Faust: Part Two
Act V
I
Open Country
Wanderer
YES! ’tis they, the dusky lindens;
There they stand in sturdy age:
And again shall I behold them,
After such a pilgrimage?
’Tis the ancient place, the drifted
Downs, the hut that sheltered me,
When the billow, storm-uplifted.
Hurled me shoreward from the sea!
Here with blessing would I greet them,
They, my hosts, the helpful pair, —
Old, indeed, if now I meet them,
Since they then had hoary hair.
Pious folk, from whom I parted!
Be my greeting here renewed,
If ye still, as open-hearted.
Taste the bliss of doing good!
BAUCIS (a little woman, very old).
Gently, stranger! lest thou cumber
Rest, whereof my spouse hath need!
He but gains from longest slumber
Strength for briefest waking deed.
Wanderer
Tell me, mother, art thou even
She, to whom my thanks I bear,—
I, the youth, whose life was given
By your kind, united care?
Art thou Baucis, who the coldly
Fading mouth refreshment gave?
(The Husband appears.)
Thou, Philemon, who so boldly
Drew my treasure from the wave?
From your fire, so quickly burning,
From your silver-sounding bell,
Changed my doom, to fortune turning,
When the dread adventure fell.
Forth upon the sand-hills stealing,
Let me view the boundless sea!
Let me pray, devoutly kneeling,
Till my burdened heart be free!
(He walks forward upon the downs.)
PHILEMON (to Baucis).
Haste, and let the meal be dighted
’Neath the garden’s blooming trees!
Let him go, and be affrighted!
He’ll believe not what he sees.
(Follows, and stands beside the WANDERER.)
Where the savage waves maltreated
You, on shores of breaking foam,
See, a garden lies completed,
Like an Eden-dream of home!
Old was I, no longer eager,
Helpful, as the younger are:
And when I had lost my vigour,
Also was the wave afar.
Wise lords set their serfs in motion.
Dikes upraised and ditches led,
Minishing the rights of Ocean,
Lords to be in Ocean’s stead.
See the green of many a meadow.
Field and garden, wood and town!
Come, our table waits in shadow!
For the sun is going down.
Sails afar are gliding yonder;
Nightly to the port they fare:
To their nest the sea-birds wander,
For a harbour waits them there.
Distant now, thou hardly seest
Where the sea’s blue arc is spanned, —
Right and left, the broadest, freest
Stretch of thickly-peopled land.
II
In the Little Garden
The Three at the Table,
BAUCIS (to the stranger).
ART thou dumb? Of all we’ve brought here
In thy mouth shall nothing fall?
Philemon
He would know the marvel wrought here;
Fain thou speakest: tell him all!
Baucis
’Twas a marvel, if there’s any!
And the thought disturbs me still:
In a business so uncanny
Surely helped the Powers of 111.
PHILEMON,
Can the Emperor’s soul be perilled,
Who on him the strand bestowed?
Gave the mandate not the herald,
Trumpeting, as on he rode?
Near our downs, all unexpected,
Was the work’s beginning seen,
Tents and huts!—but, soon erected,
Rose a palace o’er the green.
Knaves in vain by day were storming,
Plying pick and spade alike;
Where the fires at night were swarming,
Stood, the following day, a dike.
Nightly rose the sounds of sorrow,
Human victims there must bleed:
Lines of torches, on the morrow,
Were canals that seaward lead.
He would seize our field of labour.
Hut and garden, godlessly:
Since he lords it as our neighbour,
We to him must subject be.
Philemon
Yet he bids, in compensation,
Fair estate of newer land.
Baucis
Trust not watery foundation!
Keep upon the hill thy stand!
Philemon
Let us, to the chapel straying.
Ere the sunset glow has died,
Chime the vespers, kneel, and, praying,
Still in our old God confide!
III
Palace
Spacious Pleasure-Garden: broad, straightly-cut Canal.
FAUST (in extreme old age, walking about, meditative).
LYNCEUS, THE WARDER
(through the speaking-trumpet).
THE sun goes down, the ships are veering
To reach the port, with song and cheer:
A heavy galley, now appearing
On the canal, will soon be here.
The gaudy pennons merrily flutter,
The masts and rigging upward climb:
Blessings on thee the seamen utter,
And Fortune greets thee at thy prime.
(The little bell rings on the downs.)
FAUST (starting).
Accursed chime! As in derision
It wounds me, like a spiteful shot:
My realm is boundless to my vision,
Yet at my back this vexing blot!
The bell proclaims, with envious bluster,
My grand estate lacks full design:
The brown old hut, the linden-cluster,
The crumbling chapel, are not mine.
If there I wished for recreation.
Another’s shade would give no cheer:
A thorn it is a sharp vexation, —
Would I were far away from here!
WARDER (from above).
With evening wind and favouring tide,
See the gay galley hither glide!
How richly, on its rapid track.
Tower chest and casket, bale and sack!
(A splendid Galley, richly and brilliantly laden with the productions of Foreign Countries.)
Mephistopheles. The Three Mighty Men.
Here we have landed:
Furl the sail!
Hail to the Master,
Patron hail!
