Friedrich von Schlegel, The Philosophy of Life, and Philosophy of Language, tr. A. J. W. Morrison (London: Henry G. Bohn, 1847), lecture II., pp. 34-35, 37-38:
. . . longing—an indefinite feeling of profound desire, which is satisfied with no earthly object, whether real or ideal, but is ever directed to the eternal and the divine. And although it presupposes, as the condition of its existence, no special genius or peculiar talents, but proceeds immediately out of the pure source of the divinely created and immortal soul—out of the everlasting feelings of the loving soul—still, from causes which are easily conceivable, a pure development of this species is far rarer than even of the enthusiasm for art. No doubt, in certain happy temperaments, under circumstances favorable to their free expansion, this vague longing is peculiar to the age of youth, and is often enough observed there. Indeed, it is in that soft melancholy, which is always joined with the half-unconscious, but pleasant feeling of the blooming fullness of life, that lies the charm which the reminiscence of the days of youth possesses for the calm and quiet contemplations of old age. Here, too, the distinctive mark between the genuine and the spurious manifestations of this feeling is both simple enough, and easily found. For as this longing may in general be explained as an inchoate state—a love yet to be developed—the question reduces itself consequently to the simple one of determining the nature of this love. If, upon the first development and gratification of the passions, this love immediately passes over to and loses itself in the ordinary realities of life, then is it no genuine manifestation of the heavenly feeling, but a mere earthly and sensual longing. But when it survives the youthful ebullition of the feelings, when it does but become deeper and more intense by time, when it is satisfied with no joys, and stifled by no sorrows of earth—when, from the midst of the struggles of life, and the pressure of the world, it turns, like a light-seeing eye upon the storm-tossed waves of the ocean of time, to the heaven of heavens, watching to discover there some star of eternal hope—then is it that true and genuine longing, which, directing itself to the divine, is itself also of a celestial origin. Out of this root springs almost every thing that is intellectually beautiful and great—even the love of scientific certainty itself, and of a profound knowledge of life and nature. Philosophy, indeed, has no other source, and we might in this respect call it, with much propriety, the doctrine or the science of longing. But even that youthful longing, already noticed, is oftentimes a genuine, or, at least, the first foundation of the higher and truer species, although, unlike the latter, it is as yet neither purely evolved nor refined by the course of time.
. . . This beautiful longing of youth, a fruitful fancy, and a loving soul, are the best and most precious gifts of benignant nature, that dispenses with so liberal a hand, or, rather, not of nature, but of that wonderful Intelligence that presides in and over it. They form, as it were, a fair garden of hidden life within man. But as the first man was placed in the garden of Eden, not merely for his idle enjoyment, but, as it is expressly stated, “to dress it and to keep it,” so here also, when this law of duty is neglected, the inmost heart of the most eminent characters and of the most richly-endowed natures becomes, as it were, a Paradise run wild and waste. . . .
. . . three forms of man’s higher effort—viz., longing, true love, and genuine enthusiasm . . . As . . . the thinking soul is the living center of the human consciousness, so, on the other hand, the loving soul is the middle point and the foundation of all moral life, as it shows itself in that soul-bond of love, which, while it constitutes marriage, is tied and completed therein. On this union, then, which, as historically represented, appears to be the true commencement of civilized life, it will be necessary to say a few words; and the present seems the most appropriate place for them. Now, both in philosophy and in all general speculation, there are many reasoners who would derive every thing from material sensations, and seek to degrade all that is regarded as high and noble by mankind. So here, also, in the world’s mode of judging of this union—which, however, all publicly-acknowledged principles regard as holy—it, and all that belongs to it, is accounted for by some evanescent passion, some sensual impression, or some interested view or other, while the existence of any thing like true and genuine love is absolutely denied. But, in the first place, in the case of a union which embraces the entire man—his sensuous as well as his rational, or, as I should prefer to say, his earthly no less than his spiritual nature and temperament—it can not fairly be urged in objection to it, that both the elements of his mixed constitution are present in it. On the contrary, it is obviously most unjust, in our estimate of it, violently to separate what, even in the least corrupted disposition and purest characters, are most closely interwoven, or, rather, fused together, and to subject them to an invidious and destructive analysis. This is not the way to determine the characteristics of a true and of a false love. The distinction between them must rather be sought by a simpler method, similar to that which we followed in the case of longing and enthusiasm—by considering merely the total result. A feeling of this kind may appear at the beginning never so violent; it may even amuse itself with a thorough mental hallucination, which betrays itself in its very outward aspect, with the profoundest veneration, nay, deification of its admired object; but in married life this intense admiration soon gives place to satiety or indifference, and imbittered by mutual distrust and misunderstanding, it terminates in incurable discord. In such a case the feeling, even in its ardent beginnings, was no true love, but simply passion. But in those happy unions, where the first passionate ardor of youth yields only to an ever-growing and still purer development of mutual good-will and confidence—while self-sacrifice and patient endurance, both in good and evil fortune, do but cherish the same deep affection and calm friendship—here, from the very first, it was true and genuine love. For, however much the outward appearances of human life may seem to contradict it, there is not in nature, and even in the higher region, any love without a return. And as all true love is reciprocal, so also is true love lasting and indestructible; or, to “speak as a man,” even because it is the very inmost life of humanity, it is, therefore, true unto death.
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