nickname for Wagner; who, it may be remarked, actually takes this function on him.-(Part 2, Act ii.)

1486. das Stroh zu dreschen, “to thrash the straw," proverbially for fruitless toil.

1498. Wissenschaft, "Knowledge." Faust had expressed his weariness of knowledge, and had craved relief in the "Blend- und Zauberwerken ” of sensual delights. See ll. 1396 and sqq.

Mephistopheles rejoices that Faust has grown impatient of reason and knowledge; he feels that so long as this revulsion of feeling lasts he is sure of his victim, and he gloats over the manner in which he will take advantage of Faust's restlessness to drag him through one sensual pleasure after another without allowing him to find satisfaction in any. This is far removed from the spirit of the wager, and also from that of the legends and the Puppet Play; but it is in keeping with the Prologue, 11. 83-84, and 90-93.

1502. Bayard Taylor remarks here that Goethe frequently makes use of a dash to denote both a change in the address and a movement of the speaker. Here Mephistopheles looks after Faust's retreating figure and addresses him as if present; at the end of this line he turns away and continues his soliloquy, speaking of Faust in the third person.

1508. flache Unbedeutenheit, "the flat uneventful round." Mephistopheles seems to be referring to the monotony of sensual gratification. 1509. zappeln, “kick," like a young child, (cf. 1. 2783): in endeavouring to escape from his unworthy position.

starren, to cease struggling and "be stiff and still," and dead to everything except the object of his passion.

fleben, the last stage, to "stick fast" in the mire of gross pleasures, and have neither the wish nor the power to extricate himself.

1510-1512. Mephistopheles apparently forgets that the insufficiency of the pleasures he could offer was the very thing with which Faust had taunted him. 11. 1325, and sqq.

1513-14. In these lines again the terms of the wager, as Goethe has altered them, are ignored, though they are quite compatible with the compact as it stood in the legend and the Puppet Play. This, however, is probably not an oversight on Goethe's part, but a deliberate inconsistency. He was modernising the legend, but was anxious not to thrust its older form out of sight too much. He had, as is well known, some of Plato's and Shakespeare's contempt for purely formal consistency and writing "nach einem Plane.”

1515. In the scene which follows we have another respite from the graver action of the Play: the withering satire which it contains against every branch of knowledge may be intended, possibly, to justify Faust's attitude towards knowledge generally, but it is also no doubt an expression of Goethe's own contempt for university teaching, at any rate that of his younger days. "Mephistopheles not only assumes the

mantle of Faust, but Goethe also assumes the mask of Mephistopheles. This episode, which is wholly his own invention, was written during his intercourse with Merck, and while his experience of academic teaching was still fresh, and far from edifying."—(Bayard Taylor). Goethe's views on the university teaching of his day are well described in Mrs. Austin's Characteristics of Goethe, quoted by Hayward, p. 233.

1521. "Have you looked about elsewhere?" i.e. have you applied to other professors before you came to me?

1526. hieraußen, "out here," viz., here away from home. Was Rechts, cf. 1. 18, and note.

1528. aufrichtig, "to say the honest truth."

1544. Facultät, " a course of study."

1550. zerstreuen has the double meaning of distraction and amusement; the scholar in his reply shows that he has taken Mephistopheles's advice in the second sense. Cf. Goethe's own advice in his Conversations with Eckermann (p. 144, Fuller's translation): "When all is said, the great art is judiciously to limit and isolate one's-self.”

1556. Ordnung, "method."

1558. Collegium Logicum, "a course of logic.'

1560. spanische Stiefeln, instruments of torture used in the middle ages. A painful description of their use is to be found in Scott's Old Mortality, ch. 36. Others have taken the expression simply to imply fashionable, tight-laced boots.

1582. The meaning is, "they have, it is true, a great respect for the method, but have never put the method to any practical use."

