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.

The Four Seasons.

SPRING.

• • I.

  • ULL ye Distichs, awake! Ye lively youths in your joyance!
  • Rich are gardens and fields! Bring ye blossoms for wreaths.

• • II.

  • Rich is the meadow in flowers; yet the eye cannot claim all their beauty.
  • Others bloom for the heart. Reader, now choose for thyself!

• • III.

  • Rosebud! thou art the flower of the maiden, rosy and blooming;
  • Symbol of queenly guise, symbol of modest deport.

• • IV.

  • Violets cluster’d together and bound in a delicate nosegay
  • Making one flower; ’tis thou, home-loving maiden, I mean!

• • V.

  • One whom I knew, like a lily was slender. Purity cloth’d her
  • Pridelike. Such splendor of garb Solomon sure never saw.

• • VI.

  • Lovely the Columbine stands and hangs his radiant head down:
  • Petulance is it, or pride? Answer me now if you can!

• • VII.

  • Many odorous bells thou swingest, O Hyacinth, gayly,
  • Yet nor fragrance or bells have the gift to attract.

• • VIII.

  • Hesperus! thee in the garish day men pass without noting;
  • When the nightingale sings, then thy glory appears.

• • IX.

  • Thou, Tuberose, art haughty, and thou rejoicest in freedom,
  • Yet—away from my sight! Come not nigh to my heart!

• • X.

  • Glowing the Poppy I see in the distance; when I come nearer,
  • Ah! then I learn thee too late! thou that apest the Rose.

• • XI.

  • Tulips, I know ye are scorn’d by those who take pride in æsthetics;
  • Courage! a thought that’s robust needs a lusty leaf.

• • XII.

  • Pinks! how lovely ye are! Yet ye all resemble each other.
  • Who can distinguish? Not I! How then, pray, can I choose?

• • XIII.

  • Flush with the colors of dawn Ranunculus, Tulips and Asters!
  • Here is a dark fragrant flower, puts you all to the blush.

• • XIV.

  • Crowsfoot! none of thy sisters attract me; desire ye awake not;
  • Yet, commingled in beds, pleasure ye give to the eye.

• • XV.

  • Tell me what perfumes the chamber? Mignonette, fragrant and pleasing,
  • Colorless, shapeless and still, modest and sensible plant.

• • XVI.

  • Ornament fit for the garden, where’er thou appearest, thou sayest:
  • “Ceres, the Queen, with her hand scatter’d me forth with the grain.”

• • XVII.

  • Sweetest of dainty flowers! thy eyes so tender they whisper
  • Always, “Forget-me-not!” always, “Forget not thy friend!”

• • XVIII.

  • If from the eye of the mind the forms of the flowers should all vanish,
  • Eleonore! thy face would’st ever remain in my heart!

SUMMER.

• • XIX.

  • TERRIBLE, Love shows himself unto me! Ye Muses, awaken
  • Harmonies out of the pain stirr’d by the God in my heart.

• • XX.

  • Written scrolls I possess which scholars and monarchs might covet.
  • For my beloved she writes words that I turn into verse!

• • XXI.

  • As in Winter the grain only slowly sprouts, but in Summer
  • Hastens to push into bloom, so was my yearning for thee!

• • XXII.

  • Ever it seem’d to me that forests, fields, mountains and gardens
  • Were but symbols of space; Love, thou makest them real.

• • XXIII.

  • Space and Time to my mind are idle phantoms of fancy;
  • But the corner with thee, dearest, seems without bounds.

• • XXIV.

  • Care, she sits in the saddle with thee; she embarks in the vessel.
  • Zealous is Care, but Love follows us up with more zeal.

• • XXV.

  • Hard is the conquest of Passion, but if she be strengthen’d by Custom,
  • Ancient ally and friend, she’s an invincible foe!

• • XXVI.

  • What is the scroll that twice and thrice I read in succession?
  • Manuscripts sent by my love, written warm from her heart.

• • XXVII.

  • She is my joy, but perchance she deceives me. O poets and singers,
  • Mimics! much ye might learn, knowing my sweetheart, my love!

• • XXVIII.

  • All the joy of the poet in shaping his verse to perfection,
  • Sympathizing Love, that inspir’d him, feels.

• • XXIX.

  • Think you an epigram short to express a sentiment for thee?
  • Why, Love, how can that be! Isn’t a kiss far more short?

• • XXX.

  • Know’st thou, O friend, the splendid poison of love unrequited?
  • Burning, it gives fresh strength; wasting the flesh it renews.

• • XXXI.

  • Know’st thou the splendid working of love that has found its ideal?
  • Bodies it binds in sweet union, spirits are freed.

• • XXXII.

  • True love is that which always and ever remains without changing
  • When it is granted all, all things being denied.

• • XXXIII.

  • All the world I would like, so all to share with my darling;
  • All the world would I give, if she were only mine.

• • XXXIV.

  • When a loving heart is pain’d and must suffer in silence,
  • Rhadamanthus himself could not imagine such pangs.

