Verily before thou art I was,
With my sex
The mother sent me
To live in thy world,
And to hallow it
With love.
Here the ancient, mystical longing to become one with God is conceived
under the symbol of the night. (A symbol which we shall meet again,
magnified, in Wagner's _Tristan_.)
Lo! Love has burst its prison.
No parting now shall be,
And life's full tide has risen
Like to a boundless sea.
One night of love supernal,
Only one golden song,
And the face of the Eternal
To light our path along.
In addition, Novalis was a perfect woman-worshipper. He loved the Middle
Ages and Catholicism. "The reformation killed Christianity; henceforth
Christianity has ceased to exist." "Catholicism preached nothing but
love for the holy, beautiful Lady of Christianity, who, endowed with
divine virtue, was able to deliver all loyal hearts from the most
terrible dangers." He wrote hymns to Mary in the style of the pietists,
emphasising more especially the principle of motherliness:
Oh, Mary! At thy altar
A thousand hearts lie prone,
In this drear life of shadows
They yearn for thee alone.
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