No More Learning

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7185
HEINRICH HEINE
(1799-1856)
BY RICHARD BURTON
I
F QUALITY is to decide a writer's position, Heinrich Heine
stands with the few great poets and literary men of Ger-
many. His lyrics at their best have not been surpassed in
his own land, and rank with the masterpieces of their kind in world
literature. As a prose writer he had extraordinary brilliancy, vigor
of thought, and grace of form, and as a thinker he must be regarded
as one of the pioneers of modern ideas in our century. In German
criticism, because of his Semitic blood-his pen not seldom dipped
in gall when he wrote of the Fatherland—and his defects of char-
acter, full justice has not been done to him as singer and sayer. It
remained for an English critic, Matthew Arnold, to define his true
place in the literature of our time. A brief survey of his life will
make this plainer.
A main thing to remember of Heine the man is, that he was an
upper-class Jew. The services of this wonderful people to art, let-
ters, and philosophy, as well as to politics and finance, are familiar.
This boy of Düsseldorf was one of the most gifted of the race of
Mendelssohn and Rothschild, Rachel and Rubinstein, Chopin and
Disraeli. Born in that picturesque old Rhine town, December 12th
(or 13th), 1799,- he just missed, as he said, being one of the first
men of the century,- his father was a wealthy merchant, his mother
a Van Geldern, daughter of a noted physician and statesman. He
received a good education, first in a Jesuit monastery, then-after
an attempt to establish him at Hamburg in mercantile life, which to
the disappointment of his family proved utterly distasteful in the
German universities of Bonn and Göttingen. The law was thought
of as a profession; but this necessitated his becoming a Christian, for
at the time in Germany all the learned callings were closed to Jews.
Heine, though not a believer in the religion of his people, was in
thorough sympathy with their wrongs, always the champion of their
cause: deeply must he have felt the humiliation of this enforced
apostasy, which was performed in 1825, in his twenty-sixth year, the
baptismal registry reading "Johann Christian Heine," names he
never made use of as a writer. Doubtless the iron entered his soul
XII-450


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7186
HEINRICH HEINE-
in the act. Before his study at Göttingen, which resulted in his
securing a law degree, Heine spent several years in Berlin, and pub-
lished a volume of verse there in 1822 without success. Letters
which he carried from the poet Schlegel secured him, however, the
entrée of leading houses, where he met in familiar intercourse Cha-
misso, Hegel, and like noted folk, and became the centre of social
interest as he read from manuscript, essays and poems which were
later to give him fame when grouped together in the volume en-
titled 'Reisebilder' (Sketches of Travel), containing his most famous
work in the essay form; his Buch der Lieder' (Book of Songs),
which followed soon thereafter, performing the same service for his
reputation as poet. He made no professional use of his legal lore,
but traveled and tasted life. The years from 1827 to 1830 were spent
mostly in Munich and Berlin. Heine took an active part in the jour-
nalistic and literary life of these cities, and drove his pen steadily as
a doughty free-lance of letters in the cause of intellectual emanci-
pation. A satiric pamphlet against the nobility in 1830, the year of
the July Revolution in France, made him fear for his personal lib-
erty; and the next year he removed to Paris, and began the life
there which was to end only in his death a quarter-century later.
A liaison with a grisette resulted in his marriage with her; and
their quarrelsome, affectionate life together has been often limned.
In the capital that has fascinated so many distinguished spirits-at
first well, and happy, and seen in society, making occasional journeys
abroad; later poor, sick, with gall in his pen and with a swarm of
enemies- Heine passed this long period of his life, chained during
the ten final years to what he called in grim metaphor his "mattress
grave. "
His disease was a spinal affection, resulting in slow paraly-
sis, loss of sight, the withering of his limbs. No more terrible picture
is offered in the personal annals of literature than that of the once
gay poet, writhing in his bed through sleepless nights, the sight of
one eye gone, the drooping lid of the other lifted by the hand that
he might see to use the pen. "I saw the body all shrunk together,
from which his legs hung down without signs of life," says his sister,
who visited him in Paris the year before he died. "I had to gather
all my powers of self-control in order to support in quiet the horri-
ble sight. " The volumes of letters and other memorabilia published
in recent years plainly set forth the dual nature of this man: his
querulousness, equivocations, and jealousies; his impulsive affection.
towards his near of kin. The French government granted him a
pension for his services as revolutionary writer, and it came in the
nick of time; for on the death in 1844 of his rich uncle Solomon
Heine, who for years had granted him an allowance, it was found
that no provision for its maintenance had been made in the will.


