3 Again you show yourselves, you wavering Forms,
4 Revealed, as you once were, to clouded vision.
5 Shall I attempt to hold you fast once more?
6 Heart’s willing still to suffer that illusion?
7 5 You crowd so near! Well then, you shall endure,
8 And rouse me, from your mist and cloud’s confusion:
9 My spirit feels so young again: it’s shaken
10 By magic breezes that your breathings waken.
12 You bring with you the sight of joyful days,
13 10 And many a loved shade rises to the eye:
14 And like some other half-forgotten phrase,
15 First Love returns, and Friendship too is nigh:
16 Pain is renewed, and sorrow: all the ways,
17 Life wanders in its labyrinthine flight,
18 15 Naming the good, those that Fate has robbed
19 Of lovely hours, those slipped from me and lost.
21 They can no longer hear this latest song,
22 Spirits, to whom I gave my early singing:
23 That kindly crowd itself is now long gone,
24 20 Alas, it dies away, that first loud ringing!
25 I bring my verses to the unknown throng,
26 My heart’s made anxious even by their clapping,
27 And those besides delighted by my verse,
28 If they still live, are scattered through the Earth.
30 25 I feel a long and unresolved desire
31 For that serene and solemn land of ghosts:
32 It quivers now, like an Aeolian lyre,
33 My stuttering verse, with its uncertain notes,
34 A shudder takes me: tear on tear, entire,
35 30 The firm heart feels weakened and remote:
36 What I possess seems far away from me,
37 And what is gone becomes reality.
41 (Director, Dramatist, Comedian)
45 You two, who’ve often stood by me,
46 In times of need, when trouble’s breaking,
47 35 Say what success our undertaking
48 Will meet with, then, in Germany?
49 I’d rather like the crowd to enjoy it,
50 Since they live and let live, truly.
51 The stage is set, the boards complete,
52 40 And they await our festivity.
53 They’re seated already, eyebrows raised,
54 Calmly hoping they’ll be amazed.
55 I know how to make the people happy:
56 But I’ve never been so embarrassed: not
57 45 That they’ve been used to the best, you see,
58 Yet they’ve all read such a dreadful lot.
59 How can we make it all seem fresh and new,
60 Weighty, but entertaining too?
61 I’d love to see a joyful crowd, that’s certain,
62 50 When the waves drive them to our place,
63 And with tremendous and repeated surging,
64 Squeeze them through the narrow gate of grace:
65 In the light of day they’re there already,
66 Pushing, till they’ve reached the window,
67 55 As if they’re at the baker’s, starving, nearly
68 Breaking their necks: just for a ticket. Oh!
69 Only poets can work this miracle on men
70 So various: the day is yours, my friend!
74 O, don’t speak to me of that varied crew,
75 60 The sight of whom makes inspiration fade.
76 Veil, from me, the surging multitude,
77 Whose whirling will drives us everyway.
78 No, some heavenly silence lead me to,
79 Where for the poet alone pure joy’s at play:
80 65 Where Love and Friendship too grace our hearts,
81 Created and inspired by heavenly arts.
83 Ah! What springs here from our deepest being,
84 What the shy trembling lips in speaking meant,
85 Now falling awry, and now perhaps succeeding,
86 70 Is swallowed in the fierce Moment’s violence.
87 Often, when the first years are done, unseeing,
88 It appears at last, complete, in deepest sense.
89 What dazzles is a Momentary act:
90 What’s true is left for posterity, intact.
94 75 Don’t speak about posterity to me!
95 If I went on about posterity,
96 Where would you get your worldly fun?
97 Folk want it, and they’ll still have some.
98 The presence of a fine young man
99 80 Is nice, I think, for everyone.
100 Who, comfortably, shares his wit,
101 And to their moods takes no exception:
102 He’ll make himself a greater hit,
103 And win a more secure reception.
104 85 Be brave, and show them what you’ve got,
105 Have Fantasy with all her chorus, yes,
106 Mind, Reason, Passion, Tears, the lot,
107 But don’t you leave out Foolishness.
111 Make sure, above all, plenty’s happening there!
112 90 They come to look, and then they want to stare.
113 Spin endlessly before their faces,
114 So the people gape amazed,
115 You’ve won them by your many paces,
116 You’ll be the man most praised.
117 95 The mass are only moved by things en masse,
118 Each one, himself, will choose the bit he needs:
119 Who brings a lot, brings something that will pass:
120 And everyone goes home contentedly.
121 You’ll give a piece, why then give it them in pieces!
122 100 With such a stew you’re destined for success.
123 Easy to serve, it’s as easy to invent.
124 What use to bring them your complete intent?
125 The Public will soon pick at what you’ve dressed.
129 You don’t see how badly such work will do!
130 105 How little it suits the genuine creator!
131 Already, I see, it’s a principle with you.
132 The finest master is a sloppy worker.
136 Such a reproach leaves me unmoved:
137 The man who seeks to be approved,
138 110 Must stick to the best tools for it,
139 Think, soft wood’s the best to split,
140 And have a look for whom you write!
141 See, this is one that boredom drives,
142 Another’s from some overloaded table,
143 115 Or, worst of all, he’s one arrives,
144 Like most, fresh from the daily paper.
145 They rush here mindlessly, as to a Masque,
146 And curiosity inspires their hurry:
147 The ladies bring themselves, and in their best,
148 120 Come and play their parts and ask no fee.
149 What dream of yours is this, exalted verse?
150 Doesn’t a full house make you happy?
151 Have a good look at your patrons first!
152 One half are coarse, the rest are chilly.
153 125 After the show he hopes for card-play:
154 He hopes for a wild night, and a woman’s kiss.
155 Why then do so many poor fools plague,
156 The sweet Muse, for such a goal as this?
157 I tell you, just give them more and more,
158 130 So you’ll never stray far from the mark,
159 Just seek to confuse them, in the dark:
160 To keep them happy, that’s hard - for sure.
161 And now what’s wrong? Delight or Pain?
165 Go, look for another scribbler by night!
166 135 Shall the poet throw away the highest right,
167 The right of humanity, that Nature gave,
168 Carelessly, so that you might gain!
169 How will he move all hearts again?
170 How will each element be his slave?
171 140 Is that harmony nothing, from his breast unfurled,
172 That draws back into his own heart, the world?
173 When Nature winds the lengthened filaments,
174 Indifferently, on her eternal spindle,
175 When all the tuneless mass of elements,
176 145 In their sullen discord, jar and jangle –
177 Who parts the ever-flowing ranks of creation,
178 Stirs them, so rhythmic measure is assured?
179 Who calls the One to general ordination,
180 Where it may ring in marvellous accord?
181 150 Who lets the storm wind rage with passion,
182 The sunset glow the senses move?
183 Who scatters every lovely springtime blossom
184 Beneath the footsteps of the one we love?
185 Who weaves the slight green wreath of leaves,
186 155 To honour work well done in every art?
187 What makes Olympus sure, joins deities?
188 The power of Man, revealed by the bard.
192 So use it then, all this fine energy,
193 And drive along the work of poetry,
194 160 To show how we are driven in Love’s play.
195 By chance we meet, we feel, we stay,
196 And bit by bit we’re tightly bound:
197 Happiness grows, and then it’s fenced around:
198 We’re all inflamed then comes the sorrowing:
199 165 Before you know it, there’s a novel brewing!
200 Why don’t we give such a piece!
201 Grasp the life of man complete!
202 Everyone lives, though it’s seldom confessed,
203 And wherever you grasp, there’s interest.
204 170 In varied pictures there’s little light,
205 A lot of error, and a gleam of right,
206 So the best of drinks is brewed,
207 So the world’s cheered and renewed.
208 Then see the flower of lovely youth collect,
209 175 To hear your words, and view the offering,
210 And every tender nature will extract
211 A melancholy food from what you bring,
212 They’ll gain now this and that from your art,
213 So each sees what is present in their heart.
214 180 They’re readily moved to weeping or to laughter,
215 They’ll admire your verve, and enjoy the show:
216 What’s finished you can never alter after:
217 Minds still in growth will be grateful, though.
221 So give me back that time again,
222 185 When I was still ‘becoming’,
223 When words gushed like a fountain
224 In new, and endless flowing,
225 Then for me mists veiled the world,
226 In every bud the wonder glowed,
227 190 A thousand flowers I unfurled,
228 That every valley, richly, showed.
229 I had nothing, yet enough:
230 Joy in illusion, thirst for truth.
231 Give every passion, free to move,
232 195 The deepest bliss, filled with pain,
233 The force of hate, the power of love,
234 Oh, give me back my youth again!
238 Youth is what you need, dear friend,
239 When enemies jostle you, of course,
240 200 And girls, filled with desire, bend
241 Their arms around your neck, with force,
242 When the swift-run race’s garland
243 Beckons from the hard-won goal,
244 When from the swirling dance, a man
245 205 Drinks until the night is old.
246 But to play that well-known lyre
247 With courage and with grace,
248 Moved by self-imposed desire,
249 At a sweet wandering pace,
250 210 That is your function, Age,
251 And our respect won’t lessen.
252 Age doesn’t make us childish, as they say,
253 It finds that we’re still children.
257 That’s enough words for the moment,
258 215 Now let me see some action!
259 While you’re handing out the compliments,
260 You should also make things happen.
261 Why talk so much of inspiration?
262 Delay won’t make it flow, you see.
263 220 Since Poetry gave the gift of creation,
264 Take your orders then from Poetry.
265 You know what’s wanted here,
266 We need strong ale to appear:
267 So brew me a barrel right away!
268 225 Tomorrow won’t do what’s undone today,
269 We shouldn’t waste a minute, so
270 Decide what’s possible, and just
271 Grasp it firmly like a hoe,
272 Make sure that you let nothing go,
273 230 And work it about, because you must.
274 On the German stage, you see,
275 Everyone tries out what he can:
276 Don’t fail to show me, I’m your man,
277 Your trap-doors, and your scenery.
278 235 Use heavenly lights, the big and small,
279 Squander stars in any number,
280 Rocky cliffs, and fire, and water,
281 Birds and creatures, use them all.
282 So in our narrow playhouse waken
283 240 The whole wide circle of creation,
284 And stride, deliberately, as well,
285 From Heaven, through the world, to Hell.
289 (God, the Heavenly Hosts, and then Mephistopheles.)
291 (The Three Archangels step forward.)
295 The Sun sings out, in ancient mode,
296 His note among his brother-spheres,
297 245 And ends his pre-determined road,
298 With peals of thunder for our ears.
299 The sight of him gives Angels power,
300 Though none can understand the way:
301 The inconceivable work is ours,
302 250 As bright as on the primal day.
306 And swift, and swift, beyond conceiving,
307 The splendour of the Earth turns round,
308 A Paradisial light is interleaving,
309 With night’s awesome profound.
310 255 The ocean breaks with shining foam,
311 Against the rocky cliffs deep base,
312 And rock and ocean whirl and go,
313 In the spheres’ swift eternal race.
317 And storms are roaring in their race
318 260 From sea to land, and land to sea,
319 Their raging forms a fierce embrace,
320 All round, of deepest energy.
321 The lightning’s devastations blaze
322 Along the thunder-crashes’ way:
323 265 Yet, Lord, your messengers, shall praise
324 The gentle passage of your day.
328 The sight of it gives Angels power
329 Though none can understand the way,
330 And all your noble work is ours,
331 270 As bright as on the primal day.
335 Since, O Lord, you near me once again,
336 To ask how all below is doing now,
337 And usually receive me without pain,
338 You see me too among the vile crowd.
339 275 Forgive me: I can’t speak in noble style,
340 And since I’m still reviled by this whole crew,
341 My pathos would be sure to make you smile,
342 If you had not renounced all laughter too.
343 You’ll get no word of suns and worlds from me.
344 280 How men torment themselves is all I see.
345 The little god of Earth sticks to the same old way,
346 And is as strange as on that very first day.
347 He might appreciate life a little more: he might,
348 If you hadn’t lent him a gleam of Heavenly light:
349 285 He calls it Reason, but only uses it
350 To be more a beast than any beast as yet.
351 He seems to me, saving Your Grace,
352 Like a long-legged grasshopper: through space
353 He’s always flying: he flies and then he springs,
354 290 And in the grass the same old song he sings.
355 If he’d just lie there in the grass it wouldn’t hurt!
356 But he buries his nose in every piece of dirt.
360 Have you nothing else to name?
361 Do you always come here to complain?
362 295 Does nothing ever go right on the Earth?
366 No, Lord! I find, as always, it couldn’t be worse.
367 I’m so involved with Man’s wretched ways,
368 I’ve even stopped plaguing them, myself, these days.
383 300 In truth! He serves you in a peculiar manner.
384 There’s no earthly food or drink at that fool’s dinner.
385 He drives his spirit outwards, far,
386 Half-conscious of its maddened dart:
387 From Heaven demands the brightest star,
388 305 And from the Earth, Joy’s highest art,
389 And all the near and all the far,
390 Fails to release his throbbing heart.
394 Though he’s still confused at how to serve me,
395 I’ll soon lead him to a clearer dawning,
396 310 In the green sapling, can’t the gardener see
397 The flowers and fruit the coming years will bring.
401 What do you wager? I might win him yet!
402 If you give me your permission first,
403 I’ll lead him gently on the road I set.
407 315 As long as he’s alive on Earth,
408 So long as that I won’t forbid it,
409 For while man strives he errs.
413 My thanks: I’ve never willingly seen fit
414 To spend my time amongst the dead,
415 320 I much prefer fresh cheeks instead.
416 To corpses, I close up my house:
417 Or it’s too like a cat with a mouse.
421 Well and good, you’ve said what’s needed!
422 Divert this spirit from his source,
423 You know how to trap him, lead him,
424 325 On your downward course,
425 And when you must, then stand, amazed:
426 A good man, in his darkest yearning,
427 Is still aware of virtue’s ways.
431 330 That’s fine! There’s hardly any waiting.
432 My wager’s more than safe I’m thinking.
433 When I achieve my goal, in winning,
434 You’ll let me triumph with a swelling heart.
435 He’ll eat the dust, and with an art,
436 335 Like the snake my mother, known for sinning.
440 You can appear freely too:
441 Those like you I’ve never hated.
442 Of all the spirits who deny, it’s you,
443 The jester, who’s most lightly weighted.
444 340 Man’s energies all too soon seek the level,
445 He quickly desires unbroken slumber,
446 So I gave him you to join the number,
447 To move, and work, and play the devil.
448 But you the genuine sons of light,
449 345 Enjoy the living beauty bright!
450 Becoming, that works and lives forever,
451 Embrace you in love’s limits dear,
452 And all that may as Appearance waver,
453 Fix firmly with everlasting Idea!
455 (Heaven closes, and the Archangels separate.)
457 Mephistopheles (alone)
459 350 I like to hear the Old Man’s words, from time to time,
460 And take care, when I’m with him, not to spew.
461 It’s very nice when such a great Gentleman,
462 Chats with the devil, in ways so human, too!
466 (In a high-vaulted Gothic chamber, Faust, in a chair at his desk,
469 Ah! Now I’ve done Philosophy,
470 355 I’ve finished Law and Medicine,
471 And sadly even Theology:
472 Taken fierce pains, from end to end.
473 Now here I am, a fool for sure!
474 No wiser than I was before:
475 360 Master, Doctor’s what they call me,
476 And I’ve been ten years, already,
477 Crosswise, arcing, to and fro,
478 Leading my students by the nose,
479 And see that we can know - nothing!
480 365 It almost sets my heart burning.
481 I’m cleverer than all these teachers,
482 Doctors, Masters, scribes, preachers:
483 I’m not plagued by doubt or scruple,
484 Scared by neither Hell nor Devil –
485 370 Instead all Joy is snatched away,
486 What’s worth knowing, I can’t say,
487 I can’t say what I should teach
488 To make men better or convert each.
489 And then I’ve neither goods nor gold,
490 375 No worldly honour, or splendour hold:
491 Not even a dog would play this part!
492 So I’ve given myself to Magic art,
493 To see if, through Spirit powers and lips,
494 I might have all secrets at my fingertips.
495 380 And no longer, with rancid sweat, so,
496 Still have to speak what I cannot know:
497 That I may understand whatever
498 Binds the world’s innermost core together,
499 See all its workings, and its seeds,
500 385 Deal no more in words’ empty reeds.
501 O, may you look, full moon that shines,
502 On my pain for this last time:
503 So many midnights from my desk,
504 I have seen you, keeping watch:
505 390 When over my books and paper,
506 Saddest friend, you appear!
507 Ah! If on the mountain height
508 I might stand in your sweet light,
509 Float with spirits in mountain caves,
510 395 Swim the meadows in twilight’ waves,
511 Free from the smoke of knowledge too,
512 Bathe in your health-giving dew!
513 Alas! In this prison must I stick?
514 This hollow darkened hole of brick,
515 400 Where even the lovely heavenly light
516 Shines through stained glass, dull not bright.
517 Hemmed in, by heaps of books,
518 Piled to the highest vault, and higher,
519 Worm eaten, decked with dust,
520 405 Surrounded by smoke-blackened paper,
521 Glass vials, boxes round me, hurled,
522 Stuffed with Instruments thrown together,
523 Packed with ancestral lumber –
524 This is my world! And what a world!
525 410 And need you ask why my heart
526 Makes such tremors in my breast?
527 Why all my life-energies are
528 Choked by some unknown distress?
529 Smoke and mildew hem me in,
530 415 Instead of living Nature, then,
531 Where God once created Men,
532 Bones of creatures, and dead limbs!
533 Fly! Upwards! Into Space, flung wide!
534 Isn’t this book, with secrets crammed,
535 420 From Nostradamus’ very hand,
536 Enough to be my guide?
537 When I know the starry road,
538 And Nature, you instruct me,
539 My soul’s power, you shall flow,
540 425 As spirits can with spirits be.
541 Useless, this dusty pondering here
542 To read the sacred characters:
543 Soar round me, Spirits, and be near:
544 If you hear me, then answer!
546 (He opens the Book, and sees the Symbol of the Macrocosm)
548 430 Ah! In a moment, what bliss flows
549 Through my senses from this Sign!
550 I feel life’s youthful, holy joy: it glows,
551 Fresh in every nerve and vein of mine.
552 This symbol now that calms my inward raging,
553 435 Perhaps a god deigned to write,
554 Filling my poor heart with delight,
555 And with its mysterious urging
556 Revealing, round me, Nature’s might?
557 Am I a god? All seems so clear to me!
558 440 It seems the deepest works of Nature
559 Lie open to my soul, with purest feature.
560 Now I understand what wise men see:
561 “The world of spirits is not closed:
562 Your senses are: your heart is dead!
563 445 Rise, unwearied, disciple: bathe instead
564 Your earthly breast in the morning’s glow!”
566 (He gazes at the Symbol.)
568 How each to the Whole its selfhood gives,
569 One in another works and lives!
570 How Heavenly forces fall and rise,
571 450 Golden vessels pass each other by!
572 Blessings from their wings disperse:
573 They penetrate from Heaven to Earth,
574 Sounding a harmony through the Universe!
575 Such a picture! Ah, alas! Merely a picture!
576 455 How then can I grasp you endless Nature?
577 Where are your breasts that pour out Life entire,
578 To which the Earth and Heavens cling so,
579 Where withered hearts would drink? You flow
580 You nourish, yet I languish so, in vain desire.
582 (He strikes the book indignantly, and catches sight of the Symbol
583 of the Earth-Spirit.)
585 460 How differently it works on me, this Sign!
586 You, the Spirit of Earth, are nearer:
587 Already, I feel my power is greater,
588 Already, I glow, as with fresh wine.
589 I feel the courage to engage the world,
590 465 Into the pain and joy of Earth be hurled,
591 And though the storm wind is unfurled,
592 Fearless, in the shipwreck’s teeth, be whirled.
593 There’s cloud above me –
594 The Moon hides its light –
596 470 Now it dies! Crimson rays dart
597 Round my head – Horror
598 Flickers from the vault above,
600 475 I feel you float around me,
601 Spirit, I summon to appear, speak to me!
602 Ah! What tears now at the core of me!
603 All my senses reeling
605 480 I feel you draw my whole heart towards you!
606 You must! You must! Though my Life’s lost, too!
608 (He grips the book and speaks the mysterious name of the Spirit. A
609 crimson flame flashes, the Spirit appears in the flame.)
621 Mightily you have drawn me to you,
622 Long, from my sphere, snatched your food,
627 485 Ah! Endure you, I cannot!
631 You beg me to show myself, you implore,
632 You wish to hear my voice, and see my face:
633 The mighty prayer of your soul weighs
634 With me, I am here! – What wretched terror
635 490 Grips you, the Superhuman! Where is your soul’s calling?
636 Where is the heart that made a world inside, enthralling:
637 Carried it, nourished it, swollen with joy, so tremulous,
638 That you too might be a Spirit, one of us?
639 Where are you, Faust, whose ringing voice
640 495 Drew towards me with all your force?
641 Are you he, who, breathing my breath,
642 Trembles in all your life’s depths,
643 A fearful, writhing worm?
647 Shall I fear you: you form of fire?
648 500 I am, I am Faust: I am your peer!
652 In Life’s wave, in action’s storm,
653 I float, up and down,
659 Over Time’s quivering loom intent,
660 Working the Godhead’s living garment.
664 510 You who wander the world, on every hand,
665 Active Spirit, how close to you I feel!
669 You’re like the Spirit that you understand
678 I, the image of the Godhead!
683 Oh, fate! I know that sound – it’s my attendant –
684 My greatest fortune’s ruined!
685 520 In all the fullness of my doing,
686 He must intrude, that arid pedant!
688 (Wagner enters, in gown and nightcap, lamp in hand. Faust turns to
693 Forgive me! But I heard you declaim:
694 Reading, I’m sure, from some Greek tragedy?
695 To profit from that art is my aim,
696 525 Nowadays it goes down splendidly.
697 I’ve often heard it claimed, you see
698 A priest could learn from the Old Comedy.
702 Yes, when the priest’s a comedian already:
703 Which might well seem to be the case.
707 530 Ah! When a man’s so penned in his study,
708 And scarcely sees the world on holidays,
709 And barely through the glass, and far off then,
710 How can he lead men, through persuading them?
714 You can’t, if you can’t feel it, if it never
715 535 Rises from the soul, and sways
716 The heart of every single hearer,
717 With deepest power, in simple ways.
718 You’ll sit forever, gluing things together,
719 Cooking up a stew from other’s scraps,
720 540 Blowing on a miserable fire,
721 Made from your heap of dying ash.
722 Let apes and children praise your art,
723 If their admiration’s to your taste,
724 But you’ll never speak from heart to heart,
725 545 Unless it rises up from your heart’s space.
729 Still, lecturing brings orators success:
730 I feel that I am far behind the rest.
734 Seek to profit honestly!
735 Don’t be an empty tinkling fool!
736 550 Understanding, and true clarity,
737 Express themselves without art’s rule!
738 And if you mean what you say,
739 Why hunt for words, anyway?
740 Yes, your speech, that glitters so,
741 555 Where you gather scraps for Man,
742 Is dead as the mist-filled winds that blow
743 Through the dried-up leaves of autumn!
749 560 Often the studies that I’m working on
750 Make me anxious, in my head and heart.
751 How hard it is to command the means
752 By which a man attains the very source!
753 Before a man has travelled half his course,
754 565 The wretched devil has to die it seems.
758 Parchment then, is that your holy well,
759 From which drink always slakes your thirst?
760 You’ll never truly be refreshed until
761 It pours itself from your own soul, first.
765 570 Pardon me, but it’s a great delight
766 When, moved by the spirit of the ages, we have sight
767 Of how a wiser man has thought, and how
768 Widely at last we’ve spread his word about.
772 Oh yes, as widely as the constellations!
773 575 My friend, all of the ages that are gone
774 Now make up a book with seven seals.
775 The spirit of the ages, that you find,
776 In the end, is the spirit of Humankind:
777 A mirror where all the ages are revealed.
778 580 And so often it’s all a mere misery
779 Something we run away from at first sight.
780 A pile of sweepings, a lumber room, maybe
781 At best, a puppet show, that’s bright
782 With maxims, excellent, pragmatic,
783 585 Suitable when dolls’ mouths wax dramatic!
787 But, the world! Men’s hearts and minds!
788 Something of those, at least, I’d like to know.
792 Yes, what men choose to understand!
793 Who dares to name the child’s real name, though?
794 590 The few who knew what might be learned,
795 Foolish enough to put their whole heart on show,
796 And reveal their feelings to the crowd below,
797 Mankind has always crucified and burned.
798 I beg you, friend, it’s now the dead of night,
799 595 We must break up this conversation.
