The Online Library of Liberty

A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.

• The Life of Goethe By Hjalmar H. Boyesen, Ph.d.
• Poems
• Dedication.
• Songs
• Sound, Sweet Song.
• To the Kind Reader.
• The New Amadis
• When the Fox Dies, His Skin Counts.
• The Heathrose.
• Blindman’s Buff.
• Christel.
• The Coy One.
• The Convert.
• Preservation.
• The Muses’ Son.
• Found.
• Like and Like.
• Reciprocal Invitation to the Dance.
• Self-deceit.
• Declaration of War.
• Lover In All Shapes.
• The Goldsmith’s Apprentice.
• Joy and Sorrow.
• March.
• Answers In a Game of Questions.
• Different Emotions On the Same Spot.
• Who’ll Buy Gods of Love?
• The Misanthrope.
• True Enjoyment.
• Happiness and Vision.
• The Farewell.
• The Beautiful Night.
• Apparent Death.
• Proximity.
• Living Remembrance.
• The Bliss of Absence.
• To Luna.
• The Wedding Night.
• Mischievous Joy.
• Farewell.
• The Exchange.
• November Song.
• To the Chosen One.
• First Loss.
• After-sensations.
• Proximity of the Beloved One.
• Presence.
• To the Distant One.
• By the River.
• Night Song.
• Calm At Sea.
• The Prosperous Voyage.
• Courage.
• Admonition.
• Welcome and Farewell.
• New Love, New Life.
• To Belinda.
• May Song.
• With a Painted Ribbon.
• With a Golden Necklace.
• To Charlotte.
• On the Lake.
• From the Mountain.
• Flower Salute.
• May Song.
• Premature Spring.
• Autumn Feelings
• Restless Love.
• The Shepherd’s Lament.
• Comfort In Tears.
• Longing.
• To Mignon.
• The Mountain Castle
• The Spirit’s Salute.
• To a Golden Heart That He Wore Round His Neck.
• The Bliss of Sorrow.
• The Wanderer’s Night-song.
• The Same.
• To the Moon.
• The Hunter’s Even-song.
• My Only Property.
• To Lina.
• Familiar Songs
• On the New Year.
• Anniversary Song.
• The Spring Oracle.
• The Happy Couple.
• Song of Fellowship.
• Constancy In Change.
• Table Song.
• Wont and Done.
• General Confession.
• Coptic Song.
• Another.
• Vanitas! Vanitatum Vanitas!
• Swiss Song.
• Fortune of War.
• Open Table.
• The Reckoning.
• Ergo Bibamus!
• Epiphanias.
• Finnish Song.
• Gypsy Song.
• From Wilhelm Meister.
• Mignon.
• The Same.
• The Harper.
• Philine.
• Ballads
• Mignon.
• The Harper.
• Ballad of the Banished and Returning Count.
• The Violet.
• The Faithless Boy.
• The Erl-king.
• Johanna Sebus
• The Fisherman.
• The King of Thule.
• The Beauteous Flower. Song of the Imprisoned Count.
• Sir Curt’s Wedding-journey.
• Wedding Song.
• The Treasure-digger.
• The Rat-catcher.
• The Spinner.
• Before a Court of Justice.
• The Page and the Miller’s Daughter.
• The Youth and the Millstream.
• The Maid of the Mill’s Treachery.
• The Maid of the Mill’s Repentance.
• The Traveller and the Farm-maiden.
• Effects At a Distance.
• The Walking Bell.
• Faithful Eckart.
• The Pupil In Magic.
• The Dance of Death.
• The Bride of Corinth.
• The God and the Bayadere. an Indian Legend.
• The Pariah. the Pariah’s Prayer.
• Legend.
• The Pariah’s Thanks.
• The First Walpurgis-night.
• Death-lament of the Noble Wife of Asan Aga.
• Antiques
• Leopold, Duke of Brunswick. 1785.
• To the Husbandman.
• Anacreon’s Grave.
• The Brethren.
• Measure of Time.
• Warning.
• SakÓntala.
• Solitude.
• The Chosen Cliff.
• The Consecrated Spot.
• The Instructors.
• The Unequal Marriage.
• Excuse.
• The Muse’s Mirror.
• PhŒbus and Hermes.
• The New Amor.
• The Garlands.
• The Swiss Alps.
• Elegies
• Roman Elegies.
• Alexis and Dora.
• Epigrams
• Venice, 1790.
• The Four Seasons.
• Spring.
• Summer.
• Autumn.
• Winter.
• Sonnets.
• The Friendly Meeting.
• In a Word.
• The Maiden Speaks.
• Growth.
• Food In Travel.
• Departure.
• The Loving One Writes.
• The Loving One Once More.
• She Cannot End.
• Nemesis.
