*

When I am reading a book, whether wise or silly, it seems to me to be
alive and talking to me.

* * * * *

Very few men, properly speaking, _live_ at present, but are providing to
live another time.

* * * * *

If the men of wit and genius would resolve never to complain in their
works of critics and detractors, the next age would not know that they
ever had any.

* * * * *

As universal a practice as lying is, and as easy a one as it seems, I do
not remember to have heard three good lies in all my conversation, even
from those who were most celebrated in that faculty.

GOETHE IN HIS OLD AGE
[Sidenote: _W.M. Thackeray_]

In 1831, though he had retired from the world, Goethe would nevertheless
very kindly receive strangers. His daughter-in-law's tea-table was
always spread for us. We passed hour after hour there, and night after
night, with the pleasantest talk and music. We read over endless novels
and poems in French, English, and German. My delight in those days was
to make caricatures for children. I was touched to find (in 1855) that
they were remembered and some even kept to the present time; and very
proud to be told, as a lad, that the great Goethe had looked at some of
them.

He remained in his private apartments, where only a very few privileged
persons were admitted; but he liked to know all that was happening, and
interested himself about all strangers. Whenever a countenance took his
fancy there was an artist settled in Weimar who made a portrait of it.
Goethe had quite a gallery of heads, in black and white, taken by this
painter. His house was all over pictures, drawings, casts, statues and
medals.

Of course, I remember very well the perturbation of spirit with which,
as a lad of nineteen, I received the long-expected intimation that the
Herr Geheimrath would see me on such a morning. This notable audience
took place in a little antechamber of his private apartments, covered
all round with antique carts and bas-reliefs. He was habited in a long
grey or drab redingote, with a white neckcloth and a red ribbon in his
button-hole. He kept his hands behind his back just as in Rauch's
statuette. His complexion was very clear, bright, and rosy. His eyes
extraordinarily dark, piercing, and brilliant. I felt quite afraid
before them, and remember comparing them to the eyes of the hero of a
certain