## p. 7187 (#589) ###########################################

HEINRICH HEINE
7187
Heine's bitterness under the heavy hand of Fate comes out pathet-
ically in his latest poems and letters. "I am no longer," he wrote,
"a joyous, somewhat corpulent Hellenist, laughing cheerfully down
upon the melancholy Nazarenes. I am now a poor, fatally ill Jew,
an emaciated picture of woe, an unhappy man. " His mind remained
wonderfully clear to the end, as his literary work testifies; and at
least he had the courage of his convictions, contemptuously repudiat-
ing the rumor that his former skepticism had been changed in the
fiery alembic of suffering. His impious jest on his death-bed is typi-
cal, whether apocryphal or not: "God will forgive me: it is his line
of business" ("c'est son métier »).
It may be said that there is a touch of heroism in the fact that
for so long he refused to end an existence of such agony by his own
violent act, enduring until Nature gave him release, which she did
but tardily, when he had passed his fifty-sixth year, February 17th,
1856. He was buried in the cemetery of Montmartre, without any
religious ceremony, as he wished,- a conclusion in key with his whole
manner of life,-preserving his Bohemianism to the very grave's
edge. It is likely that this terrible closing couplet from his poem on
Morphine summed up his feeling honestly enough:-
"Lo, sleep is good; better is death; in sooth,
The best of all were never to be born. »
Yet skepticism was not his constant attitude; a man of moods, he
could write shortly before his taking-off: "I suffer greatly, but sup-
port my wretchedness with submission to the unfathomable will of
God. " And it is but justice to add that in his will he declared that
his intellectual pride was broken, and that he had come to rest in
the truths of religion. It is by these inconsistencies and warring emo-
tions that glimpses of the man's complex, elusive nature are gained.
In his younger days Heine is described as a handsome fellow, slight
of figure, blond, with a poetic paleness and an air of distinction.
Later he became corpulent: his sad physical presentment during the
final years is finely indicated in the Hasselriis statue of the poet
erected at Corfu by the Empress of Austria.
Heine's long Parisian residence, his Gallic inoculation, have been
the theme of countless animadversions. He has been painted as a
man without a country, a turncoat, and a traitor. Certain facts must
be borne in mind in passing judgment upon him. As a boy in Düs-
seldorf he breathed the atmosphere of the French Revolution, and
grew up an enthusiast of the cause, calling himself its "child. " The
French, again, were the people who, as Arnold remarks, made it pos-
sible for the Jews in Germany to find wide activities for the exercise
of their talents. His own land proscribed his works: in France, when


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7188
HEINRICH HEINE
he had mastered the tongue, his works which appeared in French
won him speedy applause, and he was hailed as the wittiest writer
since Voltaire. And to pass from external to internal, there was much
in Heine to respond to the peculiarly French traits: flashing wit,
lightness of touch, charm of form, lucidity of expression. Small
wonder, then, that he crossed the Rhine and took up his abode in
the city which has always been a centre of enlightened thinking. In
spite of all his sympathy, temperamental and intellectual, for things.
French, Heine never forgot that he was a German poet, nor was love
for the Fatherland killed in his soul. There is a proud ring in his
well-known lines:-
"I am a German poet
Of goodly German fame:
Where their best names are spoken,
Mine own they are sure to name. »
The estimates of Heine on his personal side range from parti-
san eulogium to savage and sweeping condemnation. Perhaps it is
safest to regard him as a man of complex nature and warring tend-
encies, in whom faults of character were accentuated by the events
of his career. He was sensitive to morbidity, irascible, dissolute in
his youth, paying in after days for his excesses the fearful penalty
of a slow torturous disease. He had a waspish tendency to sting an
enemy, and was quick to take offense from friends. His mocking
spirit of contradiction was not above sacrificing justice and purity
to its ends; he was at times, in his writings, sensual, ribald, blas-
phemous. It is fair to plead in partial extenuation the early mis-
appreciation of his kinsfolk, the hostility towards his race, and the
exigencies of his subsequent battle for bread, reputation, and the
victory of ideas. On the other hand, it is weak sentimentality or
purblind favoritism to represent Heine as a hero ill-starred by for-
tune. He was far from an admirable character, and no whitewashing
can make him so: his greatest enemy came from within. He was
one who, like Louie in 'David Grieve,' was at death "freed from the
fierce burden" of himself.
As a lyric poet Heine is incomparable. It is in this form that
the German genius finds finest, freest expression, and the student of
German literature must still point to Goethe and Heine as its chief
exponents; nor in lyric expression need the latter yield to the former.
The representative pieces hereinafter printed, with others of like
quality, are among the precious bits of poetry which the world has
taken forever to its heart. No translation can give an adequate idea
of their haunting perfection, their magic of diction and witchery of
music. The reader unfamiliar with German and making Heine's
acquaintance at second hand needs to understand this impossibility;


## p. 7189 (#591) ###########################################

HEINRICH HEINE
7189
otherwise the poet's due praise may seem rhetorical and excessive.
It is said to take a thief to catch a thief: quite as truly does it take
a poet to catch a poet, and the task is far more difficult.
To get a
first-hand knowledge of Heine lends in itself a zest to the learning
of his tongue. The characteristics of these lyrics may be defined in
few words. As to form, the poet wisely seized upon the popular
ballad measures of older German literature, and in rhythms, stanzas,
and diction, clung for the most part to those homely creations,
thereby giving his work a natural touch and archaic flavor, blending
to produce an effect of simplicity and directness which really hide.
consummate art. No lyrist has had more genuine songfulness, the
last test of the true lyric; in proof, witness the frequency with which
his most familiar poems have been set to music by the gifted com-
posers of his own and other lands.
But Heine was not alone the singer: he was critic and satirist as
well. Even the exquisite deep romanticism of his lyrics is sometimes
rudely broken by his own sneering laugh; it is as if the critical in
him had of a sudden made him ashamed of his own emotion. One
of his German critics has said that he bore a laughing tear-drop on
his escutcheon: the flowery phrase denotes this mingling of song and
satire in his work. The impish anticlimax of some of his loveliest
utterances is one of the grievous things his admirers have to forgive.
Heine, in his earlier spontaneous poetry a romanticist of the roman-
ticists, came to perceive intellectually that the work of the so-called
Romantic school in Germany must give way to an incoming age of
scientific learning and modern ideas; that because it looked backward
to the Middle Ages, the movement was wrong. And in this convic-
tion he set himself to fight the old and hail the new. However this
perception may prove his prophetic insight, it would have been bet-
ter for his poetry had he remained in bondage to romanticism. When
in a love poem which opens tenderly, he concludes with this stanza:
"Dearest friend, thou art in love,
And that love must be confessed;
For I see thy glowing heart
Plainly scorching through thy vest,"-
-
one feels that the poet gets his effect of fun at too costly a price.
Parody, to pay, must gain more than it loses. The doubt of the
singer's sincerity is never quite shaken off. There is reason for call-
ing Heine "the mocking-bird of the singing grove. "
As an essay-writer, Heine's substantial reputation rests upon the
'Reisebilder,' those gay, audacious, charming, bitter travel sketches
of mingled verse and prose, in the main descriptive of his wander-
ings through Germany, and of the most varied theme and tone:


