University of Virginia Library

FOREST AND CAVERN.
Faustus
(alone).

[Mephistopheles enters.
Mephistopheles.
Have you not had enough of this before?
A pretty kind of life to live for ever!
Well enough for a trial. Come, come, let us
Seek something new.

Faustus.
I wish you had something else
To do than thus torment me when I'm quiet.

Mephistopheles.
Well! well! and if you wish I'll leave you here
To your delights—never say it again.
Great loss to me, indeed, 'twould be to lose
A petulant, unsocial, crazy creature
Of a companion—kept the whole day long
Busy, and never can make any guess
From my lord's countenance, whether your worship
Is pleased or is displeased by what I do.

Faustus.
Ay, there's the tone—that is so very like him:
Tires me to death—expects me then to thank him!

Mephistopheles.
Poor child of earth! and couldst thou, then, have borne
Thy life till now without my aid? 'Twas I
That saved thee from imaginations idle!
I guarded thee with long and anxious care;
And, but for me, even now thou wouldst have been
Idling in other worlds! Why sittest thou there,
Lingering in hollow cave, or rifted rock,
Dull as the moping owl? Why, like the toad,
Dost thou support a useless life, deriving
Subsistence from damp moss and dripping stone?
Sweet pastime this! most charming occupation!
I fear you've not forgotten your old trade.

Faustus.
Couldst thou conceive what added life is given
In hours like this, passed in the wilderness,
And couldst thou feel it—still thou wouldst remain
The devil thou art—still hate and poison it!
Wouldst grudge the short delight—

Mephistopheles.
Delight indeed!
Yes, transcendental rapture!—mighty fine!—
In night and dew lying among the hills,
In ecstasy embracing earth and heaven—
To swell up till you are a kind of god—
To pierce into the marrow of the earth
In a fool's fancies—all the six-days' task
Of the creation in thy breast to feel—
And in the pride of conscious power enjoy
I know not what of bliss,—to cherish love
That has no limits, but must overflow
Till it loves every thing that is—till earth
And man's poor nature, in the trance forgotten,
Has passed away—and then the glorious hour
Of intuition ending—how it ends
I must not say—

Faustus.
Fie, fie upon thee.

Mephistopheles.
Yes!
“Fie, fie!”—it does not suit your taste, forsooth—
Fie, fie! this mannerly word sounds very well
In your mouth now. The modest ears are closed,
And will not hear of what the modest heart
Yet cannot go without. Good, good!—a word,
However, upon what you said—I grudge not
To you or any man such pleasure, as
He now and then may feel, in playing tricks
Of self-deception; pity 'twill not last.
You are already blown out of your course—
Are almost what you were when first we met;
And, if you don't take care, will fret yourself
Soon into actual madness—frenzy-fever,
Or melancholy horror. For your own sake
Have done with this: your love, poor creature! sits
Within there,—you should soothe her! All with her
Is sad and gloomy—out of her poor mind
You never are: she loves devotedly,
Poor thing!—on thee she thinks—thinks evermore.
First came the flood of thy o'erflowing passion,
As swells, when the snows melt, a mountain brook
Above its banks—and thou into her heart
Hast poured the sudden gush; and now the brook
Is dry with thee again: methinks 'twere well,
Instead of reigning here among the woods
On an imaginary throne, that you
Would comfort the young monkey, and requite
The poor thing for her love,—to her the time
Seems miserably long—she lingers at
The window, gazes on the clouds that pass
Slow o'er the old town-walls. “Oh that I were
A little bird!” she cries. This is her song
All the day long, and half the heavy night!
One moment is she mirthful—mostly is
Sad,—then she weeps till she can weep no more;
Then, as 'twould seem, she is at rest again.
But mirth or grief, whatever the mood be,
This all is love—deep, tender, passionate love.

Faustus.
Serpent—vile serpent!

Mephistopheles
(aside).
Ay, and one that stings.

Faustus.
Infamous wretch, begone! name not her name—
Pollute it not—stir not into desire
My half-distracted senses.

Mephistopheles.
What is this?—
She deems herself abandoned—and is right.

Faustus.
Off, viper!

Mephistopheles.
You are raving—I am laughing:
What a hard task it is, forsooth—just think,
And let it cure your spirits,—you are going
Not—as to look at you one might believe—
Not to the gibbet—but to a fond mistress!

Faustus.
What were the joys of Heaven, if with them blest
In her embrace?—could my disquiet be
Stilled on her bosom? could it hush to rest
This drear presentiment of her undoing?
And am I not the outcast—the accurst—
The homeless one, whose wanderings never cease—
The monster of his kind? No rest for me—
No aim—no object; like the stream, that, nurst
With swelling rains, foaming from rock to rock,
Along its course of ruin,
On to the inevitable precipice—
Plunges impatient down the blind abyss,
And violently seeks the desperate shock.
And—by the side of such mad stream—was she,
—A child with a child's feelings;—her low cot
In the green field upon the mountain-slope,
And all that she could wish, or love, or hope,
Her little world, all—all in that poor spot;—
And I—the heaven-detested!—was it not
Enough, that the mad torrent grasped and tore
The rocks, and shivered them to dust, and bore
All, that opposed me, in my downward course
On with me?—Her, too, her—her peace—her joy—
These must I undermine?—these too destroy?
Hell! Hell!—this victim also!—Thy support,
Devil! and the dreadful interval make short!
What must be, be it soon! Let the crush fall
Down on me of her ruin—perish all—
She—I—and these wild thoughts together!

Mephistopheles.