803 I would have watched with you, if I might
804 Speak with you still, so learned in oration.
805 But tomorrow, on Easter’s first holy day,
806 I’ll ask my several questions, if I may.
807 600 I’ve pursued my work, zealously studying:
808 There’s much I know: yet I’d know everything.
813 That mind alone never loses hope,
814 That keeps to the shallows eternally,
815 Grabs, with eager hand, the wealth it sees,
816 605 And rejoices at the worms for which it gropes!
817 Dare such a human voice echo, too,
818 Where this depth of Spirit surrounds me?
819 Ah yet! For just this once, my thanks to you,
820 You sorriest of all earth’s progeny!
821 610 You’ve torn me away from that despair,
822 That would have soon overwhelmed my senses.
823 Ah! The apparition was so hugely there,
824 It might have truly dwarfed my defences.
825 I, image of the Godhead, already one,
826 615 Who thought the spirit of eternal truth so near,
827 Enjoying the light, both heavenly and clear,
828 Setting to one side the earthbound man:
829 I, more than Angel, a free force,
830 Ready to flow through Nature’s veins,
831 620 And, in creating, enjoy the life divine,
832 Pulsing with ideas: must atone again!
833 A word like thunder swept me away.
834 I dare not measure myself against you.
835 I possessed the power to summon you,
836 625 But not the power to make you stay.
837 In that blissful moment, then
838 I felt myself so small, so great:
839 Cruelly you hurled me back again,
840 Into Man’s uncertain state.
841 630 What shall I learn from? Or leave?
842 Shall I obey that yearning?
843 Ah! Our actions, and not just our grief,
844 Impede us on life’s journey.
845 Some more and more alien substance presses
846 635 On the splendour that the Mind conceives:
847 And when we gain what this world possesses,
848 We say the better world’s dream deceives.
849 The splendid feelings that give us life,
850 Fade among the crowd’s earthly strife.
851 640 If imagination flew with courage, once,
852 And, full of hope, stretched out to eternity,
853 Now a little room is quite enough,
854 When joy on joy has gone, in time’s whirling sea.
855 Care has nested in the heart’s depths,
856 645 Restless, she rocks there, spoiling joy and rest,
857 There she works her secret pain,
858 And wears new masks, ever and again,
859 Appears as wife and child, fields and houses,
860 As water, fire, or knife or poison:
861 650 Still we tremble for what never strikes us,
862 And must still cry for what has not yet gone.
863 I am no god: I feel it all too deeply.
864 I am the worm that writhes in dust: see,
865 As in the dust it lives, and seeks to eat,
866 655 It’s crushed and buried by the passing feet.
867 Is this not dust, what these vaults hold,
868 These hundred shelves that cramp me:
869 This junk, and all the thousand-fold
870 Shapes, of a moth-ridden world, around me?
871 660 Will I find here what I’m lacking else,
872 Shall I read, perhaps, as a thousand books insist,
873 That Mankind everywhere torments itself,
874 So, here and there, some happy man exists?
875 What do you say to me, bare grinning skull?
876 665 Except that once your brain whirled like mine,
877 Sought the clear day, and in the twilight dull,
878 With a breath of truth, went wretchedly awry.
879 For sure, you instruments mock at me,
880 With cylinders and arms, wheels and cogs:
881 670 I stand at the door: and you should be the key:
882 You’re deftly cut, but you undo no locks.
883 Mysterious, even in broad daylight,
884 Nature won’t let her veil be raised:
885 What your spirit can’t bring to sight,
886 675 Won’t by screws and levers be displayed.
887 You, ancient tools, I’ve never used
888 You’re here because my father used you,
889 Ancient scroll, you’ve darkened too,
890 From smoking candles burned above you.
891 680 Better the little I had was squandered,
892 Than sweat here under its puny weight!
893 What from your father you’ve inherited,
894 You must earn again, to own it straight.
895 What’s never used, leaves us overburdened,
896 685 But we can use what the Moment may create!
897 Yet why does that place so draw my sight,
898 Is that flask a magnet for my gaze?
899 Why is there suddenly so sweet a light,
900 As moonlight in a midnight woodland plays?
901 690 I salute you, phial of rare potion,
902 I lift you down, with devotion!
903 In you I worship man’s art and mind,
904 Embodiment of sweet sleeping draughts:
905 Extract, with deadly power, refined,
906 695 Show your master all his craft!
907 I see you, and my pain diminishes,
908 I grasp you, and my struggles grow less,
909 My spirit’s flood tide ebbs, more and more,
910 I seem to be where ocean waters meet,
911 700 A glassy flood gleams around my feet,
912 New day invites me to a newer shore.
913 A fiery chariot sweeps nearer
914 On light wings! I feel ready, free
915 To cut a new path through the ether
916 705 And reach new spheres of pure activity.
917 This greater life, this godlike bliss!
918 You, but a worm, have you earned this?
919 Choosing to turn your back, ah yes,
920 On all Earth’s lovely Sun might promise!
921 710 Let me dare to throw those gates open,
922 That other men go creeping by!
923 Now’s the time, to prove through action
924 Man’s dignity may rise divinely high,
925 Never trembling at that void where,
926 715 Imagination damns itself to pain,
927 Striving towards the passage there,
928 Round whose mouth all Hell’s fires flame:
929 Choose to take that step, happy to go
930 Where danger lies, where Nothingness may flow.
931 720 Come here to me, cup of crystal, clear!
932 Free of your ancient cover now appear,
933 You whom I’ve never, for many a year,
934 Considered! You shone at ancestral feasts,
935 Cheering the over-serious guests:
936 725 One man passing you to another here.
937 It was the drinker’s duty to explain in rhyme
938 The splendour of your many carved designs
939 Or drain it at a draught, and breathe, in time:
940 You remind me of those youthful nights of mine.
941 730 Now I will never pass you to a friend,
942 Or test my wits on your art again.
943 Here’s a juice will stun any man born:
944 It fills your hollow with a browner liquid.
945 I prepared it, now I choose the fluid,
946 735 At last I drink, and with my soul I bid
947 A high and festive greeting to the Dawn!
949 (He puts the cup to his mouth.)
951 (Bells chime and a choir sings.)
956 Joy to the One, of us,
958 740 Ancestral, insidious,
963 What deep humming, what shining sound
964 Strikes the glass from my hand with power?
965 Already, do the hollow bells resound,
966 745 Proclaiming Easter’s festive course? Our
967 Choirs, do you already sing the hymn of consolation,
968 Which once rang out, in deathly night, in Angels’ oration,
969 That certainty of a new testament’s hour?
987 760 Tested, and healed:
992 You heavenly sounds, powerful and mild,
993 Why, in the dust, here, do you seek me?
994 Ring out where tender hearts are reconciled.
995 765 I hear your message, but faith fails me:
996 The marvellous is faith’s dearest child.
997 I don’t attempt to rise to that sphere,
998 From which the message rings:
999 Yet I know from childhood what it sings,
1000 770 And I’m recalled to life once more.
1001 In other times a Heavenly kiss would fall
1002 On me, in the deep Sabbath silence:
1003 The bell notes filled with presentiments,
1004 And a prayer was pleasure’s call:
1005 775 A sweet yearning, beyond my understanding,
1006 Set me wandering through woods and fields,
1007 And while a thousand tears were burning
1008 I felt a world around me come to be.
1009 Love called out the lively games of youth,
1010 780 The joy of spring’s idle holiday:
1011 Memory’s childish feelings, in truth,
1012 Hold me back from the last sombre way.
1013 O, sing on you sweet songs of Heaven!
1014 My tears flow, Earth claims me again!
1018 785 Has the buried one
1020 Raised himself, alone,
1022 Is he, in teeming air,
1023 790 Near to creative bliss:
1024 Ah! In sorrow, we’re
1025 Here on Earth’s breast.
1034 Out of corruption’s sea.
1035 Tear off your bindings
1037 Actively praising him,
1038 Lovingly claiming him,
1039 Fraternally aiding him,
1040 Prayerfully journeying,
1041 805 Joyfully promising,
1042 So is the Master near,
1045 Scene II: In Front Of The City-Gate
1047 (Passers-by of all kinds appear.)
1051 So, then, where are you away to?
1055 We’re away to the Hunting Lodge.
1059 810 We’re off to saunter by the Mill.
1063 Off to the Riverside Inn, I’d guess.
1067 The way there’s not of the best.
1075 I’m with the others, still.
1079 Come to the Castle, you’ll find there
1080 815 The prettiest girls, the finest beer,
1081 And the best place for a fight.
1085 You quarrelsome fool, are you looking
1086 For a third good hiding?
1087 Not for me, that place, I hate its very sight.
1091 820 No, No! I’m going back to town.
1095 We’ll find him by those poplar trees for sure.
1099 Well that’s no joy for me, now:
1100 He’ll walk by your side, of course,
1101 He’ll dance with you on the green.
1102 825 Where’s the fun in that for me, then!
1106 I’m sure he’s not alone, he said
1107 He’d bring along that Curly-head.
1111 My how they strut those bold women!
1112 Brother, come on! We’ll follow them.
1113 830 Fierce tobacco, strong beer,
1114 And a girl in her finery, I prefer.
1116 A Citizen’s Daughter
1118 They are handsome boys there, I see!
1119 But it’s truly a disgrace:
1120 They could have the best of company,
1121 835 And run after a painted face!
1123 Second Student (to the first)
1125 Not so fast! Those two behind,
1126 They walk about so sweetly,
1127 One must be that neighbour of mine:
1128 I could fall for her completely.
1129 840 They pass by with demure paces,
1130 But in the end they’ll go with us.
1134 Brother, no! I shouldn’t bother, anyway.
1135 Quick! Before our quarry gets away.
1136 The hand that wields a broom on Saturday,
1137 845 Gives the best caress, on Sunday too, I say.
1141 No, the new mayor doesn’t suit me!
1142 Now he’s there he’s getting cocky.
1143 And what’s he done to help the town?
1144 Isn’t it getting worse each day?
1145 850 As always it’s us who must obey,
1146 And pay more money down.
1150 Fine gentlemen, and lovely ladies,
1151 Rosy-cheeked and finely dressed,
1152 You could help me, for your aid is
1153 855 Needed: see, ease my distress!
1154 Don’t let me throw my song away,
1155 Only he who gives is happy.
1156 A day when all men celebrate,
1157 Will be a harvest day for me!
1161 860 On holidays there’s nothing I like better
1162 Than talking about war and war’s display,
1163 When in Turkey far away,
1164 People one another batter.
1165 You sit by the window: have a glass:
1166 865 See the bright boats glide down the river,
1167 Then you walk back home and bless
1168 Its peacefulness, and peace, forever.
1172 Neighbour, yes! I like that too:
1173 Let them go and break their heads,
1174 870 Make the mess they often do:
1175 So long as we’re safe in our beds.
1177 An Old Woman (to the citizen’s daughter)
1179 Ah! So pretty! Sweet young blood!
1180 Who wouldn’t gaze at you?
1181 Don’t be so proud! I’m very good!
1182 875 And what you want, I’ll bring you.
1184 The Citizen’s Daughter
1186 Agatha, come away! I must go carefully:
1187 No walking freely with such a witch as her:
1188 For on Saint Andrew’s Night she really
1189 Showed me who’ll be my future Lover.
1193 880 She showed me mine in a crystal ball,
1194 A soldier, with lots of other brave men:
1195 I look around: among them all,
1196 Yet I can never find him.
1200 Castles with towering
1201 885 Ramparts and wall,
1204 We want them to fall!
1205 The action is brave,
1206 890 And splendid the pay!
1211 895 It’s a storm, blowing!
1212 But it’s the life too!
1215 The action is brave,
1216 900 Splendid the pay!
1224 Rivers and streams are freed from ice
1225 By Spring’s sweet enlivening glance.
1226 905 Valleys, green with Hope’s happiness, dance:
1227 Old Winter, in his weakness, sighs,
1228 Withdrawing to the harsh mountains.
1229 From there, retreating, he sends down
1230 Impotent showers of hail that show
1231 910 In stripes across the quickening ground.
1232 But the sun allows nothing white below,
1233 Change and growth are everywhere,
1234 He enlivens all with his colours there,
1235 And lacking flowers of the fields outspread,
1236 915 He takes these gaudy people instead.
1237 Turn round, and from this mountain height,
1238 Look down, where the town’s in sight.
1239 That cavernous, dark gate,
1240 The colourful crowd penetrate,
1241 920 All will take the sun today,
1242 The Risen Lord they’ll celebrate,
1243 And feel they are resurrected,
1244 From low houses, dully made,
1245 From work, where they’re constricted,
1246 925 From the roofs’ and gables’ weight,
1247 From the crush of narrow streets,
1248 From the churches’ solemn night
1249 They’re all brought to the light.
1250 Look now: see! The crowds, their feet
1251 930 Crushing the gardens and meadows,
1252 While on the river a cheerful fleet
1253 Of little boats, everywhere it flows.
1254 And over-laden, ready to sink,
1255 The last barge takes to the stream.
1256 From far off on the mountain’s brink,
1257 All the bright clothing gleams.
1258 I hear the noise from the village risen,
1259 Here is the people’s true Heaven,
1260 High and low shout happily:
1261 940 Here I am Man: here, dare to be!
1265 Doctor, to take a walk with you,
1266 Is an honour and a prize:
1267 Alone I’d have no business here, true,
1268 Since everything that’s coarse I despise.
1269 945 Shrieking, fiddlers, skittles flying,
1270 To me it’s all a hateful noise:
1271 They rush about possessed, crying,
1272 And call it singing: and call it joy.
1274 (Farm-workers under the lime tree. Dance and Song.)
1276 The shepherd for the dance, had on
1277 950 His gaudy jacket, wreath, and ribbon,
1279 Under the linden-tree, already,
1280 Everyone was dancing madly.
1283 So goes the fiddle-bow.
1285 In his haste, in a whirl,
1286 He stumbled against a girl,
1287 With his elbow flailing:
1288 960 Lively, she turned, and said:
1289 Mind out, you wooden-head!
1292 Just watch where you’re sailing!
1294 965 Fast around the circle bright,
1295 They danced to left and right,
1296 Skirts and jackets flying.
1297 They grew red: they grew warm,
1298 They rested, panting, arm on arm
1301 And hip, and elbow, lying.
1303 Don’t be so familiar then!
1304 That’s how many a lying man,
1305 975 Cheated his wife so!
1306 But he soon tempted her aside,
1307 And from the linden echoed wide:
1310 980 So goes the fiddle-bow.
1314 Doctor, it’s good of you today
1315 Not to shun the crowd,
1316 So that among the folk, at play,
1317 The learned man walks about.
1318 985 Then have some from the finest jug
1319 That we’ve filled with fresh ale first,
1320 I offer it now and wish it would,
1321 Not only quench your thirst:
1322 But the count of drops it holds
1323 990 May it exceed your hours, all told.
1327 I’ll take some of your foaming drink,
1328 And offer you all, health and thanks.
1330 (The people gather round him in a circle.)
1334 Truly, it’s a thing well done:
1335 You’re here on our day of happiness,
1336 Since in evil times now gone,
1337 You’ve eased our distress!
1338 Many a man stands here alive,
1339 Whom your father, at the last,
1340 Snatched from the fever’s rage,
1341 1000 While the plague went past.
1342 And you, only a young man, went,
1343 Into every house of sickness, then,
1344 Though many a corpse was carried forth,
1345 You walked safely out again.
1346 1005 Many a hard trial you withstood,
1347 A Helper helped by the Helper above.
1351 Health to the man who’s proven true,
1352 Long may he help me and you!
1356 To Him above bow down instead,
1357 1010 Who teaches help, and sends his aid.
1359 (He walks off, with Wagner.)
1363 How it must feel, O man of genius,
1364 To be respected by the crowd!
1365 O happy he whose gifts endow
1366 Him with such advantages!
1367 1015 The father shows you to his son, now
1368 Each one asks and pushes near,
1369 The fiddle halts, and the dancers there:
1370 You pass: in ranks they stop to see,
1371 And throw their caps high in the air:
1372 1020 A little more and they’d bend the knee,
1373 As if what they worshipped was holy.
1377 Climb these few steps to that stone,
1378 Here we’ll rest from our wandering.
1379 Here I’ve sat often, thoughtful and alone,
1380 1025 Tormenting myself with prayer and fasting.
1381 Rich in hope, and firm of faith,
1382 Wringing my hands, with sighs even,
1383 Tears, to force the end of plague
1384 From the very God of Heaven.
1385 1030 The crowd’s approval now’s like scorn.
1386 O if you could read within me
1387 How little the father and the son
1388 Deserve a fraction of their glory.
1389 My father was a gloomy, honourable man,
1390 1035 Who pondered Nature and the heavenly spheres,
1391 Honestly, in his own fashion,
1392 With eccentric studies it appears:
1393 He, in his adepts’ company,
1394 Locked in his dark workshop, forever
1395 1040 Tried with endless recipes,
1396 To make things opposite flow together.
1397 The fiery Lion, a daring suitor,
1398 Wed the Lily, in a lukewarm bath, there
1399 In a fiery flame, both of them were
1400 1045 Strained from one bride-bed into another,
1401 Until the young Queen was descried,
1402 In a mix of colours, in the glass:
1403 There was the medicine: the patient died.
1404 And who recovered? No one asked.
1405 1050 So we roamed, with our hellish pills,
1406 Among the valleys and the hills,
1407 Worse than the pestilence itself we were.
1408 I’ve poisoned a thousand: that’s quite clear:
1409 And now from the withered old must hear
1410 1055 How men praise a shameless murderer.
1414 How can you grieve at that!
1415 Isn’t it enough for an honest man
1416 To exercise the skill he has,
1417 Carefully, precisely, as given?
1418 1060 Honour your father as a youth,
1419 And receive his teaching in your soul,
1420 As a man, then, add to scientific truth,
1421 So your son can achieve a higher goal.
1425 O happy the man who still can hope
1426 1065 Though drowned in a sea of error!
1427 Man needs the things he doesn’t know,
1428 What he knows is useless, forever.
1429 But don’t let such despondency
1430 Spoil the deep goodness of the hour!
1431 1070 In the evening glow, we see
1432 The houses gleaming, green-embowered.
1433 Mild it retreats, the day that’s left,
1434 It slips away to claim new being.
1435 Ah, that no wing from earth can lift
1436 1075 Me, closer and closer to it, striving!
1437 I’d see, in eternal evening’s light,
1438 The silent Earth beneath my feet, forever,
1439 The heights on fire, each valley quiet
1440 While silver streams flow to a golden river.
1441 1080 The wild peaks with their deep clefts,
1442 Would cease to bar my godlike way,
1443 Already the sea with its warm depths,
1444 Opens to my astonished gaze.
1445 At last the weary god sinks down to night:
1446 1085 But in me a newer yearning wakes,
1447 I hasten on, drinking his endless light:
1448 The dark behind me: and ahead the day.
1449 Heaven above me: and the waves below,
1450 A lovely dream, although it vanishes.
1451 1090 Ah! Wings of the mind, so weightless
1452 No bodily wings could ever be so.
1453 Yet it’s natural in every spirit, too,
1454 That feeling drives us, up and on,
1455 When over us, lost in the vault of blue,
1456 1095 The lark sings his piercing song,
1457 When over the steep pine-filled peaks,
1458 The eagle widely soars,
1459 And across the plains and seas,
1460 The cranes seek their home shores.
1464 1100 I’ve often had strange moments, I know,
1465 But I’ve never felt yearnings quite like those:
1466 The joys of woods and fields soon fade
1467 I wouldn’t ask the birds for wings: indeed,
1468 How differently the mind’s raptures lead
1469 1105 Us on, from book to book, and page to page!
1470 Then winter nights are beautiful, and sweet,
1471 A blissful warmth steals through your limbs, too
1472 When you’ve unrolled some noble text, complete,
1473 Oh, how heaven’s light descends on you!
1477 1110 You only feel the one yearning at best,
1478 Oh, never seek to know the other!
1479 Two souls, alas, exist in my breast,
1480 One separated from another:
1481 One, with its crude love of life, just
1482 1115 Clings to the world, tenaciously, grips tight,
1483 The other soars powerfully above the dust,
1484 Into the far ancestral height.
1485 Oh, let the spirits of the air,
1486 Between the heavens and Earth, weaving,
1487 1120 Descend through the golden atmosphere,
1488 And lead me on to new and varied being!
1489 Yes, if a magic cloak were mine, that
1490 Would carry me off to foreign lands,
1491 Not for the costliest garment in my hands,
1492 1125 For the mantle of a king, would I resign it!
1496 Don’t call to that familiar crowd,
1497 Streaming in misty circles, spreading,
1498 Preparing a thousand dangers now,
1499 On every side, for human beings.
1500 1130 The North winds’ sharp teeth penetrate,
1501 Down here, and spit you with their fangs:
1502 Then the East’s drying winds are at the gate,
1503 To feed themselves on your lungs.
1504 If, from the South, the desert sends them,
1505 1135 And fire on fire burns on your brow,
1506 The West brings a swarm to quench them,
1507 And you and field and meadow drown.
1508 They hear us, while they’re harming us,
1509 Hear us, while they are betraying:
1510 1140 They make out they’re from heaven above,
1511 And lisp like angels when they’re lying.
1512 Let’s go on! The world has darkened,
1513 The air is cool: the mists descend!
1514 Man values his own house at night.
1515 1145 What is it occupies your sight?
1516 What troubles you so, in the evening?
1520 Through corn and stubble, see that black dog running?
1524 I saw him long ago: he seems a wretched thing.
1528 Look at him closely! What do you make of him?
1532 1150 A dog that, in the way they do,
1533 Sniffs around to find his master.
1537 See how he winds in wide spirals too,
1538 Round us here, yet always coming nearer?
1539 And if I’m right, I see a swirl of fire
1540 1155 Twisting about, behind his track.
1544 Perhaps your eyesight proves a liar,
1545 I only see a dog, that’s black.
1549 It seems to me that with a subtle magic,
1550 He winds a fatal knot around our feet.
1554 1160 I see his timid and uncertain antics,
1555 It’s strangers, not his master, whom he meets.
1559 The circle narrows: now he’s here!
1563 You see a dog, there’s no spectre near!
1564 He barks uncertainly, lies down and crawls,
1565 1165 Wags his tail. Dogs’ habits, after all.
1569 Come on! Here, now! Here, to me!
1573 He’s a dogged hound, I agree.
1574 Stand still and he holds his ground:
1575 Talk to him, he dances round:
1576 1170 What you’ve lost, he’ll bring to you:
1577 Retrieve a stick from the water, too.
1581 You’re right: and I see nothing
1582 Like a Spirit there, it’s only training.
1586 A wise man finds agreeable,
1587 1175 A dog that’s learnt its lesson well.
1588 Yes, he deserves all your favour,
1589 Among the students, the true scholar!
1591 (They enter the City gate.)
1593 Scene III: The Study
1595 (Faust enters, with the dog.)
1599 Fields and meadows now I’ve left
1600 Clothed in deepest night,
1601 1180 Full of presentiments, a holy dread
1602 Wakes the better soul in me to light.
1603 Wild desires no longer stir
1604 At every restless act of mine:
1605 Love for Humanity is here,
1606 1185 And here is Love Divine.
1608 Quiet, dog! Stop running to and fro!
1609 Why are you snuffling at the door?
1610 Lie down now, behind the stove,
1611 There’s my best cushion on the floor.
1612 1190 Since you amused us running, leaping,
1613 Out on the mountainside, with zest,
1614 Now I take you into my keeping,
1615 A welcome, and a silent guest.
1617 Ah, when in our narrow room,
1618 1195 The friendly lamp glows on the shelf,
1619 Brightness burns in our inner gloom,
1620 In the Heart, that knows itself.
1621 Reason speaks with insistence,
1622 And Hope once more appears,
1623 1200 We see the River of Existence,
1624 Ah, the founts of Life, are near.
1626 Don’t growl, dog! With this holy sound
1627 Which I, with all my soul, embrace,
1628 Your bestial noise seems out of place.
1629 1205 Men usually scorn the things, I’ve found,
1630 That, by them, can’t be understood,
1631 Grumbling at beauty, and the good,
1632 That to them seems wearisome:
1633 Can’t a dog, then, snarl like them?
1635 1210 Oh, yet now I can feel no contentment
1636 Flow through me, despite my best intent.
1637 Why must the stream fail so quickly,
1638 And once again leave us thirsty?
1639 I’ve long experience of it, yet I think
1640 1215 I could supply what’s missing, easily:
1641 We learn to value what’s beyond the earthly,
1642 We yearn to reach revelation’s brink,
1643 That’s nowhere nobler or more excellent
1644 Than where it burns in the New Testament.
1645 1220 I yearn to render the first version,
1646 With true feeling, once and for all,
1647 Translate the sacred original
1648 Into my beloved German.
1650 (He opens the volume, and begins.)
