SCENE I.--The Garden of Polemius.

THE

TWO LOVERS OF HEAVEN:

CHRYSANTHUS AND DARIA.

A Drama of Early Christian Rome.

FROM THE SPANISH OF CALDERON.

With Dedicatory Sonnets to

LONGFELLOW,

ETC.

BY

DENIS FLORENCE MAC-CARTHY, M.R.I.A.

POR LA FE MORIRE.

Calderon's Family Motto.

DUBLIN:

JOHN F. FOWLER, 3 CROW STREET.

LONDON:

JOHN CAMDEN HOTTEN, 74 and 75 PICCADILLY.

1870.

Calderon's Family Motto.

"POR LA FE MORIRE". --

FOR THE FAITH WELCOME DEATH.

THIS motto is taken from the engraved coat of arms prefixed to an

historical account of "the very noble and ancient house of Calderon de

la Barca"--a rather scarce work which I have never seen alluded to in

any account of the poet. The circumstances from which the motto was

assigned to the family are given with some minuteness at pp. 56 and 57

of the work referred to. It is enough to mention that the martyr who

first used the expression was Don Sancho Ortiz Calderon de la Barca, a

Commander of the Order of Santiago. He was in the service of the

renowned king, Don Alfonso the Wise, towards the close of the thirteenth

century, and having been taken prisoner by the Moors before Gibraltar,

he was offered his life on the usual conditions of apostasy. But he

refused all overtures, saying: "Pues mi Dios por mi murio, yo quiero

morir por el", a phrase which has a singular resemblance to the key note

of this drama. Don Ortiz Calderon was eventually put to death with

great cruelty, after some alternations of good and bad treatment. See

"Descripcion, Armas, Origen, y Descendencia de la muy noble y antigua

Casa de Calderon de la Barca", etc., que Escrivio El Rmo. P. M. Fr.

Phelipe de la Gandara, etc., Obra Postuma, que saca a luz Juan de

Zuniga. Madrid, 1753.

D. F. M. C.

TO

HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW,

IN GRATEFUL RECOLLECTION OF SOME DELIGHTFUL DAYS SPENT WITH HIM AT

ROME,

This Drama is dedicated

BY

DENIS FLORENCE MAC-CARTHY.

TO LONGFELLOW.

I.

PENSIVE within the Colosseum's walls

I stood with thee, O Poet of the West!--

The day when each had been a welcome guest

In San Clemente's venerable halls:--

Ah, with what pride my memory now recalls

That hour of hours, that flower of all the rest,

When with thy white beard falling on thy breast--

That noble head, that well might serve as Paul's

In some divinest vision of the saint

By Raffael dreamed, I heard thee mourn the dead--

The martyred host who fearless there, though faint,

Walked the rough road that up to Heaven's gate led:

These were the pictures Calderon loved to paint

In golden hues that here perchance have fled.

II.

YET take the colder copy from my hand,

Not for its own but for THE MASTER'S sake,--

Take it, as thou, returning home, wilt take

From that divinest soft Italian land

Fixed shadows of the Beautiful and Grand

In sunless pictures that the sun doth make--

Reflections that may pleasant memories wake

Of all that Raffael touched, or Angelo planned:--

As these may keep what memory else might lose,

So may this photograph of verse impart

An image, though without the native hues

Of Calderon's fire, and yet with Calderon's art,

Of what Thou lovest through a kindred Muse

That sings in heaven, yet nestles in the heart.

D. F. M. C.

Dublin, August 24th, 1869.

PREFATORY NOTE.

THE PROFESSOR OF POETRY AT OXFORD AND THE AUTOS SACRAMENTALES OF

CALDERON.

Although the Drama here presented to the public is not an 'Auto,' the

present may be a not inappropriate occasion to draw the attention of all

candid readers to the remarks of the Professor of Poetry at Oxford on

the 'Autos Sacramentales' of Calderon--remarks founded entirely on the

volume of translations from these Autos published by me in 1867,[*]

although not mentioned by name, as I conceive in fairness it ought to

have been, by Sir F. H. Doyle in his printed Lectures.[+]

In his otherwise excellent analysis of The Dream of Gerontius, Sir F. H.

Doyle is mistaken as to any direct impression having been made upon the

mind of Dr. Newman in reference to it by the Autos of Calderon. So late

as March 3, 1867, in thanking me for the volume made use of by Sir F. H.

Doyle, Dr. Newman implies that up to that period he had not devoted any

particular attention even to this most important and unique development

of Spanish religious poetry. The only complete Auto of Calderon that

had previously appeared in English--my own translation of The Sorceries

of Sin, had, indeed, been in his hands from 1859, and I wish I could

flatter myself that it had in any way led to the production of a

master-piece like The Dream of Gerontius. But I cannot indulge that

delusion. Dr. Newman had internally and externally too many sources of

inspiration to necessitate an adoption even of such high models as the

Spanish Autos. Besides, The Dream of Gerontius is no more an Auto than

Paradise Lost, or the Divina Commedia. In these, only real personages,

spiritual and material, are represented, or monsters that typified human

passions, but did not personify them. In the Autos it is precisely the

reverse. Rarely do actual beings take part in the drama, and then only

as personifications of the predominant vices or passions of the

individuals whose names they bear. Thus in my own volume, Belshazzar is

not treated so much as an historical character, but rather as the

personification of the pride and haughtiness of a voluptuous king. In

The Divine Philothea, in the same volume, there are no actual beings

whatever, except The Prince of Light and The Prince of Darkness or The

Demon. In truth, there is nothing analogous to a Spanish Auto in

English original poetry. The nearest approach to it, and the only one,

is The Prometheus Unbound of Shelley. There, indeed, The Earth, Ocean,

The Spirits of the Hours, The Phantasm of Jupiter, Demogorgon, and

Prometheus himself, read like the 'Personas' of a Spanish Auto, and the

poetry is worthy the resemblance. The Autos Sacramentales differ also,

not only in degree but in kind from every form of Mystery or Morality

produced either in England or on the Continent. But to return to the

lecture by Sir F. H. Doyle. Even in smaller matters he is not accurate.

Thus he has transcribed incorrectly from my Introduction the name of the

distinguished commentator on the Autos of Calderon and their translator

into German--Dr. Lorinser. This Sir F. H. Doyle has printed throughout

his lecture 'Lorinzer'. From private letters which I have had the

honour of receiving from this learned writer, there can be no doubt that

the form as originally given by me is the right one. With these

corrections the lecture of Sir F. H. Doyle may be quoted as a valuable

testimony to the extraordinary poetic beauty of these Autos even in a

translation.

LECTURE III.--Dr. Newman's Dream of Gerontius.

"It is probable, indeed, that the first idea of composing such a

dramatic work may have been suggested to Dr. Newman by the Autos

Sacramentales of Spain, and especially by those of the illustrious

Calderon; but, so far as I can learn, he has derived hardly anything

from them beyond the vaguest hints, except, indeed, the all-important

knowledge, that a profound religious feeling can represent itself, and

that effectively, in the outward form of a play. I may remark that

these Spanish Autos of Calderon constitute beyond all question a very

wonderful and a very original school of poetry, and I am not without

hope that, when I know my business a little better, we may examine them

impartially together. Nay, even as it is, Calderon stands so

indisputably at the head of all Catholic religious dramatists, among

whom Dr. Newman has recently enrolled himself, that perhaps it may not

be out of place to inquire for a moment into his poetical methods and

aims, in order that we may then discover, if we can, how and why the

disciple differs from his master. Now there is a great conflict of

opinion as to the precise degree of merit which these particular Spanish

dramas possess. Speaking as an ignorant man, I should say, whilst those

who disparage them seem rather hasty in their judgments, and not so well

informed as could be wished, still the kind of praise which they receive

from their most enthusiastic admirers puzzles and does not instruct us.

"Taking for example, the great German authority on this point, Dr.

Lorinzer [Lorinser], as our guide, we see his poet looming dimly through

a cloud of incense, which may embalm his memory, but certainly does not

improve our eyesight. Indeed, according to him, any appreciation of

Calderon is not to be dreamt of by a Protestant". Lectures, pp. 109,

110.

With every respect for Sir F. H. Doyle, Dr. Lorinser says no such thing.

