No More Learning

FLORO:
Such is my confidence.

CYPRIAN:
And you?

LELIO:
Oh! would that I could lift my hope
So high, for though she is extremely poor, _275
Her virtue is her dowry.

CYPRIAN:
And if you both
Would marry her, is it not weak and vain,
Culpable and unworthy, thus beforehand
To slur her honour? What would the world say
If one should slay the other, and if she _280
Should afterwards espouse the murderer?

[THE RIVALS AGREE TO REFER THEIR QUARREL TO CYPRIAN; WHO IN CONSEQUENCE
VISITS JUSTINA, AND BECOMES ENAMOURED OF HER; SHE DISDAINS HIM, AND HE
RETIRES TO A SOLITARY SEA-SHORE. ]


SCENE 2.

CYPRIAN:
O memory! permit it not
That the tyrant of my thought
Be another soul that still
Holds dominion o'er the will,
That would refuse, but can no more, _5
To bend, to tremble, and adore.
Vain idolatry! --I saw,
And gazing, became blind with error;
Weak ambition, which the awe
Of her presence bound to terror! _10
So beautiful she was--and I,
Between my love and jealousy,
Am so convulsed with hope and fear,
Unworthy as it may appear;--
So bitter is the life I live, _15
That, hear me, Hell! I now would give
To thy most detested spirit
My soul, for ever to inherit,
To suffer punishment and pine,
So this woman may be mine. _20
Hear'st thou, Hell! dost thou reject it?
My soul is offered!

DAEMON (UNSEEN):
I accept it.

[TEMPEST, WITH THUNDER AND LIGHTNING. ]

CYPRIAN:
What is this? ye heavens for ever pure,
At once intensely radiant and obscure!
Athwart the aethereal halls _25
The lightning's arrow and the thunder-balls
The day affright,
As from the horizon round,
Burst with earthquake sound,
In mighty torrents the electric fountains;-- _30
Clouds quench the sun, and thunder-smoke
Strangles the air, and fire eclipses Heaven.
Philosophy, thou canst not even
Compel their causes underneath thy yoke:
From yonder clouds even to the waves below _35
The fragments of a single ruin choke
Imagination's flight;
For, on flakes of surge, like feathers light,
The ashes of the desolation, cast
Upon the gloomy blast, _40
Tell of the footsteps of the storm;
And nearer, see, the melancholy form
Of a great ship, the outcast of the sea,
Drives miserably!
And it must fly the pity of the port, _45
Or perish, and its last and sole resort
Is its own raging enemy.
The terror of the thrilling cry
Was a fatal prophecy
Of coming death, who hovers now _50
Upon that shattered prow,
That they who die not may be dying still.
And not alone the insane elements
Are populous with wild portents,
But that sad ship is as a miracle _55
Of sudden ruin, for it drives so fast
It seems as if it had arrayed its form
With the headlong storm.
It strikes--I almost feel the shock,--
It stumbles on a jagged rock,-- _60
Sparkles of blood on the white foam are cast.

[A TEMPEST. ]

ALL EXCLAIM [WITHIN]:
We are all lost!

DAEMON [WITHIN]:
Now from this plank will I
Pass to the land and thus fulfil my scheme.

CYPRIAN:
As in contempt of the elemental rage
A man comes forth in safety, while the ship's _65
Great form is in a watery eclipse
Obliterated from the Oceans page,
And round its wreck the huge sea-monsters sit,
A horrid conclave, and the whistling wave
Is heaped over its carcase, like a grave. _70

[THE DAEMON ENTERS, AS ESCAPED FROM THE SEA. ]

DAEMON [ASIDE]:
It was essential to my purposes
To wake a tumult on the sapphire ocean,
That in this unknown form I might at length
Wipe out the blot of the discomfiture
Sustained upon the mountain, and assail _75
With a new war the soul of Cyprian,
Forging the instruments of his destruction
Even from his love and from his wisdom. --O
Beloved earth, dear mother, in thy bosom
I seek a refuge from the monster who _80
Precipitates itself upon me.

CYPRIAN:
Friend,
Collect thyself; and be the memory
Of thy late suffering, and thy greatest sorrow
But as a shadow of the past,--for nothing
Beneath the circle of the moon, but flows _85
And changes, and can never know repose.

DAEMON:
And who art thou, before whose feet my fate
Has prostrated me?

CYPRIAN:
One who, moved with pity,
Would soothe its stings.

DAEMON:
Oh, that can never be!
No solace can my lasting sorrows find. _90

CYPRIAN:
Wherefore?

DAEMON:
Because my happiness is lost.
Yet I lament what has long ceased to be
The object of desire or memory,
And my life is not life.