1652 It’s written here: ‘In the Beginning was the Word!’
1653 1225 Here I stick already! Who can help me? It’s absurd,
1654 Impossible, for me to rate the word so highly
1655 I must try to say it differently
1656 If I’m truly inspired by the Spirit. I find
1657 I’ve written here: ‘In the Beginning was the Mind’.
1658 1230 Let me consider that first sentence,
1659 So my pen won’t run on in advance!
1660 Is it Mind that works and creates what’s ours?
1661 It should say: ‘In the beginning was the Power!’
1662 Yet even while I write the words down,
1663 1235 I’m warned: I’m no closer with these I’ve found.
1664 The Spirit helps me! I have it now, intact.
1665 And firmly write: ‘In the Beginning was the Act!’
1667 If I’m to share my room with you,
1668 Dog, you can stop howling too:
1669 1240 Stop your yapping!
1670 A fellow who’s always snapping,
1671 I can’t allow too near me.
1673 Must leave the other free.
1674 1245 I’ve no more hospitality to show,
1675 The door’s open, you can go.
1676 But what’s this I see!
1677 Can this happen naturally?
1678 Is it a phantom or is it real?
1679 1250 The dog’s growing big and tall.
1680 He rises powerfully,
1681 It’s no doglike shape I see!
1682 What a spectre I brought home!
1683 Like a hippo in the room,
1684 1255 With fiery eyes, and fearful jaws.
1685 Oh! Now, what you are, I’m sure!
1686 The Key of Solomon is good
1687 For conjuring your half-hellish brood.
1689 Spirits (In the corridor.)
1691 Something’s trapped inside!
1692 1260 Don’t follow it: stay outside!
1693 Like a fox in a snare
1694 An old lynx from hell trembles there.
1695 Be careful what you’re about!
1696 Float here: float there,
1697 1265 Under and over,
1698 And he’ll work his way out.
1699 If you know how to help him,
1700 Don’t let yourself fail him!
1701 Since it’s all done for sure,
1702 1270 Just for your pleasure.
1706 First speak the Words of the Four
1707 To encounter the creature.
1708 Salamander, be glowing,
1710 1275 Sylph, disappear,
1716 1280 And properties,
1722 1285 Rush together in foam,
1724 Shine with meteor-gleam,
1726 Bring help to the home,
1727 1290 Incubus! Incubus!
1728 Go before and end it thus!
1731 Show in the creature.
1732 He lies there quietly grinning at me:
1733 1295 I’ve not stirred him enough it seems.
1735 I’ll press him hard now.
1736 My good fellow, are you
1737 Exiled from Hell’s crew?
1738 1300 Witness the Symbol
1739 Before which they bow,
1740 The dark crowd there!
1741 Now it swells, with its bristling hair.
1743 1305 Can you know what you’re seeing?
1745 With name unexpressed,
1746 Poured through Heaven,
1747 Pierced without redress?
1749 1310 Spellbound, behind the stove,
1751 It fills the room, completely,
1752 It will vanish like mist, I can see.
1753 Don’t rise to the ceiling!
1754 1315 Lie down at your master’s feet!
1755 You see I don’t threaten you lightly.
1756 I’ll sting you with fire that’s holy!
1757 Don’t wait for the bright
1758 Triple glowing Light!
1762 (As the mist clears, Mephistopheles steps from behind the stove,
1763 dressed as a wandering Scholar.)
1767 Why such alarms? What command would my lord impart?
1771 This was the dog’s core!
1772 A wandering scholar? The fact makes me smile.
1776 1325 I bow to the learned lord!
1777 You certainly made me sweat, in style.
1786 For one who so disdains the Word,
1787 Is so distant from appearance: one
1788 1330 Whom only the vital depths have stirred.
1792 We usually gather from your names
1793 The nature of you gentlemen: it’s plain
1794 What you are, we all too clearly recognise
1795 One who’s called Liar, Ruin, Lord of the Flies.
1796 1335 Well, what are you then?
1800 Part of the Power that would
1801 Always wish Evil, and always works the Good.
1805 What meaning to these riddling words applies?
1809 I am the spirit, ever, that denies!
1810 And rightly so: since everything created,
1811 1340 In turn deserves to be annihilated:
1812 Better if nothing came to be.
1813 So all that you call Sin, you see,
1814 Destruction, in short, what you’ve meant
1815 By Evil is my true element.
1819 You call yourself a part, yet seem complete to me?
1823 I’m speaking the truth to you, and modestly.
1824 Even if Man’s accustomed to take
1825 His small world for the Whole, that’s his mistake:
1826 I’m part of the part, that once was - everything,
1827 1350 Part of the darkness, from which Light, issuing,
1828 Proud Light, emergent, disputed the highest place
1829 With its mother Night, the bounds of Space,
1830 And yet won nothing, however hard it tried,
1831 Still stuck to Bodily Things, and so denied.
1832 1355 It flows from bodies, which it beautifies,
1833 And bodies block its way:
1834 I hope the day’s not far away
1835 When it, along with all these bodies, dies.
1839 Now I see the plan you follow!
1840 1360 You can’t destroy it all, and so
1841 You’re working on a smaller scale.
1845 And frankly it’s a sorry tale.
1846 What’s set against the Nothingness,
1847 The Something, World’s clumsiness,
1848 1365 Despite everything I’ve tried,
1849 Won’t become a nothing: though I’d
1850 Storms, quakes, and fires on every hand,
1851 It deigned to stay as sea and land!
1852 And those Men and creatures, all the damned,
1853 1370 It’s no use my owning any of that crew:
1854 How many I’ve already done with too!
1855 Yet new fresh blood is always going round.
1856 So it goes on, men make me furious!
1857 With water, earth and air, of course,
1858 1375 A thousand buds unfurl
1859 In wet and dry, warm and cold!
1860 And if I hadn’t kept back fire of old,
1861 I’d have nothing left at all.
1865 So you set the Devil’s fist
1866 1380 That vainly clenches itself,
1867 Against the eternally active,
1868 Wholesome, creative force!
1869 Strange son of Chaos, start
1870 On something else instead!
1874 1385 Truly I’ll think about it: more
1875 Next time, on that head!
1876 Might I be allowed to go?
1880 I see no reason for you to ask it.
1881 Since I’ve learnt to know you now,
1882 1390 When you wish: then make a visit.
1883 There’s the door, here’s the window,
1884 And, of course, there’s the chimney.
1888 I must confess, I’m prevented though
1889 By a little thing that hinders me,
1890 1395 The Druid’s-foot on your doorsill –
1894 The Pentagram gives you pain?
1895 Then tell me, you Son of Hell,
1896 If that’s the case, how did you gain
1897 Entry? Are spirits like you cheated?
1901 1400 Look carefully! It’s not completed:
1902 One angle, if you inspect it closely
1903 Has, as you see, been left a little open.
1907 Just by chance as it happens!
1908 And left you prisoner to me?
1909 1405 Success created by approximation!
1913 The dog saw nothing, in his animation,
1914 Now the affair seems inside out,
1915 The Devil can’t get out of the house.
1919 Why not try the window then?
1923 1410 To devils and ghosts the same laws appertain:
1924 The same way they enter in, they must go out.
1925 In the first we’re free, in the second slaves to the act.
1929 So you still have laws in Hell, in fact?
1930 That’s good, since it allows a pact,
1931 1415 And one with you gentlemen truly binds?
1935 What’s promised you’ll enjoy, and find,
1936 There’s nothing mean that we enact.
1937 But it can’t be done so fast,
1938 First we’ll have to talk it through,
1939 1420 Yet, urgently, I beg of you
1940 Let me go my way at last.
1945 Tell me some good news first.
1949 I’ll soon be back, just let me go:
1950 1425 Then you can ask me what you wish.
1954 I didn’t place you here, tonight.
1955 You trapped yourself in the lime.
1956 Who snares the devil, holds him tight!
1957 He won’t be caught like that a second time.
1961 1430 I’m willing, if you so wish,
1962 To stay here, in your company:
1963 So long as we pass the time, and I insist,
1964 On arts of mine, exclusively.
1968 Gladly, you’re free to present
1969 1435 Them, as long as they’re all pleasant.
1973 My friend you’ll win more
1974 For your senses, in an hour,
1975 Than in a whole year’s monotony.
1976 What the tender spirits sing,
1977 1440 The lovely pictures that they bring,
1978 Are no empty wizardry.
1979 First your sense of smell’s invited,
1980 Then your palate is delighted,
1981 And then your touch, you see.
1982 1445 Now, I need no preparation,
1983 We’re all here, so let’s begin!
1990 1450 The friendliest blue
1991 Of aether, down here.
1998 In lovely confusion,
1999 Swaying and bending,
2001 Affectionate yearning,
2003 Their garments flowing
2004 With fluttering ribbons,
2005 1465 Cover the gardens,
2007 Where with each other
2008 In deep conversation
2010 1470 Leaves on leaves!
2013 Crushed in a stream,
2015 1475 Crushed to fountain,
2018 Through rocks divine,
2019 Leaving the heights,
2020 1480 Spreading beneath,
2023 Round the green hills.
2024 And the wings still,
2025 1485 Blissfully drunk,
2027 Fly to the brightness,
2028 Towards the islands,
2030 1490 Magically raised:
2032 The choir of joy near,
2034 See how they dance now,
2037 Some of them climbing
2040 1500 Over the ocean,
2043 All towards distant,
2044 Love of the stars, and
2045 1505 Approval’s bliss.
2049 He’s asleep! Enough, you delicate children of air!
2050 You’ve sung to him faithfully, I declare!
2051 I’m in your debt for all this.
2052 He’s not yet the man to hold devils fast!
2053 1510 Spellbind him with dream-forms, cast
2054 Him deep into illusions’ sea:
2055 Now, for the magic sill I must pass,
2056 I could use rat’s teeth: no need for me
2057 To conjure up a lengthier spell,
2058 1515 One’s rustling here that will do well.
2060 The Lord of Rats and Mice,
2061 Of Flies, Frogs, Bugs and Lice,
2062 Summons you to venture here,
2063 And gnaw the threshold where
2064 1520 He stains it with a little oil -
2065 You’ve hopped, already, to your toil!
2066 Now set to work! The fatal point,
2067 Is at the edge, it’s on the front.
2068 One more bite, then it’s complete –
2069 1525 Now Faust, dream deeply, till we meet.
2073 Am I cheated then, once again?
2074 Does the Spirit-Realm’s deep yearning fade:
2075 So a mere dream has conjured up the devil,
2076 And only a dog, it was, that ran away?
2080 (Faust, Mephistopheles)
2084 1530 A knock? Enter! Who’s plaguing me again?
2096 Three times you must say it, then.
2104 Ah, now, you please me.
2105 I hope we’ll get along together:
2106 To drive away the gloomy weather,
2107 1535 I’m dressed like young nobility,
2108 In a scarlet gold-trimmed coat,
2109 In a little silk-lined cloak,
2110 A cockerel feather in my hat,
2111 With a long, pointed sword,
2112 1540 And I advise you, at that,
2113 To do as I do, in a word:
2114 So that, footloose, fancy free,
2115 You can experience Life, with me.
2119 This life of earth, its narrowness,
2120 1545 Pains me, however I’m turned out,
2121 I’m too old to play about,
2122 Too young, still, to be passionless.
2123 What can the world bring me again?
2124 Abstain! You shall! You must! Abstain!
2125 1550 That’s the eternal song
2126 That in our ears, forever, rings
2127 The one, that, our whole life long,
2128 Every hour, hoarsely, sings.
2129 I wake in terror with the dawn,
2130 1555 I cry, the bitterest tears, to see
2131 Day grant no wish of mine, not one
2132 As it passes by on its journey.
2133 Even presentiments of joy
2134 Ebb, in wilful depreciation:
2135 1560 A thousand grimaces life employs
2136 To hinder me in creation.
2137 Then when night descends I must
2138 Stretch out, worried, on my bed:
2139 What comes to me is never rest,
2140 1565 But some wild dream instead.
2141 The God that lives inside my heart,
2142 Can rouse my innermost seeing:
2143 The one enthroned beyond my art,
2144 Can’t stir external being:
2145 1570 And so existence is a burden: sated,
2146 Death’s desired, and Life is hated.
2150 Yet Death’s a guest who’s visit’s never wholly celebrated.
2154 Happy the man whom victory enhances,
2155 Whose brow the bloodstained laurel warms,
2156 1575 Who, after the swift whirling dances,
2157 Finds himself in some girl’s arms!
2158 If only, in my joy, then, I’d sunk down
2159 Before that enrapturing Spirit power!
2163 Yet someone, from a certain brown
2164 1580 Liquid, drank not a drop, at midnight hour.
2168 It seems that you delight in spying.
2172 I know a lot: and yet I’m not all-knowing.
2176 When sweet familiar tones drew me,
2177 Away from the tormenting crowd,
2178 1585 Then my other childhood feelings
2179 Better times echoed, and allowed.
2180 So I curse whatever snares the soul,
2181 In its magical, enticing arms,
2182 Banishes it to this mournful hole,
2183 1590 With dazzling, seductive charms!
2184 Cursed be those high Opinions first,
2185 With which the mind entraps itself!
2186 Then glittering Appearance curse,
2187 In which the senses lose themselves!
2188 1595 Curse what deceives us in our dreaming,
2189 With thoughts of everlasting fame!
2190 Curse the flattery of ‘possessing’
2191 Wife and child, lands and name!
2192 Curse Mammon, when he drives us
2193 1600 To bold acts to win our treasure:
2194 Or straightens out our pillows
2195 For us to idle at our leisure!
2196 Curse the sweet juice of the grape!
2197 Curse the highest favours Love lets fall!
2198 1605 Cursed be Hope! Cursed be Faith,
2199 And cursed be Patience most of all!
2201 Choir of Spirits (Unseen)
2204 You’ve destroyed it,
2205 The beautiful world,
2206 1610 With a powerful fist:
2207 It tumbles, it’s hurled
2208 To ruin! A demigod crushed it!
2210 Fragments into the void,
2212 Lament the Beauty that’s gone.
2214 For all of Earth’s sons,
2216 1620 Build it again,
2217 Build, in your heart!
2220 With senses washed clean,
2221 1625 And sound, then,
2226 They’re little, but fine,
2227 These attendants of mine.
2228 Precocious advice they give, listen,
2229 1630 Regarding both action, and passion!
2230 Into the World outside,
2231 From Solitude, that’s dried
2232 Your sap and senses,
2234 1635 Stop playing with grief,
2235 That feeds, a vulture, on your breast,
2236 The worst society, you’ll find, will prompt belief,
2237 That you’re a Man among the rest.
2239 1640 To shove you into the mass.
2240 Among ‘the greats’, I’m second-class:
2241 But if you, in my company,
2242 Your path through life would wend,
2243 I’ll willingly condescend
2244 1645 To serve you, as we go.
2245 I’m your man, and so,
2246 If it suits you of course,
2247 I’m your slave: I’m yours!
2251 And what must I do in exchange?
2255 1650 There’s lots of time: you’ve got the gist.
2259 No, no! The Devil is an egotist,
2260 Does nothing lightly, or in God’s name,
2261 To help another, so I insist,
2262 Speak your demands out loud,
2263 1655 Such servants are risks, in a house.
2267 I’ll be your servant here, and I’ll
2268 Not stop or rest, at your decree:
2269 When we’re together, on the other side,
2270 You’ll do the same for me.
2274 1660 The ‘other side’ concerns me less:
2275 Shatter this world, in pieces,
2276 The other one can take its place,
2277 The root of my joy’s on this Earth,
2278 And this Sun lights my sorrow:
2279 1665 If I must part from them tomorrow,
2280 What can or will be, that I’ll face.
2281 I’ll hear no more of it, of whether
2282 In that future, men both hate and love,
2283 Or whether in those spheres, forever,
2284 1670 We’re given a below and an above.
2288 In that case, you can venture all.
2289 Commit yourself: today, you shall
2290 View my arts with joy: I mean
2291 To show you what no man has seen.
2295 1675 Poor devil what can you give? When has ever
2296 A human spirit, in its highest endeavour,
2297 Been understood by such a one as you?
2298 You have a never-satiating food,
2299 You have your restless gold, a slew
2300 1680 Of quicksilver, melting in the hand,
2301 Games whose prize no man can land,
2302 A girl, who while she’s on my arm,
2303 Snares a neighbour, with her eyes:
2304 And Honour’s fine and godlike charm,
2305 1685 That, like a meteor, dies?
2306 Show me fruits then that rot, before they’re ready.
2307 And trees grown green again, each day, too!
2311 Such commands don’t frighten me:
2312 With such treasures I can truly serve you.
2313 1690 Still, my good friend, a time may come,
2314 When one prefers to eat what’s good in peace.
2318 When I lie quiet in bed, at ease.
2319 Then let my time be done!
2320 If you fool me, with flatteries,
2321 1695 Till my own self’s a joy to me,
2322 If you snare me with luxury –
2323 Let that be the last day I see!
2331 When, to the Moment then, I say:
2332 1700 ‘Ah, stay a while! You are so lovely!’
2333 Then you can grasp me: then you may,
2334 Then, to my ruin, I’ll go gladly!
2335 Then they can ring the passing bell,
2336 Then from your service you are free,
2337 1705 The clocks may halt, the hands be still,
2338 And time be past and done, for me!
2342 Consider well, we’ll not forget.
2346 You have your rights, complete:
2347 I never over-estimate my powers.
2348 1710 I’ll be a slave, in defeat:
2349 Why ask whose slave or yours?
2353 Today, likewise, at the Doctors’ Feast
2354 I’ll do my duty as your servant.
2355 One thing, though! – Re: life and death, I want
2356 1715 A few lines from you, at the least.
2360 You pedant, you demand it now in writing?
2361 You still won’t take Man’s word for anything?
2362 It’s not enough that the things I say,
2363 Will always accord with my future?
2364 1720 The world never ceases to wear away,
2365 And shall a promise bind me, then, forever?
2366 Yet that’s the illusion in our minds,
2367 And who then would be free of it?
2368 Happy the man, who pure truth finds,
2369 1725 And who’ll never deign to sacrifice it!
2370 Still a document, written and signed,
2371 That’s a ghost makes all men fear it.
2372 The word is already dying in the pen,
2373 And wax and leather hold the power then.
2374 1730 What do you want from me base spirit?
2375 Will iron: marble: parchment: paper do it?
2376 Shall I write with stylus, pen or chisel?
2377 I’ll leave the whole decision up to you.
2381 Why launch into oratory too?
2382 1735 Hot-tempered: you exaggerate as well.
2383 Any bit of paper’s just as good.
2384 And you can sign it with a drop of blood.
2388 If it will satisfy you, and it should,
2389 Then let’s complete the farce in full.
2393 1740 Blood is a quite special fluid.
2397 Have no fear I’ll break this pact!
2398 The extreme I can promise you: it is
2399 All the power my efforts can extract.
2400 I’ve puffed myself up so highly
2401 1745 I belong in your ranks now.
2402 The mighty Spirit scorns me
2403 And Nature shuts me out.
2404 The thread of thought has turned to dust,
2405 Knowledge fills me with disgust.
2406 1750 Let the depths of sensuality
2407 Satisfy my burning passion!
2408 And, its impenetrable mask on,
2409 Let every marvel be prepared for me!
2410 Let’s plunge into time’s torrent,
2411 1755 Into the whirlpools of event!
2412 Then let joy, and distress,
2413 Frustration, and success,
2414 Follow each other, as well they can:
2415 Restless activity proves the man!
2419 1760 No goal or measure’s set for you.
2420 Do as you wish, nibble at everything,
2421 Catch at fragments while you’re flying,
2422 Enjoy it all, whatever you find to do.
2423 Now grab at it, and don’t be stupid!
2427 1765 It’s not joy we’re about: you heard it.
2428 I’ll take the frenzy, pain-filled elation,
2429 Loving hatred, enlivening frustration.
2430 Cured of its urge to know, my mind
2431 In future, will not hide from any pain,
2432 1770 And what is shared by all mankind,
2433 In my innermost self, I’ll contain:
2434 My soul will grasp the high and low,
2435 My heart accumulate its bliss and woe,
2436 So this self will embrace all theirs,
2437 1775 That, in the end, their fate it shares.
2441 Believe me, many a thousand year
2442 They’ve chewed hard food, and yet
2443 From the cradle to the bier,
2444 Not one has ever digested it!
2445 1780 Trust one of us, this Whole thing
2446 Was only made for a god’s delight!
2447 In eternal splendour he is dwelling,
2448 He placed us in the darkness quite,
2449 And only gave you day and night.
2457 That’s good to hear!
2458 Yet I’ve a fear, just the one:
2459 Time is short, and art is long.
2460 I think you need instruction.
2461 Join forces with a poet: use poetry,
2462 1790 Let him roam in imagination,
2463 You’ll gain every noble quality
2464 From your honorary occupation,
2465 The lion’s brave attitude
2466 The wild stag’s swiftness,
2467 1795 The Italian’s fiery blood,
2468 The North’s persistence.
2469 Let him find the mysterious
2470 Meeting of generous and devious,
2471 While you, with passions young and hot,
2472 1800 Fall in love, according to the plot.
2473 I’d like to see such a gentleman, among us,
2474 And I’d call him Mister Microcosmus.
2478 What am I then, if it’s a flight too far,
2479 For me to gain that human crown
2480 1805 I yearn towards with every sense I own?
2484 In the end, you are – what you are.
2485 Set your hair in a thousand curlicues
2486 Place your feet in yard-high shoes,
2487 You’ll remain forever, what you are.
2491 1810 All the treasures of the human spirit
2492 I feel that I’ve expended, uselessly.
2493 And wherever, at the last, I sit,
2494 No new power flows, in me.
2495 I’m not a hair’s breadth taller, as you see,
2496 1815 And I’m no nearer to Infinity.
2500 My dear sir, you see the thing
2501 Exactly as all men see it: why,
2502 We must re-order everything,
2503 Before the joys of life slip by.
2504 1820 Hang it! Hands and feet, belong to you,
2505 Certainly, a head, and a backside,
2506 Yet everything I use as new
2507 Why is my ownership of it denied?
2508 When I can count on six stallions,
2509 1825 Isn’t their horsepower mine to use?
2510 I drive behind, and am a proper man,
2511 As though I’d twenty-four legs, too.
2512 Look lively! Leave the senses be,
2513 And plunge into the world with me!
2514 1830 I say to you that scholarly fellows
2515 Are like the cattle on an arid heath:
2516 Some evil spirit leads them round in circles,
2517 While sweet green meadows lie beneath.
2521 How shall we begin then?
2525 From here, we’ll first win free.
2526 1835 What kind of a martyrs’ hole can this be?
2527 What kind of a teacher of life is he,
2528 Who fills young minds with ennui?
2529 Let your neighbours do it, and go!
2530 Do you want to thresh straw forever?
2531 1840 The best things you can ever know,
2532 You dare not tell the youngsters, ever.
2533 I hear one of them arriving, too!
2537 I’ve no desire to see him, though.
2541 The poor lad’s waited hours for you.
2542 1845 He mustn’t go away un-consoled.
2543 Come: give me your cap and gown.
2544 The mask should look delicious. So!
2546 (He disguises himself.)
2548 Now I’ve lost what wit’s my own!
2549 I want fifteen minutes with him, only:
2550 1850 Meanwhile get ready for our journey!
2554 Mephistopheles (In Faust’s long gown.)
2556 Reason and Science you despise,
2557 Man’s highest powers: now the lies
2558 Of the deceiving spirit must bind you
2559 With those magic arts that blind you,
2560 1855 And I’ll have you, totally –
2561 Fate gave him such a spirit
2562 It urges him ever onwards, wildly,
2563 And, in his hasty striving, he has leapt
2564 Beyond all earth’s ecstasies.
2565 1860 I’ll drag him through raw life,
2566 Through the meaningless and shallow,
2567 I’ll freeze him: stick to him: keep him ripe,
2568 Frustrate his insatiable greed, allow
2569 Food and drink to drift before his eyes:
2570 1865 In vain he’ll beg for consummation,
2571 And if he weren’t the devil’s, why
2572 He’d still go to his ruination!
2578 I’m only here momentarily,
2579 I’ve come, filled with humility,
2580 1870 To speak to, and to stand before ,
2581 One who’s spoken of with awe.
2585 Your courtesy delights me greatly!
2586 A man like other men you see.
2587 Have you studied then, elsewhere?
2591 1875 I beg you, please enrol me, here!
2592 I come to you strong of courage,
2593 Lined in pocket, healthy for my age:
2594 My mother didn’t want to lose me: though,
2595 I’d like to learn what it’s right for me to know.
2599 1880 Then you’ve come to the right place, exactly.
