Wherein do gods
Differ from mortals? 
In that the former
See endless billows
Heaving before them;
Us doth the billow
Lift up and swallow,
So that we perish.

Small is the ring
Enclosing our life,
And whole generations
Link themselves firmly
On to existence’s
Chain never-ending.

1789. *
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The godlike.

Noble be man,
Helpful and good! 
For that alone
Distinguisheth him
From all the beings
Unto us known.

Hail to the beings,
Unknown and glorious,
Whom we forebode! 
From his example
Learn we to know them!

For unfeeling
Nature is ever: 
On bad and on good
The sun alike shineth;
And on the wicked,
As on the best,
The moon and stars gleam.

Tempest and torrent,
Thunder and hail,
Roar on their path,
Seizing the while,
As they haste onward,
One after another.

Even so, fortune
Gropes ’mid the throng—­
Innocent boyhood’s
Curly head seizing,—­
Seizing the hoary
Head of the sinner.

After laws mighty,
Brazen, eternal,
Must all we mortals
Finish the circuit
Of our existence.

Man, and man only
Can do the impossible;
He ’tis distinguisheth,
Chooseth and judgeth;
He to the moment
Endurance can lend.

He and he only
The good can reward,
The bad can he punish,
Can heal and can save;
All that wanders and strays
Can usefully blend. 
And we pay homage
To the immortals
As though they were men,
And did in the great,
What the best, in the small,
Does or might do.

Be the man that is noble,
Both helpful and good. 
Unweariedly forming
The right and the useful,
A type of those beings
Our mind hath foreshadow’d!

1782.
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Miscellaneous poems.

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in the wares before you spread,
Types of all things may be read.
-----
The German Parnassus.

’Neath the shadow

Of these bushes,
On the meadow

Where the cooling water gushes. 
Phoebus gave me, when a boy,
All life’s fullness to enjoy. 
So, in silence, as the God
Bade them with his sov’reign nod,
Sacred Muses train’d my days
To his praise.—­
With the bright and silv’ry flood
Of Parnassus stirr’d my blood,
And the seal so pure and chaste
By them on my lips was placed.

With her modest pinions, see,
Philomel encircles me! 
In these bushes, in yon grove,

Calls she to her sister-throng,

And their heavenly choral song
Teaches me to dream of love.

Fullness waxes in my breast
Of emotions social, blest;
Friendship’s nurturedÄlove awakes,—­
And the silence Phoebus breaks
Of his mountains, of his vales,
Sweetly blow the balmy gales;
All for whom he shows affection,
Who are worthy his protection,
Gladly follow his direction.