"was liable to the charge of perpetual misconception; that his poem was the most tedious the reviewer had ever met with, and as unlike Goethe as Mr. Gurney could well have made it had he directed his faculties that way;-that the adornments with which Mr. Gurney had beautified his work were worse than insipid;-that they were ludicrously absurd, because they were quite opposed to Goethe's style ;that a few months' lessons in German would improve his knowledge of the meaning, but that nothing could make him a translator," &c. These, and similar remarks, with such epithets applied to the renderings. of various passages as lame, trivial, milk and water, &c., were very plentiful in this notice of two pages; and, finally, the critic wound up as follows: "It is really a pity that ever such labour should be thrown away in propagating a version like the present of so great a work as the Faust, because there are too many English readers ready to save themselves the trouble of reading the original, or of pronouncing on a distortion like the present as if it were the original. To Mr. Gurney himself we would recommend more serious preparation the next time he undertakes any work, with a more rigid interrogation of his own fitness for accomplishing it." Of course, when so high and mighty an authority as the Westminster has delivered its sentence of condemnation, we could not think of opposing our insignificant opinion to its magniloquent" ipse dixit;" but fortunately for Mr. Gurney we are enabled to call another witness to the bar, whose evidence is more likely to benefit him than our own could do. Thus speaks the Leipsic Literary Journal, for June 6th and 7th, 1843, of Gurney's Faust, Part Second: "The admirable critical translator of the First Part of Goethe's Faust, A. Hayward, says, in the Preface to one of his last editions, that he advises English people, from reverence for the First Part, not to read the Second at all, because the former was so fully and fearfully completed by Margaret's dungeon scene, that the sequel, moving as it does in the vague realm of dreams and ideas, could only weaken the effect produced. Since then at least three translations of the Second Part have followed the ten or twelve translations of the First. We were not able to convince ourselves that Hayward was wrong, from the specimens of the former attempted versions which we have had an opportunity of seeing. How should an Englishman be able to thread the fantastically labyrinthine course of the philosophising ancient bard, where the German himself has so much difficulty in following him over those heights and depths, and into those singular caves and ravines, through all of which the poet has wandered, led, as it would at first appear, by the most capricious fancy. A young Englishman, Archer Gurney, who, as we hear, has spent a long time in Germany, and made himself acquainted, in Weimar and other places, with German habits and customs, and German ways of thinking, has now ventured-completely, and in rhymed verses-not to translate, but to render into English, the Second Part of Faust. We read in truth this rendering with ever-waxing astonishment, wondering how it should be possible for an Englishman to make that clear to the practical British nation, which has remained mysterious to the ideological Germans. Wonderful!' we again exclaim: this Englishman has succeeded in making that firm, which even for us was unsolid, and in giving that which charmed us from its mystery an equally charming lucidity. And still more wonderful! he has a poet's mind, and a fanciful and truly poetical diction; and he has known so well how to employ this, that we Germans, too, follow with pleasure his flowing and melodious verses, which make many things clearly evident that the original has left half indistinct. In one word, this English version reads more agreeably, more freshly, more flowingly, more clearly, than many of the enigmatical and mysteriously abstract verses of Goethe. It could not be said of the First Part, that any one translation had at all equalled the original in naïve power of expression. Here, too, many of our readers may be horrified by our bold assertion, and exclaim, that this Englishman must have smeared the lime from his rough trowel over the beautiful hieroglyphs of the original. Perhaps, here and there; but now no hieroglyphs are left: the beholder sees nought but what is equally clear and beautiful.' We have then a free translation before us,-free in the true sense of the word,-in which the translator becomes a poet again for his own nation.'-' How admirably and characteristically, however, Mr. Gurney can translate, let the following passage, in a lighter vein, demonstrate.'-'It would not be difficult to quote almost numberless lyric and drastic passages from this work, and others from the dialogues-passages distinguished by that union of reflective and conversational power which is only to be found in Faust-all of which are rendered in their full power and freshness by the translator. How rich is the English language in expressions for outward and material objects ! When our German mother tongue is in danger of losing herself in abstractions, it is from her English child that she may ever draw fresh life and vigour; therefore, as many a German has no doubt read for his instruction Hayward's translation of the First Part, (its short practical notes should be translated into German,) so might many a German study with advantage this rendering into the true English vernacular-this Anglicisation of Faust, Part Second, by Gurney,-if not in order to gather critical instruction, at least to widen his range of thought. Most remarkable examples will be found here of the differences betwixt these two so nearly connected nations.'