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He arrived, he heard the praises of Miss Lou sung; she was a woman of elevated feeling, shrewd and brave; intransigent in research and in affirmation; a heroine in the manner of her childhood; it was the promise of a great life. He agreed to see her. One morning, at St. Peter's, she was presented to him and conquered him at once. He had forgotten, during his long months of meditation, the pleasure of being listened to and of talking. "The young Russian" (it is thus that he calls her in his letters) listened deliciously. She spoke little, but her calm look, her assured and gentle movements, her least words, left no doubt as to the quickness of her mind and to the presence of a soul. Very quickly, perhaps at first sight, Nietzsche liked her. "There's a soul," he said to Frulein von Meysenbug, "which has made a little body for itself with a breath."[3] Miss Salom did not let herself be thus enticed. Nevertheless, she felt the singular quality of the man who talked to her; she had long conversations with him, and the violence of his thought troubled her even in her sleep. The adventure—it was in fact a drama—commenced at once.
A few days after this first interview, Miss Salom and her mother left Rome. The two philosophers, Nietzsche and Re, went with her, both of them enthusiasts for the young girl. Nietzsche said to Re:
"There's an admirable woman, marry her." "No," answered Re; "I am a pessimist, and the idea of propagating human life is odious to me. Marry her yourself; she is the companion that you want...." Nietzsche dismissed this idea. Perhaps he said to his friend, as he had said to his sister: "I marry! Never, I would have to be a bar somewhere or other." Miss Salom's mother examined these two men who were so attentive to her child; Friedrich Nietzsche perplexed her; she preferred Paul Re.
The two friends and the two philosophers stopped at Lucerne. Friedrich Nietzsche wished to show his new friend that house at Triebschen where he had known Richard Wagner. Who was not then thinking of the master? He brought her as far as the poplars whose high foliage enclosed the gardens. He recounted to her the unforgettable days, the gaieties, the magnificent angers of the great man. Seated by the border of the lake, he talked in a low, contained voice, and turned his face a little away, for it was troubled by the memory of those joys of which he had deprived himself. Suddenly he grew silent, and the young girl, observing him, saw that he wept.
He confessed all his life to her; his childhood, the pastor's house, the mysterious grandeur of the father who had been so quickly taken away; the pious years, the first doubts, and the horror of this world without a God in which one must resolve to live; the discovery of Schopenhauer and of Wagner, the religious feeling which they had inspired in him and which had consoled him for the loss of his faith.
"Yes," said he (Miss Salom reports these words), "my adventures began in this manner. They are not ended. Where will they lead me? Whither shall I adventure again? Should I not come back to the faith? to some new belief?"
He added gravely: "In any case a return to the past is more likely than immobility."
Friedrich Nietzsche had not yet avowed his love; but he felt its force and no longer resisted. Only he feared to declare himself. He begged Paul Re to speak in his name, and withdrew.
On the 8th of May, settled for some days in Basle, he saw the Overbecks and confided in them with a strange exaltation. A woman has come into his life; it is a happiness for him; it will benefit his thought, which will henceforward be livelier, richer in its shades and emotion. Assuredly he would prefer not to marry Miss Lou, he disdains all fleshly ties; but perhaps he ought to give her his name for her protection against scandalmongers, and from this spiritual union would be born a spiritual son: the prophet Zarathustra. He is poor; this is a vexation, an obstacle. But could he not sell all his future work in a lump to some publisher for a considerable sum? He thought of doing so. These out-bursts did not fail to trouble the Overbecks, who augured ill of a liaison so bizarre and of an enthusiasm so ready.
Friedrich Nietzsche at last received Lou Salom's reply: she did not wish to marry. An unhappy love affair, which had just crossed her life, left her, she said, without strength to conceive and nourish a new affection. She therefore refused Nietzsche's offer. But she was able to sweeten the terms of this refusal: the only thing of which she could dispose, her friendship, her spiritual affection, she offered.
Friedrich Nietzsche returned at once to Lucerne. He saw Lou Salom and pressed her to give a more favourable reply; but the young girl repeated her refusal and her offer. She was to be present in July at the Bayreuth festivals, from which Nietzsche wished to abstain. She promised to rejoin him when they were over and to stay for some weeks at his side. She would then listen to his[Pg 245] teaching, she would confront the last thought of the master with that of the liberated disciple. Nietzsche had finally to accept these conditions, these limits which the young girl placed on their friendship. He advised her to read one of his books, Schopenhauer as Educator. He was always glad to acknowledge this work of his youth, this hymn to the bravery of a thinker and to voluntary solitude. "Read it," he said to her, "and you will be ready to hear me."
Friedrich Nietzsche left Basle and re-entered Germany, desirous of becoming reconciled to his country. He was, as we know, accustomed to such absorbing and unexpected desires. A Swiss, whom he had met at Messina, had praised the beauty of Grunewald, near Berlin; he wished to settle there, and wrote to Peter Gast, to whom, six weeks earlier, he had suggested as a summer residence Messina.
He went to visit this Grunewald, which pleased him well enough; but he saw, on the same occasion, Berlin and a few Berliners, who displeased him extremely. He perceived that his last books had not been read, and that his thought was ignored. He was only known as the friend of Paul Re, and no doubt his disciple. This he did not like. He went without delay to spend some weeks in Naumburg, where he dictated the manuscript of his coming book, La Gaya Scienza[4]. To his own people, it seems, to his mother and to his sister, he spoke discreetly of the new friend. His gaiety amazed them: they did not discern its cause. They did not know that their strange Friedrich had in his heart a sentiment, a hope of happiness, which Lou Salom had been far from discouraging.
The representation of Parsifal was fixed for the 27th July. Friedrich Nietzsche went to stay in a village[Pg 246] of the Thuringian forests, Tautenburg, not far from Bayreuth, where all his friends were to foregather: the Overbecks, the Seydlitzs, Gersdorff, Frulein von Meysenbug, Lou Salom, Lisbeth Nietzsche. He alone was absent from the rendezvous. At this moment a word from the master would perhaps have sufficed to bring him back; perhaps he waited for and hoped for this word. Frulein von Meysenbug wished to make an attempt at reconciliation: she dared to name Nietzsche in Wagner's presence. Wagner told her to be silent and went out of the room banging the door.
So Friedrich Nietzsche, who no doubt never knew of this overture, remained in those forests in which he had spent such hard days in 1876. How miserable he had then been and now how rich he was! He had repressed his doubts; a great thought animated his mind, a great affection his heart. Lou Salom had just dedicated to him, as a sign of spiritual sympathy, a beautiful poem.