2603 To be honest, I’d like to go already:
2604 There’s little pleasure for me at all,
2605 In these walls, and all these halls.
2606 It’s such a narrow space I find,
2607 1885 You see no trees, no leaves of any kind,
2608 And in the lectures, on the benches,
2609 All thought deserts me, and my senses.
2613 It will only come to you with habit.
2614 So the child takes its mother’s breast
2615 1890 Quite unwillingly at first, and yet it
2616 Soon sucks away at her with zest.
2617 So will you at Wisdom’s breast, here,
2618 Feel every day a little zestier.
2622 I’ll cling to her neck with pleasure:
2623 1895 But only tell me how to find her.
2627 Explain, before you travel on
2628 What faculty you’ve settled on.
2632 I want to be a true scholar,
2633 I want to grasp, by the collar,
2634 1900 What’s on earth, in heaven above,
2635 In Science, and in Nature too.
2639 Then here’s the very path for you,
2640 But don’t allow yourself to wander off.
2644 I’ll be present heart and soul:
2645 1905 Of course I’ll want to play,
2646 Have some fun and freedom, though,
2647 On each sweet summer holiday.
2651 Use your time well: it slips away so fast, yet
2652 Discipline will teach you how to win it.
2653 1910 My dear friend, I’d advise, in sum,
2654 First, the Collegium Logicum.
2655 There your mind will be trained,
2656 As if in Spanish boots, constrained,
2657 So that painfully, as it ought,
2658 1915 It creeps along the way of thought,
2659 Not flitting about all over,
2660 Wandering here and there.
2661 So you’ll learn, in many days,
2662 What you used to do, untaught, as in a haze,
2663 1920 Like eating now, and drinking, you’ll see
2664 The necessity of One! Two! Three!
2665 Truly the intricacy of logic
2666 Is like a master-weaver’s fabric,
2667 Where the loom holds a thousand threads,
2668 1925 Here and there the shuttles go
2669 And the threads, invisibly, flow,
2670 One pass serves for a thousand instead.
2671 Then the philosopher steps in: he’ll show
2672 That it certainly had to be so:
2673 1930 The first was - so, the second - so,
2674 And so, the third and fourth were - so:
2675 If first and second had never been,
2676 Third and fourth would not be seen.
2677 All praise the scholars, beyond believing,
2678 1935 But few of them ever turn to weaving.
2679 To know and note the living, you’ll find it
2680 Best to first dispense with the spirit:
2681 Then with the pieces in your hand,
2682 Ah! You’ve only lost the spiritual bond.
2683 1940 ‘Natural treatment’, Chemistry calls it
2684 Mocks at herself, and doesn’t know it.
2688 I’m not sure that I quite understand.
2692 You’ll soon know it all, as planned,
2693 When you’ve learnt the science of reduction,
2694 1945 And everything’s proper classification.
2698 After all that, I feel as stupid
2699 As if I’d a mill wheel in my head.
2703 Next, before all else, you’ll fix
2704 Your mind on Metaphysics!
2705 1950 See that you’re profoundly trained
2706 In what never stirs in a human brain:
2707 You’ll learn a splendid word
2708 For what’s occurred or not occurred.
2709 But for the present take six months
2710 1955 To get yourself in order: start at once.
2711 Five hours every day, lock
2712 Yourself in, with a ticking clock!
2713 Make sure you’re well prepared,
2714 Study each paragraph with care,
2715 1960 So afterwards you’ll be certain
2716 Only what’s in the book, was written:
2717 Then be as diligent when you pen it,
2718 As if the Holy Ghost had said it!
2722 You won’t need to tell me twice!
2723 1965 I think, myself, it’s very helpful, too
2724 That one can take back home, and use,
2725 What someone’s penned in black and white.
2729 But choose a faculty, any one!
2733 I wouldn’t be comfortable with Law.
2737 1970 I couldn’t name you anything more
2738 Vile, I know how dogmatic it’s become.
2739 Laws and rights are handed down
2740 It’s an eternal disgrace:
2741 They’re moved round from town to town
2742 1975 Dragged around from place to place.
2743 Reason is nonsense, kindness a disease,
2744 If you’re a grandchild it’s a curse!
2745 The rights we are born with,
2746 To those, alas, no one refers!
2750 1980 That just strengthens my disgust.
2751 Happy the student that you instruct!
2752 I’ve nearly settled on Theology.
2756 I wouldn’t wish to guide you erroneously.
2757 In what that branch of knowledge concerns
2758 1985 It’s so difficult to avoid a fallacious route,
2759 There’s so much poison hidden in what you learn,
2760 And it’s barely distinguishable from the antidote.
2761 The best thing here’s to make a single choice,
2762 Then simply swear by your master’s voice.
2763 1990 On the whole, to words stick fast!
2764 Through the safest gate you’ll pass
2765 To the Temple of Certainty.
2769 Yet surely words must have a sense.
2773 Why, yes! But don’t torment yourself with worry,
2774 1995 Where sense fails it’s only necessary
2775 To supply a word, and change the tense.
2776 With words fine arguments can be weighted,
2777 With words whole Systems can be created,
2778 With words, the mind does its conceiving,
2779 2000 No word suffers a jot from thieving.
2783 Forgive me, I delay you with my questions,
2784 But I must trouble you again,
2785 On the subject of Medicine,
2786 Have you no helpful word to say?
2787 2005 Three years, so little time applied,
2788 And, God, the field is rather wide!
2789 If only you had some kind of pointer,
2790 You would feel so much further on.
2792 Mephistopheles (Aside.)
2794 I’m tired of this desiccated banter
2795 2010 I really must play the devil, at once.
2799 To grasp the spirit of Medicine’s easily done:
2800 You study the great and little world, until,
2801 In the end you let it carry on
2803 2015 Useless to roam round, scientifically:
2804 Everyone learns only what he can:
2805 The one who grasps the Moment fully,
2806 He’s the proper man.
2807 You’re quite a well-made fellow,
2808 2020 You’re not short of courage too,
2809 And when you’re easy with yourself,
2810 Others will be easy with you.
2811 Study, especially, female behaviour:
2812 Their eternal aches and woes,
2813 2025 All of the thousand-fold,
2814 Rise from one point, and have one cure.
2815 And if you’re half honourable about it
2816 You shall have them in your pocket.
2817 A title first: to give them comfort you
2818 2030 Have skills that far exceed the others,
2819 Then you’re free to touch the goods, and view
2820 What someone else has prowled around for years.
2821 Take the pulse firmly, you understand,
2822 And then, with sidelong fiery glance,
2823 2035 Grasp the slender hips, in haste,
2824 To find out whether she’s tight-laced.
2828 That sounds much better! The Where and How, I see.
2832 Grey, dear friend, is all theory,
2833 And green the golden tree of life.
2837 2040 I swear it’s like a dream to me: may I
2838 Trouble you, at some further time,
2839 To expound your wisdom, so sublime?
2843 As much as I can, I’ll gladly explain.
2847 I can’t tear myself away,
2848 2045 I must just pass you my album, sir,
2849 Grant me the favour of your signature!
2855 (He writes and gives the book back.)
2857 Student (Reading Mephistopheles’ Latin inscription which means:
2858 ‘You’ll be like God, acquainted with good and evil’.)
2860 Eritis sicut Deus, scientes bonum et malum.
2862 (He makes his bows, and takes his leave.)
2866 Just follow the ancient text, and my mother the snake, too:
2867 2050 And then your likeness to God will surely frighten you!
2873 Where will we go, then?
2878 The little world, and then the great, we’ll see.
2879 With what profit and delight,
2880 This term, you’ll be a parasite!
2884 2055 Yet with my long beard, I’ll
2885 Lack life’s superficial style.
2886 My attempt will come to nothing:
2887 I know, in this world, I don’t fit in.
2888 I feel so small next to other men,
2889 2060 It only means embarrassment.
2893 My friend, just give yourself completely to it:
2894 When you find yourself, you’ll soon know how to live it.
2898 How shall we depart from here, then?
2899 I see not one servant, coach, or horse.
2903 2065 We’ll just spread this cloak wide open,
2904 Then through the air we’ll take our course.
2905 For a daring trip like this we’re on,
2906 Better not take much baggage along.
2907 A little hot air I’ll ready, first,
2908 2070 To lift us nimbly above the Earth,
2909 And as we’re light we’ll soon get clear:
2910 Congratulations on your new career!
2912 Scene V: Auerbach’s Cellar in Leipzig
2914 (Friends happily drinking.)
2918 Will none of you laugh? Nobody drink?
2919 I’ll have to teach you to smile, I think!
2920 2075 You’re all of you like wet straw today,
2921 And usually you’re well away.
2925 That’s up to you, you bring us nothing.
2926 Nothing dumb, or dirty, nothing.
2928 Frosch (Pouring a glass of wine over Brander’s head.)
2937 2080 You wanted them both, so you got mine!
2941 Out the door, whoever fights! Get out!
2942 Let’s sing a heart-felt chorus, drink and shout!
2948 Earplugs, here! This fellow’s deafened me.
2952 2085 It’s only when it echoes in the tower,
2953 You hear a bass voice’s real power.
2957 Right, out with him who takes offence!
2966 Our throats are tuned: commence.
2970 2090 ‘Dear Holy Roman Empire,
2971 How do you hold together?’
2975 A lousy song! Bah! A political song -
2976 A tiresome song! Thank God, every morning,
2977 It isn’t you who must sit there worrying
2978 2095 About the Empire! At least I’m better for
2979 Not being a King or a Chancellor.
2980 But we should have a leader, so
2981 We’ll choose a Pope of our own.
2982 You know the qualities that can
2983 2100 Swing the vote, and elevate the man.
2987 ‘Sing away, sweet Nightingale,
2988 Greet my girl, and never fail.’
2992 Don’t greet my girl! I’ll not allow it!
2996 Greet and kiss her! You’ll not stop it!
3000 2105 ‘Slip the bolt in deepest night!
3001 Slip it! Wake, the lover bright.
3002 Slip it to! At break of dawn.’
3006 Yes, sing in praise of her, and boast: sing on!
3007 I’ll laugh later when it suits:
3008 2110 She leads me a dance, she’ll lead you too.
3009 She should have a dwarf for a lover!
3010 At the crossroads, let him woo her:
3011 An old goat from Blocksberg, galloping over,
3012 Can bleat goodnight, as it passes by her.
3013 2115 An honest man, of flesh and blood,
3014 For a girl like that’s far too good.
3015 I’m not bothered even to say hello
3016 Except perhaps to break her window.
3018 Brander (Pounding on the table.)
3020 Quiet! Quiet! Or you won’t hear!
3021 2120 I know about life, you lot, confess.
3022 Besotted persons sit among us,
3023 As fits their status, then, I must
3024 Give them, tonight, of my very best.
3025 Listen! A song in the newest strain!
3026 2125 And you can shout out the refrain!
3030 ‘Once there was a cellar rat,
3031 Who lived on grease, and butter:
3032 He had a belly, round and fat,
3033 Just like Doctor Luther.
3034 2130 The cook set poison round about:
3035 It brought on such a violent bout,
3036 As if he’d love inside him.’
3040 ‘As if he’d love inside him!’
3044 ‘He ran here, and he ran there,
3045 2135 And drank from all the puddles,
3046 Gnawing, scratching, everywhere,
3047 But nothing cured his shudders.
3048 In torment, he leapt to the roof,
3049 Poor beast, soon he’d had enough,
3050 2140 As if he’d love inside him.’
3054 ‘As if he’d love inside him!’
3058 ‘Fear drove him to the light of day,
3059 Into the kitchen then he ran,
3060 Fell on the hearth and twitched away,
3061 2145 Pitifully weak, and wan.
3062 Then the murderess laughed with glee:
3063 He’s on his last legs, I see,
3064 As if he’d love inside him.’
3068 ‘As if he’d love inside him.’
3072 2150 How pleased they are, the tiresome fools!
3073 Spreading poison for wretched rats,
3074 To me, that’s the right thing to do!
3078 You’re in sympathy with them, perhaps?
3082 That fat belly with a balding head!
3083 2155 Bad luck makes him meek and mild:
3084 From a swollen rat, he sees, with dread,
3085 His own natural likeness is compiled.
3087 (Faust and Mephistopheles appear.)
3089 First of all, I had to bring you here,
3090 Where cheerful friends sup together,
3091 2160 To see how happily life slips away.
3092 For these folk every day’s a holiday.
3093 With lots of leisure, and little sense,
3094 They revolve in their round-dance,
3095 Chasing their tails as kittens prance,
3096 2165 If the hangovers aren’t too intense,
3097 If the landlord gives them credit,
3098 They’re cheerful, and unworried by it.
3102 They’re fresh from their travelling days,
3103 You can tell by their foreign ways:
3104 2170 They’ve not been back an hour: you see.
3108 True, you’re right! My Leipzig’s dear to me!
3109 It’s a little Paris, and educates its people.
3113 Who do you think the strangers are?
3117 Let me find out! I’ll draw the truth,
3118 2175 From those two, with a brimming glass,
3119 As easily as you’d pull a child’s tooth.
3120 It seems to me they’re of some noble house,
3121 They look so discontented and so proud.
3125 They’re surely strolling players, I’d guess!
3133 2180 Watch me screw it out of them, then!
3135 Mephistopheles (To Faust.)
3137 These folk wouldn’t feel the devil, even
3138 If he’d got them dangling by the neck.
3146 Thank you, and greetings.
3148 (He mutters away, inspecting Mephistopheles side-on.)
3150 What’s wrong with his foot: why’s he limping?
3154 2185 Allow us to sit with you, if you please.
3155 Instead of fine ale that can’t be had,
3156 We can still have good company.
3160 You seem a choosy sort of lad.
3164 Was it late when you started out from Rippach?
3165 2190 Perhaps you dined with Hans there, first?
3169 We passed straight by, today, without a rest!
3170 We spoke to him last some time back,
3171 When he talked a lot about his cousins,
3172 And he sent to each his kind greetings.
3174 (He bows to Frosch.)
3178 He did you, there! He’s smart!
3182 2195 A shrewd customer!
3186 Wait, I’ll have him soon, I’m sure!
3190 If I’m not wrong, we heard
3191 A tuneful choir singing?
3192 I’m sure, with this vault, the words
3193 2200 Must really set it ringing!
3197 Are you by any chance a virtuoso?
3201 No! Though my desire is great, my skill is only so-so.
3209 If you wish it, a few.
3213 So long as it’s a brand-new one!
3217 2205 Well, it’s from Spain that we’ve just come,
3218 The lovely land of wine, and singing too.
3222 ‘There was once a king, who
3227 Listen! Did you get that? A flea.
3228 2210 A flea’s an honest guest to me.
3230 Mephistopheles (Sings.)
3232 ‘There was once a king, who
3234 He loved him very much, oh,
3235 He was like a son, you see.
3236 2215 The king called for his tailor,
3238 Now, measure up the lad for
3239 A suit of clothes, I say!’
3243 Make sure the tailor’s sharp,
3244 2220 And cuts them out precisely,
3245 And, since his son’s dear to his heart,
3246 Make sure there’s never a crease to see.
3250 ‘All in silk and velvet,
3251 He was smartly dressed,
3252 2225 With ribbons on his coat,
3253 A cross upon his chest.
3254 He was the First Minister,
3255 And so he wore a star:
3256 His brothers and his sisters,
3257 2230 He made noblest by far.
3259 The lords and the ladies,
3260 They were badly smitten,
3261 The Queen and her maids,
3262 They were stung and bitten.
3263 2235 They didn’t dare to crush them,
3264 Or scratch away, all night.
3265 We smother them, and crush them,
3266 The moment that they bite.’
3270 ‘We smother them, and crush them,
3271 2240 The moment that they bite.’
3275 Bravo! Bravo! That went sweetly!
3279 So shall it be with every flea!
3283 Sharpen your nails, and crush them fine!
3287 Long live freedom, and long live wine!
3291 2245 I’d love to drink a glass, in freedom’s honour,
3292 If only the wine were a little better.
3296 Not again, we don’t want to hear!
3300 I fear the landlord might complain
3301 Or I’d give these worthy guests,
3302 2250 One of my cellar’s very best.
3306 Just bring it on! He’ll accept it: I’ll explain.
3310 Make it a good glass and we’ll praise it.
3311 But don’t make it so small we can’t taste it.
3312 Because if I’m truly going to decide,
3313 2255 I need a really big mouthful inside.
3317 They’re from the Rhine, as I guessed.
3321 Bring me a corkscrew!
3326 Is it outside already, this cask?
3330 There’s one in the landlord’s toolbox, for sure.
3332 Mephistopheles (Takes the corkscrew. To Frosch.)
3334 2260 Now, what would you like to try?
3338 What? Is there a selection, too?
3342 There’s a choice for every one of you.
3344 Altmayer (To Frosch.)
3346 Ah! You soon catch on: your lips are dry?
3350 Good! When I’ve a choice, I drink Rhenish.
3351 2265 The Fatherland grants those best gifts to us.
3353 Mephistopheles (Boring a hole in the table-edge where Frosch is
3356 Bring me a little wax, to make the seals, as well!
3360 Ah, that’s for the conjuring trick, I can tell.
3362 Mephistopheles (To Brander.)
3368 Champagne for me is fine:
3369 Make it a truly sparkling wine!
3371 (Mephistopheles bores the holes: one of the others makes the wax
3372 stoppers and stops the holes with them.)
3374 2270 We can’t always shun what’s foreign,
3375 Things from far away are often fine.
3376 Real Germans can’t abide a Frenchman,
3377 And yet they gladly drink his wine.
3379 Siebel (As Mephistopheles approaches his seat.)
3381 I must confess I do dislike the dry,
3382 2275 Give me a glass of the very sweetest!
3384 Mephistopheles (Boring a hole.)
3386 I’ll pour an instant Tokay for you, yes?
3390 Now, gentlemen, look me in the eye!
3391 I see you’ve had the better of us there.
3395 Now! Now! With guests so rare,
3396 2280 That would be far too much for me to dare.
3397 Quick! Time for you to declare!
3398 Which wine can I serve you with?
3402 Any at all! Don’t make us ask forever.
3404 (Now all the holes have been stopped and sealed.)
3406 Mephistopheles (With a strange gesture.)
3408 Grapes, they are the vine’s load!
3409 2285 Horns, they are the he-goat’s:
3410 Wine is juice: wood makes vines,
3411 The wooden board shall give us wine.
3412 Look deeper into Nature!
3413 Have faith, and here’s a wonder!
3414 2290 Now draw the stoppers, and drink up!
3416 All (Draw the stoppers, and the wine they chose flows into each
3419 O lovely fount, that flows for us!
3423 But careful, don’t lose a drop!
3425 (They drink repeatedly.)
3429 ‘We’re all of us cannibals now,
3430 We’re like five hundred sows.’
3434 2295 The folk are free, and we can go, you see!
3438 I’d like to leave here now.
3442 Watch first: their bestiality
3443 Will make a splendid show.
3447 (He drinks carelessly, wine pours on the ground and bursts into
3450 Help! Fire! Hell burns bright!
3452 Mephistopheles (Charming away the flame.)
3454 2300 Friendly element, be quiet!
3458 For this time, just a drop of Purgatory.
3462 What’s that? You wait! You’ll pay dearly!
3463 It seems you don’t quite see us right.
3467 Try playing that trick a second time, on us!
3471 2305 I think we should quietly send him packing.
3475 What, sir? You think you’re daring,
3476 Tricking us with your hocus-pocus?
3480 Be quiet, old wine-barrel!
3484 You broomstick! You’ll show us you’re ill bred?
3488 2310 Just wait, it’ll rain blows, on your head!
3490 Altmayer (Draws a stopper and fire blazes in his face.)
3492 I’m burning! Burning!
3497 The man’s a rascal! Kick him as you like!
3499 (They draw knives and rush at Mephistopheles.)
3501 Mephistopheles (With solemn gestures.)
3503 Word and Image, ensnare!
3504 Alter, senses and air!
3505 2315 Be here, and there!
3507 (They look at each other, amazed.)
3511 Where am I? What a lovely land!
3515 Vineyards? Am I seeing straight?
3519 And, likewise, grapes to hand!
3523 Deep in this green arbour, here,
3524 See, the vines! What grapes appear!
3526 (He grasps Siebel by the nose: the others do the same reciprocally,
3527 and raise their knives.)
3531 2320 From their eyes, Error, take the iron band,
3532 And let them see how the Devil plays a joke.
3534 (He vanishes with Faust: the revellers separate.)
3546 Brander (To Siebel.)
3548 And I’ve still got your nose in my hand!
3552 It was a tremor, that passed through every limb!
3553 2325 Pass me a stool: I’m sinking in!
3557 Tell me: what happened there, my friend?
3561 Where is he? When I catch that fellow,
3562 He won’t leave here alive again!
3566 I saw him myself fly out of the cellar
3567 2330 Riding on a barrel – and then –
3568 I feel there’s lead still in my feet.
3570 (He turns towards the table.)
3572 Ah! Does the wine still flow as sweet?
3576 It was deception, cheating, lying.
3580 Still, it seemed that I drank wine.
3584 2335 And what about all those grapes that hung there?
3588 Tell me, now, we shouldn’t believe in wonders!
3590 Scene VI: The Witches’ Kitchen
3592 (A giant cauldron stands on a low hearth, with a fire under it.
3593 Various shapes appear in the fumes from the cauldron. A She-Ape sits
3594 next to it, skimming it, watching to see it doesn’t boil over. The
3595 He-Ape, with young ones, sits nearby warming himself. The ceiling and
3596 walls are covered with the Witches’ grotesque instruments.)
3600 These magical wild beasts repel me, too!
3601 Are you telling me I can be renewed,
3602 Wandering around in this mad maze,
3603 2340 Demanding help from some old hag:
3604 That her foul cookery will spirit away
3605 Thirty years from my age, just like that?
3606 It’s sad, if you know of nothing better!
3607 The star of hope has quickly set.
3608 2345 Hasn’t some noble mind, or Nature,
3609 Found some wondrous potion yet?
3613 My friend, what you say, again, is intelligent!
3614 There’s a natural means to make you younger:
3615 But it’s written, in a book quite different,
3616 2350 And in an odd chapter.
3624 Fine! You’ve a method here that needs
3625 No gold, no doctor, no magician:
3626 Take yourself off to the nearest field,
3627 To scratch around, and hoe, and dig in,
3628 2355 Maintain yourself, and constrain
3629 Your senses in a narrow sphere:
3630 Feed yourself on the purest fare,
3631 Be a beast among beasts: think it no robbery,
3632 To manure the fields you harvest, there:
3633 2360 Since that’s the best of ways, believe me,
3634 To keep your youth for eighty years!
3638 I’m not used to it, can’t condescend,
3639 To take a spade in hand, and bend:
3640 That narrow life wouldn’t suit me at all.
3644 2365 So you must call the witch then, after all.
3648 Why is that old witch necessary!
3649 Why can’t you, yourself, make the brew?
3653 What a lovely occupation for me!
3654 And build a thousand bridges, meanwhile, too.
3655 2370 It’s not just art and science that tell,
3656 Patience is needed in the work as well.
3657 A calm mind’s busy years in its creation,
3658 Only time strengthens the fermentation.
3659 And everything about it
3660 2375 Is quite a peculiar show!
3661 It’s true the Devil taught it:
3662 The Devil can’t make it though.
3664 (Seeing the creatures.)
3666 See what a dainty race I hail!
3667 This is the female: this is the male!
3671 2380 The mistress isn’t home, I say?
3681 How long will she be swarming?
3685 2385 As long as our paws are warming.
3687 Mephistopheles (To Faust.)
3689 What do you think of these tender creatures?
3693 As rude as any I ever saw!
3697 Ah, but to me this kind of discourse
3698 Shows the most delightful features!
3702 2390 Accursed puppets, tell me true,
3703 What are you stirring in that brew?
3707 We’re cooking up thick beggars’ soup.
3711 Then there’ll be thousands in the queue.
3713 The He-Ape (Approaches and fawns on Mephistopheles.)
3715 O, throw the dice quick,
3716 2395 And let me be rich!
3718 It’s all arranged badly,
3724 2400 Why does the ape think he’d be lucky,
3725 If he’d only a chance to try the lottery!
3727 (Meanwhile the young apes have been playing with a large ball, and
3728 they roll it forward.)
3735 2405 Rings like glass,
3737 It’s hollow at best.
3745 2415 In pieces, lie.
3751 The He-Ape (Lifting it down.)
3754 I’d know you this minute.
3756 (He runs to the She-Ape, and lets her look through the sieve.)
3758 2420 Look through the sieve!
3759 Can you see the thief,
3760 But daren’t name him?
3762 Mephistopheles (Approaching the fire.)
3766 The He-Ape and She-Ape
3770 2425 Not to know a kettle!