CYPRIAN:
Now, since the fury
Of this earthquaking hurricane is still, _95
And the crystalline Heaven has reassumed
Its windless calm so quickly, that it seems
As if its heavy wrath had been awakened
Only to overwhelm that vessel,--speak,
Who art thou, and whence comest thou?

DAEMON:
Far more _100
My coming hither cost, than thou hast seen
Or I can tell. Among my misadventures
This shipwreck is the least. Wilt thou hear?

CYPRIAN:
Speak.

DAEMON:
Since thou desirest, I will then unveil
Myself to thee;--for in myself I am _105
A world of happiness and misery;
This I have lost, and that I must lament
Forever. In my attributes I stood
So high and so heroically great,
In lineage so supreme, and with a genius _110
Which penetrated with a glance the world
Beneath my feet, that, won by my high merit,
A king--whom I may call the King of kings,
Because all others tremble in their pride
Before the terrors of His countenance, _115
In His high palace roofed with brightest gems
Of living light--call them the stars of Heaven--
Named me His counsellor. But the high praise
Stung me with pride and envy, and I rose
In mighty competition, to ascend _120
His seat and place my foot triumphantly
Upon His subject thrones. Chastised, I know
The depth to which ambition falls; too mad
Was the attempt, and yet more mad were now
Repentance of the irrevocable deed:-- _125
Therefore I chose this ruin, with the glory
Of not to be subdued, before the shame
Of reconciling me with Him who reigns
By coward cession. --Nor was I alone,
Nor am I now, nor shall I be alone; _130
And there was hope, and there may still be hope,
For many suffrages among His vassals
Hailed me their lord and king, and many still
Are mine, and many more, perchance shall be.
Thus vanquished, though in fact victorious, _135
I left His seat of empire, from mine eye
Shooting forth poisonous lightning, while my words
With inauspicious thunderings shook Heaven,
Proclaiming vengeance, public as my wrong,
And imprecating on His prostrate slaves _140
Rapine, and death, and outrage. Then I sailed
Over the mighty fabric of the world,--
A pirate ambushed in its pathless sands,
A lynx crouched watchfully among its caves
And craggy shores; and I have wandered over _145
The expanse of these wide wildernesses
In this great ship, whose bulk is now dissolved
In the light breathings of the invisible wind,
And which the sea has made a dustless ruin,
Seeking ever a mountain, through whose forests _150
I seek a man, whom I must now compel
To keep his word with me. I came arrayed
In tempest, and although my power could well
Bridle the forest winds in their career,
For other causes I forbore to soothe _155
Their fury to Favonian gentleness;
I could and would not;
[ASIDE. ]
(thus I wake in him
A love of magic art). Let not this tempest,
Nor the succeeding calm excite thy wonder;
For by my art the sun would turn as pale _160
As his weak sister with unwonted fear;
And in my wisdom are the orbs of Heaven
Written as in a record; I have pierced
The flaming circles of their wondrous spheres
And know them as thou knowest every corner _165
Of this dim spot. Let it not seem to thee
That I boast vainly; wouldst thou that I work
A charm over this waste and savage wood,
This Babylon of crags and aged trees,
Filling its leafy coverts with a horror _170
Thrilling and strange? I am the friendless guest
Of these wild oaks and pines--and as from thee
I have received the hospitality
Of this rude place, I offer thee the fruit
Of years of toil in recompense; whate'er _175
Thy wildest dream presented to thy thought
As object of desire, that shall be thine.

. . .

And thenceforth shall so firm an amity
'Twixt thee and me be, that neither Fortune,
The monstrous phantom which pursues success, _180
That careful miser, that free prodigal,
Who ever alternates, with changeful hand,
Evil and good, reproach and fame; nor Time,
That lodestar of the ages, to whose beam
The winged years speed o'er the intervals _185
Of their unequal revolutions; nor
Heaven itself, whose beautiful bright stars
Rule and adorn the world, can ever make
The least division between thee and me,
Since now I find a refuge in thy favour. _190

NOTES:
_146 wide glassy wildernesses Rossetti.
_150 Seeking forever cj. Forman.
_154 forest]fiercest cj. Rossetti.


SCENE 3.

THE DAEMON TEMPTS JUSTINA, WHO IS A CHRISTIAN.

