ich Schlegel's philosophy of life was based upon the theory of
supremacy of the artist, the potency of poetry, with its incidental
corollaries of disregard for the Kantian ideal of Duty, and aversion
to all Puritanism and Protestantism. "There is no great world but that
of artists," he declared in the _Athenaeum_; "artists form a higher
caste; they should separate themselves, even in their way of living,
from other people." Poetry and philosophy formed in his thought an
inseparable unit, forever joined, "though seldom together--like Castor
and Pollux." His interest is in "Humanity," that is to say, a superior
type of the species, with a corresponding contempt for "commonness,"
especially for the common man as a mere machine of "duty." On
performances he set no great store: "Those countenances are most
interesting to me in which Nature seems to have indicated a great
design without taking time to carry it out."

August Wilhelm von Schlegel (1767-1845), more simply known as
"Wilhelm," was the more balanced, dignified, and serene nature, and
possessed in a far higher degree than Friedrich the art of steering
his course smoothly through life. Of very great significance in his
training were his university years at Goettingen, and his acquaintance
there with the poet Buerger, that early apostle of revolt from a formal
literature, whose own life had become more and more discredited and
was destined to go out in wretchedness and ignominy; the latter's
fecundating activities had never been allowed full scope, but
something of his spirit of adventure into new literary fields was
doubtless caught by the younger man. Buerger's attempts at naturalizing
the sonnet, for instance, are interesting in view of the fact that
Wilhelm Schlegel became the actual creator of this literary form among
the Germans. Schlegel's own pursuits as a student were prevailingly
in the field of Hellenism, in which his acquisitions were astounding;
his influence was especially potent in giving a philological character
to much of the work of the Romanticists. In Goettingen he became
acquainted with one of the most gifted women which Germany has ever
produced, Caroline, the daughter of the Goettingen professor Michaelis,
at the time a young widow in the home of her father, and destined to
become not only his wife, but the Muse of much of his most important
work. This office she performed until the time of their unfortunate
separation.

After finishing his un