The American Cyclopædia (1879)/Werner, Friedrich Ludwig Zacharias

WERNER, Friedrich Ludwig Zacharias, a German dramatist, born in Königsberg, Nov. 18, 1768, died in Vienna, Jan. 18, 1823. He studied under Kant, held a civil office in Warsaw, and relinquished one in Berlin in order to travel. He met Goethe at Weimar and Mme. de Staël at Coppet, joined the Catholic church at Rome in 1811, and became a priest in Vienna. His Der vierundzwanzigste Februar (translated into French by Jules Lacroix, Paris, 1849), thus entitled because his mother and an intimate friend died on that day, introduced the era of the so-called tragedies of fate. Several of his dramatic poems were designed to evangelize freemasonry; most of them have been collected in 6 vols. (Vienna, 1817-'18), and his complete works, including sacred poems and sermons, in 14 vols., with his biography by Schütz (Grimma, 1839-'41).