Faust and Mephistopheles.

Mephistopheles. What’s all the noise about? I’m here at leisure To work your worship’s will and pleasure.

Faust. So, so! such kernel cracked from such a shell! A travelling scholar! the jest likes me well!

Mephistopheles. I greet the learned gentleman! I’ve got a proper sweating ’neath your ban.

Faust. What is thy name?

Mephistopheles. What is my power were better, From one who so despises the mere letter, Who piercing through the coarse material shell, With Being’s inmost substance loves to dwell.

Faust. Yes, but you gentlemen proclaim Your nature mostly in your name; Destroyer, God of Flies, the Adversary, Such names their own interpretation carry. But say, who art thou?

Mephistopheles. I am a part of that primordial Might, Which always wills the wrong, and always works the right.

Faust. You speak in riddles; the interpretation?

Mephistopheles. I am the Spirit of Negation: And justly so; for all that is created Deserves to be annihilated. ’Twere better, thus, that there were no creation. Thus everything that you call evil, Destruction, ruin, death, the devil, Is my pure element and sphere.

Faust. Thou nam’st thyself a part, yet standest wholly here.

Mephistopheles. I speak to thee the truth exact, The plain, unvarnished, naked fact, Though man, that microcosm of folly deems Himself the compact whole he seems. Part of the part I am that erst was all, Part of the darkness, from whose primal pall Was born the light, the proud rebellious Light, Which now disputeth with its mother Night, Her rank and room i’ the world by ancient right. Yet vainly; though it strain and struggle much, ’Tis bound to body with the closer clutch; From body it streams, on body paints a hue, And body bends it from its course direct; Thus in due season I expect, When bodies perish, Light will perish too.

Faust. Hold! now I know thy worthy duties all! Unable to annihilate wholesale, Thy mischief now thou workest by retail.

Mephistopheles. And even thus, my progress is but small. This something, the big lumpish world, which stands Opposed to nothing, still ties my hands, And spite of all the ground that I seem winning, Remains as firm as in the beginning; With storms and tempests, earthquakes and burnings, Earth still enjoys its evenings and mornings, And the accursèd fry of brute and human clay, On them my noblest skill seems worse than thrown away. How many thousands have I not buried! Yet still a new fresh blood is hurried Through fresh young veins, that I must sheer despair. The earth, the water, and the air, The moist, the dry, the hot, the cold, A thousand germs of life unfold; And had I not of flame made reservation, I had no portion left in the creation.

Faust. And thus thou seekest to oppose The genial power, from which all life and motion flows, Against Existence’ universal chain, Clenching thy icy devil’s fist in vain! Try some more profitable feats, Strange son of Chaos, full of cross conceits.

Mephistopheles. The hint is good, and on occasion, May well deserve consideration; Meanwhile, with your good leave, I would withdraw.

Faust. My leave! do I make devil’s law? The liberty, methinks, is all your own. I see you here to-day with pleasure, Go now, and come back at your leisure. Here is the door, there is the window, and A chimney, if you choose it, is at hand.

Mephistopheles. Let me speak plain! there is a small affair, That, without your assistance, bars my way, The goblin-foot upon the threshold there—

Faust. The pentagram stands in your way! Ha! tell me then, thou imp of sin, If this be such a potent spell To bar thy going out, how cam’st thou in? What could have cheated such a son of hell?

Mephistopheles. Look at it well, the drawing is not true; One angle, that towards the door, you see, Left a small opening for me.

Faust. So so! for once dame Fortune has been kind, And I have made a prisoner of you! Chance is not always blind.

Mephistopheles. The cur sprang in before it looked about; But now the thing puts on a serious air; The devil is in the house and can’t get out.

Faust. You have the window, why not jump out there?

Mephistopheles. It is a law which binds all ghosts and sprites; Wherever they creep in, there too they must creep out; I came in at the door, by the door I must go out.

