 | Savonarola |  |
1
ACT I.
SCENE I.
[The chief apartment in the Medicean Villa at Careggi, built for Cosimo, “Pater Patriæ,” from the designs of Michelozzi, and the favourite retreat of Lorenzo de' Medici. Through an Italian window, which stands open, can be seen the city of Florence, three miles distant; the Cupola of the Duomo, the Campanile of Giotto, and the Tower of the Palazzo Pubblico, rising clearly into the air.]Bartolommeo Scala, Pico della Mirandola, Luigi Pulci, Lorenzo Tornabuoni. Enter Pier Leoni (right).
SCALA.
How is Lorenzo?
LEONI.
Gallantly in spirit,
But with a subtle sluggishness of blood
That foils medicaments. In other men,
When fever finds a lodgment, pulses bound,
And fire curvets through vein and artery.
But in Lorenzo's body it eschews
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Through subterranean currents to the seat
Of sensitive existence. He is like
Those flowers which in the summer of their bloom
Are dying at the root.
PULCI.
Out in your fears!
How would you have our princely prodigy,
Who ne'er in health resembled mortal men,
Be like them in disease? He oversteps
All common rules. What you conceive decay,
Will prove fresh efflorescence. I will lay
My poems 'gainst your physic that he lives.
LEONI.
A generous wager; but he soon may need
Nor Muse nor medicine.
SCALA.
What says Lazaro?
LEONI.
My colleague of Ticino daily pours
Golconda down his throat.
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The whole of Ind
Were not too precious to save such a life.
LEONI.
To save it, yes! But lavish jewels are
As vain 'gainst death, within us, as without.
Death gulps no bribes.
PICO.
The wolves were howling loud
All night above Fiesole, and gleams
Of intermittent light no fuel fed,
Flashed, ravaging the silence. Yesterday,
The caged Numidian lion rent his twin,
And roared for further havoc.
TORNABUONI.
And did you hear
The midday lightning smote the cupola
Of Santa Reparata, toppling down
Masses of masonry, bricks, metal, tiles,
Towards the palace of the Medici;
While simultaneously a golden ball
Dropped from Lorenzo's scutcheon to the street.
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Is it the first time wolves were heard to bark,
Stones seen to fall? Look! O'er the April sun
An April cloud comes flying. Shall I bid
Poliziano hug his amulet?
LEONI.
Be merry if you can. I would I were!
But, though you mock at portents, where is he
That likes to see the weather change for worse
About the hour of noon? Lorenzo now
Is in the just meridian of life,
When all man's various faculties should make
A marriage with each other; robust thews,
With a most delicate judgment; nimble brain,
With will impossible to move; a soul
To every air and motion sensitive,
Close wedded to a body, heat and cold,
Fatigue and indolence, and all the whims
Of outward circumstance unbudging leave
Alas! Lorenzo's immaterial part
From what he has substantial craves divorce.
PULCI.
O reconcile them quick, before the feud
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A mastery so mild, her course will be
Henceforth or sluggish or irregular.
His mind is like the rainbow, that bestrides
The earth with every colour, and hath rays
Beyond our seeing. Government with him
Is but a graver gaiety, while sport,
By him led on, takes princely dignity;
And like to Nature, whose device it is
To make a peace of all things, he includes
In his large self our petty contraries.
TORNABUONI.
But look! he comes, with mildly lifted hand,
Accentuating wisdom to his son,
The young boy Cardinal.
PICO.
And, Scala, see
The other arm familiarly flung
Over Politian's shoulder. Him he still
Loves best of all.
[Enter Lorenzo, (left), with Poliziano, and his son Giovanni, a youth of seventeen, wearing the robes of a Cardinal.]
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Good morrow, gentlemen!
I was upon a fatherly discourse
To Giovanni, which I can defer
If you have pressing matter for my ear.
SCALA.
No, pray say on! Lo! Florence smiles below,
And in her streets moves jocund Carnival;
And whilst her mood is joyous, he who would
Another than Lorenzo's voice prefer,
Were folly's hopeless reprobate.
LORENZO.
Well, next
Remember this. Be punctual as the sun,
Though others lag; for deference sits on youth
Better than any garment. Let your house
Be spacious more than splendid, and be books
And busts your most conspicuous furniture.
Buy gems for worth, not value. Of your sire
Imitate nothing save his sober love
For the chaste lap of learning. Feed your friends
With rare texts, not with banquets. Friendship craves
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Of emulous feasts that foster sycophants.
Select for intimates, if such survive,
Men like to Pico and Politian.
PULCI.
And not like Pulci?
LORENZO.
Poet! be content
To have been loved by me. He will require
No wit save wisdom.
[Turning to Cardinal Giovanni.]
