy might be introduced in appropriate manner into the spiritual life of the times. She naturally turned to those personalities of whom she had to assume that they might know what was to be done with the Goethe literary remains.
[ 14 ] First of all, there was Herr von Loeper. He was, so to speak, foreordained to become the intermediary between Goethe scholars and the Court at Weimar to which the control of the Goethe legacy had been entrusted. For he had attained to high rank in the Prussian household administration, and thus stood in close relation with the Queen of Prussia, sister of the Grand-duchess of Saxe-Weimar; and, besides, he was a collaborator in the most famous edition of Goethe of that time, that of Hempel.
[ 15 ] Loeper was an unique personality, a very congenial mixture of the man of the world and the recluse. As an amateur, not as a professional, had he come to be interested in “Goethe research.” But he had attained to high distinction in this. In his opinions concerning Goethe, which appear in such beautiful form in his edition of Faust, he was entirely independent. What he advanced he had learned from Goethe himself. Since he had now to advise how Goethe's literary remains could best be administered, he had to turn to those with whom he had become familiar as Goethe scholars through his own work with Goethe.
[ 16 ] The first to be considered was Herman Grimm. It was as an historian of art that Herman Grimm had become concerned with Goethe; as such he had delivered lectures on Goethe at the University of Berlin, which he then published as a book. But he might well look upon himself as a sort of spiritual descendant of Goethe. He was rooted in those circles of the German spiritual life which had always been conscious of a living tradition of Goethe, and which might in a sense consider themselves bound in a personal way with him. The wife of Herman Grimm was Gisela von Arnim, the daughter of Bettina, author of the book, Goethe's Correspondence with a Child.
[ 17 ] Herman Grimm's judgments about Goethe were those of an historian of art. Moreover, as an historian of art he had grown into scholarship only so far as this was possible to him under the standards of a personally coloured relationship to art as a connoisseur.
[ 18 ] I think that Herman Grimm could readily come to an understanding with Loeper, with whom he was naturally on friendly terms by reason of their common interest in Goethe I imagine that, when these two discussed Goethe, the human interest in the genius came strongly to the fore and scholarly considerations fell into the background.
[ 19 ] This scholarly way of looking at Goethe was the vital thing in William Scherer, professor of German literature at the University of Berlin. In him both Loeper and Grimm had to recognize the official Goethe scholar. Loeper did so in a childlike, harmless fashion; Herman Grimm with a certain inner opposition. For to him the philological point of view which characterized Scherer was really uncongenial. [ 20 ] With these three persons rested the actual direction in the administration of the Goethe legacy. But it nevertheless really slipped entirely into the hands of Scherer. Loeper really thought nothing about this further than to advise and to share from without as a collaborator in the task; he had his fixed social relationships through his position in the household of the Prussian King. Herman Grimm thought just as little about it. He could only contribute points of view and right directions for the work by reason of his position in the spiritual life; for the directing of details he could not take responsibility.
[ 21 ] Quite different was the thing for William Scherer. For him Goethe was an important chapter in the history of German literature. In the Goethe archives new sources had come to light of immeasurable value for this chapter. Therefore, the work in the Goethe archives must be systematically united with the general work of the history of literature. The plan arose for an edition of Goethe which should take a philologically correct form. Scherer took over the intellectual supervision; the direction of the archives was left to his student Erich Schmidt, who then occupied the chair of modern German literature at Vienna.
[ 22 ] Thus the work of the Goethe Institute received its stamp. Not only so, but also everything that happened at the Institute or by reason of this. All bore the mark of the contemporary philological character of thought and work.
[ 23 ] In William Scherer literary-historical philology strove for an imitation of contemporary natural-scientific methods. Men took the current ideas of the natural sciences and sought to form philological and literary-historical ideas on these as models. Whence had a poet derived something? How had this something been modified in him? These were the questions which were placed at the foundations of a history of the evolution of the spiritual life. The poetic personalities disappeared from view; instead there came forward views as to how “material” and “motif” were evolved by the personalities. The climax of this sort of view was reached in Erich Schmidt's extended monograph on Lessing. In this Lessing's personality is not the main fact but an extremely painstaking consideration of the motifs of Minna von Barnhelm, Nathan, and the like.
[ 24 ] Scherer died young, shortly after the Goethe Institute was established. His students were numerous. Erich Schmidt was called from the Goethe Institute to Scherer's position in Berlin. Herman Grimm then arranged so that not one of the numerous students of Scherer should have the direction of the Institute, but instead Bernhard Suphan.
[ 25 ] As to his post before this time, he had been teaching in a Gymnasium in Berlin. At the same time he had undertaken the editing of Herder's works. Through this he seemed marked as the person to take direction also of the edition of Goethe. [ 26 ] Erich Schmidt still exercised a certain influence; through this fact Scherer's spirit still continued to rule over the Goethe task. But the ideas of Herman Grimm came forward in stronger fashion, if not in the manner of work yet in the personal relationships within the Goethe Institute.
[ 27 ] When I came to Weimar, and entered into a close relationship with Bernhard Suphan, he was a man sorely tried in his personal life. His first and second wives, who were sisters, he had seen buried at an early age. He lived now with his two children in Weimar, grieving over those who had left him, and not feeling any happiness in life. His sole satisfaction lay in the good will which the Grand-duchess Sophie, his profoundly honoured lady, bore to him. In this respect for her there was nothing servile: Suphan loved and admired the Grand-duchess in an entirely personal way.
[ 28 ] In loyal dependence was Suphan devoted to Herman Grimm. He had previously been honoured as a member of the household of Grimm in Berlin, and had breathed with satisfaction the spiritual atmosphere of that home. But there was something in him which prevented him from getting adjusted to life. One could speak freely with him about the highest spiritual matters, yet something bitter would easily come into the conversation, something arising from his experiences. Most of all did this melancholy dominate in his own mind; then he would help himself past these experiences by means of a dry humour. So one could not feel warm in his company. He could in a moment grasp some great idea quite sympathetically, and then, without any transition, fall immediately into the petty and trivial. He always showed good will toward me. In the spiritual interests vital within my own soul he could take no part, and at times treated them from the view-point of his dry humour; but in the direction of my work in the Goethe Institute and in my personal life he felt the warmest interest. [ 29 ] I cannot deny that I was often painfully disturbed by what Suphan did, the way in which he conducted himself in the management of the Institute, and the direction of the editing of Goethe; I never made any secret of this fact. Yet, when I look back upon the years which I passed with him, this is outweighed by a strong inner interest in the fate and the personality of the sorely tried man. He suffered in his life, and he suffered in himself. I saw how in a certain way, with all the good aspects of his character and all his capacities, he sank more and more into a bottomless brooding which rose up in his soul. When the Goethe and Schiller archives were moved to the new building erected in Ilm, Suphan said that he looked upon himself in relation to the opening of this building like one of those human victims who in primitive times were walled up before the doors of sacred buildings to sanctify the thing. He had really come gradually to fancy himself altogether in the role of one sacrificed on behalf of something with which he did not feel that he was wholly united. He felt that he was a beast of burden working at this Goethe task with which others with higher intellectual gifts might have been occupied. In this mood I always found him later whenever I met him after I had left Weimar. He ended his life by suicide in a mood of depression.
Besides Bernhard Suphan, there was engaged at the Goethe and Schiller Institute at the time of my entrance Julius Wahle. He was one of those called by Erich Schmidt. Wahle and I were intimates from the time of my first sojourn at Weimar; a heartfelt friendship grew up between us. Wahle was working at the editing of Goethe's journals. Eduard von der Hellen worked as Keeper of the Records, and also had the responsibility of editing Goethe's letters.
[ 30 ] On Goethe's works a great part of the German “world of Germanists” was engaged. There was a constant coming and going of professors and instructors in philology. One was then much in company with them during their longer or shorter visits. One could get vitally into the circle of interests of these persons.
[ 31 ] Besides these actual collaborators in the Goethe task the archives were visited by numbers of persons who were interested in one way or another in the rich collections of manuscripts of other German poets. For the Institute gradually became the place for collecting the literary remains of many poets. And other interested persons came also who at first were less interested in manuscripts than in simply studying in the library contained within the rooms of the Institute. There were, moreover, many visitors who merely wished to see the treasures there.
