The Poems of Schiller - Third period Part 22

Here the arch Cupid slyly seems to glide By with bloom-laden basket. There the shapes Of genii press with purpling feet the grapes, Here springs the wild Bacchante to the dance, And there she sleeps [while that voluptuous trance Eyes the sly faun with never-sated glance]

Now on one knee upon the centaur-steeds Hovering--the Thyrsus plies.--Hurrah!--away she speeds!

Come--come, why loiter ye?--Here, here, how fair The goodly vessels still! Girls, hither turn, Fill from the fountain the Etruscan urn!

On the winged sphinxes see the tripod.-- Ho!

Quick--quick, ye slaves, come--fire!--the hearth prepare!

Ha! wilt thou sell?--this coin shall pay thee--this, Fresh from the mint of mighty t.i.tus!--Lo!

Here lie the scales, and not a weight we miss So--bring the light! The delicate lamp!--what toil Shaped thy minutest grace!--quick pour the oil!

Yonder the fairy chest!--come, maid, behold The bridegroom's gifts--the armlets--they are gold, And paste out-feigning jewels!--lead the bride Into the odorous bath--lo! unguents still-- And still the crystal vase the arts for beauty fill!

But where the men of old--perchance a prize More precious yet in yon papyrus lies, And see ev'n still the tokens of their toil-- The waxen tablets--the recording style.

The earth, with faithful watch, has h.o.a.rded all!

Still stand the mute penates in the hall; Back to his haunts returns each ancient G.o.d.

Why absent only from their ancient stand The priests?--waves Hermes his Caducean rod, And the winged victory struggles from the hand.

Kindle the flame--behold the altar there!

Long hath the G.o.d been wors.h.i.+pless--to prayer.

NAENIA.

Even the beauteous must die! This vanquishes men and immortals; But of the Stygian G.o.d moves not the bosom of steel.

Once and once only could love prevail on the ruler of shadows, And on the threshold, e'en then, sternly his gift he recalled.

Venus could never heal the wounds of the beauteous stripling, That the terrible boar made in his delicate skin; Nor could his mother immortal preserve the hero so G.o.dlike, When at the west gate of Troy, falling, his fate he fulfilled.

But she arose from the ocean with all the daughters of Nereus, And o'er her glorified son raised the loud accents of woe.

See! where all the G.o.ds and G.o.ddesses yonder are weeping, That the beauteous must fade, and that the perfect must die.

Even a woe-song to be in the mouth of the loved ones is glorious, For what is vulgar descends mutely to Orcus' dark shades.

THE MAID OF ORLEANS.

Humanity's bright image to impair.

Scorn laid thee prostrate in the deepest dust; Wit wages ceaseless war on all that's fair,-- In angel and in G.o.d it puts no trust; The bosom's treasures it would make its prey,-- Besieges fancy,--dims e'en faith's pure ray.

Yet issuing like thyself from humble line, Like thee a gentle shepherdess is she-- Sweet poesy affords her rights divine, And to the stars eternal soars with thee.

Around thy brow a glory she hath thrown; The heart 'twas formed thee,--ever thou'lt live on!

The world delights whate'er is bright to stain, And in the dust to lay the glorious low; Yet fear not! n.o.ble bosoms still remain, That for the lofty, for the radiant glow Let Momus serve to fill the booth with mirth; A n.o.bler mind loves forms of n.o.bler worth.

ARCHIMEDES.

To Archimedes once a scholar came, "Teach me," he said, "the art that won thy fame;-- The G.o.dlike art which gives such boons to toil, And showers such fruit upon thy native soil;-- The G.o.dlike art that girt the town when all Rome's vengeance burst in thunder on the wall!"

"Thou call'st art G.o.dlike--it is so, in truth, And was," replied the master to the youth, "Ere yet its secrets were applied to use-- Ere yet it served beleaguered Syracuse:-- Ask'st thou from art, but what the art is worth?

The fruit?--for fruit go cultivate the earth.-- He who the G.o.ddess would aspire unto, Must not the G.o.ddess as the woman woo!"

THE DANCE.

See how, like lightest waves at play, the airy dancers fleet; And scarcely feels the floor the wings of those harmonious feet.

Ob, are they flying shadows from their native forms set free?

Or phantoms in the fairy ring that summer moonbeams see?

As, by the gentle zephyr blown, some light mist flees in air, As skiffs that skim adown the tide, when silver waves are fair, So sports the docile footstep to the heave of that sweet measure, As music wafts the form aloft at its melodious pleasure, Now breaking through the woven chain of the entangled dance, From where the ranks the thickest press, a bolder pair advance, The path they leave behind them lost--wide open the path beyond, The way unfolds or closes up as by a magic wand.