He was too well informed of what had been done in Germany on the same

subject, before he himself undertook the formidable task of attempting a

complete translation of all the Autos of Calderon, to have fallen into

such an error. Cardinal Diepenbrock, Archbishop of Breslau, who, in his

"Das Leben ein Traum" (an Auto quite distinct from the well known drama

"La Vida es Sueno") first commenced this interesting labour in Germany,

was of course a Catholic. But Eichendorff and Braunfels, who both

preceded Dr. Lorinser, were Protestants. Augustus Schlegel and Baron

von Schack, who have written so profoundly and so truly on the Autos,

are expressly referred to by Dr. Lorinser, and it is superfluous to say

that they too were Protestants. Sir F. H. Doyle, in using my

translation of the passage which will presently be quoted, changes the

word 'thoroughly' into 'properly', as if it were a more correct

rendering of the original. Unfortunately, however, there is nothing to

represent either word in the German. Dr. Lorinser says, that by many,

not by all, Calderon cannot be enjoyed as much as he deserves, because a

great number of persons best competent to judge of his merits are

deficient in the knowledge of Catholic faith and Catholic theology which

for the understanding of Calderon is indispensible--"welche fuer

Calderons Verstaendniss unerlaesslich ist". Sir F. H. Doyle says that

to him these Autos are not "incomprehensible at all" (p. 112), but then

he understands them all the better for being a scholar and a churchman.

Sir F. H. Doyle thus continues his reference to Dr. Lorinser. "Even

learned critics", he says, "highly cultivated in all the niceties of

aesthetics, are deficient in the knowledge of Catholic faith and

Catholic theology properly to understand Calderon" (Lectures, p. 110,

taken from the Introduction to my volume, p. 3). "Old traditions",

continues Dr. Lorinzer, "which twine round the dogma like a beautiful

garland of legends, deeply profound thoughts expressed here and there

by some of the Fathers of the Church, are made use of with such

incredible skill and introduced so appositely at the right place,

that . . . . frequently it is not easy to guess the source from whence

they have been derived" (Lectures, p. 111, taken from the Introduction

to my volume, p. 6).

This surely is unquestionably true, and the argument used by Sir F. H.

Doyle to controvert it does not go for much. These Autos, no doubt,

were, as he says, "composed in the first instance to gratify, and did

gratify, the uneducated populace of Madrid". Yes, the crowds that

listened delighted and entranced to these wonderful compositions, were,

for the most part, "uneducated" in the ordinary meaning of that word.

But in the special education necessary for their thorough enjoyment, the

case was very different. It is not too much to say that, as the result

of Catholic training, teaching, intuition, and association, the least

instructed of his Madrid audience more easily understood Calderon's

allusions, than the great majority of those who, reared up in totally

different ideas, are able to do, even after much labour and sometimes

with considerable sympathy. Mr. Tennyson says that he counts--

"The gray barbarian lower than the Christian child",

because the almost intuitive perceptions of a Christian child as to the

nature of God and the truths of Revelation, place it intellectually

higher than even the mature intelligence of a savage. I mean no

disrespect to Sir F. H. Doyle, but I think that Calderon would have

found at Madrid in the middle of the seventeenth century, and would find

there to-day, in a Catholic boy of fifteen, a more intelligent and a

better instructed critic on these points, than even the learned

professor himself. I shall make no further comments on Sir F. H.

Doyle's Lecture, but give his remarks on Calderon's Autos to the end.

"At the same time", says Sir F. H. Doyle, "Dr. Lorinzer's knowledge of

his subject is so profound, and his appreciation of his favourite author

so keen, that for me, who am almost entirely unacquainted with this

branch of literature, formally to oppose his views, would be an act of

presumption, of which I am, as I trust, incapable. I may, however,

perhaps be permitted to observe, that with regard to the few pieces of

this kind which in an English dress I have read, whilst I think them not

only most ingenious but also surprisingly beautiful, they do not strike

me as incomprehensible at all. We must accept them, of course, as

coming from the mind of a devout Catholic and Spanish gentleman, who

belongs to the seventeenth century; but when once that is agreed upon,

there are no difficulties greater than those which we might expect to

find in any system of poetry so remote from our English habits of

thought. There is, for instance, the Divine Philothea, in other words,

our human spirit considered as the destined bride of Christ. This

sacred drama, we may well call it the swan-song of Calderon's extreme

old age, is steeped throughout in a serene power and a mellow beauty of

style, making it not unworthy to be ranked with that Oedipus Colonaeus

which glorified the sun-set of his illustrious predecessor: but yet,

Protestant as I am, I cannot discover that it is in the least obscure.

Faith, Hope, Charity, the Five Senses, Heresy, Judaism, Paganism,

Atheism, and the like, which in inferior hands must have been mere lay

figures, are there instinct with a dramatic life and energy such as

beforehand I could hardly have supposed possible. Moreover, in spite of

Dr. Lorinzer's odd encomiums, each allegory as it rises is more neatly

rounded off, and shows a finer grain, than any of the personifications

of Spenser; so that the religious effect and the theological effect

intended by the writer, are both amply produced--yes, produced upon us,

his heretical admirers. Hence, even if there be mysterious treasures of

beauty below the surface, to which we aliens must remain blind for ever,

this expression, which broke from the lips of one to whom I was eagerly

reading [Mr. Mac-Carthy's translation of] the play, 'Why, in the

original this must be as grand as Dante', tends to show that such merits

as do come within our ken are not likely to be thrown away upon any

fair-minded Protestant. Dr. Newman, as a Catholic, will have entered, I

presume, more deeply still into the spirit of these extraordinary

creations; his life, however, belongs to a different era and to a

colder people. And thus, however much he may have been directed to the

choice of a subject by the old Mysteries and Moralities (of which these

Spanish Autos must be taken as the final development and bright

consummate flower), he has treated that subject, when once undertaken by

him, entirely from his own point of view. 'Gerontius' is meant to be

studied and dwelt upon by the meditative reader. The Autos of Calderon

were got ready by perhaps the most accomplished playwright that ever

lived, to amuse and stimulate a thronging southern population.

'Gerontius' is, we may perhaps say for Dr. Newman in the words of

Shelley,

'The voice of his own soul

Heard in the calm of thought';

whilst the conceptions of the Spanish dramatist burst into life with

tumultuous music, gorgeous scenery, and all the pomp and splendour of

the Catholic Church. No wonder therefore that our English Auto, though

composed with the same genuine purpose of using verse, and dramatic

verse, to promote a religious and even a theological end, should differ

from them in essence as well as in form. There is room however for both

kinds in the wide empire of Poetry, and though Dr. Newman himself would

be the first to cry shame upon me if I were to name him with Calderon

even for a moment, still his Mystery of this most unmysterious age will,

I believe, keep its honourable place in our English literature as an

impressive, an attractive, and an original production"--pp. 109, 115.

I may mention that the volume containing Belshazzar's Feast, and The

Divine Philothea, the Auto particularly referred to by Sir F. H. Doyle,

has been called Mysteries of Corpus Christi by the publisher. A not

inappropriate title, it would seem, from the last observations of the

distinguished Professor. A third Auto, The Sorceries of Sin, is given

in my Three Plays of Calderon, now on sale by Mr. B. Quaritch, 15

Piccadilly, London. The Divine Philothea, The Sorceries of Sin, and

Belshazzar's Feast are the only Autos of Calderon that have ever been

translated either fully, or, with one exception, even partially into

English.

D. F. MAC-CARTHY.

74 Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin,

March 1, 1870.

* AUTOS SACRAMENTALES: THE DIVINE PHILOTHEA: BELSHAZZAR'S FEAST. Two

Autos, from the Spanish of Calderon. With a Commentary from the German

of Dr. Franz Lorinser. By Denis Florence Mac-Carthy, M.R.I.A. Dublin:

James Duffy, 15 Wellington Quay, and 22 Paternoster Row, London.

+ LECTURES DELIVERED BEFORE THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD, 1868. By Sir F.

H. Doyle Bart., M.A., B.C L., Late Fellow of All Souls', Professor of

Poetry. London: Macmillan & Co., 1869.

THE TWO LOVERS OF HEAVEN.[1]

INTRODUCTION.

