Thy life was centred in it,”
murmured Theophilus, smiling sadly.
Schiller started and looked inquiringly at the youth, who, in so strange a coincidence of thought, had given expression to his despair in lines taken from the same poem from which the poet had repeated a verse in his hour of trial.
“Are the lines you have just uttered your own?” asked Schiller.
“No,” replied the youth, softly, “from whence should such inspiration come to me. The lines are from Schiller’s poem, ‘To Resignation,’ from the pen of the poet who is the favorite of the gods and muses, the poet who is adored by all Germany.”
“Do you know this Frederick Schiller, of whom you speak with such admiration?”
“No, I have never seen him, nor do I desire to see him! I love and adore him as a sublime spirit, as a disembodied genius. I would, perhaps, envy him if he should appear before me in human form.”
“Envy him, and why?”
“Because he is the chosen, the happy one! I do not wish to see the poet in bodily form; I do not wish to know that he eats and drinks like other men!”