21 The World Turned Upside Down
The world is topsy-turvy turn’d,
We walk feet-upwards in it;
The woodcocks shoot the sportsmen down,
A dozen in a minute.
The calves are seen to roast the cook,
On men are riding the horses;
On freedom of teaching and laws of light
The Catholic owl discourses.
The herring is a sans-culotte,
The truth is told by Bettina,
And puss-in-boots brings Sophocles
On the stage, with learned demeanour.
An ape for German heroes has built
A Pantheon, for glory zealous;20
And Massmann has lately been using a comb,
As German papers tell us.
The German bears, I grieve to say,
Are atheists unbelieving,
And in their place the parrots of France
The Christian faith are receiving.
The Moniteur of Uckermark
With equal frenzy seems smitten;
The dead have on the living there
The vilest epitaph written.21
Then let us not swim against the stream,
Good friends! ’twould serve us but badly;
But let us ascend the Templehof hill,22
“Long life to the king!” shouting gladly.