DAEMON:
Abyss of Hell! I call on thee,
Thou wild misrule of thine own anarchy!
From thy prison-house set free
The spirits of voluptuous death,
That with their mighty breath _5
They may destroy a world of virgin thoughts;
Let her chaste mind with fancies thick as motes
Be peopled from thy shadowy deep,
Till her guiltless fantasy
Full to overflowing be! _10
And with sweetest harmony,
Let birds, and flowers, and leaves, and all things move
To love, only to love.
Let nothing meet her eyes
But signs of Love's soft victories; _15
Let nothing meet her ear
But sounds of Love's sweet sorrow,
So that from faith no succour she may borrow,
But, guided by my spirit blind
And in a magic snare entwined, _20
She may now seek Cyprian.
Begin, while I in silence bind
My voice, when thy sweet song thou hast began.

NOTE:
_18 she may]may she 1824.

A VOICE [WITHIN]:
What is the glory far above
All else in human life?

ALL:
Love! love! _25

[WHILE THESE WORDS ARE SUNG,
THE DAEMON GOES OUT AT ONE DOOR,
AND JUSTINA ENTERS AT ANOTHER. ]

THE FIRST VOICE:
There is no form in which the fire
Of love its traces has impressed not.
Man lives far more in love's desire
Than by life's breath, soon possessed not.
If all that lives must love or die, _30
All shapes on earth, or sea, or sky,
With one consent to Heaven cry
That the glory far above
All else in life is--

ALL:
Love! oh, Love!

JUSTINA:
Thou melancholy Thought which art _35
So flattering and so sweet, to thee
When did I give the liberty
Thus to afflict my heart?
What is the cause of this new Power
Which doth my fevered being move, _40
Momently raging more and more?
What subtle Pain is kindled now
Which from my heart doth overflow
Into my senses? --

NOTE:
_36 flattering Boscombe manuscript; fluttering 1824.

ALL:
Love! oh, Love!

JUSTINA:
'Tis that enamoured Nightingale _45
Who gives me the reply;
He ever tells the same soft tale
Of passion and of constancy
To his mate, who rapt and fond,
Listening sits, a bough beyond. _50

Be silent, Nightingale--no more
Make me think, in hearing thee
Thus tenderly thy love deplore,
If a bird can feel his so,
What a man would feel for me. _55
And, voluptuous Vine, O thou
Who seekest most when least pursuing,--
To the trunk thou interlacest
Art the verdure which embracest,
And the weight which is its ruin,-- _60
No more, with green embraces, Vine,
Make me think on what thou lovest,--
For whilst thus thy boughs entwine
I fear lest thou shouldst teach me, sophist,
How arms might be entangled too. _65

Light-enchanted Sunflower, thou
Who gazest ever true and tender
On the sun's revolving splendour!
Follow not his faithless glance
With thy faded countenance, _70
Nor teach my beating heart to fear,
If leaves can mourn without a tear,
How eyes must weep! O Nightingale,
Cease from thy enamoured tale,--
Leafy Vine, unwreathe thy bower, _75
Restless Sunflower, cease to move,--
Or tell me all, what poisonous Power
Ye use against me--

NOTES:
_58 To]Who to cj. Rossetti.
_63 whilst thus Rossetti, Forman, Dowden; whilst thou thus 1824.

ALL:
Love! Love! Love!

JUSTINA:
It cannot be! --Whom have I ever loved?
Trophies of my oblivion and disdain, _80
Floro and Lelio did I not reject?
And Cyprian? --
[SHE BECOMES TROUBLED AT THE NAME OF CYPRIAN. ]
Did I not requite him
With such severity, that he has fled
Where none has ever heard of him again? --
Alas! I now begin to fear that this _85
May be the occasion whence desire grows bold,
As if there were no danger. From the moment
That I pronounced to my own listening heart,
'Cyprian is absent! '--O me miserable!
I know not what I feel!
[MORE CALMLY. ]
It must be pity _90
To think that such a man, whom all the world
Admired, should be forgot by all the world,
And I the cause.
[SHE AGAIN BECOMES TROUBLED. ]
And yet if it were pity,
Floro and Lelio might have equal share,
For they are both imprisoned for my sake. _95
[CALMLY. ]
Alas! what reasonings are these? it is
Enough I pity him, and that, in vain,
Without this ceremonious subtlety.
And, woe is me! I know not where to find him now,
Even should I seek him through this wide world. _100

NOTE:
_89 me miserable]miserable me editions 1839.

[ENTER DAEMON. ]

DAEMON:
Follow, and I will lead thee where he is.

JUSTINA:
And who art thou, who hast found entrance hither,
Into my chamber through the doors and locks?
Art thou a monstrous shadow which my madness
Has formed in the idle air?

DAEMON:
No. I am one _105
Called by the Thought which tyrannizes thee
From his eternal dwelling; who this day
Is pledged to bear thee unto Cyprian.