IN the "Teatro escogido de Don Pedro Calderon de la Barca" (1868), at

present in course of publication by the Royal Academy of Madrid,

Calderon's dramas, exclusive of the autos sacramentales, which do not

form a part of the collection, are divided into eight classes. The

seventh of these comprises what the editor calls mystical dramas, and

those founded on the Legends or the Lives of Saints. The eighth

contains the philosophical or purely ideal dramas. This last division,

in which the editor evidently thinks the genius of Calderon attained its

highest development, at least as far as the secular theatre is

concerned, contains but two dramas, The Wonder-working Magician, and

Life's a Dream. The mystical dramas, which form the seventh division,

are more numerous, but of these five are at present known to us only by

name. Those that remain are Day-break in Copacabana, The Chains of the

Demon, The Devotion of the Cross, The Purgatory of St. Patrick, The

Sibyl of the East, The Virgin of the Sanctuary, and The Two Lovers of

Heaven. The editor, Sr. D. P. De La Escosura, seems to think it

necessary to offer some apology for not including The Two Lovers of

Heaven among the philosophical instead of the mystical dramas. He says:

"There is a great analogy and, perhaps, resemblance between "El Magico

Prodigioso" (The Wonder-working Magician), and "Los dos amantes del

cielo" (The Two Lovers of Heaven); but in the second, as it seems to us,

the purely mystical predominates in such a manner over the

philosophical, that it does not admit of its being classified in the

same group as the first (El Magico Prodigioso), and La Vida es Sueno

(Life's a Dream)". Introduccion, p. cxxxvii. note. Whether this

distinction is well founded or not it is unnecessary to determine. It

is sufficient for our purpose that it establishes the high position

among the greatest plays of Calderon of the drama which is here

presented to the English reader in the peculiar and always difficult

versification of the original. Whether less philosophical or more

mystical than The Wonder-working Magician, The Two Lovers of Heaven

possesses a charm of its own in which its more famous rival seems

deficient. In the admirable "Essay on the Genius of Calderon" (ch. ii.

p. 34), with which Archbishop Trench introduces his spirited analysis of

La Vida es Sueno, he refers to the group of dramas which forms, with one

exception, the seventh and eighth divisions of the classification above

referred to, and pays a just tribute to the superior merits of Los dos

amantes del cielo. After alluding to the dramas, the argument of which

is drawn from the Old Testament, and especially to The Locks of Absalom,

which he considers the noblest specimen, he continues: "Still more have

to do with the heroic martyrdoms and other legends of Christian

antiquity, the victories of the Cross of Christ over all the fleshly and

spiritual wickednesses of the ancient heathen world. To this theme,

which is one almost undrawn upon in our Elizabethan drama,--Massinger's

Virgin Martyr is the only example I remember,--he returns continually,

and he has elaborated these plays with peculiar care. Of these The

Wonder-working Magician is most celebrated; but others, as The Joseph of

Women, The Two Lovers of Heaven, quite deserve to be placed on a level,

if not higher than it. A tender pathetic grace is shed over this last,

which gives it a peculiar charm. Then too he has occupied what one

might venture to call the region of sacred mythology, as in The Sibyl of

the East, in which the profound legends identifying the Cross of Calvary

and the Tree of Life are wrought up into a poem of surpassing

beauty".[2] An excellent German version of Los dos amantes del cielo is

to be found in the second volume of the "Spanisches Theater", by Schack,

whose important work on Dramatic Art and Literature in Spain, is still

untranslated into the language of that country,--a singular neglect,

when his later and less elaborate work, "Poesie and Kunst der Araber in

Spanien und Sicilien" (Berlin, 1865), has already found an excellent

Spanish interpreter in Don Juan Valera, two volumes of whose "Poesia y

Arte de los Arabes en Espana y Sicilia" (Madrid, 1868), I was fortunate

enough to meet with during a recent visit to Spain.

The story of SS. Chrysanthus and Daria (The Two Lovers of Heaven), whose

martyrdom took place at Rome A.D. 284, and whose festival occurs on the

25th of October, is to be found in a very abridged form in the "Legenda

Aurea" of Jacobus de Voragine, c. 152. The fullest account, and that

which Calderon had evidently before him when writing The Two Lovers of

Heaven, is given by Surius in his great work, "De Probatis Sanctorum

Vitis", October, p. 378. This history is referred to by Villegas at the

conclusion of his own condensed narrative in the following passage,

which I take from the old English version of his Lives of Saints, by

John Heigham, anno 1630.

"The Church doth celebrate the feast of SS. Chrisanthus and Daria, the

25th of October, and their death was in the year of our Lord God 284, in

the raigne of Numerianus, Emperor. The martyrdom of these saints was

written by Verinus and Armenius, priests of St. Stephen, Pope and

Martyr: Metaphrastes enlarged it somewhat more. St. Damasus made

certain eloquent verses in praise of these saints, and set them on their

tombe. There is mention of them also in the Romaine Martirologe, and in

that of Usuardus: as also in the 5. tome of Surius; in Cardinal

Baronius, and Gregory of Turonensis", p. 849.

A different abridgment of the story as given by Surius, is to be found

in Ribadeneyra's "Flos Sanctorum" (the edition before me being that of

Barcelona, 1790, t. 3. p. 304). It concludes with the same list of

authorities, which, however, is given with more precision. The old

English translation by W. P. Esq., second edition: London, 1730, p. 369,

gives them thus:

"Surius in his fifth tome, and Cardinal Baronius in his 'Annotations

upon the Martyrologies', and in the second tome of his Annals, and St.

Gregory of Tours in his 'Book of the Glory of the Martyrs', make mention

of the Saints Chrysanthus and Daria".

The following is taken from Caxton's Golden Legende, or translation of

the Legenda Aurea of Jacobus de Voragine. I have transcribed from the

following edition, which is thus described in the Colophon:

"The legende named in latyn Legenda Aurea, that is to say in englyshe

the golden legende, For lyke as golde passeth all other metalles, so

this boke excedeth all other bokes". "Finyshed the xxvii daye of

August, the yere of our lord M. CCCCC. XXVII, the xix yere of the regne

of our souverayne lord Kynge Henry the eyght. Imprynted at London in

Flete Strete at the Sygne of the Sonne by Wynkyn de Worde".

In the following extract the spelling is somewhat modernised, and a few

obsolete words are omitted.

"The Life of Saynt Crysant and Saynte Daria".

Fo. cc. lxxxv.

"Here followeth the lyfe of Saynt Crysaunt, and fyrst of his name. And

of Saynte Daria, and of her name.

"Of Crysaunt is said as growen and multyplyed of God. For when his

father would have made hym do sacrifyce to the idols, God gave to hym

force and power to contrary and gaynsay his father, and yield himself to

God. Daria is sayd of dare to give, for she gave her to two thynges.

Fyrst will to do evil, when she had will to draw Crysaunt to sacrifyce

to the idols. And after she gave her to good will when Crysaunt had

converted her to Almighty God.

"Crysaunt was son of a ryght noble man that was named Polymne. And when

his father saw that his son was taught in the faith of Jesu Chryst, and

that he could not withdraw him therefrom, and make him do sacrifyce to

the idols, he commanded that he should be closed in a stronge hold and

put to hym five maidens for to seduce him with blandyshynge and fayre

wordes. And when he had prayed God that he should not be surmounted

with no fleshly desyre, anon these maydens were so overcome with slepe,

that they myght not take neither meat ne drinke as long as they were

there, but as soon as they were out, they took both meat and drinke.

And one Daria, a noble and wise virgin of the goddess Vesta, arrayed her

nobly with clothes as she had been a goddess, and prayed that she myght

be letten enter in to Crysant and that she would restore him to the

idols and to his father. And when she was come in, Crysant reproved her

of the pride of her vesture. And she answered that she had not done it

for pride but for to draw him to do sacrifyce to the idols and restore

him to his father. And then Crysant reproved her because she worshipped

them as gods. For they had been in their times evil and sinners. And

Daria answered, the philosophers called the elements by the names of

men. And Crysant said to her, if one worship the earth as a goddess,

and another work and labour the earth as a churl or ploughman, to whom

giveth the earth most? It is plain that it giveth more to the ploughman

than to him that worshippeth it. And in like wise he said of the sea

and of the other elements. And then Crysant and Daria converted to him,

coupled them together by the grace of the Holy Ghost, and feigned to be

joined by carnal marriage, and converted many others to our Lord. For

Claudian, who had been one of their persecutors, they converted to the

faith of our Lord, with his wife and children and many other knights.