[ 32 ] Everybody who worked at the Institute was happy when Loeper appeared. He entered with sympathetic and amiable remarks. He requested the material he needed for his work, sat down, and worked for hours with a concentration seldom to be seen in anyone. No matter what was going on around him, he did not look up. If I were seeking for a personification of amiability, I should choose Herr von Loeper. Amiable was his Goethe research, amiable every word he uttered to anyone. Especially amiable was the stamp his whole inner life had taken from the fact that he seemed to be thinking of one thing only: how to bring the world to a true understanding of Goethe. I once sat by him during the presentation of Faust in the theatre. I began to discuss the manner of presentation, the dramatic qualities. He did not hear at all what I said. But he replied: “Yes, this actor often uses words and phrases that do not agree with those of Goethe.” Still more lovable did Loeper appear to me in his “absentmindedness.” When in a pause I chanced to speak of something which required a reckoning of duration of time, Loeper said: “Therefore the hours to 100 minutes; the minutes to 100 seconds ...” I stared at him, and said: “Your Excellency, 60.” He took out his watch, tested it, laughed heartily, counted, and said: “Yes, yes, 60 minutes, 60 seconds.” I often observed in him such instances of absent-mindedness. But over such proofs of Loeper's unique temper of mind I myself could not laugh, for they seemed to me a significant by-product – and also charming in their effect – of the personality so utterly free from pose, unsentimental, I might say gracious, in its earnestness. He spoke in rather sprawling sentences, almost without modulation; but one heard through the colourless speech a firm articulation of thought.
[ 33 ] Spiritual purpose entered the Institute when Herman Grimm appeared. From the standpoint from which I had read – while still in Vienna – his book on Goethe, I felt the deepest sympathy with his type of mind. And when I was able to meet him for the first time in the Institute, I had read almost everything that had come from his pen. Through Suphan I was soon afterwards brought into much more intimate acquaintance with him. Then, while Suphan was once absent from Weimar and he came for a visit to the Institute, he invited me to luncheon at his hotel. I was alone with him. It was plainly agreeable to him to see how I could enter into his way of viewing the world and life. He became communicative. He spoke to me of his idea of a Geschicte der Deutsche Phantasie 4History of the German Imagination. which he had in mind. I then received the impression that he would write such a book. This did not come to pass. But he explained to me beautifully how the contemporary stream of historic evolution has its impulse in the creative fantasy of the folk, which in its temper takes on the character of a living, working supersensible genius. During this luncheon I was wholly filled with the expositions of Herman Grimm. I believed that I knew how the supersensible spiritual works through man. I had before me a man whose spiritual vision reached as far as the creative spiritual, but who would not lay hold upon the actual life of this spiritual, but remained in the region where the spiritual expresses its life in man in the form of fantasy.
Herman Grimm had a special gift for surveying greater or lesser epochs of the history of the mind and of setting forth the period surveyed in precise, brilliant, epigrammatic characterization. When he described a single personality – Michelangelo, Raphael, Goethe, Homer – his representation always appeared against the background of such a survey.
How often have I read his essays in which he characterized in his striking glances the Greek and Roman cultures and the Middle Ages. The whole man was the revelation of unified style. When he fashioned his beautiful sentences in oral speech I had the feeling: “This may appear just so in one of his essays”; and, when I read an essay of his after having become acquainted with him, I felt as if I were listening to him. He permitted himself no laxity in oral speech, but he had the feeling that in artistic or literary presentation one must remain the same person who moved about in everyday life. But Herman Grimm did not roam around like other men even in everyday life. It was inevitable for him to lead a life possessed of style. [ 34 ] When Herman Grimm appeared in Weimar, and in the Institute, then one felt that the plan of the legacy was, so to speak, united with Goethe by secret spiritual threads. Not so when Erich Schmidt came. He was bound to these papers that were preserved in the Institute, not by ideas, but by the historic-philological methods. I could never attain to a human relation with Erich Schmidt. And so all the great respect shown him by all those who worked at the Institute as Scherer philologists made practically no impression upon me.
[ 35 ] Those were always pleasant moments when the Grand-duke Karl Alexander appeared in the Institute. An inwardly true enthusiasm – though manifested in a fashionable bearing – for everything pertaining to Goethe was a part of the nature of this man. Because of his age, his long connection with much that was important in the spiritual life of Germany, and because of his attractive lovableness he made a satisfying impression. It was a pleasing thought to know that he was the protector of the Goethe work in the Institute.
[ 36 ] The Grand-duchess Sophie, owner of the Institute, one saw there only on special festival occasions. When she had anything to say, she caused Suphan to be summoned. The collaborating workers were taken to her to be presented. But her solicitude for the Institute was extraordinary. She herself personally made all the preliminary preparations for the erection of a public building in which the poetic legacies might be worthily housed.
[ 37 ] The heir of the Grand-duke also, Carl August, who died before he became Grand-duke, came often to the Institute. His interest in everything there going on was not profound, but he liked to mingle with us collaborators. This interesting himself in the requirements of the spiritual life he viewed rather as a duty. But the interest of the heiress, Pauline, was full of warmth. I was able many times to converse with her about things which pertained to Goethe, poetry, and the like. As regards its social intercourse the Institute was between the scientific and artistic circles and the courtly circle of Weimar. From both sides it received its own colouring. Scarcely would the door have closed after a professor when it would reopen to admit some princely personage who came for a visit. Many men of all social positions shared in what went on in the Institute. At bottom it was a stirring life, stimulating in many relationships.
[ 38 ] Immediately beside the Institute was the Weimar library. In this resided as chief librarian a man of a childlike temperament and unlimited scholarship, Reinhold Köhle. The collaborators at the Institute often had occasion to resort there. For what they had in the Institute as literary aid to their work was here greatly augmented. Reinhold Köhle had roved around with unique comprehensiveness in the myths, fairy-tales, and sagas; his knowledge in the field of linguistic scholarship was of the most admirable universality. He knew where to turn for the most out-of-the-way literary material. His modesty was most touching, and he received one with great cordiality. He never permitted anyone to bring the books he needed from their resting-places into the work-room of the archives where we did our work. I came in once and asked for a book that Goethe used in connection with his studies in botany, in order to look into it. Reinhold Köhle went to get the old book which had rested somewhere on the topmost shelves unused for decades. He did not come back for a long time. Someone went to see where he was. He had fallen from the ladder on which he had to climb to attend to the books. He had broken his thigh. The noble and lovable person never recovered from the effect of the accident. After a lingering illness this widely known man died. I grieved over the painful thought that his misfortune had happened while he was attending to a book for me.
Chapter XIV
[ 1 ] Auf unbestimmte Zeit war ich wieder vor eine Aufgabe gestellt, die sich nicht aus einem äußeren Anlasse, sondern aus dem innern Werdegang meiner Welt- und Lebensanschauungen ergeben hatte. Und aus diesem hatte sich auch ergeben, daß ich in Rostock mit meiner Abhandlung über den Versuch einer «Verständigung des menschlichen Bewußtseins mit sich selbst» das Doktorexamen machte. Äußere Tatsachen bewirkten nur, daß ich es in Wien nicht machen konnte. Ich hatte die Realschule, nicht das Gymnasium offiziell hinter mir, hatte mir die Gymnasialbildung, Privatunterricht darin erteilend, auch privat angeeignet. Das schloß in Österreich das Doktorieren aus. Ich war in die «Philosophie» hineingewachsen, hatte aber einen offiziellen Bildungsgang hinter mir, der mich von allem ausschloß, in das den Menschen das Philosophiestudium hineinstellt.
[ 2 ] Nun war am Ende meines ersten Lebensabschnittes mir ein philosophisches Werk in die Hände gefallen, das mich außerordentlich fesselte, die «Sieben Bücher Platonismus» von Heinrich v. Stein, der damals in Rostock Philosophie lehrte. Diese Tatsache führte dazu, daß ich bei dem lieben alten Philosophen, den mir sein Buch sehr wert machte und den ich nur bei dem Examen gesehen habe, meine Abhandlung einreichte.
[ 3 ] Die Persönlichkeit Heinrichs v. Stein steht noch ganz lebendig vor mir. Fast so, als ob ich viel mit ihm durchlebt hätte. Denn die «Sieben Bücher Platonismus» sind der Ausdruck einer scharf geprägten philosophischen Individualität. Die Philosophie als Denkinhalt wird in diesem Werke nicht als etwas genommen, das auf eigenen Füßen steht. Plato wird allseitig als der Philosoph betrachtet, der eine solche auf sich selbst gestellte Philosophie suchte. Was er auf diesem Wege gefunden hat, wird von Heinrich v. Stein sorgfältig dargestellt. Man lebt sich in diesen ersten Kapiteln des Werkes ganz in die platonische Weltanschauung ein. Dann aber geht Stein über zu dem Hereinbrechen der Christus-Offenbarung in die Entwickelung der Menschheit. Dieses reale Hereinbrechen geistigen Lebens stellt er als das Höhere hin gegenüber dem Erarbeiten eines Denkinhaltes durch die bloße Philosophie.
