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168 MODERN LANGUAGE NOTES. [Vol. xxvlVo. 6.

Corpusgenommen soll werdenund geformiert in

A PARACELSIAN PASSAGE IN seinAnatomey unnd in seinproprietate8, dassihr
GOETHE'S EPHEMERIDES. nichtanderstverstanden /danndas derLeib / der
vonVatterundMuttergeboren wirdt/dieserLeib
In February,1770, beforeleaving his native nichtist/auchnichtsin ihnza handlen. Dann
cityto attendtheUniversity ofStrasburg,Goethe denFlamen sichtman auffsteigen / aberseincor-
copiedin his notebook Ephemerides a numberof pus nichtaussdemer kompt. Also denSchmert-
quotationsfromParacelsus,to one of whichI zen empfindt man / aber sein COrpU8 sichtnie-
wishto call attention. It runs: mands. Auffdas soll ein ander Grund gefiirt
"Darum ich wohlmag reden,dasz die Artzt, werdenin erkanntnuss des PodagramI dannvon
so die CadaverumAnatomniam fiursich nehmen, allen dingensoll seinAnatomey stehn/und wel-
nichtsals unverstiindigLeut sind,dannnichtder cherderist/dernichtderKranckheitAnatomey
Cadaverzeigtdie Anatomey, dannsie giebtallein weistI kan der ein Artztseyn? [Here follows
die Bein, und des Beins Nachbaaren,noch ist Goethe'squotation.]Ich redevon derAnatomey
aberdie Kranckheitnichtda." I derKranckheiten /nit des Leibs: darumbffihre
in ich hie dieAstra, alleinaussdenselbigen anzeigun-
Althoughat that timeGoethewasinterested
the neo-Platoniamysticalphases of medicinie,gen die Anatomey der Kranckheiten /dass ichfuir
nevertheless it may,with a reasonabledegreeof das h6chst und dz erst acht zu seyn einem jeg-
be inferredfromthepointat whichhis lichen Artzt: ohn welche Anatomey nie nichts
certainty,
quotationbegins,and the pointat whichit ends, warhaffligs geschrieben istworden."8
thatit was notso muchParacelsus'smystical dis- Paracelsus believed that theprocesses oflifeare
tinction betweenthe anatomyof the " cadaver" independent of thephysical structure of the organs
and thatofthe " corpus" of a particular disease of the body and he was willing to apply the term
thatinterested him,as it was the boldstatement anatomy only to what he considered the necessary
that an anatomicaldissectionrevealsthe bones foundation of medicine,viz., a knowledgeof the
and the adjacentparts of thebody,butnotthe ultimate substance oflife. It was onlythe whole
disease,sincethediseaseis notamongtheremains. fulllife of nature and man thathad anysignifi-
Perhapsit shouldbe ourfirstaim to make as cance for him.'
clear as possiblewhatParacelsusmeans in the A disease,consideredas to its ultimatesub-
above quotation. To do thisit will be necessary stance, did notmeanto hima materialthing,but
to give the context,besidesquotingan earlier a spiritual, living thing.5 While we shouldnot
passage. The latterfirst: venture to assertthat Goetheacceptedthisdoc-
trine with its consequences, nevertheless thereis
"I So ich nuhn sollvom Corpusredendes Zip- embodiedin theshortpassagewhichhe copiedan
perlinsI so wissenanfenglichin dieserVorred idea whichbecamewithhim a fundamental prin-
dass alle ding die uns peinigenoder wolthundt / ciple,namelythe all-importance of studyingan
nicht auss dem Corpore,aber im Corporeihr organism as a livingtlhing, not as a mechanism.
werckverbringen:Dann die kranckheitistun- Thereis a passagein the Urfaust (367-372) that
sichtigniemandtshats nie gesehen/ das Corpus suggestsitselfin thisconnection
aber dasselbigeist sichtig/das istdas /dass wir
klagenI das unspeiniget."2 "Wer willwaslebigserkennen undbeschreiben,
MlusserstdenGeistherauser treiben,
Goethe's passage is fromthe chapter " De Dannhater die Theilin seinerHand,
Podagricis,Liber Secundus, " and I quote the Fehltleidernurdas geistlichBand.
context: "also sollenihran demnortauchwissen Encheiresinnaturaenennts die ChimieI
und erkennen / dass das Podagra, so es in sein BohrtsichselbsteinenEsel undweisnichtwie."

