Various

“ IT is Christmas Eve in a large city of Bavaria. Along the streets, white with snow, in the confusion of the fog, among the rattle of carriages and the ringing of bells, the crowd hurries joyously towards the open-air roast-meat shops, the holiday stalls and booths. Brushing with a light rustling sound the shops decorated with ribbons and flowers, branches of green holly and whole spruce trees covered with pendants move along in the arms of passers-by, rising above all the heads, like a shadow of the Thuringian Forests, a touch of nature in the artificial life of winter. Night is falling. ”

“ Days even in the middle of winter, and sometimes weeks, descend as it were from heaven to fill the soul with delight; and a lovely day in Rome is lovelier than under any other sky on earth. But just when foreigners go away in crowds, the weather is settling into the perfection of spring, and then it is that Rome is most charming. The rains are over, the sun is a daily blessing, all Nature is bursting into leaf and flower, and one may spend days on the Campagna without fear of colds and fever. Stay in Rome during May, if you wish to feel its beauty. ”

“ HE, from whose hand came man and woman,—HE, who strung the great harp of Existence with all its wild and wonderful and manifold chords, and attuned them to one another,—HE is the great Poet of life." Every impulse of beauty, of heroism, and every craving for purer love, fairer perfection, nobler type and style of being than that which closes like a prison-house around us, in the dim, daily walk of life, is God's breath, God's impulse, God's reminder to the soul that there is something higher, sweeter, purer, yet to be attained. ”

“ Midsummer raises its leafy arbor every where, yet it is most flush in the forest which extends for miles around. Our road goes for miles through that forest, without seeing a house, or the possibility of meeting travellers, driving, riding, or walking. Come! The ostler puts fresh horses to the carriage; come with us into the large woody desert: we have a regular trodden way to travel, the air is clear, here is summer's warmth and the fragrance of birch and lime. It is an up-and-downhill road, always bending, and so, ever changing, but yet always forest-scenery—the close, thick forest. ”

“ Olivia became known in the abodes of sorrow, and a deep power seemed given her to console the suffering and distressed. A deeper power of love sprung up within her; and love, though born of sorrow, ever brings peace with it. Many were the hearts that reposed on her; many the wandering that she reclaimed, the wavering that she upheld, the desolate that she comforted. As a soul in heaven may look back on earth, and smile at its past sorrows, so, even here, it may rise to a sphere where it may look down on the storm that once threatened to overwhelm it. ”

“ To soothe her leaving that dear home she ne'er might view again.
I saw her but a moment, yet methinks I see her now,
With a wreath of orange blossoms upon her snowy brow.
And once again I saw that brow, no bridal wreath was there,
The widow's sombre cap conceal'd her once luxuriant hair;
She weeps in silent solitude, for there is no one near,
To press her hand within his own, and wipe away the tear!
I see her broken-hearted, and methinks I see her now,
In the pride of youth and beauty, with a wreath upon her brow. ”

“ What a strange thing an old dead sin laid away in a secret drawer of the soul is! Must it some time or other be moistened with tears, until it comes to life again and begins to stir in our consciousness,—as the dry wheel-animalcule, looking like a grain of dust, becomes alive, if it is wet with a drop of water?
Or is it a passion? There are plenty of withered men and women walking about the streets who have the secret drawer in their hearts, which, if it were opened, would show as fresh as it was when they were in the flush of youth and its first trembling emotions. ”

“ Look round upon this buried meadow, and you will see emerging through the white surface a thousand stalks of grass, sedge, osmunda, golden-rod, mullein, Saint-John's-wort, plaintain, and eupatorium,—an allied army of the sun, keeping up a perpetual volley of innumerable rays upon the yielding snow.
It is their last dying service. We misplace our tenderness in winter, and look with pity upon the leafless trees. But there is no tragedy in the trees: each is not dead, but sleepeth; and each bears a future summer of buds safe nestled on its bosom, as a mother reposes with her baby at her breast. ”