[ 4 ] Von Plato zu Christus wie zu der Erfüllung eines Erstrebten, so könnte man kennzeichnen, was in der Darstellung Steins liegt. Dann verfolgt er weiter, wie in der christlichen Entwickelung der Weltanschauungen der Platonismus weiter wirkte.
[ 5 ] Stein ist der Meinung, daß die Offenbarung von außen dem menschlichen Weltanschauungsstreben seinen Inhalt gegeben habe. Da konnte ich mit ihm nicht mitgehen. Mir war Erlebnis, daß die menschliche Wesenheit, wenn sie sich zur Verständigung mit sich selbst im geistlebendigen Bewußtsein bringt, die Offenbarung haben könne, und daß diese dann im Ideen-Erleben Dasein im Menschen gewinnen könne. Aber ich empfand aus dem Buche etwas, das mich anzog. Das reale Leben des Geistes hinter dem Ideenleben, wenn auch in einer Form, die nicht die meinige war, bildete da den Impuls einer umfassenden geschichtsphilosophischen Darstellung. Plato, der große Träger einer Ideenwelt, die der Erfüllung durch den Christus-Impuls harrte; das darzustellen ist der Sinn des Stein'schen Buches. Mir stand dieses Buch, trotz des Gegensatzes, in dem ich mich zu ihm befand, viel näher als alle Philosophien, die nur aus Begriffen und Sinneserfahrungen heraus sich einen Inhalt erarbeiten.
[ 6 ] Ich vermißte bei Stein auch das Bewußtsein, daß Platos Ideenwelt doch auch zu einer uralten Offenbarung der geistigen Welt zurückführt. Diese (vorchristliche) Offenbarung, die zum Beispiel in Otto Willmanns «Geschichte des Idealismus» eine sympathische Darstellung gefunden hat, tritt in Steins Anschauung nicht zutage. Er stellt den Platonismus nicht als den Ideenrest der Uroffenbarung hin, der dann im Christenturn den verlorenen Geistgehalt in einer höheren Gestalt wiedererlangt hat; er stellt die platonischen Ideen wie einen aus sich selbst gesponnenen Begriffsinhalt hin, der dann durch Christus Leben gewonnen hat.
[ 7 ] Doch ist das Buch eines von denjenigen, die mit philosophischer Wärme geschrieben sind; und sein Verfasser war eine Persönlichkeit, die von tiefer Religiosität durchdrungen, in der Philosophie den Ausdruck des religiösen Lebens suchte. Auf jeder Seite des dreibändigen Werkes wird man der dahinterstehenden Persönlichkeit gewahr. Es war, nachdem ich das Buch, besonders die Partien über das Verhältnis des Platonismus zum Christentum immer wieder gelesen hatte, für mich ein bedeutsames Erlebnis, dem Verfasser gegenüberzutreten.
[ 8 ] Eine in ihrer ganzen Haltung ruhige Persönlichkeit, im höhern Alter, mit mildem Auge, das wie geeignet erschien, sanft aber doch eindringlich auf den Entwickelungsgang von Schülern hinzuschauen; eine Sprache, die in jedem Satze die Überlegung des Philosophen im Ton der Worte an sich trug. So stand Stein gleich vor mir, als ich ihn vor dem Examen besuchte. Er sagte mir: Ihre Dissertation ist nicht so, wie man sie fordert; man sieht ihr an, daß Sie sie nicht unter der Anleitung eines Professors gemacht haben; aber was sie enthält, macht möglich, daß ich sie sehr gerne annehme. Ich hatte nun so stark gewollt, im mündlichen Examen über etwas gefragt zu werden, was mit den «Sieben Büchern Platonismus» zusammengehangen hätte; aber keine Frage bezog sich darauf; alle waren der Kant'schen Philosophie entnommen.
[ 9 ] Ich habe das Bild Heinrichs v. Stein immer tief eingeprägt in meinem Herzen getragen; und es wäre mir unbegrenzt lieb gewesen, dem Manne wieder zu begegnen. Das Schicksal hat mich nie wieder mit ihm zusammengebracht. Mein Doktorexamen gehört zu meinen liebsten Erinnerungen, weil der Eindruck von Steins Persönlichkeit weitaus alles andere, das damit zusammenhängt, überstrahlt.
[ 10 ] Die Stimmung, mit der ich in Weimar eintrat, war gefärbt von meiner vorangehenden eingehenden Beschäftigung mit dem Platonismus. Ich meine, daß mir diese Stimmung viel geholfen hat, mich in meiner Aufgabe im Goethe- und Schiller-Archiv zurechtzufinden. Wie lebte Plato in der Ideenwelt, und wie Goethe? Das beschäftigte mich, wenn ich die Gänge von und zum Archiv machte; es beschäftigte mich auch, wenn ich über den Papieren des Goethenachlasses saß.
[ 11 ] Diese Frage war im Hintergrunde, als ich anfangs 1891 meine Eindrücke von Goethes Naturerkenntnis (in dem Aufsatze «Über den Gewinn unserer Anschauungen von Goethes naturwissenschaftlichen Arbeiten durch die Publikationen des Goethe-Archivs» im 12. Band des Goethe-Jahrbuches› in Worten aussprach wie diesen: «Es ist für die Mehrzahl der Menschen unmöglich, sich vorzustellen, daß etwas, zu dessen Erscheinung durchaus subjektive Bedingungen notwendig sind, doch eine objektive Bedeutung und Wesenheit haben kann. Und gerade von dieser letzteren Art ist die ‹Urpflanze›. Sie ist das objektiv in allen Pflanzen enthaltene Wesentliche derselben; wenn sie aber erscheinendes Dasein gewinnen soll, so muß sie der Geist des Menschen frei konstruieren.» Oder diesen: Eine rechte Erkenntnis der Goetheschen Denkungsart «liefert nun auch die Möglichkeit, darüber zu entscheiden, ob es der Auffassung Goethes gemäß ist, die Urpflanze oder das Urtier mit irgendeiner zu einer bestimmten Zeit vorgekommenen oder noch vorkommenden sinnlich-realen organischen Form zu identifizieren. Darauf kann nur mit einem entschiedenen ‹Nein› geantwortet werden. Die ‹Urpflanze› ist in jeder Pflanze enthalten, kann durch die konstruktive Kraft des Geistes aus der Pflanzenwelt gewonnen werden, aber keine einzelne, individuelle Form darf als typisch angesprochen werden. »
[ 12 ] In das Goethe- und Schiller-Archiv trat ich nun als Mitarbeiter ein. Das war die Stätte, in der die Philologie vom Ende des neunzehnten Jahrhunderts Goethes Nachlaß übernommen hatte. An der Spitze des Archivs stand, als Direktor, Bernhard Suphan. Mit ihm ergab sich auch, ich möchte sagen vom ersten Tage meines Weimarer Lebensabschnittes an, ein persönliches Verhältnis. Ich konnte oft in sein Haus kommen. Daß Bernhard Suphan der Nachfolger Erich Schmidts, des ersten Direktors des Archivs, geworden war, hatte er seiner Freundschaft mit Herman Grimm zu verdanken.
[ 13 ] Der letzte Goethenachkomme, Walter von Goethe, hatte Goethes Nachlaß der Großherzogin Sophie erblich hinterlassen. Diese hat das Archiv begründet, damit der Nachlaß in angemessener Art in das Geistesleben hineingestellt werde. Naturgemäß wandte sie sich an diejenigen Persönlichkeiten, von denen sie annehmen mußte, daß sie wissen konnten, was mit Goethes Papieren zu geschehen habe.
[ 14 ] Da war zunächst Herr v. Loeper. Er war wie vorbestimmt, der Vermittler zu werden zwischen den Goethekennern und dem Weimarischen Hofe, dem die Verwaltung des Goethenachlasses anvertraut war. Denn er hatte es zu einer hohen Beamtenstellung im preußischen Hausministerium gebracht, stand so der Königin von Preußen, der Schwester des Großherzogs von Weimar nahe, und er war zugleich der wichtigste Mitarbeiter an der damals berühmtesten Goetheausgabe, der Hempel'schen.
