After spending three or four hours delightfully, we drove home in silence by the gleaming, murmuring river, and beneath the light of the silent stars. On a subsequent visit, Retzsch showed me many more of these delicious _phantasie_, or fancies, as he termed them,--or more truly, little pieces of moral and lyrical poetry, thrown into palpable form, speaking in the universal language of the eye to the universal heart of man. I remember, in particular, one of striking and even of appalling interest. The Genius of Humanity and the Spirit of Evil are playing at chess for the souls of men: the Genius of Humanity has lost to his infernal adversary some of his principal pieces,--love, humility, innocence, and lastly, peace of mind;--but he still retains faith, truth, and fortitude; and is sitting in a contemplative attitude, considering his next move; his adversary, who opposes him with pride, avarice, irreligion, luxury, and a host of evil passions, looks at him with a _Mephistophiles'_ expression, anticipating his devilish triumph. The pawns on the one side are prayers--on the other, doubts. A little behind stands the Angel of conscience as arbitrator. In this most exquisite allegory, so beautifully, so clearly conveyed to the heart, there lurked a deeper moral than in many a sermon. There was another beautiful little allegory of Love in the character of a Picklock, opening, or trying to open, a variety of albums, lettered, the "Human Heart, No. 1; Human Heart, No. 2;" while Philosophy lights him with her lanthorn. There were besides many other designs of equal poetry, beauty, and moral interest--I think, a whole portfolio full of them. I endeavoured to persuade Retzsch that he could not do better than publish some of these exquisite _Fancies_, and when I left him he entertained the idea of doing so at some future period. To adopt his own language, the Genius of Art could not present to the Genius of Humanity a more delightful and a more profitable gift.[39] * * * * * The following list of German painters comprehends those _only_ whose works I had an opportunity of considering, and who appeared to me to possess decided merit. I might easily have extended this catalogue to thrice its length, had I included all those whose names were given to me as being distinguished and celebrated among their own countrymen. From Munich alone I brought a list of two hundred artists, and from other parts of Germany nearly as many more. But in confining myself to those whose productions I _saw_, I adhere to a principle which, after all, seems to be the best--viz. never to speak but of what we _know_; and then only of the individual impression: it is necessary to know so many things before we can give, with confidence, an opinion about any one thing!