Читать книгу The Greatest German Classics (Vol. 1-14) - Various - Страница 138

Endless, my friend, the projects which the soul

Burns to accomplish. We would every deed

At once perform as grandly as it shows

After long ages, when from land to land

The poet's swelling song hath roll'd it on.

It sounds so lovely what our fathers did,

When, in the silent evening shade reclin'd,

We drink it in with music's melting tones;

And what we do is, as their deeds to them,

Toilsome and incomplete!

Thus we pursue what always flies before;

We disregard the path in which we tread,

Scarce see around the footsteps of our sires,

Or heed the trace of their career on earth.

We ever hasten on to chase their shades,

Which, godlike, at a distance far remote,

On golden clouds, the mountain summits crown.

The man I prize not who esteems himself

Just as the people's breath may chance to raise him.

But thou, Orestes, to the gods give thanks.

That they through thee have early done so much.