Page:History of the Literature of the Scandinavian North.djvu/249

Rh generation, also kindled Oehlenschläger’s enthusiasm, and in a little drama which he wrote on this occasion, we hear for the first time notes, whose pure and deep harmony was full of promise in regard to the author’s future success. He was also already at that time writing extensively for several literary journals. He cultivated his mind by daily intercourse with the most prominent persons of the younger generation, and was, in fact, one of the literary representatives of the period, though but few had any foreboding of the extraordinary powers that lay hidden and only waited for a favorable opportunity to be released. He had himself a strong, though undefined, consciousness that he was destined to fulfil a high mission, but not until he had made the acquaintance of Steffens did it become clear to him wherein this mission consisted, and in what manner it was to be accomplished.

was born in Norway, 1773, but educated in Denmark. From childhood nature had exercised a peculiarly strong influence on him, and as soon as he entered the university, he began to devote himself with great zeal to the study of natural sciences. On a journey to Germany he became a pupil of the naturalist and philosopher Schelling, and in 1802 he returned to Denmark for the purpose of preaching the gospel of the new school, and of being the apostle of its philosophy and romanticism. Being a man of commanding talents and great strength of character, and being, moreover, enthusiastically devoted to his mission, he made an extraordinary impression on the youth by the new doctrines which he was propagating. The barren ideals of the age of enlightenment in which people had rested in sluggish satisfaction, cleared away before the strokes of “the man of the thunderbolt,” and new wide avenues opened on every side, though they were illuminated only by the faint glare of the twilight, for Steffens was not the man who was able to clear away the mist. He remained only one year and a half in Denmark, and it is more than doubtful whether it would have been of any advantage either to himself or to