And after this Crysant was enclosed in a stinking prison by the

commandment of Numerian, but the stink turned anon into a right sweet

odour and savour. And Daria was brought to the bordel, but a lion that

was in the amphitheatre came and kept the door of the bordel. And then

there was sent thither a man to befoul and corrupt the virgin, but anon

he was taken by the lion, and the lion began to look at the virgin like

as he demanded what he should do with the caitiff. And the virgin

commanded that he should do him no hurt but let him go. And anon he was

converted and ran through the city, and began to cry that Daria was a

goddess. And then hunters were sent thither to take the lion. And they

anon fell down at the feet of the virgin and were converted by her. And

then the provost commanded them to make a great fire within the entrance

of the bordel, so that the lion should be brent with Daria. And the

lion considering this thing, felt dread, and roaring took leave of the

virgin, and went whither he would without hurting of any body. And when

the provost had done to Crysant and Daria many diverse torments, and

might not grieve them, at the last they without compassion were put in a

deep pit, and earth and stones thrown on them. And so were consecrated

martyrs of Christ".

With regard to the exact year in which the martyrdom of SS. Chrysanthus

and Daria took place, it may be mentioned that in the valuable "Vies des

Saints", Paris, 1701 (republished in 1739), where the whole legend

undergoes a very critical examination, the generally received date, A.D.

284, is considered erroneous. The reign of the emperor Numerianus (A.D.

283-284), in which it is alleged to have occurred, lasted but eight

months, during which period no persecution of the Christians is

recorded. The writer in the work just quoted (Adrien Baillet)

conjectures that the martyrdom of these saints took place in the reign

of Valerian, and not later than the month of August, 257, "s' il est

vray que le pape Saint Etienne qui mourut alois avoit donne ordre qu' on

recueillit les actes de leur martyre"--Les Vies des Saints, Paris, 1739,

t. vii. p. 385.

1. Los dos amantes del cielo: Crisanto y Daria. Comedias de Don Pedro

Calderon de la Barca. Por Don Juan Eugenio Hartzenbusch. Madrid, 1865,

tomo 3, p. 234.

2. It may be added to what Dr. Trench has so well said, that Calderon's

auto, "El arbol del mejor Fruto" (The Tree of the choicest Fruit), is

founded on the same sublime theme. It is translated into German by

Lorinser, under the title of "Der Baum der bessern Frucht", Breslau,

1861.

THE TWO LOVERS OF HEAVEN.

PERSONS.

NUMERIANUS, Emperor of Rome.

POLEMIUS, Chief Senator.

CHRYSANTHUS, his son.

CLAUDIUS, cousin of Chrysanthus.

AURELIUS, a Roman general.

CARPOPHORUS, a venerable priest.

ESCARPIN, servant of Chrysanthus.

DARIA,

CYNTHIA,

NISIDA,

CHLORIS,

} Priestesses of Diana.

Two spirits.

Angels.

Soldiers, servants, people, music, etc.

SCENE: Rome and its environs.

ACT THE FIRST.

SCENE I.--A Room in the house of Polemius at Rome.

Chrysanthus is seen seated near a writing table on which are several

books: he is reading a small volume with deep attention.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Ah! how shallow is my mind!

How confined! and how restricted![3]

Ah! how driftless are my words!

And my thoughts themselves how driftless!

Since I cannot comprehend,

Cannot pierce the secrets hidden

In this little book that I

Found by chance with others mingled.

I its meaning cannot reach,

Howsoe'er my mind I rivet,

Though to this, and this alone,

Many a day has now been given.

But I cannot therefore yield,

Must not own myself outwitted:--

No; a studious toil so great

Should not end in aught so little.

O'er this book my whole life long

Shall I brood until the riddle

Is made plain, or till some sage

Simplifies what here is written.

For which end I 'll read once more

Its beginning. How my instinct

Uses the same word with which

Even the book itself beginneth!--

"In the beginning was the Word" . .[4]

If in language plain and simple

Word means speech, how then was it

In the beginning? Since a whisper

Presupposes power to breathe it,

Proves an earlier existence,

And to that anterior Power

Here the book doth not bear witness.

Then this follows: "And the Word

Was with God"--nay more, 't is written,

"And the Word was God: was with Him

In the beginning, and by HIM then

All created things were made

And without Him naught was finshed":--

Oh! what mysteries, what wonders,

In this tangled labyrinthine

Maze lie hid! which I so many

Years have studied, with such mingled

Aid from lore divine and human

Have in vain tried to unriddle!--

"In the beginning was the Word".--

Yes, but when was this beginning?

Was it when Jove, Neptune, Pluto

Shared the triple zones betwixt them,

When the one took to himself

Heaven supreme, one hell's abysses,

And the sea the third, to Ceres

Leaving earth, the ever-wing`ed

Time to Saturn, fire to Phoebus,

And the air to Jove's great sister?[5]--

No, it could not have been then,

For the fact of their partition

Shows that heaven and earth then were,

Shows that sea and land existed:--

The beginning then must be

Something more remote and distant:

He who has expressly said

'The beginning,' must have hinted

At the primal cause of all things,

At the first and great beginning,

All things growing out of HIM,

He himself the pre-existent:--

Yes, but then a new beginning

Must we seek for this beginner,

And so on ad infinitum;

Since if I, on soaring pinion

Seek from facts to rise to causes,

Rising still from where I had risen,

I will find at length there is

No beginning to the beginning,

And the inference that time

Somehow was, ere time existed,

And that that which ne'er begun

Ne'er can end, is plain and simple.

But, my thought, remain not here,

Rest not in those narrow limits,

But rise up with me and dare

Heights that make the brain grow dizzy:--

And at once to enter there,

Other things being pretermitted,

Let us venture where the mind,

As the darkness round it thickens,

Almost faints as we resume

What this mystic scribe has written.

"And the Word", this writer says,

"Was made flesh!" Ah! how can this be?

Could the Word that in the beginning

Was with God, was God, was gifted

With such power as to make all things,

Could it be made flesh? In pity,

Heavens! or take from me at once

All the sense that you have given me,

Or at once on me bestow

Some intelligence, some glimmer

Of clear light through these dark shadows:--

Deity, unknown and hidden,

God or Word, whate'er thou beest,

Of Thyself the great beginner,

Of Thyself the end, if, Thou

Being Thyself beyond time's sickle,

Still in time the world didst fashion,

If Thou 'rt life, O living spirit,

If Thou 'rt light, my darkened senses

With Thy life and light enkindle!--

(The voices of two spirits are heard from within, one at each side.)

First Voice.

Hear, Chrysanthus . . .

Second Voice.

Listen . . .

CHRYSANTHUS.

Two

Voices, if they are not instincts,

Shadows without soul or body,

Which my fancy forms within me,

Are contending in my bosom

Each with each at the same instant.

(Two figures appear on high, one clothed in a dark robe dotted with

stars; the other in a bright and beautiful mantle: Chrysanthus does not

see them, but in the following scene ever speaks to himself.)

First Voice.

What this crabbed text here meaneth

By the Word, is plain and simple,

It is Jove to whose great voice

Gods and men obedient listen.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Jove, it must be Jove, by whom

Breath, speech, life itself are given.

Second Voice.

What the holy Gospel means

By the Word, is that great Spirit

Who was in Himself for ever,

First, last, always self-existent.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Self-existent! first and last!

Reason cannot grasp that dictum.

First Voice.

In the beginning of the world

Jove in heaven his high throne fix`ed,

Leaving less imperial thrones

To the other gods to fill them.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Yes, if he could not alone

Rule creation unassisted.

Second Voice.

God was God, long, long before

Earth or heaven's blue vault existed,

He was in Himself, ere He

Gave to time its life and mission.

First Voice.

Worship only pay to Jove,

God o'er all our gods uplifted.

Second Voice.

Worship pay to God alone,

He the infinite, the omniscient.

First Voice.

He doth lord the world below.

Second Voice.

He is Lord of Heaven's high kingdom.

First Voice.

Shun the lightnings of his wrath.

Second Voice.

Seek the waves of his forgiveness. [The Figures disappear.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Oh! what darkness, what confusion,

In myself I find here pitted

'Gainst each other! Spirits twain

Struggle desperately within me,

Spirits twain of good and ill,--

One with gentle impulse wins me

To believe, but, oh! the other

With opposing force resistless

Drives me back to doubt: Oh! who

Will dispel these doubts that fill me?