“ When night came on, the Roumin lay down on his wolf-skin couch, where the golden-haired maiden, and her lover before her, had slept, but it seemed as if they had stolen his rest—he could not close his eyes there, so he rose and went out on the porch, where he spread his rug before the open door; but it was long ere he could sleep—there was an unwonted feeling at his heart, something like happiness, yet inexpressibly sad; and, buried in deep reverie, he lay with his eyes fixed on the dark blue starry vault above him till past midnight. ”

“ There is a woman, old, deformed, who takes a humble place among them: waiting like them: in her gray dress, her worn face, pure and meek, turned now and then to the sky. A woman much loved by these silent, restful people; more silent than they, more humble, more loving. Waiting: with her eyes turned to hills higher and purer than these on which she lives,—dim and far off now, but to be reached some day. There may be in her heart some latent hope to meet there the love denied her here,—that she shall find him whom she lost, and that then she will not be all-unworthy. ”

“ This power in the beauties of the natural world to excite and gratify the imagination, is emphatically the poetry of nature, sending out its appeal from every object which greets the eye. There is poetry in the pathless wood, when the summer breeze sweeps over the waves of its dark green foliage—in the bold scenery of the mountain’s height, inspiring the soul with feelings of grandeur and sublimity—in the green valley throwing a charm of hallowed tranquility around the spirit. ”

“ And we marry our human ideal, expecting the unbroken continuance of that harmony. But the discord comes; colours clash; the jarring note spoils the chord; the idol once accepted as of gold and precious stones, proves to be only common clay, thinly gilt. The diamonds are paste; the pearls are beads of glass filled with shining fishes' scales; and the love which we thought would be a practical reality for life, is nothing but a pleasing fiction, good for its day, and now dead and done with. The lover sees nothing as it is. ”

“ Here in Italy it is indeed so beautiful, suffering itself is here so beautiful,—in these ruinous marble palaces sighs sound far more romantically, than in our neat brick houses,—beneath yon laurel trees one can weep far more voluptuously, than under our surly, jagged pines,—and gaze with looks of far sweeter longing at the ideal cloud-landscapes of celestial Italy, than at the ash-gray, German work-day heaven, where the very clouds wear the looks of decent burghers, and yawn so tediously down upon us! Stay then in my heart, ye sorrows! Nowhere will you find a better lodging. ”

“ Przybyszewski despises happiness as something unworthy of an artist. A happy soul, he believes, is a miracle, the squareness of a circle, a whip made of sand. The soul is sombre, stormy, for it is the aching of passion and the madness of sweeps, living over ecstacies of boiling desire, the stupendous anxiety of depths and the boundless suffering of being. For the artist who creates the world not with his brain, but with his soul, all life is one “sale corvée,” a filthy burden, eternal horror, despair, and submission, fruitless struggle and impotent stumbling. ”

“ The outline of fire, which before was firm and motionless, now wavers and shakes as if it would pass away, as the wind blows the flames back and forth from the great cups by which it is lighted. From near and far the world looks on,—from the Piazza beneath, where carriages drive to and fro in its splendor, and the band plays and the bells toll,—from the windows and loggias of the city, wherever a view can be caught of this superb spectacle,—and from the Campagna and mountain towns, where, far away, alone and towering above everything, the dome is seen to blaze. ”

“ Fools as we all are, there are times when the cup of pleasure is as nauseous to the soul, as is wine to the sated palate of the morning reveler. Why is it, Apple, why is it that the first gay breath of spring is so saddening in its influence? Nature seems then to burst from her winter’s sleep, like a resurrection from the grave. The jocund earth puts on her brightest robes, as if soon to celebrate her nuptials with heaven. The pulse of existence beats high with new-born vigor, and the warm, bright blood runs riot through the renovated veins. ”

“ He lost all count of time; his wrist watch was smashed on his wrist. He ran through a reeling eternity, sobbing for breath, stumbling, tripping, fighting a leaden weariness; and ever the same unreasoning terror urged him on. The moon and ragged skyline swam about him; the blood drummed deafeningly in his ears, and his eyeballs felt as if they would burst from their sockets. He had nearly bitten his swollen tongue in two falling over an unseen peat-cutting, and blood-flecked foam gathered on his lips.
God, how he ran! But he was no longer among bog and heather. ”