3778 Take this brush here,
3779 And sit on the settle.
3781 (He invites Mephistopheles to sit down.)
3783 Faust (Who all this time has been standing in front of a mirror,
3784 alternately approaching it and distancing himself from it.)
3786 What do I see? What heavenly form
3787 2430 Is this that the magic mirror brings!
3788 Love, lend me your swiftest wings,
3789 Then bear me to fields she adorns!
3790 Ah, if I do not stand still here,
3791 If I dare to venture nearer,
3792 2435 I see as if through a mist, no clearer –
3793 The loveliest form of Woman, there!
3794 Is it possible: can Woman be so lovely?
3795 Must I, in her outspread body, declare
3796 The incarnation of all that’s heavenly?
3797 2440 Can any such this earth deliver?
3801 Naturally, if a God torments himself six days,
3802 And says to himself, Bravo, at last, in praise,
3803 He must have made something clever.
3804 See, this time, what will satisfy you, forever:
3805 2445 I’ll know how to fish that treasure out for you,
3806 Happy, the one who finds good fortune in her,
3807 And carries her home again, as his bride, too.
3809 (Faust gazes endlessly in the mirror. Mephistopheles stretches
3810 himself on the settle, plays with the brush, and continues to speak.)
3812 Here I sit like a king on his throne,
3813 The sceptre’s here, but where’s the crown?
3815 The Creatures (Who up till now have been making all kinds of grotesque
3816 movements together, bring Mephistopheles a crown, with great outcry.)
3818 2450 Oh, with sweat and with blood,
3819 If you’ll be so good,
3820 Glue on this crown, sublime!
3822 (They are awkward with the crown, and snap it in two pieces, with
3823 which they leap about.)
3825 Now that’s out of the way!
3827 2455 We hear, and we rhyme -
3829 Faust (In front of the mirror.)
3831 Ah! I’ll go completely mad.
3833 Mephistopheles (Pointing to the creatures.)
3835 Now my head’s almost spinning.
3839 If our luck’s not bad,
3840 If there’s sense to be had,
3841 2460 We must be thinking!
3845 My heart pains me with its burning! Quick,
3846 Let’s leave this place, forego it!
3848 Mephistopheles (Still in the same position.)
3850 Well, at least one must admit
3851 That they’re honest poets.
3853 (The cauldron that the She-Ape has forgotten to keep a watch on, now
3854 boils over: a great flame flares from the chimney. The Witch comes
3855 careering down through the flames, with horrendous cries.)
3857 2465 Ow! Ow! Ow! Ow!
3858 Damned creature! Accursed sow!
3859 You left the kettle: you’ve singed me now!
3862 (Seeing Faust and Mephistopheles.)
3865 2470 Who are you, here?
3871 (She plunges the skimming-ladle into the cauldron, and scatters flame
3872 towards Faust, Mephistopheles and the Creatures. The Creatures
3875 Mephistopheles (Reversing the brush he holds in his hand, and striking
3876 among the jars and glasses.)
3879 There lies the brew!
3880 There lies the glass!
3883 2480 To your melody, too.
3885 (As the Witch starts back in Anger and Horror.)
3887 Do you know me? Skeleton! Scarecrow!
3888 Do you know your lord and master?
3889 What stops me from striking you, so,
3890 Crushing you, and your ape-creatures?
3891 2485 Have you no respect for a scarlet coat?
3892 Don’t you understand a cockerel’s feather?
3893 Have I hidden my face, you old she-goat?
3894 Have I to name myself, as ever?
3898 Oh sir, forgive the rude welcome!
3899 2490 I don’t see a single foot cloven.
3900 And your two ravens - are where?
3904 This once, you get away with it:
3905 It’s truly a good while, isn’t it,
3906 Since we’ve been seen together.
3907 2495 And Civilisation makes men level,
3908 It even sticks to the Devil:
3909 That Northern demon is no more:
3910 Who sees horns now, or tail or claw?
3911 As for the feet, which I can’t spare,
3912 2500 That would harm me with the people.
3913 So like many a youth, now, I wear,
3914 False calves and false in-steps, as well.
3916 The Witch (Dancing.)
3918 Sense and reason flee my brain,
3919 I see young Satan here again!
3923 2505 Woman, I forbid that name!
3927 Why? What harm is caused so?
3931 It’s written in story books, always:
3932 Men are no better for it, though:
3933 The Evil One’s gone: the evil stays.
3934 2510 Call me the Baron: that sounds good:
3935 I’m a gentleman, like the other gentlemen.
3936 Perhaps you doubt my noble blood:
3937 See, here’s the crest I carry, then!
3939 (He makes an indecent gesture.)
3941 The Witch (Laughing immoderately.)
3943 Ha! Ha! That’s your way, as ever.
3944 2515 You’re the same rogue forever!
3946 Mephistopheles (To Faust.)
3948 My friend, take note: learn that this is
3949 The proper way to handle witches.
3953 Now, gentlemen, say how I can be of use.
3957 A good glass of your well-known juice!
3958 2520 But I must insist on the oldest:
3959 The years double what it can do.
3963 Gladly! Here’s a flask, on the shelf:
3964 I sometimes drink from it myself,
3965 And it doesn’t really stink at all:
3966 2525 I’ll gladly give him a glass or so.
3970 If he drinks it unprepared, recall,
3971 He won’t live a single hour, though.
3975 He’s my good friend: it’ll go down well:
3976 Don’t begrudge the best of your kitchen.
3977 2530 Draw the circle: speak the speech, then
3978 Offer him a glass full!
3980 (The Witch draws a circle with fantastic gestures, and places
3981 mysterious articles inside it: meanwhile the glasses start to ring,
3982 and the cauldron to echo, and make music. Finally she brings a large
3983 book, sits the Apes in a ring, who serve as a reading desk and hold
3984 torches. She beckons Faust to approach.)
3986 Faust (To Mephistopheles.)
3988 Tell me, now, what’s happening?
3989 These wild gestures, crazy things,
3990 All of this tasteless trickery,
3991 2535 Is known, and hateful enough to me.
3995 A farce! You should be laughing:
3996 Don’t be such a serious fellow!
3997 This hocus-pocus she, the doctor’s, making,
3998 So you’ll be aided by the juice to follow.
4000 (He persuades Faust to enter the circle.)
4002 The Witch (Begins to declaim from the book, with much emphasis.)
4004 2540 You shall see, then!
4009 2545 Take away four!
4012 Make seven and eight,
4013 So it’s full weight:
4014 2550 And nine is one,
4016 This is the Witch’s one-times-one!
4020 I’m in the dark, the hag babbles with fever.
4024 There’s still more she’s not gone over,
4025 2555 I know it well, the whole book’s like this:
4026 I’ve wasted time on it before, though,
4027 A perfect contradiction in terms is
4028 Ever a mystery to the wise: fools more so.
4029 My friend, the art’s both old and new,
4030 2560 It’s like this in every age, with two
4031 And one, and one and two,
4032 Scattering error instead of truth.
4033 Men prattle, and teach it undisturbed:
4034 Who wants to be counted with the fools?
4035 2565 Men always believe, when they hear words,
4036 There must be thought behind them, too.
4038 The Witch (Continuing.)
4042 Is hidden from the rabble!
4043 2570 One who never thought,
4044 To him it’s brought,
4045 He owns it without trouble.
4049 Why talk this nonsense to us?
4050 My head’s near split in two.
4051 2575 It seems I hear the chorus,
4052 Of a hundred thousand fools.
4056 Enough, enough, O excellent Sibyl!
4057 Bring the drink along: and fill
4058 The cup, quick, to the very brim:
4059 2580 The drink will bring my friend no harm:
4060 He’s a man of many parts, and him
4061 Many a noble draught has charmed.
4063 (The Witch, ceremoniously, pours the drink into a cup: as Faust puts
4064 it to his lips, a gentle flame rises.)
4066 Down it quickly! Every time! It’ll
4067 Likewise, warm your heart, entire.
4068 2585 You’re hand in hand with the Devil:
4069 Will you shrink before the fire?
4071 (The Witch breaks the circle. Faust steps out.)
4073 Now, quick, away! You may not rest.
4077 Much good may that potion do you!
4079 Mephistopheles (To the Witch.)
4081 On Walpurgis Night you can tell me best,
4082 2590 What favour I can return to you.
4086 Here’s a song! Sing it sometimes, and you,
4087 Will feel a peculiar effect: don’t ask me how.
4089 Mephistopheles (To Faust.)
4091 Come on, quickly, run about now:
4092 You need to sweat, that will allow
4093 2595 The power to penetrate, through and through.
4094 Later, I’ll teach you to value leisure,
4095 And soon you’ll find with deepest pleasure,
4096 How Cupid stirs, and, now and then, leaps, too.
4100 Let me look quickly in the glass, once more!
4101 2600 How lovely that woman’s form, I descried!
4105 No! No! The paragon of all women, you’re
4106 About to see before you, personified.
4110 With that drink in your body, well then,
4111 All women will look to you like Helen.
4115 (Faust. Margaret, passing by.)
4119 2605 Lovely lady, may I offer you
4120 My arm, and my protection, too?
4124 Not lovely, nor the lady you detected,
4125 I can go home, unprotected.
4127 (She releases herself and exits.)
4131 By Heavens, the child is lovely!
4132 2610 I’ve never seen anything more so.
4133 She’s virtuous, yet innocently
4134 Pert, and quick-tongued though.
4135 Her rosy lips, her clear cheeks,
4136 I’ll not forget them in many a week!
4137 2615 The way she cast down her eyes,
4138 Deep in my heart, imprinted, lies:
4139 How curt in her speech she was,
4140 Well that was quite charming, of course!
4142 (Mephistopheles enters.)
4144 Listen, you must get that girl for me!
4151 2620 The girl who just went by.
4155 That one, there? She’s come from the priest,
4156 Absolved of all her sins, while I
4157 Crept into a stall nearby:
4158 She is such an innocent thing,
4159 2625 She’s no need to sit confessing:
4160 I’ve no power with such as those, I mean!
4164 Yet, she’s older than fourteen.
4168 Now you’re speaking like some Don Juan
4169 Who wants every flower for himself alone,
4170 2630 Conceited enough to think there’s no honour,
4171 To be plucked except by him, nor favour:
4172 But that’s never the case, you know.
4176 Master Moraliser is that so?
4177 With me, best leave morality alone!
4178 2635 I’m telling you, short and sweet,
4179 If that young heart doesn’t beat
4180 Within my arms, tonight - so be it,
4181 At midnight, then our pact is done.
4185 Think, what a to and fro it will take!
4186 2640 I need at least fourteen days, to make
4187 Some kind of opportunity to meet her.
4191 If I’d seven hours at my call,
4192 I’d not need the Devil at all,
4193 To seduce such a creature.
4197 2645 You’re almost talking like a Frenchman:
4198 But don’t let yourself get all annoyed:
4199 What’s the use if she’s only part enjoyed?
4200 Your happiness won’t be as prolonged,
4201 As if you were to knead and fashion
4202 2650 That little doll, with every passion,
4203 Up and down, as yearning preaches,
4204 And many a cunning rascal teaches.
4208 I’ve enough appetite without all that.
4212 Now, without complaint or jesting, what
4213 2655 I’m telling you is, with this lovely child,
4214 Once and for all, you mustn’t be wild.
4215 She won’t be taken by storm, I said:
4216 We’ll need to use cunning instead.
4220 Get me a part of the angels’ treasure!
4221 2660 Lead me to where she lies at leisure!
4222 Get me a scarf from her neck: aspire
4223 To a garter, that’s my heart’s desire.
4227 So you can see how I will strain
4228 To help you, and ease your pain,
4229 2665 We’ll not let an instant slip away,
4230 I’ll lead you to her room today.
4234 And shall I see her? And have her?
4238 No! She has to visit a neighbour.
4239 Meanwhile, you can be alone there,
4240 2670 With every hope of future pleasure,
4241 Enjoy her breathing space, at leisure.
4249 Her room’s not yet free.
4253 Look for a gift for her, from me!
4259 A present? Good! He’s sure to work it!
4260 2675 I know many a lovely place, up here,
4261 And many an ancient buried treasure:
4262 I must have a look around for a bit.
4265 Scene VIII: Evening, A small well-kept room.
4267 (Margaret, plaiting and fastening the braids of her hair.)
4271 I’d give anything if I could say
4272 Who that gentleman was, today!
4273 2680 He’s brave for certain, I could see,
4274 And from some noble family:
4275 That his face readily told –
4276 Or he wouldn’t have been so bold.
4278 (She exits.) (Mephistopheles and Faust appear.)
4282 Come in: but quietly, I mean!
4284 Faust (After a moment’s silence.)
4286 2685 I’d ask you, now, to leave me be!
4288 Mephistopheles (Poking about.)
4290 Not every girl keeps thing so clean.
4292 (Mephistopheles exits.)
4296 Welcome, sweet twilight glow,
4297 That weaves throughout this shrine!
4298 Sweet love-pangs grip my heart so,
4299 2690 That on hope’s dew must live, and pine!
4300 How a breath of peace breathes around,
4301 Its order, and contentment!
4302 In this poverty, what wealth is found!
4303 In this prison, what enchantment!
4305 (He throws himself into a leather armchair near the bed.)
4307 2695 Accept me now, you, who with open arms
4308 Gathered joy and pain, in past days, where,
4309 How often, ah, with all their childish charms
4310 The little flock hung round their father’s chair!
4311 There my beloved, perhaps, cheeks full, stands,
4312 2700 Grateful for all the gifts of Christmas fare,
4313 Kissing her grandfather’s withered hands.
4314 Sweet girl, I feel your spirit, softly stray,
4315 Through the wealth of order, all around me,
4316 That with motherliness instructs, each day,
4317 2705 The tablecloth to lie smooth, at your say,
4318 And even the wrinkled sand beneath your feet.
4319 O beloved hand, so goddess-like!
4320 This house because of you is Heaven’s like.
4323 (He lifts one of the bed curtains.)
4325 What grips me with its bliss!
4326 2710 Here I could stand, slowly lingering.
4327 Here, Nature, in its gentlest dreaming,
4328 Formed an earthly angel within this.
4329 Here the child lay! Life, warm,
4330 Filled her delicate breast,
4331 2715 And here, in pure and holy form,
4332 A heavenly image was expressed!
4333 And I! What leads me here?
4334 Why do I feel so deeply stirred?
4335 What do I seek? Why such a heavy heart?
4336 2720 Poor Faust! I no longer know who you are.
4337 Is there a magic fragrance round me?
4338 I urged myself on, to the deepest delight,
4339 And feel myself melt in Love’s dreaming flight!
4340 Are we the sport of every lightest breeze?
4341 2725 And if she appeared at this instant,
4342 How to atone for being so indiscreet?
4343 The great man, alas, of little moment!
4344 Would lie here, melting, at her feet.
4346 Mephistopheles (Appearing.)
4348 Quick! I see her coming, there.
4352 2730 Away! Away! I’ll not return again.
4356 Here’s a casket fairly loaded, then,
4357 I’ve taken it from elsewhere.
4358 Put it just here on the chest,
4359 I swear it’ll dazzle her, when she sees:
4360 2735 I’ve put in some trinkets, and the rest,
4361 For you to win another, if you please.
4362 Truly, a child’s a child, and play is play.
4366 I don’t know, shall I?
4370 Are you asking, pray?
4371 Perhaps you’d like to keep the treasure, too?
4372 2740 Then I’d advise your Lustfulness,
4373 To spare the sweet hours of brightness,
4374 And spare me a heap of trouble over you.
4375 I hope that you’re not full of meanness!
4376 I scratch my head: I rub my hands –
4378 (He places the casket in the chest, and shuts it again.)
4380 2745 Now off we go, and go quickly!
4381 Through this you’ll bend the child, you see,
4382 To your wish and will: as any fool understands:
4383 Yet now you seem to me
4384 As if you were heading for the lecture hall, and see
4385 2750 Standing there grey-faced, in front of you,
4386 Physics, and Metaphysics too!
4391 (Margaret with a lamp.)
4395 It’s so close and sultry, here,
4397 (She opens the window.)
4399 And yet it’s not warm outside.
4400 2755 It troubles me so, I don’t know why –
4401 I wish that Mother were near.
4402 A shudder ran through my whole body –
4403 I’m such a foolish girl, so timid!
4405 (She begins to sing, while undressing.)
4407 ‘There was a king in Thule, he
4408 2760 Was faithful, to the grave,
4409 To whom his dying lady
4410 A golden goblet gave.
4412 He valued nothing greater:
4413 At every feast it shone:
4414 2765 His tears were brimming over,
4415 When he drank there-from.
4417 When he himself was dying
4418 No towns did he with-hold,
4419 No wealth his heir denying,
4420 2770 Except the cup of gold.
4422 He gave a royal banquet,
4423 His knights around him, all,
4424 In his sea-girt turret,
4425 In his ancestral hall.
4427 2775 There the old king stood, yet,
4428 Drinking life’s last glow:
4429 Then threw the golden goblet
4430 Into the waves below.
4432 He saw it falling, drowning,
4433 2780 Sinking in the sea,
4434 Then, his eyelids closing,
4435 Never again drank he.’
4437 (She opens the chest in order to arrange her clothes, and sees the
4440 How can this lovely casket be here? I’m sure
4441 I locked the chest when I was here before.
4442 2785 It’s quite miraculous! What can it hold in store?
4443 Perhaps someone brought it as security,
4444 And my mother’s granted a loan on it?
4445 There’s a ribbon hanging from it, there’s a key,
4446 I’m quite determined to open it.
4447 2790 What’s here? Heavens! What a show,
4448 More than I’ve ever seen in all my days!
4449 A jewel box! A noble lady might glow
4450 With all of these on high holidays!
4451 How would this chain look? This display
4452 2795 Of splendour: who owns it, it’s so fine?
4454 (She puts the jewellery on and stands in front of the mirror.)
4456 If only the earrings were mine!
4457 At once one looks so different.
4458 What makes us beautiful, young blood?
4459 All that’s fine and good,
4460 2800 But it’s discounted, in the end,
4461 They praise us half in pity.
4464 All things! Oh, poverty!
4468 (Faust walking about pensively. Mephistopheles appears.)
4472 2805 Scorned by all love! And by hellfire! What’s worse?
4473 I wish I knew: I could use it in a curse!
4477 What’s wrong? What’s pinching you so badly?
4478 I never, in all my life, saw such a face!
4482 I’d pack myself off to the Devil, in disgrace,
4483 2810 If I weren’t a Devil myself already!
4487 Is something troubling your brain?
4488 It’s fitting that you’ve a raging pain.
4492 To think, the priest should get his hands on
4493 Jewellery that was meant for Gretchen!
4494 2815 Her mother snatched it up, to see,
4495 And was gripped by secret anxiety.
4496 That woman’s a marvellous sense of smell,
4497 From nosing round in her prayer-book too well,
4498 And sniffs things, ever and again,
4499 2820 To see if they’re holy or profane:
4500 And about the jewels, she felt, that’s clear,
4501 There’s not much of a blessing here.
4502 ‘My child,’ she said, ‘ill-gotten goods
4503 Snare the soul, and dissipate the blood.
4504 2825 We’ll dedicate it to the Virgin,
4505 She’ll repay us with manna from Heaven!’
4506 Margaret, grimacing wryly, was quite put out:
4507 Thinking: ‘Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth,
4508 He’s not a godless man, nor one to fear,
4509 2830 He who left these fine things here.’
4510 Her mother let the parson in:
4511 He’d scarcely let the game begin
4512 Before his eyes filled with enjoyment.
4513 He said: ‘So we see aright, we sinners,
4514 2835 Who overcome themselves are winners.
4515 The Church has a healthy stomach, when,
4516 It gobbles up lands, and don’t forget,
4517 It’s never over-eaten yet.
4518 The Church alone, dear lady, could
4519 2840 Always digest ill-gotten goods.’
4523 That’s a universal custom, too, my friend,
4524 With all those who rule, and those who lend.
4528 Then he took the bangles, chains and rings,
4529 As if they were merely trifling things,
4530 2845 Thanked her too, no less nor more
4531 Than if it were a sack of nuts one wore.
4532 Promised them their reward when they died,
4533 And left them suitably edified.
4541 Sits there, restlessly, still
4542 2850 Not knowing what she should do, or will,
4543 Thinks of the jewels night and day,
4544 But more of him who placed them in her way.
4548 The dear girl’s sadness brings me pain.
4549 Find some jewels for her, again!
4550 2855 Those first were not so fine, I’d say.
4554 Oh yes, to gentlemen it’s child’s play!
4558 Fix it: arrange it, as I want you to,
4559 Attach yourself to her neighbour, too!
4560 Don’t be a devil made of clay,
4561 2860 Get her fresh jewels straight away!
4565 Yes, gracious sir, gladly, with all my heart.
4569 Such a lovesick fool would blow up the Sun,
4570 High up in the air, with the Moon and Stars,
4571 To provide his sweetheart with some diversion.
4575 Scene X: The Neighbour’s House
4579 2865 God forgive that man I love so well,
4580 He hasn’t done right by me at all!
4581 Off into the world he’s gone,
4582 And left me here, in the dust, alone.
4583 Truly I did nothing to grieve him,
4584 2870 I gave him, God knows, fine loving.
4588 Perhaps, he’s even dead! – Yet, oh!
4589 If I’d only his death certificate to show!
4598 My little Gretchen, what’s happened?
4602 My legs are giving way beneath me!
4603 2875 I’ve found another box of jewellery
4604 In the chest: it’s of ebony, fashioned,
4605 Full of quite splendid things,
4606 And richer than the first, I think.
4610 You’d better not tell your mother:
4611 2880 She’ll give it to the Church, like the other.
4615 Ah, See now! See what a show!
4617 Martha (Dressing her with jewels.)
4619 O you’re a lucky creature, though!
4623 I can’t wear them in the street, alas,
4624 Nor be seen like this, at Mass.
4628 2885 Come often then, to me, as before:
4629 You can put them on, here, secretly:
4630 Stand, for an hour, in front of the mirror,
4631 We’ll take delight in them privately.
4632 Then give us a holiday, an occasion,
4633 2890 When people can see a fraction of them.
4634 A chain first, then a pearl in the ear: your
4635 Mother won’t know, say you’d them before.
4639 Who could have left the second casket?
4640 There’s something not proper about it!
4644 2895 Good God! Is it my mother, then?
4646 Martha (Looking through the shutter.)
4648 It’s a stranger, a gentleman – Come in!
4650 (Mephistopheles enters.)
4654 In introducing myself so freely,
4655 I ask you ladies to excuse me.
4657 (He steps back reverently on seeing Margaret.)
4659 It’s Martha Schwerdtlein I seek!
4663 2900 I’m she, what do you wish with me?
4665 Mephistopheles (Aside to her.)
4667 I know you now: that’s enough for me:
4668 You’ve a distinguished visitor there, I see.
4669 Pardon the liberty I’ve taken, pray,
4670 I’ll return this afternoon, if I may.
4674 2905 To think, child: of all things: just fancy!
4675 The gentleman takes you for a lady.
4679 I’m a poor young thing he’ll find:
4680 Heavens! The gentleman’s far too kind:
4681 The jewels and trinkets aren’t mine.
4685 2910 Ah, it’s not just the jewellery, mind:
4686 The look: the manner: she has a way!
4687 I’m pleased that I’m allowed to stay.
4691 What brings you here? I wish that you –
4695 I wish I brought you happier news! –
4696 2915 This news I hope you’ll forgive me repeating:
4697 Your husband’s dead, but sends a greeting.
4701 He’s dead? That true heart! Oh!
4702 My man is dead! I’ll die, also!
4706 Ah! Dear lady, don’t despair!
4710 2920 Hear the mournful tale I bear!
4714 That’s why I’ll never love while I’ve breath,
4715 Such a loss would grieve me to death.
4719 Joy must have sorrows: sorrow its joys, too.
4723 Tell me of his last hours: ah tell me!
4727 2925 He’s buried in Padua, close to
4728 The blessed Saint Anthony,
4729 In a consecrated space,
4730 A cool eternal resting place.
4734 Have you brought nothing else, from him?
4738 2930 Yes a request, it’s large and heavy:
4739 For you to sing a hundred masses for him!
4740 Otherwise, no, my pocket’s empty.
4744 What? No piece of show? No jewellery?
4745 What every workman has in his purse,
4746 2935 And keeps with him as his reserve,
4747 Rather than having to starve or beg!
4751 Madam, it’s a heavy grief to me:
4752 But truly his money wasn’t wasted.
4753 And then, he felt his errors greatly,
4754 2940 Yes, and bemoaned his bad luck lately.
4758 Ah! How unlucky all men are! I’ll
4759 Be sure to offer many a prayer for him.
4763 You’re worthy of soon marrying:
4764 You’re such a kindly child.
4768 2945 Oh, no! That wouldn’t do as yet.
