when anxiety creates confusion, and the accusing thoughts rise up in all their strength against him— then, as he strives to win back to his former understanding of himself, he will doubtless go to this friend and say: "My soul is sick, and nothing is clear to me; but I confided everything to you. You remember it; explain the past to me." But if a man has no such friend he will doubtless have recourse to God— if he has ever confided anything to Him, if God has been his witness in the critical hour of decision, when no one else understood him. He who had recourse to a friend was perhaps not understood; and what is still harder to bear, perhaps he became an object of disgust to himself when he learned that his confidant had not understood his need though he listened to him, had not suspected the reason of his anguish, but had merely listened out of curiosity to the story of his remarkable collision with life. But such a thing could never happen with God. Who would dare to think of God in such manner; although because he does not dare to think such things of God, he may be cowardly enough to forget God altogether— until he stands before the judge who condemns him. But this could never happen to one who has taken God as his witness; for where God is the judge, there is no judge when God is the witness.
But it does not by any means follow that life becomes easy for a man who thus learns to know God. On the contrary, it may become very hard; and it will certainly become more difficult than the sensuous man's contempt- ible life of ease. But in and through this difficulty his life constantly gains deeper and deeper significance. Or shall we perhaps say that it has no significance for him that God is always present in his thoughts, that while of him- self he can do nothing he can with God's help do more and man's need of god 175 more— that he can gain a victory over himself; for with God's help he can indeed do this! Shall we say that it has no significance for him that he learns more and more to die away from the world, learns to cling less and less to external things, to that which life brings and takes away, to that which it is given him outwardly to accom- plish—but learns also to care more and more for the things of the inner man, for the understanding with God, for the privilege of remaining in this understanding, and for the learning to know God as the power that makes all things work together for good when he loves God? Shall we say even that it is without significance for him that it makes the adversities of life easier, since it is always true that a man who has something else to think of and is thereby prevented from dwelling on his sorrows, finds these easier? Shall we finally say that it is without signifi- cance for him, his blessed reward, that he comes to under- stand that God is love, and that His goodness passeth all understanding; and that he does not need to depend on the testimony of others in this respect, or on a contempla- tion of history or of the order of nature? To understand these things is certainly far greater; but the problem is to understand them in such a way as in truth to profit from the understanding.
We do not wish to be understood as saying that a knowledge of God which consists of an absorption in dreamy wonder and enthusiastic contemplation of Him is alone of the highest worth; for God cannot thus be taken in vain. Just as the self-knowledge which reveals one's own nothingness is the necessary condition for knowing God, so the knowledge of God is the condition for the sanctification of each human being in accordance with his specific end. Wherever God exists in truth there He is 176 always creative. It is not His will that men should bask in the contemplation of His glory in spiritual sloth; but He wishes, through coming to be known of man, to create in him a new man.
If it were so, let us assume it to be so, that a man with- out knowing God, could by himself be ennobled and de- veloped to the same degree, I nevertheless ask you, my hearer, whether knowing God does not have in itself the highest significance? And if a choice were conceivable, so that a man could progress equally far either by himself or by knowing God, which would you choose? Even in the minor human relationships you would choose the latter. For if it were possible that you could be developed in soli- tude as much as by learning to know some other human being, to whom you were drawn with your whole soul, the fact that you learned to know him would have in itself the most beautiful significance for you. The most beautiful significance— ah, no, you are well aware that at least when we speak of God, it is quite otherwise. For the knowl- edge of God is the most decisive factor in every human life, and without this knowledge, a man would become absolutely nothing. Without God he would perhaps scarcely be able to grasp the most elementary secret of the truth, that he is of himself absolutely nothing; even less would he be able to understand that it is his need of God that constitutes his highest perfection.
