Изображения страниц
PDF
EPUB

For ever, by adversitie are wrought
The greatest workes of admiration.
And all the faire examples of renowne
Out of distresse and miserie are growne.

Mutius the fire, the tortures Regulus,
Did make the miracles of faith and zeale,
Exile renown'd, and grac'd Rutilius;
Imprisonment and poyson did reveale
The worth of Socrates; Fabritius
Povertie did grace that common-weale
More then all Syllaes riches got with strife;
And Catoes death did vie with Caesars life

Not to b' unhappy is unhappynesse;
And misery not t' have knowne miserie:
For the best way unto discretion, is
The way that Leades us by adversitie
And men are better shew'd what is amisse,
By th' expert finger of calamitie

Then they can be with all that fortune brings, Who never shewes them the true face of things.

How could we know that thou could'st have indur'd,

With a reposed cheere, wrong and disgrace;
And with a heart and countenance assur'd
Have lookt sterne Death and horror in the face!
How should we know thy soule had beene
secur'd

In honest counsels and in way unbase!
Hadst thou not stood to shew us what thou
wert,

By thy affliction, that discri'd thy heart.

It is not but the tempest that doth show
The sea-mans cunning; but the field that tries
The captaines courage: and we come to know
Best what men are, in their worst jeoperdies:
For lo, how many have we seene to grow
To high renowne from lowest miseries,
Out of the hands of death, and many a one
T' have beene undone, had they not beene undone.

He that indures for what his conscience knowes
Not to be ill, doth from a patience hie
Looke onely on the cause whereto he owes
Those sufferings, not on his miserie:

The more h'endures, the more his glory growes,
Which never growes from imbecillitie:
Onely the best compos'd and worthiest harts

God sets to act the hardest and constant'st

parts.

Sonnet.

Restore thy tresses to the golden ore,

Yeeld Cithereas sonne those arkes of love; Bequeath the heavens the starres that I adore, And to th' orient do thy pearles remove. Yeeld thy hands pride unto th' ivory white, T' Arabian odors give thy breathing sweete; Restore thy blush unto Aurora bright, To Thetis give the honour of thy feete. Let Venus have thy graces, her resign'd,

And thy sweet voice give back unto the spheares.

But yet restore thy fierce and cruell mind,

To Hyrcan tygres, and to ruthles beares.
Yeeld to the marble thy hard hart againe;
So shalt thou cease to plague, and I to paine.

Sonnet.

Care - charmer Sleepe, sonne of the sable Night,
Brother to Death, in silent darknes borne:
Relieve my languish, and restore the light,
With darke forgetting of my care returne.
And let the day be time enough to mourne
The shipwracke of my ill adventred youth
Let waking eyes suffice to waile their scorne,
Without the torment of the nights untruth.
Cease dreames, th' images of day desires,
To modell forth the passions of the morrow.
Never let rising sunne approve you liers,
To adde more griefe to aggravate my sorrow.
Still let me sleepe, imbracing clouds in vaine,
And never wake to feele the dayes disdaine.

A Pastoral.

O happy golden age,
Not for that rivers ranne

With streames of milke, and hunny dropt from trees,

Not that the earth did gage
Unto the husband - man

Her voluntary fruites, free without fees:
Not for no cold did freeze,

Nor any cloud beguile,
Th' eternall flowring spring
Wherein liv'd every thing,

And whereon th' heavens perpetually did smile,
Not for no ship had brought

From forraine shores, or warres or wares ill

sought.

But onely for that name,

That idle name of wind:

That idoll of deceit, that empty sound
Call'd Honor, which became
The tyran of the minde:

And so torments our nature without ground,
Was not yet vainly found:
Nor yet sad griefes imparts
Amidst the sweet delights
Of joyfull amorous wights.

Nor were his hard lawes knowne to free-borne
hearts.

But golden lawes like these
Which Nature wrote. That's lawfull which
doth please!