(T7iey disembark; the goods are brought ashore.)
MEPHISTOPHELES
We’ve proved our worth in many ways,
Delighted, if the Patron praise!
We sailed away with vessels twain,
With twenty come to port again.
Of great successes to relate,
We only need to show our freight.
Free is the mind on Ocean free:
Who there can ponder sluggishly?
You only need a rapid grip:
You catch a fish, you seize a ship;
And when you once are lord of three,
The fourth is grappled easily;
The fifth is then in evil plight;
You have the Power, and thus the Right.
You count the What, and not the How:
If I have ever navigated.
War, Trade and Piracy, I vow.
Are three in one, and can’t be separated!
The Three Mighty Men
No thank and hail?
No hail and thank?
As if our freight
To him were rank!
He makes a face
Of great disgust;
The royal wealth
Displease him must.
Expect no further
Any pay;
Your own good share
Ye took away.
THE MIGHTY MEN,
We only took it
For pastime fair;
We all demand
An equal share.
First, arrange them.
In hall on hall, —
The precious treasures,
Together all!
If such a splendour
Meets his ken,
And he regards it
More closely then,
A niggard he
Won’t be, at least:
He’ll give our squadron
Feast on feast.
To-morrow the gay birds hither wend,
And I can best to them attend.
(The cargo is removed.)
MEPHISTOPHELES (to FAUST).
With gloomy gaze, with serious brow,
Of this great fortune hearest thou.
Crowned is thy wisest industry,
And reconciled are shore and sea;
And from the shore, to swifter wakes,
The willing sea the vessels takes.
Speak, then, that here from thy proud seat,
Thine arm may clasp the world complete.
Here, on this spot, the work was planned!
Here did the first rough cabin stand;
A little ditch was traced, a groove,
Where now the feathered oar-blades move.
Thy high intent, thy servants’ toil.
From land and sea have won the spoil.
From here
Still that accursed Here!
To me a burden most severe.
To thee, so clever, I declare it, —
It gives my very heart a sting;
It is impossible to bear it!
Yet ashamed am I, to say the thing.
The old ones, there, should make concession;
A shady seat would I create:
The lindens, not my own possession.
Disturb my joy in mine estate.
There would I, for a view unbaffled.
From bough to bough erect a scaffold.
Till for my gaze a look be won
O’er everything that I have done,—
To see before me unconfined,
The masterpiece of human mind,
Wisely asserting to my sense
The people’s gain of residence.
No sorer plague can us attack,
Than rich to be, and something lack!
The chiming bell, the lindens’ breath,
Oppress like air in vaults of death:
My force of will, my potence grand,
Is shattered here upon the sand.
How shall I ban it from my feeling!
I rave whene’er the bell is pealing.
’Tis natural that so great a spite
Thy life should thus embitter quite.
Who doubts it? Every noble ear,
Disgusted, must the jangle hear;
And that accursed bim-bam-booming,
Through the clear sky of evening glooming,
Is mixed with each event that passes,
From baby’s bath to burial-masses,
As if, between its bath and bim,
Life were a dream, in memory dim.
Their obstinate, opposing strain
Darkens the brightest solid gain,
Till one, in plague and worry thrust
Grows tired, at last, of being just.
Why be annoyed, when thou canst well despise them?
Wouldst thou not long since colonize them?
Then go, and clear them out with speed!
Thou knowest the fair estate, indeed,
I chose for the old people’s need.
MEPHISTOPHELES.
We’ll set them down on other land;
Ere you can look, again they’ll stand:
When they’ve the violence outgrown,
Their pleasant dwelling shall atone.
(He whistles shrilly.)
The Three enter.
Come, as the Master bids, and let
The fleet a feast to-morrow get!
The Three
Reception bad the old Master gave;
A jolly feast is what we crave.
MEPHISTOPHELES.
(ad spectatores).
It happens as it happed of old:
Still Naboth’s vineyard we behold!
IV.
DEAD OF NIGHT.
LYNCEUS, THE WARDER (singing on the watch-tower of the Palace).
FOR seeing intended,
Employed for my sight,
The tower’s my dwelling,
The world my delight.
I gaze on the Distant,
I look on the Near, —
The moon and the planets,
The forest and deer.
So see I in all things
The grace without end,
And even as they please me,
Myself I commend.
Thou fortunate Vision,
Of all thou wast ‘ware,
Whatever it might be,
Yet still it was fair!
Pause.
Not alone that I delight me,
Have I here been stationed so:—
What a horror comes, to fright me,
From the darksome world below!
Sparks of fire I see outgushing
Through the night of linden-trees;
Stronger yet the glow is flushing,
Fanned to fury by the breeze.
Ah! the cabin burns, unheeded,
Damp and mossy though it stand:
Quick assistance here is needed,
And no rescue is at hand!
Ah, the good old father, mother,
Else so careful of the fire,
Doomed amid the smoke to smother!—
The catastrophe how dire!
Now the blackening pile stands lonely
In the flames that redly swell:
If the good old folk be only
Rescued from the burning hell!