• • XXXV.

  • “Why do I fade so soon, O Zeus?” ask’d Beauty in sorrow.
  • “Ah,” said the father of gods, “only the beautiful fades.”

• • XXXVI.

  • Love and youth and the dew and the flowers heard the hard saying;
  • All turn’d their faces away, weeping, from Jupiter’s throne.

• • XXXVII.

  • Live while we may and love; for life and love are both fleeting.
  • Fate, thou cuttest the threads! Both must come to an end!

AUTUMN.

• • XXXVIII.

  • LIFE brings fruits unto man! Yet rarely they hang from the branches,
  • Rosy and bright in the sun, greeting, like apples, the eye.

• • XXXIX.

  • Hold the staff of direction o’er life and all its transactions.
  • Leave unto Love and the Muse chance for jovial sport!

• • XL.

  • Preach, for it seemeth you well; we also honor the custom;
  • Yet will the Muse not allow orders peremptorily given.

• • XLI.

  • Seize the lighted torch from Prometheus, O Muse, and inspire us!
  • Seize it from Love, and torment us with ravishing joy.

• • XLII.

  • All creation is Nature’s work. From Zeus on Olympos
  • Flashes the wonderful bolt, building and crushing the world.

• • XLIII.

  • Brothers! do all that ye do with zeal and with love. Both are virtues
  • Lovely for German hearts, easily turn’d from the path.

• • XLIV.

  • Children toss the ball to the wall and catch it rebounding;
  • This is a game that I like play’d by the friend of my choice.

• • XLV.

  • Ever strive for the whole, and if the whole should escape thee,
  • Be, as thou canst, a part useful in forming the whole.

• • XLVI.

  • Knowledge of self is fine, yet when one is treasur’d by others,
  • Object of honor and love, is it not better by far?

• • XLVII.

  • What controls the youth, holds the man, embraces the graybeard,
  • That be thy portion of joy all thy life, lovely child.

• • XLVIII.

  • Willingly age clings to youth, and youth for age has affection;
  • Yet all over the world like is attracted by like.

• • XLIX.

  • Keep in thy heart the vision of worthies: bright constellations,
  • Nature scatter’d them forth, out of measureless space.

• • L.

  • Who is the luckiest man? ’Tis he who has wisdom to welcome
  • Service of others and feel joy like his own in his friend’s.

• • LI.

  • Time gives us much and robs us of much; but the love of thy betters,
  • Graciously bestowed, ever should be thy delight.

• • LII.

  • Were ye, foolish dreamers, able to grasp your ideals,
  • Honor to Nature ye’d pay as her merits deserve.

• • LIII.

  • Honest friend, I will tell thee what thou canst safely believe in:
  • Life is the only thing teaching better than books.

• • LIV.

  • Ev’ry blossom must fall before the fruit will rejoice us;
  • Blossoms and fruit at once only the Muses can give.

• • LV.

  • Truth that hurts I prefer to falsehood giving advantage.
  • Truth, it assuages the pain which perchance it has caus’d.

• • LVI.

  • Does an error hurt? Not always; but making the error
  • Always hurts, and how sore only the sequel can tell.

• • LVII.

  • Never so dear to us seem as our own the children of others;
  • Error, the child of our hearts, claims so much of our love.

• • LVIII.

  • Error is ever at hand. Yet a higher necessity draws us
  • Gently and steadily on, strive as we will, towards Truth.

• • LIX.

  • No one resembles another, yet each resembles the Highest.
  • How can this be explain’d? Each is complete in himself!

• • LX.

  • Why are Genius and Taste so seldom blended in union?
  • Genius hates the curb; Taste is timid at force.

• • LXI.

  • Helpless for moving the world are all the discourses of Reason;
  • Impotent also is she, crush’d in the presence of Art.

• • LXII.

  • Whom do I wish for a reader? He who is freest from bias,
  • Losing himself and the world, living alone in my book.

• • LXIII.

  • He is my dearest friend who walks with me as I struggle;
  • If he invite me to sit, forth I wander alone.

• • LXIV.

  • Ah, how it goes to my heart, that this most excellent spirit,
  • Bent on seeking the goal, uses me as a means.

• • LXV.

  • Praise the child for the toys on which it squanders its pennies
  • Recklessly! Truth, thou wilt be godlike to trader and child.

• • LXVI.

  • What is the method of Nature in joining the good and the evil,
  • Forming man? She thrusts vanity deftly between.

• • LXVII.

  • In susceptible people no good have I ever discover’d.
  • Give them only the chance, rascals they readily turn.

• • LXVIII.

  • Gallomania checks in this degenerate epoch
  • Peaceful culture as once Lutheranism did.

• • LXIX.

  • Whatever in France is past the Germans take up and encourage;
  • For the proudest man flatters the rabble and crawls.

• • LXX.

  • “Darest thou call it the rabble? Where is the rabble?” The people,
  • Could ye get your own way, soon a rabble would be.

