Historic Heidelberg – 1815, Carl Anton Joseph Rottman
An die Sonne
Regal morning sun,
I greet you in your bliss,
I greet you heartily in your splendour!
The hills are already flowing with the gold
of your robes, and the birds
in every wood are all awake.
Everything feels your blessing;
the meadows beneath you sing;
everything becomes harmony:
and you listen with pleasure to the choir
of the merry woods; o listen,
listen also to my song of praise.
The Battle of Nations
.
PRAYER DURING BATTLE
.
(1813)
.
Father, I call to thee.
The roaring artillery's clouds thicken round me,
The hiss and the glare of the loud bolts confound me.
Ruler of battles, I call on thee
O Father, lead thou me!
.
O Father, lead thou me;
To victory, to death, dread Commander, O guide me;
The dark valley brightens when thou art beside me;
Lord, as thou wilt, so lead thou me.
God, I acknowledge thee.
.
God, I acknowledge thee;
When the breeze through the dry leaves of autumn is moaning,
When the thunder-storm of battle is groaning,
Fount of mercy, in each I acknowledge thee.
O Father, bless thou me!
.
O Father, bless thou me;
I trust in thy mercy, whate'er may befall me;
'Tis thy word that hath sent me; that word can recall me.
Living or dying, O bless thou me!
Father, I honor thee.
.
Father, I honor thee;
Not for earth's hoards or honors we here are contending;
All that is holy our swords are defending;
Then falling, and conquering, I honor thee.
God, I repose in thee.
.
God, I repose in thee;
When the thunders of death my soul are greeting,
When the gashed veins bleed, and the life is fleeting,
In thee, my God, I repose in thee.
Father, I call on thee.
, .
.
..I have learned to look on Nature . . .
as a presence that disturbs me
with the joy of elevated thoughts;
a sense sublime…
.
Whose dwelling is the light of Setting Suns,
and the round ocean,
and the living air,
and the blue sky,
and in the mind of Man:
.
A motion and a spirit that impels
all thinking things,
all objects of all thought,
and rolls through all things.
,
Therefore am I still a lover of the meadows,
the woods and mountains;
and of all that we behold from this green earth . . .
.
Well pleased to recognize in nature
and the language of the sense
the anchor of my purest thoughts,
the nurse, the guide,
the guardian of my heart, and soul,
of all my moral being.
. William Wordsworth, 1798
Thought goes before the deed as lightning precedes thunder.
German thunder is indeed German, and not in a hurry,
and it comes rolling slowly onward;
but come it will,
and when ye hear it crash as naught ever crashed before
in the whole history of the world,
then know that der deutsche Donner,
our German thunder,
has at last hit its mark.
At that sound the eagles will fall dead from on high,
the lions in remotest deserts in Africa will draw in their tails
and creep into their royal caves.
There will be played in Germany a drama compared to which
the French Revolution will be only an innocent idyll.
Just now all is tolerably quiet,
and if here and there someone behaves in a lively manner,
do not believe that the great actors have as yet
appeared upon the stage.
They are only the little dogs who run round in the amphitheatre,
and bark and bite one another,
before the hour begins when the great array of gladiators will enter,
and war to the death … or for life.
Heinrich Heine, 1834
Napoleon III. and Bismarck on the way to Wilhelm I on the morning after the battle of Sedan. Wilhelm Camphausen, 1877.
Excerpt, “German Classics of the 19th and 20th Centuries,” Vol. X, 1914; translator Charlton T. Lewis et al.
If we are not unmeasured in our claims
And do not imagine we have conquered the world,
We shall achieve a peace that is worth the trouble.
Otto von Bismarck
Minister-President Otto von Bismarck; Minister of War Albrecht von Roon;
Helmuth Karl von Moltke, Chief of the Prussian General Staff.
Excerpt, “German Classics of the 19th and 20th Centuries,” Vol. X, 1914; translator Charlton T. Lewis et al.
Adrian Ludwig Richter – Mädchen auf der Wiese – 1823
Liebesbotschaft
Clouds that hurry toward the East,
where the one who’s mine is waiting,
all my wishes, my hopes and songs
shall fly with you on your wings,
shall steer you, hurrying ones, to her
so that my chaste love
shall think of me with loyal love.
.
Sing morning dreams to her still,
float gently in the garden,
sink like dew into the shadowy room,
strew pearls upon the flowers and trees
so that to that wonderful being, if she passes by,
all the merry blossoms
shall open with even brighter splendor.
.
And in the evening, in the silent calm,
spread the sinking sun’s light upon her!
.
It shall paint you purple and gold;
And in the sea, bright with glow and sunbeams,
the little ship plies its way,
so that she believes singing angels
are preserving her.
.
Yes, it may well be angels,
if my heart were pure like hers;
All my wishes, my hopes and songs
are drawn there on your wings,
are steered there by you, hurrying ones,
to my chaste love,
so that I alone may think of her.
.
