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Driving far off each thing of sin and guilt,
And in clear dream and solemn vision,
Tell her of things that no gross ear can hear;
Till oft converse with heavenly habitants
Begun to cast a beam on the outward shape,
The unpolluted temple of the mind,
And turns it by degrees to the soul's essence
Till all be made immortal; but when Lust,
By unchaste looks, loose gestures and foul talk,
But most by lewd and lavish act of sin,
Lets in defilement to the inward parts,
The soul grows clotted by contagion,
Imbodies and imbrutes, till she quite lose
The divine property of her first being,
Such are those thick and gloomy shadows damp,
Oft seen in charnel vaults and sepulchres,
Lingering, and sitting by a new-made grave,
As loth to leave the body that it loved,
And link'd itself by carnal sensuality
To a degenerate and degraded state."

The reader of this beautiful passage, who is familiar with Plato will hardly need to be referred to the sources whence much of it is drawn, particularly the Phædon, Chap. xxx., where Socrates, describing the condition of the soul of the sensualist after death, represents it as still contaminated by those gross and corporeal elements to which it has been so attached: "By which," he adds, "it is weighed down, and filled with dread of the unseen and spiritual world: it remains in the regions of sense, hovering about monuments and sepulchres, about which, you know, there are frequently seen shadowy apparitions of souls-images such as are presented by those souls that depart from the body not purified but partaking of the visible and grosser element."

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"But I prattle something too wildly." I did not intend to offer my reader a homily on Plato; though I do intend to do it ere the waning of many moons; but to treat myself, and I hope also my reader with a morceau or two from our old German friends Goethe and Schiller. It is now summer. "The leafy month of June," is once more in our midst, and "the Maiden from afar,' is once more among us, scattering not indeed her fruits but her flowers. By the way, who can explain Schiller's allegory? Who is represented by the Maiden from abroad? I might, but will not now, hazard a conjecture, but will translate the ballad and let the reader do his own guessing.

THE MAIDEN FROM ABROAD.

Within a vale, 'mid humble swains,

Appeared, when spring first decked the glade,
And earliest larks pour'd forth their strains,
A beautiful and wondrous maid.

She was not in that valley reared;

The region whence she came unknown;
Yet scarce the maid had disappeared,
When every trace of her was flown.

Joy followed where her form was seen,
All hearts expand to greet the maid;
Yet still her high and stately mien

All free companionship forbade

And fruits and flowers her hands convey,
Which in more genial climates grow;
Where brighter sun-light gilds the day,
And richer charms of nature glow.

Her gifts with all she freely shared ;

Here fruits, there flowers, her hand bestows;
The youth, the old man silver-haired,
Each gladdened by her bounty goes.

A welcome kind each guest receives;
Yet sought two loving hearts her bowers,
To them her choicest fruits she gives;
On them bestows her loveliest flowers.

Speaking of flowers, reminds me of Goethe's sweet little ballad, "das Blümlein Wünderschön," in which the flowers are personified, and sustain their several parts with admirable propriety. They go through all gradations, from the queenly pride of the rose, to the unaffected and profound humility of the violet. The lover, whether of flowers or of poetry, must always read this ballad with fresh pleasure. Like most of Goethe's little pieces, it has an exquisite finish and charm of language, which no translator will have the vanity to dream of rivalling. The plastic hand of Goethe works his plastic language into forms of wondrous and inimitable beauty.

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Not slight the pangs my heart has felt
For when in freedom's light I dwelt,
That flower was ever near me.

From these high walls each weary hour,
I gaze the landscape over;

But from its steeps my darling flower
I nowhere can discover;

And who shall bring it before my sight,
Or be he page, or be he knight,

Shall aye be my heart's best lover.

THE ROSE.

Beneath thy lattice, here blooming bright,
I list the words thou speakest:
'Tis surely me, poor noble knight,
'Tis me, the rose, thou seekest.
Thou bearest ever a lofty mind;

The Queen of flowers must surely find
A throne in a heart so noble.

COUNT.

