Explore "The Seven Sleepers" by Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Six among the courtiers favour'd Fly before the Caesar's fury, Who would as a god be worshipp'd, Though in truth no god appearing, For a fly prevents him ever From enjoying food at table. Though with fans his servants scare it, They the fly can never banish. It torments him, stings, and troubles, And the festal board perplexes, Then returning like the herald Of the olden crafty Fly-God. "What! " -- the striplings say together -- "Shall a fly a god embarrass?
Shall a god drink, eat at table, Like us mortals? No, the Only, Who the sun and moon created, And the glowing stars arch'd o'er us, He is God, -- we'll fly! " -- The gentle, Lightly shod, and dainty striplings Did a shepherd meet, and hide them, With himself, within a cavern.