[ 15 ] Loeper war eine eigenartige Persönlichkeit; eine höchst sympathische Mischung von Weltmann und Sonderling. Als Liebhaber, nicht als Fachmann war er in die «Goetheforschung» hineingewachsen. Aber er hatte es in ihr zu hohem Ansehen gebracht. In seinen Urteilen über Goethe, die in so schöner Art in seiner Faustausgabe zutage traten, war er durchaus selbständig. Was er vorbrachte, hatte er von Goethe selbst gelernt. Da er nun raten sollte, wer Goethes Nachlaß am besten verwalten könne, mußte er auf diejenigen verfallen, denen er als Goethekennern durch seine eigene Tätigkeit an Goethe nahegetreten war.
[ 16 ] Da kam zunächst Herman Grimm in Betracht. Als Kunsthistoriker ist Herman Grimm an Goethe herangetreten; als solcher hat er an der Berliner Universität Vorlesungen über Goethe gehalten, die er dann als Buch veröffentlicht hat. Aber er konnte sich zugleich als eine Art geistiger Nachkomme Goethes betrachten. Er wuchs aus denjenigen Kreisen des deutschen Geisteslebens heraus, die stets eine lebendige Tradition von Goethe bewahrt hatten und die sich gewissermaßen in einer persönlichen Verbindung mit ihm denken konnten. Die Frau Herman Grimms war Gisela v. Arnim, die Tochter Bettinas, der Verfasserin des Buches: «Goethes Briefwechsel mit einem Kinde».
[ 17 ] Herman Grimm urteilte als kunstbegeisterter Mensch über Goethe. Er ist ja auch als Kunsthistoriker nur insoweit in die Gelehrsamkeit hineingewachsen, als ihm dies unter Wahrung einer persönlich gefärbten Stellung zur Kunst, als Kunstgenießer, möglich war.
[ 18 ] Ich denke, mit Loeper, mit dem er durch das gemeinschaftliche Goethejnteresse naturgemäß befreundet war konnte sich Herman Grimm gut verständigen. Ich stelle mir vor, daß bei den beiden, wenn sie über Goethe sprachen, die menschliche Anteilnahme an dem Genius durchaus im Vordergrunde, die gelehrte Betrachtung aber im Hintergrunde stand.
[ 19 ] Diese gelehrte Art, Goethe anzusehen, lebte nun in Wilhelm Scherer, dem Professor für deutsche Literaturgeschichte an der Berliner Universität. In ihm mußten die beiden den offiziellen Kenner Goethes gelten lassen. Loeper tat das in kindlich harmloser Art. Herman Grimm mit einem gewissen inneren Widerstreben. Denn ihm war die philologische Betrachtungsweise, die in Scherer lebte, eigentlich nicht sympathisch.
[ 20 ] An diese drei Persönlichkeiten kam die eigentliche Führung in der Verwaltung des Goethe-Nachlasses. Aber sie glitt doch stark ganz in die Hände Scherers hinüber. Loeper dachte wohl nicht daran, mehr als ratend und von außen mitarbeitend sich an der Aufgabe zu beteiligen; er hatte seine festen gesellschaftlichen Zusammenhänge durch seine Stellung am preußischen Königshause. Herman Grimm dachte ebensowenig daran. Er konnte durch seine Stellung im Geistesleben nur Neigung haben, Gesichtspunkte und Richtlinien für die Arbeit anzugeben; für die Einrichtung der Einzelheiten konnte er nicht aufkommen.
[ 21 ] Ganz anders stand die Sache für Wilhelm Scherer. Für ihn war Goethe ein gewichtiges Kapitel der deutschen Literaturgeschichte. In dem Goethe-Archiv waren neue Quellen von unermeßlicher Bedeutung für dieses Kapitel zutage getreten. Da mußte denn die Arbeit des Goethe-Archivs in die allgemeine literarhistorische Arbeit systematisch eingegliedert werden. Der Plan zu einer Goethe-Ausgabe entstand, die im philologisch richtigen Sinne gestaltet sein sollte. Scherer übernahm die geistige Oberaufsicht; die Leitung des Archivs wurde seinem Schüler, der damals die Professur für neuere deutsche Literaturgeschichte in Wien innehatte, Erich Schmidt, übertragen.
[ 22 ] Dadurch bekam die Arbeit am Goethe-Archiv ihr Gepräge. Aber auch alles andere, was im Goethe-Archiv und durch dieses geschah. Es trug alles den Charakter der damaligen philologischen Denk- und Arbeitsart.
[ 23 ] In Wilhelm Scherer hat die literargeschichtliche Philologie nach einer Nachahmung der damaligen naturwissenschaftlichen Methoden gestrebt. Man nahm die gebräuchlichen naturwissenschaftlichen Ideen und wollte die philologisch4iterarhistorischen ihnen nachbilden. Woher ein Dichter etwas entlehnt hat, wie das Entlehnte sich in ihm umgebildet hat, wurden die Fragen, die man einer Entwickelungsgeschichte des Geisteslebens zum Grunde legte. Die dichterischen Persönlichkeiten verschwanden aus der Betrachtung; eine Anschauung davon, wie sich «Stoffe», «Motive» durch die Persönlichkeiten hindurch entwickelten, trat auf. Ihren Höhepunkt erreichte diese Anschauungsart in Erich Schmidts großer Lessing-Monographie. In dieser ist nicht Lessings Persönlichkeit die Hauptsache, sondern eine höchst sorgfältige Betrachtung des Minna von Barnhelm-, des Nathan-Motivs usw.
[ 24 ] Scherer starb früh, bald nachdem das Goethe-Archiv errichtet war. Seine Schüler waren zahlreich. Erich Schmidt wurde vom Goethe-Archiv hinweg an seine Stelle in Berlin berufen. Herman Grimm setzte es dann durch, daß nicht einer der zahlreichen Schüler Scherers die Direktion des Archivs erhielt, sondern Bernhard Suphan.
[ 25 ] Dieser war vorher seiner Stellung nach Gymnasiallehrer in Berlin. Er hatte sich zugleich der Herausgabe von Herders Werken unterzogen. Dadurch schien er gut vorbestimmt, auch die Leitung der Goethe-Ausgabe zu übernehmen.
[ 26 ] Erich Schmidt behielt noch einen gewissen Einfluß; dadurch waltete Scherers Geist an der Goethe-Arbeit fort. Aber die Ideen Herman Grimms traten daneben, wenn auch nicht in der Arbeitsweise, so doch innerhalb des persönlichen Verkehrs im Goethe-Archiv stärker hervor.
[ 27 ] Bernhard Suphan war, als ich nach Weimar kam und in ein näheres Verhältnis zu ihm trat, ein persönlich hartgeprüfter Mann. Er hatte zwei Frauen, die Schwestern waren, frühzeitig ins Grab sinken sehen. Mit seinen beiden Knaben lebte er nun in Weimar, trauernd um die Dahingeschiedenen, ohne jegliche Lebensfreude. Sein einziger Lichtpunkt war das Wohlwollen, das ihm die Großherzogin Sophie, seine von ihm ehrlich verehrte Herrin, entgegenbrachte. In dieser Verehrung war nichts von Servilismus; Suphan liebte und bewunderte die Großherzogin ganz persönlich.
[ 28 ] In treuer Anhänglichkeit war Suphan Herman Grimm zugetan. Er war vorher, in Berlin, wie ein Mitglied im Hause Grimm angesehen worden, hatte mit Befriedigung in der geistigen Atmosphäre geatmet, die in diesem Hause war. Aber es lag in ihm etwas, das ihn mit dem Leben nicht zurechtkommen ließ. Man konnte wohl mit ihm über die höchsten geistigen Angelegenheiten sprechen; aber es kam leicht etwas Säuerliches, das von seiner Empfindung ausging, in das Gespräch. Vor allem waltete dieses Säuerliche in seiner eigenen Seele; dann half er sich durch einen trockenen Humor über diese Empfindung hinweg. Und so konnte man mit ihm nicht warm werden. Er konnte in einem Atemzug ganz sympathisch das Große erfassen, und, ohne Übergang, in Kleinlich-Triviales verfallen. Er stand mir dauernd mit Wohlwollen gegenüber. Für die geistigen Interessen, die in meiner Seele lebten, hatte er keine Anteilnahme, behandelte sie wohl auch zuweilen vom Gesichtspunkte seines trockenen Humors; für meine Arbeitsrichtung im Goethe-Archiv und für mein persönliches Leben hatte er aber das größte Interesse.