POLEMIUS (within).

Yes, Carpophorus must pay

For the trouble that this gives me.--

CHRYSANTHUS.

Though these words by chance were spoken

As an omen I 'll admit them:

Since Carpophorus (who in Rome

Was the most renowned, most gifted

Master in all science), now

Flying from the emperor's lictors,

Through suspect of being a Christian,

In lone deserts wild and dismal

Lives a saintly savage life,

He will give to all my wishes

The solution of these doubts:--

And till then, O restless thinking

Torture me and tease no more!

Let me live for that! [His voice gradually rises.

ESCARPIN (within).

Within there

My young master calls.

CLAUDIUS (within).

All enter.

(Enter Polemius, Claudius, Aurelius, and Escarpin).

POLEMIUS.

My Chrysanthus, what afflicts thee?

CHRYSANTHUS.

Canst thou have been here, my father?

POLEMIUS.

No, my son, 't was but this instant

That I entered here, alarmed

By the strange and sudden shrillness

Of thy voice; and though I had

On my hands important business,

Grave and weighty, since to me

Hath the Emperor transmitted

This decree, which bids me search

Through the mountains for the Christians

Hidden there, and specially

For Carpophorus, their admitted

Chief and teacher, for which cause

I my voice too thus uplifted--

"Yes, Carpophorus must pay

For the trouble that this gives me"--

I left all at hearing thee.--

Why so absent? so bewildered?

What 's the reason?

CHRYSANTHUS.

Sir, 't is naught.

POLEMIUS.

Whom didst thou address?

CHRYSANTHUS.

Here sitting

I was reading to myself,

And perchance conceived some image

I may have addressed in words

Which have from my memory flitted.

POLEMIUS.

The grave sadness that o'erwhelms thee

Will, unless it be resisted,

Undermine thy understanding,

If thou hast it still within thee.

CLAUDIUS.

'T is a loud soliloquy,

'T is a rather audible whisper

That compels one's friends to hasten

Full of fear to his assistance!

CHRYSANTHUS.

Well, excitement may . . .

POLEMIUS.

Oh! cease;

That excuse will scarce acquit thee,

Since when one 's alone, excitement

Is a flame that 's seldom kindled.

I am pleased, well pleased to see thee

To the love of books addicted,

But then application should not

To extremes like this be driven,

Nor should letters alienate thee

From thy country, friends, and kinsmen.

CLAUDIUS.

A young man by heaven so favoured,

With such rare endowments gifted,

Blessed with noble birth and valour,

Dowered with genius, rank, and riches,

Can he yield to such enthralment,

Can he make his room a prison,

Can he waste in idle reading

The fair flower of his existence?

POLEMIUS.

Dost thou not remember also

That thou art my son? Bethink thee

That the great Numerianus,

Our good emperor, has given me

The grand government of Rome

As chief senator of the city,

And with that imperial burden

The whole world too--all the kingdoms,

All the provinces subjected

To its varied, vast dominion.

Know'st thou not, from Alexandria,

From my native land, my birth-place,

Where on many a proud escutcheon

My ancestral fame is written,

That he brought me here, the weight

Of his great crown to bear with him,

And that Rome upon my entry

Gave to me a recognition

That repaid the debt it owed me,

Since the victories were admitted

Which in glorious alternation

By my sword and pen were given her?

Through what vanity, what folly,

Wilt thou not enjoy thy birth-right

As my son and heir, indulging

Solely in these idle whimseys?--

CHRYSANTHUS.

Sir, the state in which you see me,

This secluded room, this stillness,

Do not spring from want of feeling,

Or indifference to your wishes.

'T is my natural disposition;

For I have no taste to mingle

In the vulgar vain pursuits

Of the courtier crowds ambitious.

And if living to myself here

More of true enjoyment gives me,

Why would you desire me seek for

That which must my joys diminish?

Let this time of sadness pass,

Let these hours of lonely vigil,

Then for fame and its applauses,

Which no merit of my own,

But my father's name may bring me.

POLEMIUS.

Would it not, my son, be fitter

That you should enjoy those plaudits

In the fresh and blooming spring-time

Of your life, and to hereafter

Leave the loneliness and vigil?

ESCARPIN.

Let me tell a little story

Which will make the whole thing simple:--

A bad painter bought a house,

Altogether a bad business,

For the house itself was bad:

He however was quite smitten

With his purchase, and would show it

To a friend of his, keen-witted,

But bad also: when they entered,

The first room was like a kitchen,

Black and bad:--"This room, you see, sir,

Now is bad, but just permit me

First to have it whitewashed over,

Then shall my own hand with pictures

Paint the walls from floor to ceiling,

Then you 'll see how bright 't will glisten".--

To him thus his friend made answer,

Smiling archly: "Yes, 't will glisten,

But if you would paint it first,

And then whitewash o'er the pictures,

The effect would be much better".--

Now 's the time for you, my lord,

To lay on the shining pigment:

On that brilliant ground hereafter

Will the whitewash fall more fitly,

For, in fine, the poorest painting

Is improved by time's slow finger.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Sir, I say, that in obedience

To your precepts, to your wishes,

I will strive from this day forward

So to act, that you will think me

Changed into another being. [Exit.

POLEMIUS.

Claudius, my paternal instinct

Makes me fear Chrysanthus' sadness,

Makes we tremble that its issue

May result in total madness.

Since thou art his friend and kinsman

Both combined, make out, I pray thee,

What occasions this bewitchment,

To the end that I may break it:

And my promise now I give thee,

That although I should discover

Love's delirious dream delicious

May be at the root,--most likely

At his age the true suspicion,--

It shall not disturb or grieve me.

Nay, since I am doomed to witness

His dejection, it will glad me

To find out that so it springeth.

ESCARPIN.

Once a high priest of Apollo

Had two nephews soft and silly,

More than silly, wretched creatures,

More than wretched, doltish drivels;

And perceiving from experience

How love smartens up its victims,

He but said to them this only,

"Fall in love at least, ye ninnies".--

Thus, though not in love, sir, now,

I 'll be bound he 'll be so quickly,

Merely to oblige you.

POLEMIUS.

This

Is not quite as I would wish it,

For when anything has happened,

The desire to know it, differs

From the wish it so should happen.

CLAUDIUS.

I, my lord, my best assistance

Offer thee to strive and fathom

From what cause can have arisen

Such dejection and such sadness;

This henceforth shall be my business

To divert him and distract him.

POLEMIUS.

Such precisely are my wishes:

And since now I am forced to go

In obedience to the mission

Sent me by Numerianus,

'Mid the wastes to search for Christians,

In my absence, Claudius,

Most consoling thoughts 't will give me,

To remember that thou watchest

O'er Chrysanthus.

CLAUDIUS.

From this instant

Until thy return, I promise

Not to leave his side.

POLEMIUS.

Aurelius . . .

AURELIUS.

My good lord.

POLEMIUS.

Art sure thou knowest

In this mountain the well-hidden

Cave wherein Carpophorus dwelleth?

AURELIUS.

Him I promise to deliver

To thy hands.

POLEMIUS.

Then lead the soldiers

Stealthily and with all quickness

To the spot, for all must perish

Who are there found hiding with him:--

For the care with which, ye Heavens!

I uphold the true religion

Of the gods, their faith and worship,

For the zeal that I exhibit

In thus crushing Christ's new law,

Which I hate with every instinct

Of my soul, oh! grant my guerdon

In the cure of my son's illness! [Exeunt Polemius and Aurelius.

CLAUDIUS (to Escarpin).

Go and tell my lord Chrysanthus

That I wish he would come with me

Forth to-day for relaxation.

ESCARPIN.

Relaxation! just say whither

Are we to go forth to get it;

Of that comfort I get little--

CLAUDIUS.

Outside Rome, Diana's temple

On the Salarian way uplifteth

Its majestic front: the fairest

Of our Roman maids dwell in it:

'T is the custom, as thou knowest,

That the loveliest of Rome's children

Whom patrician blood ennobles,

From their tender years go thither

To be priestesses of the goddess,

Living there till 't is permitted

They should marry: 't is the centre

Of all charms, the magic circle

Drawn around a land of beauty--

Home of deities--Elysium!--

And as great Diana is

Goddess of the groves, her children

Have to her an altar raised

In the loveliest cool green thicket.

