together with the form.  They begin to declare the representation of noble sentiments and deeds as tedious, and attempt to treat of all sorts of abominations.  Instead of the beautiful subjects from Grecian mythology, there are devils, witches, and vampires, and the lofty heroes of antiquity must give place to jugglers and galley slaves.  This is piquant!  This is effective!  But after the public has once tasted this highly seasoned food, and has become accustomed to it, it will always long for more, and that stronger.  A young man of talent, who would produce an effect and be acknowledged, and who is great enough to go his own way, must accommodate himself to the taste of the day—­nay, must seek to outdo his predecessors in the horrible and frightful.  But in this chase after outward means of effect, all profound study, and all gradual and thorough development of the talent and the man from within, is entirely neglected.  And this is the greatest injury which can befall a talent, although literature in general will gain by this tendency of the moment.”

“But,” added I, “how can an attempt which destroys individual talents be favorable to literature in general?”

“The extremes and excrescences which I have described,” returned Goethe, “will gradually disappear; but at last this great advantage will remain—­besides a freer form, richer and more diversified subjects will have been attained, and no object of the broadest world and the most manifold life will be any longer excluded as unpoetical.  I compare the present literary epoch to a state of violent fever, which is not in itself good and desirable, but of which improved health is the happy consequence.  That abomination which now often constitutes the whole subject of a poetical work, will in future only appear as an useful expedient; aye, the pure and the noble, which is now abandoned for the moment, will soon be resought with additional ardor.”

“It is surprising to me,” remarked I, “that even Merimee, who is one of your favorites, has entered upon this ultra-romantic path, through the horrible subjects of his Guzla.”

“Merimee,” returned Goethe, “has treated these things very differently from his fellow-authors.  These poems certainly are not deficient in various horrible motives, such as churchyards, nightly crossways, ghosts and vampires; but the repulsive themes do not touch the intrinsic merit of the poet.  On the contrary, he treats them from a certain objective distance, and, as it were, with irony.  He goes to work with them like an artist, to whom it is an amusement to try anything of the sort.  He has, as I have said before, quite renounced himself, nay, he has ever renounced the Frenchman, and that to such a degree that at first these poems of Guzla were deemed real Illyrian popular poems, and thus little was wanting for the success of the imposition he had intended.”