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7190
HEINRICH HEINE
now beautiful rhapsodies on the scenes of nature; now quaint pict-
ures of life in city or country, painted with Dutch-like fidelity and
realism; now rapier thrusts of wit; again powerful diatribes against
existing conventions, or personal attacks upon fellow writers, as in
his ill-judged and wanton onslaught upon the romantic bard, the
Count von Platen. Far from being all of a piece, these phantasy
sketches are of very unequal merit, ranging from the exquisite lyric
work of the opening section and the delightful narrative of his expe-
riences in the Hartz Mountains, to the sparkling indecencies of the
division dealing with Italy, and the more labored argument and sat-
ire of the English Fragments. Of the 'Reisebilder' as a whole it
may be said that inspiration grows steadily less in the successive
parts. The portion penned in Heine's early twenties deservedly
caught the fancy of Europe by the polish and poetry, the striking
manner and daring thought it possessed. The writer laughs at the
traditions of learning in his native land, he pricks with the sword of
satire the ponderous German sentimentality, and he fights with all
the weapons in the arsenal of a gifted wit for that modern thing,
Liberty, liberty of conscience, action, opinion. The point of view
was new in the literature of the early century, dosed as it was with
heavy romanticism and in awe of the old for its own sake. The
style was of unprecedented vigor and brilliance: it is easy to under-
stand why he took his wide audience by storm, and became the liter-
ary force of the day. To say a wise, keen thing in a light way, to
say it directly yet with grace, calls for a beautiful talent. To accom-
plish this in and with the German language is a double triumph. All
Heine's later writings, prose or poetry,- and during his residence in
Paris he published numerous works,-are developments or after-
echoes of his travel sketches and Book of Songs. Some of them
are simply high-class journalism: his critical faculty and graces of
manner are best represented by the critique on the Romantic school,
which is wise in forecasting the new literary ideals, and a model of
clearness and elegance. But for the general reader it will suffice to
make the acquaintance of the inimitable 'Reisebilder' and the 'Buch
der Lieder,' born of his youth and meridian of genius.
As a thinker, a force in the development of modern ideas,— the
ideas of liberty in its application to politics, science, education, and
religion, Heine was a torch-bearer of his time. In his remarkable
essay upon the German poet, Matthew Arnold gives him full credit
for this influence,- possibly exaggerating it. The sympathy between
the enlightened Jew who railed at perfunctoriness in Church and
State, and the English radical who rebukes his fellow islanders for
their lack of devotion to the Idea, naturally made Arnold the other's
champion. Both attacked the Philistine and saw the movement of the
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HEINRICH HEINE
7191
Time-spirit. But if the Englishman goes too far in declaring Heine
"the most important German successor and continuator of Goethe in
Goethe's most important line of activity," that of "a soldier in the
war of liberation of humanity,”—it is equally true that his estimate
hits nearer the mark than the misappreciations of too many critics of
his own country. Heine was an individualist, an iconoclast, satirizing
with trenchant power existing abuses, as Ibsen in later days has done
in Norway, a service which Carlyle with Juvenalian vigor performed
for England. This mission is at the best a thankless one; especially
so when, as in the case of Heine, the character of the prophet is full
of flaws. Yet is the work none the less valuable.
Heine's sentiment had in it much of the morbid, and in this
aspect he might not inaptly be dubbed decadent; using the word as it
is applied in latter-day literature, to denote what is unwholesome,
extravagant, or bestial. But intellectually he saw clear, and was at
bottom sane. His mind was too broad and vigorous, too incisive, for
any other result.
But in the ultimate decision, and in spite of his acidulous force as
a dissolvent of outworn thoughts, Heinrich Heine's chief fame must
rest on his wonderful poetry; he was a poet called to song, who,
when true to his highest inspiration, was a romantic bard of the
first rank in lyric utterance. With his music in our ears, we can for-
get if not condone the blots on his career, the unequal quality of his
production, growing pensive over the strange commingling in this
man of Divine gifts and human defects. He is another of those clay
vessels shaped by the hand of the mystic Potter to hold precious
wine, for the stimulation and joy of his kind.
Richard Burton.
ATLAS
Α'
H ME, most wretched Atlas! All the world,
The whole great world of sorrow I am bearing;
I bear what is unbearable, and breaking
Is now my heart within me.
Thou haughty heart, thou hast now what thou wouldst!
For happy thou wouldst be, supremely happy,
Else be supremely wretched, haughty heart;
And lo! now art thou wretched.
Translation of Charles Harvey Genung.


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7192
HEINRICH HEINE
THE LORELEI
KNOW not whence it rises,
I
This thought so full of woe;
But a tale of times departed
Haunts me, and will not go.
The air is cool, and it darkens,
And calmly flows the Rhine;
The mountain peaks are sparkling
In the sunny evening-shine.
And yonder sits a maiden,
The fairest of the fair:
With gold is her garment glittering,
As she combs her golden hair;
With a golden comb she combs it;
And a wild song singeth she,
That melts the heart with a wondrous
And powerful melody.
The boatman feels his bosom
With a nameless longing move;
He sees not the gulfs before him,
His gaze is fixed above;
Till over the boat and boatman
The Rhine's deep waters run:
And this, with her magic singing,
The Lorelei has done!
T"
From the Edinburgh Review.
PINE AND PALM
HERE stands a lonely pine-tree
In the north, on a barren height;
He sleeps while the ice and snowflakes
Swathe him in folds of white.
He dreameth of a palm-tree
Far in the sunrise land,
Lonely and silent longing
On her burning bank of sand.
'Poems and Ballads': Translated, and copyright 1881, by Emma Lazarus.


