So gentle, and pure, and fair;
I gaze on thee, and sadness
Comes over me unaware.
I feel, as though I should lay, sweet,
My hands on thy head with a prayer,
That God may keep thee, my darling,
As gentle, and pure, and fair[[170-2]].
Several poems of Heine, which are coloured with what is called in modern phrase the “Weltschmerz,” show even more clearly that their author has inherited something of the sombre spirit of the prophets. Any one who has, for instance, read the Book of Lamentations, or the 137th Psalm beginning with the words “By the river of Babylon there we sat down, and when we thought of Zion our tears did flow,” will hardly fail to detect an identity of feeling in the fine verses of Heine on Zion. One of these poems runs in the original German as follows:—
Brich aus in tiefe Klagen,
Du düsteres Martyrlied,