Thy beginning is one with that of the woman.
Yet, alas! thou sufferest, although thy agony brings nought to the birth, and avails thee nothing.
The groans of the lowest beggar are counted in heaven, compensated amid the music of angels' harps—but thy sighs, thy despair, fall into the bottomless abyss, and Satan gathers them together, and joyfully adds them to the pile of his own lies and delusions—and the Lord will deny and disown them, as they have denied and disowned the Lord!
But not for this do I pity thee, spirit of Poetry, mother of Beauty and Freedom! No. I mourn for the unhappy souls who are forced to remember or divine thee upon chaotic worlds destined to destruction—alas! thou ruinest only those who consecrate themselves to thee, who become the living voices of thy fame!
And yet, blessed is it when thou takest up thine abode in a man, as God dwelt in the world, unseen, unknown, yet everywhere great and mighty, the Lord, before whom all creatures bow and say: 'He is here!'
Such a man will bear thee like a star upon his radiant brow; he will never turn from thee even for the duration of a little word; he will love men, and, like a man, walk with his brethren.
And he who guards thee not, who is willing to betray thee, to devote thee to the idle pleasure of men—from him thou turnest sadly away, scattering in pity a few fading flowers upon his head; he plays with the dying bloom, and weaves his death-wreath all the days of his short life.
Thy beginning is one with that of the woman!