## p. 7193 (#595) ###########################################

HEINRICH HEINE
LOVE SONGS
HOU Seemest like a flower,
So pure and fair and bright;
A melancholy yearning
Steals o'er me at thy sight.
THOU
I fain would lay in blessing
My hands upon thy hair;
Imploring God to keep thee
So bright, and pure, and fair.
THOU fairest fisher-maiden,
Row thy boat to the land.
Come here and sit beside me,
Whispering, hand in hand.
Lay thy head on my bosom,
And have no fear of me;
For carelessly thou trustest
Daily the savage sea.
My heart is like the ocean,
With storm and ebb and flow;
And many a pearl lies hidden
Within its depths below.
THE Ocean hath its pearls,
The heaven hath its stars,
But oh! my heart, my heart,
My heart hath its love.
Great are the sea and the heavens,
But greater is my heart;
And fairer than pearls or stars
Glistens and glows my love.
7193
Thou little youthful maiden,
Come unto my mighty heart!
My heart, and the sea, and the heavens
Are melting away with love.
'Poems and Ballads': Translated, and copyright 1881, by Emma Lazarus.


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HEINRICH HEINE
7194
MY HEART WITH HIDDEN TEARS IS SWELLING
Y HEART with hidden tears is swelling,
I muse upon the days long gone;
The world was then a cozy dwelling,
And people's lives flowed smoothly on.
Mỹ
Now all's at sixes and at sevens,
Our life's a whirl, a strife for bread;
There is no God in all the heavens,
And down below the Devil's dead.
And all things look so God-forsaken,
So topsy-turvy, cold, and bare;
And if our wee bit love were taken,
There'd be no living anywhere.
A
E
Translation of Ernest Beard.
WILL SHE COME?
VERY morning hears me query:
Will she come to-day?
Every evening answers, weary:
Still she stays away.
In my nights of lonely weeping,
Sleep I never know;
Dreaming, like a man half sleeping,
Through the day I go.
KATHARINA
Translation of Ernest Beard.
LUSTROUS star has risen on my night,
A star which beams sweet comfort from its light,
And brightens all my earthly lot;
Deceive me not!
Like as still moonward swells the heaving sea,
So swells and flows my soul, so wild and free,
Aloft to that resplendent spot,—
Deceive me not!
Translation of Charles Harvey Genung.


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HEINRICH HEINE
7195
GOLD
From the Romances >
SAY
AY, my golden ducats, say,
Whither are you fled away?
Are ye with the golden fishes
In the little rushing river,
Gaily darting hither, thither?
Are ye with the golden blossoms.
On the meadows green and fair,
Sparkling in the dewy air?
Are ye with the golden songsters
Sweeping through the azure sky,
Flashing splendor to the eye?
Are ye with the golden stars,
Clusters of refulgent light.
Smiling through the summer night?
Well-a-day! my golden ducats
Do not in the river lie,
Do not sparkle in the dew,
Do not flash across the blue,
Do not twinkle in the sky:
But my creditors can tell
Where my golden ducats dwell.
GLIMPSES
Translation of Ernest Beard.
From the Romances >
HEN Spring with her sunshine revisits the Earth,
WHE The buds peep out and the blossoms shake;
W"
When the Moon on her nightly course sails forth,
The little stars swim in her shimmering wake;
When sweet eyes trouble the poet's gaze.
They touch the note of a thousand lays.
Yet eyes, and songs, and blossoming flowers,
And splendor of Sun or of Moon or of Star,
However beautiful such things are,
Are far from being this world of ours.
Translation of Ernest Beard.


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7196
HEINRICH HEINE
THE
THE FISHER'S HUT
HE ocean shimmered far around,
As the last sun-rays shone;
We sat beside the fisher's hut,
Silent and all alone.
The mist swam up, the water heaved,
The sea-mew round us screamed;
And from thy dark eyes, full of love,
The scalding tear-drops streamed.
I saw them fall upon thy hand;
Upon my knee I sank,
And from that white and yielding hand
The glittering tears I drank.
And since that hour I waste away,
Mid passion's hopes and fears:
O weeping girl! O weary heart! -
Thou'rt poisoned with her tears!
Translation of Charles G. Leland.
IN THE FISHER'S CABIN
WⓇ
E SAT in the fisher's cabin,
Looking out upon the sea;
Then came the mists of evening,
Ascending silently.
The lights began in the light-house
One after one to burn,
And on the far horizon
A ship we could still discern.
We spake of storm and shipwreck,
The sailor and how he thrives,
And how betwixt heaven and ocean,
And joy and sorrow he strives;
We spake of distant countries,
South, North, and everywhere,
And of the curious people
And curious customs there;


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HEINRICH HEINE
The fragrance and light of the Ganges,
That giant trees embower,
Where a beautiful, tranquil people
Kneel to the lotus flower;
Of the unclean folk in Lapland,
Broad-mouthed and flat-headed and small,
Who cower upon the hearthstone,
Bake fish, and cackle, and squall.
The maidens listened gravely;
Then never a word was said.
The ship we could see no longer:
It was far too dark o'erhead.
'Poems and Ballads': Translated, and copyright 1881, by Emma Lazarus.
THE GRAMMAR OF THE STARS
A
THOUSAND years unmoving
The stars have stood above,
On one another gazing
With the pain of yearning love.
They speak a wondrous language
So sweet and rich and grand;
Yet none of the famous linguists
A word can understand.
But I have learned this language
Which naught from my heart can erase;
The grammar that I studied
Was my little sweetheart's face.
7197
Translation of Charles Harvey Genung.
SONNETS TO HIS MOTHER
O BEAR me proudly is my custom aye;
My spirit too unbending is, and high;
What though the King should look me in the eye?
I would not flinch, or turn my head away.
Yet, dearest mother, let me truly say:
Whatever else my stubborn pride deny,
When to thy loving, trustful side I fly,
Submissive awe possesses me alway.


