SCHILLER.

"Das Jahrhundert

Ist meinem Ideal nicht reif. Ich lebe

Ein Bürger deser, welche kouemen werden."

To contest the supremacy of Goethe, the great founder of intellectual culture in Germany, Schiller appeared. A coal from the heavenly altars kindled in his soul the fire whose flame was to shed light over that land. His mission was to purify, to elevate. The romancers of his and preceding times, had been content to oppose to that spirit of improvement, which had been quietly yet surely insinuating itself into the science and letters of Germany, representations of other ages, transcripts of the past, overflowing with fantastic dreams, in which the vanities of a superficial age, played to their heart's content. To please, with little care or wish to instruct, had been their aim. A pure and noble patriotism, humanity improving by lessons in Eternal Right, ideals of greatness and virtue, which might have existed, but had not, were subjects foreign to those, who had given, as a literature to their countrymen, formalism, and a reverence, nay, almost a servility to the institutions of the past. In the History of every country, of any literary reputation, have there been periods of indolence and darkness, but, as surely, have there been men raised up to dispel the gloom and work strongly for Freedom and for Right. So here, Goethe, Schiller, Koerner, contemporaries—strong in talent, great in soul, expending their energies for the good of mankind, a trio that Germany and the world of letters reverence.

Frederic Schiller was born November 10th, 1759, at Marbach, a town of Wurtemberg on the Neckar. His father, originally a surgeon in the army, was afterwards a captain, and finally a superintendent of a nursery of trees attached to a castle of the Duke of Wurtemberg. His parents were pious and upright, and if his early education did not afford much opportunity for the development of his genius, by intercourse with men of talent, or by a wide field of observation, it was eminently calculated to awaken that sensibility to the good and the true, which forms so essential a trait in his character; and his early acquaintance with the Bible,

making him familiar with the poetical passages of the Old Testament, contributed not a little to develop his poetical genius. When a child, he always manifested a cheerful disposition, and was devotedly attached to his parents. He loved at an early period to repeat the sermons which he had heard at church on Sunday. He would stand on a chair and preach with great zeal, never forgetting the divisions the minister had made in his discourse. A fondness for solitary contemplation and for witnessing the grander operations of Nature, as exhibited in storms and tempests, seems, even at this early period of his life, to have discovered the future and peculiar bent of his genius. "It is said, that, once during a tremendous thunder storm, his father missed him in the gay group within doors. None of the sisters could tell what had become of Fritz, and the old man grew so anxious that he was forced to go out in search of him. Fritz was scarcely passed the age of infancy and knew not the dangers of a scene so awful. His father found him at last, in a solitary place in the neighborhood, perched on the branch of a tree, gazing at the tempestuous face of the sky, and watching the flashes as in succession they spread their lurid glare over it. To the reprimand of the parent, the whimpering truant plead in extenuation, that the lightning was so beautiful, and he wished to see where it was coming from.'"

For a long time he wished to study theology, although a brilliant tragedy, which he had seen performed on the stage at Stuttgard, when he was nine years old, strangely attracted his attention to the drama. His first poem is said to have been written the day before his confirmation in 1772. He had till this time, received instruction in a good Latin school, in order to prepare himself for the University, as his father wished to procure for him, the benefit of a good education, though his own had been neglected. At this time, Charles, Duke of Wurtemberg, having become weary of parade and dissipation, turned his thoughts to an object of a better character, though still the whim of a petty prince, viz: the establishment of a school on a military-monastic plan, where no efforts should be spared to give the pupils the best education of which he could conceive. The Duke offered to take young Schiller for a pupil. His father could not well refuse, and in 1773, Schiller was received into the Charles' school, sacrificing his own inclination to the interest of his parents. He studied Law at this institution, in which the students were kept so entirely separate from the world, that they were permitted to see no females except their mothers and very young sisters, who visited them on Sunday. The plan of this institution was afterwards enlarged and Medicine allowed

to be studied. In 1775, Schiller began to study Medicine and Latin zealously. When sixteen he published a translation of part of Virgil's Eneid in Hexameter, but poetry was a forbidden fruit to him and his companions, and hence attracted them the more. At eighteen, he began the "Robbins," a work containing deep views and admirable displays of character. This was written in his monastic cell, and he says of it, "he dared to describe men before he knew anything of them, in his grated cell." This he published at his own expense, no publisher being willing to take the risk. A few years after this he prepared it for the stage, and stole away from the regiment that he might see it played. He was detected and put under an injunction to write no more poetry. After many and severe trials, he fled the regiment in 1782, to Franconia, and lived in retirement under an assumed name. Here with "Frisco " and "Love and Intrigue," commences his literary career, which continued through a period of 23 years. In 1785, he went to Dresden, where, for two years, he devoted himself to the study of all the works he could procure, relative to the history of Philip II., to prepare himself for the "Don Carlos." Three years after he met Goethe, whom, he, at first, did not like; but, with whom, afterwards, a most intimate and pleasant friendship existed. Their correspondence for the years 1794-1805, is of a peculiarly interesting nature, was much as it is "the conversation of a Schiller with a Goethe, so rarely do Schillers meet with Goethes among us." Through the influence of this friend Schiller obtained the Professorship of Philosophy at Jena. This is the date of his historic efforts, as also his philosophic and aesthetic treatises.

