plicates of them, and
those that we do find are doubly interesting on account of their
resemblances and dissimilarities. The offer I could make at present is
as follows: I have a very fine collection of medals, mostly in bronze,
from the middle of the fifteenth century up to our day. It was collected
principally in order to illustrate to amateurs and experts the progress
of plastic art, which is always reflected in the medals. Among these
medals I have some very beautiful and valuable duplicates, so that I
could probably get together a most instructive series of them to give
away. An art lover, who as yet possessed nothing of this description,
would in them get a good foundation for a collection, and a sufficient
inducement to continue. Further, such a collection, like a set of Greek
and Roman coins, affords opportunity for very interesting observations;
indeed it completes the conception furnished us by the coins, and brings
it up to present times. I may also say that the bull would have to be
very perfect, if I am not to have a balance to my credit in the bargain
above indicated.

Something very pleasing has occurred to me in the last few days; it was
the presentation to me, from the Empress of Austria, of a beautiful gold
snuff-box with a diamond wreath, and the name Louisa engraved in full.
I know you too will take an interest in this event, as it is not often
that we meet with such unexpected and refreshing good fortune.

* * * * *

LETTER 665

Weimar, December 3, 1812.

Your letter telling me of the great misfortune which has befallen your
house,[35] depressed me very much, indeed quite bowed me down; for it
reached me in the midst of very serious reflections on life, and it is
owing to you alone that I have been able to pluck up courage. You have
proved yourself to be pure refined gold when tried by the black
touchstone of death. How beautiful is a character when it is so compact
of mind and soul, and how beautiful must be a talent that rests on such
a foundation.

Of the deed or the misdeed itself, I know of nothing to say. When the
_toedium vitoe_ lays hold on a man, he is to be pitied, not to be
blamed. That all the symptoms of this strange, natural, as well as
unnatural, disease have raged within me--of that _Werther_ leaves no one
in doubt. I know right well what amount of resolution and effort it cost
me then to escape from the waves of death, with what difficulty I sav