1851
“That Line about Goldschmidt Was Fateful”
Kierkegaard knew well that withPractice in Christianityhe had gone too far,
and he imagined that Mynster would perhaps reprimand him with a “little
dig in a sermon.” He was mistaken about this. The bishop chose another
tactic. In mid-March 1851 Mynster entered the debate on civil marriage
with a fifty-page essay titledFurther Contributions to the Negotiations concerning
Ecclesiastical Relations in Denmark, a copy of which he sent to Kierkegaard,
whom he had cited a couple of times. Kierkegaard immediately read it and
saw himself mentioned as “the gifted author.” And in a way that was fine.
What was not so fine, however, was that a few lines earlier Mynster had
alluded to Goldschmidt. True, Mynster did it indirectly and as an aside, but
he did allude to Goldschmidt when he wrote, “Among the more fortunate
appearances[Danish:Fremtoninger]—we adopt this word from one our most
talented authors—that has manifested itself during these negotiations, et
cetera....”This word for “appearance” was a new word in the Danish
language and Mynster therefore gave credit to Goldschmidt, who had
coined it, not by mentioning his name but simply by referring to him as
“one of our most talented authors.”
Merely a bagatelle, perhaps, but trifles are not always trifling. And
Goldschmidt was quite definitely not just anybody: He had been the editor
ofThe Corsair.After selling the journal in October 1846 he had set out on
a sort of delayed grand tour, and since his return he had served as editor
and publisher of the periodicalNorth and South, which he founded in De-
cember 1847. With these activities Goldschmidt had tried to put the sins of
his past behind him, but when Kierkegaard read the article in the first issue
ofNorth and South, where Goldschmidt made a programmatic declaration
of the new journal’s intentions, he thought its author gave the “impression
of a confirmand” who knew his “lessons by heart,” but who, beyond this,
hadn’t the faintest idea of what he was doing: “What an unbelievable differ-
ence between the cheeky Goldschmidt who took shelter behind a wall of
privileged contemptibleness and the awkward, self-conscious little Gold-
schmidt. It is like when you see someone, who started out as the leading668