The Express.
London, England, 1859-11-11 00:00:00

THE SCHILLER FESTIVAL.

Yesterday, at the Crystal Palace, took place the
celebration ot the hundredth anniversary of Friedrich
Schiller's birth. In reporting these proceedings, we
may refer to the considerations which gave all its
interest to the occasion. There is obviously much
reason for this kind of secular commemoration of the
nativity of the world's best men. Some are born of
such rare excellence that Nature cannot aff.ird to
give us their like even so often as once in a hundred
years, and it is scarcely to be hoped that another
poet equal to Schiller began his life yesterday in
Germany or elsewhere. Once at least in a century,
therefore, the arrival of one of the great spiritual
benefactors of mankind may properly be re-
membered. An eminent writer of our own,
one of the brat who taught English readers
the high and valuable import of Fchiller's
life and genius, has indeed satirically remarked that
" the doting world is apt to forget its chief men : it
manages to remember a chakspeare or so once in •
thousand years, and prate., considerably like a
goes, about him." But England does commemorate
her Sbakspeare at stated times, and tcotland her
Barns, not unwisely, as Mr. Carlyle would probably
allow. And in the brilliant lemma of yesterday,
whilst the Germans resident in London, ever faith-
ful and affectionate towards their Fatherland, joined
in full accord with their fellow-countrymen at home
to honour • lofty tiaras which most signally adorns
their national literature, not only the Germans, but
others also, u many as are conscious of his worth,
might feel jostified in bestowing a tribute of grateful
admiration upon Schiller's memory. They, too,
might claim a right to share in the public reoogni-
tion of this noble poet, historian, moralist, and phtfo-
sopher, this gifted and devoted missionary of that
which is essentially tree, beautiful, and good ; this
artist, who was by his art aa apostle
of virtue and of mental freedom, whilst
in the unswerving pursuit of the sublimest aims of
his calling he fortified the moral influence of his
writings by • pure example. They, too, might well
have part in this periodical reflection of the glory of
Schiller, whose bright soul has thus shone notnierely
for the sake of rendering Germany more illustrious,
bat for the enlightenment and cheering of mankind.
It is surely known amongst ourselves, as well as
amongst his own people, that the unique merit of
Friedrich Schiller's works and ways as a prime
master of the literary art is especially this—that he
was able, above all others in his day, to apply that
consummate art of his to the teaching of great lessons
and the inculcation of great ideas, without in any
cue impairing the artistic perfection of his compo-
sitions, or the grace and harmonious proportion of
his imaginative creations, by an excessive deference
to the object and moral tendency he kept in
view. It may be said of him that if he
did not make his poetry subservient to the expression
of the sacred principles which he cherished, he re-
conciled the one interest with the other, he married
beauty and righteousness together; he combined the
exquisite taste and genial sympathies of the suscep-
tible artist with the ardent enthusiasm of the re-
former and philanthropist—we had almost written
the human prophet—more remarkably than any
other dramatic or lyrical writer in the German or in
any other langusge of Europe in modern times.
And this, we take it, is the difference in kind between
the greatness of Schiller and the greatness, perhaps
intellectually superior, of Goethe. The one was
endowed with a mind so vast in its range, so pro-
found, so clear, and so delicate, that it was capable
of representing, as from the placid surface of a per-
fect mirror, the ideal forms and moving images of all
that in nature or humanity exists. His genius was
more cultivated and better disciplined than that
of Shskspeare, and he lacked only the humour and
native tenderness which Jean Pant possessed, to be
almost a Shakspear• of Germany, for his intellect,
though not his heart, was equally comprehensive.
But the other of the Weimar Dioaruri was &hiller.
His poetry glows with the inspiration of an earnest
faith in the eternal concord of all those supreme
ideas which rule the various aspirations of our
spiritual nature; to him the *esthetic perfection he is
striving to attain coincides with his pursuit of truth,
his benevolence, and his reverence for what is divine
and holy. That this was really the consecration of
his labours might be inferred by those who have an
eye to see, from each of his chief poetical productions
as they stand; but in his prose critical essays
and in his psychological discussions of the
origin, nature, and uses of poetry, we may
find this doctrine fairly acknowledged. And
never did a religious bard of antiquity, or •
saintly painter of the Madonna in some Italian
monastery of the Catholic middle-ages, adhere more
devoutly to that service which was the ground and
motive of their operations, than Schiller adhered to
the cause of humanity—to the promotion of justice
and liberty in all social and political relations—to
the progress of true freedom, peace, and love, which
has seemed to be dawning upon the earth of late,
since be came into this world, and the faint promise
of which does somewhat cheer the hopes of the
patriots and reformers of the present age.
Having dwelt • little while on these reasons,
which appear to ns to amount for the interest be-
longing to yesterday's festival, we most now simply
relate what was done in the Crystal Palace. Many
thousands of ladies and gentlemen were there as-
sembled—Germans, English, and foreigners—who,
like ourselves, held themselves entitled to cells
brats the cosmopolitan fame of Schiller. The
weather, some of our readers at the An-
tipodes will be glad to learn, was sunny and
tweet, as in November it is conventionally supposed
never to be. The peat Handel Thee::
other monument of German excenence in the realm
of thought and feeling which we call art) was occu-
pied by the conductors of this festival, by the
German glee clubs and other societies, numbering
several hundred vocalists, and by the instrumental
performers. The audience filled the transept floor
and galleries. The " Schiller March," composed by
Herr Carl Wilhelm Gross, was played as a prelude
to the proceedings.
An accomplished critic and lecturer, well known
for some years past in London and Manchester, Dr.
Gottfried Kinkel, formerly of Bonn, professor of the
fine arts and German literature at several institutions