We have seen Faust grow, fragment by fragment, before our eyes. So long as there existed only a First Part, two views arose. The one maintained that it was in this incompleteness what it should be, a wonderful Torso; that this magnificent poem only as a fragment could reflect the World in order to indicate that Man is able to grasp the Universe in a one-sided, incomplete manner only; that as the poet touched the mysteries of the World, but did not give a complete solution, so the Enigmatical, the Prophetic, is that which is truly poetic, infinitely charming, really mystic. This view was considered as genial, particularly because it left to every one free play—in fact, invited every one in his imagination to fill up the outlines; for it could not be defended from a philosophic nor from an artistic standpoint. Knowing seeks not half knowledge, Art aims not at halfness of execution. If Dante in his Divine Comedy had neglected any element of nature or of history, if he had not wrought out all with equal perseverance in corresponding proportion, could it be said that his poem would stand higher without this completion? Or conversely, shall we praise it as a merit that Novalis’ Ofterdingen has remained mere fragments and sketches? This would be the same as if we should admire the Cologne Cathedral less than we now do were it complete. Another view supposed that a Second Part was indeed possible, and the question arose, in what manner shall this possibility be thought? Here again two opposite opinions showed themselves. According to the one, Faust must perish; reconciliation with God would be unbecoming to the northern nature of this Titanic character; the teeth-gnashing defiance, the insatiate restlessness, the crushing doubt, the heaven-deriding fierceness, must send him to hell. In this the spirit of the old legend was expressed as it was at the time of the Reformation—for in the middle ages the redemption of the sinner through the intercession of the Virgin Mary first appeared—as the _Volksbuch_ simply but strikingly narrates it, as the Englishman, Marlowe, has dramatized it so excellently in his Doctor Faustus. But all this was not applicable to the Faust of Goethe, for the poet had in his mind an alteration of the old legend, and so another party maintained that Faust must be saved. This party also asserted that the indication of the poet in the Prologue led to the same conclusion; that God could not lose his bet against the Devil; that the destruction of Faust would be blasphemous irony on Divine Providence. This assertion of the necessity of Faust’s reconciliation found much favor in a time, like ours, which has renounced not indeed the consciousness and recognition of Evil, but the belief in a separate extra-human Devil; which purposes not merely the punishment but also the improvement of the criminal; which seeks even to annul the death penalty, and transfer the atonement for murder