WILHELM MEISTER. CONFESSIONS OF A FAIR SAINT. TILL my eighth year, I was always a healthy child; but of that period I can recollect no more, than of the day when I was born. About the beginning of my eighth year, I was seized with a hemorrhage; and from that moment my soul became all feeling, all memory. The smallest circumstances of that accident are yet before my eyes, as if they had occurred but yesterday. During the nine months, which I then spent patiently upon a sick-bed, it appears to me, the ground-work of my whole turn of thought was laid; for the first means were then afforded to my spirit of developing itself in its own manner. I suffered and I loved; this was the peculiar form of my heart. In the most violent fits of coughing, in the depressing pains of fever, I lay quiet, like a snail drawn back within its house: the moment I obtained a respite, I wanted to enjoy something pleasant; and as every other pleaI endeavoured to amuse was denied me, sure myself with the innocent delights of eye and ear. The people brought me dolls and picture books; and whoever chose to sit beside my bed, was forced to tell me something. From my mother I rejoiced to hear the Bible histories and my father entertained me with natural curiosities. He had a very pretty cabinet; from which he brought me first one drawer and then another, as occasion served; shewing me the articles, and pointing out their properties. Dried plants and insects, with many kinds of anatomical preparations, such as human skin, bones, mummies, and the like, were in succession laid upon the sick-bed of the little one; the birds and animals he killed in hunting were shewn to me before they passed into the kitchen: and that the Prince of the World might also have a voice in this assembly, my aunt related to me love adventures out of fairy tales. All was accepted, all took root. There were hours, in which I vividly conversed with the invisible Power: I can still repeat some verses, which I then dictated, and my mother wrote. Frequently I told my father back again, what I had learned from him. I would scarce take any physic, without asking where the simples grew that it was made of, what look they had, what names they bore. Nor had the stories of my aunt alighted upon stony ground. I figured myself out in pretty clothes; and met the most de lightful princes, who could find no peace or rest, till they discovered who the unknown Beauty was. One adventure of this kind with a charming little angel, dressed in white with golden wings, who warmly courted me, I dwelt upon so long, that my imagination painted out his form till it was almost visible. After a year, I was pretty well restored to health; but nothing of the giddiness of childhood remained with me. I could not play with dolls; I longed for beings that were able to return my love. Dogs, cats, and birds, of which my father kept a great variety, afforded me delight: but what would I have given for such a creature as my aunt once told me of! It was a lamb, which a peasant girl took up and nourished in a wood; but in the guise of this pretty beast, an enchanted prince was hid; who at length appeared in his native shape, a lovely youth, and recompensed his benefactress by his hand. Such a lamb as this I would have given the world for. But none was to be had; and as every thing about me went along quite naturally and commonly, I by degrees abandoned nearly all my hopes of such a precious treasure. Meanwhile I comforted myself by reading books, in which the strangest incidents were represented. Among them all, my favourite was the Christian German Hercules: that devout love history was altogether in my way. Whenever any thing befel his dear |