• • LXXI.

  • Wherever parties arise each holds itself this side and that side;
  • Many years will elapse ere their centres unite.

• • LXXII.

  • “Those men there are starting a party; what a ridiculous notion!
  • But our party indeed! That is a different thing!”

• • LXXIII.

  • Son, wilt thou always be free? then learn something useful, remaining
  • Quite content with thy lot, never aspiring too high.

• • LXXIV.

  • Who is the nobler man in ev’ry station? Whoever
  • Gives impartial advice, scorning advantage for self.

• • LXXV.

  • Know’st thou how even the small may be great? By doing their duty,
  • Small though it be; the great needs must do just the same.

• • LXXVI.

  • What is holy? ’Tis that which binds many spirits in union.
  • Bond, though ever so slight, like the grass on a wreath.

• • LXXVII.

  • What is the holiest? That which binds to-day and forever,
  • Spirits in sympathy close, union of soul unto soul.

• • LXXVIII.

  • Who is the worthiest man in the state? A respectable burgher;
  • Under whatever rule he is the soldiest prop.

• • LXXIX.

  • Who then is really a prince? My own observation has taught me
  • He alone is a prince who has it in him to be.

• • LXXX.

  • Wisdom failing in rulers, right good-will in the people,
  • Force must grasp the helm, else will destruction ensue.

• • LXXXI.

  • Many states have I seen, and that stands high above others,
  • Where the rulers must serve, leaving to others the gain.

• • LXXXII.

  • Only let every being fairly use his advantage,
  • Granting to others their share; then will peace ever reign.

• • LXXXIII.

  • But if none is content with the share that Fate has allotted,
  • Then is the train ready laid always and ever for war.

• • LXXXIV.

  • Twain are the methods of speaking the truth if truth be unwelcome:
  • Frankly that people may know, secretly unto the prince.

• • LXXXV.

  • If thou findest fault with the individual loudly,
  • He will harden his heart as the throng do at praise.

• • LXXXVI.

  • Thou art monarch and knight and thou canst rule and do battle;
  • But if treaties are made call the chancellor’s aid.

• • LXXXVII.

  • Wise, industrious, firm, acquainted with all, understanding
  • High and low alike, thus the minister stands.

• • LXXXVIII.

  • What is the courtier I honor? The keenest and shrewdest. Whatever
  • Yet that he fails to possess comes to his service as man.

• • LXXXIX.

  • Whether thou art the wisest or not who gives an opinion?
  • But—be the upright man both at home and abroad.

• • XC.

  • Whether thou wakest or not we care not, provided thou singest.
  • Sing, O watchman, thy song, sleeping, as multitudes do.

• • XCI.

  • Now, O Autumn, thou strewest only yellowing leaflets.
  • Give me another year full-ripen’d fruit instead.

WINTER.

• • XCII.

  • WATER is body and substance in flux. The stage that is newest
  • Shines in the glow of the sun held by the shimmering shores.

• • XCIII.

  • Truly it seems like a vision! Life in significant pictures
  • Hovers earnest and fair over the far-gleaming plains.

• • XCIV.

  • Countless centuries frozen, like ice, stretch off in our vision;
  • Reason and Sympathy glide dim in the background away.

• • XCV.

  • Only the level plain conditions the whirl of existence:
  • If it be smooth we all reck not of danger at hand.

• • XCVI.

  • All are striving and hasting, seeking and fleeing each other;
  • Yet our courses are fix’d over the slippery plain.

• • XCVII.

  • Hither and thither they glide, the pupils and master together,
  • And the common folk holding the middle way.

• • XCVIII.

  • Every one must show what he can; not praise and not glory
  • Kept this man from the goal, drove that other one on.

• • XCIX.

  • You who praise the bungler, the Master’s detractors, I see you,
  • Dumb with impotent rage, standing here on the shore.

• • C.

  • Novice! thou totterest clumsily shunning, the dangerous mirror.
  • Keep up thy heart! thou wilt be soon the pride of the course.

• • CI.

  • Wilt thou already show prowess, and art not confident? Nonsense!
  • Only from well-pois’d force gleams true happiness forth.

• • CII.

  • Falls are the fortune of man; the pupil must fall, and the master
  • Also will meet with mishaps; let him beware how he strikes.

• • CIII.

  • If the skilfullest skater but fall, the idle spectators
  • Laugh, as over their cups men boast of whipping their foes.

• • CIV.

  • Glide away joyfully, giving advice to the novice beginning;
  • Take full pride in thy leadership, joy in the day.

• • CV.

  • See! already the Spring is at hand. The hurrying waters
  • Waste the ice from below, gentler sunbeams above.

• • CVI.

  • This generation is vanish’d, scatter’d the radiant circles.
  • Fishers and sailors once more claim the swift-rolling stream.

• • CVII.

  • Swim, thou wonderful floe, away, and if thou shalt never
  • Join the sea as a floe, drop by drop thou may’st come.