Nathan the Wise

"[...]in “Letters upon the Latest Literature,” known as his Literatur briefe. Dissertations upon fable, led also to Lessing’s “Fables,” produced in this period of his life. In 1760 Lessing was tempted by scarcity of income to serve as a Government secretary at Breslau. He held that office for five years, and then again returned to his old work in Berlin. During the five years in Breslau, Lessing had completed his play of “Minna von Barnhelm,” and the greatest of his critical works, “Laocoon,” a treatise on the “Boundary Lines of Painting and Poetry.” All that he might then have saved from his earnings went to the buying of books and to the relief of the burdens in the Camenz [...]".