Delphi Collected Works of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe \(Illustrated\) pdfdrive com

Translation.

To-day how full I am of glee,

Content in heart and clear in thought;

But when my boyish blood flowed free,

How gloomy was I and distraught!

Yet, when I feel the years behind,

However joyous I may be,

Those ruddy cheeks I call to mind,

And wish they still remained to me.

Our friend having very soon found the hunting-poem among his well-arranged

papers, he congratulated himself on the careful calligraphy, as years ago he had

written  it  down  in  most  elegant  style,  with  Roman  characters,  in  large  octavo.

The  precious  letter-case,  being  of  considerable  size,  would  contain  the  poem

quite  conveniently,  and  not  often  has  an  author  seen  himself  so  magnificently

bound.  A  few  lines  on  the  subject  were  absolutely  necessary;  but  prose  was

scarcely admissible. That Ovidian passage again occurred to him, and he thought

he  would  best  manage  the  matter  by  a  poetical  transcription,  as  he  had  on  the

other occasion by a prose one. It ran as follows:

Nec factas solum vestes spectare juvabat,

Tum quoque, dum fierent: tantus decor adfuit arti