Part 2 — VANITAS VANITATUM.
John Addington Symonds translation
No. 58.
This vile world In madness hurled Offers but false shadows; Joys that wane And waste like vain Lilies of the meadows. Worldly wealth, Youth, strength, and health, Cramp the soul's endeavour; Drive it down In hell to drown, Hell that burns for ever. What we see, And what let be, While on earth we tarry, We shall cast Like leaves at last Which the sere oaks carry. Carnal life, Man's law of strife, Hath but brief existence; Passes, fades, Like wavering shades Without real subsistence. Therefore bind, Tread down and grind Fleshly lusts that blight us; So heaven's bliss 'Mid saints that kiss Shall for aye delight us.
The fourth, in like manner, would have but little to do with a Commersbuch, were it not for the fact that the most widely famous modern student-song of Germany has borrowed two passages from its serious and tragic rhythm. Close inspection of Gaudeamus Igitur shows that the metrical structure of that song is based on the principle of quoting one of its long lines and rhyming to it.