4772 If not a husband, a lover, while you wait.
4773 It’s heaven’s greatest charm,
4774 To have a dear one on one’s arm.
4778 That’s not the custom of the country.
4782 2950 Custom or not! It seems to be.
4786 Go on with your tale!
4790 I stood beside his death-bed,
4791 Hardly better than a rubbish-tip, poor man,
4792 Of half-rotten straw: yet he died a Christian,
4793 And found that he was even further in debt.
4794 2955 ‘Alas,’ he cried, ‘I hate myself, with good reason,
4795 For leaving, as I did, my wife and my occupation!
4796 Ah the memory of that is killing me,
4797 Would in this life I might be forgiven, though!’
4801 The dear man! I forgave him long ago.
4805 2960 ‘Although, God knows, she was more to blame than me.’
4809 The liar! What! At death’s door, lies he was telling!
4813 In his last wanderings, he was rambling,
4814 If I’m any judge myself of the thing.
4815 ‘I had,’ he said, ‘no time to gaze in play:
4816 2965 First children, then bread for them each day,
4817 And I mean bread in the wider sense:
4818 And couldn’t even eat my share in silence.’
4822 Did he forget the love, the loyalty,
4823 My drudgery, night and day!
4827 2970 Not at all, he thought of it deeply, in his way.
4828 He said: ‘As I was leaving Malta
4829 I prayed hard for my wife and children:
4830 And favour came to me from heaven,
4831 Since our ship took a Turkish cutter,
4832 2975 Carrying the great Sultan’s treasure.
4833 There was a reward for bravery,
4834 And I received, in due measure,
4835 The generous share that fell to me.’
4839 What? And where? Has he buried it by chance?
4843 2980 Who can tell: the four winds know the circumstance.
4844 A lovely girl there took him on,
4845 As he, a stranger, roamed round Naples:
4846 She gave him loyalty, and loved the man,
4847 And he felt it so, till his last hour fell.
4851 2985 He stole from his children, and his wife!
4852 The rogue! All the pain and misery he met,
4853 Couldn’t keep him from that shameful life!
4857 Ah, but: now he’s died of it!
4858 If I were truly in your place,
4859 2990 I’d mourn him quietly for a year,
4860 And look, meanwhile, for a dear new face.
4864 Ah, sweet God! I’ll not easily find another,
4865 In all the world, such as my first one was!
4866 There never was a dearer fool than mine.
4867 2995 Only he loved roaming too much, at last,
4868 And foreign women, and foreign wine,
4869 And the rolling of those cursed dice.
4873 Well, that would have still been fine,
4874 If, with you, he’d followed that line,
4875 3000 And noticed nothing, on your side.
4876 I swear that, with that same condition,
4877 I’d swap rings with you, no question!
4881 O, the gentleman’s pleased to jest!
4883 Mephistopheles (To himself.)
4885 I must fly from here, swift as a bird!
4886 3005 She might hold the Devil to his word.
4890 How does your heart feel? At rest?
4894 What does the gentleman mean?
4896 Mephistopheles (To himself.)
4898 Sweet, innocent child!
4908 Oh, speak to me yet, a while!
4909 I’d like a witness, as to where, how, and when
4910 3010 My darling man died and was buried: then,
4911 As I’ve always been a friend of tradition,
4912 Put his death in the paper, the weekly edition.
4916 Yes, dear lady, two witnesses you need
4917 To verify the truth, or so all agree:
4918 3015 I’ve a rather fine companion,
4919 He can be your second man.
4920 I’ll bring him here.
4927 That young lady will be here, too?
4928 He’s a brave youth! Travelled, yes,
4929 3020 And with ladies he’s all politeness.
4933 I’d be shamed before the gentleman.
4937 Not before any king on earth, madam.
4941 Behind the house, then, in my garden,
4942 Tonight: we’ll expect you gentlemen.
4944 Scene XI: The Street
4946 (Faust. Mephistopheles.)
4950 3025 How goes it? Will it be? Will it soon be done?
4954 Ah, bravo! Do I find you all on fire?
4955 In double-quick time you’ll have your desire.
4956 You’ll meet tonight, at her neighbour Martha’s home:
4957 There’s a woman, who’s the thing,
4958 3030 For procuring and for gipsying!
4965 But, she needs something from us, too.
4969 One good turn deserves another, true.
4973 We only have to bear a valid witness,
4974 That her husband’s outstretched members bless
4975 3035 A consecrated place in Padua.
4979 Brilliant! We must first make the journey there!
4983 Sacred Simplicity! There’s no need to do that.
4984 Just testify, without saying too much to her.
4988 If you can’t do better than that, your pact I’ll tear.
4992 3040 O holy man! Now I see you there!
4993 Is it the first time in your life, come swear,
4994 That you’ve ever born false witness?
4995 Haven’t you shown skill in definition
4996 Of God, the World, what’s in it, Men,
4997 3045 What moves them, in mind and breast?
4998 With impudent brow, and swollen chest?
4999 And if you look at it more deeply, oh yes,
5000 Did you know as much now - confess,
5001 As you do about Herr Schwerdtlein’s death?
5005 3050 You are, and you’ll remain, a Liar and a Sophist.
5009 Yes when no one’s the wiser for it.
5010 This coming morn, in all honour though,
5011 Won’t you beguile poor Gretchen so:
5012 And swear you love her with all your soul?
5020 3055 Well, and good!
5021 And will your eternal Truth and Love,
5022 Your one all-powerful Force, above –
5023 Flow from your heart, too, as it should?
5027 Stop! Stop! It will! If I but feel,
5028 3060 For that emotion, for that throng,
5029 Seek the name, that none reveal,
5030 Roam, with senses, through the world.
5031 Seize on every highest word,
5032 And call the fire, that I’m tasting,
5033 3065 Endless, eternal, everlasting –
5034 Does that to some devil’s game of lies belong?
5038 Yet, I’m still right!
5042 Hear one thing more,
5043 I beg you, and spare my breath – the one
5044 Who wants to hold fast, and has a tongue,
5045 3070 He’ll hold for sure.
5046 Come, chattering fills me with disgust,
5047 And then you’re right, especially since I must.
5049 Scene XII: The Garden
5051 (Margaret on Faust’s arm, Martha and Mephistopheles walking up and
5054 I know the gentleman flatters me,
5055 Lowers himself, and shames me, too.
5056 3075 A traveller is used to being
5057 Content, out of courtesy, with any food.
5058 I know too well, so learned a man,
5059 Can’t feed himself on my poor bran.
5063 A glance, a word from you, feeds me more,
5064 3080 Than all the world’s wisest lore.
5066 (He kisses her hand.)
5070 Don’t trouble yourself! How could you kiss it?
5071 It’s such a nasty, rough thing!
5072 What work haven’t I done with it!
5073 My mother’s so exacting.
5079 3085 And you, sir, you’re always travelling?
5083 Ah, work and duty are such a bother!
5084 There’s many a place one’s sad at leaving,
5085 And daren’t stay a moment longer!
5089 In youth it’s fine, up and down,
5090 3090 Flitting about, the whole world over:
5091 Then harsher days come round,
5092 And lonely bachelors small joy discover,
5093 In sliding towards their hole in the ground.
5097 I view the prospect with horror.
5101 3095 Then take advice in time, dear sir.
5107 Yes, out of sight is out of mind!
5108 Politeness comes naturally to you:
5109 But you’ll meet friends, often, who,
5110 Are more sensible than me, you’ll find.
5114 3100 Dearest, believe me, what men call sense,
5115 Is often just vanity and short-sightedness.
5122 Ah, that simplicity and innocence never know
5123 Themselves, or their heavenly worth!
5124 That humble meekness, the highest grace
5125 3105 That Nature bestows so lovingly –
5129 It’s only for a moment that you think of me,
5130 I’ve plenty of time to dream about your face.
5134 You’re often alone, then?
5138 Yes, our household’s a little one,
5139 3110 Yet it has to be cared for by someone.
5140 We have no servant: I sweep, knit, sew,
5141 And cook, I’m working early and late:
5142 And in everything my mother is so
5143 Strict, and straight.
5144 3115 Not that she has to be quite so economical:
5145 We could be more generous than others:
5146 My father left a little fortune for us:
5147 A house and garden by the town-wall.
5148 But now my days are spent quietly:
5149 3120 My brother is a soldier: I’d
5150 A younger sister who died.
5151 The trouble I had with that child:
5152 Yet I’d take it on again, the worry,
5153 She was so dear to me.
5156 An angel, if like you.
5160 3125 I raised her, and she loved me too.
5161 After my father died, she was born,
5162 We gave mother up for lost, so worn
5163 And wretchedly she lay there then,
5164 And slowly, day by day, grew well again.
5165 3130 She couldn’t think of feeding
5166 It herself: that poor little thing,
5167 And so I nursed it all alone,
5168 On milk and water, as if it were my own,
5169 In my arms, in my lap,
5170 3135 It charmed me, tumbling, and grew fat.
5174 You found your greatest happiness there, for sure.
5178 But also truly many a weary hour.
5179 The baby’s cradle stood at night
5180 Beside my bed: and if it hardly stirred
5181 3140 I woke outright:
5182 Now I nursed it, now laid it beside me: heard
5183 When it cried, and left my bed, and often
5184 Danced it back and forth, in the room: and then,
5185 At break of dawn stood at the washtub, again:
5186 3145 Then the market and the kitchen, oh,
5187 And every day just like tomorrow.
5188 One sometimes lacks the courage, sir, and yet
5189 One appreciates one’s food and rest.
5195 Women have the worst of it: it’s true:
5196 3150 A bachelor is hard to change, you see.
5200 That just depends on the likes of you,
5201 The right teacher might improve me.
5205 Say, have you never found anyone, dear sir?
5206 Has your heart never been captured, anywhere?
5210 3155 The proverb says: A hearth of your own,
5211 And a good wife, are worth pearls and gold.
5215 I mean: have you never felt desire, even lightly?
5219 I’ve everywhere been treated most politely.
5223 I meant to say: were you never seriously smitten?
5227 3160 With ladies, one should never dare be flippant.
5231 Ah, you won’t understand me!
5234 I am sorry! Yet you’ll find
5235 I understand – that you are very kind.
5241 And, Angel, did you recognise me again,
5242 As soon as I appeared in the garden?
5246 3165 Didn’t you see my gaze drop then?
5250 And you forgive the liberty I’ve taken,
5251 The impertinence of it all,
5252 Just as you were leaving the Cathedral?
5256 I was flustered, such a thing’s never happened to me:
5257 3170 ‘Ah’, I thought, ‘has he seen, in your behaviour,
5258 Something that’s impertinent or improper?
5259 No one could ever say anything bad about me.
5260 He seems to be walking suddenly, with you,
5261 As though he dealt with a girl of easy virtue’.
5262 3175 I confess, I didn’t know what it was, though,
5263 That I began to feel, and to your advantage too,
5264 But certainly I was angry with myself, oh,
5265 That I could not be angrier with you.
5275 (She picks a Marguerite and pulls the petals off one by one.)
5278 What’s that for, a bouquet?
5288 3180 No, you’ll laugh if I say!
5290 (She pulls off the petals, murmuring to herself.)
5294 What are you whispering?
5296 Margaret (Half aloud.)
5298 He loves me – he loves me not.
5302 You sweet face that Heaven forgot!
5304 Margaret (Continuing.)
5306 Loves me – Not – Loves me – Not
5308 (She plucks the last petal with delight.)
5314 Yes, my child! Let this flower-speech
5315 3185 Be heaven’s speech to you. He loves you!
5316 Do you know what that means? He loves you!
5318 (He grasps her hands.)
5325 Don’t tremble, let this look,
5326 Let this clasping of hands tell you
5327 3190 What’s inexpressible:
5328 To give oneself wholly, and feel
5329 A joy that must be eternal!
5330 Eternal! – Its end would bring despair.
5333 (Margaret presses his hand, frees herself, and runs away. He stands a
5334 moment in thought: then follows her.)
5336 Martha (Coming forward.)
5342 3195 Yes, and we must away.
5346 I’d ask you to remain here longer,
5347 But this is quite a wicked place.
5348 It’s as if they had nothing to do yonder,
5349 And no work they should be doing
5350 3200 But watching their neighbours’ to-ing and fro-ing,
5351 And whatever one does, insults are hurled.
5352 And our couple, now?
5356 Flown up the passage, there.
5357 Wilful little birds!
5361 He seems keen on her.
5365 And she on him. It’s the way of the world.
5367 Scene XIII: An Arbour in the Garden
5369 (Margaret comes in, hides behind the door of the garden-house, holds
5370 her fingers to her lips, and peeps through the gaps.)
5378 3205 Ah, rascal, you tease me so! I’ve got you!
5382 Margaret (Clasping him, and returning the kiss.)
5384 Dearest man! With all my heart I love you!
5386 (Mephistopheles knocks.)
5388 Faust (Stamping his foot in frustration.)
5404 Yes, sir, it’s late!
5408 May I keep company with you, though?
5412 My mother would tell me, – Farewell!
5424 3210 And soon to meet again!
5426 (Faust and Mephistopheles exit.)
5430 Dear God! That one man, by thinking,
5431 Can know everything, oh, everything!
5432 I stand in front of him, ashamed
5433 And just say yes to all he says.
5434 3215 I’m such a poor, ignorant child, and he -
5435 I can’t understand what he sees in me.
5437 Scene XIV: Forest and Cavern
5441 Sublime spirit, you gave me all, all,
5442 I asked for. Not in vain have you
5443 Revealed your face to me in flame.
5444 3220 You gave me Nature’s realm of splendour,
5445 With the power to feel it, and enjoy.
5446 Not merely as a cold, awed stranger,
5447 But allowing me to look deep inside,
5448 Like seeing into the heart of a friend.
5449 3225 You lead the ranks of living creatures
5450 Before me, showing me my brothers
5451 In the silent woods, the air, the water.
5452 And when the storm roars in the forest,
5453 When giant firs fell their neighbours,
5454 3230 Crushing nearby branches in their fall,
5455 Filling the hills with hollow thunder,
5456 You lead me to the safety of a cave,
5457 Show me my own self, and reveal
5458 Your deep, secret wonders in my heart.
5459 3235 And when the pure Moon, to my eyes,
5460 Rises, calming me, the silvery visions
5461 Of former times, drift all around me,
5462 From high cliffs, and moist thickets,
5463 Tempering thought’s austere delight.
5464 3240 Oh, I know now that nothing can be
5465 Perfect for Mankind. You gave me,
5466 With this joy, that brings me nearer,
5467 Nearer to the gods, a companion,
5468 Whom I can no longer do without,
5469 Though he is impudent, and chilling,
5470 3245 Degrades me in my own eyes, and with
5471 A word, a breath, makes your gifts nothing.
5472 He fans a wild fire in my heart,
5473 Always alive to that lovely form.
5474 So I rush from desire to enjoyment,
5475 3250 And in enjoyment pine to feel desire.
5477 (Mephistopheles enters.)
5481 Haven’t you had enough of this life yet?
5482 How can you be happy all this time?
5483 It’s fine for a man to try it for a bit,
5484 But then you need a newer clime!
5488 3255 I wish you’d something else to do,
5489 Than plague me on a good day.
5493 Now, now! I’d gladly ignore you,
5494 You don’t really mean it anyway.
5495 You’d be little loss to me,
5496 3260 A rude, mad, sour companion.
5497 One’s hands are full all day, and see,
5498 What pleases you, or what to let be,
5499 No one can tell from your expression.
5503 So that’s the tone he takes!
5504 3265 I’m to thank him, for boring me.
5508 Poor Son of Earth, how could you make
5509 Your way through life without me?
5510 I’ve cured you for a while at least
5511 Of your twitches of imagination,
5512 3270 If I weren’t here, you’d certainly
5513 Have walked right off this earthly station.
5514 In rocky hollows, in a hole,
5515 Why sit around here, like an owl?
5516 From soaking moss and dripping stone,
5517 3275 Sucking your nourishment, like a toad?
5518 Spend your time sweeter, better!
5519 Your body’s still stuck there with the Doctor.
5523 Do you understand the new power of being
5524 That a walk in the wilderness can bring?
5525 3280 But then, if you were able to guess,
5526 You’re devil enough to begrudge my happiness.
5530 An other-worldly pleasure.
5531 Night and day, mountains for leisure.
5532 Clasping heaven and earth, blissfully,
5533 3285 Inflating yourself, becoming a deity.
5534 With expectant urge burrowing through earth’s core,
5535 Feeling all that six days’ work, in yours,
5536 To taste who knows what, in power’s pride,
5537 Overflowing, almost, with the joy of life,
5538 3290 Vanishing, the Earthly Son,
5539 And into some deep Intuition –
5543 I can’t say how – passing inside.
5551 Ah, you don’t like it from me!
5552 You’ve the right, to say ‘fie’ to me, politely.
5553 3295 Before chaste ears men daren’t speak aloud,
5554 That which chaste hearts can’t do without:
5555 Short and sweet, I begrudge the pleasure you get
5556 From occasionally lying to yourself, about it.
5557 But you won’t hold out for long, I’m sure.
5558 3300 You’re already over-driven,
5559 Sooner or later you’ll be given
5560 To madness, or to fear and horror.
5561 Enough! Your lover sits inside,
5562 All is dull, oppressive to her,
5563 3305 She can’t get you out of her mind,
5564 Her deep love overwhelms her.
5565 First your love’s flood round her flowed,
5566 As a stream pours from melted snow:
5567 You’ve so filled her heart, and now,
5568 3310 Your stream again is shallow.
5569 Instead of enthroning yourself in the wood,
5570 Let the great gentleman do some good,
5571 To that poor little ape of flesh and blood,
5572 And reward her, I think, for her love.
5573 3315 Her days seem pitifully long:
5574 She sits at the window, cloud drifting
5575 Over the old City wall, sees it lifting.
5576 ‘Would I were a little bird!’ runs her song,
5577 All day long, and all night long.
5578 3320 Sometimes lively, mostly not,
5579 Sometimes crying out, in tears,
5580 Then quiet again, it appears,
5585 You snake! You snake, you!
5589 3325 A touch! That caught you!
5593 Wretch! Be gone from my presence:
5594 Don’t name that lovely girl to me!
5595 Don’t bring desire for that sweet body
5596 Before every half-maddened sense!
5600 3330 Well, what then? She thinks you’ve flown away,
5601 And, half and half, you already have, I’d say.
5605 I’m near her, and were I still far,
5606 I can’t lose her or forget her,
5607 I even envy the body of our Lord,
5608 3335 When her lips touch it at the altar.
5612 Quite so, my friend! My envy often closes
5613 On that pair of twins that feed among the roses.
5617 Away from me, procurer!
5621 Fine, you curse and I must smile.
5622 The god who made both man and woman,
5623 3340 He likewise knew the noblest profession,
5624 So made the opportunity as well.
5625 Go on, it’s a crying shame!
5626 Since you’re bound, all the same
5627 For your lover’s room, not death.
5631 3345 Where is the heavenly joy in her arms?
5632 Let me warm myself with her charms!
5633 Do I not always feel her absent breath?
5634 Am I not the fugitive? The homeless one?
5635 The creature without aim or rest,
5636 3350 A torrent in the rocks, still thundering down,
5637 Foaming eagerly into the abyss?
5638 And she beside it, with vague childlike mind,
5639 In a hut there, on a little Alpine field,
5640 So, her first homely life you’d find,
5641 3355 Hidden there in that little world.
5642 And I, the god-forsaken,
5643 Was not great enough,
5644 To grasp the cliffs, and take them,
5645 And crush them into dust!
5646 3360 I still must undermine her peaceful life!
5647 You, Hell, must have your sacrifice.
5648 Help, Devil, curtail the anxious moment brewing.
5649 What must be, let it be, and swiftly!
5650 Let her fate also fall on me,
5651 3365 And she and I rush to ruin!
5655 Again it glows: again it seethes!
5656 Go in and comfort her, you fool!
5657 When a brain, like yours, no exit sees,
5658 It calls it the end of all things, too.
5659 3370 Praise him who keeps his courage fresh!
5660 Or you’ll soon get quite be-devilled, there.
5661 I find nothing in the world so tasteless,
5662 As a Devil, in despair.
5664 Scene XV: Gretchen’s Room
5666 (Gretchen alone at the spinning wheel.)
5669 3375 My heart is sore:
5670 I’ll find it, never,
5675 3380 The world is all,
5681 3385 Seems dazed to me.
5685 I’ll find it, never,
5688 3390 Only to see him
5694 3395 His noble figure,
5696 His eyes: their power.
5700 3400 His fingers’ touch,
5705 I’ll find it, never,
5718 Scene XVI: Martha’s Garden
5724 Promise me, Heinrich!
5731 3415 Say, as regards religion, how you feel.
5732 I know that you are a dear, good man,
5733 Yet, for you, it seems, it has no appeal.
5737 Leave that alone, child! You feel I’m kind to you:
5738 For Love I’d give my blood, my life too.
5739 3420 I’ll rob no man of his church and faith.
5743 That’s not right, we must have faith.
5751 Ah, if in this I was only fluent!
5752 You don’t respect the Holy Sacrament.
5760 Without wanting it, though. You’ve passed
5761 3425 So many years without confession, or mass.
5762 Do you believe in God?
5766 My darling, who dare say:
5768 Choose priest to ask, or sage,
5769 The answer would seem a joke, would it not,
5770 Played on whoever asks?
5774 3430 So, you don’t believe?
5778 Sweetest being, don’t misunderstand me!
5779 Who dares name the nameless?
5780 Or who dares to confess:
5782 3435 Yet who, in feeling,
5784 Says: ‘I don’t believe’?
5787 3440 Does it not clasp, uphold,
5789 Don’t the heavens arch above us?
5790 Doesn’t earth lie here under our feet?
5791 And don’t the eternal stars, rising,
5792 3445 Look down on us in friendship?
5793 Are not my eyes reflected in yours?
5794 And don’t all things press
5795 On your head and heart,
5796 And weave, in eternal mystery,
5797 3450 Visibly: invisibly, around you?
5798 Fill your heart from it: it is so vast,
5799 And when you are blessed by the deepest feeling,
5800 Call it then what you wish,
5801 Joy! Heart! Love! God!
5803 For it! Feeling is all:
5804 Names are sound and smoke,
5805 Veiling Heaven’s bright glow.
5809 That’s all well and good, I know,
5810 3460 The priest says much the same,
5811 Only, in slightly different words.
5815 It’s what all hearts, say, everywhere
5816 Under the heavenly day,
5817 Each in its own speech:
5818 3465 And why not I in mine?
5822 Listening to you, it almost seems quite fine,
5823 Yet something still seems wrong, to me,
5824 Since you don’t possess Christianity.
5832 I’ve long been grieved
5833 3470 To see you in such company.
5841 That man who hangs round you so,
5842 I hate him in my innermost soul:
5843 Nothing in all my life has ever
5844 Given my heart such pain, no, never,
5845 3475 As his repulsive face has done.
5849 Don’t be afraid of him, sweet one!
5853 His presence here, it chills my blood.
5854 To every other man I wish good:
5855 But much as I’m longing to see you
5856 3480 I’ve a secret horror of seeing him, too,
5857 I’ve thought him a rogue, all along!
5858 God forgive me, if I do him wrong!
5862 There have to be such odd fellows.
5866 I’d rather not live with such as those!
5867 3485 Once he’s inside the door, again,
5868 He looks around in a mocking way,
5870 You can see he’s not at all in sympathy:
5871 It’s written on his forehead even,
5872 3490 That there’s no spirit of love within.
5873 I’m so happy in your arms,
5874 Free, untroubled, and so warm,
5875 Yet I’m stifled in his presence.
5879 You angel, full of presentiments!
5883 3495 It oppresses me, so deeply, too,
5884 That when he meets with us, wherever,
5885 I feel that I no longer love you.
5886 Ah I can’t pray when he’s there,
5887 And that gnaws inside me: oh,
5888 3500 Heinrich, for you too, surely it’s so.
5892 It’s merely an antipathy!
5900 Ah, will there never be
5901 An hour where I can clasp you to my heart,
5902 And heart to heart, and soul, to soul impart?
5906 3505 Ah, if I only slept alone!
5907 For you, I’d gladly draw the bolt tonight:
5908 But my mother hears the slightest tone,
5909 And if we were caught outright,
5910 I’d die on the selfsame spot!
5914 3510 You angel: no need for that.
5915 Here is a little phial to keep!
5916 Three drops of this, in her drink, she’ll take,
5917 And Nature will favour her with deepest sleep.
5921 What would I not do for your sake?
5922 3515 I hope that it won’t harm her though!
