Laudator Temporis Acti

Goethe, Faust, Part II, lines 4782-4786 (tr. David Luke):

Look down from this high place, look far and wide
Over the empire: it must seem
A nightmare of deformity, a dream
Of monsters, law to lawless power unfurled,
And rooting error spread about the world.

Wer schaut hinab von diesem hohen Raum
Ins weite Reich, ihm scheint's ein schwerer Traum,
Wo Mißgestalt in Mißgestalten schaltet,
Das Ungesetz gesetzlich überwaltet
Und eine Welt des Irrtums sich entfaltet.

The same (tr. Bayard Taylor):

Who looks abroad from off this height supreme
Throughout the realm, 'tis like a weary dream,
Where one deformity another mouldeth,
Where lawlessness itself by law upholdeth,
And 'tis an age of Error that unfoldeth.

The same (tr. Stuart Atkins):

If from this lofty vantage point one views below
your far-flung realm, it seems an ugly dream
in which Deformity holds sway among deformities
and Lawlessness prevails by legal means
as Error spreads and fills the world with error.