JUSTINA:
So shall thy promise fail. This agony
Of passion which afflicts my heart and soul _110
May sweep imagination in its storm;
The will is firm.

DAEMON:
Already half is done
In the imagination of an act.
The sin incurred, the pleasure then remains;
Let not the will stop half-way on the road. _115

JUSTINA:
I will not be discouraged, nor despair,
Although I thought it, and although 'tis true
That thought is but a prelude to the deed:--
Thought is not in my power, but action is:
I will not move my foot to follow thee. _120

DAEMON:
But a far mightier wisdom than thine own
Exerts itself within thee, with such power
Compelling thee to that which it inclines
That it shall force thy step; how wilt thou then
Resist, Justina?

NOTE:
_123 inclines]inclines to cj. Rossetti.

JUSTINA:
By my free-will.

DAEMON:
I _125
Must force thy will.

JUSTINA:
It is invincible;
It were not free if thou hadst power upon it.

[HE DRAWS, BUT CANNOT MOVE HER. ]

DAEMON:
Come, where a pleasure waits thee.

JUSTINA:
It were bought
Too dear.

DAEMON:
'Twill soothe thy heart to softest peace.

JUSTINA:
'Tis dread captivity.

DAEMON:
'Tis joy, 'tis glory. _130

JUSTINA:
'Tis shame, 'tis torment, 'tis despair.

DAEMON:
But how
Canst thou defend thyself from that or me,
If my power drags thee onward?

JUSTINA:
My defence
Consists in God.

[HE VAINLY ENDEAVOURS TO FORCE HER, AND AT LAST RELEASES HER. ]

DAEMON:
Woman, thou hast subdued me,
Only by not owning thyself subdued. _135
But since thou thus findest defence in God,
I will assume a feigned form, and thus
Make thee a victim of my baffled rage.
For I will mask a spirit in thy form
Who will betray thy name to infamy, _140
And doubly shall I triumph in thy loss,
First by dishonouring thee, and then by turning
False pleasure to true ignominy.

[EXIT. ]

JUSTINA: I
Appeal to Heaven against thee; so that Heaven
May scatter thy delusions, and the blot _145
Upon my fame vanish in idle thought,
Even as flame dies in the envious air,
And as the floweret wanes at morning frost;
And thou shouldst never--But, alas! to whom
Do I still speak? --Did not a man but now _150
Stand here before me? --No, I am alone,
And yet I saw him. Is he gone so quickly?
Or can the heated mind engender shapes
From its own fear? Some terrible and strange
Peril is near. Lisander! father! lord! _155
Livia! --

[ENTER LISANDER AND LIVIA. ]

LISANDER:
Oh, my daughter! What?

LIVIA:
What!

JUSTINA:
Saw you
A man go forth from my apartment now? --
I scarce contain myself!

LISANDER:
A man here!

JUSTINA:
Have you not seen him?

LIVIA:
No, Lady.

JUSTINA: I saw him.

LISANDER: 'Tis impossible; the doors _160
Which led to this apartment were all locked.

LIVIA [ASIDE]:
I daresay it was Moscon whom she saw,
For he was locked up in my room.

LISANDER:
It must
Have been some image of thy fantasy.
Such melancholy as thou feedest is _165
Skilful in forming such in the vain air
Out of the motes and atoms of the day.

LIVIA:
My master's in the right.

JUSTINA:
Oh, would it were
Delusion; but I fear some greater ill.
I feel as if out of my bleeding bosom _170
My heart was torn in fragments; ay,
Some mortal spell is wrought against my frame;
So potent was the charm that, had not God
Shielded my humble innocence from wrong,
I should have sought my sorrow and my shame _175
With willing steps. --Livia, quick, bring my cloak,
For I must seek refuge from these extremes
Even in the temple of the highest God
Where secretly the faithful worship.

LIVIA:
Here.

NOTE:
_179 Where Rossetti; Which 1824.

JUSTINA [PUTTING ON HER CLOAK]:
In this, as in a shroud of snow, may I _180
Quench the consuming fire in which I burn,
Wasting away!

LISANDER:
And I will go with thee.

LIVIA:
When I once see them safe out of the house
I shall breathe freely.

JUSTINA:
So do I confide
In thy just favour, Heaven!

LISANDER:
Let us go. _185

JUSTINA:
Thine is the cause, great God! turn for my sake,
And for Thine own, mercifully to me!

***


STANZAS FROM CALDERON'S CISMA DE INGLATERRA.

TRANSLATED BY MEDWIN AND CORRECTED BY SHELLEY.