The tyrants of the world from hell’s abysm
Summoned the demons of revenge and pride,
The countless hosts in whom they did confide, –
And gathering round the flag of despotism
The priest, the slave, and the liberticide, –
All who had bound men’s souls within their den, –
Tore down the loftiest cedar of the height,
The tree sublime; and, drunk with anger then,
Threatened in ghastly bands our few astonished men.
.
The little ones, confounded, trembled then
At their appalling fury; and their brow
Against the Lord of Hosts these impious men
Uplifting, sought with Heaven-insulting vow,
The triumph of thy people’s overthrow, –
Their armed hands extending, and their crest
Moving omnipotent, because that thou
Wert as a tower of refuge, to invest
All whom man’s quenchless hope had prompted to resist.
.
Thou said those insolent and scornful ones;
“Knows not this earth the vengeance of our wrath,
The strength of our illustrious fathers’ thrones?
Or did the Roman power avail? Or hath
Rebellious Greece, in her triumphant path,
Scattered the seeds of freedom on your land?
Italia!Austria!Who shall save you both?
Is it your God? – Ha ha!Shall he withstand
The glory of our might, our conquering right hand?
.
“Our Rome, now tamed and humbled, into tears
And psalms converts her songs of freedom’s rights;
And for her sad and conquered children fears
The carnage of more Cannae’s fatal fights,
Now Asia with her discord disunites;
Spain threatens with her horrors to asail
All who still harbour Moorish proselytes;
Each nation’s throne a traitor crew doth veil;
And, though in concord joined, what could their might avail?
.
“Earth’s haughtiest nations tremble and obey,
And to our yoke their necks in peace incline.
And peace, for their salvation, of us pray,
Cry, ‘Peace!’ but that means death, when monarchs sign.
Vain is their hope!Their lights obscurely shine!
Their valiant gone, their virgins in our powers,
Their glories to our sceptres they resign:
From Nile to Euphrates and Tiber’s towers.
.
Whate’er the all-seeing sun looks down on, all is ours.”
“Thou, Lord! Who wilt not suffer that thy glory
They should usurp who in their might put trust,
Hearing the vauntings of these anarchs hoary,
These holy ones beheld, whose horrid lust
Of triumph did thy sacred altars crust
With blood; nor wouldst thou longer that the base
Should he permitted to oppress thy just,
Then, mocking, cry to Heaven, “Within what place
Abides the God of these? Where hideth he his face?”
.
For the due glory of thy righteous name,
For the just vengeance of thy race oppressed,
For the deep woes the wretched loud proclaim,
In pieces hast thou dashed the dragon’s crest,
And clipped the wings of the destroying pest:
Back to his cave he draws his poisonous fold,
And trembling hisses; then in torpid breast
Buries his fear:for thou, to Babel sold
Captive, no more on earth thy Zion wilt behold.
.
Portentous Egypt, now with discord riven,
The avenging fire and hostile spear affright;
And the smoke, mounting to the light of heaven,
O’erclouds her cities in its pall of night:
In tears and solitude she mourns the sight,
But thou, O Graecia! The fierce tyrant’s stay,
The glory of her excellence and might,
Dost thou lament, old Ocean Queen, thy prey,
Nor fearing God, dost seek thine own regenerate day?
.
Wherefore, ingrate, didst thou adorn thy daughters
In foul adultery with an impious race?
Why thus confederate in the unholy slaughters
Of those whose burning hope is thy disgrace?
With mournful heart, yet hypocritic face,
Follow the life abhorred of that vile crew?
God’s sharpened sword thy beauty shall efface,
Falling in vengeance on thy neck.O, who,
Thou lost one his right hand in mercy shall subdue?
.
But thou, O pride of ocean! Lofty Tyre!
Whoin thy ships so high and glorious stood,
O’ershadowing earth’s limits, and whose ire
With trembling filled this orb’s vast multitude;
How have ye ended, fierce and haughty brood?
What power hath marked your sins and slaveries foul,
Your neck until this cruel yoke subdued?
.
God, to avenge us, clouds thy sunlike soul,
And causes on thy wise this blinding storm to roll.
Howl, ships of Tarsus, howl! For, lo! Destroyed
Lies your high hope.Oppressors of the free!
Lost is your strength, your glory is defied.
Thou tyrant-shielder, who shall pity thee?
.
And thou, O Asia! Who didst bow the knee
To Baal, in vice immerged, who shall atone
For thy idolatries?For God doth see
Thine ancient crimes, who silent prayers have flown
For vengeance unto Heaven before his judgment throne.
Those who behold thy mighty arms when shattered,
And Ocean flowing naked of thy pines,
Over his weary waves triumphant scattered
So long, but now wreck-strewn, in awful signs,
Shall say, beholding thy deserted shrines,
“Who ‘gainst the fearful One hath daring striven?
.
The Lord of our Salvation their designs
O’erturned, and, for the glory of his heaven,
To man’s devoted race this victory hath given.”