Dazzling tongues the crater launches
Through the ‘eaves and through the branches
Withered boughs, at last ignited,
Break, in burning, from the tree:
Why must I be thus far-sighted?
Witness such calamity?
Now the little chapel crashes
’Neath a branch’s falling blow;
Soon the climbing, spiry flashes
Set the tree-tops in a glow.
Down to where the trunks are planted
Burn they like a crimson dawn.
Long pause. Chant.
What erewhile the eye enchanted
With the centuries is gone.
FAUST
(on the balcony, towards the downs).
Above, what whining lamentation?
The word, the tone, too late I heed.
My warder wails: I feel vexation
At heart, for this impatient deed.
Yet be the lindens extirpated,
Till half-charred trunks the spot deface,
A look-in-the-land is soon created.
Whence I can view the boundless space.
Thence shall I see the newer dwelling
Which for the ancient pair I raise.
Who, my benign forbearance feeling,
Shall there enjoy their latter days.
MEPHISTOPHELES AND THE THREE (below).
We hither come upon the run!
Forgive! not happily ’twas done.
We knocked and beat, but none replied,
And entrance ever was denied;
Of jolts and blows we gave good store,
And broken lay the rotten door;
We called aloud, with direst threat,
But still no hearing could we get.
And, as it haps, with such a deed,
They would not hear, they would not heed;
But we began, without delay,
To drive the stubborn folks away.
The pair had then an easy lot:
They fell and died upon the spot.
A stranger, who was there concealed,
And fought, was left upon the field;
But in the combat, fierce and last,
From coals, that round about were cast,
The straw took fire. Now merrily
One funeral pile consumes the three.
FAUST.
Deaf unto my commands were ye!
Exchange I meant, not robbery.
The inconsiderate, savage blow
I curse! Bear ye the guilt and go!
The proverb old still runs its course:
Bend willingly to greater force!
If you are bold, and face the strife,
Stake house and home, and then—your life!
FAUST (on the balcony).
The stars conceal their glance and glow,
The fire sinks down, and flickers low;
A damp wind fans it with its wings.
And smoke and vapour hither brings.
Quick bidden, and too quick obeyed! —
What hovers hither like a shade?
V
MIDNIGHT.
Four Gray Women enter.
FIRST.
MY name, it is Want.
Second
And mine, it is Guilt.
Third
And mine, it is Care.
Fourth
Necessity, mine.
Three Together
The portal is bolted, we cannot get in:
The owner is rich, we’ve no business within.
Want
I shrink to a shadow.
Guilt
I shrink unto naught.
NECESSITY.
The pampered from me turn the face and the thought.
Ye Sisters, ye neither can enter, nor dare;
But the keyhole is free to the entrance of Care,
(Care disappears.)
Want
Ye, grisly old Sisters, be banished from here!
Guilt
Beside thee, and bound to thee, I shall appear!
Necessity
At your heels goes Necessity, blight in her breath.
The Three
The clouds are in motion, and cover each star!
Behind there, behind! from afar, from afar,
He cometh, our Brother! he comes, he is...
.,. Death!
FAUST (in the Palace).
Four saw I come, but those that went were three;
The sense of what they said was hid from me.
But something like “Necessity” I heard;
Thereafter, “Death” a gloomy, threatening word!
It sounded hollow, spectrally subdued:
Not yet have I my liberty made good:
If I could banish Magic’s fell creations,
And totally unlearn the incantations, —
Stood I, O Nature! Man alone in thee,
Then were it worth one’s while a man to be!
Ere in the Obscure I sought it, such was I, —
Ere I had cursed the world so wickedly.
Now fills the air so many a haunting shape,
That no one knows how best he may escape.
What though One Day with rational brightness beams,
The Night entangles us in webs of dreams,
From our young fields of life we come, elate:
There croaks a bird: what croaks he? Evil fate!
By superstition constantly insnared,
It grows to us, and warns, and is declared.
Intimidated thus, we stand alone. —
The portal jars, yet entrance is there none.
(Agitated.)
Is any one here?
Yes! must be my reply.
FAUST.
And thou, who art thou, then?
Well,—here am I.
Avaunt!
I am where I should be.
FAUST (first angry, then composed, addressing himself). Take care, and speak no word of sorcery!
Though no ear should choose to hear me,
Yet the shrinking heart must fear me:
Though transformed to mortal eyes,
Grimmest power I exercise.
On the land, or ocean yonder,
I, a dread companion, wander,
Always found, yet never sought,
Praised or cursed, as I have wrought!
Hast thou not Care already known?
I only through the world have flown:
Each appetite I seized as by the hair;
What not sufficed me, forth I let it fare,
And what escaped me, I let go.
I’ve only craved, accomplished my delight,
Then wished a second time, and thus with might
Stormed through my life: at first ’twas grand, completely,
But now it moves most wisely and discreetly.
The sphere of Earth is known enough to me;
The view beyond is barred immutably:
A fool, who there his blinking eyes directeth,
And o’er his clouds of peers a place expecteth!
Firm let him stand, and look around him well!
This World means something to the Capable.
Why needs he through Eternity to wend?
He here acquires what he can apprehend.