All praise beseems thy crimson dyes,
With their green leaflets blended;
The maiden doth thy garland prize,
As gold or jewels splendid.

Thou lendest a charm to the fairest face,
But thou art not the flower whose grace
Attracts my heart's devotion.

THE LILY.

The red rose flaunts, with haughty crest,

Her sister flowerets over :

Yet are the lily's charms confest,

By many a tender lover.

Who bears a heart from falsehood free,

And is all chaste and pure like me,

Will soon hold me the dearest.

COUNT.

And chaste and pure, methinks am I,
No guilty passion feeling;
Yet here in prison must I lie,
And ceaseless tears be stealing.
Thou art to me an image rare,
Of many a maiden pure and fair;
Yet I know a flower still dearer.

THE PINK.

That I, the pink, must surely be,
In the keeper's garden growing;
Else why should the old man tend on me,
Such ceaseles care bestowing?

With my circle of leaves in a beautiful throng,
And perfume so sweet my whole life long,
And my thousand hues so glowing?

COUNT.

The pink, one surely may not slight;
All honor the gardener yields her;
Now must her petals court the light,
Now from the sun he shields her,
Yet 'tis no nursed and gaudy flower,
To soothe this anguished heart has power;
'Tis a quiet-blooming floweret.

THE VIOLET.

Concealed and low my head I bow,
Nor e'er have gladly spoken;
And yet, methinks, 'tis time that now
My silence deep be broken.

Thou noble man, if I am thy flower
How it pains me that I have not power
To send thee up my fragrance.

COUNT.

The violet sweet-I love it well,
So fragrant and so lowly;

Yet more is needed to dispel

My bitter melancholy;

And now the truth I'll tell you here,
Grows not on these rock-heights so drear
The flower my heart delights in.

But the truest wife on earth that dwells,
By the brook below doth wander;
And many a sigh her bosom swells,
Till my bonds are burst asunder.

And when she breaks a little blue flower,
And says, "Forget-me-not-its power
I feel in the far off distance.

Yes, faithful love's mysterious tie

Nor distance nor time may sever;

Hence, though in the dungeon's gloom I lie,
The light of hope burns ever;

And e'en when my heart is breaking in twain,
"Forget-me-not!" I respond again,
And life to my bosom returneth.

Schiller's "Knight Toggenburg," has been, I believe, several times translated, but it will bear another trial. Campbell has a somewhat different version of the story. The hero of his poem is Roland, which I believe is the

name handed down by the legend. By what monstrous perversity of taste Schiller was led to adopt the barbarous soubriquet of "Toggenburg," it is difficult to imagine. The poem informs us that "the name of the Toggenburg frightened the Musselmen;" and in this the Musselmen showed their taste, if they did not their courage. However, abating the matter of the name, the ballad is a beautiful and tender one; and the following version, if it have no other merits, is at least, I think, sufficiently literal.

KNIGHT TOGGENBURG.

Knight, a sister's pure devotion
Thine shall e'er remain ;
Ask no tenderer emotion,
Since it gives me pain;
Let me still with tranquil feeling
See thee come and go;
Why that silent tear is stealing,
Nay, I must not know.

Mute with grief her words he catches,
While his heart-strings bleed ;
One last fond embrace he snatches,
Springs upon his steed;

Summons from their alpine legions

All his vassal band;

And to join the sacred regions,
Seeks the Holy Land.

Many a mighty deed achieveth
There the warrior knight;

Still his helmet's plumage waveth
O'er the thickest fight.

Paynim bands, with terror quailing,
List the hero's name ;

Yet his heart its grief unfailing
Nurses still the same.

Thus for one long year he bore him,
Bears his grief no more:

Peace, pursued, still flies before him,

And he seeks the shore,

Where a ship, with canvass swelling,

Lies on Joppa's strand;

Wafts him toward the loved one's dwelling ;-
Seeks that hallowed land.

Where her castle-turrets meet him,

List the pilgrim's knock;

Oh, what dreadful tidings greet him,
Like a thunder shock !

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