University of Virginia Library

Scene, the Wood on the edge of the Moor.
Marmaduke (alone).
Mar.
Deep, deep and vast, vast beyond human thought,
Yet calm.—I could believe, that there was here
The only quiet heart on earth. In terror,
Remembered terror, there is peace and rest.

Enter Oswald.
Osw.
Ha! my dear Captain.

Mar.
A later meeting, Oswald,
Would have been better timed.

Osw.
Alone, I see;
You have done your duty. I had hopes, which now
I feel that you will justify.

Mar.
I had fears,
From which I have freed myself—but 'tis my wish
To be alone, and therefore we must part.

Osw.
Nay, then—I am mistaken. There's a weakness
About you still; you talk of solitude—
I am your friend.

Mar.
What need of this assurance
At any time? and why given now?

Osw.
Because
You are now in truth my Master; you have taught me
What there is not another living man
Had strength to teach;—and therefore gratitude
Is bold, and would relieve itself by praise.

Mar.
Wherefore press this on me?

Osw.
Because I feel
That you have shown, and by a signal instance,
How they who would be just must seek the rule
By diving for it into their own bosoms.
To-day you have thrown off a tyranny
That lives but in the torpid acquiescence
Of our emasculated souls, the tyranny
Of the world's masters, with the musty rules
By which they uphold their craft from age to age:
You have obeyed the only law that sense
Submits to recognise; the immediate law,
From the clear light of circumstances, flashed
Upon an independent Intellect.
Henceforth new prospects open on your path;
Your faculties should grow with the demand;
I still will be your friend, will cleave to you
Through good and evil, obloquy and scorn,
Oft as they dare to follow on your steps.

Mar.
I would be left alone.

Osw.
(exultingly).
I know your motives!
I am not of the world's presumptuous judges,
Who damn where they can neither see nor feel,
With a hard-hearted ignorance; your struggles
I witness'd, and now hail your victory.

Mar.
Spare me awhile that greeting.

Osw.
It may be,
That some there are, squeamish half-thinking cowards,
Who will turn pale upon you, call you murderer,
And you will walk in solitude among them.
A mighty evil for a strong-built mind!—
Join twenty tapers of unequal height
And light them joined, and you will see the less
How 'twill burn down the taller; and they all
Shall prey upon the tallest. Solitude!—
The Eagle lives in Solitude!

Mar.
Even so,
The Sparrow so on the house-top, and I,
The weakest of God's creatures, stand resolved
To abide the issue of my act, alone.

Osw.
Now would you? and for ever?—My young Friend,
As time advances either we become
The prey or masters of our own past deeds.
Fellowship we must have, willing or no;
And if good Angels fail, slack in their duty,
Substitutes, turn our faces where we may,
Are still forthcoming; some which, though they bear
Ill names, can render no ill services,
In recompense for what themselves required.
So meet extremes in this mysterious world,
And opposites thus melt into each other.

Mar.
Time, since Man first drew breath, has never moved
With such a weight upon his wings as now;
But they will soon be lightened.

Osw.
Ay, look up—
Cast round you your mind's eye, and you will learn
Fortitude is the child of Enterprise:
Great actions move our admiration, chiefly
Because they carry in themselves an earnest
That we can suffer greatly.

Mar.
Very true.

Osw.
Action is transitory—a step, a blow,
The motion of a muscle—this way or that—
'Tis done, and in the after-vacancy
We wonder at ourselves like men betrayed:
Suffering is permanent, obscure and dark,
And shares the nature of infinity.

Mar.
Truth—and I feel it.

Osw.
What! if you had bid
Eternal farewell to unmingled joy
And the light dancing of the thoughtless heart;
It is the toy of fools, and little fit
For such a world as this. The wise abjure
All thoughts whose idle composition lives
In the entire forgetfulness of pain.
—I see I have disturbed you.

Mar.
By no means.