1584. der Geift, “the life." In Wahrheit und Dichtung Goethe says: "It seemed strange to me in the case of logic that I should have to pull apart, isolate, and, as it were, destroy those operations of the mind, which from my youth up I had been in the habit of performing with the greatest ease, in order to perceive their proper use !" cf. also

"And all a rhetorician's rules

Teach nothing but to name his tools."—(Hudibras.)

Cf. also Macaulay on the Baconian method (Essay on Lord Bacon). 1587. Encheiresin naturae, lit. "the treatment of Nature," seems to be used here for the mysterious, inscrutable force of Nature.

The absurdity of the phrase seems to lie in the Greek word, which naturally implies just such an investigation as man makes of nature; which is consequently assumed, conceitedly, to resemble nature's own method and design.

Goethe, writing to Wackenroder, Professor of Chemistry at Jena, in January 1832, says: "Though we are ready to allow Nature her secret Encheiresis, by which she creates and promotes life, and are obliged to admit, though we are no mystics, that there is, after all, a something

which defies investigation, still it is impossible for man, if he be in earnest, to refrain from attempting to drive this something into the narrowest possible limits." According to Falk, Goethe himself commented upon the passage thus: "What do I care about the parts, or their names? What I want to know is, what it is that animates everything in the Universe to such an extent that it seeks out some other portion, and either ministers to it or rules it, and does this in accordance with some law which is innate in all in a greater or lesser degree. But these are the very points as to which the deepest silence universally prevails. (Bayard Taylor, Notes, p. 302.)

1602. Ordnung, "arrangement of time."

1603. Stunden, "lectures."

1606. Paragraphos, "the paragraphs," i.e. in your text-books.

1614. getroft, "with good confidence;" because there is no fear now of his forgetting what he has heard.

1615. Logic and Metaphysic are only preparatory studies; after these some definite course of study (Facultät) must be chosen.

1619. erben sich, "perpetuate themselves." Gesetz strictly means "law" in the sense of enactment; Recht, "law" or "rule of law" generally. For Goethe's own opinion about jurisprudence, see Wahrheit und Dichtung, B. xxi. 39. He was originally intended by his father for the law, but could only with the greatest reluctance be persuaded to qualify for the necessary examination at Strasburg.

1620-6. This denunciation of Law seems to resolve itself into an anathema 66 upon the dead hand," or intrusion of the wishes and provisions of our predecessors into social and political affairs. Woe on thee, that thou art a grandchild !” is a compendious statement of the case. 1635. von der Arzenei, "from the medicine;" i.e. it is very difficult to distinguish between that which is poisonous and that which is healing. 1655. cher, "easier."

1657. recht, "in earnest."

1678. 3um Willkomm', "at the outset."

1696. Cf. Prologue, 93.

1699. "The programme of both Parts of Faust is given in this line. 'The little world' is here Faust's individual experience of human desires and passions; he issues from his seclusion to share in the ordinary history of men. This plan is developed so far as possible in the First Part. 'The great world' is life on a broader stage of action intellectual forces are substituted for sentiments and passions; the narrow interests of the individual are merged in those of the race; and government, war, activity on a grand scale and for universal, permanent ends succeed, in order that Faust's knowledge of the life of man shall be rounded into completeness. The Second Part of the work is devoted to this latter experience." (Bayard Taylor.)

1701. durchschmarußen. Schmaruzen is to sponge, to live like a parasite. Faust will sponge upon Mephistopheles for his enjoyment, i.e. he will be provided with it without any effort of his own.

1702. bei, "with."

1705. "I shall never be able to adapt myself to the world."

1712. This use of the cloak occurs both in the legend and in the Puppet Play, but the Feuerluft is peculiar to Goethe. Its introduction is no doubt intended as a humorous allusion to the attempts at ballooning then being made in France by the brothers Montgolfier. That Goethe himself was very much interested in the question is shown by several passages in his writings. In Wahrheit und Dichtung, Bk. xxxvi. 71, he relates how, on the 10th of May 1784, the first balloon was sent up from the terrace at Weimar; another reference to the same subject occurs in Bk. iii. 330.

