HEINRICH HEINE - Repositories

Heinrich Heine
smile on human tears, and makes them a beauteous
rainbow on the cloudy background of life; a wit,
who holds in his mighty hand the most scorching
hghtnings of satire; an artist in prose literature, who
has shown even more completely than Goethe the
possibilities of German prose; and — in spite of all
charges against him, true as well as false — a lover
of freedom, who has spoken wise and brave words
on behalf of his fellow-men."
George Ehot was the first English writer of eminence
to appraise Heine as a lyric genius equalled
by none save Goethe: "His song has a wide compass
of notes; he can take us to the shores of the
Northern Sea and thrill us by the sombre subhmity
of his pictures and dreamy fancies; he can draw
forth our tears by the voice he gives to our sorrows,
or to the sorrows of Poor Peter; he can throw
a cold shudder over us by a mysterious legend, a
ghost story, or a still more ghastly rendering of
hard reality; he can charm us by a quiet idyl, shake
us with laughter at his overflowing fun, or give us
a piquant sensation of surprise by the ingenuity of
his transitions from the lofty to the ludicrous. . . .
His songs are all music and feeling; they are like
birds, that not only enchant us with their deUcious
notes, but nestle against us with their soft breasts,
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