VIII LOVE CONQUERS ALL (on the occasion of a wedding) UNCLARIFIED moods rest in the depths of the soul, secure in love's beautiful assurance; the organ tones have ceased to sound, and only their echoes again move the soul, desiring to translate the beau- tiful assurance into sacred feelings: now is the time for speech! The voice of an individual will be heard. How poor the words from his lips must seem in comparison with the wealth of feeling in the beautiful and sacred emotion! May not the spoken word be disturbing, the well-meant word inopportune, and the word of guidance portentous! And yet it must be spoken, and it must be spoken with decisiveness. The indeterminate wealth of feeling must be expressed, the word must be named; clarity without in the least wishing to disturb, must ex- tract from the word its utmost significance.
What a change, what commensurability in this incom- mensurability! For what is so clear and precise and defi- nite as a man's duty is and ought to be, and what is so mysterious as the impulse of love! And yet, love must here become duty. And what is more transparent and intent upon the future than a sacred promise, and what is less concerned with the future than the presence of love in the lovers! And yet love here demands a prom- ise. And what is so terrible to mention as a curse, and what is so remote from this as the pure joy of the lovers! And yet this word must be mentioned in connection with love!
i78 But it is a free matter, and just as the lovers become free by being bound to one another, so is this step a re- solve of the free will. We are glad with those who today rejoice, whom love has made free in their union, but it must not be spoken with veiled words or disparagingly about the marriage pledge, as if it were something less significant because it is a free act, since, on the contrary, it is the one thing needful in connection with the most beautiful form of human happiness.
And so now these two, whom life has joined together in the happiness of love, are at this moment resolved, and a pact is to be instituted between them. A pact for- ever. Forever— is not this word by its very strength almost portentous, since it is as if death came between, and it is upon the grave one lays the garland of everlastings? Oh, far from it, for this ominous word is a beautiful an- nouncement. The marriage pledge is indeed like a gar- land of everlastings, but love weaves it, and duty says it must be woven, and it is love's happiness to weave it, and duty says it must be woven— each day from the blossoms of the moment. Eternity is not here through with time, but the pact of love is eternity's beginning in time. The eternal resolution and the duty must forever remain with the wedded pair throughout time in the union of their love; and each anniversary shall be a solemn holiday, with power in its remembrance and hope in its promise.
The spoken word must be definite, and it must also be uttered with authority. And the speech shall be ad- dressed to you, respected bridegroom; it does not offer congratulations, but the speaker asks you an earnest ques- tion, and he has authority to demand an earnest answer. He does not ask you about your happiness, but whether you have consulted God and your conscience. The ques- LOVE CONQUERS ALL *79 don is not intended to dissipate your happiness, nor is it indifferent to it. The question desires only to make your happiness secure, if you answer deliberately, and it is asked in earnestness for your own sake, lest you answer frivolously. And though it seems to you so wholly natural, so completely in harmony with the order of things, that you should be bound to one whom the early wishes of parents and relatives had selected, to one with whom you felt yourself united in an anticipation that finally passed over into certainty, to one to whom you felt yourself drawn in so many ways, until love revealed itself as the ul- timate ground, and took over the preparation into its glo- rious possession: nevertheless though our earnest question need by no means give pause to a hectic and surprised res- olution, which often enough gives rise to late regrets, it would make you pause with a sense of the responsibility of duty, to lay the emphasis of choice upon the quiet experience.
And next the speech shall be directed to you, respected bride; it will not disturb you with its question or trouble you by arousing difficult thoughts, but it will ask you with the same earnestness as the equality of the pact re quires, whether you have consulted with God and your conscience. Oh, the question will not make your happi- ness precarious, it will not make you weak, it will make you, in the freedom of earnestness, equally strong with the husband to whom as a wife you are to be submissive. And though you feel with a joyous confidence and per- fect trust that happiness could not have come for you in any other way, that it could not be otherwise than that you should be united with him whom long association and the close relationship, and participation in so many things, and mutual sympathy bound to you until love i8o came and explained all that went before as a beautiful preface, a dowry of security, a wealth of happiness: never- theless, though the earnest question is far from wishing to interrupt the many thoughts, it would still imbue you with the sense of the responsibility of duty to lay the em- phasis of choice upon the almost imperceptible transition of this quiet experience.
