Cornelia had been made the sole victim of her father's pedagogic discipline which had been partially alleviated when it was shared with her brother, and she had come to regard her over-anxious parent with a hardness which Goethe describes as having something dreadful (_fuerchterliches_) in it.

The arrival of Goethe could not improve the existing relations in the household.

As in the time before his going to Leipzig, Cornelia drew to him as the only member of the family who sympathetically understood her, and she remained as obdurate as ever in her sullen attitude towards her father.

Between Goethe himself and his father their former estrangement continued, and we are given to understand that during the year and a half he now spent under the paternal roof there was no cordial understanding regarding the son's pursuits and his future career.[48] Dissatisfied with his son, as from his point of view he had every reason to be, Herr Goethe nevertheless cherished a secret pride in his genius.

With a paternal pride, which is even touching in the circumstances, he carefully framed the drawings executed by his son, and collected and stitched together his letters from Leipzig.
[Footnote 48: Referring to the time he now spent in Frankfort, Goethe says in _Dichtung und Wahrheit_: "Mit dem Vater selbst konnte sich kein angenehmes Verhaeltniss knuepfen."] As in the case of his Leipzig period, Goethe's reminiscent account of his present sojourn in Frankfort gives a somewhat different impression of his main interests from that conveyed by his contemporary letters.
If we accept the testimony of his Autobiography, his attention was mainly turned to religion and to chemical and cabbalistical studies; from his correspondence, on the other hand, it would appear that his thoughts at least occasionally ran on subjects that had little to do with his spiritual welfare.