A certain strength of mind is required both on the part of the poet and the reader; in the former that he may not disguise vice, in the latter that he may not suffer brilliant qualities to beguile him into admiration of what is essentially detestable. Whether the author has fulfilled his duty he leaves others to judge, that his readers will perform theirs he by no means feels assured. The vulgar—among whom I would not be understood to mean merely the rabble—the vulgar I say (between ourselves) extend their influence far around, and unfortunately—set the fashion. Too shortsighted to reach my full meaning, too narrow-minded to comprehend the largeness of my views, too disingenuous to admit my moral aim—they will, I fear, almost frustrate my good intentions, and pretend to discover in my work an apology for the very vice which it has been my object to condemn, and will perhaps make the poor poet, to whom anything rather than justice is usually accorded, responsible for his simplicity.

Thus we have a Da capo of the old story of Democritus and the Abderitans, and our worthy Hippocrates would needs exhaust whole plantations of hellebore, were it proposed to remedy this mischief by a healing decoction.

[This alludes to the fable amusingly recorded by Wieland in his
Geschichte der Abderiten. The Abderitans, who were a byword among
the ancients for their extreme simplicity, are said to have sent
express for Hipocrates to cure their great townsman Democritus,
whom they believed to be out of his senses, because his sayings
were beyond their comprehension. Hippocrates, on conversing with
Democritus, having at once discovered that the cause lay with
themselves, assembled the senate and principal inhabitants in the
market-place with the promise of instructing them in the cure of
Democritus. He then banteringly advised them to import six
shiploads of hellebore of the very best quality, and on its arrival
to distribute it among the citizens, at least seven pounds per
head, but to the senators double that quantity, as they were bound
to have an extra supply of sense. By the time these worthies
discovered that they had been laughed at, Hippocrates was out of
their reach. The story in Wieland is infinitely more amusing than
this short quotation from memory enables me to show. H. G. B.]

Let as many friends of truth as you will, instruct their fellow-citizens in the pulpit and on the stage, the vulgar will never cease to be vulgar, though the sun and moon may change their course, and "heaven and earth wax old as a garment." Perhaps, in order to please tender-hearted people, I might have been less true to nature; but if a certain beetle, of whom we have all heard, could extract filth even from pearls, if we have examples that fire has destroyed and water deluged, shall therefore pearls, fire, and water be condemned. In consequence of the remarkable catastrophe which ends my play, I may justly claim for it a place among books of morality, for crime meets at last with the punishment it deserves; the lost one enters again within the pale of the law, and virtue is triumphant. Whoever will but be courteous enough towards me to read my work through with a desire to understand it, from him I may expect—not that he will admire the poet, but that he will esteem the honest man.
SCHILLER.
EASTER FAIR, 1781.

ADVERTISEMENT TO THE ROBBERS.

AS COMMUNICATED BY SCHILLER TO DALBERG IN 1781, AND SUPPOSED TO HAVE BEEN USED AS A PROLOGUE.

—This has never before been printed with any of the editions.—

The picture of a great, misguided soul, endowed with every gift of excellence; yet lost in spite of all its gifts! Unbridled passions and bad companionship corrupt his heart, urge him on from crime to crime, until at last he stands at the head of a band of murderers, heaps horror upon horror, and plunges from precipice to precipice into the lowest depths of despair. Great and majestic in misfortune, by misfortune reclaimed, and led back to the paths of virtue. Such a man shall you pity and hate, abhor yet love, in the Robber Moor. You will likewise see a juggling, fiendish knave unmasked and blown to atoms in his own mines; a fond, weak, and over-indulgent father; the sorrows of too enthusiastic love, and the tortures of ungoverned passion. Here, too, you will witness, not without a shudder, the interior economy of vice; and from the stage be taught how all the tinsel of fortune fails to smother the inward worm; and how terror, anguish, remorse, and despair tread close on the footsteps of guilt. Let the spectator weep to-day at our exhibition, and tremble, and learn to bend his passions to the laws of religion and reason; let the youth behold with alarm the consequences of unbridled excess; nor let the man depart without imbibing the lesson that the invisible band of Providence makes even villains the instruments of its designs and judgments, and can marvellously unravel the most intricate perplexities of fate.

PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.

The eight hundred copies of the first edition of my ROBBERS were exhausted before all the admirers of the piece were supplied. A second was therefore undertaken, which has been improved by greater care in printing, and by the omission of those equivocal sentences which were offensive to the more fastidious part of the public. Such an alteration, however, in the construction of the play as should satisfy all the wishes of my friends and critics has not been my object.

In this second edition the several songs have been arranged for the pianoforte, which will enhance its value to the musical part of the public. I am indebted for this to an able composer,* who has performed his task in so masterly a manner that the hearer is not unlikely to forget the poet in the melody of the musician.

DR. SCHILLER.

STUTTGART, Jan. 5, 1782.

* Alluding to his friend Zumsteeg.—ED.

THE ROBBERS.

A TRAGEDY.

"Quae medicamenta non sanant, ferrum sanat; quae ferrum non
sanat, ignis sanat."—HIPPOCRATES.

DRAMATIS PERSONAE.

MAXIMILIAN, COUNT VON MOOR.

CHARLES,|
FRANCIS,| his Sons.
AMELIA VON EDELREICH, his Niece.
SPIEGELBERG,|
SCHWEITZER, |
GRIMM, |
RAZMANN, | Libertines, afterwards Banditti
SCHUFTERLE, |
ROLLER, |
KOSINSKY, |
SCHWARTZ, |
HERMANN, the natural son of a Nobleman.
DANIEL, an old Servant of Count von Moor.
PASTOR MOSER.
FATHER DOMINIC, a Monk.
BAND OF ROBBERS, SERVANTS, ETC.

The scene is laid in Germany. Period of action about two years.

THE ROBBERS

ACT I.

SCENE I.—Franconia.

Apartment in the Castle of COUNT MOOR.

FRANCIS, OLD MOOR.

FRANCIS. But are you really well, father? You look so pale.

OLD MOOR. Quite well, my son—what have you to tell me?

FRANCIS. The post is arrived—a letter from our correspondent at Leipsic.

OLD M. (eagerly). Any tidings of my son Charles?

FRANCIS.