But if you should meet
Large spirits like to mountain streams let loose,
Twisting this way and that, as if to make
Life's journey longer and more various,
Treat them indulgently. Be not austere:
Outward austerity, as oft as not,
Is but the friar's serge 'neath which there lurks
More taste for sack than sackcloth. For the rest,
Remember you are mortgaged to the Church
Without redemption. Rome, not Florence, is
Henceforth your country. But if you be wise,
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To couple them together. Where is Piero?
SCALA.
Playing pallone in the outer court.
LORENZO.
Playing pallone!
[Goes to the window, and gazes at Florence.]
O, how fair she looks!
There never was a kingdom like to that,
And kingdoms have been played away ere this.
Pray for your brother.
GIOVANNI.
So I do, that he
May lift his leading purposes aloft
As the sap rises.
LORENZO.
Ah, they tell me, trees
Shoot only just as high as they dive deep;
And much I fear his shallow-rooted soul
Will soar but dwarfishly.
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The Commonwealth
Hath made herself the sponsor for your debts,
As you for hers responded.
LORENZO.
Welcome news!
Yes, I have been a spendthrift for the sake
Of my fair Florence, proud that she should wear
The splendour that hath beggared me.
SCALA.
So now
We must perpend what impost to prefer.
LORENZO.
Well, have a care to tax men tenderly.
For if you pilfer all the eggs at once,
You'll find the nest deserted. Take but one,
To-morrow will another fill its place.
What news from Pisa?
SCALA.
News that doth not change.
Pisa still chafes against your government.
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Then let the medicine, like the ill, not change.
'Tis fear unseats the horseman,—not the horse.
Touch his proud stomach with a rowelled heel,
He'll know a master rider.
POLIZIANO.
Yet there comes
From Pisa, dear my master, such a gift
As in your eyes submission will outweigh.
Roscio of Pisa found and sends you this.
[He points to a bust of Plato, which stands on a pedestal, and which he, Pico, Pulci, and Tornabuoni have been examining.]
LORENZO.
What! Plato's bust, in feature as he lived!
Pisa foro this must wear a looser chain.
How noble and familiar he looks
'Twixt Scipio and Faustina! The great gods
Are still at home in any company.
But how about the Pandects?
PICO.
All but done;
And then unto the Codex. Martial's text
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While Fontio tackles Persius.
LORENZO.
All were well,
Could years revive like learning! I would fain
Make Florence wise even as she is fair.
But this activity we boast hath bounds,
And all the running waves of eager life
End on the motionless fixed strand of death.
PULCI.
Savonarola sermonises thus.
LORENZO.
An easy way of preaching; you do well
To drag me upward from this drowning vein.
Half the reputed wisdom of the world
Is but the lack of sane sagacity
To lay the ghost of sorrow. But what news
Is current of the Prior of Saint Mark?
TORNABUONI.
He makes a widening conquest of men's hearts,
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Scatters in vain his honied homilies;
The flies have ta'en to vinegar.
LORENZO.
A sour-souled monk! He came into my house,
And never asked for me. And when that I,
Not to be foiled in courtesy, repaired
Unto his convent garden, he, 'twould seem,
Was busy with his prayers. Gifts he disdains,
Confronting them as bribes, forgetting, though,
To send me back the library, the busts,
And all the antique fragments that my House
Have squandered on his thankless monastery.
Well, well, from Heaven when men credentials bring,
They often treat this poor earth scurvily!
TORNABUONI.
I would have sent him long since to the Court
Whose arrogant ambassador he is.
What doth he here in Florence? You should raise
A wind about his ears to set his cowl
Towards Ferrara. Hard at prayers indeed!
His exhortations trespass on the State;
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With a veneer of piety. He lights
The flame of disaffection in men's minds.
LORENZO.
Beware, lest if you blow it out too hard,
You blow it in again.
SCALA.
Sir, I have sent
Valori, with four intimates, to mind
This pulpit-politician of the laws.
Have I exceeded my authority?
LORENZO.
A seasonable message ne'er is ill.
But, for your choice, Valori is a vane
For every wind to play its whimsy with;
And the slim arrows of his wit will veer
Under the friar's gusty arguments.
PULCI.
Besides, I have suspected latterly,
Valori is indifferently drawn
Towards your rule, since you forbade him mate
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The dainty Candida, who lulls her grief,
They tell me, with the mortuary drone
Of Frà Girolamo.
LEONI.
How comes she, in sooth,
To be so dainty? For a sorrier pair
Than sire and mother alike, I never drugged.
LORENZO.
Is then your science, doctor, left at fault?
Know, Nature, like the cuckoo, laughs at law,
Placing her eggs in whatso nest she will;
And when at callow-time you think to find
The sparrow's stationary chirp, lo! bursts
Voyaging voice to glorify the spring.
PULCI.
