undertook the business of literature; in the same
spirit he pursued it with unflinching energy all the days of his life.
The common, and some uncommon, difficulties of a fluctuating and
dependent existence could not quench or abate his zeal: sickness
itself seemed hardly to affect him. During his last fifteen years, he
wrote his noblest works; yet, as it has been proved too well, no day
of that period could have passed without its load of pain.[41] Pain
could not turn him from his purpose, or shake his equanimity: in death
itself he was _calmer and calmer_. Nor has he gone without his
recompense. To the credit of the world it can be recorded, that their
suffrages, which he never courted, were liberally bestowed on him:
happier than the mighty Milton, he found 'fit hearers,' even in his
lifetime, and they were not 'few.' His effect on the mind of his own
country has been deep and universal, and bids fair to be abiding: his
effect on other countries must in time be equally decided; for such
nobleness of heart and soul shadowed forth in beautiful imperishable
emblems, is a treasure which belongs not to one nation, but to all. In
another age, this Schiller will stand forth in the foremost rank among
the master-spirits of his century; and be admitted to a place among
the chosen of all centuries. His works, the memory of what he did and
was, will rise afar off like a towering landmark in the solitude of
the Past, when distance shall have dwarfed into invisibility the
lesser people that encompassed him, and hid him from the near
beholder.

[Footnote 41: On a surgical inspection of his body after
death, the most vital organs were found totally deranged.
'The structure of the lungs was in great part destroyed, the
cavities of the heart were nearly grown up, the liver had
become hard, and the gall-bladder was extended to an
extraordinary size.' _Doering._]

On the whole, we may pronounce him happy. His days passed in the
contemplation of ideal grandeurs, he lived among the glories and
solemnities of universal Nature; his thoughts were of sages and
heroes, and scenes of elysian beauty. It is true, he had no rest, no
peace; but he enjoyed the fiery consciousness of his own activity,
which stands in place of it for men like him. It is true, he was long
sickly; but did he not even then conceive and body-forth Max
Piccolomini, and Thekla, and the Maid of Orleans, and the scenes of
_Wilhelm Tell_? It is true