Part IV Jean Christophe
It is really astonishing to note how the epic and the philosophical are here compressed within the same work. In respect of form we have so beautiful a whole. Reaching outwards, the work touches the infinite, touches both art and life. In fact we may say of this romance, that it is in no respects limited except in point of æsthetic form, and that where it transcends form it comes into contact with the infinite. I might compare it to a beautiful island lying between two seas.
Schiller to Goethe concerning Wilhelm Meister.
October 19, 1796.