Softer she be, the harder sure it seems
For him that must forego her.
LORENZO.
Wherefore hard?
Why, look but on the first hedge-rose you meet;
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And is far more encased in innocence.
Its breath is sweeter, and if it should fade,
Well, you may pluck another. But a maid,
That you have once dissevered from her stem,
Upon your breast for ever must you keep,
Though all the scent of love evaporate,
And leave you but the stalk of what she was.
POLIZIANO.
Is then this Candida so wondrous fair?
TORNABUONI.
Fair as the world when yet 'tis hardly Spring,
But swelling buds and purpling coppices
Admonish it is coming.
LORENZO.
There, replied
The close-observant lover! Happy you
Lorenzo Tornabuoni! for none else
Shall wear this vernal blossom on his breast,
Till moist Spring wax to Summer's parching heat,
To Autumn's too material fruitfulness,
Then wintry disillusion.
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Back you glide
Into your sombre vein, traducing thus
The hues of life.
LORENZO.
Life's a chameleon,
Whose colour is fit argument for fools.
But let us all to Florence, and defeat
These monkish menaces with merry songs,
Minted to mark the reign of Carnival.
[Suddenly he totters, and stretches out his arm. Cardinal Giovanni and Poliziano are swiftly at his side, and Leoni approaches.]
LEONI.
Feel you amiss?
[Lorenzo recovers, and puts them gently aside.]
LORENZO.
No, nothing. There! 'Tis gone!
“Flower of the clove!”—How, Pulci, goes the strain?
Hence! hence! Come, Pico! Come, Politian!
Learning must now join hands with levity,
And foot a jocund round. We all must go,
Yes, you as well, my solemn Chancellor,—
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Keep gravity engaged till we return.
We shall be back to Vespers.
[They all prepare to leave.]
GIOVANNI.
Fare you well!
And I will go refresh myself with work,
From the fatigue of too much idleness.
SCENE II.
Piazza of the Duomo; the façade, and the Campanile of Giotto, at the Back of the stage.[Enter a Carnival Procession of both sexes, the most conspicuous figures among which are Doffo Spini, Annibale Soderini, and Francesco Cei (right). All are running and romping. Some are masked, others not, but all are richly or fantastically attired. Many carry baskets of flowers, with which they pelt each other and the passers-by.]
SPINI.
Now let us sing the song Lorenzo made
The year his daughter Maddalena wed
The Holy Father's son, Francesco Cibo.
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Hush! Holy Fathers have no children, boy;
You mean his nephew.
CEI.
Have it as you will.
Are we not all his children? Now, the song!
[They wind round the stage, singing the following song, and pass out gradually (left). Enter Niccolo Grosso and his wife Anita (right).]
I.
Now comes Spring with buxom pleasures,Buds and sunshine, dance and song;
Gallants, foot your friskiest measures!
Maids, unlock your daintiest treasures!
Youth and springtime last not long.
II.
Every wall is white with roses,Linnets pair in every tree;
Brim your beakers, twine your posies
Kiss and quaff ere April closes;
Bloom and beauty quickly flee.
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Not a new gown to honour Carnival!
When not the basest citizen but pours
His purse upon the pavement for his wife.
GROSSO.
Mine is already empty. Look at it!
[He draws his leathern pouch from his girdle.]
ANITA.
Then why not swift replenish it? Your hands
Hang idle, while Lorenzo stretches his,
Imploring you for statues, miniatures,
Busts, anything you will.
GROSSO.
And do you think
I, for Lorenzo, will my art demean
To make him more magnificent?
ANITA.
Others do,
And all their wives walk finely.
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Fie on you!
What would you say, were I to bid you hire
Your beauty out to use, and urge you to it
By argument from others? Sooth, your gown
Is well enough
ANITA
And am I beautiful?
[She approaches and caresses him.]
GROSSO.
How you have caught the blackbird's homely pipe,
Now sweet, now scolding!
ANITA.
Better mate, I ween,
Than is the lark that only sings in Heaven.
GROSSO.
Make thyself Heaven, and I will sing to thee.
ANITA.
Ah! to do that, I needs must go far off,
Or thou wilt ne'er think me celestial.
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Then go and trim our nest upon the ground:
I am not always singing. But before
You homeward wend, this wisdom in your ear
Why do you come betwixt my Art and me?
In that, you are as foolish as the Earth,
When it thrusts in between the sun and moon,
And gets the light of neither. This eclipse
Bars me from art, and leaves you solitary.
Pass, and let each in turn illuminate
Your giddy round. Well, you shall have the gown.
Choose it as much like me as possible,
Who now am but a remnant, going cheap.
ANITA.
Dearer to me than any younger piece,
My gifted artist! Hark! Again they come,
The gaudy revellers. I straight will hie
And make my beauty yet more beautiful.