[Published by Medwin, "Life of Shelley", 1847,
with Shelley's corrections in ''. ]

1.
Hast thou not seen, officious with delight,
Move through the illumined air about the flower
The Bee, that fears to drink its purple light,
Lest danger lurk within that Rose's bower?
Hast thou not marked the moth's enamoured flight _5
About the Taper's flame at evening hour;
'Till kindle in that monumental fire
His sunflower wings their own funereal pyre?

2.
My heart, its wishes trembling to unfold.
Thus round the Rose and Taper hovering came, _10
'And Passion's slave, Distrust, in ashes cold.
Smothered awhile, but could not quench the flame,'--
Till Love, that grows by disappointment bold,
And Opportunity, had conquered Shame;
And like the Bee and Moth, in act to close, _15
'I burned my wings, and settled on the Rose. '

***


SCENES FROM THE FAUST OF GOETHE.

[Published in part (Scene 2) in "The Liberal", No. 1, 1822;
in full, by Mrs. Shelley, "Posthumous Poems", 1824. ]

SCENE 1. --PROLOGUE IN HEAVEN.

THE LORD AND THE HOST OF HEAVEN.

ENTER THREE ARCHANGELS.

RAPHAEL:
The sun makes music as of old
Amid the rival spheres of Heaven,
On its predestined circle rolled
With thunder speed: the Angels even
Draw strength from gazing on its glance, _5
Though none its meaning fathom may:--
The world's unwithered countenance
Is bright as at Creation's day.

GABRIEL:
And swift and swift, with rapid lightness,
The adorned Earth spins silently, _10
Alternating Elysian brightness
With deep and dreadful night; the sea
Foams in broad billows from the deep
Up to the rocks, and rocks and Ocean,
Onward, with spheres which never sleep, _15
Are hurried in eternal motion.

MICHAEL:
And tempests in contention roar
From land to sea, from sea to land;
And, raging, weave a chain of power,
Which girds the earth, as with a band. -- _20
A flashing desolation there,
Flames before the thunder's way;
But Thy servants, Lord, revere
The gentle changes of Thy day.

CHORUS OF THE THREE:
The Angels draw strength from Thy glance, _25
Though no one comprehend Thee may;--
Thy world's unwithered countenance
Is bright as on Creation's day.

NOTE:
_28 (RAPHAEL:
The sun sounds, according to ancient custom,
In the song of emulation of his brother-spheres.
And its fore-written circle
Fulfils with a step of thunder.
Its countenance gives the Angels strength
Though no one can fathom it.
The incredible high works
Are excellent as at the first day.

GABRIEL:
And swift, and inconceivably swift
The adornment of earth winds itself round,
And exchanges Paradise-clearness
With deep dreadful night.
The sea foams in broad waves
From its deep bottom, up to the rocks,
And rocks and sea are torn on together
In the eternal swift course of the spheres.

MICHAEL:
And storms roar in emulation
From sea to land, from land to sea,
And make, raging, a chain
Of deepest operation round about.
There flames a flashing destruction
Before the path of the thunderbolt.
But Thy servants, Lord, revere
The gentle alternations of Thy day.

CHORUS:
Thy countenance gives the Angels strength,
Though none can comprehend Thee:
And all Thy lofty works
Are excellent as at the first day.

Such is a literal translation of this astonishing chorus; it is
impossible to represent in another language the melody of the
versification; even the volatile strength and delicacy of the ideas
escape in the crucible of translation, and the reader is surprised to
find a caput mortuum. --[SHELLEY'S NOTE. ])

[ENTER MEPHISTOPHELES. ]

MEPHISTOPHELES:
As thou, O Lord, once more art kind enough
To interest Thyself in our affairs, _30
And ask, 'How goes it with you there below? '
And as indulgently at other times
Thou tookest not my visits in ill part,
Thou seest me here once more among Thy household.
Though I should scandalize this company, _35
You will excuse me if I do not talk
In the high style which they think fashionable;
My pathos certainly would make You laugh too,
Had You not long since given over laughing.
Nothing know I to say of suns and worlds; _40
I observe only how men plague themselves;--
The little god o' the world keeps the same stamp,
As wonderful as on creation's day:--
A little better would he live, hadst Thou
Not given him a glimpse of Heaven's light _45
Which he calls reason, and employs it only
To live more beastlily than any beast.
With reverence to Your Lordship be it spoken,
He's like one of those long-legged grasshoppers,
Who flits and jumps about, and sings for ever _50
The same old song i' the grass. There let him lie,
Burying his nose in every heap of dung.

NOTES:
_38 certainly would editions 1839; would certainly 1824.
_47 beastlily 1824; beastily editions 1839.

