Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
Published: 2013-09
Total Pages: 148
Get eBook
This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1846 edition. Excerpt: ... EIGHTH BOOK. Another man, although infinitely different from Behrisch in every respect, might yet be compared with him in a certain sense; I mean Oeser, who was also one of those men who dream away their lives in a comfortable and indolent activity. His friends themselves secretly acknowledged that, with very fine natural powers, his younger years had not been spent in sufficiently active life; for which reason, he never perfectly attained the technics of his art. Yet a certain diligence appeared to be reserved for his more advanced age, and, during the many years that I knew him, he never lacked invention nor laboriousness. From the first moment, he had attracted me strongly; even his residence, singularly quaint and suggestive of solemn thoughts, was highly charming to me. In the old castle of Pleissenburg, at the right-hand corner, we ascended a repaired, cheerful, winding staircase. The light and roomy saloons of the Academy of Design, of which he was Director, were found to the left; but we could not reach the man himself except through a narrow darkling corridor, at the end of which we first sought the entrance into his apartments, having just passed between his suite of rooms, and an extensive granary. The first apartment was adorned with pictures of the later Italian schools, by Masters whose gracefulness he used highly to commend. As I, with some noblemen, had taken private lessons of him, we were permitted to draw here, and we often penetrated into his private cabinet adjoining, which contained at the same time his few books, his collections of art and natural curiosities, and whatever else might have most interested him. Everything was arranged with taste, with simplicity, and iq such a manner that a great deal was...