And then there is required a promise, and the speaker has the authority to require it. But the requirement is in all its earnestness a challenge to the lovers. It will give the worthy a solemn opportunity to announce freely and in the sight of God that which it is hard for the lovers to keep silent about, that which it is sweet to communicate to a confidant, that which, when here expressed, receives its consecration.
When this has been done, the officiating authority will unite the happy pair and make earnestness of what is already earnest. For the act itself has its own earnestness, and when this is not found in the wedded, the act is desecrated, for marriage is not merely a temporal event. But when the earnestness exists, the officiating authority gives to the act the stamp of earnestness, and the pact is concluded.
On the other hand, the unauthorized discourse has no lovers to unite. But still, my hearer, you can give it your attention. For as was said above, the act has its own seri- ousness, and this does not consist in external happenings, that some curious people have come as witnesses, that two persons have effected an outward change in the cir- cumstances of their lives. And that earnestness the au- thorized speaker presupposes in the wedded pair, and that it is thus mature. If it came into being only in that moment of the ceremony, who would dare to answer the LOVE CONQUERS ALL l8l question which asks about something past, though this past is also the present? Or, if the speaker in that moment must develop this earnestness in the lovers, then must he speak quite otherwise; he must say much which it is risky to say now at the last moment, difficult to say to just these two, though it would have been profitable for them to have considered it. Hence there is given a reflection which in earnestness of thought already stands before the altar. To such a thoughtful consideration, then, my hear- er, I invite you, and with the marriage ceremony in mind, I shall consider the theme: LOVE CONQUERS ALL, viewed as the resolution that constitutes marriage.
And you, my hearer, will you also hold that solemn moment fast before your thought, and not concern your- self with the deliberation in any other manner than as if it concerned yourself; it may be that for you the mar- riage pact is something in the future or something past; for it is something irrelevant only to a fool. And surely here we are in agreement, that a discourse about godly matters should never be contentious or discordant with anything except that which is ungodly. When therefore the poor man, or one who in a humble situation works for his bread, without on that account being excluded from the happiness of love, when he must gather in toil- some care and take many a weary step in order to get the necessities together, while the master or overseer only too well understands, perhaps, that the duties of the service must first and foremost be attended to, when there is left only the scanty opportunity, the sparingly measured time, for the godly consideration of the heart's concerns, upon which the privileged, perhaps wisely, perhaps foolishly, l82 l82 spend so much time— when these two lovers finally also stand before the altar and in all brevity are declared wedded: Oh, my hearer, we are surely agreed that God, who is present when the pact is made, not only as a wit- ness but to grant His blessing upon it, does not in His blessing make a distinction like that in the speech of men. Because He alone is rich, He has but one blessing, and at one and the same price for all; be the believer great or humble, wise or simple, clothed in gold or in linsey, rich in thoughts or poor in spirit. But if anyone, man or woman, attacked by an aristocratic distemper, be inhuman enough to find the sacred observances too sim- ple, if anyone wished to invent new rites, then are we agreed, my hearer, that this is the miracle of the godly ordinance, that the simple finds everything therein, and the wise more than he can fathom, when he earnestly thinks himself in relation thereto, and thinks earnestly about himself.
An old adage says that love is older than everything else; and many a beautiful and profound thought has been linked with this word, in order by the aid of the adage to explain existence. But just as the adage is valid in relation to great things, so it is also valid wherever love is present: it is older than all other things. So in the life of an individual; when love awakens it is older than everything, for when it is, it is as if it had been there a long time, it presupposes itself far back in the distant past, until all search for its origin ends in the inexplicable. While one generally says about all beginning that it is difficult, this does not hold true of love. Its happy awak- ening knows no labor, and no preparation precedes. If love does indeed sometimes generate pain, it is not itself born with pain: lightly and jubilantly it breaks forth in its mysterious becoming. Miraculous beginning!— But LOVE CONQUERS ALL 183 the life of freedom requires a beginning, and a beginning is here a resolution, and the resolution has its own labor and pain, the beginning its difficulty. The individual con- ceiving a resolution cannot be finished, for then would he already have experienced that of which the resolution is the beginning; but if no resolution is taken, then such a man will doubtless share the experience that sometimes comes to a speaker, that only after he is finished and has already spoken, does he know how he ought to have spoken: only after he has lived, does he know how he ought to have lived (sorry profit from life's experiences!), and how he ought to have made the beginning with the good resolution, bitter wisdom, now that there lies an entire life between the beginning and the dying man!