THE LORD:
Have you no more to say? Do you come here
Always to scold, and cavil, and complain?
Seems nothing ever right to you on earth? _55

MEPHISTOPHELES:
No, Lord! I find all there, as ever, bad at best.
Even I am sorry for man's days of sorrow;
I could myself almost give up the pleasure
Of plaguing the poor things.

THE LORD:
Knowest thou Faust?

MEPHISTOPHELES:
The Doctor?

THE LORD:
Ay; My servant Faust.

MEPHISTOPHELES:
In truth _60
He serves You in a fashion quite his own;
And the fool's meat and drink are not of earth.
His aspirations bear him on so far
That he is half aware of his own folly,
For he demands from Heaven its fairest star, _65
And from the earth the highest joy it bears,
Yet all things far, and all things near, are vain
To calm the deep emotions of his breast.

THE LORD:
Though he now serves Me in a cloud of error,
I will soon lead him forth to the clear day. _70
When trees look green, full well the gardener knows
That fruits and blooms will deck the coming year.

MEPHISTOPHELES:
What will You bet? --now am sure of winning--
Only, observe You give me full permission
To lead him softly on my path.

THE LORD:
As long _75
As he shall live upon the earth, so long
Is nothing unto thee forbidden--Man
Must err till he has ceased to struggle.

MEPHISTOPHELES:
Thanks.
And that is all I ask; for willingly
I never make acquaintance with the dead. _80
The full fresh cheeks of youth are food for me,
And if a corpse knocks, I am not at home.
For I am like a cat--I like to play
A little with the mouse before I eat it.

THE LORD:
Well, well! it is permitted thee. Draw thou _85
His spirit from its springs; as thou find'st power
Seize him and lead him on thy downward path;
And stand ashamed when failure teaches thee
That a good man, even in his darkest longings,
Is well aware of the right way.

MEPHISTOPHELES:
Well and good. _90
I am not in much doubt about my bet,
And if I lose, then 'tis Your turn to crow;
Enjoy Your triumph then with a full breast.
Ay; dust shall he devour, and that with pleasure,
Like my old paramour, the famous Snake. _95

THE LORD:
Pray come here when it suits you; for I never
Had much dislike for people of your sort.
And, among all the Spirits who rebelled,
The knave was ever the least tedious to Me.
The active spirit of man soon sleeps, and soon _100
He seeks unbroken quiet; therefore I
Have given him the Devil for a companion,
Who may provoke him to some sort of work,
And must create forever. --But ye, pure
Children of God, enjoy eternal beauty;-- _105
Let that which ever operates and lives
Clasp you within the limits of its love;
And seize with sweet and melancholy thoughts
The floating phantoms of its loveliness.

[HEAVEN CLOSES; THE ARCHANGELS EXEUNT. ]

MEPHISTOPHELES:
From time to time I visit the old fellow, _110
And I take care to keep on good terms with Him.
Civil enough is the same God Almighty,
To talk so freely with the Devil himself.


SCENE 2. --MAY-DAY NIGHT.

THE HARTZ MOUNTAIN, A DESOLATE COUNTRY.

FAUST, MEPHISTOPHELES.

MEPHISTOPHELES:
Would you not like a broomstick? As for me
I wish I had a good stout ram to ride;
For we are still far from the appointed place.

FAUST:
This knotted staff is help enough for me,
Whilst I feel fresh upon my legs. What good _5
Is there in making short a pleasant way?
To creep along the labyrinths of the vales,
And climb those rocks, where ever-babbling springs,
Precipitate themselves in waterfalls,
Is the true sport that seasons such a path. _10
Already Spring kindles the birchen spray,
And the hoar pines already feel her breath:
Shall she not work also within our limbs?

MEPHISTOPHELES:
Nothing of such an influence do I feel.
My body is all wintry, and I wish _15
The flowers upon our path were frost and snow.
But see how melancholy rises now,
Dimly uplifting her belated beam,
The blank unwelcome round of the red moon,
And gives so bad a light, that every step _20
One stumbles 'gainst some crag. With your permission,
I'll call on Ignis-fatuus to our aid:
I see one yonder burning jollily.
Halloo, my friend! may I request that you
Would favour us with your bright company? _25
Why should you blaze away there to no purpose?
Pray be so good as light us up this way.

IGNIS-FATUUS:
With reverence be it spoken, I will try
To overcome the lightness of my nature;
Our course, you know, is generally zigzag. _30

MEPHISTOPHELES:
Ha, ha! your worship thinks you have to deal
With men. Go straight on, in the Devil's name,
Or I shall puff your flickering life out.

NOTE:
_33 shall puff 1824; will blow 1822.