[ 29 ] Ich kann nicht in Abrede stellen, daß mich manchmal recht unangenehm berührte, was Suphan tat, wie er sich in der Führung des Archivs und in der Leitung der Goethe-Ausgabe verhielt; ich habe daraus nie ein Hehl gemacht. Aber, wenn ich auf die Jahre zurückblicke, die ich mit ihm durchlebt habe, so überwiegt doch eine starke innere Anteilnahme an dem Schicksal und an der Persönlichkeit des schwer geprüften Mannes. Er litt am Leben und er litt an sich. Ich sah, wie er gewissermaßen immer mehr mit guten Seiten seines Charakters und seiner Fähigkeiten in ein bodenloses, wesenloses Grübeln versank, das in seiner Seele aufstieg. Als das Goethe- und Schiller-Archiv in das neue, an der Ilm gebaute Haus einzog, sagte Suphan, er komme sich vor gegenüber der Eröffnung dieses Hauses wie eines der Menschenopfer, die in uralten Zeiten vor den Toren geheiligter Gebäude zum Segen der Sache eingemauert wurden. Er hatte sich auch allmählich ganz in die Rolle eines für die Sache, mit der er sich doch nicht ganz verbunden fühlte, Geopferten hineinphantasiert. Wie ein Lasttier der Goethe-Arbeit, das keine Freude empfinden konnte an einer Aufgabe, bei der andere mit höchster Begeisterung hätten sein können, empfand er sich. In dieser Stimmung fand ich ihn später immer, wenn ich ihn nach meinem Weggang von Weimar traf. Er endete durch Selbstmord in getrübtem Bewußtsein. Außer Bernhard Suphan wirkte am Goethe- und Schiller-Archiv zur Zeit meines Eintrittes Julius Wahle. Er war noch von Erich Schmidt berufen worden. Wahle und ich waren einander schon zur Zeit meines ersten Aufenthaltes in Weimar nahegekommen; es bildete sich zwischen uns eine herzliche Freundschaft aus. Wahle arbeitete an der Herausgabe von Goethes Tagebüchern. Als Archivar wirkte Eduard von der Hellen, der auch die Ausgabe von Goethes Briefen besorgte.
[ 30 ] An «Goethes Werken» wirkte ein großer Teil der deutschen Germanistenwelt mit. Es war ein fortwährendes Kommen und Gehen von Professoren und Privatdozenten der Philologie. Man war mit diesen dann auch außerhalb der Archivstunden während ihrer längeren und kürzeren Besuche viel zusammen. Man konnte sich ganz in die Interessenkreise dieser Persönlichkeiten einleben.
[ 31 ] Außer diesen eigentlichen Mitarbeitern an der Goethe-Ausgabe wurde das Archiv von zahlreichen Persönlichkeiten besucht, die sich für das eine oder das andere der reichen Handschriftensammlungen deutscher Dichter interessierten. Denn das Archiv wurde nach und nach die Sammelstätte vieler Dichter-Nachlässe. Und auch andere Interessenten kamen, die zunächst weniger mit Handschriften zu tun hatten, die nur innerhalb der Archivräume in der vorhandenen Bibliothek studieren wollten. Auch viele Besucher, die nur die Schätze des Archivs sehen wollten, gab es.
[ 32 ] Eine Freude war es allen, die im Archiv arbeiteten, wenn Loeper erschien. Er trat mit sympathisch-liebenswürdigen Bemerkungen ein. Er ließ sich sein Arbeitsmaterial geben, setzte sich hin und arbeitete nun stundenlang mit einer Konzentration, die man selten an einem Menschen bemerken kann. Was auch um ihn herum vorging, er blickte nicht auf. - Sollte ich nach einer Personifikation der Liebenswürdigkeit suchen: ich würde Herrn v. Loeper wählen. Liebenswürdig war seine Goethe-Forschung, liebenswürdig jedes Wort, das er zu jemand sprach. Besonders liebenswürdig war die Prägung, die sein ganzes Seelenleben dadurch angenommen hatte, daß er fast immer nur daran zu denken schien: wie bringt man Goethe der Welt zum rechten Verständnis. Ich saß einmal neben ihm bei einer Faust-Aufführung im Theater. Ich fing an, über die Art der Darstellung, über das Schauspielerische zu sprechen. Er hörte gar nicht, was ich sagte. Aber er erwiderte: «Ja, diese Schauspieler sprechen ja oft Worte und Wendungen, die mit den Goethe'schen nicht ganz stimmen. » Noch liebenswürdiger erschien mir Loeper in seiner «Zerstreutheit». Als ich in der Pause auf etwas zu sprechen kam, wobei man eine Zeitdauer ausrechnen sollte, sagte Loeper: «Also die Stunde zu 100 Minuten, die Minute zu 100 Sekunden...» Ich schaute ihn an und sagte: «Exzellenz, 60.» Er nahm seine Uhr heraus, prüfte, lächelte herzlich, zählte und sprach: «Ja, ja, 60 Minuten, 60 Sekunden.» Ähnliche Proben von «Zerstreutheit» erlebte ich viele bei ihm. Aber selbst über solche Proben der Eigenart von Loepers Seelenverfassung konnte ich nicht lachen, denn sie erschienen als eine notwendige Beigabe des ganz posenlosen, unsentimentalischen, ich möchte sagen, graziösen Ernstes dieser Persönlichkeit, der zugleich anmutig wirkte. Er sprach in etwas sich übersprudelnden Sätzen, fast ohne allen Tonfall; aber man hörte durch die farblose Sprache eine starke Artikulation der Gedanken.
[ 33 ] Geistige Vornehmheit zog in das Archiv ein, wenn Herman Grimm erschien. Von dem Zeitpunkte an, da ich - noch in Wien - sein Goethe-Buch gelesen hatte, lebte zu seiner Geistesart die tiefste Neigung in mir. Und da ich ihm im Archiv zum erstenmal begegnen durfte, hatte ich fast alles gelesen, was bis dahin von ihm erschienen war. Durch Suphan wurde ich denn bald näher mit ihm bekannt. Er lud mich dann einmal, als Suphan nicht in Weimar anwesend war und er zum Besuch ins Archiv kam, zu einem Mittagessen in sein Hotel ein. Ich war allein mit ihm. Ihm war offenbar sympathisch, wie ich auf seine Art, Welt und Leben anzusehen, eingehen konnte. Er wurde mitteilsam. Er sprach zu mir von seiner Idee einer «Geschichte der deutschen Phantasie», die er in seiner Seele trug. Ich bekam damals den Eindruck, daß er eine solche schreiben wolle. Es ist nicht dazu gekommen. Aber er setzte mir schön auseinander, wie der fortlaufende Strom des geschichtlichen Werdens seine Impulse in der schaffenden Volksphantasie habe, die in seiner Auffassung den Charakter eines lebenden, wirkenden übersinnlichen Genius annahm. Ich war während dieses Mittagsmahles ganz erfüllt von den Ausführungen Herman Grimms. Ich glaubte zu wissen, wie die übersinnliche Geistigkeit durch Menschen wirkt. Ich hatte einen Mann vor mir, dessen Seelenblick bis zu der schaffenden Geistigkeit reicht, der aber nicht das Eigenleben dieser Geistigkeit erkennend ergreifen will, sondern der in der Region verbleibt, wo sich im Menschen das Geistige als Phantasie auslebt. Herman Grimm hatte eine besondere Gabe, größere oder kleinere Epochen der Geistesgeschichte zu überschauen und das Überschaute in präzisen, geistvollen epigrammatischen Charakteristiken darzustellen. Wenn er eine einzelne Persönlichkeit, wenn er Michel Angelo, Raphael, Goethe, Homer schilderte, so erschien seine Darstellung immer auf dem Hintergrunde solcher Überschauen. Wie oft habe ich doch seinen Aufsatz gelesen, in dem er Griechentum, Römertum, Mittelalter in seinen schlagenden Überblicken charakterisiert. Der ganze Mann war die Offenbarung eines einheitlichen Stiles. Wenn er seine schönen Sätze im mündlichen Gespräche prägte, so hatte ich die Vorstellung: das könnte genau so in einem Aufsatze von ihm stehen; und wenn ich, nachdem ich ihn kennen gelernt hatte, einen Aufsatz von ihm las, so vermeinte ich, ihn sprechen zu hören. Er ließ sich keine Lässigkeit im mündlichen Gespräche durch; aber er hatte das Gefühl, man müsse im künstlerisch-schriftstellerischen Darstellen der Mensch bleiben, als der man alltäglich herumwandelt. Aber Herman Grimm wandelte eben in der Alltäglichkeit nicht so herum wie andere Menschen. Es war ihm selbstverständlich, ein stilisiertes Leben zu führen.
