On this page
-
Text (4)
-
Untitled Article
-
Untitled Article
-
Untitled Article
-
Untitled Article
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
-
-
Transcript
-
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
Untitled Article
of kindred ou their lips . In the mean time , let the beam and the mote be cast out , that together they may clearly discern the things of the ^ p ' , which it is their equal desire to understand .
Untitled Article
GENERAL LITERATURE . Art . V . — German Poetical Anthology , preceded by a concise History of German Poetry , and Short Notices of the Authors selected By A . Bernays . Second edition , improved London . 1831 .
What is prettier to the eye than clear German text on good English paper ? What is more attractive to the imagination than such groups of names as we here meet with at every page , —names which , all inharmonious as they may be , waken music in the soul of the true lover of poetry ? What can be more luxurious than to have all truth and beauty presented to us in the unpretending form of an Anthology ?
We speak not of Anthologies in general . We never saw a collection of Beauties in our own language , or in any oiher but German , that we could interest ourselves in for half an hour at a time : but German miuor pieces are unlike all others . If the principle be ever illustrated that " all is in all , " it is in those mysterious compositions in which , under
the appearance of a well-defined single form , manifold essences are concentrated —essences which change their aspect perpetually , as if the conceptions themselves were alive and stirring before the perceptive power . Thus Gothe brings all earthly life within the compass of fewer thoughts than serve some men in descanting ou their mistress ' s eyebrow . Thus Schiller suggests all heaven by slight references to whatever may have
happened to meet his eye , or recur to his memory , in the moments of his " high visitation . " The fact in , we suppose , that we except German from other Anthologies , because most of its component parts are not morsels , are not minor poems - , but as great as any number of volumes could make them , as important as any preluding invocation could iniimate . Where is the philosopher who can teach more of the intellect than the
Die Ideate of Schiller ? What can all the St . Sitnonites in all France propound on the fine aris that is not already concentrated in the Die Kiinstier of him to whom nature seems transparent , and all realities equally recognizable , whether material or spiritual ?
Untitled Article
Mr . Bernays has in nothing pleased us more than in his exaltatiou of Schiller . It almost enables us to forgive him for his inadequate appreciation of Wielaud , which is not a necessary concomitant of the just ceusure which that great man ' s warmest admirers never withhold . Exceeding , as we do , the praise that we now quote , it follows that we are pleased to meet with Schiller ' s name in so many departments of the work under notice . " If Gothe is the true poet of nature ; if he loves to paint man in his dependency on circumstances , with humiliating detail : if he knows the art of reconciling
us to our ' flat , stale , and unprofitable ' existence , as exemplified in this preaeut age ; SchiJJer delights to raise man from the abject state of mean reality , by stirring up within him every feeling of what is true , honourable , and great in his soul . No one can rise from the perusal of a tragedy of Schiller , ( with the exception , perhaps , of his two first , ) or even of oi . e of his shorter poems , without the conviction that he has conversed with one
of those exalted natures which Providence occasionally sends into the world to prevent its thorough corruption . ' —P . XXIV . This collection of poems appears to us as extensive as its purpose warrants , and it is ceitaiuly very rich . Its contents are arranged in four classes , — Epics ,
including Fables , Parables , and Narrative Poems : — Descriptive pieces , —Didactic pieces , —and Lyrics . It may be anticipated that all variety is here comprehended , from the light raillery of Pleffel to the solemn devotion of Klop * tock , and ( if we may venture to say so ) the sounder and more sympathetic piety of less ambitious poets—The assistance of the notes must be valuable to those who
cannot quite go alone in this land of beauties and wonders ; and it is to be hoped that the facilities afforded by works like this will induce many to discover for themselves how they have been misled by the general tone of translations from the German into our tongue , and how uutransfusable the best beauties of German composition are , and we imagine will ever be , as far as they are connected with the mode of expression .
Untitled Article
Critical Notices . — Miscellaneous . 281
Untitled Article
VOL . V . X
Untitled Article
Art . VI . — The Moorish Queen ; a liecord of Pompeii ; and other Poems . By Eleanor Suowden . pp 166 . Longman . 1831 . The descriptive beauties of Miss Snowden ' s poems afford assurance that she has that within which will in time prompt
-
-
Citation
-
Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), April 2, 1831, page 281, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2596/page/65/
-