Название: Goethe and Schiller
Автор: L. Muhlbach
Издательство: Bookwire
Жанр: Языкознание
isbn: 4064066249236
isbn:
“Can do nothing but pray and scold,” exclaimed Schiller, emphatically. “There you see what an unworthy, trifling fellow I am. All the hopes which my family and friends entertained for me, yes, which I entertained for myself and my talents, are blighted, dissolved in smoke like burning straw. Nothing real is left but the burden of my debts, and my poverty. My good Oswald, you have had the weakness to believe in me, and to accept a draft on my future. To your own detriment, you must now perceive that this draft is worthless, and that my father was right in reproaching me for having had the temerity to attempt to make a German poet out of a Wurtemberg regimental surgeon.”
“Do not speak so, Frederick Schiller,” exclaimed Streicher, indignantly. “Your words are blasphemous; and all Germany would be angry with you if it heard them!”
“But all Germany would take good care not to pay my debts. While I, in holy and true disinterestedness, am ready to consecrate my whole being to the service of my country, and to devote all the powers of my mind and talents to its benefit, its instruction and entertainment, if I should demand of the German nation that it should also bring me an offering, that each individual who had read and seen my tragedies should give me a groschen, each one would deny that he had ever seen or read them, and, with a shrug of his shoulders, would turn from the beggar who had the temerity to require any thing of the public but its applause and its momentary delight. My friends, I am very miserable, for you must know that this is not the only large debt which troubles me. There were other noble souls who had confidence in my success, and allowed themselves to be bribed by ‘The Robbers.’ My noble friend, Madame von Wolzogen, who gave the homeless one an asylum on her estate in Bauerbach, when he had fled from Ludwigsburg, did more than this. When, after a sojourn of seven months in her beautiful Tusculum, I marched out into the world again, she loaned me two hundred florins, which I solemnly promised to return in a year. The year has expired, my noble friend depends on this sum to make a necessary payment on a mortgage which is attached to her estate, and I am not able to keep my word. I must expect her to consider me a swindler who has cheated her with empty promises!”
“No, Madame von Wolzogen will not think so, for she knows you,” exclaimed Streicher, indignantly.
“She will be as far from thinking so as I am,” said Oswald Schwelm, gently. “It is not your fault that you are in pecuniary difficulties; the blame does not attach to you, but to the German public, to the German nation, which allows its poets to suffer want, even while enraptured with their works. The German people are prodigal with laurels and wreaths, but cannot be taught that laurels do not sustain life, and that wreaths are of no avail to the poet if they do not also prepare a home for him, where he can await the muses at his ease, and rest on his laurels. Ah, Frederick Schiller, when I see how you, one of the noblest of poets, are tormented by the want of a paltry sum of money, my eyes fill with tears of compassion, not for you, but for the German fatherland, which disowns its most exalted sons, while it worships the foreigner and gives a warm reception to every stranger charlatan who condescends to come and pocket German money for his hackneyed performances.”
“No, no,” said Schiller, hastily. “You must not abuse and condemn the object of my highest and holiest love. As a true son never reviles his mother, even when he believes that she has been unjust to him, so the true son of Germany must never scold his sublime mother, but must love her tenderly and endearingly, even if she should accord him nothing but a cradle and a grave. As we say, ‘what God does is well done,’ we must also say what Germania does is well done. And believe me, my friends, if I truly deserve it, and if, as you say, and I hope, I am really a poet, the German fatherland will smile upon me, and give me the bread of life for the manna of poetry. Men will not let him die of hunger to whom the gods have given the kiss of immortality.”
“Amen,” said Streicher, with a slight touch of derision.
“Yes, amen,” repeated Schiller, smiling. “It was well, friend Oswald, that you awakened the patriot in me by your indignation in my behalf, for the patriot has helped me to overlook my little earthly necessities. My friends, be patient and indulgent with me. Better times are coming, and if I am really a poet the gods will take pity on me, and a day of recognition and renown will also come! To be sure, I have nothing to offer you at present but hope. The draft on the future is all I can give you, my good Oswald, for the money you loaned me.”
“This draft is, in my eyes, the most beautiful coin,” said Oswald Schwelm, heartily, “and truly it is not your fault that my hard-hearted creditor cannot take the same view of the matter, but demands payment for the publication of ‘The Robbers.’ Well, we will speak of it no more. Forgive me, Schiller, for having caused you disquiet by coming here. But, as I said before, I did not think of the ingratitude of the German fatherland, but only of the German poet who had given it ‘The Robbers,’ ‘Fiesco,’ and ‘Louise Müllerin;’ and I hoped that applause had made him rich. Give me your hand, Schiller, and let us say farewell.”
“And what will you do, my poor friend?” asked Schiller, feelingly. “Will you return to Stuttgart, where the hard-hearted creditor awaits you?”
“No, no,” answered Oswald, “I will not return to Stuttgart, for the warrant of arrest would hang over my head like the sword of Damocles! I will go to Carlsruhe, where I have an old uncle, and will endeavor to soften his heart. Do not trouble yourself about me, my friend; and may your cheerfulness and the creative power of the poet not for a single moment be darkened by the remembrance of me! We prosaic sons of humanity are often aided by accident, and find some little avenue of escape from the embarrassments of life, while you poets march through the grand portals into the temple of fame, where you are more exposed to the attacks of enemies. Farewell, friend Schiller, and may great Jupiter ever be with you!”
“Adieu, friend Schwelm!” said Schiller, extending his hand and gazing sadly at his kind, open countenance. “You assume to be gay, in order to hide your anxiety; but I see through the veil which friendship and the goodness of your heart have prompted you to assume, and behind СКАЧАТЬ