[ 34 ] Wenn Herman Grimm in Weimar und im Archiv erschien, dann fühlte man die Nachlaßstätte wie durch geheime geistige Fäden mit Goethe verbunden. Nicht so, wenn Erich Schmidt kam. Er war nicht durch Ideen, sondern durch die historisch-philologische Methode mit den Papieren verbunden, die im Archiv aufbewahrt waren. Ich konnte nie ein menschliches Verhältnis zu Erich Schmidt gewinnen. Und so ging denn an mir ziemlich interesselos vorbei, was sich an großer Verehrung für diesen in den Kreisen aller derer auslebte, die als Scherer-Philologen im Archiv arbeiteten.
[ 35 ] Sympathische Augenblicke waren es immer, wenn der Großherzog Karl Alexander im Archiv erschien. Eine in vornehmer Haltung auftretende, aber innerlich wahre Begeisterung für alles, was an Goethe anknüpfte, lebte in dieser Persönlichkeit. Durch sein Alter, seine lange Verbindung mit vielem Bedeutenden im deutschen Geistesleben, durch seine gewinnende Liebenswürdigkeit machte er einen wohltuenden Eindruck. Es war ein befriedigender Gedanke, ihn als Beschützer der Goethe-Arbeit im Archiv zu wissen.
[ 36 ] Die Großherzogin Sophie, die Besitzerin des Archivs, sah man in diesem nur bei besonders feierlichen Anlässen. Wenn sie etwas zu sagen hatte, ließ sie Suphan zu sich rufen. Die mitarbeitenden Besucher wurden zu ihr geführt, uni ihr vorgestellt zu werden. Ihre Fürsorge für das Archiv war aber eine außerordentliche. Sie bereitete damals persönlich alles vor, was zum Bau eines staatlichen Hauses führen sollte, in dem die Dichternachlässe würdig untergebracht werden sollten.
[ 37 ] Auch der Erbgroßherzog Karl August, der, bevor er zur Regierung kam, gestorben ist, kam öfter ins Archiv. Sein Interesse an all dem, was da vorhanden war, ging nicht tief, aber er unterhielt sich gerne mit uns Mitarbeitenden. Er betrachtete es mehr als Pflicht, sich für die Angelegenheiten des geistigen Lebens zu interessieren. Warm aber war das Interesse der Erbgroßherzogin Pauline. Mit ihr konnte ich manches Gespräch über Dinge führen, die Goethe, Dichtung usw. betrafen. Das Archiv stand in bezug auf seinen Verkehr zwischen der wissenschaftlichen, künstlerischen und der Weimarischen Hofgesellschaft darinnen. Von beiden Seiten her erhielt es seine eigene gesellschaftliche Färbung. Kaum hatte sich die Türe hinter einem Kathedermann geschlossen, so ging sie wieder für irgendeine fürstliche Persönlichkeit auf, die am Hofe zum Besuche erschienen war. Viele Menschen aller gesellschaftlichen Stellungen nahmen teil an dem, was im Archiv geschah. Es war im Grunde ein reges, in vieler Beziehung anregendes Leben.
[ 38 ] In der unmittelbaren Nachbarschaft des Archivs war die Weimarische Bibliothek. In ihr hauste ein Mann mit kindlichem Gemüte und einer schier unbegrenzten Gelehrsamkeit, Reinhold Köhler, als Oberbibliothekar. Die Mitarbeiter des Archivs hatten oft dort zu tun. Denn, was sie im Archiv als literarische Hilfsmittel ihrer Arbeit hatten, fand dort seine wichtige Ergänzung. Reinhold Köhler war in einzigartiger Umfänglichkeit bewandert in der Mythen-, Märchen- und Sagenschöpfung; sein Wissen auf sprachgelehrtem Gebiet war von der bewunderungswürdigsten Universalität. Er wußte Rat im Aufsuchen der verborgensten Literaturbelege. Dabei war er von rührender Bescheidenheit, von herzlichstem Entgegenkommen. Er ließ es sich nie nehmen, die Bücher, die man brauchte, selbst von ihren Ruheplätzen her in das Bibliotheksarbeitszimmer, wo man arbeitete, zu holen. Ich kam einmal hin, bat um ein Buch, das Goethe bei seinen botanischen Studien benützt hatte, um es einzusehen. Reinhold Köhler holte den Schmöker, der wohl seit Jahrzehnten unbenützt ganz oben irgendwo gelagert hatte. Er kam längere Zeit nicht zurück. Man schaute nach, wo er blieb. Er war von der Leiter gefallen, auf der er zur Besorgung des Buches zu klettern harte. Ein Bruch eines Oberschenkelknochens. Die liebe, edle Persönlichkeit konnte sich von den Folgen des Unfalles nicht mehr erholen. Nach langem Kranksein starb der weithin verehrte Mann. Ich litt unter dem schmerzlichen Gedanken, daß sein Unfall bei dem Besorgen eines Buches für mich geschehen war.
Chapter XIV
[ 1 ] For an indefinite period of time, I was again faced with a task that had not arisen from an external cause, but from the inner development of my world and life views. And this had also resulted in my taking the doctoral examination in Rostock with my essay on the attempt to "communicate human consciousness with itself". External facts only meant that I couldn't do it in Vienna. I had officially completed secondary school, not grammar school, and had also acquired my grammar school education privately by taking private lessons. That ruled out doing a doctorate in Austria. I had grown into "philosophy", but had an official education behind me that excluded me from everything that the study of philosophy puts people into.
[ 2 ] At the end of my first phase of life, I came across a philosophical work that captivated me extraordinarily, the "Seven Books of Platonism" by Heinrich v. Stein, who was teaching philosophy in Rostock at the time. This fact led me to submit my essay to the dear old philosopher, whom his book made very dear to me and whom I had only seen at the exam.
[ 3 ] The personality of Heinrich v. Stein still stands before me quite vividly. Almost as if I had lived through a lot with him. For the "Seven Books of Platonism" are the expression of a sharply defined philosophical individuality. In this work, philosophy as the content of thought is not taken as something that stands on its own two feet. Plato is universally regarded as the philosopher who sought a philosophy that stood on its own feet. What he found on this path is carefully presented by Heinrich v. Stein. In these first chapters of the work, one becomes completely immersed in the Platonic world view. Then, however, Stein moves on to the breaking in of the revelation of Christ into the development of humanity. He presents this real breaking in of spiritual life as the higher thing compared to the working out of a thought content through mere philosophy.
[ 4 ] From Plato to Christ as to the fulfillment of an aspiration, this is how one could characterize what lies in Stein's presentation. He then goes on to trace how Platonism continued to have an effect in the Christian development of world views.
[ 5 ] Stein is of the opinion that revelation from outside has given human worldview striving its content. I could not go along with him on that. It was my experience that the human being could have revelation if it brought itself to an understanding with itself in the spiritually alive consciousness, and that this could then gain existence in the human being in the experience of ideas. But I sensed something in the book that attracted me. The real life of the spirit behind the life of ideas, albeit in a form that was not my own, formed the impulse for a comprehensive historical-philosophical presentation. Plato, the great bearer of a world of ideas awaiting fulfillment through the Christ-impulse; that is the purpose of Stein's book. Despite the opposition I felt towards it, this book was much closer to me than all philosophies that only develop content from concepts and sensory experiences.
[ 6 ] I also missed the awareness in Stein that Plato's world of ideas also leads back to an ancient revelation of the spiritual world. This (pre-Christian) revelation, which has found a sympathetic portrayal in Otto Willmann's "History of Idealism", for example, does not emerge in Stein's view. He does not present Platonism as the remnant of ideas of the original revelation, which then regained the lost spiritual content in a higher form in Christianity; he presents the Platonic ideas as a conceptual content spun out of itself, which then gained life through Christ.
[ 7 ] However, the book is one of those written with philosophical warmth; and its author was a personality who, imbued with deep religiosity, sought the expression of religious life in philosophy. On every page of the three-volume work, one becomes aware of the personality behind it. After reading the book again and again, especially the sections on the relationship between Platonism and Christianity, it was a significant experience for me to come face to face with the author.
