WALLENSTEIN.
'Du schilderst deines Vaters Herz. Wie Du's
Beschreibst, so ist's in seinem Eingeweide,
In dieser schwarzen Heuchlers Brust gestaltet.
Oh, mich hat Hoellenkunst getaeuscht! Mir sandte
Der Abgrund den verflecktesten der Geister,
Den Luegenkundigsten herauf, und stellt' ihn
Als Freund an meiner Seite. Wer vermag
Der Hoelle Macht zu widersthn! Ich zog
Den Basilisken auf an meinem Busen,
Mit meinem Herzblut naehrt' ich ihn, er sog
Sich schwelgend voll an meiner Liebe Bruesten,
Ich hatte nimmer Arges gegen ihn,
Weit offen liess ich des Gedankens Thore,
Und warf die Schluessel weiser Vorsicht weg,
Am Sternenhimmel,' etc.
LITERAL TRANSLATION.
'Alas! for those who place their confidence on thee, against thee
lean their secure hut of their fortune, allured by thy hospitable
form. Suddenly, unexpectedly, in a moment still as night, there is
a fermentation in the treacherous gulf of fire; it discharges
itself with raging force, and away over all the plantations of men
drives the wild stream in frightful devastation.'
WALLENSTEIN.-'Thou art portraying thy father's heart; as thou
describest, even so is it shaped in its entrails, in this black
hypocrite's breast. Oh, the art of hell has deceived me! The abyss
sent up to me the most the most spotted of the spirits, the most
skilful in lies, and placed him as a friend by my side. Who may
withstand the power of hell? I took the basilisk to my bosom, with
my heart's blood I nourished him; he sucked himself glutfull at the
breasts of my love. I never harbored evil towards him; wide open
did I leave the door of my thoughts; I threw away the key of wise
foresight. In the starry heaven, etc.' We find a difficulty in
believing this to have been written by Schiller.
[6] This is a poor and inadequate translation of the affectionate
simplicity of the original-
Sie alle waren Fremdlinge, Du warst
Das Kind des Hauses.
Indeed the whole speech is in the best style of Massinger.
O si sic omnia!
[7] It appears that the account of his conversion being caused by
such a fall, and other stories of his juvenile character, are not
well authenticated.
[8] We doubt the propriety of putting so blasphemous a statement in the
mouth of any character.-T.
[9] [This soliloquy, which, according to the former arrangement,
constituted the whole of scene ix., and concluded the fourth act,
is omitted in all the printed German editions. It seems probable
that it existed in the original manuscript from which Mr. Coleridge
translated.-ED.]
[10] The soliloquy of Thekla consists in the original of six-and-twenty
lines twenty of which are in rhymes of irregular recurrence. I
thought it prudent to abridge it. Indeed the whole scene between
Thekla and Lady Neubrunn might, perhaps, have been omitted without
injury to the play.-C.
[11] These four lines are expressed in the original with exquisite
felicity:-
Am Himmel ist geschaeftige Bewegung.
Des Thurmes Fahne jagt der Wind, schnell geht
Der Wolken Zug, die Mondessichel wankt
Und durch die Nacht zuckt ungewisse Helle.
The word 'moon-sickle' reminds me of a passage in Harris, as quoted
by Johnson, under the word 'falcated.' 'The enlightened part of the
moon appears in the form of a sickle or reaping-hook, which is while
she is moving from the conjunction to the opposition, or from the
new moon to the full: but from full to a new again the enlightened
part appears gibbous, and the dark falcated.'
The words 'wanken' and 'schweben' are not easily translated. The
English words, by which we attempt to render them, are either vulgar
or antic, or not of sufficiently general application. So 'der
Wolken Zug'-The Draft, the Procession of Clouds. The Masses of the
Clouds sweep onward in swift stream.
[12] A very inadequate translation of the original:-
Verschmerzen werd' ich diesen Schlag, das weiss ich,
Denn was verschmerzte nicht der Mensch!
LITERALLY.
I shall grieve down this blow, of that I'm conscious:
What does not man grieve down?