So the word says that love conquers all, and therefore the marriage ceremony, which is not a festive congratula- tion but a godly challenge, does not greet the lovers as victors, but invites them to a struggle, encloses them in the arena of a state well-pleasing unto God, encourages them to fight the good fight, strengthens their striving by means of the marriage pact, promises them victory as it also takes a promise from them, gives them a blessing for the long journey— but also informs them that the strug- gle is there: a struggle to be fought through, trouble to be endured, danger to be experienced, a curse if it is not borne in harmony as a blessing. And yet, is it the right place here to evoke such sorry considerations, that come soon enough with the dark thoughts and the sad experi- ences: in the moment of joy to call to mind the days that have no pleasure in them? But is it then sad that this high-minded word actually means something, that it is not sounding brass, not a jubilation over an imaginary victory which is badly won, or still bad if it is supposed 184 184 already won, but the announcement of an actual victory which shall be gloriously won! And is the place so unsuit- able—the holy place? Is it so inopportune for joy to think about the danger; is there perhaps no time for this— in the urge of danger there is surely less time! Alas, time comes and time goes, it takes little by little; it takes from a man one good whose loss he feels, and his pain is great; alas, he does not discover that it has already long since taken away from him the thing of greatest importance: the ability to form a resolution, and that he has become so familiar with this condition that there is no dismay over its loss, the last thing which might help him to gain new strength for a renewed resolution.
No, in earnest the saying means very much, indeed it means everything to the truly wedded pair. But it desires to be understood in earnest; it does not wish to visit the wedded couple as an unexpected guest, gracing the wed- ding day with his high presence; but it desires to make its home with them, to meet the test of the years, to answer for everything. It is thus it would be understood, and only thus can it be said: it must be said by a beginner, but only by one who begins with the good resolution. For he who became old in the faithful service of love, tested as gold is tested and found true— for the noble poet says of the maiden, a little in love, that her young soul was tested gold, but the years and the dangers are the test- hence the venerable figure who in the course of years won the rich and incorruptible beauty of faithfulness, loyal to his pledge as his own conscience required, faithful with a man's courage and with a woman's tenderness, with a man's intrepidity and with a woman's sympathy, with the sober reflection of the understanding in the inwardness of the heart, he will doubtless say with the mild, friendly, LOVE CONQUERS ALL 185 unassuming admonition of age: "My little children, love conquers all." And he moves youth, and almost deceives it, for when he says it, then it seems so easy, and it is so pleasant to hear him say it again. But if youth accepts the saying vain-mindedly, and would frivolously weave a bri- dal-wreath from it, then the experience that comes in life's struggle, intervenes between youth and venerable age, saying: "Step aside, learn respect for the venerable, but learn first what the difficulties are," and then he points to him with this word, "See, here, that love has conquered all!" Oh, how beautiful to be old, how illusory is not all eloquence beside such a witness! Has conquered all! This is the last word, and is indeed somewhat different from the first. Stay your course, O wanderer, pause to consider this difference; when you grasp it, you will doubtless be a man of resolve! Has conquered; so says experience en- gaged in the struggle of life, respectfully, about the vet- eran in the service, whom the marriage pact called to the good fight, whose life leaves no irregularity behind, since he became no man's debtor, because he loved much. In civil life, it is often the case that if anyone would travel to a foreign country, and he owes someone a debt, the creditor will refer the matter to the civil authority, and the journey will be prohibited. Oh, if the obligation of a sacred pledge is left unfulfilled, or but poorly fulfilled, is it not like an objection that makes the last journey the flight of a defaulter— but, no, how does it help to flee? The justice which watches over existence cannot be evaded.