## p. 7198 (#600) ###########################################

7198
HEINRICH HEINE
Is it the secret influence of thy soul,
Thy lofty soul, that reaches every goal
And like the lightning flashes to and fro ?
Or bitter pangs of memory, that proceed
From countless acts that caused thy heart to bleed,—
That dearest heart, that ever loved me so?
I LEFT thee lately in my frenzied state,
Resolved to wander all the wide world o'er,
To ask for love on every distant shore,-
Love that alone might ease my spirit's weight.
I sought for love from early morn till late;
With fevered hand I knocked at every door
In Love his name, a token to implore,
Yet never gathered aught but chilling hate.
And on, and ever on, with growing pain
I searched for Love through many a heavy mile;
Till, sick and weary, to my homestead turning,
Thou camest to greet me with a mother's smile,-
And there, upon thy dearest features burning,
I saw that Love I long had sought in vain.
Translation of Ernest Beard.
B
THE JEWELS
LUE sapphires are those eyes of thine,
Those eyes so sweet and tender:
Oh, three times happy is the man
Whom they shall happy render!
Thy heart's a diamond, pure and clear,
With radiance overflowing:
Oh, three times happy is the man
Who sets that heart a-glowing!
Red rubies are those lips of thine-
Love ne'er did fairer fashion:
Oh, three times happy is the man
Who hears their vows of passion!
Oh, could I know that fortunate man,
And meet him unattended
Beneath the forest trees so green
His luck would soon be ended!
Translation of Ernest Beard.


## p. 7199 (#601) ###########################################

HEINRICH HEINE
VOICES FROM THE TOMB
From 'Dream Pictures >
I
WENT to the house of my lady fair,
I wandered in madness and dark despair;
And as by the church-yard I went my way,
Sadly the gravestones signed me to stay.
The minstrel's tombstone made me a sign,
In the glimmering light of the pale moon's shine:
"Good brother, I'm coming," wild whispering flow
Pale as a cloud from the grave it rose.
―
'Twas the harper himself: from the grave he flits;
High on the tombstone the harper sits;
O'er the strings of the cithern his fingers sweep,
And he sings, in a voice right harsh and deep:-
-
"What! know ye yet that song of old,
Which through the heart once deeply rolled,
Ye strings now slow to move?
The angels call it heaven's joy,
The devils call it hell's annoy,
But mortals call it love! "
"Love, Love, it was thy might
Laid us in these beds with right,
Closed our eyelids from the light:
Wherefore call'st thou in the night? "
7199
Scarce had sounded the last word's tone,
Ere the graves were opened, every one,
And airy figures came pressing out,
And sweep round the minstrel, while shrill they shout:-
Translation of Charles G. Leland.


## p. 7200 (#602) ###########################################

7200
HEINRICH HEINE
MAXIMS AND DESCRIPTIONS
I'
F ALL Europe were to become a prison, America would still
present a loop-hole of escape; and God be praised! that loop-
hole is larger than the dungeon itself.
"PAPA," exclaimed a little Carlist, "who is the dirty-looking
woman with the red cap? "
"It is the Goddess of Liberty," was the answer.
"But, papa, she has not even a chemise. "
"A real Goddess of Liberty, my dear child, rarely uses a
chemise; and is on that account the more embittered against those
who do wear clean linen. "
IF FREEDOM Should at some future day vanish from the earth,
a German dreamer would again discover it in one of his dreams.
WHEN the Lord feels ennui, he opens one of the windows of
heaven and takes a look at the Parisian boulevards.
LITERARY history is the great morgue where all seek the dead
ones whom they love, or to whom they are related.
PSYCHICAL pain is more easily borne than physical; and if I
had my choice between a bad conscience and a bad tooth, I should
choose the former.
NAPOLEON was not of the wood of which kings are made: he
was of the marble from which gods are shaped.
It is not generally known why our sovereigns live to so old
an age. They are afraid to die, lest they may meet Napoleon
in the next world.
GOD has given us speech in order that we may say pleasant
things to our friends and tell bitter truths to our enemies.
—
THE People that poor monarch in rags-has found flatterers
who, with even less of shame than the courtiers of Byzantium
and Versailles, fling their censers at his head. These court lack-
eys of the People are constantly praising the virtues and extol-
ling the merit of their ragged king. "How lovely! " they cry;
"how intelligent! " But no, ye lie! Your poor monarch is not


## p. 7201 (#603) ###########################################

HEINRICH HEINE
7201
lovely; on the contrary, he is very ugly. But his ugliness is the
result of dirt, and will vanish as soon as we erect public bath-
houses where his Majesty the People can bathe gratis. A bit
of soap will not prove amiss, and we shall then behold a smart-
looking People, a People indeed of the first water. Although
this monarch's goodness is often praised, he is not at all good;
sometimes indeed he is as bad as many other sovereigns. He is
angered when hungry; let us therefore see to it that he has some-
what to eat. As soon as his High Mightiness has been properly
fed, and has sated his appetite, he will smile on us with gracious
condescension, just as the other monarchs do. Nor is his Majesty
the People very intelligent: he is more stupid than all other
rulers, and almost as beastly stupid as his own favorites. He
bestows his affection and his confidence on those who shout the
jargon of his own passions; while he reserves his hatred for the
brave man who endeavors to reason with and exalt him. It is
thus in Paris; it was thus in Jerusalem. Give the People the
choice between the most righteous of the righteous and the most
wretched highway robber, and rest assured its cry will be, "Give
us Barabbas! Long live Barabbas! " The secret of this perverse-
ness is ignorance. This national evil we must endeavor to allay
by means of public schools, where education, together with bread
and butter and such other food as may be required, will be sup-
plied free of expense.
WHILE I was standing before the cathedral at Amiens, with a
friend who with mingled fear and pity was regarding that monu-
ment, built with the strength of Titans and decorated with the
patience of dwarfs,- he turned to me at last and inquired, "How
does it happen that we do not erect such edifices in our day? »
And my answer was, "My dear Alphonse, the men of that day
had convictions, while we moderns have only opinions; and some-
thing more than opinions are required to build a cathedral. "
THE Horatian rule, "Nonum prematur in annum," may like
many others be very good in theory, but in practice it is worth-
less. When Horace offered the author the celebrated rule, he
ought at the same time to have furnished him with directions how
to live nine years without food. While Horace was meditating
on this maxim he was probably seated at the table of Mæcenas,
eating turkey with truffles, pheasant pudding with game sauce,
XII-451