[ 8 ] A calm personality in his whole demeanor, of advanced age, with a mild eye that seemed suited to looking gently yet insistently at the development of pupils; a language that carried the philosopher's deliberation in the tone of the words in every sentence. Stein was standing in front of me when I visited him before my exams. He said to me: "Your dissertation is not what is required; one can see that you did not write it under the guidance of a professor; but what it contains makes it possible for me to accept it very gladly. Now I had so much desired to be asked in the oral examination about something connected with the "Seven Books of Platonism"; but no question referred to it; all were taken from Kant's philosophy.
[ 9 ] I have always carried the image of Heinrich v. Stein deeply imprinted in my heart; and it would have been infinitely dear to me to meet the man again. Fate never brought me together with him again. My doctoral examination is one of my fondest memories, because the impression of Stein's personality far outshines everything else connected with it.
[ 10 ] The mood in which I entered Weimar was colored by my previous in-depth study of Platonism. I think that this mood helped me a lot in finding my way around my task in the Goethe and Schiller Archive. How did Plato live in the world of ideas, and how did Goethe? That kept me busy when I was walking to and from the archive; it also kept me busy when I was sitting over the papers in Goethe's estate.
[ 11 ] This question was in the background when, at the beginning of 1891, I wrote about my impressions of Goethe's knowledge of nature (in the essay "Über den Gewinn unserer Anschauungen von Goethes naturwissenschaftlichen Arbeiten durch die Publikationen des Goethe-Archivs" in the 12th volume of the Goethe-Jahrbuch). The majority of people find it impossible to imagine that something for whose appearance subjective conditions are absolutely necessary can nevertheless have an objective meaning and essence. And it is precisely of this latter kind that the 'original plant' is. It is the essential objectively contained in all plants; but if it is to gain apparent existence, it must be freely constructed by the mind of man." Or this one: A proper realization of Goethe's way of thinking "now also provides the possibility of deciding whether it is in accordance with Goethe's view to identify the primordial plant or the primordial animal with any sensory-real organic form that occurred at a certain time or still occurs. The answer to this can only be a decisive 'no'. The 'original plant' is contained in every plant and can be extracted from the plant world through the constructive power of the spirit, but no single, individual form may be addressed as typical."
[ 12 ] I now joined the Goethe and Schiller Archive as an employee. This was the place where philology had taken over Goethe's estate at the end of the nineteenth century. At the head of the archive was Bernhard Suphan as director. I also had a personal relationship with him, I would say from the very first day of my life in Weimar. I was often able to come to his house. The fact that Bernhard Suphan became the successor to Erich Schmidt, the first director of the archive, was thanks to his friendship with Herman Grimm.
[ 13 ] The last descendant of Goethe, Walter von Goethe, had bequeathed Goethe's estate to Grand Duchess Sophie. She founded the archive so that the estate could be placed in the intellectual life in an appropriate manner. Naturally, she turned to those personalities who she assumed would know what to do with Goethe's papers.
[ 14 ] First of all, there was Mr. v. Loeper. He was destined to become the mediator between the Goethe connoisseurs and the Weimar court, which was entrusted with the administration of Goethe's estate. This was because he had attained a high civil servant position in the Prussian House Ministry and was thus close to the Queen of Prussia, the sister of the Grand Duke of Weimar, and he was also the most important contributor to the most famous Goethe edition of the time, Hempel's.
[ 15 ] Loeper was a peculiar personality; a highly likeable mixture of man of the world and eccentric. He had grown into "Goethe research" as an enthusiast, not as an expert. But he had achieved a high reputation within it. In his judgments about Goethe, which emerged so beautifully in his Faust edition, he was thoroughly independent. What he put forward he had learned from Goethe himself. Since he was now supposed to advise who could best administer Goethe's estate, he had to fall back on those whom he had come close to as Goethe connoisseurs through his own work on Goethe.
[ 16 ] The first person to come into consideration was Herman Grimm. Herman Grimm approached Goethe as an art historian; as such, he gave lectures on Goethe at Berlin University, which he then published as a book. At the same time, however, he could consider himself a kind of intellectual descendant of Goethe. He grew out of those circles of German intellectual life that had always preserved a living tradition of Goethe and who could think of themselves as having a personal connection with him. Herman Grimm's wife was Gisela v. Arnim, the daughter of Bettina, the author of the book "Goethe's Correspondence with a Child".
[ 17 ] Herman Grimm judged Goethe as an art enthusiast. As an art historian, he only grew into scholarship to the extent that he was able to do so while maintaining a personally colored position on art, as an art connoisseur.
[ 18 ] I think Herman Grimm was able to communicate well with Loeper, with whom he was naturally friends due to their shared interest in Goethe. I imagine that when the two of them talked about Goethe, human sympathy for the genius was definitely in the foreground, but scholarly contemplation was in the background.
[ 19 ] This scholarly way of looking at Goethe was now alive in Wilhelm Scherer, the professor of German literary history at Berlin University. In him, the two had to accept Goethe's official connoisseur. Loeper did this in a childishly harmless manner. Herman Grimm did so with a certain inner reluctance. For he did not really like the philological approach that lived in Scherer.
[ 20 ] The actual management of the Goethe estate was entrusted to these three personalities. But it slipped heavily into the hands of Scherer. Loeper probably did not think of participating in the task in more than an advisory and external capacity; he had his firm social connections through his position in the Prussian royal household. Herman Grimm did not think about it either. Due to his position in intellectual life, he could only be inclined to provide points of view and guidelines for the work; he could not be responsible for the organization of the details.
[ 21 ] The situation was completely different for Wilhelm Scherer. For him, Goethe was an important chapter in German literary history. New sources of immeasurable importance for this chapter had come to light in the Goethe Archive. The work of the Goethe Archive had to be systematically integrated into the general work of literary history. The plan for a Goethe edition emerged, which was to be designed in the philologically correct sense. Scherer took over the intellectual supervision; the management of the archive was transferred to his student, Erich Schmidt, who at the time held the professorship for modern German literary history in Vienna.
[ 22 ] This gave the work at the Goethe Archive its character. But also everything else that happened in the Goethe Archive and through it. It all had the character of the philological way of thinking and working at the time.
[ 23 ] In Wilhelm Scherer, literary-historical philology strove to imitate the scientific methods of the time. It took the common ideas of the natural sciences and wanted to emulate the philological and literary-historical ones. Where a poet borrowed something from, how the borrowed material was transformed in him, became the questions on which a history of the development of intellectual life was based. The poetic personalities disappeared from consideration; a view of how "materials", "motifs" developed through the personalities emerged. This way of looking at things reached its peak in Erich Schmidt's great Lessing monograph. In this, it is not Lessing's personality that is the main focus, but a very careful examination of the Minna von Barnhelm motif, the Nathan motif, etc.
[ 24 ] Scherer died early, soon after the Goethe Archive was established. His students were numerous. Erich Schmidt was appointed by the Goethe Archive to take his place in Berlin. Herman Grimm then succeeded in ensuring that Bernhard Suphan, rather than one of Scherer's numerous students, became director of the archive.
[ 25 ] The latter had previously been a grammar school teacher in Berlin. At the same time, he had also edited Herder's works. This seemed to have predestined him to take over the management of the Goethe edition.
[ 26 ] Erich Schmidt still retained a certain influence; as a result, Scherer's spirit continued to influence Goethe's work. But Herman Grimm's ideas became more prominent alongside this, if not in the way he worked, then at least in his personal dealings in the Goethe Archive.
[ 27 ] Bernhard Suphan was, when I came to Weimar and entered into a closer relationship with him, a personally hard-tested man. He had seen two wives, who were sisters, sink prematurely into their graves. He now lived in Weimar with his two boys, grieving for the deceased, without any joy in life. His only bright spot was the benevolence shown to him by the Grand Duchess Sophie, his honestly revered mistress. There was nothing of servility in this reverence; Suphan loved and admired the Grand Duchess personally.
[ 28 ] Suphan was loyally devoted to Herman Grimm. He had previously, in Berlin, been regarded as a member of the House of Grimm, had breathed with satisfaction in the intellectual atmosphere that existed in that house. But there was something in him that made him unable to cope with life. It was possible to talk to him about the highest spiritual matters, but something sour, which emanated from his feelings, easily entered into the conversation. Above all, this sourness reigned in his own soul; then he helped himself over this feeling with a dry sense of humor. And so it was impossible to warm to him. He could grasp the big picture quite sympathetically in one breath and, without transition, lapse into pettiness and triviality. He was always sympathetic towards me. He had no sympathy for the intellectual interests that lived in my soul, and sometimes treated them from the point of view of his dry humor; but he took the greatest interest in the direction of my work in the Goethe Archive and in my personal life.