After the publication of the Thirty Years War, which appeared in print, first, in a periodical called the "Pocket Almanac for Ladies from 1790-1793, he married, at 31 years of age. Twelve years after he had the right of citizenship conferred on him by the French Republic, and was raised to the nobility by the Emperor of Germany.

Incessant study and the use of stimulants undermined his health. His physician ordered, without effect, a total abstinence from intellectual exertion. His last and greatest efforts were carried on under the intensest bodily suffering, and while his last play, Wilhelm Tell, was being acted at Berlin, his disease brought him to the brink of the grave. He recovered, however, sufficiently to return to Weimer, where he died on the 9th of May, 1805.

In his private character, Schiller was friendly, candid and sincere. His domestic life was very happy, as indeed it deserved to be, after the

many and serious embarrassments which he encountered, preliminary to his individual experience in that state of existence. He made six bold attempts to secure a fellow voyager from among the gentler sex, five of which proved ineffectual. However, "fortune favors the brave," and Schiller was victorious. His life was spent in retirement. The only public station he ever held was the professorship at Irna. His indifference to the honors of political life is evidenced in that he never adopted the title of Baron which had been conferred on him. He had few intimates, and seemed to regard the social life, as merely the dwelling place of the spiritual. The latter, as is everywhere in his writings manifest, was the one thing paramount. The fact that his stock of money was limited seemed to cause no anxiety. Benevolence and philanthropy were marked features in his character. He often said, "he had no deeper wish than to know all men happy," and if the writings of a man give any insight into his character, his certainly proves he strove earnestly to effect this end. It was his "evening song and morning prayer." For it he lived and died," sacrificing," in the words of Goethe, "his life itself to the delineation of life."

In intellectual character, Schiller was clear, varied and pure. He saw through the human soul, dwelt on the noble development of passion, and wrote, as he pictured to himself, of character, portraying itself in the highest and noblest forms of the pathetic, the tragical, and the heroic. He looked on character from the side of truth, never with jesting, but rather with earnestness and gravity. He does not teach morality by contrasting it with immorality, but speculates boldly on the duties and rights of man. Man has duties and he ought to perform them-has rights and he ought to know and claim them. He spoke no ribaldry or low jest, and this is the highest praise to the man, coming out, as he did, so in opposition to the indecency that characterized the school of Voltaire, which, in fact, preceded him. From this imputation, his contemporary, Goethe, is by no means free. Schiller's mind was too deeply imbued. with the teachings of the Bible, to take delight in low and ribald talk, or the sensual gratifications of the world.

The intimacy that sprung up between Goethe and Schiller, was of a deeply interesting character, both on account of their mutual influence, and because it gives such an insight into their real characters. The outspoken sentiment of their souls are in these letters, and there we can study the men. This intimacy between the rival lights in literature at that period, is indeed an anomaly. The respect, and indeed the love

Goethe had for genius and for learning, was well calculated to find a congenial and sympathizing spirit in the pure and truthful Schiller. Their characters of mind were so far different, that, with their dispositions there could be no ground for envy or unhallowed rivalry. Each eager for self improvement, and thinking, that with every advanced step into the mysteries of the inner world, he might be better able to benefit mankind. Schiller, with his bold, almost untimely ideal; Goethe, with his keen thrust at living institutions, were each doing a great work in the reform of German literature, but in very different ways, and they could counsel and advise and commune with one another, with such freedom and intimacy as has in no similar case been witnessed.

In his poetry, the interest turns on old fashioned, old established matters, common love mania, passionate greatness, enthusiasm for liberty and the like. In these simple yet elegant effusions, there is great delicacy and naturalness of expression. Everything seemed to inspire his lyre, from the glowing ode to the homely ballad-the passionate love song to the amusing elegy. To the human heart he goes. He marches there himself and takes possession. His own soul shines forth from every line, and in the poetry we see the man. His poems made him a great favorite with his countrywomen, and it is said that the lady-who afterwards became his wife-was so enamored with a volume of his poems, that she wrote him with many expressions of gratification, enclosing at the same time an offer of marriage, which was accepted by the poet, and their union consummated.

It was as a dramatic author, especially, that Schiller distinguished himself to the world. To understand the means that led to his great popularity, we should require a knowledge of the state of poetry and the drama in his time. What it was, in the main, we have seen; but Schiller thought the poet had a far higher duty to perform than to put the faults and virtues of one age over against the faults and virtues of another, and that his highest problem was to bring out the eternal and godlike ideal in strong contrast with temporal commonplaceness. Men should not remain obstinately attached to customs and external affairs, but should endeavor to develop their whole natures, and have all their characteristic features represented. His prominent characters are ideals, in each of which we find the presence of a similar mind, but presenting itself in a variety of forms. Modern in "Love and Intrigue," romantic in "Wallenstein" and the "Maid of Orleans," classic in the "Bride of Messina," though in all we find the same creative mind at work. He paints only