## p. 7202 (#604) ###########################################

HEINRICH HEINE
7202
larks' ribs with Teltow turnips, peacocks' tongues, Indian birds'-
nests, and the Lord knows what else; and all of it gratis, at that.
But we, unfortunate children of a later day! live in changed
times. Our Mæcenases have quite different principles: they be
lieve that authors, like medlars, develop best if they lie on straw
for a while; they believe that dogs who are too well fed are not
so well fitted for hunting similes and ideas. And alas! when
they do for once happen to feed a poor dog, it is the one who is
least deserving of their crumbs; such, for instance, as the spaniel
who licks their hands, the tiny puppy who softly nestles in the
perfumed lap of the lady of the house, or the patient poodle who
has learned a trade and knows how to fetch and carry, to dance
and to drum.
I HAVE the most peaceable disposition. My desires are a
modest cottage with thatched roof, but a good bed, good fare,
fresh milk and butter, flowers by my window, and a few fine
trees before the door. And if the Lord wished to fill my cup
of happiness, he would grant me the pleasure of seeing some six
or seven of my enemies hanged on those trees. With a heart
moved to pity, I would before their death forgive the injury
they had done me during their lives. Yes, we ought to forgive
our enemies-but not until they are hanged.
THERE is something peculiar in patriotism, or real love of
country. One can become eighty years old, and without knowing
it, have loved his fatherland during all that time; that is, if one
has remained at home. The true nature of spring is not appre-
ciated until winter is upon us, and the best May songs are written
by the fireside. Love of freedom is a prison flower, and we do
not learn the full value of liberty until we are imprisoned. Thus,
the German's patriotism begins at the frontier, where he can
from afar behold his country's misery.
EVERY man who marries is like the Doge who weds the Adri-
atic Sea: he knows not what he may find therein,— treasures,
pearls, monsters, unknown storms.
Translation of Stern and Snodgrass.


## p. 7203 (#605) ###########################################

HEINRICH HEINE
7203
―――――――
MARIE
T WAS a cold winter evening, with keen north wind and blind-
ing snow. I was alone in the room with Marie; it was cozy
in the dim light, and the open fire crackled and whispered
so comfortably! She sat at the piano, and was playing an old
Italian melody. Her head was bowed, and the candle that stood
beside her threw a soft sweet light over the little hand; and I
stood opposite her and watched the mobile hand, every little
dimple of it, and the network of delicate veins, and meanwhile
the music stole so tender and fervent into my heart, and I stood
and dreamed a dream of unspeakable happiness. And the music
grew ever more triumphant and powerful, melting away again.
into tones of yielding submission. I died, I lived, and died again;
eternities swept by me: and when I awoke, kindly she appeared
before me, standing, and begged me with a trembling voice to
put on her fingers again the rings which she had laid aside to
play the piano; and I did it, and pressed her hand to my lips.
and "Why," I said, "did you treat me so coldly yesterday? "
and she answered, “Forgive me - I was very naughty. "
What I have told thee here, dear reader, is not an event of
yesterday, or the day before; it is an old, old story, and thousands.
of years, many thousands of years, will roll away before it reaches
an end, a good end. For lo! time is without end, but the things
in time have an end; they can be scattered into the smallest
particles of dust, but these particles, the atoms even, have their
fixed number, and fixed likewise is the number of the forms
which out of them spontaneously body themselves forth; and
no matter how long it takes, according to the eternal laws of
combination in this play of eternal repetition, all forms which
have been upon this earth must again appear, must again attract,
repel, kiss, and ruin, afterwards as before.
And it will one day come to pass that again a man will be
born quite like me, and a woman be born quite like Marie,-
only I hope the man's head may contain somewhat less foolishness
than mine now, and the woman's heart somewhat more love than
Marie's; and in a better land these two shall meet and regard
each other long, and at last the woman, reaching out her hand,
will say in a soft voice, "Forgive me I was very naughty. "
Translation of Charles Harvey Genung.
-


## p. 7204 (#606) ###########################################

7204
HEINRICH HEINE
-
B
From The Hartz Journey. Translated by Charles G. Leland
LACK dress coats and silken stockings,
Snowy ruffles frilled with art,
Gentle speeches and embraces —
Oh, if they but held a heart!
GÖTTINGEN
Held a heart within their bosom,
Warmed by love which truly glows;
Ah! I'm wearied with their chanting
Of imagined lovers' woes!
I will climb upon the mountains,
Where the quiet cabin stands,
Where the wind blows freely o'er us,
Where the heart at ease expands.
I will climb upon the mountains,
Where the dark-green fir-trees grow;
Brooks are rustling, birds are singing,
And the wild clouds headlong go.
Then farewell, ye polished ladies,
Polished men and polished hall!
I will climb upon the mountain,
Smiling down upon you all.
THE town of Göttingen, celebrated for its sausages and uni-
versity, belongs to the King of Hanover, and contains nine.
hundred and ninety-nine dwellings, divers churches, a lying-in
asylum, an observatory, a prison, a library, and a "council cellar "
where the beer is excellent. The stream which flows by the
town is termed the Leine, and is used in summer for bath-
ing, its waters being very cold, and in more than one place
so broad that Luder was obliged to take quite a run before he
could leap across. The town itself is beautiful, and pleases most
when looked at- -backwards. It must be very ancient; for I well
remember that five years ago, when I matriculated there (and
shortly after "summoned "), it had already the same gray, old-
fashioned, wise look, and was fully furnished with beggars,
beadles, dissartations, tea-parties with a little dancing, washer-
women, compendiums, roasted pigeons, Guelphic orders, professors
--


