Again, in Jean Paul’s “Titan,” when Schoppe, melancholy and now brooding
over himself, frequently looking at his hands, says to himself, “There
sits a lord in bodily reality, and I in him; but who is such?” Heinrich
Heine appears as a true humourist in his “_Romancero_.” Behind all his
jokes and drollery we discern a profound seriousness, which is ashamed to
appear unveiled. Accordingly humour depends upon a special kind of mood or
temper (German, _Laune_, probably from _Luna_) through which conception in
all its modifications, a decided predominance of the subjective over the
objective in the apprehension of the external world, is thought. Moreover,
every poetical or artistic presentation of a comical, or indeed even a
farcical scene, through which a serious thought yet glimmers as its
concealed background, is a production of humour, thus is humorous. Such,
for example, is a coloured drawing of Tischbein’s, which represents an
empty room, lighted only by the blazing fire in the grate. Before the fire
stands a man with his coat off, in such a position that his shadow, going
out from his feet, stretches across the whole room. Tischbein comments
thus on the drawing: “This is a man who has succeeded in nothing in the
world, and who has made nothing of it; now he rejoices that he can throw
such a large shadow.” Now, if I had to express the seriousness that lies
concealed behind this jest, I could best do so by means of the following
verse taken from the Persian poem of Anwari Soheili:—
“If thou hast lost possession of a world,
Be not distressed, for it is nought;
Or hast thou gained possession of a world,
Be not o’erjoyed, for it is nought.
Our pains, our gains, all pass away;
Get thee beyond the world, for it is nought.”