German Ideals of To-day: And Other Essays on German CultureHoughton, Mifflin, 1907 - 341 pages This book contains a collection of essays and sketches which showcase the literary and artistic achievments of Germany in order to provide a picture of the German national mind and character. |
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Common terms and phrases
activity æsthetic American appears aspirations atonement Azazel Bamberg beauty brought century character Church classic conception conflict contemporary German drama Emerson epoch evolutionary existence expression eyes fact fantastic feeling Fichte force freedom Friedrich Paulsen genius GERMAN IDEALS German literature German sculpture Goethe Goethe's Greek harmony Hauptmann's heart Hegel Heinrich Herman Grimm higher human idea imagination individual infinite influence inner inspiring instinct intellectual Jacob Burckhardt Karl Lamprecht leads literature and art living matter mediæval ment method Middle High German mind modern moral national culture nature Naumburg ness Nibelungenlied noble Novalis Parzival Paulsen perhaps personality philological pity poem poetry poets political principle religious reveal Riehl Romantic Rosenmontag Schiller Schlegel scientific seems sense social society soul sphere spiritual stand striving struggle symbol sympathy tendency things thought tion to-day tragedy tragic true truly ture universal whole Wilhelm Wilhelm Scherer words writers
Popular passages
Page 101 - I ask not for the great, the remote, the romantic, what is doing in Italy or Arabia, what is Greek art or Provencal minstrelsy; I embrace the common; I explore and sit at the feet of the familiar, the low.
Page 105 - It is one central fire, which, flaming now out of the lips of Etna, lightens the capes of Sicily ; and now out of the throat of Vesuvius, illuminates the towers and vineyards of Naples. It is one light which beams out of a thousand stars. It is one soul which animates all men.
Page 152 - In Italy this veil first melted into air; an objective treatment and consideration of the State and of all the things of this world became possible. The subjective side at the same time asserted itself with corresponding emphasis; man became a spiritual individual, and recognized himself as such.
Page 105 - The granite is differenced in its laws only by the more or less of heat, from the river that wears it away. The river, as it flows, resembles the air that flows over it; the air resembles the light which traverses it with more subtile currents ; the light resembles the heat which rides with it through Space. Each creature is only a modification of the other ; the likeness in them is more than the difference, and their radical law is one and the same.
Page 62 - Erden, In keinem Falle darf es ruhn. Es soll sich regen, schaffend handeln, Erst sich gestalten, dann verwandeln; Nur scheinbar steht's Momente still.
Page 83 - ... momentary dream of liberty; its aim is to make us absolutely free ; and this it accomplishes by awakening, exercising, and perfecting in us a power to remove to an objective distance the sensible world (which otherwise only burdens us as rugged matter and presses us down with a brute influence) ; to transform it into the free working of our spirit, and thus acquire a dominion over the material by means of ideas.
Page 62 - Weltseele komm uns zu durchdringen! Dann mit dem Weltgeist selbst zu ringen Wird unsrer Kräfte Hochberuf. Teilnehmend führen gute Geister, Gelinde leitend, höchste Meister Zu dem der alles schafft und schuf.
Page 71 - Thus we are driven from the whole to the part, and from the part to the whole, whether we will or not.
Page 100 - That it is possible for him to harbor such a feeling, — this, by implying a comparison of himself with something higher in himself, this is it which makes him the immortal creature that he is. NIGHT. The earth is every day overspread with the veil of night for the same reason as the cages of birds are darkened — viz. that we may the more readily apprehend the higher harmonies of thought in the hush and quiet of darkness. Thoughts...
Page 203 - ... others in still different postures and moods — there is not a figure among them which did not represent a particular individual at a particular moment, and which did not, without losing itself in capricious imitation of accidental trifles, reproduce life as it is. It is impossible in the face of such works of sculpture as these not to feel that they proceeded from artists deeply versed in the study of human character, fully alive to the problems of human conduct, keenly sensitive to impressions...