378a. Schelling to Johanna Frommann in Jena: Jena, ca. 20/21 May 1803 [*]
[Jena, ca. 20 or 21 May 1803]
I cannot depart from here, excellent Madam, without kissing your hand and taking my leave in writing. My heart shall remain eternally touched by your having made me godparent to your child, as it will also by your efforts on behalf of and affection for Caroline. I hope some day to see that child as a splendidly developed individual, and because I can do nothing more to that end for now, I intend to entreat heaven on behalf of its well-being. [1] I will take care of Caroline in every possible way and will seek to preserve her health as a precious, sacred possession.
Stay very well, as you both wish and certainly deserve.
Please commend me to your husband, and to the Hungarian knight please extend — no regards from me. [2]
Yours,
Schelling
Notes
[*] Source: Fuhrmans 1:276. — Date and addressee according to Fuhrmans 1:276fn111. Back.
[1] Schelling’s godchild, Allwina Frommann, seems to have frequented the Schelling household socially after Schellling himself and his second wife, Pauline Gotter, moved to Berlin in 1841. See Schelling im Spiegel seiner Zeitgenossen. Ergänzungsband. Melchior Meyr über Schelling, ed. Xavier Tilliette (Torino 1981), index s.v. “Frommann (Allwine).” Back.
[2] After a cordial acquaintance between Schelling and Podmanitzky, differences seem to have developed; see Caroline’s letters to Luise Wiedemann on 5 and 19 June 1803 (letters 379, 380).
Neither Schelling nor Caroline ever returned to Jena (J. E. Gailer, Neuer Orbis Pictus für die Jugend oder Schauplatz der Natur der Kunst und des Menschenlebens, 5th ed. [Reutlingen 1842], plate 319):
Translation © 2016 Doug Stott