[Exit (left). Re-enter Carnival Procession (right), singing, dancing, and playing practical jokes. With them, Bettuccio and Letizia, hand in hand, whom they salute with flowers and pleasantry; Grosso, with folded arms, looks on.]
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III.
Toss the hay and scent the clover,Chase coy damsels till they trip.
What is life when life is over?
While it lingers play the rover,
Play the bee to honeyed lip.
IV.
Soft cheeks blush and dark eyes twinkle,Bosoms swell with light desire;
Ankles twitch and bracelets tinkle,
Love and joy smooth out the wrinkle;
Death is smoke, let youth be fire!
GROSSO.
Ho! pretty maiden, will you sit to me?
BETTUCCIO.
To you, good sculptor! She's my model now.
GROSSO.
How! When for marble did you quit the Muse?
I thought you were a poet.
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So he is,
And I am sworn to marry him. His song
Hath made love liquid; he melts pearls of speech
I' the bubbling wine of a young maiden's blood.
GROSSO.
Nay, marry not a poet. He will have
As many changeling mistresses as moods.
He wantons with the February winds,
And toys with March's forward daffodils.
He is an April fool each cuckoo-call
Can set a-gaping, and he falls in love
With every lamb that frisks its pretty tail.
LETIZIA.
He may love all, so that he loves me too.
Who would monopolise a poet's heart,
Large as the universe? It is enough
To sit within it.
GROSSO.
May you never find
Its vastness cold. But, meanwhile, warm yourself.
[Exit Grosso (right).]
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Heed him not, sweet! the wisdom of the world
Is far too general; we poets are
Diverse as our detractors.
LETIZIA.
Be it so!
We women, when we love, are all alike.
Go like the sea and like the sea return,
Thou still wilt find me here. I am thy shore,
That slopes towards thee, and knows no other bent.
Nor will I ask if any fickle moon,
Swaying thee hither and thither, thy motions rule.
Smile on her as thou wilt and she on thee;
But thou must never so unfaithful prove
As to withhold the burden of thy moan,
When nights are dark and heaven untenanted,
From my deep-anchored lap.
BETTUCCIO.
I'll never leave it,
Though every star in heaven should shine on me.
[Re-enter Carnival Procession (left), singing, dancing, and joking. Bettuccio and Letizia stand aside, hand
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SAVONAROLA.
What do you here, you Pagan roysterers,
Roaring around the pillars of God's House
Your lewd fantastic canticles! The Sword
Hangs by a thread and is about to fall,—
To fall, ay, and on Florence. Put off quick
Your carnal garments, and make haste to don
The sackcloth of repentance, triflers all,
That, Christians called, are worse than infidel,
Blasphemers, usurers, slaves to fleshy lusts,
Mortgaged to Hell, whom Christ would fain redeem.
Blessëd are they that weep! You only laugh.
Shameless as Sodom are ye, and as deaf,
Seeing no star in the East! Accursëd be
Your obscene songs and foul frivolities!
Accursëd they that writ and they that sing,
Accursëd in their offspring and their doom!
The Sword of the Lord is sharpened, and your necks
Shall feel the smiting of its edge. How long,
How long shall I implore you, Florentines!
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Cleaves to my mouth, and none is there that hears.
BETTUCCIO.
Look! in resplendent trim Valori comes,
With Bonsi and Vespucci in his train,
Luca Corsini likewise hurrying up.
We shall see sport directly.
[Enter Francesco Valori, Luca Corsini, Domenico Bonsi, and Guidantanio Vespucci. Savonarola turns towards them.]
Likewise you,
Who should uphold the Commonwealth and be
The solid buttress of the State, are but
Lorenzo's sycophants.
BETTUCCIO.
Who blasphemes now?
Cheers for Lorenzo! Come, my lads and maids,
Convince this kill-joy friar that your lungs
Have not gone dry with singing canticles.
Long live Lorenzo the Magnificent!
ALL.
Long live Lorenzo and the Medici!
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You hear them, friar? They use plain arguments.
But I wish gentler messages have come,
Commissioned by Lorenzo to lament
You use him so distrustfully. Other sons
Of Dominick, when lifted to the rank
Of Prior of your Convent, homage paid
To him their benefactor; but you flout
His pious gifts, and fling them in his face.
SAVONAROLA.
You count them gifts, I reckon them as bribes,
And have rejected them accordingly;
And as to my election, that I owe
Not to Lorenzo, but to God alone,
And unto God I pay my fealty.
May that be all?
CORSINI.
Your answer is as rough
As smooth was his remonstrance. We are charged,
If failing in our embassy, to warn,
Still in respectful language, there are laws
That give disturbers of the city's peace
But choice of exile or obedience.
