" Have you looked through it, and do you
remember his intercourse with the Wertherian Plessing? That
tale pained me exceedingly. We cry, "help, help," and there is
no help--in man at least. How often I have thought, if I could
see Goethe, and tell him my state of mind, he would support
and guide me! He would be able to understand; he would show
me how to rule circumstances, instead of being ruled by them;
and, above all, he would not have been so sure that all would
be for the best, without our making an effort to act out the
oracles; he would have wished to see me what Nature intended.
But his conduct to Plessing and Ohlenschlager shows that to
him, also, an appeal would have been vain.'
'Do you really believe there is anything "all-comprehending"
but religion? Are not these distinctions imaginary? Must not
the philosophy of every mind, or set of minds, be a system
suited to guide them, and give a home where they can bring
materials among which to accept, reject, and shape at
pleasure? Novalis calls those, who harbor these ideas,
"unbelievers;" but hard names make no difference. He says with
disdain, "To _such_, philosophy is only a system which will
spare them the trouble of reflecting.
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