men's folly.

•

And Goethe came to feel warm, soft waves flooding over him, engulfing his being and firing his creative powers. His poetry began to pour forth straight from the heart. The deep springs had opened in his soul, and behold, he burst out in song that will live as long as time endures!

One day, as Goethe sat at a table in Gretchen's country house, holding in his hand a pen with which he was tracing a letter in the voice of an imaginary girl addressing an imaginary sweetheart of hers, Gretchen dropped the embroidery frame from her hands onto the window ledge, came toward the boy poet, drew near him, and made him a pledge — none was ever more piercing to his heart, nor more exalted! Then she showed him that such trifling was unworthy of a prodigy like him. Goethe says, in summary:

"... And she drew toward her the scrap of paper on which I had written the love letter, and began to read it in a voice of sweet, enchanting melody. Then she said:

"'It is wonderful, this letter! But what a loss it is that this feeling should not travel a better road — that is, a natural road... so that you would express what lies hidden in your own soul... and not amuse yourself with playing the lover's

part, writing love letters in his voice?!' I answered, saying:

"'That is what I hope for from the depths of my soul!' And Gretchen went on:

"'For achieving that there are many possibilities.' I said: 'If, for example, there came to you a young man who knows you, respects you, and worships you, and he laid before your hands a letter like this one, begging you with all his heart to sign your name at its close — what would you do?'

"And I approached her with the paper she had dropped at my side; her face lit up, she smiled, she thought a little, then she took up the pen and signed her name with it. I could no longer master myself for the flood of rapture... I leaped high into the air, and then I made to kiss her, whereupon she said, with a wondrous elegance and sweetness:

"'We have no need of kisses now... but of love, if love is possible!'

"Quickly I took the letter and slipped it into my pocket, and I said to Gretchen:

"'No creature on earth shall see this letter after today. You have delivered me from what was tormenting my soul!' And she said, looking at me with a look of ten-derness, love, and truth all at once:

"'Then you must go to the very end along this road — the road of

deliverance you speak of!'

"I could not bring myself to leave her at that moment. But she begged it of me with a softness and a gentleness I know no equal to, pressing my right hand with both her hands. Then she hastened out of my sight! Never in all my life have I felt an agitation like the agitation that seized me then!"

Then the great poet contin-ues, saying:

"My love for this girl revealed to my soul, then, a new world of beauty and goodness. And I fell upon that letter, reading it; I read it over a hundred times, gazing at Gretchen's signature and kissing it, and tasting the savor of her beloved avowal!"

Thus did Goethe's heart beat its first beat, and thus did he understand for the first time that the road to beauty, and to great creation, is love — love, and love alone!

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