In Danish literature the work most allied to _Heinrich von Ofterdingen_ is Ingemann's _De Sorte Riddere_ ("The Black Knights"). We learn from Ingemann's autobiography how exactly his frame of mind at the time he was writing this book corresponded to that of the German Romanticist. "I paid but little attention to all the great events that were happening in the outer world. Even the conflagration of Moscow, the destruction of the Great Army, and the fall of Napoleon were to me ephemeral phenomena ... even in the German War of Liberation I only saw a divided nation in conflict with itself, noble powers without any principle of unity and concord. _Between the ideal life and human life there lay a yawning abyss_, which only the heavenly rainbow of love and poetry could bridge over.... I wrote myself into a fairy labyrinth, in which love was my Ariadne-thread, and in which I hoped, with the great harp of the poetry of life, the strings of which are strung by genius from rock to rock over black abysses, _to lull the monsters of existence to sleep_, resolve the dissonances in the great world-harmony, and solve the world-mystery." The result of this attempt was woeful. It is certain that in _Heinrich von Ofterdingen_ Novalis succeeded in producing something as unlike Wilhelm Meister as possible. The "blue flower" was the emblem of the ideal. Here we have the real forgotten in the ideal, and the ideal in its emblem. Poetry is entirely separated from life. Novalis thinks that this is as it should be. In _Ofterdingen_ he says of poets: "Many and important events would only disturb them. A simple life is their lot, and they must make acquaintance with the varied and numberless phenomena of the outer world only by means of tales and books. Only seldom during the course of their lives is it permissible for them to be drawn into the wild eddy of some great event, in order that they may acquire a more accurate knowledge of the position and character of men of action. Their receptive minds are quite sufficiently occupied with near and simple phenomena.... Here upon earth already in possession of the peace of heaven, untormented by vain desires, only inhaling the fragrance of earthly fruits, not devouring them, they are free guests, whose golden feet tread lightly, and whose presence causes all involuntarily to spread their wings.... If we compare the poet with the hero, we shall find that the poet's song has many a time awakened heroic courage in youthful hearts, but never that heroic deeds have called the spirit of poetry to life in any soul."