Thus let him wander down his earthly day;
When spirits haunt, go quietly his way;
In marching onwards, bliss and torment find,
Though, every moment, with unsated mind!
Whom I once possess, shall never
Find the world worth his endeavour:
Endless gloom around him folding,
Rise nor set of sun beholding.
Perfect in external senses,
Inwardly his darkness dense is;
And he knows not how to measure
True possession of his treasure.
Luck and Ill become caprices;
Still he starves in all increases;
Be it happiness or sorrow.
He postpones it till the morrow;
To the Future only cleaveth:
Nothing, therefore, he achieveth.
Desist! So shalt thou not get hold of me!
I have no mind to hear such drivel.
Depart! Thy gloomy litany
Might even befool the wisest man to evil.
Shall he go, or come?—how guide him?
Prompt decision is denied him;
Midway on the trodden highway
Halting, he attempts a by-way;
Ever more astray, bemisted,
Everything beholding twisted,
Burdening himself and others,
Taking breath, he chokes and smothers,
Though not choked, in Life not sharing,
Not resigned, and not despairing!
Such incessant rolling, spinning, —
Painful quitting, hard beginning,—
Now constraint, now liberation, —
Semi-sleep, poor recreation.
Firmly in his place insnare him
And, at last, for Hell prepare him!
Ill-omened spectres! By your treatment strays
A thousand times the human race to error:
Ye even transform the dull, indifferent days
To vile confusion of entangling terror.
’Tis hard, I know, from Daemons to escape;
The spirit’s bond breaks not, howe’er one tries it;
And yet, O Care, thy power, thy creeping shape.
Think not that I shall recognize it!
So feel it now: my curse thou’lt find,
When forth from thee I’ve swiftly passed!
Throughout their whole existence men are blind;
So, Faust, be thou like them at last!
(She breathes in his face.)
FAUST (blinded).
The Night seems deeper now to press around me,
But in my inmost spirit all is light;
I rest not till the finished work hath crowned me:
The master’s Word alone bestows the might.
Up from your couches, vassals, man by man!
Make grandly visible my daring plan!
Seize now your tools, with spade and shovel press!
The work traced out must be a swift success.
Quick diligence, severest ordering
The most superb reward shall bring;
And, that the mighty work completed stands,
One mind suffices for a thousand hands.
VI
GREAT OUTER COURT OF THE PALACE.
Torches.
MEPHISTOPHELES (in advance, as Overseer).
COME here, come here! Come on, come on!
Ye Lemures, loose-hung creatures!
Of sinew, ligament, and bone
Your knitted semi-natures!
LEMURES (in Chorus).
Without delay are we at hand,
And half ’tis our impression
That this discerns a spacious land,
Whereof we’ll have possession.
The pointed stakes, we bring them all,
The measuring-chain, for distance;
But we’ve -forgotten why the call
Was made for our assistance.
Here is no need of your artistic zeal:
Proceed as you may think it best!
Your tallest lay full length, from head to heel,
And lift the turf around him, all the rest!
As for our fathers made, prepare
To excavate a lengthened square!
From palace to the narrow house transferred,
Such is, at last, the issue most absurd.
LEMURES
(digging with mocking gestures).
In youth when I did love, did love,
Methought it was very sweet;
When ’twas jolly and merry every way,
And I blithely moved my feet.
But now old Age, with his stealing steps,
Hath clawed me with his crutch:
I stumbled over the door of a grave;
Why leave they open such?
FAUST
(comes forth from the Palace, groping his way along the doorposts).
How I rejoice, to hear the clattering spade!
It is the crowd, for me in service moiling.
Till Earth be reconciled to toiling,
Till the proud waves be stayed,
And the sea girded with a rigid zone.
MEPHISTOPHELES (aside).
And yet, thou’rt labouring for us alone,
With all thy dikes and bulwarks daring;
Since thou for Neptune art preparing —
The Ocean-Devil—carousal great.
In every way shall ye be stranded;
The elements with us are banded.
And ruin is the certain fate.
Overseer!
Here!
However possible.
Collect a crowd of men with vigour,
Spur by indulgence, praise, or rigour, —
Reward, allure, conscript, compel!
Each day report me, and correctly note
How grows in length the undertaken moat.
MEPHISTOPHELES (half aloud).
When they to me the information gave,
They spake not of a moat, but of—a grave,
Below the hills a marshy plain
Infects what I so long have been retrieving;
This stagnant pool likewise to drain
Where now my latest and my best achieving.
To many millions let me furnish soil.
Though not secure, yet free to active toil;
Green, fertile fields, where men and herds go forth
At once, with comfort, on the newest Earth,
And swiftly settled on the hills firm base.
Created by the bold, industrious race.
A land like Paradise here, round about:
Up to the brink the tide may roar without, '
And though it gnaw, to burst with force the limit.
By common impulse all unite to hem it.
Yes, to this thought I hold with firm persistence;
The last result of wisdom stamps it true:
He only earns his freedom and existence,
Who daily conquers them anew.
Thus here, by dangers girt, shall glide away
Of childhood, manhood, age, the vigorous day:
And such a throng I fain would see, —
Stand on free soil among a people free!
