I tear myself away from him reluctantly, yet I would make this remark:  his satire refers throughout to the middle class; he lets us see here and there that he is also well acquainted with the higher ranks, but does not hold it advisable to come in contact with them.  It may be said, that he has had no successor, that no one has been found who could consider himself equal or even similar to him.

Now for criticism! and first of all for the theoretic attempts.  It is not going too far when we say that the ideal had, at that time, escaped out of the world into religion; it scarcely even made its appearance in moral philosophy; of a highest principle of art no one had a notion.  They put Gottsched’s “Critical Art of Poetry” into our hands; it was useful and instructive enough, for it gave us a historical information of all the kinds of poetry, as well as of rhythm and its different movements:  the poetic genius was presupposed!  But, besides that, the poet was to have acquirements and even learning:  he should possess taste, and every thing else of that kind.  They directed us at last to Horace’s “Art of Poetry:”  we gazed at single golden maxims of this invaluable work, but did not know in the least what to do with it as a whole, or how we should use it.

The Swiss stepped forth as Gottsched’s antagonists:  they must take it into their heads to do something different, to accomplish something better; accordingly we heard that they were, in fact, superior.  Breitinger’s “Critical Art of Poetry” was taken in hand.  Here we reached a wider field, but, properly speaking, only a greater labyrinth, which was so much the more tiresome, as an able man, in whom we had confidence, was driving us about in it.  Let a brief review justify these words.

For poetry in itself they had been able to find no fundamental axiom:  it was too spiritual and too volatile.  Painting, an art which one could hold fast with one’s eyes, and follow step by step with the external senses, seemed more favorable for such an end:  the English and French had already theorized about plastic art; and, by a comparison drawn from this, it was thought that poetry might be grounded.  The former presented images to the eye, the latter to the imagination:  poetical images, therefore, were the first thing which was taken into consideration.  People began with comparisons, descriptions followed, and only that was expressed which had always been apparent to the external senses.

Images, then!  But where should these images be got except from nature?  The painter professedly imitated nature:  why not the poet also?  But nature, as she lies before us, cannot be imitated:  she contains so much that is insignificant and worthless, that one must make a selection; but what determines the choice? one must select that which is important:  but what is important?

To answer this question, the Swiss may have taken a long time to consider; for they came to a notion, which is indeed singular, but clever, and even comical, inasmuch as they say, the new is always the most important:  and after they have considered this for a while, they discover that the marvellous is always newer than every thing else.