## p. 7205 (#607) ###########################################

HEINRICH HEINE
7205
ordinary and extraordinary, pipe heads, court counselors, and law
counselors. Many even assert that at the time of the great
migration of races, every German tribe left a badly corrected
proof of its existence in the town, in the person of one of its
members; and that from these descended all the Vandals, Fries-
ians, Suabians, Teutons, Saxons, Thuringians, and others who
at the present day abound in Göttingen, where, separately dis-
tinguished by the color of their caps and pipe tassels, they may
be seen straying singly or in hordes along the Weender Street.
They still fight their battles on the bloody arena of the Rasen-
mill, Ritschenkrug, and Bovden, still preserve the mode of life
peculiar to their savage ancestors, and are still governed partly
by their Duces, whom they call "chief cocks," and partly by their
primevally ancient law-book, known as the 'Comment,' which
fully deserves a place among the legibus barbarorum.
The inhabitants of Göttingen are generally and socially divided
into Students, Professors, Philistines, and Cattle; the points of
difference between these castes being by no means strictly defined.
The cattle class is the most important. I might be accused of
prolixity should I here enumerate the names of all the students
and of all the regular and irregular professors: besides, I do
not just at present distinctly remember the appellations of all
the former gentlemen; while among the professors are many
who as yet have no name at all. The number of the Göttingen
Philistines must be as numerous as the sands (or, more correctly
speaking, as the mud) of the sea; indeed, when I beheld them
of a morning, with their dirty faces and clean bills, planted be-
fore the gate of the collegiate court of justice, I wondered greatly
that such an innumerable pack of rascals should ever have been
created.
·
•
It was as yet very early in the morning when I left Göt-
tingen, and the learned *** beyond doubt still lay in bed,
dreaming that he wandered in a fair garden, amid the beds of
which grew innumerable white papers written over with citations.
On these the sun shone cheerily, and he plucked them and
planted them in new beds, while the sweetest songs of the night-
ingales rejoiced his old heart.
Before the Weender Gate I met two native and diminutive
schoolboys, one of whom was saying to the other, "I don't intend
to keep company any more with Theodore: he is a low little
blackguard, for yesterday he didn't even know the genitive of


## p. 7206 (#608) ###########################################

7206
HEINRICH HEINE
mensa. " Insignificant as these words may appear, I still regard
them as entitled to record - nay, I would even write them as
town-motto on the gate of Göttingen; for the young birds pipe
as the old ones sing, and the expression accurately indicates the
narrow-minded academic pride so characteristic of the "highly
learned" Georgia Augusta.
Finding the next morning that I must lighten my knapsack,
I threw overboard the pair of boots, and arose and went forth
unto Goslar. There I arrived without knowing how. This much
alone do I remember, that I sauntered up and down hill, gazing
upon many a lovely meadow vale. Silver waters rippled and
rustled, sweet wood-birds sang, the bells of the flocks tinkled,
the many-shaded green trees were gilded by the sun; and over
all, the blue-silk canopy of heaven was so transparent that I
could look through the depths even to the Holy of Holies, where
angels sat at the feet of God, studying sublime thorough-bass in
the features of the Eternal countenance. But I was all the time
lost in a dream of the previous night, which I could not banish.
It was an echo of the old legend, how a knight descended
into a deep fountain, beneath which the fairest princess of the
world lay buried in a death-like magic slumber. I myself was
the knight, and the dark mine of Clausthal was the fountain.
Suddenly innumerable lights gleamed around me, wakeful dwarfs
leapt from every cranny in the rocks, grimacing angrily, cutting
at me with their short swords, blowing terribly on horns which
ever summoned more and more of their comrades, and frantically
nodding their great heads. But as I hewed them down with my
sword, and the blood flowed, I for the first time remarked that
they were not really dwarfs, but the red-blooming long-bearded
thistle-tops, which I had the day before hewed down on the
highway with my stick. At last they all vanished, and I came
to a splendid lighted hall, in the midst of which stood my heart's
loved one, veiled in white, and immovable as a statue. I kissed
her mouth, and then-O Heavens! -I felt the blessed breath
of her soul and the sweet tremor of her lovely lips. It seemed
that I heard the divine command, "Let there be light! " and a
dazzling flash of eternal light shot down, but at the same instant
it was again night, and all ran chaotically together into a wild
desolate sea! A wild desolate sea, over whose foaming waves the
ghosts of the departed madly chased each other, the white shrouds.
floating on the wind, while behind all, goading them on with