Osw.
Compassion!—pity!—pride can do without them;
And what if you should never know them more!—
He is a puny soul who, feeling pain,
Finds ease because another feels it too.
If e'er I open out this heart of mine
It shall be for a nobler end—to teach
And not to purchase puling sympathy.
—Nay, you are pale.

Mar.
It may be so.

Osw.
Remorse—
It cannot live with thought; think on, think on,
And it will die. What! in this universe,
Where the least things control the greatest, where
The faintest breath that breathes can move a world;
What! feel remorse, where, if a cat had sneezed,
A leaf had fallen, the thing had never been
Whose very shadow gnaws us to the vitals.

Mar.
Now, whither are you wandering? That a man
So used to suit his language to the time,
Should thus so widely differ from himself—
It is most strange.

Osw.
Murder!—what's in the word!—
I have no cases by me ready made
To fit all deeds. Carry him to the Camp!—
A shallow project;—you of late have seen
More deeply, taught us that the institutes
Of Nature, by a cunning usurpation
Banished from human intercourse, exist
Only in our relations to the brutes
That make the fields their dwelling. If a snake
Crawl from beneath our feet we do not ask
A license to destroy him: our good governors
Hedge in the life of every pest and plague
That bears the shape of man; and for what purpose,
But to protect themselves from extirpation?—
This flimsy barrier you have overleaped.

Mar.
My Office is fulfilled—the Man is now
Delivered to the Judge of all things.

Osw.
Dead!

Mar.
I have borne my burthen to its destined end.

Osw.
This instant we'll return to our Companions—
Oh how I long to see their faces again!

Enter Idonea with Pilgrims who continue their journey.
Idon.
(after some time).
What, Marmaduke! now thou art mine for ever.
And Oswald, too! (To Marmaduke.)
On will we to my Father
With the glad tidings which this day hath brought;
We 'll go together, and, such proof received
Of his own rights restored, his gratitude
To God above will make him feel for ours.

Osw.
I interrupt you?

Idon.
Think not so.

Mar.
Idonea,
That I should ever live to see this moment!

Idon.
Forgive me.—Oswald knows it all—he knows,
Each word of that unhappy letter fell
As a blood drop from my heart.

Osw.
'Twas even so.

Mar.
I have much to say, but for whose ear?—not thine.

Idon.
(To Marmaduke).

[Hides her face.
Mar.
Patience—Heaven grant me patience!—
She weeps, she weeps—my brain shall burn for hours
Ere I can shed a tear.

Idon.
I was a woman;
And, balancing the hopes that are the dearest
To womankind with duty to my Father,
I yielded up those precious hopes, which nought
On earth could else have wrested from me;—if erring,
Oh let me be forgiven!

Mar.
I do forgive thee.

Idon.
But take me to your arms—this breast, alas!
It throbs, and you have a heart that does not feel it.

Mar.
(exultingly).
She is innocent.

[He embraces her.
Osw.
(aside).
[Addressing them.

[Exit Oswald.
Idon.
Marmaduke,
This is a happy day. My Father soon
Shall sun himself before his native doors;
The lame, the hungry, will be welcome there.
No more shall he complain of wasted strength,
Of thoughts that fail, and a decaying heart;
His good works will be balm and life to him.

Mar.
This is most strange!—I know not what it was,
But there was something which most plainly said,
That thou wert innocent.

Idon.
How innocent!—
Oh heavens! you 've been deceived.

Mar.
Thou art a Woman,
To bring perdition on the universe.

Idon.
[Smiling affectionately.

[Pointing to the belt on which was suspended Herbert's scrip.
Mar.
Mercy of Heaven!

[Sinks.
Idon.
What ails you!

[Distractedly.
Mar.
The scrip that held his food, and I forgot
To give it back again!

Idon.
What mean your words?

Mar.
I know not what I said—all may be well.

Idon.
That smile hath life in it!

Mar.
This road is perilous;
I will attend you to a Hut that stands
Near the wood's edge—rest there to-night, I pray you:
For me, I have business, as you heard, with Oswald,
But will return to you by break of day.

[Exeunt.