• The Christmas-box.
• The Warning.
• The Doubters and the Lovers.
• The Epochs.
• Charade.
• Miscellaneous Poems.
• The German Parnassus.
• Mahomet’s Song.
• Spirit Song Over the Waters.
• My Goddess.
• Winter Journey Over the Hartz Mountains.
• To Father Kronos.
• The Wanderer’s Storm-song.
• The Sea-voyage.
• Prometheus.
• The Eagle and Dove.
• Ganymede.
• The Boundaries of Humanity.
• The Godlike.
• Royal Prayer.
• Human Feelings.
• Lily’s Menagerie.
• Love’s Distresses.
• To His Coy One.
• Petition.
• The Musagetes.
• Morning Lament.
• The Visit.
• The Magic Net.
• The Goblet.
• Night Thoughts.
• To Lida.
• Forever.
• From an Album of 1604.
• To the Rising Full Moon.
• Betrothed.
• At Midnight Hour.
• Lines On Seeing Schiller’s Skull.
• Trilogy of Passion.
• To Werther.
• Elegy.
• Atonement.
• April.
• May.
• June.
• Ever and Everywhere.
• Next Year’s Spring.
• Such, Such Is He Who Pleaseth Me.
• St. Nepomuk’s Eve. Carlsbad, May 15, 1820.
• The Freebooter.
• Reciprocal.
• Song of the Emigrants.
• Explanation of an Ancient Woodcut Representing Hans Sachs’ Poetical Mission.
• Thoughts On Jesus Christ’s Descent Into Hell.
• Art
• The Drops of Nectar.
• The Wanderer.
• Love As a Landscape-painter.
• Artist’s Evening Song.
• Parables
• Explanation of an Antique Gem.
• Cat-pie.
• Legend.
• The Critic.
• Authors.
• The Dilettante and the Critic.
• Celebrity.
• The Yelpers.
• The Wrangler.
• Joy.
• Playing At Priests.
• Songs.
• Poetry.
• A Parable.
• Cupid and Psyche.
• The Death of the Fly.
• By the River.
• The Fox and Crane.
• The Fox and Huntsman.
• The Stork’s Vocation.
• The Frogs.
• The Wedding.
• Burial.
• Threatening Signs.
• The Buyers.
• The Mountain Village.
• Symbols.
• Three Palinodias.
• Valediction.
• The Country Schoolmaster.
• The Legend of the Horseshoe.
• Epigrams.
• To Originals.
• The Soldier’s Consolation.
• Genial Impulse.
• Neither This Nor That.
• The Way to Behave.
• The Best.
• As Broad As It’s Long.
• Calm At Sea.
• The Rule of Life.
• The Same, Expanded.
• The Fair At Huehenefeld. July 25th, 1814.
• The Little Girl’s Wish.
• Epitaph.
• Admonition.
• My Only Property.
• Old Age.
• Courage.
• Rule For Monarchs.
• Memories.
• Paulo Post Futuri.
• The Fool’s Epilogue.
• On the Divan.
• God and World.
• Prooemion.
• The Metamorphosis of Plants.
• The Sages and the People.
• Rhymed Distichs.
• God, Soul and World.
• Distichs.
• West-eastern Divan.
• Moganni Nameh.
• Hafis Nameh.
• Uschk Nameh.
• Teskir Nameh.
• Rendsch Nameh.
• Hikmet Nameh.
• Timur Nameh.
• Suleika Nameh.
• Safi Nameh.
• Mathal Nameh.
• Parsi Nameh.
• Chuld Nameh.
• Hermann and Dorothea
• Fate and Sympathy.
• Hermann.
• The Burghers.
• Mother and Son.
• The Cosmopolite.
• The Age.
• Dorothea.
• Hermann and Dorothea.
• Conclusion.

LEGEND.

• • WATER-FETCHING goes the noble
  • Brahmin’s wife, so pure and lovely;
  • He is honor’d, void of blemish,
  • And of justice rigid, stern.
  • Daily from the sacred river
  • Brings she back refreshment precious;—
  • But where is the pail and pitcher?
  • She of neither stands in need.
  • For with pure heart, hands unsullied,
  • She the water lifts, and rolls it
  • To a wondrous ball of crystal;
  • This she bears with gladsome bosom,
  • Modestly, with graceful motion,
  • To her husband in the house.
• • She to-day at dawn of morning
  • Praying comes to Ganges’ waters,
  • Bends her o’er the glassy surface—
  • Sudden, in the waves reflected,
  • Flying swiftly far above her,
  • From the highest heavens descending,
  • She discerns the beauteous form
  • Of a youth divine, created
  • By the God’s primeval wisdom
  • In his own eternal breast.
