Honors.

[Dignities would be the better title, if the word were not so essentially unpoetical.]

When the column of light on the waters is glassed,
As blent in one glow seem the shine and the stream;
But wave after wave through the glory has passed,
Just catches, and flies as it catches, the beam
So honors but mirror on mortals their light;
Not the man but the place that he passes is bright.

Friedrich Schiller

Friedrich Schiller was a renowned German poet, philosopher, physician, historian, and playwright. Born on November 10, 1759, in Marbach am Neckar, and passing away on May 9, 1805, in Weimar, Schiller is considered one of the most important figures in German literature. His works, including 'Ode to Joy' and 'William Tell', have left a lasting impact on Western literature and thought.

Friedrich Schiller

The Dilettante.

Friedrich Schiller, Simple Poetry

Epitaph On A Certain Physiognomist.

Friedrich Schiller, Simple Poetry

The Feast Of Victory.

Friedrich Schiller, Simple Poetry

The Circle Of Nature.

Friedrich Schiller, Simple Poetry

English

Suggested Poems

Explore a curated selection of verses that share themes, styles, and emotional resonance with the poem you've just read.

The Honorable.

Ever honor the whole; individuals only I honor;
In individuals I always discover the whole.

Friedrich Schiller

The Favor Of The Moment.

Once more, then, we meet
In the circles of yore;
Let our song be as sweet
In its wreaths as before,
Who claims the first place
In the tribute of song?
The God to whose grace
All our pleasures belong.
Though Ceres may spread
All her gifts on the shrine,
Though the glass may be red
With the blush of the vine,
What boots if the while
Fall no spark on the hearth;
If the heart do not smile
With the instinct of mirth?
From the clouds, from God's breast
Must our happiness fall,
'Mid the blessed, most blest
Is the moment of all!
Since creation began
All that mortals have wrought,
All that's godlike in man
Comes the flash of a thought!
For ages the stone
In the quarry may lurk,
An instant alone
Can suffice to the w...

Friedrich Schiller

The Antiques At Paris.

That which Grecian art created,
Let the Frank, with joy elated,
Bear to Seine's triumphant strand,
And in his museums glorious
Show the trophies all-victorious
To his wondering fatherland.

They to him are silent ever,
Into life's fresh circle never
From their pedestals come down.
He alone e'er holds the Muses
Through whose breast their power diffuses,
To the Vandal they're but stone!

Friedrich Schiller

The Fortune-Favored. [53]

Ah! happy he, upon whose birth each god
Looks down in love, whose earliest sleep the bright
Idalia cradles, whose young lips the rod
Of eloquent Hermes kindles to whose eyes,
Scarce wakened yet, Apollo steals in light,
While on imperial brows Jove sets the seal of might!
Godlike the lot ordained for him to share,
He wins the garland ere he runs the race;
He learns life's wisdom ere he knows life's care,
And, without labor vanquished, smiles the grace.
Great is the man, I grant, whose strength of mind,
Self-shapes its objects and subdues the fates
Virtue subdues the fates, but cannot blind
The fickle happiness, whose smile awaits
Those who scarce seek it; nor can courage earn
What the grace showers not from her own free urn!
From aught unworthy, the determined ...

Friedrich Schiller

Trifles.

    THE EPIC HEXAMETER.

Giddily onward it bears thee with resistless impetuous billows;
Naught but the ocean and air seest thou before or behind.


    THE DISTICH.

In the hexameter rises the fountain's watery column,
In the pentameter sweet falling in melody down.


    THE EIGHT-LINE STANZA.

Stanza, by love thou'rt created, by love, all-tender and yearning;
Thrice dost thou bashfully fly; thrice dost with longing return.


    THE OBELISK.

On a pedestal lofty the sculptor in triumph has raised me.
"Stand thou," spake he, and I stand proudly and joyfully here.


    THE TRIUMPHAL ARCH.

"Fear not," the builder exclaimed, "the rainbow that stands in the heavens;
I will extend thee, like it, into infini...

Friedrich Schiller

Upon Honour.

Honour, I say, or honest Fame,
I mean the substance, not the name;
(Not that light heap of tawdry wares,
Ermin, Coronets, and Stars,
Which often is by merit sought,
By gold and flatt'ry oft'ner bought.
The shade, for which Ambition looks,
In Selden's or in Ashmole's books):
But the true glory which proceeds,
Reflected bright from honest deeds,
Which we in our Own breast perceive,
And Kings can neither take nor give.

Matthew Prior