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NEMESIS. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Goethe’s Works, vol. 1 (Poems) [1885]

Edition used:

Goethe’s Works, illustrated by the best German artists, 5 vols. (Philadelphia: G. Barrie, 1885). Vol. 1.

Part of: Goethe’s Works, 5 vols.

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NEMESIS.

    • WHEN through the nations stalks contagion wild,
    • We from them cautiously should steal away.
    • E’en I have oft with ling’ring and delay
    • Shunn’d many an influence, not to be defil’d.
    • And e’en though Amor oft my hours beguil’d,
    • At length with him preferr’d I not to play,
    • And so, too, with the wretched sons of clay,
    • When four and three-lin’d verses they compil’d.
    • But punishment pursues the scoffer straight,
    • As if by serpent-torch of furies led
    • From hill to vale, from land to sea to fly.
    • I hear the genie’s laughter at my fate;
    • Yet do I find all power of thinking fled
    • In sonnet-rage and love’s fierce ecstasy.