The Online Library of Liberty

A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.

• Preface.
• Julian and Maddalo; a Conversation.
• The Witch of Atlas.
• Letter to —
• The Triumph of Life.
• Fragments From an Unfinished Drama.
• Prince Athanase: a Fragment.
• Ode to Naples. *
• Marianne’s Dream.
• Mont Blanc. Lines Written In the Vale of Chamouni.
• Miscellaneous Poems.
• On the Medusa of Leonardo Da Vinci, In the Florentine Gallery.
• Song.
• To Constantia, Singing.
• The Fugitives.
• A Lament.
• The Pine Forest of the Cascine, Near Pisa.
• To Night.
• Evening. Ponte a Mare, Pisa.
• Arethusa.
• The Question.
• Lines to an Indian Air.
• Stanzas Written In Dejection, Near Naples.
• Autumn: a Dirge.
• Hymn of Apollo.
• Hymn of Pan.
• The Boat On the Serchio.
• The Zucca. *
• The Two Spirits. an Allegory.
• A Fragment.
• A Bridal Song.
• The Sunset.
• Song, On a Faded Violet.
• Lines to a Critic.
• Good Night.
• To-morrow.
• Death.
• A Lament.
• Love’s Philosophy.
• To E*** V***
• To —
• Lines.
• To William Shelley.
• An Allegory.
• Mutability.
• From the Arabic. an Imitation.
• To —
• Music.
• Lines.
• Death.
• To —
• Passage of the Apennines.
• To Mary —
• The Past.
• Song of a Spirit.
• Liberty.
• To —
• The Isle.
• To —
• Time.
• Lines.
• A Song.
• The World’s Wanderers.
• A Dirge.
• Lines.
• Dirge For the Year.
• Sonnet I.
• Sonnet II. Political Greatness.
• Sonnet III.
• Sonnet IV.
• Fragments.
• Ginevra. *
• Charles the First. Fragments.
• Prince Athanase. Part II.
• Mazenghi. *
• The Woodman and the Nightingale.
• To the Moon.
• Song For Tasso.
• The Waning Moon.
• Epitaph.
• Alastor; Or the Spirit of Solitude.
• Translations.
• Hymn to Mercury. Translated From the Greek of Homer
• The Cyclops; a Satyric Drama.
• Translation From Moschus.
• Scenes From the “magico Prodigioso” of Calderon.
• Scenes From the Faust of GoËthe.

SCENES

FROM THE FAUST OF GOËTHE.

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,
• 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,
• 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,
• 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.—
• 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,
• Though no one comprehend thee may;—
• Thy world’s unwithered countenance
• Is bright as on creation’s day.*

EnterMephistopheles.

mephistopheles.

• As thou, O Lord, once more art kind enough
• To interest thyself in our affairs—
• And ask, “How goes it with you there below?”
• And as indulgently at other times
• Thou tookedst not my visits in ill part,
• Thou seest me here once more among thy household.
• Though I should scandalize this company,
• You will excuse me if I do not talk
• In the high style which they think fashionable;
• My pathos would certainly make you laugh too,
• Had you not long since given over laughing.
• Nothing know I to say of suns and worlds;
• 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
• 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
• The same old song i’ the grass. There let him lie,
• Burying his nose in every heap of dung.

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?

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.

• Aye; my servant Faust.

mephistopheles.

• In truth
• 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,
• 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.
• When trees look green full well the gardener knows
• That fruits and blooms will deck the coming year.

mephistopheles.

• What will you bet?—now I am sure of winning—
• Only, observe you give me full permission
• To lead him softly on my path.

the lord.

• As long
• 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.
• 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
• 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.
• 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.
• Aye; dust shall he devour, and that with pleasure,
• Like my old paramour, the famous Snake.

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
• 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 for ever.—But ye, pure
• Children of God, enjoy eternal beauty;—
• 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,
• And I take care to keep on good terms with him.
• Civil enough is this same God Almighty,
• To talk so freely with the Devil himself.

SCENES

FROM THE FAUST OF GOËTHE.

MAY-DAY NIGHT.

Scene—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 th’ appointed place.

faust.

• This knotted staff is help enough for me,
• Whilst I feel fresh upon my legs. What good
• 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.
• 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
• 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
• One stumbles ’gainst some crag. With your permission,
• I’ll call an 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?
• 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 zig-zag.

mephistopheles.

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

ignis-fatuus.

• Well,
• I see you are the master of the house;
• I will accommodate myself to you.
• 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,andignis-fatuus,in alternate Chorus.

• • The limits of the sphere of dream,
  • The bounds of true and false, are past.
  • Lead us on, thou wandering Gleam,
  • Lead us onward, far and fast,
  • To the wide, the desart waste.
• • But see, how swift advance and shift,
  • 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!
• • 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
  • 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,
  • 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
  • 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!
  • Every root is like a snake,
  • And along the loose hill side,
  • With strange contortions through the night,
  • Curls, to seize or to affright;
  • And, animated, strong, and many,
  • They dart forth polypus-antennæ,
  • To blister with their poison spume
  • The wanderer. Through the dazzling gloom
  • The many-coloured mice, that thread
  • The dewy turf beneath our tread,
  • 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.
• • Tell me, shall we go or stay?
  • Shall we onward? Come along!
  • Everything around is swept
  • Forward, onward, far away!
  • Trees and masses intercept
  • The sight, and wisps on every side
  • Are puffed up and multiplied.

mephistopheles.