See now, they vanish from the gaze in wild confusion blended; All, in sweet chaos whirled again, that gentle world is ended!

No!--disentangled glides the knot, the gay disorder ranges-- The only system ruling here, a grace that ever changes.

For ay destroyed--for ay renewed, whirls on that fair creation; And yet one peaceful law can still pervade in each mutation.

And what can to the reeling maze breathe harmony and vigor, And give an order and repose to every gliding figure?

That each a ruler to himself doth but himself obey, Yet through the hurrying course still keeps his own appointed way.

What, would'st thou know? It is in truth the mighty power of tune, A power that every step obeys, as tides obey the moon; That threadeth with a golden clue the intricate employment, Curbs bounding strength to tranquil grace, and tames the wild enjoyment.

And comes the world's wide harmony in vain upon thine ears?

The stream of music borne aloft from yonder choral spheres?

And feel'st thou not the measure which eternal Nature keeps?

The whirling dance forever held in yonder azure deeps?

The suns that wheel in varying maze?--That music thou discernest?

No! Thou canst honor that in sport which thou forgettest in earnest.

[52]

THE FORTUNE-FAVORED. [53]

Ah! happy he, upon whose birth each G.o.d Looks down in love, whose earliest sleep the bright Idalia cradles, whose young lips the rod Of eloquent Hermes kindles--to whose eyes, Scarce wakened yet, Apollo steals in light, While on imperial brows Jove sets the seal of might!

G.o.dlike the lot ordained for him to share, He wins the garland ere he runs the race; He learns life's wisdom ere he knows life's care, And, without labor vanquished, smiles the grace.

Great is the man, I grant, whose strength of mind, Self-shapes its objects and subdues the fates-- Virtue subdues the fates, but cannot blind The fickle happiness, whose smile awaits Those who scarce seek it; nor can courage earn What the grace showers not from her own free urn!

From aught unworthy, the determined will Can guard the watchful spirit--there it ends The all that's glorious from the heaven descends; As some sweet mistress loves us, freely still Come the spontaneous gifts of heaven!--Above Favor rules Jove, as it below rules love!

The immortals have their bias!--Kindly they See the bright locks of youth enamored play, And where the glad one goes, shed gladness round the way.

It is not they who boast the best to see, Whose eyes the holy apparitions bless; The stately light of their divinity Hath oft but shone the brightest on the blind;-- And their choice spirit found its calm recess In the pure childhood of a simple mind.

Unasked they come delighted to delude The expectation of our baffled pride; No law can call their free steps to our side.

Him whom he loves, the sire of men and G.o.ds (Selected from the marvelling mult.i.tude) Bears on his eagle to his bright abodes; And showers, with partial hand and lavish, down, The minstrel's laurel or the monarch's crown!

Before the fortune-favored son of earth, Apollo walks--and, with his jocund mirth, The heart-enthralling smiler of the skies For him gray Neptune smooths the pliant wave-- Harmless the waters for the s.h.i.+p that bore The Caesar and his fortunes to the sh.o.r.e!

Charmed at his feet the crouching lion lies, To him his back the murmuring dolphin gave; His soul is born a sovereign o'er the strife-- The lord of all the beautiful of life; Where'er his presence in its calm has trod, It charms--it sways as solve diviner G.o.d.

Scorn not the fortune-favored, that to him The light-won victory by the G.o.ds is given, Or that, as Paris, from the strife severe, The Venus draws her darling--Whom the heaven So prospers, love so watches, I revere!

And not the man upon whose eyes, with dim And baleful night, sits fate. Achaia boasts, No less the glory of the Dorian lord [54]

That Vulcan wrought for him the s.h.i.+eld and sword-- That round the mortal hovered all the hosts Of all Olympus--that his wrath to grace, The best and bravest of the Grecian race Untimely slaughtered, with resentful ghosts Awed the pale people of the Stygian coasts!

Scorn not the darlings of the beautiful, If without labor they life's blossoms cull; If, like the stately lilies, they have won A crown for which they neither toiled nor spun;-- If without merit, theirs be beauty, still Thy sense, unenvying, with the beauty fill.

Alike for thee no merit wins the right, To share, by simply seeing, their delight.

Heaven breathes the soul into the minstrel's breast, But with that soul he animates the rest; The G.o.d inspires the mortal--but to G.o.d, In turn, the mortal lifts thee from the sod.

Oh, not in vain to heaven the bard is dear; Holy himself--he hallows those who hear!

The busy mart let justice still control, Weighing the guerdon to the toil!--What then?

A G.o.d alone claims joy--all joy is his, Flus.h.i.+ng with unsought light the cheeks of men.