[Under this title Schiller arranged that more dignified and philosophical portion of the small Poems published as Epigrams in the Musen Almanach; which rather sought to point a general thought, than a personal satire.—Many of these, however, are either wholly without interest for the English reader, or express in almost untranslatable laconism what, in far more poetical shapes, Schiller has elsewhere repeated and developed. We, therefore, content ourselves with such a selection as appears to us best suited to convey a fair notion of the object and spirit of the class.—Translator]
What the God taught—what has befriended all
Life's ways, I place upon the Votive Wall.
(ZWEIERLEI WIRKUNGSARTEN)
The Good's the Flower to Earth already given—
The Beautiful, on Earth sows flowers from Heaven!
If thou hast something, bring thy goods—a fair return be thine;
If thou art something, bring thy soul and interchange with mine.
To know thyself—in others self discern;
Wouldst thou know others? Read thyself—and learn!
Yes, in the moral world, as ours, we see
Divided grades—a Soul's Nobility;
By deeds their titles Commoners create—
The loftier order are by birthright great.[5]
Spreads Life's true mystery round us evermore,
Seen by no eye, it lies all eyes before.
Wouldst thou the loftiest height of Wisdom gain?
On to the rashness, Prudence would disdain;
The purblind see but the receding shore,
Not that to which the bold wave wafts thee o'er!
Truth seek we both—Thou, in the life without thee and around;
I in the Heart within—by both can Truth alike be found;
The healthy eye can through the world the great Creator track—
The healthy heart is but the glass which gives creation back.
All that thou dost be right—to that alone confine thy view,
And halt within the certain rule—the All that's right to do!
True zeal the what already is would sound and perfect see;
False zeal would sound and perfect make the something that's to be!
Of the Nebulæ and planets do not babble so to me;
What! is Nature only mighty inasmuch as you can see?
Inasmuch as you can measure her immeasurable ways,
As she renders world on world, sun and system to your gaze?
Though through space your object be the Sublimest to embrace,
Never the Sublime abideth—where you vainly search—in space!
How the best state to know?—It is found out,
Like the best women—that least talked about.
What thy religion? Those thou namest—none!
None! Why?—Because I have religion!
Dear is my friend—yet from my foe, as from my friend, comes good;
My friend shows what I can do, and my foe shows what I should.
Dwell, Light, beside the changeless God—God spoke and Light began;
Come, thou, the ever-changing one—come, Color, down to Man!
Woman—to judge man rightly—do not scan
Each separate act;—pass judgment on the Man!
Intellect can repeat what's been fulfill'd,
And, aping Nature, as she buildeth—build;
O'er Nature's base can haughty Reason dare
To pile its lofty castle—in the air.
But only thine, O Genius, is the charge,
In Nature's kingdom Nature to enlarge!
Good out of good—that art is known to all—
But Genius from the bad the good can call;
Then, Mimic, not from leading-strings escaped,
Work'st but the matter that's already shaped
The already-shaped a nobler hand awaits—
All matter asks a Spirit that creates!
(FREE TRANSLATION)
The calm correctness, where no fault we see,
Attests Art's loftiest or its least degree;
Alike the smoothness of the surface shows
The Pool's dull stagner—the great Sea's repose.
The herd of scribes, by what they tell us,
Show all in which their wits excel us;
But the True Master we behold,
In what his art leaves—just untold.
O'er Ocean, with a thousand masts, sails forth the stripling bold—
One boat, hard rescued from the deep, draws into port the old!
"A little earth from out the Earth-and I
The Earth will move:" so spake the Sage divine.
Out of myself one little moment—try
Myself to take:—succeed, and I am thine!
What to cement the lofty and the mean
Does Nature?—What?—Place vanity between?
[This is an Epigram on Lavater's work, called "Pontius Pilatus, oder der
Mensch in Allen Gestalten," etc.—TRANSLATOR.]
"How poor a thing is man!" Alas, 'tis true
I'd half forgot it—when I chanced on you!
