Part 18 (1/2)

The one great opponent of the whole sentimental tendency, whose censure of Sterne's disciples involved also a denunciation of the master himself, was the Gottingen professor, Georg Christopher Lichtenberg.[7]

In his inner nature Lichtenberg had much in common with Sterne and Sterne's imitators in Germany, with the whole ecstatic, eccentric movement of the time. Julian Schmidt[8] says: ”So much is sure, at any rate, that the greatest adversary of the new literature was of one flesh and blood with it.”[9] But his period of residence in England shortly after Sterne's death and his a.s.sociation then and afterwards with Englishmen of eminence render his att.i.tude toward Sterne in large measure an English one, and make an idealization either of the man or of his work impossible for him.

The contradiction between the greatness of heart evinced in Sterne's novels and the narrow selfishness of the author himself is repeatedly noted by Lichtenberg. His knowledge of Sterne's character was derived from acquaintance with many of Yorick's intimate friends in London. In ”Beobachtungen uber den Menschen,” he says: ”I can't help smiling when the good souls who read Sterne with tears of rapture in their eyes fancy that he is mirroring himself in his book. Sterne's simplicity, his warm heart, over-flowing with feeling, his soul, sympathizing with everything good and n.o.ble, and all the other expressions, whatever they may be; and the sigh 'Alas, poor Yorick,' which expresses everything at once--have become proverbial among us Germans. . . . Yorick was a crawling parasite, a flatterer of the great, an unendurable burr on the clothing of those upon whom he had determined to sponge!”[10]

In ”Timorus” he calls Sterne ”ein scandalum Ecclesiae”;[11] he doubts the reality of Sterne's n.o.bler emotions and condemns him as a clever juggler with words, who by artful manipulation of certain devices aroused in us sympathy, and he s.n.a.t.c.hes away the mask of loving, hearty sympathy and discloses the grinning mountebank. With keen insight into Sterne's mind and method, he lays down a law by which, he says, it is always possible to discover whether the author of a touching pa.s.sage has really been moved himself, or has merely with astute knowledge of the human heart drawn our tears by a sly choice of touching features.[12]

Akin to this is the following pa.s.sage in which the author is unquestionably thinking of Sterne, although he does not mention him: ”A heart ever full of kindly feeling is the greatest gift which Heaven can bestow; on the other hand, the itching to keep scribbling about it, and to fancy oneself great in this scribbling is one of the greatest punishments which can be inflicted upon one who writes.”[13] He exposes the heartlessness of Sterne's pretended sympathy: ”A three groschen piece is ever better than a tear,”[14] and ”sympathy is a poor kind of alms-giving,”[15] are obviously thoughts suggested by Yorick's sentimentalism.[16]

The folly of the ”Lorenzodosen” is several times mentioned with open or covert ridicule[17] and the imitators of Sterne are repeatedly told the fruitlessness of their endeavor and the absurdity of their accomplishment.[18] His ”Vorschlag zu einem Orbis Pictus fur deutsche dramatische Schriftsteller, Romanendichter und Schauspieler”[19] is a satire on the lack of originality among those who boasted of it, and sought to win attention through pure eccentricities.

The Fragments[20] are concerned, as the editors say, with an evil of the literature in those days, the period of the Sentimentalists and the ”Kraftgenies.” Among the seven fragments may be noted: ”Lorenzo Eschenheimers empfindsame Reise nach Laputa,” a clever satirical sketch in the manner of Swift, bitterly castigating that of which the English people claim to be the discoverers (sentimental journeying) and the Germans think themselves the improvers. In ”Bittschrift der Wahnsinnigen” and ”Parakletor” the unwholesome literary tendencies of the age are further satirized. His brief essay, ”Ueber die Vornamen,”[21] is confessedly suggested by Sterne and the sketch ”Da.s.s du auf dem Blockberg warst,”[22] with its mention of the green book ent.i.tled ”Echte deutsche Fluche und Verwunschungen fur alle Stande,” is manifestly to be connected in its genesis with Sterne's famous collection of oaths.[23] Lichtenberg's comparison of Sterne and Fielding is familiar and significant.[24] ”Aus Lichtenbergs Nachla.s.s: Aufsatze, Gedichte, Tagebuchblatter, Briefe,” edited by Albert Leitzmann,[25]

contains additional mention of Sterne.

The name of Helfreich Peter Sturz may well be coupled with that of Lichtenberg, as an opponent of the Sterne cult and its German distortions, for his information and point of view were likewise drawn direct from English sources. Sturz accompanied King Christian VII of Denmark on his journey to France and England, which lasted from May 6, 1768, to January 14, 1769[26]; hence his stay in England falls in a time but a few months after Sterne's death (March 18, 1768), when the ungrateful metropolis was yet redolent of the late lion's wit and humor.