IGNIS-FATUUS:
Well,
I see you are the master of the house;
I will accommodate myself to you. _35
Only consider that to-night this mountain
Is all enchanted, and if Jack-a-lantern
Shows you his way, though you should miss your own,
You ought not to be too exact with him.

FAUST, MEPHISTOPHELES, AND IGNIS-FATUUS, IN ALTERNATE CHORUS:
The limits of the sphere of dream, _40
The bounds of true and false, are past.
Lead us on, thou wandering Gleam,
Lead us onward, far and fast,
To the wide, the desert waste.

But see, how swift advance and shift _45
Trees behind trees, row by row,--
How, clift by clift, rocks bend and lift
Their frowning foreheads as we go.
The giant-snouted crags, ho! ho!
How they snort, and how they blow! _50

Through the mossy sods and stones,
Stream and streamlet hurry down--
A rushing throng! A sound of song
Beneath the vault of Heaven is blown!
Sweet notes of love, the speaking tones _55
Of this bright day, sent down to say
That Paradise on Earth is known,
Resound around, beneath, above.
All we hope and all we love
Finds a voice in this blithe strain, _60
Which wakens hill and wood and rill,
And vibrates far o'er field and vale,
And which Echo, like the tale
Of old times, repeats again.

To-whoo! to-whoo! near, nearer now _65
The sound of song, the rushing throng!
Are the screech, the lapwing, and the jay,
All awake as if 'twere day?
See, with long legs and belly wide,
A salamander in the brake! _70
Every root is like a snake,
And along the loose hillside,
With strange contortions through the night,
Curls, to seize or to affright;
And, animated, strong, and many, _75
They dart forth polypus-antennae,
To blister with their poison spume
The wanderer. Through the dazzling gloom
The many-coloured mice, that thread
The dewy turf beneath our tread, _80
In troops each other's motions cross,
Through the heath and through the moss;
And, in legions intertangled,
The fire-flies flit, and swarm, and throng,
Till all the mountain depths are spangled. _85

Tell me, shall we go or stay?
Shall we onward? Come along!
Everything around is swept
Forward, onward, far away!
Trees and masses intercept _90
The sight, and wisps on every side
Are puffed up and multiplied.

NOTES:
_48 frowning]fawning 1822.
_70 brake 1824; lake 1822.

MEPHISTOPHELES:
Now vigorously seize my skirt, and gain
This pinnacle of isolated crag.
One may observe with wonder from this point, _95
How Mammon glows among the mountains.

FAUST:
Ay--
And strangely through the solid depth below
A melancholy light, like the red dawn,
Shoots from the lowest gorge of the abyss
Of mountains, lightning hitherward: there rise _100
Pillars of smoke, here clouds float gently by;
Here the light burns soft as the enkindled air,
Or the illumined dust of golden flowers;
And now it glides like tender colours spreading;
And now bursts forth in fountains from the earth; _105
And now it winds, one torrent of broad light,
Through the far valley with a hundred veins;
And now once more within that narrow corner
Masses itself into intensest splendour.
And near us, see, sparks spring out of the ground, _110
Like golden sand scattered upon the darkness;
The pinnacles of that black wall of mountains
That hems us in are kindled.

MEPHISTOPHELES:
Rare: in faith!
Does not Sir Mammon gloriously illuminate
His palace for this festival? --it is _115
A pleasure which you had not known before.
I spy the boisterous guests already.

FAUST:
How
The children of the wind rage in the air!
With what fierce strokes they fall upon my neck!

NOTE:
_117 How 1824; Now 1822.

MEPHISTOPHELES:
Cling tightly to the old ribs of the crag. _120
Beware! for if with them thou warrest
In their fierce flight towards the wilderness,
Their breath will sweep thee into dust, and drag
Thy body to a grave in the abyss.
A cloud thickens the night. _125
Hark! how the tempest crashes through the forest!
The owls fly out in strange affright;
The columns of the evergreen palaces
Are split and shattered;
The roots creak, and stretch, and groan; _130
And ruinously overthrown,
The trunks are crushed and shattered
By the fierce blast's unconquerable stress.
Over each other crack and crash they all
In terrible and intertangled fall; _135
And through the ruins of the shaken mountain
The airs hiss and howl--
It is not the voice of the fountain,
Nor the wolf in his midnight prowl.
Dost thou not hear? _140
Strange accents are ringing
Aloft, afar, anear?
The witches are singing!
The torrent of a raging wizard song
Streams the whole mountain along. _145

NOTE:
_132 shattered]scattered Rossetti.