1720. The four boon companions have each a certain amount of individuality. Altmayer would seem to be better bred than the rest; he is short and sarcastic in his replies, and can scarcely conceal a certain contempt for the society in which he finds himself; he is also more sceptical than the others as to the professed magical power of Mephistopheles; although, after he is once convinced, he becomes the most credulous of them all.

Siebel, with his pot-belly and bald pate, is the Altbursch among them; he appears as the bully and braggart of the party, and seems to find a special pleasure in noise and drink. At the present moment he is somewhat dejected by the conduct of his mistress, who has jilted him, and his woebegone looks render him at first the butt of his companions. Frosch is the youngest and the most impudent, while Brander seems to have been hitherto recognised as the poet of the circle, and is indignant at Frosch's attempts to supersede him, nor can he even hear Mephistopheles's song without criticising and interrupting.

1726. Doppelt, because he is both stupid and nasty.

1727. ja, "why, you wished for it."

1728. Siebel has come to drown his love troubles in a good carouse, and will not be disappointed.

1738. The fiction of a Holy Roman Empire was still maintained at the coronation at Frankfurt, and in various legal and official forms. 1748. Den Ausschlag giebt, "gives the preference." Ausschlag is literally the turn of the scale.

1749. This couplet is to be found in several old Volkslieder.

1758. angeführt, "led me a fool's dance."

1761. Where he had been taking his part in the festivities of the Walpurgis Nacht. Cf. 1. 3484.

1770. nach Standsgebühr, “to suit their quality.”

1774. This song appears to have been written by Goethe in September 1775, during the height of his passion for Lili.

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1776. The introduction of the Ränzlein was probably intended to annoy Siebel, cf. 1. 1802; angemäst, fattened," derived from Mast, which in Germany, as in England, is used as food for pigs.

1799. "Methinks 'tis high art.”

1810. Behagen, "self-satisfaction." Cf. 1. 183.

1820. Frosch, as the freshman, is naturally the most enthusiastic in the praise of his university.

1828. ich schraube sie, "I'll chaff them."

1832. Cf. Grimm's Mythologie, p. 944.

1837. Rippach was the last posting-house between Weissenfels and Leipzig.

1838. Hans von Rippach was a common phrase in Leipzig for a country bumpkin, and probably had a special application to freshmen.

1843.

A. 'You've caught it. He's wide awake.

S. A smart fellow.'

Altmayer thoroughly appreciates the retort just made at Frosch's expense.

pfiffig, sharp, artful; from pfiff (1) a whistle, (2) an artful trick, probably from the use of whistles to decoy birds.

1849. Frosch insinuates that he is a wandering musician.

1852. Siebel, the Altbursch, is naturally most weary of the old songs, and most eager for something new.

1859. This song of the flea is a coarse satire upon parasites and court favourites, who, after working themselves into power, make use of their influence to provide for their relations, and also upon these relations themselves, who, after being established at court, annoy every one with impunity so long as they are under the protection of court favour.

1879. Frosch, though at first inclined to be obstructive, is at the end quite won over by the merit of the song.

1899. ich nehm's auf mich, “I will be responsible," i.e. in case the host should be indignant at their drinking other wine than his.

1905. Goethe has taken this piece of jugglery, and also that of the grapes, from the legend, making however Mephistopheles the performer instead of Faust. The change was necessary, in order that Faust might maintain his attitude of reserve and disgust to the very end of the scene.

1926. “You are making fun of us."

1936. Mephistopheles perhaps intended here a sly allusion to Faust and his "Gährung in die Ferne."

1937. Cf. 1. 413. "Das Wunder ist des Glaubens liebstes Kind.”

1942. Goethe, in one of his letters to Merck, says: "Ist mir auch fauwohl geworden.”

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1947. Mephistopheles, as in the scene with the student, cannot conclude without gratifying his love of mischief; he must "recht den Teufel spielen" before he leaves them.