## p. 7207 (#609) ###########################################

HEINRICH HEINE
7207
cracking whip, ran a many-colored harlequin—and I was the har-
lequin. Suddenly from the black waves the sea monsters raised
their misshapen heads, and yawned towards me with extended
jaws, and I awoke in terror.
Alas! how the finest dreams may be spoiled! The knight in
fact, when he has found the lady, ought to cut a piece from her
priceless veil, and after she has recovered from her magic sleep
and sits again in glory in her hall, he should approach her and
say, "My fairest princess, dost thou not know me? " Then she
will answer, "My bravest knight, I know thee not! " And then
he shows her the piece cut from her veil, exactly fitting the defi-
ciency, and she knows that he is her deliverer, and both tenderly
embrace, and the trumpets sound, and the marriage is celebrated!
It is really a very peculiar misfortune that my love dreams so
seldom have so fine a conclusion.
THE SUPPER ON THE BROCKEN
From The Hartz Journey'
HE company around the table
quainted and much noisier.
gradually became better ac-
Wine banished beer, punch-
bowls steamed, and drinking, schmolliren,* and singing were
the order of the night. The old 'Landsfather' and the beautiful
songs of W. Müller, Rückert, Uhland, and others rang around,
with the exquisite airs of Methfessel. Best of all sounded our
own Arndt's German words, "The Lord, who bade iron grow,
wished for no slaves. " And out of doors it roared as if the old
mountain sang with us, and a few reeling friends even asserted
that he merrily shook his bald head, which caused the great
unsteadiness of our floor. The bottles became emptier and the
heads of the company fuller. One bellowed like an ox, a second
piped, a third declaimed from 'The Crime,' a fourth spoke Latin,
a fifth preached temperance, and a sixth, assuming the chair,
learnedly lectured as follows:- "Gentlemen, the world is a round
cylinder, upon which human beings as individual pins are scat-
tered apparently at random. But the cylinder revolves, the pins
knock together and give out tones, some very frequently and
others but seldom; all of which causes a remarkably complicated
sound, which is generally known as universal history. We will,
* Hobnobbing.
Τ


## p. 7208 (#610) ###########################################

7208
HEINRICH HEINE
in consequence, speak first of music, then of the world, and
finally of history, which latter we divide into positive and Spanish
flies >>> And so sense and nonsense went rattling on.
A jolly Mecklenburger, who held his nose to his punch-glass,
and smiling with happiness snuffed up the perfume, remarked
that it caused in him a sensation as if he were standing again
before the refreshment table in the Schwerin Theatre! Another
held his wine-glass like a lorgnette before his eye, and appeared
to be carefully studying the company, while the red wine trickled
down over his cheek into his projecting mouth. The Greifs-
walder, suddenly inspired, cast himself upon my breast, and
shouted wildly, "Oh that thou couldst understand me, for I am a
lover, a happy lover; for I am loved again, and G-d d—n me,
she's an educated girl, for she has a full bosom, wears a white
gown, and plays the piano! " But the Swiss wept, and tenderly
kissed my hand, and ever whimpered, "O Molly dear! O Molly
dear! "
During this crazy scene, in which plates learned to dance and
glasses to fly, there sat opposite me two youths, beautiful and
pale as statues, one resembling Adonis, the other Apollo. The
faint rosy hue which the wine spread over their cheeks was
scarcely visible. They gazed on each other with infinite affec-
tion, as if the one could read in the eyes of the other; and in
those eyes there was a light as though drops of light had fallen
therein from the cup of burning love which an angel on high
bears from one star to the other. They conversed softly with
earnest, trembling voices, and narrated sad stories, through all of
which ran a tone of strange sorrow. "Lora is also dead! " said
one, and sighing, proceeded to tell of a maiden of Halle who
had loved a student, and who, when the latter left Halle, spoke
no more to any one, ate but little, wept day and night, gazing
ever on the canary-bird which her lover had given her. "The
bird died, and Lora did not long survive it," was the conclusion,
and both the youths sighed as though their hearts would break.
Finally the other said, "My soul is sorrowful; come forth with
me into the dark night! Let me inhale the breath of the clouds
and the moon-rays. Partake of my sorrows! I love thee: thy
words are musical, like the rustling of reeds and the flow of
rivulets; they re-echo in my breast, but my soul is sorrowful! »
Both of the young men arose. One threw his arm around the
neck of the other, and thus left the noisy room. I followed, and


## p. 7209 (#611) ###########################################

HEINRICH HEINE
7209
saw them enter a dark chamber, where the one, by mistake,
instead of the window threw open the door of a large wardrobe;
and both, standing before it with outstretched arms, expressing
poetic rapture, spoke alternately. "Ye breezes of darkening
night," cried the first, "how ye cool and revive my cheeks! How
sweetly ye play amid my fluttering locks! I stand on the cloudy
peak of the mountain; far below me lie the sleeping cities of
men, and blue waters gleam. List! far below in the valley rustle
the fir-trees! Far above yonder hills sweep in misty forms the
spirits of my fathers. Oh that I could hunt with ye on your
cloud steeds through the stormy night, over the rolling sea,
upwards to the stars! Alas! I am laden with grief, and my soul
is sad! " Meanwhile, the other had also stretched out his arms
towards the wardrobe, while tears fell from his eyes as he cried
to a broad pair of yellow pantaloons which he mistook for the
moon: "Fair art thou, daughter of heaven! lovely and blessed is
the calm of thy countenance. Thou walkest lonely in thy loveli-
ness. The stars follow thy blue path in the east! At thy glance
the clouds rejoice, and their dark brows gleam with light. Who
is like unto thee in heaven, thou the night-born? The stars are
ashamed before thee, and turn away their green sparkling eyes.
Whither, ah whither, when morning pales thy face, dost thou
flee from thy path? Hast thou, like me, thy hall? Dwellest
thou amid shadows of sorrow? Have thy sisters fallen from
heaven? Are they who joyfully rolled with thee through the
night now no more? Yea, they fell adown, O lovely light! and
thou hidest thyself to bewail them! Yet the night must at some
time come when thou too must pass away, and leave thy blue
path above in heaven. Then the stars, who were once ashamed
in thy presence, will raise their green heads and rejoice. Now
thou art clothed in thy starry splendor and gazest adown from
the gate of heaven. Tear aside the clouds, O ye winds, that
the night-born may shine forth and the bushy hills gleam, and
that the foaming waves of the sea may roll in light!