Where the opinions agree,—that the pair may, in rapt contemplation.
Lovingly blend into one,—find the more excellent world.
RELIGION AND CHURCH.
THOUGHTS ON JESUS CHRIST'S DESCENT INTO HELL.
[The remarkable poem, of which this is a literal but faint representation, was written when Goethe was only sixteen years old. It derives additional interest from the fact of its being the very earliest piece of his that is preserved. The few other pieces included by Goethe under the title of "Religion and Church" are polemical, and devoid of interest to the English reader.]
What wondrous noise is heard around!
Through heaven exulting voices sound,
A mighty army marches on.
By thousand millions followed, lo,
To yon dark place makes haste to go
God's Son, descending from His throne!
He goes—the tempests round Him break,
As Judge and Hero cometh He;
He goes—the constellations quake,
The sun, the world quake fearfully.
I see Him in His victor-car,
On fiery axles borne afar,
Who on the cross for us expired.
The triumph to yon realms He shows,—
Remote from earth, where star ne'er glows,—
The triumph He for us acquired.
He cometh. Hell to extirpate,
Whom He, by dying well-nigh killed;
He shall pronounce her fearful fate;
Hark! now the curse is straight fulfilled.