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Go tell Lorenzo that it is not I
But he that will be exiled; exiled too
Unto a land whose exiles ne'er return.
Before the unrising Judgment-Seat of God
I summon him, Lorenzo; after him,
Shortly, Pope Innocent; and swiftly then,
King Ferdinand of Naples; and this Three,
To God must answer for the swinish trough
That Italy doth wallow in. The cup
Of her abominations now is full,
Full unto overflowing. Tell him that.
BONSI.
You are ungracious, Frà Girolamo!
SAVONAROLA.
God is ungracious, when men spurn His grace.
But you, Valori, in whose heart I glance,
You will be left to serve a nobler work
Before you die.
BETTUCCIO.
And, Friar, what of us,
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One gets one's fortune prophesied for nought.
SAVONAROLA.
The fountains of felicity run dry
When youth's no more in season. I will keep
A girdle and a hair-shirt for you, boy;
You yet may need them. Meanwhile, hold her sweet,
And from her heart divert all bitterness.
Come, brothers Dominick and Silvester,
We'll to our Convent.
[Exeunt (right) Corsini, Bonsi, and Vespucci. Savonarola and Monks retire into the Duomo. The Carnival revellers break out again into merriment. A girl throws a rope of flowers round Letizia.]
GIRL.
A girdle for Letizia!
SECOND GIRL.
And behold
A hair-shirt for Bettuccio!
[She tries to put a sack over his head.
BETTUCCIO.
Peace, you romps!
30
Lorenzo be not coming.
VALORI.
'Tis the hour
He should be from Careggi on his way,
With a most gallant company. His friends
Are at the gate by this.
BETTUCCIO.
Then let us hie
Unto San Gallo, there to welcome him,
Fast followed by yon other stream of joy
That flows this way.
ALL.
On for San Gallo, on!
[They all pass out (left). As they do so, a fresh Carnival Company, headed by Soderini, enters (right), teasing and chasing Candida, who seems scared, and rushes to Valori for protection.]
VALORI.
My pretty bird, how fast your bosom beats!
[To the crowd.]
So roughly you a fledgling should not chase.
31
We did not plan to hurt her. She's so shy,
And with her foolish fleeing tempts pursuit.
CANDIDA.
[Still confused and alarmed.]
Forgive me, sir, for clinging to your arm;
But they were me importuning with words
I do not understand, but much mislike.
But oh! 'tis he!
[She breaks away from Valori.]
VALORI.
Yes, maiden, it is I;
Who would protect you with these living hands,
If death were your pursuer. But why leave
So swift the port where you a shelter found?
CANDIDA.
They mean no harm. It was a foolish scare.
SODERINI.
My comrades, hence! Lorenzo else will miss
The welcome you intend him. This coy maid
Hath found a bold protector. Thus it is:
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But danger which they love, security.
[Exeunt Soderini and the revellers (left).
VALORI.
How gracious Fate hath been to me to-day,
Driving your fears this way!
CANDIDA.
Not gracious more
Than unto me providing at my need
Such valid help. I thank you, and farewell.
VALORI.
The hunted hare stops longer in her seat
When the tormenting greyhounds have swept by,
And found another scent. Stay just awhile,
Until the trepidation of your heart
Subside to gentler rhythms.
CANDIDA.
So it has.
My heart again beats temperately now.
VALORI.
Alas! alas! too temperately far!
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Thy very coldness keeps my love so warm
That it must surely end by melting thee,
And make those icy lids and frozen orbs
Windows and eaves of dripping tenderness.
CANDIDA.
O sir! I pray you do not talk of love.
My heart is in the grave, my hope in Heaven,
Where my dear parents have preceded me,
Taking life's summer with them.
VALORI.
Say not that!
Grief in young hearts is like the nightingale,
Whose note is almost sweeter than 'tis sad,
And stays but briefly. Then when he is gone,
The cuckoo calleth lustier than before,
Proclaiming loud his victory of joy.
So, sweet, sad maiden, will it be with you.
CANDIDA.
There's silent winter now, silent and bare:
I have gleaned happiness.
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Let hopeful love
But drive its furrow through the fields of death,
There yet will wave a harvest; but, if not,
Lend me your desolation, and we twain
Will still be sad together.
CANDIDA.
You forget.
If I could more than filial fetters wear,
For other chains Lorenzo destines me.
You speak of love and liberty to one
Who lacks the second even as the first.
VALORI.
Can you give one, the other being denied?
CANDIDA.
In the old lore of love I am not skilled.
But hearts need not be erudite to know
If love be sweet, compulsion must be sour,
And other maidens say that love is sweet!
I have not tasted it. But hark! they come.
[There is the sound of returning Carnival.]
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Nay, do not go! I will protect you still.
Or, ere you go, tell me that love is sweet.
CANDIDA.
