[266]. American War.
[267]. Lord Heathfield.
[268]. [Parodied from Pope’s Prologue to Cato.—Ed.]
[269]. See The Robbers, a German tragedy [by Schiller], in which robbery is put in so fascinating a light, that the whole of a German University went upon the highway in consequence of it.
[270]. See Cabal and Love, a German tragedy [by Schiller], very severe against prime ministers and reigning Dukes of Brunswick. This admirable performance very judiciously reprobates the hire of German troops for the American war in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, a practice which would undoubtedly have been highly discreditable to that wise and patriotic princess, not to say wholly unnecessary—there being no American war at that particular time.
[271]. See The Stranger; or, Reformed Housekeeper, in which the former of these morals is beautifully illustrated; and Stella, a genteel German comedy [by Goethe], which ends with placing a man bodkin between two wives, like Thames between his two banks in The Critic. Nothing can be more edifying than these two dramas. I am shocked to hear that there are some people who think them ridiculous.
[272]. These are the warnings very properly given to readers, to beware how they judge of what they cannot understand. Thus if the translation runs, “lightning of my soul, fulgation of angels, sulphur of hell,” we should recollect that this is not coarse or strange in the German language when applied by a lover to his mistress; but the English has nothing precisely parallel to the original Mulychause Archangelichen, which means rather emanation of the archangelic nature—or to Smellmynkern Vankelfer, which, if literally rendered, would signify made of stuff of the same odour whereof the devil makes flambeaux. See Schüttenbrüch on the German idiom.
[273]. A manifest error, since it appears from the Waiter’s conversation (p. [211]) that Rogero was not doomed to starve on water-gruel, but on pease-soup, which is a much better thing. Possibly the length of Rogero’s imprisonment had impaired his memory; or he might wish to make things appear worse than they really were; which is very natural, I think, in such a case as this poor unfortunate gentleman’s.—Printer’s Devil.
[274]. Vide The Stranger.
[275]. Lovers’ Vows.