So much for has conquered all. But our theme says: Love conquers all. And so it ought to sound in the begin- ning, and so it is rightly said by the resolving individual. But no one can be said to be resolved who is ignorant of i86 the danger, who excludes the danger from his thoughts, instead of including in his resolution a real conception of it, whose courage has therefore lost its victory, just as good deeds lose their reward, because the victory antici- pated it. Nor is he resolved who runs as if uncertainly, and who certainly misses the goal when he believes he has attained it. Nor is he resolved who, improvidently trusting in some mysterious power, dares to begin the journey without including in the resolution a real con- ception of God's assistance, of its necessity, and of its suf- ficiency. Nor is the resolution of which we speak, a com- mon resolution because in such a moment the two are of like mind, and both without a resolve.
Does life give evidence of only one kind of unhappy love in marriage, when death separates them and only the sorrowing one remains behind? Oh, death does not have this power to make unhappy; if nothing else sep- arates them, they are nevertheless united. Yet perhaps someone says, "I know very well what you mean and what the discourse hints at, but such things happen only to those who were never in love; whoever really loves, con- quers all." And it is impossible to deny that he who really loves, does as the word says; but does it follow that the speaker has even as much as a clear conception of what it means really to love, and about life, and about the others? A clear conception of the change which takes place in the lover when he is called upon really to conquer all, and when this all is something real. What a difference be- tween youthfully desiring to change the whole world and then discovering that it is one's self that is to be changed, and that the requirement is to do it with enthusiasm; or that the task is to preserve himself unchanged, alas, while everything changes! What a difference between the novel LOVE CONQUERS ALL 187 surprise of being the first inventor of everything, and then when trouble comes, the discovering that it is the monot- onous repetition of what has been experienced by others thousands and thousands of times! What a difference be- tween youthfully wishing to fight, and the explanation that he must suffer, and that it is this which he must do with enthusiasm! To desire victory; well, one may yield to a superior force but with the consciousness of being the stronger in comparison with the individual— and now the explanation that it is his own weakness he must fight against, and the requirement neither sympathizing nor regretful, but cruelly uncompromising: that one must be enthusiastic in the struggle. When then the great require- ment of the imaginary task does not give imaginary strength, but it is in reality the small and despised task that is to be done; when one does not defy a world which cheated one's expectation, but sits there abandoned by the great expectation concerning oneself, deprived of every evasion; when no broad prospect tempts one to dare the venture, but one sits inactive, despondent before the humble task of patience, which becomes even more hum- ble because time is wasted in dreaming youth's dream over again; aye, then there is opportunity to show that one really loves, or rather that the occasion has waited too long, that it should not have been permitted to become what it is; and had the beginning been made with a reso- lution, then one might have understood in time that things could come to such a pass.
Consider one who resembles a lover, an enthusiast. Does life show only a single case of half-finished labor, of interrupted plans, of a sorry and miserable outcome of a brilliant beginning? Is this the only case where the striv- ing individual was prevented by death from finishing the i88 work, from perfecting the plan, from attaining the goal? O Death, thou art powerless; dost thou presume to mock an enthusiast! No, the brief misfortune of the moment of death is soon overcome, and he truly dies with honor, aye, with the glorious accomplishment of his task who dares say with truth, "It was death that prevented me!" "But," says perhaps an enthusiastic youth, and thus every enthu- siastic youth, "I know what you refer to; you need not even name it. I will not be disturbed or delayed or made despondent— but such things do not happen to the really enthusiastic." And this is undeniable; but does it fol- low that the speaker even has a clear conception of what it is to be really enthusiastic? What he will say when it is no longer his task to spring forward like a lion, but to remain in the same place and, in spite of all exertion, not to be able to move; when the task is not to traverse the world in easy flight, but to endure in a dead calm in which the enthusiasm threatens to expire; when the task is to feel the weakness, and yet not let go the enthusiasm, to hope against hope; when it is the task to endure in the long toilsome drudgery which is inseparable from every enthusiastic enterprise; when abandoned, one must even