enberg, though his
expression of them has a singular savour. About a fortnight after his
arrival in Strassburg he writes as follows to one Limprecht, a
theological student whose acquaintance he had made in Leipzig: "I am
now again _Studiosus_, and, thank God, have now as much health as I
need, and spirits in superabundance. As I was, so am I still; only
that I stand better with our Lord God and with his dear Son Jesus
Christ. It follows that I am a somewhat wiser man; and have learned by
experience the meaning of the saying, 'The fear of the Lord is the
beginning of wisdom.' To be sure, we first sing Hosanna to him who
cometh yonder; well and good! even that is joy and happiness; the King
must first enter before he ascends his throne." A week later he writes
again to the same correspondent in a similar strain[65]: "I am a
different man, very different: for that I thank my Saviour; and I am
thankful also that I am not what I pass for."[66]

[Footnote 65: _Werke, Briefe_, Band i. 232.]

[Footnote 66: _Ib._ p. 234.]

Two months later (July 28th) he appears to be in the same pious frame
of mind. "I still live somewhat at random," he writes to another
correspondent, "and I thank God for it; and often, when I dare, I
thank His Son also that I am in circumstances which seem to enjoin
this random mode of life.... Reflections are very light wares, but
prayer is a profitable business; a single welling-up of the heart to
Him whom we call _a_ God till we can name Him _our_ God, and we are
overwhelmed by the multitude of our mercies."[67]

[Footnote 67: _Ib._ pp. 240, 241.]

This mood, we cannot help feeling, sits ill on Goethe; pious as are
his expressions, they have not the ring of the genuine believer. Yet
it would be unjust to charge him with deliberate hypocrisy. The truth
is that at this time, and indeed throughout all his sojourn in
Strassburg, he was in a state of nervous irritability of which both
himself and his friends were aware.[68] Other expressions in letters
of the same date reveal a variability of moods, the only explanation
of which is that he had not fully recovered from the depressed mental
condition consequent on his long illness in Frankfort. But his
unnatural mood of piety did not long withstand the new influences to
which he was now subjected, and it is in a letter to Fraeulein von
Klettenberg herself, written towards the end of August, that he
intimates his growing distaste for the religious set to who