“ The children of the spirit are amazed at the bat-blind inability to see the fact,—to see that life is more certain and enduring than matter, soul than sense. The organs of the body are changed, diseased, die; the body itself dies; generations of bodies die, but like a containing cord of silk, on which all the glittering beads of flesh are strung, there is the soul, the life, ever the same, persisting unchanged through all change, giving unity to diversity, moulding, making, discarding, choosing, healing, working to far-away ends with blind, and dead, and obstinate materials. ”

“ Do you promenade on the west side, as of yore, without a sigh, and gaze into those deserted windows, from which smiles and rose-tinted notes were showered down upon us with such munificence, without a thought of the fair hands and glad hearts which then gave a sort of sunlight to our devotion—the Mecca to which we turned in our morning prayers and evening rambles? Is it not a sad thought, that as we journey through life, the very innocency of boyhood, the first fresh feelings of the heart, are things of which it is conventional to be ashamed? ”

“ The eyes of the Dwarf rolled like little fire-balls in their cells—his cheeks grew paler and paler, and cold sweat poured down in a stream from his forehead. Nevertheless, he fiddled away incessantly—now merrily, now mournfully, now slowly, now quicker than ever. Every dancer had reason that night to thank his stars, if he left off without having thrown himself into a phthisic; for, when he once began, it was as easy for him to fly into the air as to come to a stand-still, until it pleased Klaus Stringstriker to make a pause with his fiddle. ”

“ They talked of former days, and, as they talked, an expression amounting almost to a smile rose to the face of the father. The sunshine, too, seemed to partake of their joy, streaming in more gaily through the narrow window, and playing, like a wilful but merry child fitfully across the floor; while a bird—a wanderer from green fields far away—pausing a moment outside the casement, poured forth such a gush of music that it thrilled the inmost hearts of the listeners with joy. Could the duke have seen them then how would he have envied them. ”

“ We seem to have entered into a new world, and to have lost by the transition all our old and more selfish feelings, so that now, every emotion of our heart is softened down to a gentle calm, in unison with the beauty and repose around us. There is a dreaminess in the landscape, thus half seen by the light of the moon, giving full play to the imagination. The spirit spurns this mortal tenement of clay, and soars upwards to a brighter world, holding fancied communion with the myriads of beatified spirits, which it would fain believe, hover in the air and whisper unseen into our souls. ”

“ Give the homage of admiration to every great man, whether he be a hero, a genius, or a saint.
When you see Napoleon on the battle-field, and look into his eye, and behold there the soul of the war-god that looks and conquers, forget for the moment his tyranny and selfishness, and let your soul shout unto his presence a shout of living enthusiasm, even as the war-cry of his own unconquered veterans when, in the battle, he rode amongst them in strength and majesty, like unto the archangel when he beat into hell the rebellious powers of heaven. ”

“ Yet, welcomed or not, there is no record of any female prose-writer's ever having lived who possessed more than a portion of that genius which permeated Elizabeth Sheppard's whole being. Genius,—the very word expresses her: in harmony with the great undertone of the universe, the soul suffused with light. Flower-warmth and fragrance are on her page, the soft low summer wind seems to be speaking with you as you read, her characters are like the stars impersonated, and still, however lofty her nature, always and forever genial. ”

“ Youth that's fled can none recapture;
Not with thought
Wisdom's bought.
Out on pride and scorn and sadness!
Give me laughter, give me gladness.
Sweetest Earth, I love and love thee,
Seas about thee, skies above thee,
Sun and storms,
Hues and forms
Of the clouds with floating shadows
On thy mountains and thy meadows.
Earth, there's none that can enslave thee,
Not thy lords it is that have thee;
Not for gold
Art thou sold,
But thy lovers at their pleasure
Take thy beauty and thy treasure. ”