Then dared I hail the Moment fleeing:
“Ah, still delay—thou art so fair!”
The traces cannot, of mine earthly being,
In æons perish,—they are there! —
In proud fore-feeling of such lofty bliss,
I now enjoy the highest Moment—this!
[Faust sinks back: the Lemures take him and lay him upon the
ground.]
No joy could sate him, and suffice no bliss!
To catch but shifting shapes was his endeavour:
The latest, poorest, emptiest Moment—this, —
He wished to hold it fast for ever.
Me he resisted in such vigorous wise,
But Time is lord, on earth the old man lies.
The clock stands still —
Stands still! silent as midnight, now!
The index falls.
It falls; and it is finished, here!
’Tis past!
— Past! a stupid word.
If past, then why?
Past and pure Naught, complete monotony!
What good for us, this endlessly creating? —
What is created then annihilating?
“And now it’s past!” Why read a page so twisted?
’Tis just the same as if it ne’er existed,
Yet goes in circles round as if it had, however:
I’d rather choose, instead, the Void for ever.
Sepulture
LEMUR. Solo.
Who then hath built the house so ill,
With shovel and with spade?
LEMURES. Chorus.
For thee, dull guest, in hempen vest,
It all too well was made.
LEMUR. Solo.
Who then so ill hath decked the hall?
No chairs, nor table any!
LEMURES. Chorus.
’Twas borrowed to return at call:
The creditors are so many.
The Body lies, and if the Spirit flee,
I’ll show it speedily my blood-signed title. —
But, ah! they’ve found such methods of requital,
His souls the Devil must oft abstracted see!
One now offends, the ancient way;
Upon the new we’re not yet recommended:
Once, I alone secured my prey.
But now by helpers need to be befriended.
In all things we must feel the spite!
Transmitted custom, ancient right, —
Nothing, indeed, can longer one confide in.
Once with the last breath left the soul her house;
I kept good watch, and like the nimblest mouse,
Whack! was she caught, and fast my claws her hide in!
Now she delays, and is not fain to quit
The dismal place, the corpse’s hideous mansion;
The elements, in hostile, fierce expansion,
Drive her, at last, disgracefully from it.
And though I fret and worry till I’m weary,
When? How? and Where? remains the fatal query:
Old Death is now no longer swift and strong:
Even the Whether has been doubtful long.
Oft I beheld with lust the rigid members:
’Twas only sham; Life kindled from its embers.
(Fantastic, whirling gestures of conjuration.)
Come on! Strike up the double quick, anew,
With straight or crooked horns, ye gentlemen infernal!
Of the old Devil-grit and kernel,
And bring at once the Jaws of Hell with you!
Hell hath a multitude of jaws, in short.
To use as suiteth place and dignity;
But we, however, in this final sport.
Will henceforth less considerate be.
(The fearful Jaws of Hell open, on the left.)
The side-tusks yawn: then from the throat abysmal
The raging, fiery torrents flow,
And in the vapours of the background dismal
I see the city flame in endless glow.
Up to the teeth the breakers lash the red arena;
The Damned, in hope of help, are swimming through;
But, caught and mangled by the fell hyena,
Their path of fiery torment they renew.
In every nook new horrors flash and brighten,
In narrow space so much of dread supreme!
Well have you done, the sinners thus to frighten;
But still they’ll think it lie, and cheat, and dream!
(To the stout Devils, with short, straight horns.)
Now, paunchy scamps, with cheeks so redly burning!
Ye glow, so fat with hellish sulphur fed;
With necks thick-set and stumpy, never turning,—
Watch here below, if phosphor-light be shed:
It is the Soul, the winged Psyche is it;
Pluck off the wings, ’tis but a hideous worm:
First with my stamp and seal the thing I’ll visit,
Then fling it to the whirling, fiery storm!
The lower parts be well inspected.
Ye Bloats! perform your duty well:
If there the Soul her seat selected
We cannot yet exactly tell.
Oft in the navel doth she stay:
Look out for that, she thence may slip away!
(To the lean Devils, with long, crooked horns.)
Ye lean buffoons, file-leaders strange and giant,
Grasp in the air, yourselves no respite give!
Strong in the arms, with talons sharp and pliant,
That ye may seize the fluttering fugitive!
In her old home discomforted she lies.
And Genius, surely, seeks at once to rise.
(Glory from above, on the right.)
THE HEAVENLY HOST.
Envoys, unhindered,
Heavenly kindred,
Follow us here!
Sinners forgiving,
Dust to make living!
Lovingest features
Unto all creatures
Show in your swaying,
Delaying career!
Discords I hear, a harsh, disgusting strumming,
Flung from above with the unwelcome Day;
’Tis that emasculate and bungled humming
Which Pious Cant delights in, every way.
You know how we, atrociously contented,
Destruction for the human race have planned:
But the most infamous that we’ve invented
Is just the thing their prayers demand.
The fops, they come as hypocrites, to fool us!
Thus many have they snatched, before our eyes:
With our own weapons they would overrule us;
They’re also Devils—in disguise.
To lose this case would be your lasting shame;
On to the grave, and fortify your claim!