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

faust.

• Aye—
• 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
• 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;
• 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,
• 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
• 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!

mephistopheles.

• Cling tightly to the old ribs of the crag.
• 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.
• 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;
• 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;
• 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?
• Strange accents are ringing
• Aloft, afar, anear;
• The witches are singing!
• The torrent of a raging wizard song
• Streams the whole mountain along.

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 Urean is sitting aloft in the air;
• Hey over stock! and hey over stone!
• ’Twixt witches and incubi, what shall be done?
• Tell it who dare! tell it who dare!

a voice.

• Upon a sow-swine, whose farrows were nine,
• Old Baubo rideth alone.

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,
• Darkening the night, and outspeeding the wind—

a voice.

• Which way comest thou?

a voice.

• Over Ilsenstein;
• The owl was awake in the white moon-shine;
• I saw her at rest in her downy nest,
• And she stared at me with her broad, bright eye.

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 dropt poison upon me as I past.
• Here are the wounds—

chorus of witches.

• Come away! come along!
• The way is wide, the way is long,
• 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.—

semi-chorus of wizards i.

• We glide in
• Like snails when the women are all away;
• And from a house once given over to sin
• Woman has a thousand steps to stray.

semi-chorus ii.

• 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 Felunsee.

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, is for ever in vain.

both chorusses.

• The wind is still, the stars are fled,
• 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,
• 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!

both chorusses.

• 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?
• 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;
• With a rag for a sail we can sweep through the sky,
• Who flies not to-night, when means he to fly?

both chorusses.

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

[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,
• Take hold on me, or we shall be divided:—
• Where are you?

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, and with one step
• 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.

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.

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.

faust.

• Would that I were
• Up yonder in the glow and whirling smoke,
• Where the blind million rush impetuously
• To meet the evil ones; there might I solve
• Many a riddle that torments me!

mephistopheles.

• Yet
• Many a riddle there is tied anew
• Inextricably. Let the great world rage!
• We will stay here safe in the quiet dwellings.
• ’Tis an old custom. Men have ever built
• Their own small world in the great world of all.
• I see young witches naked there, and old ones
• Wisely attired with greater decency.
• Be guided now by me, and you shall buy
• A pound of pleasure with a dram of trouble.
• I hear them tune their instruments—one must
• Get used to this damned scraping. Come, I’ll lead you
• Among them; and what there you do and see,
• As a fresh compact ’twixt us two shall be.
• How say you now? this space is wide enough—
• Look forth, you cannot see the end of it—
• An hundred bonfires burn in rows, and they
• Who throng around them seem innumerable:
• Dancing and drinking, jabbering, making love,
• And cooking, are at work. Now tell me, friend,
• What is there better in the world than this?

faust.

• In introducing us, do you assume
• The character of wizard or of devil?

mephistopheles.

• In truth, I generally go about
• In strict incognito; and yet one likes
• To wear one’s orders upon gala days.
• I have no ribbon at my knee; but here
• At home, the cloven foot is honourable.
• See you that snail there?—she comes creeping up,
• And with her feeling eyes hath smelt out something,
• I could not, if I would, mask myself here.
• Come now, we’ll go about from fire to fire:
• I’ll be the pimp, and you shall be the lover.

[To some Old Women, who are sitting round a heap of glimmering coals.

• Old gentlewomen, what do you do out here?
• You ought to be with the young rioters
• Right in the thickest of the revelry—
• But every one is best content at home.

general.

• Who dare confide in right or a just claim?
• So much as I had done for them! and now—
• With women and the people ’tis the same,
• Youth will stand foremost ever,—age may go
• To the dark grave unhonoured.

minister.

• Now-a-days
• People assert their rights: they go too far;
• But as for me, the good old times I praise;
• Then we were all in all, ’twas something worth
• One’s while to be in place and wear a star;
• That was indeed the golden age on earth.

parvenu.*

• We too are active, and we did and do
• What we ought not, perhaps; and yet we now
• Will seize, whilst all things are whirled round and round,
• A spoke of Fortune’s wheel, and keep our ground.

author.

• Who now can taste a treatise of deep sense
• And ponderous volume? ’tis impertinence
• To write what none will read, therefore will I
• To please the young and thoughtless people try.

mephistopheles

(Who at once appears to have grown very old).

• I find the people ripe for the last day,
• Since I last came up to the wizard mountain;
• And as my little cask runs turbid now,
• So is the world drained to the dregs.

pedlar-witch.

