“I have,” said I, “a peculiar feeling towards Schiller.  Some scenes of his great dramas I read with genuine love and admiration; but presently I meet with something which violates the truth of nature, and I can go no further.  I feel this even in reading Wallenstein.  I cannot but think that Schiller’s turn for philosophy injured his poetry, because this led him to consider the idea far higher than all nature; indeed, thus to annihilate nature.  What he could conceive must happen, whether it were in conformity with nature or not.”

“It was sad,” said Goethe, “to see how so highly gifted a man tormented himself with philosophical disquisitions which could in no way profit him.  Humboldt has shown me letters which Schiller wrote to him in those unblest days of speculation.  There we see how he plagued himself with the design of perfectly separating sentimental from naive poetry.  For the former he could find no proper soil, and this brought him into unspeakable perplexity.”

“As if,” continued he, smiling, “sentimental poetry could exist at all without the naive ground in which, as it were, it has its root.”

“It was not Schiller’s plan,” continued Goethe, “to go to work with a certain unconsciousness, and as it were instinctively; he was forced, on the contrary, to reflect on all he did.  Hence it was that he never could leave off talking about his poetical projects, and thus he discussed with me all his late pieces, scene after scene.

“On the other hand, it was contrary to my nature to talk over my poetic plans with anybody—­even with Schiller.  I carried everything about with me in silence, and usually nothing was known to any one till the whole was completed.  When I showed Schiller my Hermann and Dorothea finished, he was astonished, for I had said not a syllable to him of any such plan.

“But I am curious to hear what you will say of Wallenstein tomorrow.  You will see noble forms, and the piece will make an impression on you such as you probably do not dream of.”

Saturday, November 15.—­In the evening I was in the theatre, where I for the first time saw Wallenstein.  Goethe had not said too much; the impression was great, and stirred my inmost soul.  The actors, who had almost all belonged to the time when they were under the personal influence of Schiller and Goethe, gave an ensemble of significant personages, such as on a mere reading were not presented to my imagination with all their individuality.  On this account the piece had an extraordinary effect upon me, and I could not get it out of my head the whole night.

Sunday, November 16.—­In the evening at Goethe’s; he was still sitting in his elbow-chair, and seemed rather weak.  His first question was about Wallenstein.  I gave him an account of the impression the piece had made upon me as represented on the stage, and he heard me with visible satisfaction.