CHORUS OF ANGELS (scattering roses),
Roses, ye glowing ones,
Balsam-bestowing ones!
Fluttering, quivering,
Sweetness delivering.
Branching unblightedly,
Budding delightedly,
Bloom and be seen!
Springtime declare hira.
In purple and green!
Paradise bear him.
The Sleeper serene!
MEPHISTOPHELES (to the Satans).
Why do ye jerk and squat? Is this Hell’s rule?
Stand to your ground, and let them sprinkle!
Back to his place each gawky fool!
They think, perhaps, with such a flowery crinkle.
As if ’twere snow, the Devils’ heat to cool:
Your breath shall make it melt, and shrink, and wrinkle.
Now blow, ye Blowers!—’Tis enough, enough!
Before your breath fades all the floating stuff.
Not so much violence,—shut jaws and noses!
Forsooth, ye blow too strongly at the roses.
The proper measure can you never learn?
They sting not only, but they wither, burn!
They hover on with flames of deadly lustre:
Resist them ye, and close together cluster! —
Your force gives out; all courage fails you so:
The Devils scent the strange, alluring glow.
Angels
Blossoms of gratitude,
Flames of beatitude,
Love they are bearing now,
Rapture preparing now,
As the heart may:
Truth in its nearness,
Ether in clearness.
Give the Eternal Hosts
Everywhere Day!
O curse and shame upon such dolts be sped!
Each Satan stands upon his head!
In somersaults the stout ones whirl and swerve,
And into Hell plunge bottom-uppermost.
Now may your bath be hot as you deserve!
But I remain, unflinching, at my post.
(Beating off the hovering roses.)
Off, Will-o’-the-wisps! Bright as ye seem to be.
When caught, the vilest clinging filth are ye.
Why flutter thus? Off with you, quick! —
Like pitch and sulphur on my neck they stick.
CHORUS OF ANGELS.
What not appertaineth
To you, cease to share it!
What inwardly paineth.
Refuse ye to bear it!
If it press in with might,
Use we our stronger right:
Love but the Loving
Leads to the Light!
My head, heart, liver, by the flames are rent!
An over-devilish element! —
Sharper than Hell’s red conflagration!
Thence so enormous is your lamentation.
Unfortunate Enamoured! who, so spurned.
Your heads towards the sweethearts’ side have turned.
Mine, too! What twists my head in like position?
With them am I not sworn to competition?
The sight of them once made my hatred worse.
Hath then an alien force transpierced my nature?
I like to see them, youths of loveliest stature;
What now restrains me, that I dare not curse?
And if I take their cozening bait so,
Who else, henceforth, the veriest fool will be?
The stunning fellows, whom I hate so,
How very charming they appear to me! —
Tell me, sweet children, ere I miss you,
Are ye not of the race of Lucifer?
You are so fair, forsooth, I’d like to kiss you;
It seems to me as if ye welcome were.
I feel as comfortable and as trustful,
As though a thousand times ere this we’d met!
So surreptitiously catlike-lustful:
With every glance ye’re fairer, fairer yet.
O, nearer come,—O, grant me one sweet look!
Angels
We come! Why shrink? Canst not our presence brook?
Now we approach: so, if thou canst, remain!
(The Angels, coming forward, occupy the whole space.)
MEPHISTOPHELES
(who is crowded into the proscenium).
Us, Spirits damned, you brand with censure,
Yet you are wizards by indenture;
For man and woman, luring, you enchain. —
What chance the curst adventure brings me?
Is this Love’s chosen element?
The fire o’er all my body stings me;
My neck I scarcely feel, so hotly sprent. —
Ye hover back and forth; sink down and settle!
Move your sweet limbs with more of worldly mettle!
The serious air befits you well, awhile.
But I should like, just once, to see you smile;
That were, for me, an everlasting rapture.
I mean, as lovers look, the heart to capture;
About the mouth a simper there must be.
Thee, tall one, as enticing I’ll admit thee.
The priestly mien does not at all befit thee,
So look at me the least bit wantonly!
You might be nakeder, and modest made so:
Your shirts’ long drapery is over-moral. —
They turn!—and, from the rear surveyed so.
With their attraction there’s no need to quarrel!
Chorus of Angels
Love still revealing.
Flames, become clearer!
All, cursed with error,
Truth be their healing!
Glad self-retrieval
Free them from Evil,
In the all-folding Breast,
Blessed, to rest!
MEPHISTOPHELES (collecting himself).
How is’t with me!—Like Job, the boils have cleft me
From head to foot, so that myself I shun;
Yet triumph also, when my self-inspection’s done, —
When self and tribe I have confided in.
The noble Devil-parts, at least, are left me!
This love-attack’s a rash upon the skin.
Burned out already are the scurvy fires,
And one and all I damn you, as the case requires!
CHORUS OF ANGELS.
Hallowed glories!
Round whom they brood,
Wakes unto being
Of bliss with the Good.
Join ye, the Glorified,
Rise to your goal!
Airs are all purified, —
Breathe now the Soul!
(They rise, bearing away the immortal part of Faust.)