-' Finally, most worthy of observation are the artifices, by means of which the English translator has avoided, with much tact and knowledge of what he was about, the introduction of those repulsive images and sensual allusions, which an English ear could not well bear to hear, and yet has managed to do this in such a manner that he cannot be reproached with having translated incorrectly.'" Perhaps some of our readers may be inclined to think that this critique must err as widely on the side of praise as the notice of the Westminster on that of blame. At all events, the German Journal tells a very different tale from the English publication. We shall give our readers a few extracts from the work in question before we conclude, which will enable them to decide for themselves which of these rival critics has come nearest to the truth in his appreciation of the merits of Mr. Gurney's work. But, in the first place, we must crave our readers' patience whilst we show the mingled ignorance and presumption of him of the Westminster, and so enable the public to form an estimate of his means of pronouncing an authoritative sentence on such a subject. We devote so much space to the matter, because we think it highly desirable that such flagrant incapacity, when combined with such seeming critical authority, should be fully exposed-1st, for the sake of other future deserving writers who may share Mr. Gurney's fate; and 2dly, for that of the public at large, who are liable to be imposed upon by such self-sufficient effrontery, even when combined with the most deplorable critical ignorance. We need not say that we are not now about to speak of the Westminster Critic's opinions of the poetical merits or demerits of Mr. Gurney's version. On this subject we have, for the present, nothing more to say. The grammatical knowledge or ignorance of German of Mr. Gurney and the reviewer is the question here at issue. In our former short article on this subject we exposed many of the critic's ludicrous mistakes-amongst others, his rendering of the German word " Alle," by "all things." We then told him that " Alle" was never employed like the Latin “omnia" in this sense; but that, on the contrary, it was used with reference to some substantive, which either went before, or followed soon after it. We may add, that it sometimes stands for all persons, as in "Alle lieben ihn"--but never, for all things. A most violent attack had been made by the critic on Mr. Gurney's reading of the first two lines of Faust: "Wenn der Blüthen Frühlings Regen The which was:-" When the blossoms' Spring rain sinks over all of them." In this reading the Spring rain was supposed to be designated flowers' rain, or rain of the flowers, from its power of engendering and vivifying the blossoms. We asserted that this reading was perfectly grammatical, and expressed our dislike to that of the Westminster Reviewer's, which was "When the Spring shower of blossoms over all things hovering sinks." What we especially complained of was this severe critic's rendering the word " Alle," in a translation purporting to be correctness itself, by "all things." We will admit that the mere words, "Blüthen Frühlings Regen," may be rendered "rain of blossoms," as well as "rain of the blossoms," or "blossoms' rain;" but, despite Mr. Hayward's preference of the former, we consider the latter interpretation correct, from the position in which " Alle" is placed in the second line. But this is not the actual point at issue. Westminster Critic has adduced Mr. Hayward and Mr. Bernays. as authorities for his translation of the word "Alle" as "all things." The latter of these gentlemen, whom he rather absurdly brings forward as a son of the well-known German Professor, and himself an Oxonian,† has produced a translation of Faust, Part Second, in the metres of the original, but unrhymed. This is a highly creditable performance, and does not clash at all with Mr. Gurney's, purporting to give only a general idea of the poetical beauties of the original, but to produce a far closer version than any rhyming translator could possibly lay before his readers. However, in this matter Mr. Bernays has fallen into an error, he having really translated "Alle" as "all things;" but it must be remembered that he was writing in a peculiar metre, besides which he had not critically undertaken to expose the faults of another's translation in construing the passage, and might, therefore, easily fall into this mistake. We feel ourselves bound to add that Mr. Bernays is generally very correct in his readings, and has not often * Besides this, the German article "der" conveys, in this instance, the sense of "pertaining to the." Thus, if Goethe had meant to say "the shower of blossoms pertaining to i. e. of the Spring," he would have worded the sentence thus :-"Wenn des Frühlings Blüthen Regen." Having, on the contrary, given the distinctive article to Blüthen, he must have meant "the Spring showers pertaining to the blossoms." Had he said, "a Heidelbergian or a Göttingingian," we should have understood the meaning of the assertion, but how a mere residence at Oxford can enable a man to be a better German scholar than his neighbours, we cannot for the life of us discover. VOL. III.