  • When she sees him, straightway feels she
  • Wondrous, new, confus’d sensations
• • In her inmost, deepest being;
  • Fain she’d linger o’er the vision,
  • Then repels it,—it returneth,—
  • And, perplex’d, she bends her floodwards
  • With uncertain hands to draw it;
  • But, alas, she draws no more!
  • For the water’s sacred billows
  • Seem to fly, to hasten from her;
  • She but sees the fearful chasm
  • Of a whirlpool black disclos’d.
• • Arms drop down, and footsteps stumble,
  • Can this be the pathway homewards?
  • Shall she fly, or shall she tarry?
  • Can she think, when thought and counsel,
  • When assistance, all are lost?
  • So before her spouse appears she—
  • On her looks he—look is judgment—
  • Proudly on the sword he seizes,
  • To the hill of death he drags her,
  • Where delinquents’ blood pays forfeit.
  • What resistance could she offer?
  • What excuses could she proffer,
  • Guilty, knowing not her guilt?
• • And with bloody sword returns he,
  • Musing, to his silent dwelling,
  • When his son before him stands:
  • “Whose this blood? Oh, father! father!”
  • “The delinquent woman’s!”—“Never!
  • For upon the sword it dries not,
  • Like the blood of the delinquent;
  • Fresh it flows, as from the wound.
  • Mother! mother! hither hasten!
  • Unjust never was my father,
  • Tell me what he now hath done.”—
  • “Silence! silence! hers the blood is!”
  • “Whose, my father?”—“Silence! Silence!”
  • “What! oh, what! my mother’s blood!
  • What her crime? What did she? Answer!
  • Now, the sword! the sword now hold I;
  • Thou thy wife perchance might’st slaughter,
  • But my mother might’st not slay!
  • Through the flames the wife is able
  • Her beloved spouse to follow,
  • And his dear and only mother
  • Through the sword her faithful son.”
  • “Stay! oh, stay!” exclaim’d the father:
  • “Yet ’tis time, so hasten, hasten!
  • Join the head upon the body,
  • With the sword then touch the figure,
  • And, alive, she’ll follow thee.”
• • Hastening, he, with breathless wonder,
  • Sees the bodies of two women
  • Lying crosswise, and their heads too;
  • Oh, what horror! which to choose!
  • Then his mother’s head he seizes,—
  • Does not kiss it, deadly pale ’tis,—
  • On the nearest headless body
  • Puts it quickly, and then blesses
  • With the sword the pious work.
  • Then a giant form uprises.—
  • From the dear lips of his mother,
  • Lips all godlike—changeless—blissful,
  • Sound these words with horror fraught:
  • “Son, O son! what overhast’ning!
  • Yonder is thy mother’s body,
  • Near it lies the impious head
  • Of the woman who hath fallen
  • Victim to the judgment-sword!
  • To her body I am grafted
  • By thy hand for endless ages;
  • Wise in counsel, wild in action,
  • I shall be amongst the gods.
  • E’en the heav’nly boy’s own image,
  • Though in brow and eye so lovely,
  • Sinking downwards to the bosom
  • Mad and raging lust will stir.
• • “ ’Twill return again forever,
  • Ever rising, ever sinking,
  • Now obscur’d, and now transfigur’d,—
  • So great Brama hath ordain’d.
  • He ’twas sent the beauteous pinions,
  • Radiant face, and slender members
  • Of the only God-begotten,
  • That I might be prov’d and tempted;
  • For from high descends temptation,
  • When the gods ordain it so.
  • And so I, the Brahmin woman,
  • With my head in heaven reclining,
  • Must experience, as a Pariah,
  • The debasing power of earth.
• • “Son, I send thee to thy father!
  • Comfort him! Let no sad penance,
  • Weak delay, or thought of merit,
  • Hold thee in the desert fast;
  • Wander on through ev’ry nation,
  • Roam abroad throughout all ages,
  • And proclaim to e’en the meanest,
  • That great Brama hears his cry!
• • “None is in his eyes the meanest—
  • He whose limbs are lame and palsied,
  • He whose soul is wildly riven,
  • Worn with sorrow, hopeless, helpless,
  • Be he Brahmin, be he Pariah,
  • If tow’rd heaven he turns his gaze,
  • Will perceive, will learn to know it:
  • Thousand eyes are glowing yonder,
  • Thousand ears are calmly list’ning,
  • From which nought below is hid.
• • “If I to his throne soar upward,
  • If he sees my fearful figure
  • By his might transform’d to horror,
  • He forever will lament it,—
  • May it to your good be found!
  • And I now will kindly warn him,
  • And I now will madly tell him
  • Whatsoe’er my mind conceiveth,
  • What within my bosom heaveth.
  • But my thoughts, my inmost feelings—
  • Those a secret shall remain.”