and furnished in print as a hearty admonition and warning to all wilful sinners, by One with Christian Intentions.” This quaint and curious narrative was certainly known to Goethe, as well as Widmann’s work. It is the last appearance of the legend in a popular form: thenceforth, through many channels, the latter found its way into literature.
The original book of Spiess was followed in 1594 by an account of the life of Christopher Wagner, whom the Devil accompanied in the form of an ape, under the name of Auerhahn (moor-cock). It is an evident imitation of the story of Faust; there is a similar compact, there are magical tricks, adventures, and airy travels, with a like tragical conclusion. This book was translated into English the same year, and immediately afterwards into Dutch; but there appears to have been no further German edition until 1712, when the original, with some additions, was reprinted in Berlin. In 1742, a play entitled “The Vicious Life and Terrible End of Joh. Christoph Wagner,” was acted in the Frankfurt theatre.
The stamp of the sixteenth century—of its beliefs, its superstitions, its struggles and its antagonisms—is unmistakably impressed on the legend. The singular individual, half genius, half impostor, who bore the name of Faust, must have typified then, as now, the activity of blind, formless, unresting forces in the nature of the people; and through all the coarseness and absurdity of the stories which they have gathered around him, there are constant suggestions of the general craving for some withheld knowledge or right. In spite of Widmann’s “Reminders” and the “One with Christian Intentions,” it is very doubtful whether the moral of Faust’s ending overcame the sympathy of the people with his courage or their admiration of his power. There are elements in the legend, the value of which even a purblind poet could not help seeing, yet which the loftiest genius may admit to be almost beyond his grasp. It is not the least of Goethe’s deserts, that, although in his youth “a new Faust was announced in every quarter of Germany,” he took up the theme already hackneyed by small talents, and made it his own solely and forever.
