This is an analysis of Hymns To The Night : 5 by Novalis.
In ancient times, over the widespread families of men an iron Fate ruled with dumb force. A gloomy oppression swathed their heavy souls -- the earth was boundless -- the abode of the gods and their home. From eternal ages stood its mysterious structure. Beyond the red hills of the morning, in the sacred bosom of the sea, dwelt the sun, the all-enkindling, living Light. An aged giant upbore the blissful world. Fast beneath mountains lay the first-born sons of mother Earth. Helpless in their destroying fury against the new, glorious race of gods, and their kindred, glad-hearted men. The ocean's dark green abyss was the lap of a goddess. In crystal grottos revelled a luxuriant folk. Rivers, trees, flowers, and beasts had human wits. Sweeter tasted the wine -- poured out by Youth-abundance -- a god in the grape-clusters -- a loving, motherly goddess upgrew in the full golden sheaves -- love's sacred inebriation was a sweet worship of the fairest of the god-ladies -- Life rustled through the centuries like one spring-time, an ever-variegated festival of heaven-children and earth-dwellers. All races childlike adored the ethereal, thousand-fold flame as the one sublimest thing in the world. There was but one notion, a horrible dream-shape --
That fearsome to the merry tables strode,…
Structure
- Rhyme scheme: a bcbcbXdd XebebefX acacabccb bcgceehhX i iiiijkjl hmhmhihi nkdlnioc obobbigi ajajodXc oolXXihiXnkdkfgkb
- Stanza lengths: 1,8,8,9,9,1,8,8,8,8,8,17,
- Metre: 0101100111000111011011010010111010111000100111100101010010010010110010001010001101011001011110100101101101011101011001010100101100101111011010101101101001001010100001001101101111011010011111010010011001010010100011011101000101100010001101101010011011110100010001010111011011010010010111011001001111110010011 1100010101 010101011 0101110111 0101010101 01001010101 1111110110 1111010101 0101011101 01000111100 11010100101 01000110010 111010101 00110101110 1111000101 1101010101 1101000101 0101010101 0101010101 0101110101 011101111 111110101001 1101000101 11000010101 0101000111 0110100101010001110011001101001001001110010101100110110101110110110101001010011101010011010101111010110101010101011001010011111001001011010101111010100010011010101010001010100001010100100100101010101010101011101010101101010010011010010011011100101001010101010101000001111101010101111001100100010101011100010101101100001001100010101100110101001000001010010011011000101001000100101100100011110100100011011010010100010010010101011001011001010010010101001010001010001011000100110010110101010100010101001010001010010110000111010100101001100101100011110111111110000110011110110111001010010010110101110001100010100111100110101010010111101100101 0111110111 0111110101 0101000101 1101000101 1111001001 111001101 0101011101 1111111111 1010101101010101010001011101010011001011101011011001110010101100100100101110101101101110011010001010010101010010101100110010010101010011111110001001110101001101111111101010110010100101111011001110111001011001011011011010010110010101010010110110101000100110001101011010001111000110110001010100101010100111101100110 11111101101011011010111001011110110101011101101011001101001001110011100101111010100011011001100100100010010010101010101010100101101010011111101111010010101111010110101011101011011101010010010110100100010011000100100110101 100001 1111010 110111 1100110 110101 110101 111111 10111010 0010111 010101 011101 011011 00101101 001011001 110111 11010111 101110 010101 001011 1101010 011110100 010101010 010111010 110011 0100110 1101101 1100110 011111 101101 011001 10011 0101101 11111 101111 010111 011001001 01110010 11101 10101110 11101 11011010 010101 111010 11011000 110101 110101 100101 111101 0101010 11010011 0111110 1010101 11101 1101010 101111 00101
- Closest metre: iambic tetrameter
- Guessed form: ballad stanza
- Stanzas: 13
- Lines: 92
Repeated words/phrases
of, in, and, their, earth, one, gods, to, with, his, into, new, all, over, world, far, more, most, from, rigid, fell, up, thee, he, death, heavenly, thy, mother, tears, love, have, life, old, hand
Anaphora
the