5926 Would I advise it, Love, if it were so?
5930 Ah, I only have to see you, dearest man,
5931 And something bends me to your will,
5932 For you, so much, I have already done,
5933 3520 Little remains for me to do for you still.
5937 (Mephistopheles enters.)
5939 The little monkey! Has it gone?
5943 Spying again, are you?
5947 I’ve heard in infinite detail, how
5948 The Doctor works his catechism through,
5949 And I hope it does you good, now.
5950 3525 Girls are always so keen to review
5951 Whether one’s virtuous, and sticks to the rules.
5952 They think if a man can be led, he’ll follow too.
5956 Monster, you can’t see
5957 How this true loving soul,
5958 3530 Full of a belief,
5960 Her salvation, torments herself so,
5961 In case her lover should be lost indeed.
5965 You sensual wooer, beyond the sensual,
5966 3535 A Magdalen leads you by the nose, I see.
5970 Abortion, of the filth and fire of hell!
5974 And how well she reads one’s physiognomy:
5975 In my presence, senses, without knowing how,
5976 The hidden mind behind the mask: she feels
5977 3540 That I’m an evil genius, at least, and now
5978 Perhaps, that it’s the Devil it conceals.
5987 I take my pleasure in it too!
5989 Scene XVII: At The Fountain
5991 (Gretchen and Lisbeth.)
5995 Have you not heard from Barbara?
5999 3545 Not a word. I go out so seldom.
6003 It’s certain, Sibyl told me: well then,
6004 She finally fell to that seducer.
6005 There’s a lady for you!
6014 She’s feeding two when she eats and drinks.
6022 Serves her right then, finally.
6023 She clung to that fellow, oh so tightly!
6024 That was a fine to-ing and fro-ing,
6025 Round the village, and dance-going,
6026 3555 Ahead of us all, they had to shine,
6027 Him treating her always to cakes and wine:
6028 She the picture of loveliness, oh so fine,
6029 So low after all, then, and so shameless,
6030 And the gifts she took from him, nameless.
6031 3560 It was all kissing and carrying on:
6032 But now the flower is gone!
6040 Why are you so pitying?
6041 When each of us was at our spinning,
6042 When mother never let us out,
6043 3565 She and her lover hung about:
6044 On the bench, in a dark alley,
6045 Forgetting the time, he and she.
6046 She can’t raise her head again,
6047 In a sinner’s shift now, penitent.
6051 3570 Surely he’ll take her for his wife.
6055 He’d be a fool! A lively fellow
6056 Can ply his trade elsewhere, and so -
6060 Oh, that’s not nice!
6064 If she gets him, she’ll reap ill in a trice,
6065 3575 The lads will tear at her wreath, what’s more
6066 We’ll scatter chaff in front of her door!
6070 Gretchen (Walking home.)
6072 How proudly I’d revile her, then,
6073 Whenever some poor girl had fallen!
6074 I couldn’t find words enough, I mean,
6075 3580 To pour out scorn for another’s sin!
6076 Black as it seemed, I made it blacker,
6077 Not black enough for me: oh never.
6078 It blessed its own being, that proud self,
6079 Yet now I’m the image of sin, myself!
6080 3585 Yet all that drove me on to do it,
6081 God! Was so fine! Oh, so sweet!
6083 Scene XVIII: A Tower
6085 (In a niche of its wall a shrine, and image of the Mater Dolorosa,
6086 with flowers in front of it. Gretchen sets out fresh flowers. )
6092 Your kind face, to my affliction!
6094 3590 A sword in your heart,
6095 Where a thousand pains start,
6096 You look up, at your dead Son.
6098 You look up to the Father,
6099 You send Him your sighs, there,
6100 3595 For His, and for your, affliction.
6104 Is the pain inside my bones?
6105 What my poor heart fears for,
6106 3600 What it quakes for, and longs for
6107 You know, and you alone!
6110 How sore, sore, sore now
6111 How sore my heart must be!
6112 3605 Ah, when I’m alone here,
6113 I moan, moan, moan here:
6114 My heart it breaks in me.
6116 The pots before my window!
6117 My tears bedewed them so,
6118 3610 In the early dawn, when
6119 I picked the flowers below.
6121 The sun it shone so brightly,
6122 And early, in my room,
6123 Where I sat already,
6124 3615 On my bed, in deepest gloom.
6126 Help me! Oh, save me, from shame and destruction!
6129 Your kind face, to my affliction!
6133 (The Street in front of Gretchen’s door.)
6135 Valentine (A soldier, Gretchen’s brother.)
6137 3620 When I have sat, and heard the toasts,
6138 Where everyone makes good his boasts,
6139 And comrades praised, to me, the flower
6140 Of maidenhood, and loud the hour,
6141 With brimming glass that blurred the praise,
6142 3625 And elbows sticking out all ways,
6143 I sat in my own peace secure,
6144 Listening to the boastful roar,
6145 And as I stroked my beard, I’d smile
6146 And take a full glass in my hand,
6147 3630 Saying: ‘Each to his own, but I’ll
6148 Ask if there’s any in this land,
6149 Who, to my Gretel, can compare
6150 Whose worth can ever equal hers?’
6151 Hear! Hear! Clink! Clang! Went around:
6152 3635 Some cried out: ‘He’s quite correct,
6153 She’s an ornament to all her sex.’
6154 There sat the boasters, not a sound.
6155 And now! – I could tear my hair out, bawl,
6156 And dash my head against the wall! –
6157 3640 With jeers, they now turn up their noses:
6158 Every rogue can taunt me, he supposes!
6159 Like a bankrupt debtor, when I’m sitting,
6160 A casual word can start me sweating!
6161 And though I thrash them all together,
6162 3645 I’ve still no right to call them liars.
6164 Who goes there? What’s creeping by?
6165 If I’m not wrong, there’s two I spy.
6166 If it’s him, I’ll have him by the skin,
6167 Alive he’ll not leave the place he’s in!
6169 (Faust. Mephistopheles)
6173 3650 How the glow of the eternal light
6174 Shines from the Sacristy window, there,
6175 On either side grows fainter, fainter,
6176 And all around draws in the night!
6177 Now it seems as dark within my heart.
6181 3655 And I’ve a little of the tom-cat’s art,
6182 That creeps around the fire escape,
6183 Then slinks along the wall, a silent shape,
6184 I’m quite virtuous in my way,
6185 A little prone to thieve, and stray.
6186 3660 The splendour of Walpurgis Night,
6187 Already haunts all my members,
6188 It’s the day after tomorrow’s light:
6189 There, why one watches, one remembers.
6193 Meanwhile you’ll bring that wealth to view,
6194 3665 That I see there, glimmering, behind you?
6198 You’ll soon experience the delight
6199 Of holding this cauldron to the light.
6200 I recently had a squint inside –
6201 Where splendid silver dollars hide.
6205 3670 And not a jewel, or a ring,
6206 To adorn my darling girl?
6210 Among the rest I saw a thing,
6211 A sort of necklace, made of pearl.
6215 That’s good! It’s painful to me,
6216 3675 To take no gift for her to see.
6220 You shouldn’t find it so annoying,
6221 To get something now, for nothing.
6222 Now the sky glows, filled with stars,
6223 You’ll hear the work of a master:
6224 3680 I’ll sing a few moralising bars,
6225 All the better to seduce her.
6227 (Sings to the zither.)
6232 3685 At your lover’s door?
6236 Let out a maid no more!
6238 3690 Take care: for once
6241 Goodnight to you, poor thing!
6244 3695 From every thief,
6245 Unless you’ve a wedding ring.’
6247 Valentine (Approaching.)
6249 Whom do you lure? By every element!
6250 You evil-tongued rat-catcher!
6251 3700 To the devil, with your instrument!
6252 To the devil, too, with the singer!
6256 The zither’s broken! There’s nothing left of it.
6260 There’s a still a skull left I’ll need to split!
6262 Mephistopheles (To Faust.)
6264 Look lively, Doctor! Don’t give ground.
6265 3705 Stand by: I’ll command this thing.
6266 Out with your fly-whisk, now.
6267 You lunge! I’m parrying.
6275 And why not, indeed?
6287 The devil opposes me!
6288 3710 What’s this? My hand’s already maimed.
6290 Mephistopheles (To Faust.)
6300 Now, the lout is tamed!
6301 Away, we must go! Swiftly, of course,
6302 Soon the cries of murder will begin,
6303 With the police, now, I’m well in:
6304 3715 But not so much so with the courts.
6306 (He exits with Faust.)
6308 Martha (At the window.)
6310 Come here! Come here!
6312 Gretchen (At the window.)
6318 Hear how they swear and struggle, yell and fight.
6322 Here’s one dead already!
6324 Martha (Leaving the house.)
6326 Where have the murderers gone?
6328 Gretchen (Leaving the house.)
6330 Who is it, lying there?
6334 3720 Your mother’s son.
6338 Almighty God! What misery!
6342 I’m dying! That’s soon spoken,
6343 And, sooner still, it will be done.
6344 Why stand there, crying, woman?
6345 3725 Come, hear me everyone!
6347 (They gather round him.)
6349 You’re still young, my Gretchen, see!
6350 And still haven’t sense enough, to be
6351 Effective in your occupation.
6352 I’ll tell you confidentially:
6353 3730 Now that you’re a whore indeed,
6354 Be one, by proclamation!
6358 My brother! God! Why speak to me so?
6362 In this business, leave God alone!
6363 Sadly, what is done is done,
6364 3735 And what will come: will come.
6365 Begin with one, in secret, then,
6366 Soon you’ll gather other men,
6367 And, when a dozen of them have had you,
6368 All the town can have you too.
6369 3740 When Shame herself appears,
6370 She’s first brought secretly to light,
6371 Then they draw the veil of night
6372 Over both her eyes and ears:
6373 Men would gladly kill her, I say,
6374 3745 But they let her walk about and prosper,
6375 So she goes nakedly by day,
6376 Yet isn’t any lovelier.
6377 She’s the uglier to our sight,
6378 The more it is she seeks the light.
6379 3750 Truly I can see the day
6380 When all honest people
6381 Will turn aside from you, girl,
6382 As from a corpse with plague.
6383 Your heart’s flesh will despair,
6384 3755 When they look you in the face,
6385 You’ll have no golden chain to wear!
6386 At the altar, there, you’ll have no place!
6387 You’ll not be dancing joyfully
6388 In all your lovely finery!
6389 3760 In some wretched gloomy corner, you
6390 Will hide, with cripples and beggars too,
6391 And, though God may still forgive,
6392 Be damned on earth while you live!
6396 Commend your soul to God’s mercy!
6397 3765 Will you end your life with blasphemy?
6401 If I could destroy your withered body,
6402 Shameless, bawd, I’d hope to see
6403 A full measure of forgiveness
6404 For me, and all my sinfulness.
6408 3770 My brother! These are the pains of hell!
6412 I said, leave off weeping, girl!
6413 When you and honour chose to part,
6414 That was the sword-thrust in my heart.
6415 I go, through a sleep within the grave,
6416 3775 To God, as a soldier, true and brave.
6420 Scene XX: The Cathedral
6422 (A Mass, with organ and choir.)
6424 (Gretchen among a large congregation: the Evil Spirit behind
6429 How different it was, Gretchen,
6430 When you, still innocent,
6431 Came here to the altar,
6432 And from that well-thumbed Book,
6433 3780 Babbled your prayers,
6434 Half, a childish game,
6435 Half, God in your heart!
6437 What’s in your mind?
6440 Do you pray for your mother’s soul, who
6441 Through you, fell asleep to long, long torment?
6442 Whose blood is on your doorstep?
6443 3790 And beneath your heart,
6444 Does not something stir and swell,
6445 And trouble you, and itself,
6446 A presence full of foreboding?
6451 3795 Would I were free of the thoughts
6452 That rush here and there inside me,
6455 Choir (Singing the Requiem Mass, the verses of Thomas of Celano, which
6456 commence: ‘That day, the day of wrath, will dissolve the world to
6459 ‘Dies Irae, dies illa,
6460 Solvet saeclum in favilla!’
6466 3800 Wrath grasps you!
6471 3805 To fiery torment
6477 Would I were not here!
6478 It seems to me as if the organ
6479 3810 Steals my breath,
6481 My heart in the abyss.
6485 (Verse 6:‘So when the Judge takes the chair, whatever is hidden will
6486 appear, nothing is left unpunished there.’)
6488 ‘Judex ergo cum sedebit,
6489 Quidquid latet adparebit,
6490 3815 Nil unultum remanebit.’
6495 The pillars of the walls
6498 3820 Crush me! – Air!
6502 Hide yourself! Sin and shame
6507 Choir (Verse 7: ‘What shall I say in that misery, who shall I ask to
6508 speak for me, when the righteous will be saved, and barely?’)
6510 3825 ‘Quid sum miser tunc dicturus,
6511 Quem patronum rogaturus,
6512 Cum vix Justus sit securus?’
6516 The transfigured, turn
6517 Their faces from you.
6518 3830 The pure, shudder
6519 To offer you their hand.
6522 Choir (Repeats: ‘What shall I say in that misery?’)
6524 ‘Quid sum miser tunc dicturus?’
6528 Neighbour! Your restorative!
6530 (She falls, fainting.)
6532 Scene XXI: Walpurgis Night
6534 (The Hartz Mountains, in the region of Schierke and Elend.)
6536 (Faust, Mephistopheles.)
6540 3835 Don’t you just long for a broomstick?
6541 I wish I’d the sturdiest goat to ride.
6542 Like this, the journey’s not so quick.
6546 So long as my legs can do the trick,
6547 This knotted stick will do me fine.
6548 3840 Why do we need a shorter way! –
6549 To wander this labyrinth of valleys,
6550 Climb all these cliffs and gullies,
6551 From which the waters ever spray,
6552 That’s a delight enchants the day!
6553 3845 Spring stirs already in the birches,
6554 And even the fir tree knows it now:
6555 Shouldn’t our limbs feel it search us?
6559 Truly, I don’t feel a thing!
6560 It’s winter in my body, still,
6561 3850 On my path I want it frosty, snowing.
6562 How sadly the Moon’s imperfect circle
6563 With its red belated glow, is rising,
6564 So dim its light that at every step
6565 You scrape a rock, or else a tree!
6566 3855 Ah, there, a will o’ the wisp leapt!
6567 It’s burning fiercely, now, I see.
6568 Hey! My friend! May I ask your aid?
6569 Would you like to give us a blaze?
6570 Be so good as to light us up the hill!
6574 3860 With respect, I hope I’ll still be able,
6575 To keep my Natural light quite stable:
6576 We usually zig-zag here, at will.
6580 Ha, ha! He thinks to play the human game.
6581 Go straight along now, in the Devil’s name!
6582 3865 Or I’ll blow out your flickering spark!
6586 You’re master of the house, I’ll remark,
6587 And yes, I’ll serve you willingly.
6588 But think! The mount is magically mad today,
6589 And if a will o’ the wisp should lead the way,
6590 3870 You mustn’t judge things too precisely.
6592 Faust, Mephistopheles, The Will O’ The Wisp (In alternating song.)
6594 We it seems, now find ourselves.
6595 In the sphere of dreams and magic,
6596 Do us honour, guide us well
6597 So our journey will be quick,
6598 3875 Through the wide, deserted spaces!
6599 Tree on tree now shift their places,
6600 See how fast they open to us
6601 And the cliffs bow down before us,
6602 And their long and rocky noses,
6603 3880 How they whistle and blow, for us!
6604 Through the stones, and through the grasses,
6605 Stream and streamlet, downward, hurrying.
6606 Is that rustling? Is that singing?
6607 Do I hear sweet lovers’ sighing,
6608 3885 Heavenly days, is that their babbling?
6609 What we hope for, what we love!
6610 And the echoes, like the murmuring
6611 Of those other days, are ringing.
6612 ‘Too-wit! Too-woo!’ sounding nearer,
6613 3890 Owl there, and jay, and plover,
6614 Are they all awake above?
6615 A salamander in the scrub, he’s
6616 Long of leg, and fat of belly!
6617 And every root like a snake,
6618 3895 Over sand and rock all bent,
6619 Stretches with a strange intent,
6620 To scare us, of us prisoners make:
6621 From the gnarled and living mass,
6622 Stretching towards those who pass,
6623 3900 Fibrous tentacles. And mice
6624 Multi-coloured, lemming-wise,
6625 In the moss and in the heather!
6626 And all the fire-flies glowing,
6627 Crushed together, tightly crowding,
6628 3905 In their tangled cohorts gather.
6629 Tell me, are we standing still,
6630 Or are we climbing up the hill?
6631 All seems spinning like a mill,
6632 Rocks and trees, with angry faces
6633 3910 Lights, now, wandering in spaces,
6634 Massing: swelling at their will.
6638 Grasp me bravely by the coat-tail!
6639 Here’s a summit in the middle,
6640 Where, astonished you can see,
6641 3915 Mammon glowing furiously.
6645 How strangely, through the hollow, glows
6646 A sort of dull red morning light!
6647 Into the deepest gorge it flows,
6648 Scenting abysses in their night.
6649 3920 There vapour rises: here cloud sweeps,
6650 Here the glow burns through the haze,
6651 Now like a fragile thread it creeps,
6652 Now like a coloured fountain plays.
6653 Here a vast length winds its way,
6654 3925 In a hundred veins, down the vales,
6655 And here in a corner, locked away,
6656 All at once, now lonely, fails.
6657 Nearby the sparks pour down,
6658 Like showers of golden sand,
6659 3930 But see! On all the heights around,
6660 The cliffs, now incandescent, stand.
6664 Has Mammon not lit his palace
6665 Splendidly, for this festivity?
6666 It’s fortunate you’re here to see,
6667 3935 I already sense the eager guests.
6671 How the wind roars through the air!
6672 And whips around my head!
6676 Grasp the ancient stony bed,
6677 Lest you’re thrown in the abyss, there.
6678 3940 Mist dims the night to deepest black.
6679 Hear the forest timbers crack!
6680 The owls are flying off in terror.
6681 Hear, how the columns shatter,
6682 In the vast, evergreen halls.
6683 3945 Now the boughs groan and fall!
6684 All the tree-trunks are thrumming!
6685 All their roots are creaking, gaping!
6686 Sinking in a tangled horror,
6687 Crashing down on each other,
6688 3950 And through the ruined gorges
6689 The wind howls and surges.
6690 Hear the voices on the heights?
6691 Far away, and then nearby?
6692 Yes, a furious magic song
6693 3955 Sweeps the mountain, all along!
6695 Witches (In chorus.)
6697 To Brocken’s tip the witches stream,
6698 The stubble’s yellow, the seed is green.
6699 There the crowd of us will meet.
6700 Lord Urian has the highest seat.
6701 3960 So they go, over stone and sticks,
6702 The stinking goat, the farting witch.
6706 Old Baubo comes, alone, and how:
6707 She’s riding on a mother-sow.
6711 So honour then, where honour’s due!
6712 3965 Baubo, goes first! Then, all the crew!
6713 A tough old sow, a mother proud,
6714 Then follow, all the witches’ crowd.
6718 Which way did you come?
6723 I gazed at the owl in her nest alone.
6724 3970 What a pair of Eyes she made!
6728 O, all you who to Hell’s gate go!
6729 Why ride there so quickly though?
6733 She’s driven me hard: oh, see,
6734 The wounds, all over me!
6738 The way is broad: the way is long.
6739 Where is this mad yearning from?
6740 The fork will prick, the broom will scratch,
6741 The child will smother: the mother crack.
6743 Wizards, Half-Chorus
6745 Like snails in their shells, we’re crawlers,
6746 All the women are there before us.
6747 3980 At the House of Evil, when we’re callers,
6748 Woman’s a thousand steps before us.
6752 We don’t measure with so much care,
6753 In a thousand steps a Woman’s there.
6754 But make whatever speed she can,
6755 3985 A single leap, and there is Man.
6759 Come now: come now from stony mere!
6763 We’d like to climb the heights from here.
6764 We’re as bright and clean as ever,
6765 But we’re unfruitful still, forever.
6769 3990 The wind is quiet: a star shoots by,
6770 The shadowy Moon departs the sky.
6771 The magic choir’s a rush of sparks,
6772 Thousands shower through the dark.
6780 3995 Who calls there, from the stony vault?
6784 Take me with you! Take me with you!
6785 Climbing for three hundred years,
6786 I haven’t reached the summit yet,
6787 I long to be where my peers are met.
6791 4000 Here’s the broom: and here’s the stick,
6792 The ram is here, the fork to prick.
6793 Tonight, whoever can’t deliver
6794 There’s a man is lost forever.
6796 Half-witches (Below.)
6798 I’ve stumbled round so long, down here:
6799 4005 How far ahead the rest appear!
6800 I get no peace around the house,
6801 And get none either hereabouts.
6805 An ointment makes the witches hale:
6806 A rag will do them for a sail,
6807 4010 A trough’s a goodly ship, and tight:
6808 He’ll fly not who flies not tonight.
6812 And once we’ve soared around,
6813 So, alight then, on the ground,
6814 Cover the heather, far and wide,
6815 4015 With your swarming witches’ tide.
6817 (They let themselves fall.)
6821 They push and shove, they roar and clatter!
6822 They whistle and whirl, jostle and chatter!
6823 They glimmer and sparkle, stink and flare!
6824 The genuine witch-element’s there!
6825 4020 We’ll soon be parted, so stay near!
6828 Faust (In the distance.)
6833 What! Nearly out of sight?
6834 Then I’ll have to use a master’s right.
6835 Ground! Sir Voland comes. Sweet folk, give ground!
6836 Here, Doctor, hold tight! In a single bound,
6837 4025 Far from the crowd, we’ll soon be free:
6838 It’s too much, even for the likes of me.
6839 Something burned there with a special light,
6840 In that thicket, as far then as I could see,
6841 Come on! We can slip inside, all right.
6845 4030 You spirit of contradiction! Go on! I follow you.
6846 I think after all it’s worked out quite cleverly:
6847 We walk the Brocken on Walpurgis Night, yet we
6848 Are as isolated now, as we ever could choose.
6852 See now, what colours flare!
6853 4035 A lively mob club together there.
6854 In little groups one’s not alone.
6858 I’d still rather be higher, though!
6859 I can see fire and whirling smoke.
6860 There the crowd stream, to the Evil One:
6861 4040 There many a puzzle finds solution.
6865 But many a puzzle’s knotted so.
6866 Let the whole world have its riot,
6867 Here we’ll house ourselves in quiet.
6868 It’s a long and well-established tradition,
6869 4045 From the great one makes a smaller edition.
6870 I see young witches, naked, bare,
6871 And old ones, veiled cunningly.
6872 For my sake, be a little friendly.
6873 The trouble’s slight, the fun is rare.
6874 4050 I hear instruments being tuned, too!
6875 A cursed din, you’ll soon get used to.
6876 Come, with me! There’s no way otherwise,
6877 I’ll step ahead, lead you to their eyes,
6878 And earn your fresh gratitude, so.
6879 4055 What say you? There’s lots of room, my friend.
6880 Look over there! You can’t see its end.
6881 A hundred fires burning, in a row,
6882 They love, and drink, and dance, and chat,
6883 Tell me where you’ll find better than that?
6887 4060 Will you, as we make our bow,
6888 Play the devil, or wizard now?
6892 To be sure I’m used to travelling incognito,
6893 But on formal occasions rank’s allowed to show.
6894 I’ve no Knight’s garter to mark me out,
6895 4065 But the cloven foot’s honoured in this house.
6896 Do you see how that snail there crawls to me:
6897 With those delicate feelers on its head,
6898 It’s already scented me, you see,
6899 I can’t deny myself, if I wished.
6900 4070 Come! We’ll go from fire to fire,
6901 I’m the broker: you’re the suitor.
6903 (To some, sitting by dying embers.)
6905 Old sirs, what do you sit at the edge for?
6906 I’d praise you, in the middle, more,
6907 Among the youthful buzz, and shout.
6908 4075 You’re alone enough inside the house.
6912 Who would trust the Nation!
6913 One’s toiled so long for it:
6914 With the people, as with women,
6915 Youth’s always the best fit.
6919 4080 From every rule they’ve gone astray,
6920 Me, I praise the good old days,
6921 Then, truly, we were all the rage,
6922 That was a real golden age.
6926 We weren’t so stupid, you’d have found,
6927 4085 And often did, what wasn’t right:
6928 But now it all turns round and round,
6929 Just as we’d like to grasp it tight.
6933 Who writes anything good these days,
6934 Or reads with moderate intelligence!
6935 4090 And what the dear young folk all praise,
6936 I’ve never seen such stupid nonsense.
6938 Mephistopheles (Suddenly looking old.)
6940 I feel folk are ripe for Judgement Day,
6941 Of Witches’ Mount, I’ve made my last ascent.
6942 And now my cask runs cloudy, anyway,
6943 4095 The world itself is all as good as spent.