[ 29 ] I cannot deny that I was sometimes quite unpleasantly touched by what Suphan did, how he behaved in the management of the archive and in the management of the Goethe edition; I never made a secret of this. But when I look back on the years I lived through with him, a strong inner sympathy for the fate and personality of this sorely tried man prevails. He suffered from life and he suffered from himself. I saw him, as it were, sinking more and more into a bottomless, insubstantial brooding that rose up in his soul with the good aspects of his character and his abilities. When the Goethe and Schiller Archive moved into the new house built on the Ilm, Suphan said that he felt like one of those human sacrifices that in ancient times were walled in at the gates of sacred buildings for the blessing of the cause. He had also gradually fantasized himself into the role of someone sacrificed for the cause with which he did not feel entirely connected. He felt like a beast of burden in Goethe's work, unable to take pleasure in a task where others could have been most enthusiastic. I later found him in this mood whenever I met him after I left Weimar. He died by suicide in a clouded state of consciousness. Apart from Bernhard Suphan, Julius Wahle was working at the Goethe and Schiller Archive at the time I joined. He had been appointed by Erich Schmidt. Wahle and I had already become close during my first stay in Weimar; a warm friendship developed between us. Wahle was working on the publication of Goethe's diaries. Eduard von der Hellen, who was also responsible for the edition of Goethe's letters, acted as archivist.
[ 30 ] A large part of the German philological world contributed to "Goethes Werke". Professors and private lecturers of philology were constantly coming and going. We also spent a lot of time with them outside the archive hours during their longer and shorter visits. You could completely immerse yourself in the interests of these personalities.
[ 31 ] In addition to these actual collaborators on the Goethe edition, the archive was visited by numerous personalities who were interested in one or other of the rich manuscript collections of German poets. The archive gradually became the collection point for many poets' estates. And other interested parties also came, who initially had less to do with manuscripts, who only wanted to study within the archive rooms in the existing library. There were also many visitors who just wanted to see the archive's treasures.
[ 32 ] It was a pleasure for everyone who worked in the archive when Loeper appeared. He entered with pleasant and amiable remarks. He had his work materials handed to him, sat down and worked for hours with a concentration that you rarely see in a person. Whatever was going on around him, he never looked up. - If I were looking for a personification of amiability, I would choose Mr. v. Loeper. His Goethe research was endearing, every word he spoke to someone was endearing. Particularly endearing was the imprint that his whole mental life had taken on by the fact that he almost always seemed to be thinking only of how to make the world understand Goethe. I once sat next to him at a performance of Faust in the theater. I began to talk about the way the play was presented, about the acting. He didn't even hear what I was saying. But he replied: "Yes, these actors often use words and phrases that are not quite the same as Goethe's. " Loeper seemed even more amiable to me in his "absent-mindedness". When I came to talk about something during the break, where you were supposed to calculate a duration, Loeper said: "So the hour to 100 minutes, the minute to 100 seconds..." I looked at him and said: "Your Excellency, 60." He took out his watch, checked it, smiled warmly, counted and said: "Yes, yes, 60 minutes, 60 seconds." I experienced many similar samples of "absent-mindedness" with him. But I couldn't laugh even at such samples of Loeper's peculiar state of mind, because they seemed to be a necessary addition to the completely pose-less, unsentimental, I would say graceful seriousness of this personality, which at the same time appeared graceful. He spoke in somewhat effervescent sentences, almost without any intonation; but one heard a strong articulation of thought through the colorless language.
[ 33 ] Spiritual nobility entered the archive when Herman Grimm appeared. From the moment I read his Goethe book while still in Vienna, I had the deepest affection for his way of thinking. And since I was allowed to meet him for the first time in the archive, I had read almost everything that had been published by him up to that point. I soon became acquainted with him through Suphan. Once, when Suphan was not in Weimar and he came to visit the archive, he invited me to lunch at his hotel. I was alone with him. He obviously liked the way I was able to respond to his way of looking at the world and life. He became communicative. He spoke to me about his idea of a "history of the German imagination", which he carried in his soul. I got the impression at the time that he wanted to write one. It never came to pass. But he explained to me beautifully how the ongoing stream of historical development had its impulses in the creative popular imagination, which in his view took on the character of a living, active supersensible genius. During this lunch I was completely absorbed by Herman Grimm's explanations. I believed I knew how the supersensible spirit works through people. I had before me a man whose soul's gaze reaches as far as the creative spirituality, but who does not want to grasp the life of this spirituality by recognizing it, but who remains in the region where the spiritual lives itself out in man as fantasy. Herman Grimm had a special gift for surveying major or minor epochs of intellectual history and depicting what he surveyed in precise, witty epigrammatic characteristics. When he described an individual personality, when he described Michel Angelo, Raphael, Goethe, Homer, his depiction always appeared on the background of such overviews. How often have I read his essay in which he characterizes Greekism, Romanism and the Middle Ages in his striking overviews. The whole man was the revelation of a uniform style. When he coined his beautiful sentences in oral conversation, I had the idea that it could be written in exactly the same way in one of his essays; and when, after I had got to know him, I read one of his essays, I thought I could hear him speak. He didn't allow himself any casualness in oral conversation; but he had the feeling that in artistic and literary representation one must remain the person one walks around as in everyday life. But Herman Grimm did not walk around in everyday life like other people. It was natural for him to lead a stylized life.
[ 34 ] When Herman Grimm appeared in Weimar and in the archive, one felt that the estate was connected to Goethe by secret spiritual threads. Not so when Erich Schmidt came. He was not connected to the papers stored in the archive through ideas, but through the historical-philological method. I was never able to establish a human relationship with Erich Schmidt. And so I was quite uninterested in the great admiration for him among all those who worked as Scherer philologists in the archive.
[ 35 ] It was always a pleasant moment when the Grand Duke Karl Alexander appeared in the archive. A noble demeanor, but inwardly true enthusiasm for everything related to Goethe lived in this personality. His age, his long association with many important figures in German intellectual life and his winning amiability made a pleasant impression. It was a satisfying thought to know that he was the protector of Goethe's work in the archive.
[ 36 ] The Grand Duchess Sophie, the owner of the archive, was only seen in it on particularly festive occasions. When she had something to say, she had Suphan called in. Visitors working in the archive were taken to her to be introduced. However, her care for the archive was extraordinary. At the time, she personally prepared everything that was to lead to the construction of a state house in which the poets' estates were to be worthily housed.
[ 37 ] The Hereditary Grand Duke Karl August, who died before he came to power, also visited the archive frequently. His interest in all that was there did not run deep, but he enjoyed talking to us employees. He considered it more of a duty to take an interest in the affairs of intellectual life. Hereditary Grand Duchess Pauline, however, took a warm interest. I was able to have many a conversation with her about things concerning Goethe, poetry, etc. The archive stood between the scientific, artistic and the Weimar court society in terms of its communication. It took on its own social coloring from both sides. No sooner had the door closed behind a catheter man than it opened again for some princely personage who had come to visit the court. Many people from all walks of life took part in what was going on in the archive. It was basically a lively, stimulating life in many respects.
[ 38 ] In the immediate vicinity of the archive was the Weimar Library. It was home to a man with a childlike disposition and an almost unlimited erudition, Reinhold Köhler, as head librarian. The archive staff often worked there. Because what they had in the archive as a literary aid to their work found its important complement there. Reinhold Köhler was uniquely well versed in the creation of myths, fairy tales and legends; his knowledge in the field of linguistics was of the most admirable universality. He knew how to find the most hidden literary references. At the same time, he was touchingly modest and warmly accommodating. He never missed the opportunity to fetch the books you needed from their resting places into the library study where you were working. I once went there and asked to see a book that Goethe had used in his botanical studies. Reinhold Köhler fetched the book, which had probably been stored somewhere upstairs unused for decades. He did not return for a long time. They looked to see where it was. He had fallen off the ladder he had climbed to get the book. A broken femur. The dear, noble personality could not recover from the consequences of the accident. After a long illness, the widely revered man died. I suffered from the painful thought that his accident had happened while I was getting a book for him.