Excerpt from Goethe's Torquato Tasso: Edited for the Use of Students In the first place, it will be noticed, the poet cautions us against supposing that the work was written in the interest Of some abstract ethical doctrine; he declares that he could hardly tell what his idea was. This does not' mean that the play is entirely devoid of ethical significance, but only that the didactic or philosophical element in it is incidental, and is not the center about which and for the sake of which the whole was built up. The poet's admonition being duly borne in mind, the ethical import of the drama will still be, within limits, a proper object Of interest. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.