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    Voi < . 37 is devoted to two of Goethe ' s distinguished countrymen and contemporaries—Winkelmann ^ the great historian of ancient art , and Philip Hackert , the landscape painter . We know not (whether it be a sufficient excuse for the fact , that our language is still without a translation of the History of the Arts of Design

    among the Ancients / which for more than half a century hag enjoyed the highest celebrity on the continent , that that voluminous and expensive work exists in the Italian and French , as well as in German ; and that perhaps not a man is to be found to whom that very curious subject is an object of interest , who is not familiar with one of those languages . We cannot , however , digress into so wide a field , and shall merely take occasion to extract a few

    piquant passages in which Goethe exhibits himself rather than his subject . We merely remind our readers that Winkelmann was a poor scholar , born in Prussia in 1717 ; that having devoted himself to the study of classical antiquity and the fine arts , being without any provision , and feeling an intense desire to pursue his studies in Italy , the only country where his learning and attain *

    ments could be rendered available , he yielded to the suggestion of the Pope ' s nuncio at Dresden ; and in order to obtain the means ; of travelling into , what was to him , the land of promise , and of there employing his talents to advantage , he submitted to the painful sacrifice of his integrity , and became a nominal convert to the church of Rome ; we say nominal , for it does not appear that any even of his new Italian friends , affected to consider his conversion

    sincere . It was treated as the subscription to articles of faith has been in other churches . He acquired immediate fame , and became the cuxtode of the Vatican museum of antiquities , the noblest in the world ; he was highly esteemed by Pope fienedictXIV . but his more especial personal patron was Cardinal Albani , the riches of whose villa he made known to the world in the Monumenti inediti .

    His career was as short aa it was distinguished ; he was murdered at Trieste in 1768 by an Italian to whom he had indiscreetly shown some medals . In 1805 , Goethe , having obtained possession of a number of his ( Winkelmann ' s ) unpublished letters , joined his friend Meyer in the publication of ' Winkelmann and his Age , ' a

    biographical , critical , and epistolary miscellany ; his own original matter is here collected and preserved . * The characteristic is divided and classed under heads such as the Antique , Catholicism , Rome , &c . Having previously described Winkelmann as a heathen from his birth , * . e . as one having those

    * Goethe's ' Winkelmann' was his first publication , in 1805 , after the death of Schiller , and his own alarming illness . If this were doubtful , I could prove the fact by the fallowing incident : —The book , you know , is dedicated to the Duchess Dowager of Weimar . Taking it up as it lay on the Duchess's drawing-room table , there ton etit a slip of paper , on which was written a distich in Goethe \» hand . It was as follows ¦ ¦

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    871

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    GOETHE'S WORKS . — . No . 9 , and last .

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), April 2, 1833, page 271, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2612/page/55/