Thither, when the evening falleth,

And the season is propitious,

Various squadrons of fair nymphs

Hasten: and it is permitted

Gallant youths, unmarried also,

As an escort to go with them.

There this evening will I lead him.

ESCARPIN.

Well, I doubt that your prescription

Is the best: for fair recluses,

Whose sublime pursuits, restricted

To celestial things, make even

The most innocent thought seem wicked,

Are by no means likely persons

To divert a man afflicted

With this melancholy madness:

Better take him into the thickest

Throng of Rome, there flesh and bone

Goddesses he 'll find, and fitter.--

CLAUDIUS.

Ah! you speak but as the vulgar:

Is it not the bliss of blisses

To adore some lovely being

In the ideal, in the distance,

Almost as a vision?--

ESCARPIN.

Yes;

'T is delightful; I admit it,

But there 's good and better: think

Of the choice that once a simple

Mother gave her son: she said:

"Egg or rasher, which will I give thee?"

And he said: "The rasher, mother,

But with the egg upon it, prithee".

"Both are best", so says the proverb.

CLAUDIUS.

Well, if tastes did n't sometimes differ,

What a notable mistake

Providence would have committed!

To adore thee, sweetest Cynthia, [aside

Is the height of all my wishes:

As it well may be, for am I

Worthy, worship even to give her? [Exeunt.

SCENE THE SECOND

A Wood near Rome.

(Enter NISIDA and CHLORIS, the latter with a lyre).

NISIDA.

Have you brought the instrument?

CHLORIS.

Yes.

NISIDA.

Then give it me, for here

In this tranquil forest sphere,

Where the boughs and blossoms blent,

Ruby blooms and emerald stems,

Round about their radiance fling,

Where the canopy of spring

Breathes of flowers and gleams with gems,

Here I wish that air to play,

Which to words that Cynthia wrote

I have set--a simple note.

CHLORIS.

And the song, senora, say,

What 's the theme?

NISIDA.

A touching strain,--

How a nightingale in a grove

Singing sweetly of his love,

Sang its pleasure and its pain.

Enter CYNTHIA (reading in a book).

CYNTHIA (to herself).

Whilst each alley here discloses

Youthful nymphs, who as they pass

To Diana's shrine, the grass

Turn to beds of fragrant roses,--

Where the interlac`ed bars

Of these woods their beauty dowers

Seem a verdant sky of flowers--

Seem an azure field of stars.

I shall here recline and read

(While they wander through the grove)

Ovid's 'Remedy of Love.'

NISIDA (to Chloris).

Hear the words and air.

CHLORIS.

Proceed.

NISIDA (singing).

O nightingale, whose sweet exulting strain

Tells of thy triumphs to the listening grove,

Thou fill'st my heart with envy and with pain.

But no; but no; for if thou sing'st of love,

Jealousy's pangs and sorrow's tears remain.

CYNTHIA (advancing).

What a charming air! To me

What an honour! From this day

I may well be vain, as they

May without presumption be,

Who, despite their numerous slips,

Find their words can please the ear,

Who their rugged verses hear

Turn to music on thy lips.

NISIDA.

'T is thine own genius, not my skill,

That produces this effect;

For, without it, I suspect,

Would my voice sound harsh and shrill,

And my lute's strings should be broken

With a just and wholesome rigour,

For presuming to disfigure

What thy words so well have spoken.

Whither wert thou wending here?

CYNTHIA.

Through the quiet wood proceeding,

I the poet's book was reading,

When there fell upon my ear,

Soft and sweet, thy voice: its power,

Gentle lodestone of my feet,

Brought me to this green retreat--

Led me to this lonely bower:

But what wonder, when to listen

To thy sweetly warbled words

Ceased the music of the birds--

Of the founts that glide and glisten?

May I hope that, since I came

Thus so opportunely near,

I the gloss may also hear?

NISIDA.

I will sing it, though with shame.

(Sings)

Sweet nightingale, that from some echoing grot

Singest the rapture of thy love aloud,

Singest with voice so joyous and so proud,

All unforgetting thou mayst be forgot,

Full of thyself and of thy happy lot!

Ah! when thou trillest that triumphant strain

To all the listening lyrists of the grove,

Thou fill'st my heart with envy and with pain!

But no; but no; for if thou sing'st of love.

Jealousy's pangs and sorrow's tears remain!

Enter DARIA.

DARIA.

Ah! my Nisida, forbear,

Ah! those words forbear to sing,

Which on zephyr's wanton wing

Thou shouldst waft not on the air.

All is wrong, how sweet it be,

That the vestal's thoughts reprove:

What is jealousy? what is love?

That they should be sung by thee?

Think this wood is consecrated

To Diana's service solely,

Not to Venus: it is holy.

Why then wouldst thou desecrate it

With thy songs? Does 't not amaze

Thee thyself--this strangest thing--

In Diana's grove to sing

Hymns of love to Cupid's praise?

But I need not wonder, no,

That thou 'rt so amused, since I

Here see Cynthia with thee.

CYNTHIA.

Why

Dost thou say so?

DARIA.

I say so

For good cause: in books profane

Thou unceasingly delightest,

Verse thou readest, verse thou writest,

Of their very vanity vain.

And if thou wouldst have me prove

What I say to thy proceeding,

Tell me, what 's this book thou 'rt reading?

CYNTHIA.

'T is The Remedy of Love.

Whence thou mayst perceive how weak

Is thy inference, thy deduction

From my studious self-instruction;

Since the patient who doth seek

Remedies to cure his pain

Shows by this he would grow better;--

For the slave who breaks his fetter

Cannot surely love his chain.

NISIDA.

This, though not put quite so strong,

Was involved in the conclusion

Of my lay: Love's disillusion

Was the burden of my song.

DARIA.

Remedies and disillusions,

Seek ye both beneath one star?

Ah! if so, you are not far

From its pains and its confusions:

For the very fact of pleading

Disillusion, shows that thou

'Neath illusion's yoke doth bow,--

And the patient who is needing

Remedies doth prove that still

The sharp pang he doth endure,

For there 's no one seeks a cure

Ere he feels that he is ill:--

Therefore to this wrong proceeding

Grieved am I to see ye clinging--

Seeking thou thy cure in singing--

Thou thy remedy in reading.

CYNTHIA.

Casual actions of this class

That are done without intention

Of a second end, to mention

Here were out of place: I pass

To another point: There 's no one

Who with genius, or denied it,--

Dowered with mind, but has applied it

Some especial track to go on:

This variety suffices

For its exercise and action,

Just as some by free attraction

Seek the virtues and the vices;--

This blind instinct, or this duty,

We three share;--'t is thy delight

Nisida to sing,--to write

Mine,--and thine to adore thy beauty.

Which of these three occupations

Is the best--or those that need

Skill and labour to succeed,

Or thine own vain contemplations?--

Have I not, when morning's rays

Gladdened grove and vale and mountain,

Seen thee in the crystal fountain

At thyself enamoured gaze?

Wherefore, once again returning

To our argument of love,

Thou a greater pang must prove,

If from thy insatiate yearning

I infer a cause: the spell

Lighter falls on one who still,

To herself not feeling ill,

Would in other eyes seem well.

DARIA.

Ah! so far, so far from me

Is the wish as vain as weak--

(Now my virtue doth not speak,

Now but speaks my vanity),

Ah! so far, I say, my breast

Turns away from things of love,

That the sovereign hand of Jove,

Were it to attempt its best,

Could no greater wonder work,

Than that I, Daria, should

So be changed in mind and mood

As to let within me lurk

Love's minutest, smallest seed:--

Only upon one condition

Could I love, and that fruition

Then would be my pride indeed.

CYNTHIA.

What may that condition be?

DARIA.

When of all mankind, I knew

One who felt a love so true

As to give his life for me,

Then, until my own life fled,

Him, with gratitude and pride,

Were I sure that so he died,

I would love though he were dead.

NISIDA.

Poor reward for love so great

Were that tardy recollection,

Since, it seems, for thy affection

He, till life is o'er, must wait.

CYNTHIA.

Soars thy vanity so high?

Thy presumption is above

All belief: be sure, for love

No man will be found to die.

DARIA.

Why more words then? love must be

In my case denied by heaven:

Since my love cannot be given

Save to one who 'll die for me.

