Know how to entertain ladies and gentlemen so that contented
They shall depart from my house, and strangers agreeably can flatter.
Yet I'm resolved that some day I one will have for a daughter,
Who shall requite me in kind and sweeten my manifold labors;
Who the piano shall play to me, too; so that there shall with pleasure
All the handsomest people in town and the finest assemble,
As they on Sundays do now in the house of our neighbor." Here Hermann
Softly pressed on the latch, and so went out from the chamber.



THALIA

THE CITIZENS

Thus did the modest son slip away from the angry upbraiding;
But in the tone he had taken at first, the father continued:
"That comes not out of a man which he has not in him; and hardly
Shall the joy ever be mine of seeing my dearest wish granted:
That my son may not as his father be, but a better.
What would become of the house, and what of the city if each one
Were not with pleasure and always intent on maintaining, renewing,
Yea, and improving, too, as time and the foreigner teach us!
Man is not meant, forsooth, to grow from the ground like a mushroom,
Quickly to perish away on the spot of ground that begot him,
Leaving no trace behind of himself and his animate action!
As by the house we straightway can tell the mind of the master,
So, when we walk through a city, we judge of the persons who rule it.
For where the towers and walls are falling to ruin; where offal
Lies in heaps in the gutters, and alleys with offal are littered;