Yet The Heads Are Both Great And Majestic Heads, And Would
Indicate A Plenary Manhood.
We went into the library, disturbing a quiet, good sort of bibliopole
there, who, with some regret, put aside his book to guide us.
"Is Luther's Bible here?" W. and G. opened on him.
"No;" but he ushered us into a cabinet.
"There are Luther's _shoes!_"
"Shoes!" we all exclaimed; and there was an irreverent laugh. Yes,
there they were in a glass case, - his shoes, large as life, - shoes
without heels; great, clumping, thick, and black! What an idea!
However, there was a genuine picture by Lucas Cranach, and another of
Catharine, by Holbein, which gave more consolatory ideas of her person
than that which I saw before at Basle. There were also autographs of
Goethe and Schiller, as well as of Luther and Melanchthon.
Our little bibliopole looked mournfully at us, as if we were wasting
his time, and seemed glad when we went out. C. thought he was huffy
because we laughed at Luther's shoes; but I think he was only yearning
after his book. C. offered him a fee, but he would not take it. Going
down stairs, in the entry, I saw a picture of the infant Goethe on an
eagle. We rode, also, to see a bronze statue of him in some street or
other, and I ate an ice cream there to show my regard for him. We are
delighted on the whole with Frankfort.
Now, after all, that I should forget the crown of all our seeings,
Dannecker's Ariadne! It is in a pavilion in a gentleman's garden.
Could mere beauty and grace delight and fill the soul, one could not
ask for more than the Ariadne. The beautiful head, the throat, the
neck, the bust, the hand, the arm, the whole attitude, are exquisite.
But after all, what is it? No moral charm, - mere physical beauty, cold
as Greek mythology. I thought of his _Christ_, and did not wonder
that when he had turned his art to that divine representation, he
should refuse to sculpture from classic models. "He who has sculptured
a Christ cannot sculpture a Venus."
Our hotel here is very beautiful. I think it must have been some
palace, for it is adorned with fine statues, and walls of real marble.
The staircase is beautiful, with brass railing, and at the foot a
marble lion on each side. The walls of my bed room are lined with
green damask, bordered by gilt bands; the attendance here is
excellent. In every hotel of each large city, there is a man who
speaks English. The English language is slowly and surely creeping
through. Europe; already it rivals the universality of the French.
Two things in this city have struck me singularly, as peculiarly
German: one was a long-legged stork, which I saw standing on a chimney
top, reminding me of the oft-mentioned "dear white stork" of German
stories. Why don't storks do so in America, I wonder? Another thing
was, waking suddenly in the middle of the night, and hearing the hymn
of the watchman as he announced the hour. I think this is a beautiful
custom.
In the morning, I determined to get into the picture gallery. Now C.,
who espoused to himself an "_Amati_" at Geneva, has been, like
all young bridegrooms, very careless about every thing else but his
beloved, since he got it. Painting, sculpture, architecture, all must
yield to music. Nor can all the fascinations of Raphael or Rubens vie
in his estimation with the melodies of Mozart, or the harmonies of
Beethoven. So, yesterday, when we found the picture gallery shut, he
profanely remarked, "What a mercy!" And this morning I could enlist
none of the party but W. to go with me. We were paid for going. There
were two or three magnificent pictures of sunrise and sunset in the
Alps by modern artists. Never tell me that the _old_ masters have
exhausted the world of landscape painting, at any rate. Am I not
competent to judge because I am not an artist? What! do not all
persons feel themselves competent to pronounce on the merits of
natural landscapes, and say which of two scenes is finer? And are
painters any greater artists than God? If they say that we are not
competent to judge, because we do not understand the mixing of colors,
the mysteries of foreshortening, and all that, I would ask them if
they understand how God mixes his colors? "Canst thou understand the
balancing of the clouds? the wondrous ways of Him who is perfect in
wisdom?" If, therefore, I may dare to form a judgment of God's
originals, I also will dare to judge of man's imitations. Nobody shall
impose old, black, smoky Poussins and Salvator Rosas on me, and so
insult my eyesight and common sense as to make me confess they are
better than pictures which I can see have all the freshness and bloom
of the living reality upon them.
So, also, a most glorious picture here. The Trial of John Huss before
the Council of Constance, by Lessing - one of the few things I have
seen in painting which have had power deeply to affect me. I have it
not in my heart to criticize it as a mere piece of coloring and
finish, though in these respects I thought it had great merits. But
the picture had the power, which all high art must have, of rebuking
and silencing these minor inquiries in the solemnity of its
_morale_. I believe the highest painter often to be the subject
of a sort of inspiration, by which his works have a vitality of
suggestion, so that they sometimes bring to the beholder even more
than he himself conceived when he created them. In this picture, the
idea that most impressed me was, the representation of that more
refined and subtle torture of martyrdom which consists in the
incertitude and weakness of an individual against whom is arrayed the
whole weight of the religious community.
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