CYNTHIA.

Thy ambition is a thing

So sublime, what can be said?--

Better I resumed and read,

Better, Nisida, thou shouldst sing,

This disdain so strange and strong,

This delusion little heeding.

NISIDA.

Yes, do thou resume thy reading,

I too will resume my song.

DARIA.

I, that I may not renew

Such reproaches, whilst you sing,

Whilst you read, in this clear spring

Thoughtfully myself shall view.

NISIDA sings.

O nightingale, whose sweet exulting strain

Tells of thy triumphs to the listening grove,

Thou fill'st my heart with envy and with pain!--

But no, but no, for if thou sing'st of love

Jealousy's pangs and sorrow's tears remain!

Enter CHRYSANTHUS, CLAUDIUS, and ESCARPIN.

CLAUDIUS, to Chrysanthus.

Does not the beauty of this wood,

This tranquil wood, delight thee?

CHRYSANTHUS.

Yes:

Here nature's lord doth dower and bless

The world in most indulgent mood.

Who could believe this greenwood here

For the first time has blessed mine eyes?

CLAUDIUS.

It is the second Paradise,

Of deities the verdant sphere.

CHRYSANTHUS.

'T is more, this green and grassy glade

Whither our careless steps have strolled,

For here three objects we behold

Equally fair by distance made.

Of these that chain our willing feet,

There yonder where the path is leading,

One is a lady calmly reading,

One is a lady singing sweet,

And one whose rapt though idle air

Gives us to understand this truth--

A woman blessed with charms and youth,

Does quite enough in being fair.

ESCARPIN.

You are quite right in that, I 've seen

Beauties enough of that sort too.

CLAUDIUS.

If of the three here given to view,

The choice were thine to choose between,

Which of them best would suit thy taste?

Which wouldst thou make thy choice of, say?

CHRYSANTHUS.

I do not know: for in one way

They so with equal gifts are graced,

So musical and fair and wise,

That while one captivates the mind,

One works her witcheries with the wind,

And one, the fairest, charms our eyes.

The one who sings, it seems a duty,

Trusting her sweet voice, to think sweet,

The one who reads, to deem discreet,

The third, we judge but by her beauty:

And so I fear by act or word

To wrong the three by judging ill,

Of one her charms, of one her skill,

And the intelligence of the third.

For to choose one does wrong to two,

But if I so presumed to dare . . .

CLAUDIUS.

Which would it be?

CHRYSANTHUS.

The one that 's fair.

ESCARPIN.

My blessings on your choice and you!

That 's my opinion in the case,

'T is plain at least to my discerning

That in a woman wit and learning

Are nothing to a pretty face.

NISIDA.

Chloris, quick, take up the lyre,

For a rustling noise I hear

In this shady thicket near:

Yes, I 'm right, I must retire.

Swift as feet can fly I 'll go.

For these men that here have strayed

Must have heard me while I played. [Exeunt Nisida and Chloris.

CYNTHIA.

One of them I think I know.

Yes, 't is Claudius, as I thought,

Now he has a chance: I 'll see

If he cares to follow me,

Guessing rightly what has brought

Me to-day unto the grove:--

Ah! if love to grief is leading

Of what use to me is reading

In the Remedies of Love? [Exit.

DARIA (to herself).

In these bowers by trees o'ergrown,

Here contented I remain,

All companionship is vain,

Save my own sweet thoughts alone:--

CLAUDIUS.

Dear Chrysanthus, your election

Was to me both loss and gain,

Gave me pleasure, gave me pain:--

It seemed plain to my affection

(Being in love) your choice should fall

On the maid of pensive look,

Not on her who read the book:

But your praise made up for all.

And since each has equal force,

My complaint and gratulation,

Whilst with trembling expectation

I pursue my own love's course,

Try your fortune too, till we

Meet again. [Exit.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Confused I stay,

Without power to go away,

Spirit-bound, my feet not free.

From the instant that on me,

As a sudden beam might dart,

Flashed that form which Phidian art

Could not reach, I 've known no rest.--

Babylon is in my breast--

Troy is burning in my heart.

ESCARPIN.

Strange that I should feel as you,

That one thought should fire us two,

I too, sir, have lost my senses

Since I saw that lady.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Who,

Madman! fool! do you speak of? you!

Dare to feel those griefs of mine!--

ESCARPIN.

No, sir, yours I quite resign,

Would I could my own ones too!--

CHRYSANTHUS.

Leave me, or my wrath you 'll rue;

Hence! buffoon: by heaven I swear it,

I will kill you else.

ESCARPIN.

I go:--

For if you address her, oh!

Could my jealous bosom bear it? [aside [Exit.

CHRYSANTHUS (to Daria).

If my boldness so may dare it,

I desire to ask, senora,

If thou art this heaven's Aurora,

If the goddess of this fountain,

If the Juno of this mountain,

If of these bright flowers the Flora,

So that I may rightly know

In what style should speak to thee

My hushed voice . . . but pardon me

Now I would not thou said'st so.

Looking at thee now, the glow

Of thy beauty so excelleth,

Every charm so plainly telleth

Thou Diana's self must be;

Yes, Diana's self is she,

Who within her grove here dwelleth.

DARIA.

If, before you spoke to me,

You desired my name to know,

I in your case act not so,

Since I speak, whoe'er you be,

Forced, but most unwillingly

(As to listening heaven is plain)

To reply:--a bootless task

Were it in me, indeed, to ask,

Since, whoe'er you be, my strain

Must be one of proud disdain.

So I pray you, cavalier,

Leave me in this lonely wood,

Leave me in the solitude

I enjoyed ere you came here.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Sweetly, but with tone severe,

Thus my error you reprove--

That of asking in this grove

What your name is: you 're so fair,

That, whatever name you bear,

I must tell you of my love.

DARIA.

Love! a word to me unknown,

Sounds so strangely in my ears,

That my heart nor feels nor hears

Aught of it when it has flown.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Then there is no rashness shown

In repeating it once more,

Since to hear or to ignore

Suits alike your stoic coldness.

DARIA.

Yes, the speech, but not the boldness

Of the speaker I pass o'er,

For this word, whate'er it be,

When it breaks upon my ear,

Quick 't is gone, although I hear.

CHRYSANTHUS.

You forget it?

DARIA.

Instantly.

CHRYSANTHUS.

What! love's sweetest word! ah, me!

Canst forget the mightiest ray

Death can dart, or heaven display?

DARIA.

Yes, for lightning, entering where

Naught resists, is lost in air.

CHRYSANTHUS.

How? what way?

DARIA.

Well, in this way:

If two doors in one straight line

Open lie, and lightning falls,

Then the bolt between the walls

Passes through, and leaves no sign.

So 't is with this word of thine;

Though love be, which I do n't doubt,

Like heaven's bolt that darts about,

Still two opposite doors I 've here,

And what enters by one ear

By the other ear goes out.

CHRYSANTHUS.

If this lightning then darts through

Where no door lies open wide

To let it pass at the other side,

Must not fire and flame ensue?

This being so, 't is also true

That the fire of love that flies

Into my heart, in flames must rise,

Since without its feast of fire

The fatal flash cannot retire,

That has entered by the eyes.

DARIA.

If to what I said but now

You had listened, I believe

You would have preferred to leave

Still unspoken love's vain vow.

This you would yourself allow.

CHRYSANTHUS.

What then was it?

DARIA.

I do n't know:

Something 't was that typified

My presumption and my pride.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Let me know it even so.

DARIA.

That in me no love could grow

Save for one who first would die

For my love.

CHRYSANTHUS.

And death being past,

Would he win your love at last?--

DARIA.

Yes, on that he might rely.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Then I plight my troth that I

Will to that reward aspire,--

A poor offering at the fire

By those beauteous eyes supplied.

DARIA.

But as you have not yet died,

Pray do n't follow me, but retire. [Exit.

CHRYSANTHUS.

In what bosom, at one moment,

Oh! ye heavens! e'er met together[6]

Such a host of anxious troubles?

Such a crowd of boding terrors?

Can I be the same calm student

Who awhile ago here wended?

To a miracle of beauty,

To a fair face now surrendered,

I scarce know what brought me hither,

I my purpose scarce remember.

What bewitchment, what enchantment,

What strange lethargy, what frenzy

Can have to my heart, those eyes

Such divine delirium sent me?

