From Buchner's "Lenz"


Lenz shuddered when he touched her cold limbs and saw her half-open glassy eyes. The child seemed to him so forlorn, and he himself so alone and isolated; he threw himself on top of the corpse; death frightened him, he was seized by an agony of pain, these features, this quiet face were going to rot away, he threw himself to his knees and with all the plangent ardour of despair he prayed that God might give him, weak and wretched creature that he was, a sign, and bring the child back to life; whereupon he huddled down in total concentration, focusing all his will-power on a single point, and thus he remained for a long time, quite rigid. Then he stood and, grasping the hands of the child, said loudly and firmly: 'Arise, and walk!' But the words echoed back from the sober walls as though in mockery, and the corpse stayed cold. 

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