Then amongst flowres and springs

Making delightfull sport,

Sate lovers without conflict, without flame,
And nymphs and shepheards sings

Mixing in wanton sort

Whisp'rings with songs, then kisses with the

Which from affection came:

The naked virgin then

Her roses fresh reveales

same

Which now her vaile conceales,

The tender apples in her bosome seene,
And oft in rivers cleere

The lovers with their loves consorting were,

Honor, thou first didst close

The spring of all delight:

Denying water to the amorous thirst;

Thou taught'st faire eyes to lose

The glory of their light,

[blocks in formation]

Now each creature joyes the other,
Passing happy dayes and howers,

One bird reports unto another,

In the fall of silver showers,
Whilst the earth (our common mother)
Hath her bosome deckt with flowers.
Whilst the gratest torch of heaven,

With bright rayes warmes Floras lap,
Making nights and dayes both even,
Chearing plants with fresher sap:
My field of flowers quite bereven,
Wants refresh of better hap.

Restrain 'd from men, and on themselves re- Eccho, daughter of the aire,

Thou in a lawne didst first

verst.

(Babling guest of rocks and hils,) Knows the name of my fierce faire,

[blocks in formation]

Gav'st bridle to their words, arts to their pace. Whilst that she (O cruell mayd)
O Honour it is thou

Doth me and my love despise,

That mak'st that stealth, which love doth free My lives florish is decayed

It is thy worke that brings

allow.

Our griefes, and torments thus:

That depended on her eyes:
But her will must be obeyed,

And well he ends for love who dies.

Drayto n.

Das

Michael Drayton ward 1563 zu Harfull in Warwickshire geboren, zeichnete sich schon früh durch seine Fähigkeiten aus und studirte, nachdem er einige Jahre hindurch Page eines vornehmen Mannes gewesen, zu Oxford. Später trat er in die Armee und bekleidete lange Zeit daselbst einen höheren Posten. 1621 erhielt er die Würde eines Hofdichters (poet laureat). Er starb 1631 und wurde in der Westminsterabtei begraben, wo ihm die Gräfin von Dorset ein Denkmal errichten liess. Drayton hinterliess sehr viele poetische Werke, zwei derselben haben sich jedoch nur im Andenken der Nachwelt erhalten: Nymphidia or the Court of the Faeries und the Polyolbion. Erstere ist eine Nachahmung und gewissermaassen Fortbildung von Shakspeare's Sommernachtstraum, doch keinesweges ohne selbstständigen Werth; das Letztere dagegen eine poetische Topographie von England mit eingemischten Episoden und Beschreibungen: wichtiger für den Alterthumsforscher als für den Freund englischer Dichtkunst. Unter seinen kleineren Poesieen zeichnen sich besonders seine Ideas, womit er Sonnette in freierer Form bezeichnete, vortheilhaft aus. Warmes Gefühl, Lebendigkeit, Phantasie und glückliche, wenn auch nicht immer streng correcte, Behandlung der Sprache und der Form characterisiren seine poetischen Leistungen überhaupt.

Ideas.

Since there's no help, come, let us kisse and part,
Nay, I have done, you get no more of me;
And I am glad, yea, glad with all my heart,
That thus so cleanly I myselfe can free;
Shake hands for ever, cancell all our vowes;
And when we meet at any time againe,
Be it not seen in either of our browes
That we one jot of former love retaine.
Now at the last gaspe of Love's latest breath,
When his pulse failing, passion speechlesse lies,
When Faith is kneeling by his bed of death,
And Innocence is closing up his eyes,

Now if thou would'st, when all have given
him over,
From death to life thou might'st yet recover.

As Love and I late harbour'd in one inne
With proverbs thus each other entertaine :
In love there is no lucke, thus I begin;
Faire words make fooles; replieth he againe;
Who spares to speake, doth spare to speed,
(quoth I);

As well (saith he) too forward, as too slow:
Fortune assists the boldest, I reply;
A hasty man (quoth he) ne'er wanted woe:
Labour is light, where love (quoth I) doth pay;
(Saith he) Light burthens heavy, if far borne:
(Quoth I) The maine lost, cast the by away;
Y' have spun a faire thred, he replies in scorne
And having thus awhile each other thwarted,
Fooles as we met, so fooles again we parted.

