120 



SC1I1RVAN SCHLEGEL. 



to Ispahan and Yezd. The sides of the hills that 

 bound the plain of Schiras, produce a wine, which 

 has the highest reputation of any in the East. 

 Schiras is an ancient city, and has been the capital 

 of the Persian empire, but exhibits no ruins to at- 

 test its former greatness. 



SCHIRVAN. See Caucasus. 



SCHISM (<r X ifft<t, a fissure) is chiefly applied to 

 separations happening through diversity of opinions 

 among people of-the same religion. In the Catholic 

 church, the election of popes has often given rise to 

 schisms, by the division of the Christian world in 

 favour of rival candidates. The longest schism of 

 this kind was the Great Schism, which began in 

 1378, when Urban VI. and Clement VII. both 

 claimed the papacy. This was finally settled by 

 the council of Constance, which effected the general 

 recognition of pope Martin V., who was chosen by 

 it in 1417. See Pope. 



SCHLANGENBAD,AND LANGENSCHWAL- 

 BACH; two watering places in Nassau, near 

 the charming Rheingau. (q. v.) The water (from 

 79 83 Fahrenheit) contains clay and lime. It 

 feels like soap, softens and renders pliable the fibres 

 of the skin, and is excellent in cases of stiffness and 

 contraction. The slime which floats on the water 

 is used to cure old ulcers. 



SCHLEGEL; a name' distinguished in German 

 literature, chiefly as that of the two brothers 

 Augustus William and Frederic von Schlegel. John 

 Elias, their uncle, born in 1718, at Meissen, was 

 the first German dramatic writer, after Gryphius, 

 who contributed to the advancement of German 

 belles-lettres. He died in 1749. 



His brother John Adolphus, a poet and pulpit 

 orator, was born in 1721, at Meissen. He was the 

 author of several valuable works, and made a trans- 

 lation of Batteux's Les Beaux Arts reduits a un mfme 

 Principe, which he accompanied with notes and 

 treatises of his own (1751, 3d edition 1770). He 

 died in 1753, 



John Henry, the third brother, was born in 1724, 

 at Meissen, and died at Copenhagen in 1780. He 

 is the author of valuable works on Danish history, 

 and of some translations from English poets into 

 German. 



Augustus William and Frederic are the sons of 

 John Adolphus. The first was born September 8, 

 1767, at Hanover; and Frederic in 1772, at the 

 same place. The former early manifested a great 

 ability for learning languages, as well as much 

 poetical talent. When eighteen years old, he re- 

 cited, at the lyceum of Hanover, a piece in hexame- 

 ters on the birth-day of the king, in which he gave 

 a sketch of the history of German poetry, which 

 was justly admired. He first studied theology at 

 Gottingen, but soon quitted it for philology. At 

 Gottingen, he gained the friendship of Burger, who, 

 in the preface to the second edition of his poems 

 (1789), consecrated him to the service of the 

 Muses, and prophesied his immortality in one of 

 the finest German sonnets. A. W. Schlegel con- 

 tributed to Burger's Academy of Belles-Lettres. 

 In 1787, when in the philological seminary under 

 Heyne, a Latin treatise by him, on the geography 

 of Homer, obtained a prize. After leaving Got- 

 tingen, he acted as tutor for three years in the 

 house of a banker in Amsterdam. He returned to 

 Germany, and took part in the Horce. and Schiller's 

 Almanac of the Muses, in which his translations 

 from Dante, with commentaries, attracted particu- 

 lar attention. Until 1799, he was one of the most 



active contributors to the General Literary Gazette. 

 In 1797, he began his translation of Shakspeare, of 

 which nine volumes have appeared. Tieck has 

 undertaken the revision of them, and the ad- 

 dition of the pieces not yet translated, in a new 

 edition. We know of no translation so perfect as 

 this. It may well be called a German reproduction 

 of the original. It has made Shakspeare a German 

 popular poet to all intents and purposes, on the stage 

 and in the closet. Schlegel had now become a 

 professor at Jena, where he delivered lectures on 

 aesthetics, and, from 1798 to 1800, was connected 

 with his brother in the publication of the Athenaeum, 

 a critical journal, which did much to promote a 

 more independent spirit in German literature. The 

 first edition of his poems appeared in 1800, and 

 Schlegel became the second father of the German 

 sonnet. In 1800, he also published his poetic attack 

 on Kotzebue. In 1801, appeared his Characteristics 

 and Critiques, in two volumes ; in 1802, the Al- 

 manac of the Muses, published by him and Tieck, 

 together, which is pervaded by a mystico-symbolical 

 spirit. Having separated from his wife, he went, 

 in 1802, to Berlin, where he delivered lectures, 

 published in vol. iii. of Europa. His Ion appeared 

 in 1803. He took an active part in the publication 

 of the Paper for the Fashionable World, which was 

 opposed by Kotzebue 's Freimuthige (Liberal)-; and 

 a paper-war began, not very honourable to the 

 latter. In 1803, appeared vol. i. of the Spanish 

 Theatre, containing three pieces of Calderon ; vol. 

 ii. followed in 1809. These translations fully 

 satisfied the high expectations which the public had 

 formed from his translation of Shakspeare. In 1804, 

 he published his Nosegays of Italian, Spanish, and 

 Portuguese Poetry. In 1805, he travelled with 

 madame de Stael, and lived with her at Copet, in 

 Italy, France, Vienna, and Stockholm. In his 

 elegy on Rome, he celebrates his generous friend. He 

 wrote many critiques during this time, partly, in the 

 Jena Literary Gazette, partly in the Heidelberg 

 Annals. In 1807, he published at Paris his Com- 

 parison of the Phaedra of Euripides with that of 

 Racine, which was written in French, and attracted 

 much attention from the French literati. In 1808, 

 he delivered lectures on the dramatic art, in Vienna, 

 and published them, at a later period, in three vol- 

 umes, 2d edition, 1817. They have been translated 

 into almost all the languages of Europe. In 1812, 

 he made a new collection of his poems (2d edition, 

 1820). In 1813, he became a political writer in 

 French and German, accompanied the then crown- 

 prince of Sweden, as secretary, and received several 

 orders, and the rank of nobility. After the fall of 

 Napoleon, he returned to madame de Stael, after 

 whose death, in 1818, he accepted a professorship 

 in the university of Bonn, which had been but a 

 short time established. His marriage with the 

 daughter of Mr Paulus, in 1819, was dissolved in 

 1820. He lately lectured chiefly upon the history of 

 arts and sciences in ancient and modern times, and, 

 since 1820, published the Indian Library, a 

 periodical for promoting the study of the Oriental 

 languages, particularly Sanscrit. He superintended 

 the printing of the great Sanscrit work Bamfnjana, 

 at the printing-office established by him at the ex- 

 pense of the Prussian government. In 1823, he 

 published Bhagavad-Gita, an episode of the epos 

 Mahakliarata, with a Latin translation. His Ori- 

 ental studies led him again to France, and, in 1823, 

 to England, where he examined the manuscripts at 

 London, Oxford, Cambridge, and Hayleybury. In 



