INFLUENCE OF MERCK AND THE DARMSTADT CIRCLE 1772 Specially associated with _Goetz von Berlichingen_, but associated also with Goethe's general development at this time, was another of those mentors whose counsel and stimulus were necessary to him at all periods of his life.

This was Johann Heinrich Merck, the son of an apothecary in Darmstadt and now Paymaster of the Forces there.

Of Merck Goethe says that "he had the greatest influence on my life," and he makes him the subject of one of his elaborate character sketches in his Autobiography.

To men of original nature, however discordant with his own, Goethe was always attracted.

We have seen him in more or less close relations with Behrisch, Jung Stilling, and Herder, from all of whom he was divided by dissonances which made a perfect mutual understanding impossible.