Sweet as a rivulet one stays to hear,
Yet doth not know its meaning. Be my friend.
Friendship, 'tis said, is love without his wings,
And friendship, sir, is sweet enough for me.
VALORI.
But I would rather be your love than friend,
For see, it follows, I could fly to you.
[Enter Carnival Procession (right), headed by Bettuccio, followed by Letizia; also Anita, in her new gown.]
VALORI.
Why, stripling rhymester, back again so soon?
BETTUCCIO.
Ill news, ill news! Lorenzo hath not come.
ANITA.
But he must come. What think you of my gown?
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You should have bought it black. Lorenzo's eye
Will never fall upon your finery.
They say he's dying.
CANDIDA.
Let us go and pray
That he may live.
VALORI.
[To Candida.]
Pray for the obstacle
Of all I yearn for!
CANDIDA.
Hush! Love should at least
Be silent in the corridors of death.
Farewell!
VALORI.
Farewell But this, to take away.
Though from my lips thou may'st remove thine ear,
Withal, as in some sea-suffusëd shell,
The ocean of my love shall murmur still.
[Exit Candida (right). Enter (left) Frà Domenico and Frà Silvestro.]
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Go home! go home! Lorenzo's hour hath come!
Lorenzo, master of your revels when
Life sat upon his heart and waved his plume.
Now death hath mounted up behind, 'twere meet
You should suspend awhile your carnival.
VALORI.
But surely, friar, Lorenzo is not dead?
FRÀ SILVESTRO.
Not dead, but now so tightly clutched by death,
That he hath sent for Frà Girolamo
To loose his soul.
ANITA.
No use then in my gown.
I would that I had waited. I must go
And pray them change it for a funeral one.
[Exit Anita (left).]
LETIZIA.
Savonarola's prophecy hath quick
Marched to its issue.
38
Ay, and look you, child.
He prophesied about Bettuccio's fate.
SECOND GIRL.
And wove a hair-shirt for your wedding night!
FIRST GIRL.
Yes, and a girdle, but not one of love.
VALORI.
My friends! it were more seemly to depart,
Since this grave news looks true. Lorenzo dead
Would shame your revelry; and should he live,
He will remember with due thankfulness
You put on gravity in time of joy,
Because he was not joyous.
CROWD.
True! Very true!
'Tis just what we were going to say, ourselves.
So let us separate.
39
Then come, Letizia,
And we will be as glum and miserable
As love will let us.
[They all prepare to depart. The scene shifts.
SCENE III.
[The same as in Scene I., at Careggi; but a curtain is drawn across the stage, cutting off the interior of the apartment. Enter (left) Pico della Mirandola and Luigi Pulci. At the same time enter (right) Leoni.]PULCI.
What news, physician?
LEONI.
News most ominous.
Lorenzo, not contented to be shriven
By his own confessor, Matteo Bossi,
Nor by Frà Mariano, hath besought
That Frà Girolamo will hither come,
And ere he journey to the other world,
Arrange his soul.
40
The Prior of Saint Mark's,
Savonarola!
LEONI.
Even he in sooth.
He will be here anon.
PULCI.
You stagger me.
But often so it is: the steadiest souls
Seem to lose equilibrium when they stand
Upon the narrow edge that doth divide
This life from the deep precipice of death.
I had not thought it.
PICO.
Doth he suffer much?
LEONI.
He must, though his brave visage still belies
The stomach's agonies, to which the gout,
Routed from limbs, hath sulkily retired.
He gleans no comfort from our tepid baths
Nor Bono Avogradi's heliotrope.
41
Are we to lose him then? Alas! alas!
The loftiest leaves are blown away the first,
While lowlier foliage melancholy hangs
Through half the winter!
[Poliziano appears from behind the curtain, and draws it back. Lorenzo is seen reclining on a couch at the back of the stage, near the window overlooking Florence.]
POLIZIANO.
Lorenzo craves his dear familiars
To come as near him as they are in thought.
Will you approach?
LORENZO.
Come close, Mirandola!
I could not die contented save I had
With thy young aspect first refreshed myself.
Learning and loveliness in thee have paired,
And seeing thee once more, I take farewell
Of all I lived for.
PICO.
You are ruddier now.
Dismiss death's far too early messenger,
42
Give him not audience yet.
LORENZO.
Death hath no hours,
But makes his own appointments. Better so:
For, Pico, I am out of heart and breath,
And could not breast the hill of life again.
POLIZIANO.
But what a height, my master, you have climbed!
And if the moment to descend have come,
Survey once more the conquered territory,
And die believing that no mountain soars
So loftily as that aspiring name
That you will leave behind.
LORENZO.
Consoling thought!
But, O Politian! if our labours live,
It will but be as tablets on a tomb
For sake of those that they commemorate,
Our names no more than speaking monument
To tell the world where a great spirit lies;
43
What pinch of immortality we keep.