MEPHISTOPHELES (looking around him).
But how!—at once I find them failing!
This race of minors takes me by surprise!
They with their booty heavenwards are sailing;
Thence on this grave they cast their greedy eyes!
My rare, great treasure they have peculated:
The lofty soul, to me hypothecated.
They’ve rapt away from me in cunning wise.
But unto whom shall I appeal for justice?
Who would secure to me my well-earned right?
Tricked so in one’s old days, a great disgust is;
And I deserve it, this infernal spite.
I’ve managed in a most disgraceful fashion;
A great investment has been thrown away:
By lowest lust seduced, and senseless passion.
The old, case-hardened Devil went astray.
And if, from all this childish-silly stuff
His shrewd experience could not wrest him,
So is, forsooth, the folly quite enough.
Which, in conclusion, hath possessed him.
VII
Mountain-gorges, Forest, Rock, Desert
Holy Anchorites.
Divided in ascending planes, posted among the ravines.
Chorus and Echo
FORESTS are waving grand,
Rocks, they are huge at hand,
Clutching, the roots expand,
Thickly the tree-trunks stand;
Foaming comes wave on wave;
Shelter hath deepest cave;
Lions are prowling dumb,
Friendly where’er we come,
Honouring the sacred place,
Refuge of Love and Grace!
PATER ECSTATICUS
(hovering up and down)
Endless ecstatic fire,
Glow of the pure desire,
Pain of the pining breast,
Rapture of God possessed!
Arrows, transpierce ye me,
Lances, coerce ye me.
Bludgeons, so batter me,
Lightnings, so shatter me,
That all of mortality’s
Vain unrealities
Die, and the Star above
Beam’ but Eternal Love!
PATER PROFUNDUS.
(Loiver Region.)
As at my feet abysses cloven
Rest on abysses deep below;
As thousand severed streams are woven
To foamy floods that plunging go;
As, up by self-impulsion driven.
The tree its weight sustains in air, ■
To Love, Almighty Love, ’tis given
All things to form, and all to bear.
Around me sounds a savage roaring.
As rocks and forests heaved and swayed,
Yet plunges, bounteous in its pouring,
The wealth of waters down the glade,
Appointed then, the vales to brighten;
The bolt, that flaming struck and burst,
The atmosphere to cleanse and lighten,
Which pestilence in its bosom nursed, —
Love’s heralds both, the powers proclaiming.
Which, aye creative, us infold.
May they, within my bosom flaming,
Inspire the mind, confused and cold,
Which frets itself, through blunted senses.
As by the sharpest fetter-smart!
O God, soothe Thou my thoughts bewildered,
Enlighten Thou my needy heart!
PATER SERAPHICUS.
(Middle Region.)
What a cloud of morning hovers
O’er the pine-trees’ tossing hair!
Can I guess what life it covers?
They are spirits young and fair.
Chorus of Blessed Boys
Tell us, Father, where we wander;
Tell us, Kind One, who are we.
Happy are we; for so tender
Unto all, it is, to Be.
Pater Seraphicus
Boys, brought forth in midnights haunted,
Half-unsealed the sense and brain.
For the parents lost when granted.
For the angels sweetest gain!
That a loving heart is nigh you
You can feel: then come to me!
But of earthly ways that try you,
Blest ones! not a trace have ye.
Enter in mine eyes: enjoy them,
Organs for the earthly sphere!
As your own ye may employ them:
Look upon the landscape here!
(He takes them into himself.)
Those are trees, there rocks defend us;
Here, a stream that leaps below,
And with plunges, wild, tremendous,
Shorteneth its journey so.
BLESSED BOYS (from within him).
To a vision grand we waken,
But the scenes too gloomy show;
We with fear and dread are shaken:
Kindest Father, let us go!
PATER SERAPHICUS.
Upward rise to higher borders!
Ever grow insensibly.
As, by pure, eternal orders,
God’s high Presence strengthens ye!
Such the Spirits’ sustentation.
With the freest ether blending;
Love’s eternal Revelation,
To Beatitude ascending.
CHORUS OF BLESSED BOYS
(circling around the highest summit).
Hands now enring ye,
Joyously wheeling!
Soar ye and sing ye,
With holiest feeling!
The Teacher before ye,
Trust, and be bold!
Whom ye adore, ye
Him shall behold.
ANGELS
(soaring in the higher atmosphere, bearing the immortal part of
Faust).
The noble Spirit now is free,
And saved from evil scheming:
Whoe’er aspires unweariedly
Is not beyond redeeming.
And if he feels the grace of Love
That from On High is given.
The Blessed Hosts that wait above,
Shall welcome him to Heaven!
The Younger Angels
They, the roses, freely spended
By the penitent, the glorious.
Helped to make the light victorious, ■
And the lofty work is ended.
We this precious Soul have won us;
Evil ones we forced to shun us;
Devils fled us, when we hit them:
‘Stead of pangs of Hell, that bit them,
Love-pangs felt they, sharper, vaster:
Even he, old Satan-Master,
Pierced with keenest pain, retreated.
Now rejoice! The work’s completed!
