University of Virginia Library

Scene I.

Adam and Eve.
Adam.
Since that last evening we have fallen indeed!
Yes, we have fallen, my Eve! O yes!—
One, two, and three, and four;—the Appetite,
The Enjoyment, the aftervoid, the thinking of it—
Specially the latter two, most specially the last.
There, in synopsis, see, you have it all:
Come, let us go and work!
Is it not enough?
What, is there three, four, five?

Eve.
Oh, guilt, guilt, guilt!

Adam.
Be comforted; muddle not your soul with doubt.
'Tis done, it was to be done; if, indeed,
Other way than this there was, I cannot say:
This was one way, and a way was needs to be found.
That which we were we could no more remain
Than in the moist provocative vernal mould
A seed its suckers close and rest a seed;
We were to grow. Necessity on us lay
This way or that to move; necessity, too,
Not to be over careful this or that,
So only move we should.
Come, my wife,
We were to grow, and grow I think we may,
And yet bear goodly fruit.

Eve.
Oh, guilt! oh, guilt!

Adam.

Eve.
Guilt! oh, guilt!

Adam.
Peace, woman, peace; I go.

Eve.
Nay, Adam, nay;
Hear me,—I am not dreaming, am not crazed.
Did not yourself confess that we are changed?
Do not you too?

Adam.
Do not I too? Well, well,
Listen! I too when homeward, weary of toil,
Through the dark night I have wandered in rain and wind,
Bewildered, haply scared, I too have lost heart,
And deemed all space with angry power replete,
Angry, almighty—and panic-stricken have cried,
‘What have I done?’ ‘What wilt thou do to me?’
Or with the coward's ‘No, I did not, I will not,’
Belied my own soul's self. I too have heard,
And listened, too, to a voice that in my ear
Hissed the temptation to curse God, or worse,
And yet more frequent, curse myself and die;
Until, in fine, I have begun to half believe
Your dream my dream too, and the dream of both
No dream but dread reality; have shared
Your fright: e'en so share thou, sweet life, my hope;
I too, again, when weeds with growth perverse
Have choked my corn and marred a season's toil,
Have deemed I heard in heaven abroad a cry,
‘Cursed is the ground for thy sake; thou art cursed.’
But oftener far, and stronger also far,
In consonance with all things out and in,
I hear a voice more searching bid me, ‘On!
On! on! it is the folly of the child
To choose his path and straightway think it wrong,
And turn right back and lie on the ground to weep.
Forward! go, conquer! work and live!’ Withal
A word comes, half command, half prophecy,
‘Forgetting things behind thee, onward press
Unto the mark of your high calling.’ Yea,
And voices, too, in woods and flowery fields
Speak confidence from budding banks and boughs,
And tell me, ‘Live and grow,’ and say, ‘Look still
Upward, spread outward, trust, be patient, live;’
Therefore, if weakness bid me curse and die,
I answer, No! I will not curse myself,
Nor aught beside; I shall not die, but live.

Eve.
Ah, me! alas! alas!
More dismally in my face stares the doubt,
More heavily on my heart weighs the world.
Methinks
The questionings of ages yet to be,
The thinkings and cross-thinkings, self-contempts,
Self-horror; all despondencies, despairs
Of multitudinous souls on souls to come,
In me imprisoned fight, complain and cry.
Alas!
Mystery, mystery, mystery evermore.