' Sch8llo,Briefeund Aufslitzevon Goethe,

76; DeutscheLit- "Ibid.,p. 573.
teraturdenkmale in Neudrucken, 4Cf. Haeser,Lecrbuch
des 18. und 19. Jahrhunderts derGeechichte
der'Medicin,3d
xiv, 8; Weimar ed. of Goethe,xxxviI, 87. ed., ii, 87.
2Opera, ed. Huser, Strasburg,1603, I, 569. fl6bid.,p. 95.
June, 1910.] MODERN LANGUAGE NOTES. 169

Schr6erand Steiner,theformerin hispreface, of theidea common to all thesepassagesleadsme

thelatterin hisintroduction to vol. xxxiii of the to venture the opinion that he, and notSchiller,
D. N. L. edition of Goethe's 'works, interpret was theauthor of the xenion, Der Sprachforscher,
these lines as referring both to chemistry and Anatomieren magst du die Sprache, dochnurihrCadaver;
anatomy. The lines are frequently quoted as Geistund Leben entschliipft
fluichtigdemgrobenScalpell.9
a
embodying general principle of quite broad The onlyauthority, so far as I know,upon
bearing,and this may well be done without which this distichhas ever been attributed to
doinganyviolenceto Goethe'sbelief,thoughwe Schiller,is the fact that Schiller'swife wrote
shallsee laterthathe was thinking specificallyof "ISch." after it in her de luxe copy of the
or
chemistry, perhaps alchemy, when he wrote Xentien volumeof theMusen-Almanach."0 Even
thepassage. Back in Leipsic,beforehe had read Hoffmeister, whoproudlyboastedthat theposses-
Paracelsus,he wrotethelittlepoem,Die Freuden, sion of that"Prachtexemplar"enabledhim to.
endingwiththeline, name the authorof each of the Votivtafelm and
deinerFreuden."
" So gehtesdir,Zergliederer most of the Xenien., was nevertheless in fact very
skepticalof theresultswithrespectto someofthe
As has been pointedout by Schr6er,6 Goethe's Votivtafeln, thoughstill cocksurewithregardto
mainidea in thispoem,confirmed by thepassage theXenien.1 Thescientific valueofthat" Pracht-
fromParacelsus,wasmoreclearlyand morefully exemplar" wassoonattackedby certainscholars,
statedin a letterto HetzlerJr., on the 14thof thoughstill defended by others." The discovery
July, 1770, ". . . der Leichnamist nichtdas and publicationof the old manuscript that had
ganzeThier,es geh6rtnoch etwasdazu,nochein wanderedback and forthbetweenWeimarand
Hauptstiick,und bei der Gelegenheit,wie bey Jena,growingwitheachjourney,seemedto have
ieder andern,ein sehr hauptsichlichesHaupt- considerable weightin the problemof dividing
stuck: das Leben, der Geist der alles sch6n the literaryownership,18 since forthe mostpart
macht.. lassen Sie mir die Freudenfeindlichethedistichsare in thehandof oile orthe otherof
Erfahrungssucht, die Sommerv6geltodtetund the poets. But even such manuscript evidence
Blumenanatomirt, alten oder kaltenLeuten." I has not been universally acceptedas convincing.
Schr6er'squotationof the Paracelsianpassage For example,Erich Schmidtmakes it appear
as a parallelto lines 1936ff. of Faust has lost highlyprobablethat Goethe was the authorof
someof its weightsinceLippmann'sdiscovery of threeof the distichsthat appear in this manu-
Goethe'ssourceforthe chemicaltermsemployed scriptin Schiller'shand." Seeingthatthexenion
in theseliinesofFaust,' thoughit is easilycon- hereunderdiscussion doesnotevenappearin that
ceivablethat Goethemay have had the general originalmanuscript, and the evidenceof thepas-
principlein mind in the firstfour lines,even sage fromParacelsus,the letterto Hetzler,the
thoughthewords" denGeistherauszu treiben" lines fromFaust, and the peculiarlyGoethean
be clearly (al)chemical,and the last two lines tendency of the distich,all opposetheconjecture
containa stinginggibe at a pretentious, albeit ofCharlotte v. Schiller,it wouldseempermissible
rare,specimenof chemicalterminology.How- to claim for Goethethe authorshipof thelines,
ever, it shouldnot be deducedfromwhathas themoreso as no documentary evidencehas ever
beensaid thatGoethethoughtlittleof chemistrybeenbroughtforwardto substantiate theclaimof
or despisedanatomy,for his manyexperimentsLotteSchiller.
in the one and his important discoveries in the
otherproveexactlytheopposite. 9Musen-Almanachfir das Jahr1797,hrsg.vonSchiller,
p.
234. No. 353 in the editionof Schmidtand Suphan,
The factthat Goetheseemsto havebeenfond Schriften der viii.
Goethe-Gesellschaft,
10Hoffmeister, .Nachlese
zu Schiller8 III, 72, 104.
Werken,
607ronikdesWiener vii, Nr. 8, p. 31;
Goethe-Vereins, "1Ibid.,74 ff.,104ff.
and Faust,mitEinl., etc.3teAufl.1892,p. 124f. 12Boas, Schillerund GoetheimXenienkampf, I, 41 ff.
7Briefe,
i, 238f. Is Cf.Boas-Maltzahn, SchillersundGoelhes
Xenien-Manu-
8Chemiker-Zeitung,1907, Nr. 36, "EncheiresisNatu- script,
p. 35.
rae." See also G.-J.,YxxT. 163f. "4Charakteriatiken,
Berlin,1886,p. 318f.
170 MODERN LANGUAGE NOTES. [VoL xxv,No. 6.
Goethe's contemptfor the mirth-provoking, peut qu'entrevoirle sens." De Lasteyrie2sug-
ratherthan respect-commanding perpetrationsof gestedthefollowing interpretation: "A cetautel,
philologists, especiallydictionary etymologists,of toutesles messesqui en chargesontaccueillies
the time,needs no new demonstration.Suffice ... et donnArent cette verri6re. . . ceux qui
it to referto thepoemEtymologie, supposedto be sontconfr6res de SaintVincent." Thisreading
spokenby Mephistopheles, and to the lines in is far fromgivinga clear meaningor an exact
Faust (7093 if.) in whichtheGreifgivesventto interpretation of all thelettersof theinscription.
his displeasureat beingwrongly called " Greis'' All thatfollowsfromit is thata " confr6rie " of
SaintVincentgave thewindow;theirconnection
"Nicht GreisenI Greifen I -Niemand hortes gern
withthealtarand themassesis notapparent.
Dasz manihnGreisnennt. JedemWorteklingt
Der IJrsprung nachwo es sichherbedingt: I believethat it is possibleto reach a more
Grau,grimlich, griesgram, Griber,grimmig, preciseand literalrendering
greulich, of the inscription.
Etymologisch gleicherweisestimmig, Whenwe adopttheusualmethod,as de Lasteyrie
Verstimmen uns. evidentlydid, beginningat the top and reading
MEPHISTOPrHELz. down,it appearsconfused, full of gaps and in-
Unddoch,nichtabzuschweifen, versions. Suppose,however,that we apply the
Gefiilltdas Grei im EhrentitelGr4ifen. methodused in reading the picturesin the
GREIF. " vitraux." It is wellknownthat themedieval
NatiirlichI die Verwandtschaftisterprobt, when preparinga window,began
glass-workers,
Zwaroftgescholten, mehrjedochgelobt; at the bottomand workedup. It is thus that
Mangreife nunnachMiidchen, Kronen, Gold, mostof the "vitraux," whetherhistorical, mys-
Dem Greifenden istmeistFortunahold. ticalor dogmatic,are to be read.8 Adoptingthis
W. A. COOPER. methodfor the inscription and numberingthe
StanfordUniversity. wordsas follows:

TERA: A CEST : AVTEL : TES LES MESSES

17 18 19 20 18 14 15
QEN: CHARE: SONT: ACOILLI: EN: TO
16 17 10 11 12 18
THE WEAVERS' INSCRIPTION IN THE ERET: CE5TE: VERRIE: CENT: CIL: QVIDO:
CATHEDRAL OF CHARTRES. 7 8 9 4 5 6 7
LI: CONFRERE: SAINT: VIN
2 8 4
In thechapelof the SacredHeartof Mary,on 1
theNorthside of the cathedralof Chartres, is a
we getthisresult: " Li confreresaintVincentcil
windowgivenby the II metierdes tisserands " of
qui doeretceste verriesont acoilli en totesles
thattownanddedicatedto SaintVincent.Under-
messesqen chareteraa cestautel."
neathit, near the medallionswherethe weaveYs
Thus read,everything is in orderexcept for
are represented,thisinscription1 can stillbe read:
thewordschareteraand verne. And itbecomes
TERA : A CEST : AVTEL : TES LES: MESSES: almost self-evidentthat the lettersRE of the
QEN : CHARE: SONT: ACOILLI EN: TO
formerbelongwith VERRIE of the line below,
formingverritre, and that they should be re-
ERET : CESTE: VERRIE: CENT: CIL: QVIDO:
placedby an N or a nasal bar,forming chantera.
LI : CONFRERE : SAINT: VIN The wholeinscription wouldthenread : " Li con-
This inscription has greatlypuzzledthearchme-freresaintVincent,cil qui donerent cesteverriere,
sontacoillien les
totes messesq'en chanteraa cest
ologistswho have discussedit. M. MAlespeaks
in French: "Les confreres
of it as an " inscriptiontr6sobscure,donton ne autel." Or, Modern
de saintVincent,ceux qui donntrent cette yer-
I Facsimileby F. de Mdryin Revuede l'artchritien,
1888,p. 422. See also E. MAle,L'Art religicux
au ziiis de la peinture
2Histoire urverre,
p. 527.
p. 367f.
siadle, aSee Mile, op.cit.,p. 55.