Nothing truly convincing - which would possess thoroughness

Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel, philosopher, critic, and champion of Romantic thought, once declared: “Nothing truly convincing – which would possess thoroughness, vigor, and skill – has been written against the ancients as yet; especially not against their poetry.” In this pronouncement, he affirms the unmatched grandeur of the ancients, whose works, forged in the dawn of civilization, remain the fountainhead of wisdom, beauty, and strength. Schlegel insists that though generations of moderns have tried to surpass or belittle them, none have succeeded with true power. The poetry of the ancients stands unshaken, towering like a mountain whose roots go deep into the eternal soil of the human spirit.

The origin of this reflection lies in Schlegel’s role in the Romantic movement of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. He lived in a time when modernity was rising with pride, boasting of its sciences, philosophies, and new arts. Yet Schlegel, with deep reverence, looked back to the Greeks and Romans. He recognized that the ancients created not with haste or imitation, but with thoroughness, vigor, and skill—qualities that lent their poetry the weight of eternity. Homer’s Iliad, Sophocles’ tragedies, Virgil’s Aeneid—these were not merely works of literature, but monuments of the human soul, carrying truths that no passing age could refute.

Consider the story of Homer, the blind bard who sang the tales of Troy and Odysseus. His epics were composed without the printing press, without the machinery of modern culture, yet they continue to live after nearly three millennia. Many modern poets, with all their resources, have tried to rival him, but none have erased his place. Even the Enlightenment critics who scorned myth and praised reason could not tear down his verse. Time has proved Schlegel correct: no one has written a work of “thoroughness, vigor, and skill” that destroys Homer, or even diminishes him.

The meaning of Schlegel’s claim is not that the moderns lack value, but that true greatness acknowledges its roots. The ancients wrote from the raw sources of human experience—war, love, exile, fate, and death. Their words carry the freshness of humanity’s first encounters with destiny. Modern works may refine or challenge, but they build upon foundations already laid. Those who try to dismiss the ancients altogether only expose their own shallowness, for the soil of our art and thought is still the soil they first tilled.

Yet Schlegel emphasizes poetry above all. Why? Because poetry, more than philosophy or science, carries the living pulse of humanity. Empires rise and fall, but the Iliad still burns with wrath, the Odyssey still longs for home, the tragedies still teach us pity and fear. Poetry endures not by force, but by resonance with the eternal. This is why no critic, however skilled in rhetoric, has ever convinced mankind to abandon Homer, Sophocles, or Virgil. Their voices are carved into the very marrow of our being.

The lesson we inherit from Schlegel is twofold. First: do not despise the ancients, for they are the roots of our tree. To reject them is to sever ourselves from our own source of nourishment. Second: strive for thoroughness, vigor, and skill in your own works, so that what you create might endure as theirs has endured. Do not chase novelty alone, for novelty fades. Seek instead the eternal, the elemental, the truths that pulse in every generation.

Practically, this means immersing ourselves in the wisdom of the ancients, not as relics but as guides. Read their poetry not as dusty artifacts, but as living voices speaking to you across the centuries. Let Homer teach you courage, let Sophocles teach you humility, let Virgil teach you endurance. And when you create—whether in words, deeds, or life itself—strive to join their company by building with care, by shaping with passion, by daring to touch the eternal.

Thus Schlegel’s words resound like a trumpet across the ages: “Nothing truly convincing… has been written against the ancients as yet; especially not against their poetry.” Let us honor this truth, not as a call to worship the past blindly, but as a reminder that true greatness is not easily overturned. The ancients endure because they spoke to what is timeless. So must we, if we would leave behind works that future ages cannot dismiss. For to write, to live, to create with thoroughness, vigor, and skill, is to carve one’s voice into the eternal chorus of humanity.