[Also on Lavater, and alluding to the "Jesus Messias, oder die Evangelien und Apostelgeschichte in Gesängen."—TRANSLATOR.]
How God compassionates Mankind, thy muse, my friend, rehearses—
Compassion for the sins of Man!—What comfort for thy verses!
To some she is the Goddess great, to some the milch-cow of the field;
Their care is but to calculate—what butter she will yield.
How many starvelings one rich man can nourish!
When monarchs build, the rubbish-carriers flourish.
Within a vale, each infant year,
When earliest larks first carol free,
To humble shepherds doth appear
A wondrous maiden, fair to see.
Not born within that lowly place—
From whence she wander'd, none could tell;
Her parting footsteps left no trace,
When once the maiden bade farewell.
And blessèd was her presence there—
Each heart, expanding, grew more gay;
Yet something loftier still than fair
Kept man's familiar looks away.
From fairy gardens, known to none,
She brought mysterious fruits and flowers—
The things of some serener sun—
Some Nature more benign than ours.
With each, her gifts the maiden shared—
To some the fruits, the flowers to some;
Alike the young, the aged fared;
Each bore a blessing back to home.
Though every guest was welcome there,
Yet some the maiden held more dear,
And cull'd her rarest sweets whene'er
She saw two hearts that loved draw near.
A TALE
Before his lion-court,
To see the gruesome sport,
Sate the king;
Beside him group'd his princely peers;
And dames aloft, in circling tiers,
Wreath'd round their blooming ring.
King Francis, where he sate,
Raised a finger—yawn'd the gate,
And, slow from his repose,
A LION goes!
Dumbly he gazed around
The foe-encircled ground;
And, with a lazy gape,
He stretch'd his lordly shape,
And shook his careless mane,
And—laid him down again!
A finger raised the king—
And nimbly have the guard
A second gate unbarr'd;
Forth, with a rushing spring,
A TIGER sprung!
Wildly the wild one yell'd
When the lion he beheld;
And, bristling at the look,
With his tail his sides he strook,
And roll'd his rabid tongue;
In many a wary ring
He swept round the forest king,
With a fell and rattling sound;—
And laid him on the ground,
Grommelling!
The king raised his finger; then
Leap'd two LEOPARDS from the den
With a bound;
And boldly bounded they
Where the crouching tiger lay
Terrible!
And he gripped the beasts in his deadly hold;
In the grim embrace they grappled and roll'd;
Rose the lion with a roar!
And stood the strife before;
And the wild-cats on the spot,
From the blood-thirst, wroth and hot,
Halted still!
Now from the balcony above,
A snowy hand let fall a glove:—
Midway between the beasts of prey,
Lion and tiger; there it lay,
The winsome lady's glove!
Fair Cunigonde said, with a lip of scorn,
To the knight DELORGES—"If the love you have sworn
Were as gallant and leal as you boast it to be,
I might ask you to bring back that glove to me!"
The knight left the place where the lady sate;
The knight he has pass'd thro' the fearful gate;
The lion and tiger he stoop'd above,
And his fingers have closed on the lady's glove!
All shuddering and stunn'd, they beheld him there—
The noble knights and the ladies fair;
But loud was the joy and the praise, the while
He bore back the glove with his tranquil smile!
With a tender look in her softening eyes,
That promised reward to his warmest sighs,
Fair Cunigonde rose her knight to grace;
He toss'd the glove in the lady's face!
"Nay, spare me the guerdon, at least," quoth he;
And he left forever that fair ladye!
THE DIVER (1797)
A BALLAD
[The original of the story on which Schiller has founded this ballad, matchless perhaps for the power and grandeur of its descriptions, is to be found in Kircher. According to the true principles of imitative art, Schiller has preserved all that is striking in the legend, and ennobled all that is common-place. The name of the Diver was Nicholas, surnamed the Fish. The King appears, according to Hoffmeister's probable conjectures, to have been either Frederic I. or Frederic II., of Sicily. Date from 1295 to 1377.]
