[Footnote 25: Could I have hazarded such a Germanism as the use of the word after-world, for posterity—"Es spreche Welt und Nachwelt meinen Namen" might have been rendered with more literal fidelity:—Let world and after-world speak out my name, etc.]
[Footnote 26: I have not ventured to affront the fastidious delicacy of our age with a literal translation of this line,
werth
Die Eingeweide schaudernd aufzureger.]
[Footnote 27: Anspessade, in German Gefreiter, a soldier inferior to a corporal, but above the sentinels. The German name implies that he is exempt from mounting guard.]
[Footnote 28: I have here ventured to omit a considerable number of lines. I fear that I should not have done amiss, had I taken this liberty more frequently. It is, however, incumbent on me to give the original, with a literal translation.
Weh denen, die auf Dich vertraun, an Dich
Die sichre Hütte illres Glückes lehnen,
Gelockt von deiner geistlichen Gestalt.
Schnell unverhofft, bei nächtlich stiller Weile
Gährts in dem tückschen Feuerschlunde, ladet
Sich aus mit tobender Gewalt, und weg
Treibt über alle Pflanzungen der Menschen
Der Wilde Strom in grausender Zerstörung.
WALLENSTEIN.
Du schilderst deines Vaters Herz. Wie Du's
Beschreibst, so ist's in seinem Eingeweide,
In dieser schwarzen Heuchlers Brust gestaltet.
O, mich hat Höllenkunst getäuscht! Mir sandte
Der Abgrund den verflecktesten der Geister,
Den Lügenkundigsten herauf, and stellt' ihn
Als Freund an meiner Seite. Wer vermag
Der Hölle Macht zu widerstehn! Ich zog
Den Basilisken auf an meinem Busen,
Mit meinem Herzblut nährt ich ihn, er sog
Sich schwelgend voll an meiner Liebe Brüsten,
Ich hatte nimmer Arges gegen ihn,
Weit offen liess ich des Gedankens Thore,
Und warf die Schlüssel weiser Vorsicht weg,
Am Sternenhimmel, etc.
LITERAL TRANSLATION
Alas! for those who place their confidence on thee, against thee lean the secure hut of their happiness, allured by thy hospitable form. Suddenly, unexpectedly, in a moment still as night, there is a fermentation in the treacherous gulf of fire; it discharges itself with raging force, and away over all the plantations of men drives the wild stream in frightful devastation.—WALLENSTEIN. Thou art portraying thy father's heart; as thou describest, even so is it shaped in his entrails, in this black hypocrite's breast. O, the art of hell has deceived me! The Abyss sent up to me the most spotted of the spirits, the most skilful in lies, and placed him as a friend by my side. Who may withstand the power of hell? I took the basilisk to my bosom, with my heart's blood I nourished him; he sucked himself glutfull at the breasts of my love. I never harbored evil toward him; wide open did I leave the door of my thoughts; I threw away the key of wise foresight. In the starry heaven, etc.—We find a difficulty in believing this to have been written by Schiller.]