The central position of symbol in the poetic philosophy of art is based on two assumptions and conditions – on the recognition of identity of nature and spirit, whose language is of divine origin, and on the presence of analogy between a human and the universe. The correspondence between dream and reality is a central problem not only for Lermontovʼs and Goethe’s poetry, but also of European literature in general. The symbols of Russian and German poets appear in two variants. The first is equal to the semantics of the word, which appeals to poetics of the universe. The structure of symbol is not disclosed, but only implied for the reader who must be aware of all phenomena, feelings, experiences referred to the semantics of the words «earth», «sky», «star», «cup of life» in which «drink was – a dream». The doctrine of correspondences, which viewed the exter­nal world as a system of symbols revealing the spiritual world in material form. By the romantic period, the view that nature is the visual language of God or spirit be­came established as one of the mainstays of poetry, but two fundamental shifts had occurred: the material and spiritual worlds were seen as merged rather than related simply as representation to the thing represented; and, as a result, the meaning of symbols became less fixed and more ambiguous. The correspondence between individual elements allows us to conclude about the uniqueness of Lermontov’s and Goethe’s ideas about forms of its realization. Symbol is extremely individualized, devoid of tradition. They have become a model of a new kind of romantic symbolization in European poetry of the nineteenth century. Natural phenomena become elements of their external imagery. If they «play» person, it appears somewhat sketchy in terms of psychological development, «carries» only one «idea», whether it is the desire for freedom or fight. Human appears in these texts as a complex set of feelings and emotions, and personifies an «idea».