Nathan the Wise | Page 4

was born on the 22nd of January, 1729,
eldest of ten sons of a pious and learned minister of Camenz in the
Oberlausitz, who had two daughters also. As a child Lessing delighted
in books, and had knowledge beyond his years when he went to school,
in Meissen, at the age of twelve. As a school-boy he read much Greek
and Latin that formed no part of the school course; read also the
German poets of his time, wrote a "History of Ancient Mathematics,"
and began a poem of his own on the "Plurality of Worlds."
In 1746, at the age of seventeen, Lessing was sent to the University of
Leipsic. There he studied with energy, and was attracted strongly by the
theatre. His artistic interest in the drama caused him to be put on the
free list of the theatre, in exchange for some translations of French
pieces. Then he produced, also for the Leipsic stage, many slight pieces
of his own, and he had serious thought of turning actor, which excited
alarm in the parsonage at Camenz and caused his recall home in
January, 1747. It was found, however, that although he could not be
trained to follow his father's profession, he had been studying to such
good purpose, and developing, in purity of life, such worth of character,
that after Easter he was sent back to Leipsic, with leave to transfer his
studies from theology to medicine.
Lessing went back, continued to work hard, but still also gave all his
leisure to the players. For the debts of some of them he had
incautiously become surety, and when the company removed to Vienna,
there were left behind them unpaid debts for which young Lessing was
answerable. The creditors pressed, and Lessing moved to Wittenberg;
but he fell ill, and was made so miserable by pressure for impossible
payments, that he resolved to break off his studies, go to Berlin, and
begin earning by his pen, his first earnings being for the satisfaction of
these Leipsic creditors. Lessing went first to Berlin to seek his fortune
in December, 1748, when he was nineteen years old. He was without
money, without decent clothes, and with but one friend in Berlin,
Mylius, who was then editing a small journal, the Rudigersche Zeitung.
Much correspondence brought him a little money from the
overburdened home, and with addition of some small earning from
translations, this enabled him to obtain a suit of clothes, in which he
might venture to present himself to strangers in his search for fortune.
A new venture with Mylius, a quarterly record of the history of the

theatre, was not successful; but having charge committed to him of the
library part of Mylius's journal, Lessing had an opportunity of showing
his great critical power. Gottsched, at Leipsic, was then leader of the
war on behalf of classicism in German literature. Lessing fought on the
National side, and opposed also the beginning of a new French
influence then rising, which was to have its chief apostle in Rousseau.
In 1752 Lessing went back to Wittenberg for another year, that he
might complete the work for graduation; graduated in December of that
year as Master of Arts, and then returned to his work in Berlin. He
worked industriously, not only as critic, but also in translation from the
classics, from French, English, and Italian; and he was soon able to
send help towards providing education for the youngest of the
household of twelve children in the Camenz parsonage. In 1753 he
gave himself eight weeks of withdrawal from other work to write, in a
garden-house at Potsdam, his tragedy of "Miss Sarah Sampson." It was
produced with great success at Frankfort on the Oder, and Lessing's
ruling passion for dramatic literature became the stronger for this first
experience of what he might be able to achieve. In literature, Frederick
the Great cared only for what was French. A National drama, therefore,
could not live in Berlin. In the autumn of 1755, Lessing suddenly
moved to Leipsic, where an actor whom he had befriended was
establishing a theatre. Here he was again abandoning himself to the
cause of a National drama, when a rich young gentleman of Leipsic
invited his companionship upon a tour in Europe. Terms were settled,
and they set out together. They saw much of Holland, and were passing
into England, when King Frederick's attack on Saxony recalled the
young Leipsiger, and caused breach of what had been a contract for a
three years' travelling companionship. In May, 1758, Lessing, aged
twenty-nine, returned to his old work in Berlin. Again he translated,
edited, criticised. He wrote a tragedy, "Philotas," and began a "Faust."
He especially employed his critical power in "Letters upon the Latest
Literature," known as his Literatur