Transcriber's Note:
1. Page scan source: http://www.archive.org/details/lostmanuscripta01freygoog
2. The Greek symbol for "pi" is π.
"A noble human life does not end on earthwith death. It continues in the minds andthe deeds of friends, as well as in the thoughtsand the activity of the nation."
Gustav Freytag has expressed the central idea of his novel The LostManuscript in the motto which he has written for the American edition:
"A noble human life does not end on earth with death. It continues inthe minds and the deeds of friends, as well as in the thoughts and theactivity of the nation."
This idea of the continuity and preservation of soul-life permeates thewhole work. It meets us at every hand. We observe the professor in hisstudy, ever eager to fathom the thoughts of the great thinkers of thepast and imbuing his students with their lofty spirit. We sympathizewith the heroine of this novel, the strong, pious Saxon maiden, in herreligious and intellectual development; we behold her soul enlargingunder the influence of unusual and trying situations; we watch hermentally growing amid the new ideas crowding in upon her. We enjoy thedroll characterizations of the half-educated, of Mrs. Rollmaus and theservants, in whose minds the mysteries of soul-life appear in the shapeof superstitious notions. And we see, again, the consequences ofwrong-doing, of errors, and of mistakes continuing like a heavy curse,depressing the mind and hindering its freedom. And this last provokes awholesome reaction and is finally conquered by unshirking courage inhonest spiritual combat.
Illustrations of psychical laws showing the connections and continuityof the threads in the warp and woof of human soul-life, are foundindeed in all the works of Gustav Freytag. The great novelistanticipated the results that have of late been established by theexperiments of modern psychology. He says in his AutobiographicalReminiscences:
"What a man's own life accomplishes in the formation of his character,and the extent to which it fully develops his native capacities, weobserve and estimate even in the best cases only with imperfectknowledge. But still more difficult is it to determine and comprehendwhat the living have acquired in the way of advancement and hindrancefrom their parents and ancestors; for the threads are not alwaysvisible that bind the existence of the present to the souls ofgenerations past; and even where they are discernible, their power andinfluence are scarcely to be calculated. Only we notice that the forcewith which they operate is not e