PULCI.
To Plato generous, why be thus unjust
To his posterity? Lorenzo's age,
Poised on its own broad pinions, shall defy
The downward gusts of time, while weaker wings
Are whirled beneath the horizon. Tongues unborn
Shall lisp the sweet survival of your deeds,
As children practise with a father's name
To learn a larger utterance.
LORENZO.
Spoken well,
And worthy of my poet. But this vein
Of forward-reaching vanity infects
Each generation, this one most of all.
Nought new is said, but only newly thought:
And these pretentious novelties wherein
The upstart age struts proudly, are but gems
Carefully carven by an older time,
Now furnished with fresh setting.
44
[Aside to Pico and Leoni.]
Hark how he talks!
Too equably for one that is to live.
Only when death over our shoulder leans
And guides our childish fingers through life's page,
Write we in such well-balanced characters.
LORENZO.
[Raising himself on his elbow.]
I want you all to hold in tenderness
Hieronymo Donato, Barbaro,
And Paolo Cortese, for my sake.
You know how they have traversed land and sea
To help me bridge the present with the past,
And open out for penetrating minds
Unexplored lands of learning. See you too
That Giovanni Lascaris, whose freight
Of twice one hundred volumes, ransacked fresh
From cloisters of Mount Athos, hath been sucked
Down by the ignorant waves, doth not receive
Less than the promised guerdon had he brought
That argosy to shore.
45
It shall be done.
Myself will see to it.
LORENZO.
Pulci, to you
I do commit my poesies that have
Enjoyed obscurity.
PULCI.
They quick shall greet
The light that waits for them.
LORENZO.
No, Pulci, no!
Consume them utterly. I would recall
Much that is now on every Tuscan tongue,
If that were possible. Our Plato held
The Muse should sing but praises of the Gods
And hymns to virtue.
PULCI.
You on me put a far more murderous task
Than I have heart for.
46
Friendship orders you.
Hark to the thrush gurgling in yonder tree!
He hath inhaled the liquid air whilst flying,
And, now he chooses him another perch,
Gives it us back in notes intangible;
Which is the very music that we want,
Did we but know it. For your spoken song,
Too full of meaning, lacks significance.
Hark how again he sings celestially,
The very heaven of music meaningless!
He is a better poet than us all.
[An attendant enters (left), and whispers to Pico, who is joined by the rest. They confer silently, while Lorenzo gazes out towards Florence.]
LORENZO.
Does your debate concern me, gentlemen?
POLIZIANO.
The Prior of Saint Mark is now without.
LORENZO.
Then let him come within. He is a guest
47
With him I must hold dialogue of death
Before life's curtain falls.
[They take tender leave of him. Exeunt (right).]
LORENZO.
[Alone.]
My intimates!
The best men ever had, but helpless now
To hold me here or cheer me thitherward.
Of all the company of hearts that sit
Round our existence smiling, that not one
Should be told off to see us to the land,
The road of which we know not! That seems hard.
To be alone in the full glare of life
Lulls fear to sleep. But loneliness in death
Might make the most intrepid spirit take
Shadows for substance.
[The door (left) opens, and Savonarola appears. He stands pausing in the doorway. Lorenzo motions to him to approach.]
48
SCENE IV.
Savonarola. Lorenzo.LORENZO.
Will you approach, good Prior? 'Tis not from lack
Of reverence for your habit, that I fail
To greet you more becomingly, but death
That glues my limbs.
SAVONAROLA.
[Advancing.]
No need to rise, Lorenzo.
Heaven lays no tax of courtly ceremony;
But, being far more exorbitant, it claims
Full payment of the substance from the soul.
Why have you sent for me?
LORENZO.
To readjust,
Before I journey on, unbalanced wrongs
That gall my conscience.
49
Show me them!
Since that it seems Plato avails not now.
Philosophy, like any false ally,
Comes to man's aid when need is at the least,
To shrink away in true extremity.
But Virtue, unaffected friend, contrives
To pull us through, though all the fiends conspire
To wedge us in with evil.
LORENZO.
I have made
Elsewhere confession of my homelier sins.
But those transgressions that have walked abroad
In all men's eyes, I have reserved for one
Who knows no private favour.
SAVONAROLA.
Then speak on!
Death is the looking-glass of life wherein
Each man may scan the aspect of his deeds.
How looks it now, Lorenzo, now that God
Holds that unflattering mirror to your soul?
50
'Tis hard on twenty years since, but still, still,
The cry of sacked Volterra haunts my ears.
SAVONAROLA.
And well it may, Lorenzo! Do you think
Thus to divide eternity? Twenty years
Have placed no second 'twixt your sin and you.
LORENZO.
