Apart from the opening Scenes, which have no dramatic
connection with it, the Gretchen tragedy constitutes an artistic whole
which by its perfection of detail and overwhelming tragic effect must
ever remain one of the marvels of creative genius. Not less
astonishing as a manifestation of Goethe's youthful power is the
creation in all their essential lineaments of the three figures,
Faust, Mephistopheles, and Margaret--figures stamped ineffaceably on
the imagination of educated humanity. Be it said also that from the
_Urfaust_ mainly come those single lines and passages which are among
the memorable words recorded in universal literature. Such, to specify
only a few, are the Song of the Earth-Spirit; the lines commenting on
man's vain endeavour to comprehend the past, and on the dreariness of
all theory,[242] contrasted with the freshness and colour of life;
Faust's confession of his religious faith, and Margaret's songs. To
have added in this measure to the intellectual inheritance of the race
assures the testator his rank among the great spirits of all time.
[Footnote 242:
Grau, theurer Freund, ist alle Theorie,
Und gruen des Lebens goldner Baum.
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