SCENE THE SEVENTH.
Death, Adam, and Eve.
Death.
Thou art the creature, Woman,
Who first hast summon'd me,
And with a sinful voice,
From the Tartarean shades;
Thou, perishable flesh and form of clay,
Hast call'd this fearful monster,
Of human bones compacted,
This day to look upon the light of heaven.
Say now what wouldst thou speak?
Dost thou abhor thy life?
Behold the sickle-bearer, and the sickle
That now invites thee to desert the day.
Now with a lynx's eye,
I see, in looking into future time,
To my dread name and these ungodly arms,
What fatal trophies rise.
But what! not here shall end the full perdition
With which heaven threatens thee, such mighty evils
Hell now prepares for thee,
And such excess of horrors,
That I, I who am Death,
Wish for destruction to escape their sight.
Thou art condemn'd to die,
Thy residence is Hell,
Become a rebel to thy mighty Maker.
Adam.
Oh source of tears! Oh sorrow!
Oh miserable sinner!
Eve.
Ah me, most wretched Eve!
The origin of sin.
Adam.
Ah, how the heaven grows dark, how it withdraws
Its light from us, who are of light unworthy!
But ah! what flame in heaven quickens and dies,
Dazzling our sight, and sudden darts away,
A serpent all of fire?
Eve.
Alas! not here the wrath of heaven shall end,
First we must suffer death.
Adam.
Ah, what rebellowing sounds I hear above!
Perchance with such a voice
Offended Heaven now drives us from the world,
And sends us banish'd to the gulfs below!
What shafts, how numberless
Strike down the woods and groves! with what wild force
The raging winds contend!
Now rushes from the sky
Water congeal'd to forceful globes of hail!
Eve.
Alas! how from on high
The swelling waters pour,
That rising o'er their banks,
The proud o'erflowing rivers
Now put the beasts to flight,
And in the groves and woods
Precipitately drive the fish to dwell.
Adam.
Fly! let us haste to fly
Up to those lofty mountains,
Where heaven now seems at last
Satiate with ceaseless thundering to repose!
