Herder, who had studied Rousseau closely, had appropriated all that was most vital in his teaching, and had applied his doctrines, not only in the criticism of life, but in his judgments of literature; and now he made Goethe a sharer of the intellectual wealth he had himself acquired. Goethe had already been a reader of Rousseau, but from this time, as we know from the characteristics of his early writings, his mind was deeply penetrated by the spirit of “La Nouvelle Héloïse” and “Émile.” Of still greater importance was the help he obtained in the comprehension of the full splendour of Shakespeare’s genius. Of all poets, Shakespeare, as Herder taught, was the one in whom nature had found her truest interpreter; and, returning in earnest to the study of his dramas, Goethe was impressed, as he had never been impressed before, by their power and beauty, and felt more and more strongly that it would be impossible for him ever to exhaust their meaning. Herder had also much to say about Swift, Richardson, Fielding, Sterne, and Goldsmith; and to a circle of friends, of whom Goethe was one, he read “The Vicar of Wakefield,” the humour, pathos, and idyllic charm of which filled them with delight. Through Herder’s influence Goethe began the serious study of Homer; and even from “Hamlet” he did not receive a deeper inspiration than from the “Iliad” and the “Odyssey.” Macpherson’s rendering of Ossian had touched the imagination of Herder, and he communicated his enthusiasm for it to Goethe, who perceived in “Fingal” and “The Songs of Selma” many a trace of a great and entrancing primitive literature. From Herder, too, who was familiar with Percy’s “Reliques,” Goethe first learned that some of the finest manifestations of the poetic impulse are to be found in popular songs and ballads. This revelation gave him exquisite pleasure, and it led to his collecting folk-songs, the directness, freshness, and simplicity of which, but with a new and subtle delicacy, were reproduced in his own lyrics.