• Look here,
• Gentlemen; do not hurry on so fast
• And lose the chance of a good pennyworth.
• I have a pack full of the choicest wares
• Of every sort, and yet in all my bundle
• Is nothing like what may be found on earth;
• Nothing that in a moment will make rich
• Men and the world with fine malicious mischief—
• There is no dagger drunk with blood; no bowl
• From which consuming poison may be drained
• By innocent and healthy lips; no jewel,
• The price of an abandoned maiden’s shame;
• No sword which cuts the bond it cannot loose,
• Or stabs the wearer’s enemy in the back;
• No—

mephistopheles.

• Gossip, you know little of these times.
• What has been, has been; what is done, is past.
• They shape themselves into the innovations
• They breed, and innovation drags us with it.
• The torrent of the crowd sweeps over us,
• You think to impel, and are yourself impelled.

faust.

• Who is that yonder?

mephistopheles.

• Mark her well. It is
• Lilith.

faust.

• Who?

mephistopheles.

• Lilith, the first wife of Adam.
• Beware of her fair hair, for she excels
• All women in the magic of her locks;
• And when she winds them round a young man’s neck,
• She will not ever set him free again.

faust.

• There sit a girl and an old woman—they
• Seem to be tired with pleasure and with play.

mephistopheles.

• There is no rest to-night for any one:
• When one dance ends another is begun;
• Come, let us to it; We shall have rare fun.

[Faust dances and sings with a Girl, and Mephistopheles with an Old Woman.

brocto-phantasmist.

• What is this cursed multitude about?
• Have we not long since proved to demonstration
• That ghosts move not on ordinary feet?
• But these are dancing just like men and women.

the girl.

• What does he want then at our ball?

faust.

• Oh! he
• Is far above us all in his conceit:
• Whilst we enjoy, he reasons of enjoyment;
• And any step which in our dance we tread,
• If it be left out of his reckoning.
• Is not to be considered as a step.
• There are few things that scandalize him not:
• And when you whirl round in the circle now,
• As he went round the wheel in his old mill,
• He says that you go wrong in all respects,
• Especially if you congratulate him
• Upon the strength of the resemblance.

brocto-phantasmist.

• Fly!
• Vanish! Unheard of impudence! What, still there!
• In this enlightened age too, since you have been
• Proved not to exist!—But this infernal brood
• Will hear no reason and endure no rule.
• Are we so wise, and is the pond still haunted?
• How long have I been sweeping out this rubbish
• Of superstition, and the world will not
• Come clean with all my pains!—it is a case
• Unheard of!

the girl.

• Then leave off teazing us so.

brocto-phantasmist.

• I tell you, spirits, to your faces now,
• That I should not regret this despotism
• Of spirits, but that mine can wield it not.
• To-night I shall make poor work of it,
• Yet I will take a round with you, and hope
• Before my last step in the living dance
• To beat the poet and the devil together.

mephistopheles.

• At last he will sit down in some foul puddle;
• That is his way of solacing himself;
• Until some leech, diverted with his gravity,
• Cures him of spirits and the spirit together.

[ToFaust,who has seceded from the dance.

• Why do you let that fair girl pass from you,
• Who sung so sweetly to you in the dance?

faust.

• A red mouse in the middle of her singing
• Sprung from her mouth.

mephistopheles.

• That was all right, my friend,
• Be it enough that the mouse was not grey.
• Do not disturb your hour of happiness
• With close consideration of such trifles.

faust.

• Then saw I—

mephistopheles.

• What?

faust.

• Seest thou not a pale
• Fair girl, standing alone, far, far away?
• She drags herself now forward with slow steps,
• And seems as if she moved with shackled feet:
• I cannot overcome the thought that she
• Is like poor Margaret.

mephistopheles.

• Let it be—pass on—
• No good can come of it—it is not well
• To meet it—it is an enchanted phantom,
• A lifeless idol; with its numbing look,
• It freezes up the blood of man; and they
• Who meet its ghastly stare are turned to stone,
• Like those who saw Medusa.

faust.

• Oh, too true!
• Her eyes are like the eyes of a fresh corpse
• Which no beloved hand has closed, alas!
• That is the heart which Margaret yielded to me—
• Those are the lovely limbs which I enjoyed!

mephistopheles.

• It is all magic, poor deluded fool;
• She looks to every one like his first love.

faust.

• Oh, what delight! what woe! I cannot turn
• My looks from her sweet piteous countenance.
• How strangely does a single blood-red line,
• Not broader than the sharp edge of a knife,
• Adorn her lovely neck!

mephistopheles.

• Aye, she can carry
• Her head under her arm upon occasion;
• Perseus has cut it off for her. These pleasures
• End in delusion.—Gain this rising ground,
• It is as airy here as in a []
• And if I am not mightily deceived,
• I see a theatre—What may this mean?

attendant.

• Quite a new piece, the last of seven, for ’tis
• The custom now to represent that number.
• ’Tis written by a Dilettante, and
• The actors who perform are Dilettanti;
• Excuse me, gentleman; but I must vanish,
• I am a Dilettante curtain-lifter.

the end.

[* ] raphael.

• The sun sounds, according to ancient custom,
• In the song of emulation of his brother-spheres.
• And its fore-written circle
• Fulfills 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.—Author’s Note.

[* ]A sort of fundholder.