“Very true,” replied the German; “and the character of Richter is too marked to be easily misunderstood. Its prominent traits are tenderness and manliness,—qualities which are seldom found united in so high a degree as in him. Over all he sees, over all he writes, are spread the sunbeams of a cheerful spirit,—the light of inexhaustible human love. Every sound of human joy and of human sorrow finds a deep-resounding echo in his bosom. In every man, he loves his humanity only, not his superiority. The avowed object of all his literary labors was to raise up again the down-sunken faith in God, Virtue, and Immortality; and, in an egotistical, revolutionary age, to warm again our human sympathies, which have now grown cold. And not less boundless is his love for Nature,—for this outward, beautiful world. He embraces it all in his arms.”
“Yes,” answered Flemming, almost taking the words out of the stranger’s mouth, “for in his mind all things become idealized. He seems to describe himself when he describes the hero of his Titan, as a child, rocking in a high wind upon the branches of a full-blossomed apple-tree, and as its summit, blown
