, at least in his best
works, no more so than is compatible with the demands of artistic
presentation. He does not, like Gotthelf, delight in painting a face
with all its wrinkles, warts, and freckles, but works more like the
portrait painter who will remove unsightly blemishes by retouching the
picture without in any way sacrificing its lifelike character. When
occasion demands he also shows himself capable of handling thoroughly
tragic themes with pronounced success. In his later years, it is true,
he fell into mannerism, overemphasized his inclination toward
didacticism and sententiousness, and allowed the philosopher to run away
with the poet by making his peasant folk think and speak as though they
were adepts in the system of Spinoza, with which Auerbach himself,
being of Jewish birth and having been educated to be a rabbi, was
intimately familiar. On the whole, however, the lasting impression we
obtain from Auerbach's literary work remains a very pleasant one--that
of a rich and characteristic life, sound to the core, vigorous and
buoyant.

Not as a writer of village stories--for in the portrayal of the rustic
population, as such, he was not concerned--but in his basic purpose of
holding up nature, pure and holy, as an ideal, Adalbert Stifter
(1805-1868), an Austrian, must be assigned a place of honor in this
group. A more incisive contrast to the general turbulence of the forties
could hardly be imagined than is found in the nature descriptions and
idyls of this quietist, who "from the madding crowd's ignoble strife"
sought refuge in the stillness of the country and among people to whom
such outward peace is a physical necessity. His feeling for nature,
especially for her minutest and seemingly most insignificant phenomena,
is closely akin to religion; there is an infinite charm in his
description of the mysterious life of apparently lifeless objects; he
renders all the sensuous impressions so masterfully that the reader
often has the feeling of a physical experience; and it is but natural
that up to his thirty-fifth year, before he discovered his literary
talent, he had dreamed of being a landscape painter. Hebbel's epigram,
"Know ye why ye are such past masters in painting beetles and
buttercups? 'Tis because ye know not man; 'tis because ye see not the
stars," utterly fails to do justice to Stifter's poetic individuality.
But in avoiding the great tempests and serious conflicts of the human
heart he obeyed a