Love banish'd heaven, in earth was held in

scorne,

Wand'ring abroad in need and beggery;
And wanting friends, though of a goddesse borne,
Yet crav'd the almes of such as passed by:

I like a man devout and charitable,

Cloth'd the naked, lodg'd this wand'ring guest,
With sighes and teares still furnishing his table,
With what might make the miserable blest;
But this ungratefull, for my good desert,
Intic'd my thoughts against me to conspire,
Who gave consent to steale away my heart,
And set my breast, his lodging, on a fire.
Well, well, my friends, when beggers grow
thus bold

No marvell then though charity grow cold.

To Himselfe and the Harpe.

And why not I, as hee
That's greatest, if as free,

(In sundry strains that strive
Since there so many be)

Th' old Lyrick kind revive?

I will, yea, and I may;
Who shall oppose my way?
For what is he alone,
That of himselfe can say,
Hee's heire of Helicon?

Apollo, and the Nine,

Forbid no man their shrine,

That commeth with hands pure

Else they be so divine.

They will him not indure.

[blocks in formation]
[blocks in formation]

William Shakspeare, der grösste dramatische Dichter der neueren Zeit, ward am 23. April 1564 zu Stratford-on-Avon geboren, wo sein Vater als Wollhändler lebte und er bestimmt wurde, dessen Geschäft fortzusetzen. Bereits 1582 vermählte er sich mit Anna Hathaway, verliess aber in Folge von Wilddieberei 1586 seine Heimath und seine Familie und wandte sich nach London, wo er Schauspieler wurde und zuerst 1593 mit einer eigenen dramatischen Production auftrat und zwanzig Jahre hindurch durch seine Bühnenstücke den höchsten Beifall seiner Nation erwarb. 1603 wurde er Mitdirector des Globe-Theaters und trat nun von der Bühne als Schauspieler ab; 1613 zog er sich nach seiner Vaterstadt zurück, um den Rest seiner Tage in ländlicher Abgeschiedenheit hinzubringen. Leider starb er schon in der vollen Kraft seiner Jahre an seinem zwei und funfzigsten Geburtstage 1616 zu Stratford.

Shakspeare ausführlich und nach allen Seiten hin zu charakterisiren, gestattet theils der beschränkte Raum nicht, theils ist dies in Deutschland so oft und von so grossen Meistern geschehen, dass wir doch nur längst Gesagtes wiederholen könnten. Hinsichtlich seines Einflusses auf die dramatische Poesie der Engländer überhaupt, verweisen wir auf das, was wir in der Einleitung darüber bemerkten. Das Treffendste, was je in wenigen Worten über ihn gesagt wurde, hat ein nicht minder grosser Geist, Goethe, ausgesprochen. (S. Wilhelm Meister's Lehrjahre 3. B. 11. Cap.) Möge es hier folgen.

,,Sie (Shakspeare's Dramen) scheinen ein Werk eines himmlischen Genius zu sein, der sich den Menschen nähert, um sie mit sich selbst auf die gelindeste Weise bekannt zu machen. Es sind keine Gedichte. Man glaubt vor den aufgeschlagenen, ungeheuern Büchern des Schicksals zu stehen, in denen der Sturmwind des bewegtesten Lebens saust und sie mit Gewalt rasch hin und wieder blättert."

,,Es scheint, als wenn er (Shakspeare) uns alle Räthsel offenbarte, ohne dass man doch sagen kann hier oder da ist das Wort der Auflösung. Seine Menschen scheinen natürliche Menschen zu sein und sie sind es doch nicht. Diese geheimnissvollen und zusammengesetztesten Geschöpfe der Natur handeln vor uns in seinen Stücken als wenn sie Uhren wären, deren Zifferblatt und Gehäuse

« ПредыдущаяПродолжить »