"Oh, where is the knight or the squire so bold,
As to dive to the howling charybdis below?—
I cast in the whirlpool a goblet of gold,
And o'er it already the dark waters flow;
Whoever to me may the goblet bring,
Shall have for his guerdon that gift of his king."
He spoke, and the cup from the terrible steep,
That, rugged and hoary, hung over the verge
Of the endless and measureless world of the deep,
Swirl'd into the maëlstrom that madden'd the surge.
"And where is the diver so stout to go—
I ask ye again—to the deep below?"
And the knights and the squires that gather'd around,
Stood silent—and fix'd on the ocean their eyes;
They look'd on the dismal and savage Profound,
And the peril chill'd back every thought of the prize.
And thrice spoke the monarch—"The cup to win,
Is there never a wight who will venture in?"
And all as before heard in silence the king—
Till a youth with an aspect unfearing but gentle,
'Mid the tremulous squires—stept out from the ring,
Unbuckling his girdle, and doffing his mantle;
And the murmuring crowd as they parted asunder,
On the stately boy cast their looks of wonder.
As he strode to the marge of the summit, and gave
One glance on the gulf of that merciless main;
Lo! the wave that forever devours the wave
Casts roaringly up the charybdis again;
And, as with the swell of the far thunder-boom,
Rushes foamingly forth from the heart of the gloom.
And it bubbles and seethes, and it hisses and roars,[6]
As when fire is with water commix'd and contending,
And the spray of its wrath to the welkin up-soars,
And flood upon flood hurries on, never-ending.
And it never will rest, nor from travail be free,
Like a sea that is laboring the birth of a sea.
Yet, at length, comes a lull O'er the mighty commotion,
As the whirlpool sucks into black smoothness the swell
Of the white-foaming breakers—and cleaves thro' the ocean
A path that seems winding in darkness to hell.
Round and round whirl'd the waves-deeper and deeper
still driven,
Like a gorge thro' the mountainous main thunder-riven!
The youth gave his trust to his Maker! Before
That path through the riven abyss closed again—
Hark! a shriek from the crowd rang aloft from the shore,
And, behold! he is whirl'd in the grasp of the main!
And o'er him the breakers mysteriously roll'd,
And the giant-mouth closed on the swimmer so bold.
O'er the surface grim silence lay dark; but the crowd
Heard the wail from the deep murmur hollow and fell;
They hearken and shudder, lamenting aloud—
"Gallant youth-noble heart-fare-thee-well, fare-thee-well!"
More hollow and more wails the deep on the ear—
More dread and more dread grows suspense in its fear.
If thou should'st in those waters thy diadem fling,
And cry, "Who may find it shall win it and wear;"
God wot, though the prize were the crown of a king—
A crown at such hazard were valued too dear.
For never shall lips of the living reveal
What the deeps that howl yonder in terror conceal.
Oh, many a bark, to that breast grappled fast,
Has gone down to the fearful and fathomless grave;
Again, crash'd together the keel and the mast,
To be seen, toss'd aloft in the glee of the wave.
Like the growth of a storm, ever louder and clearer,
Grows the roar of the gulf rising nearer and nearer.
And it bubbles and seethes, and it hisses and roars,
As when fire is with water commix'd and contending;
And the spray of its wrath to the welkin up-soars,
And flood upon flood hurries on, never ending;
And as with the swell of the far thunder-boom
Rushes roaringly forth from the heart of the gloom.
And, lo! from the heart of that far-floating gloom,[7]
What gleams on the darkness so swanlike and white?
Lo! an arm and a neck, glancing up from the tomb!—
They battle—the Man's with the Element's might.
It is he—it is he! In his left hand, behold!
As a sign!—as a joy!—shines the goblet of gold!
And he breathed deep, and he breathed long,
And he greeted the heavenly delight of the day.