The More Perfect Angels
Earth’s residue to bear
Hath sorely pressed us;
It were not pure and fair,
Though ’twere asbestus.
When every element
The mind’s high forces
Have seized, subdued, and blent,
No Angel divorces
Twin-natures single grown,
That inly mate them:
Eternal Love, alone.
Can separate them.
The Younger Angels
Mist-like on heights above,
We now are seeing
Nearer and nearer move
Spiritual Being.
The clouds are growing clear;
And moving throngs appear
Of Blessed Boys,
Free from the earthly gloom,
In circling poise.
Who taste the cheer
Of the new spring-time bloom
Of the upper sphere.
Let them inaugurate
Him to the perfect state.
Now, as their peer!
The Blessed Boys
Gladly receive we now
Him, as a chrysalis:
Therefore achieve we now
Pledge of our bliss.
The earth-flakes dissipate
That cling around him!
See, he is fair and great!
Divine Life hath crowned him.
DOCTOR MARIANUS
(in the highest, purest cell)
Free is the view at last,
The spirit lifted:
There women, floating past,
Are upward drifted:
The Glorious One therein,
With star-crown tender, —
The pure, the Heavenly Queen,
I know her splendour.
(Enraptured.)
Highest Mistress of the World!
Let me in the azure
Tent of Heaven, in light unfurled,
Here thy Mystery measure!
Justify sweet thoughts that move
Breast of man to meet thee.
And with the holy bliss of love
Bear him up to greet thee!
With unconquered courage we
Do thy bidding highest;
But at once shall gentle be.
When thou pacificst.
Virgin, pure in brightest sheen.
Mother sweet, supernal, —
Unto us Elected Queen,
Peer of Gods Eternal!
Light clouds are circling
Around her splendour,—
Penitent women
Of natures tender.
Her knees embracing,
Ether respiring,
Mercy requiring!
Thou, in immaculate ray,
Mercy not leavest.
And the lightly led astray,
Who trust thee, receivest!
In their weakness fallen at length.
Hard it is to save them:
Who can crush, by native strength,
Vices that enslave them?
Whose the foot that may not slip
On the surface slanting?
Whom befool not eye and lip.
Breath and voice enchanting?
(The Mater Gloriosa soars into the space.)
CHORUS OF WOMEN PENITENTS
To heights thou’rt speeding
Of Endless Eden:
Receive our pleading,
Transcendent Maiden,
With Mercy laden!
MAGNA PECCATRIX. (St. Luke vii. 36.)
By the love before him kneeling, —
Him, Thy Son, a godlike vision,
By the tears like balsam stealing,
Spite of Pharisees’ derision,
By the box, whose ointment precious
Shed its spice and odours cheery;
By the locks, whose softest meshes
Dried the holy feet and weary!—
MULIER SAMARITANA. (St. John iv.)
By that well, the ancient station
Whither Abram’s flocks were driven,
By the jar whose restoration
To the Saviour’s lips was given;
By the fountain, pure and vernal.
Thence its present bounty spending,—
Overflowing, bright, eternal.
Watering the world’s unending! —
MARIA ÆGYPTIACA. (Acta Sanctorum.)
By the place, where the Immortal
Body of the Lord hath lain;
By the arm, which from the portal,
Warning, thrust me back again;
By the forty years’ repentance
In the lonely desert-land;
By the blissful farewell sentence
Which I wrote upon the sand! —
The Three
Thou Thy presence not deniest
Unto sinful women ever, —
Liftest them to win the highest
Gain of penitent endeavour, —
So, from this good soul withdrawn not-
Who but once forgot, transgressing,
Who her loving error saw not —
Pardon adequate, and blessing!
UNA PŒNITENTIUM (formerly named Margaret, stealing closer).
Incline, O Maiden,
With Mercy laden,
In light unlading,
Thy gracious countenance upon my bliss!
My loved, my lover,
His trials over
In yonder world, returns to me in this!
Blessed Boys
(approaching in hovering circles).
With mighty limbs he towers
Already above us;
He, for this love of ours,
Will richlier love us.
Early were we removed,
Ere Life could reach us;
Yet he hath learned and proved.
And he will teach us.
THE PENITENT
(formerly named Margaret).
The spirit-choir around him seeing,
New to himself, he scarce divines
His heritage of new-born Being,
When like the Holy Host he shines.
Behold, how he each band hath cloven,
The earthly life had round him thrown,
And through his garb, of ether woven,
The early force of youth is shown!
Vouchsafe to me that I instruct him!
Still dazzles him the Day’s new glare.
Mater Gloriosa
Rise, thou, to higher spheres! Conduct him.
Who, feeling thee, shall follow there!
Doctor Marianus
(prostrate, adoring).
Penitents, look up elate.
Where she beams salvation;
Gratefully to blessed fate
Grow, in re-creation!
Be our souls, as they have been,
Dedicate to Thee!
Virgin Holy, Mother, Queen,
Goddess, gracious be!
Chorus Mysticus
All things transitory
But as symbols are sent:
Earth’s insufficiency
Here grows to Event:
The Indescribable,
Here it is done:
The Woman-Soul leadeth us
Upward and on!