Part 25 (1/2)

Vita nostra brevis est, Brevi finietur; Venit mors velociter; Rapit nos atrociter; Nemini parcetur.

Vivat academia, Vivant professores, Vivat membrum quodlibet, Vivant membra quaelibet; Semper sint in flore.

Vivant omnes virgines, Faciles, formosae; Vivant et mulieres, Vivant et mulieres Bonae, laboriosae.

Vivat et respublica, Et qui illam regit; Vivat nostra civitas, Mecenatum caritas, Quae nos hic protegit.

Pereat trist.i.tia, Pereant osores; Pereat diabolus, Quivis anti-burschius Atque irrisores.

CHAPTER XV.

DRINKING CUSTOMS OF STUDENT LIFE, ANCIENT AND MODERN.

Seize the glittering wine-cup there!

See ye not, no purply winking, Blood of nature, rich and rare?

Let us grasp it, boldly drinking, That a fire-strength may glow Through each vein--a new creation!

Sacred is of wine the flow-- Is of youth the glad elation!

_Uhland_.

Have the G.o.ds drunk nectar!--the G.o.ds, exempt from all the cares of mortal existence, and shall then poor mankind be envied the enjoyment of their earthly nectar? No; not without cause was it celebrated by all the ancient poets. Even the great Reformer himself joined in its praise; and Horace says--

Narratur et prisci Catonis, Saepe mero caluisse virtus.

Then come the moralists truly and say, ”You should not purposely throw yourselves into an artificial gladness; the true gladness comes from within.” Very true; and the genuine healing of sickness comes from within, and you shall and cannot subdue it by art? It is therefore that the Turks believe that you ought not to a.s.sist nature in her marvellous operations by a healing means. If that be your faith, do as the Turks do, and drink no wine. But have we not thus a thousand things which are to a certain degree necessary to our well-being, necessary to preserve the proper tone of mind and body? And would you blindly condemn all these? Wherefore then do you imagine that wine was made? Would you banish all poetry out of life, and say

Who then would cheat himself with phantom shapes, That with a borrowed charm do clothe existence, And with a false possession follow Hope?

_Schiller_.

Will you do that? Then, indeed, must you banish wine; for it is, so to say, an incarnate poetry. For if it were not that, it were nothing to us; and to whomsoever it is not that, him counsel we to refrain, and to hand it over to other and happier mortals. But think well on it ere you banish all poetry out of the world.

The roseate-tinted veil of dreams Falls from Life's countenance of pallid gloom, And the world showeth as it is--a tomb.

_Schiller_.

Who, then, would wish to live in such a world? No; we value the wine which calls forth the poetry of the inner man of him who is not totally abandoned of the Muses. But you, perhaps, reprobate the enjoyment of wine as too ign.o.ble and material. But is it then the material portion of the wine which confers on us its witchcraft? No; it is the fine spirit, and that ethereal life which the German calls the flower of the wine. They ascend to the exhausted brain, and brace the relaxed chords.

Know you then whether the strength which gives to life poetry and fresh grace, may not be one and the same? Whether the strength which is here bound to the material substratum, be not the same which there seizes thee mightily in the creations of Shakspeare? whether it be not the same which lives in the accord of the violoncello; whether it be not the same which dwells so entrancingly in the voice of the beloved? Yes, the spirits of the wine are related to others; and when they discover their brothers in the b.r.e.a.s.t.s of men, so combine they vigorously, and bursting their bonds, rush forth into active operation. All those n.o.ble feelings which had long, perhaps, by their possessor, who had experienced the bitter deceits of life, been beaten down and slept in obscurity--now, touched by the magic wand of wine, start again from their tomb. But when the spirits of the wine find there only strange and ign.o.ble a.s.sociates, then raise they with them a fierce conflict, in order from such guests of h.e.l.l to free man; whose difference from all other beings, says Goethe, consists in this--that he be n.o.ble, helpful, and good! Therefore despise not wine, which is capable of accomplis.h.i.+ng such rare ends, which can raise phantasies such as were dreamed in the Rathskeller at Bremen.[36] No; we acknowledge the wisdom of him who gave the wine to mankind, and of the good old patriarch who so thankfully received it.

OLD NOAH.

Noah from the ark had got, The Lord came to him on the spot; He smelt his offering in the wind, And said to thee I will be kind.

And since a pious house thou art, Thyself shall name the gracious part.

Then Noah answered, as he stood, ”Dear Lord, this water smacks not good.