6947 Gentlemen: don’t pass me by!
6948 Don’t lose the opportunity!
6949 Inspect my wares attentively,
6950 I’ve a selection for your eye.
6951 4100 There’s nothing on my stall, here,
6952 On Earth, it’s equal you’ll not find,
6953 That hasn’t caused some harm somewhere,
6954 To the world itself, and then, mankind.
6955 No knife that isn’t dyed in gore,
6956 4105 No cup that, through some healthy body,
6957 Hot, gnawing venom hasn’t poured,
6958 No gems that haven’t bought some kindly
6959 Girl, no sword that’s not cut ties that bind,
6960 Or, perhaps, struck an enemy from behind.
6964 4110 Granny! You misunderstand the age.
6965 What’s gone: is done! What’s done: is gone!
6966 Get novelties they’re all the rage!
6967 Now it’s novelties that lead us on.
6971 Don’t let me lose myself in here!
6972 4115 Now, this is what I call a fair!
6976 This whole whirlpool’s trying to climb above,
6977 You think you’re shoving, and you’re being shoved!
6994 4120 Pay attention to her lovely hair,
6995 The only adornment she need wear.
6996 When she traps a young man in her snare,
6997 She won’t soon let him from her care.
7001 Those two, the old and young one, sitting,
7002 4125 They’ve leapt about more than is fitting!
7006 No rest tonight for anyone.
7007 Let’s grasp them. There’s a new dance, come!
7009 Faust (Dancing with the lovely young witch.)
7011 A lovely dream once came to me,
7012 And there I saw an apple-tree,
7013 4130 Two lovely apples, there, did shine,
7014 Tempting me so, I had to climb.
7018 Apples you love a lot, I know,
7019 That once in Paradise did grow.
7020 I’m deeply moved with joy to feel,
7021 4135 That such my garden does reveal.
7023 Mephistopheles (Dancing with the old witch.)
7025 A vile dream once came to me,
7026 In it, I saw an old cleft tree,
7027 A monstrous crack there met my eyes,
7028 It pleased me, though, despite its size.
7032 4140 I offer my best greetings to
7033 The knight of the cloven shoe!
7034 He’ll need to have a real stopper,
7035 If he’s not scared of that whopper.
7037 A Rationalist (Nicolai)
7039 Cursed Folk! How do you dare to?
7040 4145 Haven’t we shown, for many a season,
7041 Spirits can’t exist: it stands to reason?
7042 Yet you dance around, just as we do!
7044 The Lovely Witch (Dancing.)
7046 Why’s he here then, at our ball?
7050 Oh! He’s everywhere, and into all.
7051 4150 While others dance, he must reflect.
7052 If he can’t discuss every last step,
7053 It’s as good as if it didn’t happen.
7054 He’s angriest at a forward pattern.
7055 But if you turn around in circles,
7056 4155 As he does in his ancient mills,
7057 He’ll call it excellent, least ways
7058 If you greet with interest what he says.
7062 You’re still there! Oh, it’s quite unheard of.
7063 We’re enlightened now, so take yourselves off!
7064 4160 The Devil’s crew’s discounted by every rule:
7065 Yet though clever, still we’re haunted, in Tegel, too.
7069 Well listen: here we’re bored with it!
7073 4165 I tell you, Spirit, to your face:
7074 For me, spirit-rule has no place:
7075 Because my spirit can’t exercise it.
7077 (The dance continues.)
7079 I see, tonight, I’ll have no success:
7080 But I get a bit from every trip,
7081 4170 And hope, before the final step,
7082 I’ll defeat the devils and the poets.
7086 Now he’ll sit in some wet sump,
7087 And console himself, like that, about you,
7088 And if he sticks leeches on his rump,
7089 4175 He’s cured of the Spirit, and Spirits, too.
7091 (To Faust, who has left the dance.)
7093 Why have you deserted that lovely girl,
7094 Who sang so sweetly in the dancing?
7098 Ugh! Right in the middle of her singing
7099 A red mouse sprang out of her mouth.
7103 4180 That’s fine: don’t brood on it, anyway:
7104 Enough, that the mouse wasn’t grey.
7105 At harvest time who queries a mouse?
7117 Mephisto, can you see
7118 4185 That lovely child, far off, alone there,
7119 Travelling slowly, so painfully,
7120 As if her feet were chained together.
7121 I must admit, without question
7122 She’s the image of my sweet Gretchen.
7126 Forget all that! It benefits no one.
7127 4190 It’s a lifeless magic form, a phantom.
7128 Encountering it will do you no good:
7129 Its fixed stare freezes human blood,
7130 And then one’s almost turned to stone:
7131 Medusa’s story is surely known.
7135 4195 Those are the eyes of the dead, truly,
7136 No loving hand has closed their void.
7137 That’s the breast Gretchen offered to me:
7138 That’s the sweet body I enjoyed.
7142 It’s magic, fool: you’re an easy one to move!
7143 4200 She comes to all, as if she were their love.
7147 What delight! What pain!
7148 I can’t turn from her, again.
7149 Strange, around her lovely throat,
7150 A single scarlet cord adorns her,
7151 4205 Like a knife-cut, and no wider!
7155 That’s right! I see it too: and note,
7156 She can carry her head under her arm,
7157 Since Perseus did her that fatal harm.
7158 Always desire for that illusion!
7159 4210 Come on, climb this bit of mountain:
7160 It’s as lively as the Vienna Prater,
7161 And if no one’s deceiving me,
7162 I’m looking at a genuine theatre.
7167 It’ll be on again shortly.
7168 4215 A fresh performance: last of seven.
7169 That number, for us, is traditional.
7170 An amateur’s written it, and then
7171 It’s amateurs who perform it all.
7172 Forgive me, sir, if I break off here,
7173 4220 Since I’m the amateur curtain-raiser.
7177 That I find you on the Blocksberg’s good,
7178 Since I find you exactly where I should.
7180 Scene XXII: A Walpurgis Night’s Dream
7184 Oberon and Titania’s Golden Wedding.
7186 An Interlude (Intermezzo)
7190 You brave stagehands, of Weimar,
7191 Take a rest, at least for today.
7192 4225 Ancient mountains, misty vales are,
7193 All the scenery for our play.
7197 Fifty years we’ve passed by,
7198 To make this wedding golden,
7199 But let some argument arise:
7200 4230 There’s gold in it, for me, then.
7204 Spirits, where I am, be seen:
7205 Appear, all, at this moment:
7206 Fairy King, and Fairy Queen,
7207 Renew their old intent.
7211 4235 Puck comes shooting through the air,
7212 And moves his feet, in time:
7213 After him a hundred, there,
7214 Share his joyful rhyme.
7218 Ariel conducts his singing
7219 4240 In pure and heavenly tones:
7220 Ugly faces greet its ringing,
7221 But also lovely ones.
7225 Partners if you’d get along,
7226 Learn then from the two of us!
7227 4245 If we in pairs would love for long,
7228 Someone needs to separate us.
7232 The sulky man, the wilful wife,
7233 So they might know each other,
7234 I’d show him all the Northern ice,
7235 4250 And show her the Equator.
7237 The Whole Orchestra (Tutti. Very loud.)
7239 From fly-snout and midge-nose,
7240 And all of their relations,
7241 Frog and cricket, too, there flow
7242 These musical vibrations!
7246 4255 See, the bagpipes on their way!
7247 Made from a soap-bubble.
7248 Hear the snail’s-twaddle play
7249 Through its stumpy nozzle.
7251 Spirit (Newly formed.)
7253 Spider’s-feet and toad’s-belly,
7254 With useless winglets to ’em!
7255 A little creature, it can’t be
7256 But it makes a little poem.
7260 Little steps and high leaps,
7261 Through honeydew and fragrance here,
7262 4265 You still won’t do enough it seems,
7263 To climb into the atmosphere.
7267 A masquerade of mockery?
7268 Do I dare to trust my eyes?
7269 Oberon, that fair divinity,
7270 4270 Do I see him here, tonight?
7274 He’s no tail, and not a claw!
7275 And yet it’s him, it’s true:
7276 Like the gods of Greece, I’m sure,
7277 He must be a devil too.
7281 4275 What I capture here today,
7282 In truth is only sketchy:
7283 Yet I prepare myself, someday
7284 For my Italian journey.
7288 Ah! My bad luck brings me here:
7289 4280 Since I haven’t been invited!
7290 Of all the witches to appear,
7291 Only two are powdered.
7295 Powder like a petticoat
7296 On an old, grey witch you’ll see,
7297 4285 While I sit naked on my goat,
7298 And show a fine young body.
7302 We have too much experience,
7303 To moan about you, here, then!
7304 Yet, as young and tender you are, once,
7305 4290 So, I hope you will be, rotten.
7307 Orchestral Conductor
7309 Fly-snout and midge-nose,
7310 Don’t swarm around the naked!
7311 Frog and cricket, too, all know
7312 Your time, and don’t mistake it!
7314 A Wind-Vane (Swinging to one side.)
7316 4295 Society, as one would like it done:
7317 True pure brides along the slope!
7318 And young fellows, one for one,
7319 People quite brimful of hope!
7321 The Wind-Vane (Swinging to the other side.)
7323 And if the ground doesn’t split,
7324 4300 And swallow everyone,
7325 I’ll be so amazed at it,
7326 I’ll leap into hell at once.
7328 Xenies (Barbed verses: Greek – gifts exchanged.)
7330 As insects we appear,
7331 With little claws we’re nipping,
7332 4305 To do Satan, our Papa,
7333 Due honour as is fitting.
7335 Hennings (August Von Hennings, a literary enemy.)
7337 See them, packed in a crowd,
7338 Naïve, together, poking fun!
7339 At last, they’ll even say, aloud,
7340 4310 Their hearts were blameless ones.
7342 Musagete (Controller of the Muses: Greek – epithet of Apollo)
7344 Among this witches’ crew,
7345 I’d gladly lose my way:
7346 They’re easier to manage, too
7347 Than Muses, any day.
7349 Former ‘Genius of the Age’
7351 4315 One was someone, among real folk.
7352 Come on, then: I can hold my end up!
7353 Like Germany’s Parnassus, look,
7354 The Blocksberg’s summit’s broad enough.
7356 Curious Traveller (Nicolai)
7358 Say, who’s that haughty man?
7359 4320 He walks with such proud steps.
7360 He sniffs as only a sniffer-out can.
7361 ‘He smells out Jesuits.’
7365 I like to fish among the clear
7366 And the muddy levels:
7367 4325 So the pious man appears
7368 Mixing with the devils.
7370 A Child of This World (Goethe himself.)
7372 To the pious man, as I’m aware,
7373 Every place is fitting,
7374 So you build, on the Blocksberg here,
7375 4330 Many a house of meeting.
7379 Does some new choir succeed?
7380 I hear a distant drum.
7381 ‘No! It’s the booming in the reeds,
7382 Of bitterns, in unison.’
7386 4335 How they lift their legs, this lot!
7387 As best they can, they all take flight!
7388 The cripples skip, the clumsy hop,
7389 And don’t care at all what they look like.
7393 The ragged mob all hate so much,
7394 4340 They’d gladly crush the others.
7395 Here the bagpipe draws them, just
7396 As Orpheus’ lyre the creatures.
7400 I won’t declare it’s madness, now,
7401 Or show myself too critical.
7402 4345 The devil must exist somehow,
7403 Or how could we act the devil?
7407 The fantasy in my mind,
7408 For once, is too despotic.
7409 Truly, if I am all, I find
7410 4350 Today I’m idiotic!
7414 Here’s real pain, at hand,
7415 It annoys me so to see it:
7416 For the first time, here I stand,
7417 Unsteady, on my feet.
7419 A Believer in the Supernatural
7421 4355 It’s very pleasant to be here,
7422 And this crowd too has merit:
7423 Since from the devil I infer
7424 Some much more virtuous spirit.
7428 These little flames a-hunting go,
7429 4360 And think they’re near the treasure:
7430 But Devil rhymes with doubtful: so
7431 My being here’s a pleasure.
7433 Orchestral Conductor
7435 Frog on leaf, and cricket, oh
7436 You amateur editions!
7437 4365 Fly-snout and midge-nose,
7438 Remember you’re musicians!
7442 Carefree, is what they call
7443 This band of happy creatures:
7444 When we can’t go on foot at all
7445 4370 Our head it is that features.
7449 We picked up many a titbit once,
7450 But now, God orders things so,
7451 Our shoes are ragged from the dance,
7452 And we travel on naked soles.
7456 4375 From the swamps we’ve come,
7457 Where we first arose:
7458 In the ranks here, we, at once,
7459 As glittering gallants pose.
7463 I shoot here from the sky
7464 4380 And star- and firelight meet.
7465 Now across the grass I lie -
7466 Who’ll help me to my feet?
7470 Room, round about us, room!
7471 We crush the grasses under.
7472 4385 Spirits come, and spirits too
7473 Have their bulky members.
7477 Don’t tread so heavily,
7478 Like elephantine calves: let
7479 Puck himself, the sturdy, be,
7480 4390 On this night, the stoutest.
7484 Loving nature winged your backs,
7485 You spirits, one supposes,
7486 Follow, then, on my light track,
7487 To the hill of roses!
7489 Orchestra (Quietly: pianissimo)
7491 4395 Trailing cloud, and misted trees,
7492 Brighten with the day.
7493 Breeze in leaves, and wind in reeds,
7494 And all have flown away.
7496 Scene XXIII: Gloomy Day
7498 (A Field. Faust, Mephistopheles.)
7502 In misery! Despair! Wandering wretchedly on the face of the earth,
7503 for ages, and now imprisoned! That kind, unfortunate creature, locked
7504 up in prison as a criminal, and lost in torment! To this! This! –
7505 Treacherous, worthless spirit, you hid it from me! – Stand there,
7506 then! Roll the devil’s eyes in your head, in anger! Stand there, and
7507 defy me with your unbearable presence! Imprisoned! In irredeemable
7508 misery! Delivered up to evil spirits, and the judgement of unfeeling
7509 men! And you’ve troubled me meanwhile with tasteless diversions,
7510 concealed her growing misery from me, and left her helpless in the
7515 She is not the first.
7519 Dog! Loathsome Monster! – Change him, infinite Spirit! Change the
7520 worm into his dog-form, in which he often liked to scamper in front of
7521 me, at night, rolling at the feet of the unsuspecting traveller, and
7522 clambering on his shoulders when he fell. Change him into his
7523 favourite likeness, so he can crawl on his belly in the sand in front
7524 of me, and I can trample him, depraved thing, under my feet! – ‘Not
7525 the first!’ – Misery! Misery! That no human spirit can grasp. That
7526 more than one being should sink into the depth of this wretchedness:
7527 that the first, writhing in its death-pangs, under the eyes of Eternal
7528 Forgiveness, did not expiate the guilt of all the others! It pierces
7529 to the marrow of my bones, the misery of this one being – and you
7530 smile calmly at the fate of thousands!
7534 Now we’re out of our wits again, already, at the point where men’s
7535 brains are cracked. Why did you enter into partnership with us, if
7536 you can’t go through with it? Would you take wing, and yet be free of
7537 dizziness? Did we thrust ourselves on you, or you on us?
7541 Don’t gnash your greedy jaws at me! It disgusts me! – Great and
7542 glorious Spirit, you who revealed yourself to me, nobly, who know my
7543 heart and soul, why shackle me to this disgraceful companion, who
7544 feeds on injury, and at the last on ruin?
7552 Save her, or woe to you! May the weightiest curse fall on you for a
7557 I can’t undo the bonds of the Avenger, nor loose his bolts. – ‘Save
7559 Who was it dragged her to ruin? I or you?
7561 (Faust looks around, wildly.)
7563 Would you grasp the lightning? A good thing it has not been allowed
7564 you miserable mortals! To crush the innocent one who replies is the
7565 tyrant’s way to free oneself of an embarrassment.
7569 Take me to her! She shall be freed!
7573 And the danger you expose yourself to? Be aware, the guilty blood
7574 from your hands lies on the town. Avenging spirits hover over the
7575 place of death, and lie in wait for the murderer’s return.
7579 And not from yours, too? Murder, and death in this world, be on you,
7580 monster! Take me there, I say, and free her.
7584 I’ll take you: listen to what I can do! Have I all the powers of
7585 heaven and earth? I’ll confuse the jailor’s mind: you take possession
7586 of the key, and bring her out, hand in human hand! I’ll keep watch:
7587 magic horses are ready: I’ll carry you away. That, I can do.
7595 (An open field. Faust and Mephistopheles flying onwards on black
7600 What do they weave, round the Ravenstone?
7604 4400 I don’t know what they’re cooking and brewing.
7608 Soaring up, diving down, bending and bowing.
7616 They scatter, they consecrate.
7622 Scene XXV: A Dungeon
7624 (Faust, with a bunch of keys and a lamp, in front of an iron door.)
7626 4405 A long-forgotten shudder grips me,
7627 I’m gripped by all of Mankind’s misery,
7628 Here behind these damp walls, she
7629 Lives: and all her guilt’s illusory.
7630 Do I tremble, then, to free her!
7631 4410 Do I dread, once more, to see her!
7632 On! Fear adds to death’s proximity.
7634 (He grips the lock. She sings within.)
7636 My mother, the whore
7638 My father, the rogue,
7642 In the cool of the clay:
7643 Then I was a sweet bird on the stone.
7644 4420 Fly away! Fly away!
7646 Faust (Unlocking the door.)
7648 She doesn’t know her lover’s listening,
7649 Hears the chains, the straw’s rustling.
7653 Margaret (Hiding herself in the bed of straw.)
7655 Woe! Woe! It comes. Bitterest Death!
7659 Hush! Hush! It’s I who come, to free you.
7661 Margaret (Throwing herself down in front of him.)
7663 4425 Are you a man? Then pity my distress.
7667 Your cries will wake the jailors, too!
7669 (He grasps the chains, to loose them.)
7671 Margaret (On her knees.)
7673 Who gives the executioner
7675 At midnight you’re already here.
7676 4430 Let me live, have mercy on me!
7677 Won’t it be soon enough when dawn should come?
7681 I’m still so young, so young!
7683 I was lovely too, that was my
7684 4435 Ruin. My love was near, now he’s gone:
7685 The garland’s torn: the flowers are done.
7686 Don’t grip me, now, so violently!
7687 What harm have I done you? Spare me!
7688 Don’t let me beg for mercy, in vain,
7689 4440 I’ve never seen you before today!
7693 How shall I endure this misery, say!
7697 I’m wholly in your power. Oh,
7698 Let me feed my baby first.
7699 I caressed it all night, though,
7700 4445 They told me I caused it hurt,
7701 And now they say I killed it, so,
7702 And now I’ll never be happy again.
7703 They sing songs of me! It’s wicked of folk!
7704 There’s an old story ends this way,
7705 4450 Who told them to tell it so?
7707 Faust (Falling on his knees.)
7709 A lover lies at your feet,
7710 Who’ll end your painful slavery.
7712 Margaret (Throwing herself down next to him.)
7714 O let’s kneel, the saints will bless!
7715 See here! Under these steps,
7716 4455 Under this sill,
7724 4460 Gretchen! Gretchen!
7726 Margaret (Listening closely.)
7728 The voice of my lover!
7730 (She leaps to her feet: the chains fall away.)
7732 Where? I heard him call me.
7733 I’m free! No one holds me.
7734 To his neck, I shall fly,
7735 4465 On his breast, I shall lie!
7736 He called Gretchen! Stood at the sill.
7737 Among the howls and cries of Hell,
7738 Among the devil’s, scornful groans,
7739 I knew his sweet, dear tones.
7747 4470 Here! O, say it once again!
7751 It’s he! It’s he! Where now is all the pain?
7752 Where now the chains, the dungeon’s misery?
7753 You’re here! You come to save me.
7755 4475 Already the street is there again,
7756 Where I first saw you plain,
7757 And the joyful garden,
7758 Where Martha and I waited, then.
7760 Faust (Struggling to move.)
7764 Margaret (Caressing him.)
7767 4480 I’ll gladly stay, if you are with me.
7777 What? You can no longer kiss?
7778 4485 My dear, so short a time to miss me,
7779 And you’ve forgotten how to kiss me?
7780 Why am I so anxious on your breast?
7781 When, once, at your words, your gaze,
7782 With a whole heaven I was blessed,
7783 4490 And you kissed me, enough to suffocate.
7789 Oh! How cold and silent,
7791 4495 Where has your passion
7793 Who brought me this?
7795 (She turns away from him.)
7799 Come! Follow me! Darling, be bold!
7800 I’ll clasp you with a thousand-fold
7801 4500 Warmth: now follow me! I beg you!
7803 Margaret (Turning to him.)
7805 And is it you? Is it really you?
7809 It is! Come, with me!
7813 You’ll loose the chains,
7814 And take me to your breast, again.
7815 How is it you don’t shrink from me?
7816 4505 Do you know, friend, whom you free?
7820 Come! Come! The night will soon be over.
7824 I’ve killed my mother,
7825 I’ve drowned my child.
7826 Was it not given to you and I?
7827 4510 You too. - You here! I scarce believe.
7828 Give me your hand! This is no dream.
7829 Your dear hand! – Ah, but it’s damp!
7830 Wipe it clean! Why do I think,
7832 4515 Ah God! What have you done?
7833 Put your sword away,
7838 Let past be past I say!
7839 You’re destroying me!
7843 4520 No you must live on: must do.
7844 I’ll describe our graves to you.
7847 The best one is for my mother,
7848 4525 Then, by her, my brother,
7849 Myself, a little further, lay,
7850 But not too far away!
7851 And the little one, at my right breast.
7852 No one else by me will lie! –
7853 4530 Ah, to nestle at your side,
7854 That was a sweet, a darling bliss!
7855 But no more will I achieve it:
7856 It’s as if I must force you to it,
7857 As if you turn aside my kiss:
7858 4535 And yet it’s you, so good, so sweet to see!
7862 You know it is, so come with me!
7874 If the grave is there,
7875 Death waiting, then I come!
7876 4540 From here to everlasting rest,
7877 And not a step further would
7878 You go now? O Heinrich, if I could!
7882 You can! Just will it! The door is open!
7886 I dare not: there’s no hope for me then.
7887 4545 What use is flight? They lie in wait for me.
7888 To be forced to beg is a bitter existence,
7889 And cursed too with an evil conscience!
7890 To wander among strangers, bitter,
7891 And even then I’d still be captured!
7895 4550 I’ll stay beside you.
7901 Away! Down the ridge,
7903 4555 Over the bridge,
7905 Left, where the plank is,
7908 4560 It’s trying to rise,
7915 Only one step, and then you’re free!
7919 4565 If we were on the mountain, only!
7920 There my mother sits, on a stone,
7921 And oh, the cold, it grips me!
7922 There my mother sits on a stone,
7923 And wags her head, so heavy.
7924 4570 No sign, no nod, for me, I’m sure
7925 Her sleep’s so long: she’ll wake no more.
7926 She slept, while we took our pleasure.
7927 That was such a time to treasure!
7931 Here all’s useless, speech or prayer:
7932 4575 I’ll take you from this place: I’ll dare.
7936 Let me alone! No, no force!
7937 Don’t grip me so murderously, oh,
7938 I’ve done all else to please you so.
7942 The day breaks! Dearest! Dearest!
7946 4580 Day! Yes, it’s dawn! The last I’ll see:
7947 My wedding day, that was to be!
7948 Tell no one you’ve been with Gretchen. Ah, bright glance!
7949 It’s done with: all in vain!
7950 4585 We two will meet again:
7951 But not in the dance.
7952 The crowd gather, without speech.
7953 The streets, the square,
7954 Can’t hold them, there.
7955 4590 The bell tolls, the wand breaks.
7956 Now, they seize and tie me!
7957 I’m dragged already to the block.
7958 The blade that quivers over me,
7959 Has quivered before over every neck.
7960 4595 Silent the world, now, as the grave!
7964 Oh, would that I’d never seen the light!
7966 Mephistopheles (Appears outside.)
7968 Away! Or you’ll be lost, tonight.
7969 Useless staying and praying! Chattering!
7970 The horses are shivering,
7971 4600 The dawn breaks, clear.
7975 What rises in the doorway, here?
7976 Him! Him! Send him away!
7977 Why is he here in this holy place?
7986 4605 God of Judgement! To you, myself I give!
7988 Mephistopheles (To Faust)
7990 Come! Now! Or I leave you both to stew.
7994 Father, save me! I belong to you!
7995 Angels! In Holy Company,
7996 Draw round me: guard me!
7997 4610 Heinrich! For you, I fear.
8003 A Voice (From above.)
8007 Mephistopheles (To Faust.)
8011 (He vanishes, with Faust.)
8013 A Voice (From within, dying away.)
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