-NO. I. X missed his author's meanings. And now for Mr. Hayward, whom the Westminster Critic has also summoned to the bar in this matter. He translates—“When the Spring shower of blossoms drops wavering over all, when the fields' green blessing smiles on all the earthborn." Now surely it is very evident here that the first "all" refers to persons. Otherwise Mr. Hayward would have added the word "things:" for it will be felt immediately on a perusal of the passage, by every English reader, that "all," when thus employed alone in English, is far more likely to signify all men than all things. Yet the Westminster Critic goes on to say, "If the reviewer," (meaning ourselves,) "after this, will persist in saying, that' über Alle' does not mean 'over all things,' we envy him the profundity and accuracy of his knowledge of German." We have seen that Mr. Hayward translates "Alle," " all," and not "all things;" but even if he had fallen into the error of the Westminster Reviewer, that error would not cease to be one. Once more we repeat it, "all men love him," may be rendered by "Alle lieben ihn;" but to express all things, as in the sentence, "all things look up unto God," we cannot use Alle," but only the neuter of the singular, "Alles.” Again, the last four lines of the first stanza, chanted by the fairies in chorus, were most ludicrously translated by the Westminster Reviewer after the following fashion :-"Gently murmurs the sweet tranquillity, &c." We exposed the absurdity of this, assuring him that it was not tranquillity which murmured, but something else that went before, and that Frieden, the German word for this tranquillity, was in the accusative, and not the nominative case. The reviewer has quoted Mr. Hayward's version of the last four lines, leaving out that of the preceding four, from which it would have been seen that Mr. Hayward translates, twilight "gently murmurs sweet tranquillity, rocks the heart to childlike rest, &c.' To give our readers a clear conception of this passage, we will quote this stanza from a more literal version of this scene which Mr. Gurney has forwarded to us.' It will be seen that he has followed our advice in discarding his former perfectly grammatical but less poetical reading of this passage, which con 86 It must be confessed that this first scene of Mr. Gurney's production is not as closely rendered as the rest of his work; and this he has himself satisfactorily accounted for in a communication which he has addressed to us, thanking us for our former defence of his cause, and inclosing the version above referred to. This scene, it appears, was translated by Mr. Gurney several years ago, before any of the rest of his work, and it was then corrected, and, in point of fact, remodelled with a view to greater metrical beauty, by his father, who did not himself understand German. Still Mr. Gurney says, that he liked his father's translation, as he calls it, so much, and considered it so correct in all main matters, that he could not prevail on himself to throw it away, when some years after he took up and completed the work. He adds, to prevent the possibility of misapprehension, that, with the exception of two lines in the second scene, there is no single passage in the rest of the work which has been corrected or at all altered by any other person than himself. This accounts for what we could not ourselves at first well understand-the difference betwixt the style and manner of the first scene, and all the ensuing ones. We may also observe, that the further Mr. Gurney went in his translation, the more literal he became, so that all but about the first half of the first act has been kept very close to the original. strued the verb "lispelt" as the second person of the imperative addressed to the fairy sprites, "Ihr Elfen" being understood: "When the zephyrs, gently breathing, Here the words in the original, "from the eyes of the tired one," are omitted at the conclusion-so the Westminster Reviewer will of course find fresh food for discontent. However, his mistakes remain not the less ludicrous from his own extreme critical severity; and, perhaps, in taking the accusative Frieden for the nominative, and translating "Gently murmurs the sweet tranquillity," he may be said to have surpassed himself. These are the two matters on which the Westminster Critic labours to exonerate himself from the charge of ignorance. Alle, he maintains, does mean all things, and tranquillity does murmur; i. e. süssen Frieden is in the nominative case. With respect to various other charges brought against him he shows no fight at all, with one solitary exception. He, in his much debated article, had so stopped a passage of Mr. Gurney's translation, as to render it absolute nonsense, and had then asked whether it was not nonsensical. For this we reproached him somewhat severely. In his reply, he attempts to justify himself on the score of an error in the printing, and inquires how we can excuse ourselves for having written Dämmerung with one m in our article, if we are so severe upon him for such a casual inaccuracy. Now we need scarcely point out the enormous difference betwixt the two cases. When a critic quotes a passage for the sake of exposing its absurdity, he is at least bound to quote it correctly-and no excuse can be tendered for such errors in printing as should make the passage altogether unintelligible. With respect to the word Dämmerung, the Westminster Critic's knowledge of German was probably not sufficiently practical for him to be aware that any person in the habit of writing that language would only draw a line above the first m to express the second in that word, thus Damerung. Of course the printer did not understand this, and the error was inadvertently allowed to remain. If, further, in the numerous notices to the article on Dante, the printer forget to do the same in Italian, we presume this is to be put down to our ignorance; but the public will not believe so readily the word of a Westminster Reviewer against scholars and gentlemen. But this attempt to turn the tables upon us, when the carelessness (to use the very mildest expression) of the offending critic is clearly so extremely reprehensible-this attempt, we say, would really excite our astonishment, if any thing on the part of that most remarkable reviewer could do so. On one subject, in which, for the preservation of his critical reputation, an answer would be more |