Faust. So so! then hell too has its laws and rights, Thus might one profit by the powers of evil, And make an honest bargain with the devil.

Mephistopheles. The devil, sir, makes no undue exaction, And pays what he has promised to a fraction; But this affair requires consideration, We’ll leave it for some future conversation. For this time, I beseech your grace, Let me be gone; I’ve work to do.

Faust. Stay but one minute, I’ve scarce seen your face. Speak; you should know the newest of the new.

Mephistopheles. I’ll answer thee at length some other day; At present, I beseech thee, let me loose.

Faust. I laid no trap to snare thee in the way, Thyself didst thrust thy head into the noose; Whoso hath caught the devil, hold him fast! Such lucky chance returns not soon again.

Mephistopheles. If ’tis your pleasure so, I will remain, But on condition that the time be passed In worthy wise, and you consent to see Some cunning sleights of spirit-craft from me.

Faust. Thy fancy jumps with mine. Thou may’st commence, So that thy dainty tricks but please the sense.

Mephistopheles. Thou shalt, in this one hour, my friend, More for thy noblest senses gain, Than in the year’s dull formal train, From stale beginning to stale end. The songs the gentle Spirits sing thee, The lovely visions that they bring thee, Are not an empty juggling show. On thine ear sweet sounds shall fall, Odorous breezes round thee blow, Taste, and touch, and senses all With delicious tingling glow. No lengthened prelude need we here, Sing, Spirit-imps that hover near!

Spirits. Vanish ye murky Old arches away! Through the cloud curtain That blinds heaven’s ray Mild and serenely Look forth the queenly Eye of the day! Star now and starlet Beam more benign, And purer suns now Softlier shine. In beauty ethereal, A swift-moving throng, Of spirits aërial, Are waving along, And the soul follows On wings of desire; The fluttering garlands That deck their attire, Cover the meadows, Cover the bowers, Where lovers with lovers Breathe rapturous hours. Bower on bower! The shoots of the vine, With the leaves of the fig-tree, Their tendrils entwine! Clusters of ripe grapes, Bright-blushing all, Into the wine-press Heavily fall; From fountains divine Bright rivers of wine Come foaming and swirling; O’er gems of the purest, Sparkling and purling, They flow and they broaden In bright vista seen, To deep-bosomed lakes Lightly fringed with the green, Where leafy woods nod In their tremulous sheen. On light-oaring pinions The birds cut the gale, Through the breezy dominions As sunward they sail; They sail on swift wings To the isles of the blest, On the soft swelling waves That are cradled to rest; Where we hear the glad spirits In jubilee sing, As o’er the green meadows Fleet-bounding they spring: With light airy footing, A numberless throng, Like meteors shooting The mountains along; Some there are flinging Their breasts to the seas, Others are swinging In undulant ease, Lovingly twining Life’s tissue divine, Where pure stars are shining In beauty benign!

Mephistopheles. He sleeps! well done, ye airy urchins! I Remain your debtor for this lullaby, By which so bravely ye have sung asleep This restless spirit, who, with all his wit, Is not yet quite the man with cunning cast, To hook the devil and hold him fast. Around him let your shapes fantastic flit, And in a sea of dreams his senses steep. But now this threshold’s charm to disenchant, The tooth of a rat is all I want; Nor need I make a lengthened conjuration, I hear one scraping there in preparation.

The lord of the rats and of the mice, Of the flies, and frogs, and bugs, and lice, Commands you with your teeth’s good saw, The threshold of this door to gnaw! Forth come, and there begin to file, Where he lets fall this drop of oil. Ha! there he jumps! that angle there, With thy sharp teeth I bid thee tear, Which jutting forward, sad disaster, Unwilling prisoner keeps thy master. Briskly let the work go on, One bite more and it is done! [Exit.

Faust. [awakening from his trance] Once more the juggler Pleasure cheats my lip, Gone the bright spirit-dream, and left no trace, That I spake with the devil face to face, And that a poodle dog gave me the slip!