They gaze on each other—they shout, as they throng—
"He lives—lo the ocean has render'd its prey!
And safe from the whirlpool and free from the grave,
Comes back to the daylight the soul of the brave!"
And he comes, with the crowd in their clamor and glee,
And the goblet his daring has won from the water,
He lifts to the king as he sinks on his knee;—
And the king from her maidens has beckon'd his daughter—
She pours to the boy the bright wine which they bring,
And thus spake the Diver—"Long life to the king!
"Happy they whom the rose-hues of daylight rejoice,
The air and the sky that to mortals are given!
May the horror below never more find a voice—
Nor Man stretch too far the wide mercy of Heaven!
Never more—never more may he lift from the sight
The veil which is woven with Terror and Night!
"Quick-brightening like lightning—it tore me along,
Down, down, till the gush of a torrent, at play
In the rocks of its wilderness, caught me—and strong
As the wings of an eagle, it whirl'd me away.
Vain, vain was my struggle—the circle had won me,
Round and round in its dance, the wild element spun me.
"And I call'd on my God, and my God heard my prayer
In the strength of my need, in the gasp of my breath—
And show'd me a crag that rose up from the lair,
And I clung to it, nimbly—and baffled the death!
And, safe in the perils around me, behold
On the spikes of the coral the goblet of gold!
"Below, at the foot of the precipice drear,
Spread the gloomy, and purple, and pathless Obscure!
A silence of Horror that slept on the ear,
That the eye more appall'd might the Horror endure!
Salamander—snake—dragon—vast reptiles that dwell
In the deep-coil'd about the grim jaws of their hell.
"Dark-crawl'd—glided dark the unspeakable swarms,
Clump'd together in masses, misshapen and vast—
Here clung and here bristled the fashionless forms—
Here the dark-moving bulk of the Hammer-fish pass'd—
And with teeth grinning white, and a menacing motion,
Went the terrible Shark—the Hyena of Ocean.
"There I hung, and the awe gather'd icily o'er me,
So far from the earth, where man's help there was none!
The One Human Thing, with the Goblins before me—
Alone—in a loneness so ghastly—ALONE!
Fathom-deep from man's eye in the speechless profound,
With the death of the Main and the Monsters around.
"Methought, as I gazed through the darkness, that now
IT[8] saw—the dread hundred-limbed creature-its prey!
And darted—O God! from the far flaming-bough
Of the coral, I swept on the horrible way;
And it seized me, the wave with its wrath and its roar,
It seized me to save—King, the danger is o'er!"
On the youth gazed the monarch, and marvel'd; quoth he,
"Bold Diver, the goblet I promised is thine,
And this ring will I give, a fresh guerdon to thee,
Never jewels more precious shone up from the mine,
If thou'lt bring me fresh tidings, and venture again
To tell what lies hid in the innermost main?"
Then outspake the daughter in tender emotion
"Ah! father, my father, what more can there rest?
Enough of this sport with the pitiless ocean—
He has served thee as none would, thyself has confest.
If nothing can slake thy wild thirst of desire,
Let thy knights put to shame the exploit of the squire!"
The king seized the goblet—he swung it on high,
And whirling, it fell in the roar of the tide:
"But bring back that goblet again to my eye,
And I'll hold thee the dearest that rides by my side;
And thine arms shall embrace, as thy bride, I decree,
The maiden whose pity now pleadeth for thee."
In his heart, as he listen'd, there leapt the wild joy—
And the hope and the love through his eyes spoke in fire,
On that bloom, on that blush, gazed delighted the boy;
The maiden-she faints at the feet of her sire!
Here the guerdon divine, there the danger beneath;
He resolves! To the strife with the life and the death!
They hear the loud surges sweep back in their swell,
Their coming the thunder-sound heralds along!
Fond eyes yet are tracking the spot where he fell:
They come, the wild waters, in tumult and throng,
Roaring up to the cliff—roaring back, as before,
But no wave ever brings the lost youth to the shore.
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