I know it, Prior; and poignantly confess
To you and Heaven the guilt was mostly mine.
Endorsing claims equivocal to glut
The yawning coffers of the State, I clutched
A shadowy right; the alum mines were won,
And now the gain lies leaden on my breast,
Though bade I not the slaughter.
SAVONAROLA.
Hold! We bid
Whatever buttresses our bold designs,
And are the architects of every wrong
Raised o'er the ruins of demolished right.
You cannot take before the throne of God
51
Clings to your hands.
LORENZO.
Seem they so very red?
So red, contrition cannot wash them white?
For there is other gore that soaks my skirt,
Spilt in usurious payment of the blow
Struck by the Pazzi at my life, but spilt
Not from vindictiveness but policy.
SAVONAROLA.
Will policy avail to change the score
Of the Recording Angel? Hell is full
Of politic expedients, condoned
By Earth, to double their offence 'fore Heaven.
God saved your life; you slew your enemies.
[Lorenzo exhibits signs of agitation.]
Yet will He pardon even as He saved,
So anguish in the balance lift up guilt.
Is your confession ended?
LORENZO.
Alas! no.
Full many an orphan maiden hath been robbed
52
Of its substantial outwork, hath succumbed
To the besieger. This seems direst wrong—
SAVONAROLA.
And is the direst wrong. The body pushed
Out of this life precociously may find
A better tenement. But he that fouls
A virgin soul and leaves it to corrupt,
Would strain God's mercy to the snapping-point,
If it were not far-reaching as Himself.
You must amend this injury.
LORENZO.
Show me how,
And quickly will I do it.
SAVONAROLA.
'Tis enough.
Let restitution be in full ordained;
And, if you live, each victim ferret out
And wed her to the cloister.
LORENZO.
Doing this,
53
And reckon on indulgence?
SAVONAROLA.
Nought that is,
Mountain, nor sea, nor the vast atmosphere,
Nor even man's stupendous scope of sin,
Can get beyond the circumambient range
Of Divine mercy. But before my hands
May absolution shower upon your soul,
Three things there are first indispensable.
LORENZO.
What may these be?
SAVONAROLA.
Firstly, that you should have
Faith in God's mercy, living faith and full.
LORENZO.
And that I have; for if I had it not,
How ill-caparisoned were I to start
Upon this final journey!
54
Next, that you
Make reparation absolute, and lay
This as a prior legacy on your sons,
For lingering wrong to friend or enemy.
To this you pawn your soul?
LORENZO.
My soul be bond,
And forfeit if I fail!
SAVONAROLA.
Lastly, Lorenzo,
But mainly this of all, you must restore
Her liberties to Florence.
LORENZO.
[Starting forward on the couch.]
Friar, hold!
You overstep your territory there,
And make a raid on my dominions.
Remember what is Cæsar's.
SAVONAROLA.
Do I fail?
Where did you get your empire? Who was it gave
55
Which you have tightened? Nay, invoke not God!
For he as Cæsar ne'er anointed you;
And, failing His anointment, show me then
The sanction of His people.
LORENZO.
What I have,
They freely gave.
SAVONAROLA.
They were not free to give;
For you with splendour first corrupted them,
Drugging their love of virtue, that you might
Their love of freedom violate, and they
The detriment discern not.
LORENZO.
I gave all,
All that I have, all I inherited,
To vivify this city, and to lift
Her diadem of glory high above
All cities, kingdoms, principalities,
Lavished the substance of my House on her,
Discriminating not which hers, which mine,
56
The fame of Florence. Was it crime in me?
In face of heavenly ermine will I claim,
For that, exemption.
SAVONAROLA.
Pandars might as well
Plead the foul price they pay, as you invoke
The substance squandered on the Commonwealth,
Whose freedom you have ravished. Well you know
In Florence that the government of One
Was an abomination till your Line
Drew all the reins of rule into its hand,
And jingling trappings of subjection laid
Upon a pampered people. Glory! Fame!
Fame is but sound; conscience makes harmony;
And happy he who truthfully can say,
When the world's pagan plaudits cease, he hears
The sacred music of a virtuous heart.
Give Florence back her freedom!
LORENZO.
She is free,
And of her freedom made me what I am,
57
If they run short of wisdom.
SAVONAROLA.
Then, enough!
And summon your attendants.
[Lorenzo rings. His friends enter.]
You have need
No more of me. But this, Lorenzo, mark!
What you refuse, that Florence swift will take,
When your magnificence shall lie entombed,
And God arraign you for the rights you filched,
But could not carry with you, nor bequeath.
Die, by my voice unshriven!
[His friends crowd round him. Savonarola turns to depart, but pauses, and gazes at Lorenzo with a look of austere menace. Curtain falls.]
END OF ACT I.
| Savonarola | |