Sturz was an accomplished linguist and a complete master of English, hence found it easy to a.s.sociate with Englishmen of distinction whom he was privileged to meet through the favor of his royal patron. He became acquainted with Garrick, who was one of Sterne's intimate friends, and from him Sturz learned much of Yorick, especially that more wholesome revulsion of feeling against Sterne's obscenities and looseness of speech, which set in on English soil as soon as the potent personality of the author himself had ceased to compel silence and blind opinion.

England began to wonder at its own infatuation, and, gaining perspective, to view the writings of Sterne in a more rational light.

Into the first spread of this reaction Sturz was introduced, and the estimate of Sterne which he carried away with him was undoubtedly colored by it. In his second letter written to the _Deutsches Museum_ and dated August 24, 1768, but strangely not printed till April, 1777,[27] he quotes Garrick with reference to Sterne, a notable word of personal censure, coming in the Germany of that decade, when Yorick's admirers were most vehement in their claims. Garrick called him ”a lewd companion, who was more loose in his intercourse than in his writings and generally drove all ladies away by his obscenities.”[28] Sturz adds that all his acquaintances a.s.serted that Sterne's moral character went through a process of disintegration in London.

In the _Deutsches Museum_ for July, 1776, Sturz printed a poem ent.i.tled ”Die Mode,” in which he treats of the slavery of fas.h.i.+on and in several stanzas deprecates the influence of Yorick.[29]

”Und so schwingt sich, zum Genie erklart, Strephon kuhn auf Yorick's Steckenpferd.

Trabt maandrisch uber Berg und Auen, Reist empfindsam durch sein Dorfgebiet, Oder singt die Jugend zu erbauen Ganz Gefuhl dem Gartengott ein Lied.

Gott der Garten, stohnt die Burgerin, Lachle gutig, Rasen und Schasmin Haucht Geruche! Fliehet Handlungssorgen, Da.s.s mein Liebster heute noch in Ruh Sein Mark-Einsaz-Lomber spiele--Morgen, Schliessen wir die Unglucksbude zu!”

A pa.s.sage at the end of the appendix to the twelfth Reisebrief is further indication of his opposition to and his contempt for the frenzy of German sentimentalism.

The poems of Goeckingk contain allusions[30] to Sterne, to be sure partly indistinctive and insignificant, which, however, tend in the main to a ridicule of the Yorick cult and place their author ultimately among the satirical opponents of sentimentalism. In the ”Epistel an Goldhagen in Peters.h.a.ge,” 1771, he writes:

”Doch geb ich wohl zu uberlegen, Was fur den Weisen besser sey: Die Welt wie Yorick mit zu nehmen?

Nach Konigen, wie Diogen, Sich keinen Fuss breit zu bequemen,”--

a query which suggests the hesitant point of view relative to the advantage of Yorick's excess of universal sympathy. In ”Will auch 'n Genie werden” the poet steps out more unmistakably as an adversary of the movement and as a skeptical observer of the exercise of Yorick-like sympathy.

”Doch, ich Patronus, merkt das wohl, Geh, im zerrissnen Kittel, Hab' aber alle Taschen voll Yorickischer Capittel.

Doch la.s.s' ich, wenn mir's Kurzweil schafft, Die Hulfe fleh'nden Armen Durch meinen Schweitzer, Peter Kraft, Zerprugeln ohn' Erbarmen.”

Goeckingk openly satirizes the sentimental cult in the poem ”Der Empfindsame”

”Herr Mops, der um das dritte Wort Empfindsamkeit im Munde fuhret, Und wenn ein Grashalm ihm verdorrt, Gleich einen Thranenstrom verlieret-- . . . . . . . .

Mit meinem Weibchen thut er schier Gleich so bekannt wie ein Franzose; All' Augenblicke bot er ihr Toback aus eines Bettlers Dose Mit dem, am Zaun in tiefem Schlaf Er einen Tausch wie Yorik traf.

Der Unempfindsamkeit zum Hohn Hielt er auf eine Muck' im Glase Beweglich einen Leichsermon, Purrt' eine Flieg' ihm an der Nase, Macht' er das Fenster auf, und sprach: Zieh Oheim Toby's Fliege nach!

Durch Mops ist warlich meine Magd Nicht mehr bey Trost, nicht mehr bey Sinnen So sehr hat ihr sein Lob behagt, Da.s.s sie empfindsam allen Spinnen Zu meinem Hause, frank und frey Verstattet ihre Weberey.

Er trat mein Hundchen auf das Bein, Hilf Himmel! Welch' ein Lamentiren!

Es hatte mogen einen Stein Der Stra.s.se zum Erbarmen ruhren, Auch wedelt' ihm in einem Nu Das Hundgen schon Vergebung zu.

Ach! Hundchen, du beschamst mich sehr, Denn da.s.s mir Mops von meinem Leben Drey Stunden stahl, wie schwer, wie schwer, Wird's halten, das ihm zu vergeben?

Denn Spinnen werden oben ein Wohl gar noch meine Morder seyn.”

This poem is a rather successful bit of ridicule cast on the over-sentimental who sought to follow Yorick's foot-prints.