Читать книгу The Greatest German Classics (Vol. 1-14) - Various - Страница 1261

Who lives, doth much experience glean;

By naught in this world will he be surprised;

Already in my travel-years I've seen

Full many a race of mortals crystallized.

WAGNER (still gazing intently on the phial)

It mounts, it glows, and doth together run,

One moment, and the work is done!

As mad, a grand design at first is view'd;

But we henceforth may laugh at fate,

And so a brain, with thinking-power embued,

Henceforth your living thinker will create.

(Surveying the phial with rapture)

The glass resounds, with gracious power possessed;

It dims, grows clear; living it needs must be!

And now in form of beauty dressed,

A dainty mannikin I see.

What more can we desire, what more mankind?

Unveiled is now what hidden was of late;

Give ear unto this sound, and you will find,

A voice it will become, articulate.—

HOMUNCULUS (in the phial, to WAGNER)

Now, Fatherkin, how goes it? 'Twas no jest!

Come, let me to thy heart be fondly pressed—

Lest the glass break, less tight be thine embrace

This is the property of things: the All

Scarcely suffices for the natural;

The artificial needs a bounded space.

(To MEPHISTOPHELES)

But thou, Sir Cousin, Rogue, art thou too here?

At the right moment! Thee I thank. 'Tis clear

To us a happy fortune leadeth thee;

While I exist, still must I active be,

And to the work forthwith myself would gird;

Thou'rt skill'd the way to shorten.