Roger in his well known book _De Open-Deure tot het Verborgen
Heydendom_, published at Leyden in 1651, two years after the author's
death. This book also gave to the West the first specimen of Sanskrit
literature in the shape of a Dutch version of two hundred maxims of
Bhartṛhari, not a direct translation from the Sanskrit, but based on
oral communication imparted by a learned Brahman Padmanaba.[59] As a
rule the rendering is very faithful, sometimes even literal. The maxims
were translated into German by C. Arnold and were published at Nuremberg
in 1663.

This, however, ended the progress of Sanskrit literature in Europe for
the time being. Information came in very slowly. The _Lettres
Édifiantes_ of the Jesuits, and the accounts of travellers like Sonnerat
began to shed additional light on the religious customs of India, but
its sacred language remained a secret. In 1785, Herder wrote that what
Europe knew of Hindu literature was only late legends, that the Sanskrit
language as well as the genuine Vēda would probably for a long time
remain unknown.[60] Sir William Jones, however, had founded the Asiatic
Society a year before and the first step towards the discovery of
Sanskrit had really thus been taken.

But let us consider what bearing all this had on German poetry. In this
field the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were desperately dreary.
In the former century the leading thinkers of Germany were absorbed in
theological controversy, while in the next the Thirty Years' War
completely crushed the spirit of the nation. There is little poetry in
this period that calls for even passing notice in this investigation.
Paul Fleming, although he was with Olearius in Persia, has written
nothing that would interest us here. Andreas Gryphius took the subject
for his drama "Catharina von Georgien" (1657) from Persian history. It