ived. As soon as Frederick caught sight of him he
rushed up to him and before the Baron could defend himself kicked him in
the abdomen, so that he fell over backward to the ground; then Frederick
quietly gave himself up to the peasants, who at the order of the justice
of the peace were trying to overpower him.

When the Baron learned next morning what had happened to Anna, he
ordered them to search for her bones among the ashes and to bury them in
the potter's field. This was done.

ON THEODOR KOeRNER AND HEINRICH VON
KLEIST (1835)

By FRIEDRICH HEBBEL
TRANSLATED BY FRANCES H. KING

Not only in the history of the world but in the history of literature as
well, we meet with strange aberrations on the part of entire epochs in
their estimate of individual men, rightly or wrongly raised above their
environment. Exactly what the age happens to demand, what fits in with
its restless activity, that is what it rewards and values. We cannot
deny, indeed, that every generation has the right to require the poet,
as well as its other sons, to consult its needs so far as possible. But
it is seldom satisfied with this; he must confer his benefits in the
most agreeable way, and whether or not he is weak enough to humor it in
this, determines, as a rule, whether it will take him fondly in its
arms, or will crush him. These reflections were recently aroused in me
when a volume of Heinrich von Kleist's writings came into my possession
together with a volume of Theodor Koerner's works, and I trust that the
Scientific Society will not consider them too unimportant to be
developed in some detail.

In the two poets named we see two remarkable examples of the
above-mentioned aberration of an entire epoch. While the first of the
two, Heinrich von Kleist, possesses all the qualities that go to make up
the great poet and at the same time the true German, the other, Theodor
Koerner, has only enthusiasm for those qualities; but while Kleist
refuses to forget his own dignity in the interests of the times, and
finally strives to unite these interests with the highest mission of
art, Koerner prefers to throw himself submissively into the vortex. For
this reason Kleist was maligned, ignored, and misjudged during his
lifetime, scorned at his death, and forgotten by immediate posterity,
whereas Koerner was enthusiastically received and applauded, and when he
descended into his early grave, was mourned by the whole world. I would
gladly pa