Page:Schwenkfelder Hymnology.djvu/60

48 As a hymn-writer, he was honored by his contemporaries and is ranked high by modern writers on hymnology. Grammatically, his poetry is not infrequently defective, but it will be remembered that his linguistic traditions were Low German. Schneider says: "Sudermann always chose good models, in Dutch, French and Latin as well as in German. Schwenkfeld's flow of language, Reissner's brevity and Tauler's fervour are reflected in his writings." Wackernagel's valuation of Sudermann and his hymns runs thus, in English translation: "He was a true Christian, his poems are simply like so many spontaneous devotions, in which his soul was submerged as he studied the Holy Scriptures, the church fathers, the mystics and the Reformers; and it seems as though in the fifty years of his hymn-writing he had only godly thoughts. I have spent much time in the study of this author; indeed, I have a fondness for him, because his hymns are so genuine and at the same time so pertinent." The following hymn on the deception of temporal joy, written in 1584, we have chosen to illustrate both the godliness and the lyric fire of this' prince of Schwenkfelder hymn-writers:

"VON DER FALSCHEN BETRUEGLICHEN WELTFREUDE.

"O blinde Welt, wie hast du mich gestöret

Von Jugend vff vnd noch in diese Zeit,

O arge Welt, wie hastu mich bethöret

Vnd abgebracht von rechter Bahn so weit!

O falsche Welt, Wollust vnd Gelt, Wee dem ewig, der auff dich belt.

"O kurtze freüd, o langwirige schmertzen, O Ewigkeit, wie machst mir ein geträng, Wan ich ernstlich bedenck von gantzem hertzen, Nach dieser Zeit dasz du wehrest so lang. O falsche Welt, etc.