CHORUS OF WITCHES:
The stubble is yellow, the corn is green,
Now to the Brocken the witches go;
The mighty multitude here may be seen
Gathering, wizard and witch, below.
Sir Urian is sitting aloft in the air; _150
Hey over stock! and hey over stone!
'Twixt witches and incubi, what shall be done?
Tell it who dare! tell it who dare!

NOTE:
_150 Urian]Urean editions 1824, 1839.

A VOICE:
Upon a sow-swine, whose farrows were nine,
Old Baubo rideth alone. _155

CHORUS:
Honour her, to whom honour is due,
Old mother Baubo, honour to you!
An able sow, with old Baubo upon her,
Is worthy of glory, and worthy of honour!
The legion of witches is coming behind, _160
Darkening the night, and outspeeding the wind--

A VOICE:
Which way comest thou?

A VOICE:
Over Ilsenstein;
The owl was awake in the white moonshine;
I saw her at rest in her downy nest,
And she stared at me with her broad, bright eyne. _165

NOTE:
_165 eyne 1839, 2nd edition; eye 1822, 1824, 1839, 1st edition.

VOICES:
And you may now as well take your course on to Hell,
Since you ride by so fast on the headlong blast.

A VOICE:
She dropped poison upon me as I passed.
Here are the wounds--

CHORUS OF WITCHES:
Come away! come along!
The way is wide, the way is long, _170
But what is that for a Bedlam throng?
Stick with the prong, and scratch with the broom.
The child in the cradle lies strangled at home,
And the mother is clapping her hands. --

SEMICHORUS OF WIZARDS 1:
We glide in
Like snails when the women are all away; _175
And from a house once given over to sin
Woman has a thousand steps to stray.

SEMICHORUS 2:
A thousand steps must a woman take,
Where a man but a single spring will make.

VOICES ABOVE:
Come with us, come with us, from Felsensee. _180

NOTE:
_180 Felsensee 1862 ("Relics of Shelley", page 96);
Felumee 1822; Felunsee editions 1824, 1839.

VOICES BELOW:
With what joy would we fly through the upper sky!
We are washed, we are 'nointed, stark naked are we;
But our toil and our pain are forever in vain.

NOTE:
_183 are editions 1839; is 1822, 1824.

BOTH CHORUSES:
The wind is still, the stars are fled, _185
The melancholy moon is dead;
The magic notes, like spark on spark,
Drizzle, whistling through the dark. Come away!

VOICES BELOW:
Stay, Oh, stay!

VOICES ABOVE:
Out of the crannies of the rocks _190
Who calls?

VOICES BELOW:
Oh, let me join your flocks!
I, three hundred years have striven
To catch your skirt and mount to Heaven,--
And still in vain. Oh, might I be
With company akin to me! _195

BOTH CHORUSES:
Some on a ram and some on a prong,
On poles and on broomsticks we flutter along;
Forlorn is the wight who can rise not to-night.

A HALF-WITCH BELOW:
I have been tripping this many an hour:
Are the others already so far before? _200
No quiet at home, and no peace abroad!
And less methinks is found by the road.

CHORUS OF WITCHES:
Come onward, away! aroint thee, aroint!
A witch to be strong must anoint--anoint--
Then every trough will be boat enough; _205
With a rag for a sail we can sweep through the sky,
Who flies not to-night, when means he to fly?

BOTH CHORUSES:
We cling to the skirt, and we strike on the ground;
Witch-legions thicken around and around;
Wizard-swarms cover the heath all over. _210

[THEY DESCEND. ]

MEPHISTOPHELES:
What thronging, dashing, raging, rustling;
What whispering, babbling, hissing, bustling;
What glimmering, spurting, stinking, burning,
As Heaven and Earth were overturning.
There is a true witch element about us; _215
Take hold on me, or we shall be divided:--
Where are you?

NOTE:
_217 What! wanting, 1822.

FAUST [FROM A DISTANCE]:
Here!

MEPHISTOPHELES:
What!
I must exert my authority in the house.
Place for young Voland! pray make way, good people.
Take hold on me, doctor, an with one step _220
Let us escape from this unpleasant crowd:
They are too mad for people of my sort.
Just there shines a peculiar kind of light--
Something attracts me in those bushes. Come
This way: we shall slip down there in a minute. _225

FAUST:
Spirit of Contradiction! Well, lead on--
'Twere a wise feat indeed to wander out
Into the Brocken upon May-day night,
And then to isolate oneself in scorn,
Disgusted with the humours of the time. _230

MEPHISTOPHELES:
See yonder, round a many-coloured flame
A merry club is huddled altogether:
Even with such little people as sit there
One would not be alone.