What divinity, desirous

That I should not know the endless

Mysteries of the book I carry,

In my path such snares presenteth,

Seeking from these serious studies

To distract me and divert me?

But what 's this I say? One passion

Accidentally developed,

Should not be enough, no, no,

From myself myself to sever.

If the violence of one star

Draws me to a deity's service,

It compels not; for the planets

Draw, but force not, the affections.

Free is yet my will, my mind too,

Free is still my heart: then let me

Try to solve more noble problems

Than the doubts that love presenteth.

And since Claudius, the new Clytie[7]

Of the sun, whose golden tresses

Lead him in pursuit, her footsteps

Follows through the wood, my servant

Having happily too departed,

And since yonder rocks where endeth

The dark wood in savage wildness

Must be the rude rustic shelter

Of the Christians who fled thither,

I 'll approach them to endeavour

To find there Carpophorus:--

He alone, the wise, the learn`ed,

Can my understanding rescue

From its night-mare dreams and guesses. [Exit.

SCENE III. The extremity of the wood:

wild rocks with the entrance to a cave.

Carpophorus comes forth from the cave, but is for a while unseen by

Chrysanthus, who enters.

CHRYSANTHUS.

What a labyrinthine thicket

Is this place that I have entered!

Nature here takes little trouble,

Letting it be seen how perfect

Is the beauty that arises

Even from nature's careless efforts:

Deep within this darksome grotto

Which no sunbeam's light can enter,

I shall penetrate: it seemeth

As if until now it never

Had been trod by human footsteps.

There where yonder marge impendeth

O'er a streamlet that swift-flying

Carries with it the white freshness

Of the snows that from the mountains

Ever in its waves are melted,

Stands almost a skeleton;

The sole difference it presenteth

To the tree-trunks near it is,

That it moves as well as trembles,

Slow and gaunt, a living corse.

Oh! thou venerable elder

Who, a reason-gifted tree,

Mid mere natural trees here dwelleth.--

CARPOPHORUS.

Wo! oh! wo is me!--a Roman!

(At seeing Chrysanthus, he attempts to fly.)

CHRYSANTHUS.

Though a Roman, do not dread me:

With no evil end I seek thee.

CARPOPHORUS.

Then what wouldst thou have, thou gentle

Roman youth? for thou hast silenced

My first fears even by thy presence.

CHRYSANTHUS.

'T is to ask, what now I ask thee,

Of the rocks that in this desert

Gape for ever open wide

In eternal yawns incessant,

Which is the rough marble tomb

Of a living corse interred here?

Which of these dark caves is that

In whose gloom Carpophorus dwelleth?

'T is important I speak with him.

CARPOPHORUS.

Then, regarding not the perils,

I will own it. I myself

Am Carpophorus.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Oh! let me,

Father, feel thy arms enfold me.

CARPOPHORUS.

To my heart: for as I press thee,

How, I know not, the mere contact

Brings me back again the freshness

And the greenness of my youth,

Like the vine's embracing tendrils

Twining round an aged tree:

Gallant youth, who art thou? tell me.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Father, I am called Chrysanthus,

Of Polemius, the first member

Of the Roman senate, son.

CARPOPHORUS.

And thy purpose?

CHRYSANTHUS.

It distresses

Me to see thee standing thus:

On this bank sit down and rest thee.

CARPOPHORUS.

Kindly thought of; for, alas!

I a tottering wall resemble:

At the mouth of this my cave

Let us then sit down together. [They sit down.

What now wouldst thou have, Sir Stranger?

CHRYSANTHUS.

Sir, as long as I remember,

I have felt an inclination

To the love of books and letters.

In my casual studies lately

I a difficulty met with

That I could not solve, and knowing

No one in all Rome more learn`ed

Than thyself (thy reputation

Having with this truth impressed me)

I have hither come to ask thee

To explain to me this sentence:

For I cannot understand it.

'T is, sir, in this book.

CARPOPHORUS.

Pray, let me

See it then.

CHRYSANTHUS.

'T is at the beginning;

Nay, the sentence that perplexes

Me so much is that.

CARPOPHORUS.

Why, these

Are the Holy Gospels! Heavens!

CHRYSANTHUS.

What! you kiss the book?

CARPOPHORUS.

And press it

To my forehead, thus suggesting

The profound respect with which

I even touch so great a treasure.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Why, what is the book, which I

By mere accident selected?

CARPOPHORUS.

'T is the basis, the foundation

Of the Scripture Law.

CHRYSANTHUS.

I tremble

With an unknown horror.

CARPOPHORUS.

Why?

CHRYSANTHUS.

Deeper now I would not enter

Into the secrets of a book

Which are magic spells, I 'm certain.

CARPOPHORUS.

No, not so, but vital truths.

CHRYSANTHUS.

How can that be, when its verses

Open with this line that says

(A beginning surely senseless)

"In the beginning was the Word,

And it was with God": and then it

Adds: this Word itself was God;

Then unto the Word reverting,

Says explicitly that IT

"Was made flesh"?

CARPOPHORUS.

A truth most certain:

For this first evangelist

Here to us our God presenteth

In a twofold way: the first

As being God, as Man the second.

CHRYSANTHUS.

God and Man combined together?

CARPOPHORUS.

Yes, in one eternal Person

Are both natures joined together.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Then, for this is what more presses

On my mind, can that same Word

When it was made flesh, be reckoned

God?

CARPOPHORUS.

Yes, God and Man is Christ

Crucified for our transgressions.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Pray explain this wondrous problem.

CARPOPHORUS.

He is God, because He never

Was created: He is the Word,

For, besides, He was engendered

By the Father, from both whom

In eternal due procession

Comes the Holy Ghost, three Persons,

But one God, thrice mystic emblem!--

In the Catholic faith we hold

In one Trinity one God dwelleth,

And that in one God is also

One sole Trinity, ever bless`ed,

Which confounds not the three Persons,

Nor the single substance severs.

One is the person of the Father,

One the Son's, beloved for ever,

One, the third, the Holy Ghost's.

But though three, you must remember

That in the Father, and in the Son,

And in the Holy Ghost . . .

CHRYSANTHUS.

Unheard of

Mysteries these!

CARPOPHORUS.

There 's but one God,

Equal in the power exerted,

Equal in the state and glory;

For . . .

CHRYSANTHUS.

I listen, but I tremble.

CARPOPHORUS.

The eternal Father is

Limitless, even so unmeasured

And eternal is the Son,

And unmeasured and eternal

Is the Holy Ghost; but then

Three eternities are not meant here,

Three immensities, no, but One,

Who is limitless and eternal.

For though increate the three,

They are but one Uncreated.

First the Father was not made,

Or created, or engendered;

Then engendered was the Son

By the Father, not created;

And the Spirit was not made

Or created, or engendered

By the Father or the Son,

But proceeds from both together.

This is God's divinity

Viewed as God alone, let 's enter

On the human aspect.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Stay:

For so strange, so unexpected

Are the things you say, that I

Need for their due thought some leisure.

Let me my lost breath regain,

For entranced, aroused, suspended,

Spell-bound your strong reasons hold me.

Is there then but one sole God

In three Persons, one in essence,

One in substance, one in power,

One in will?

CARPOPHORUS.

My son, 't is certain.

(Enter Aurelius and Soldiers.)

AURELIUS to the Soldiers.

Yonder is the secret cavern

Of Carpophorus, at its entrance

See him seated with another

Reading.

A SOLDIER.

Why delay? Arrest them.

AURELIUS.

Recollect Polemius bade us,

When we seized them, to envelope

Each one's face, that so, the Christians,

Their accomplices and fellows,

Should not know or recognize them.

A SOLDIER.

You 're our prisoners.

[A veil is thrown over the head of each.]

CHRYSANTHUS.

What! base wretches . . .

AURELIUS.

Gag their mouths.

CHRYSANTHUS.

But then I am . . .

AURELIUS.

Come, no words: now tie together

Both their hands behind their backs.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Why I am . . .

CARPOPHORUS.

Oh! sacred heaven!

Now my wished-for day has come.

A VOICE FROM HEAVEN.

No, not yet, my faithful servant:--

I desire the constancy

Of Chrysanthus may be tested:--

Heed not him, as for thyself,

In this manner I preserve thee. [Carpophorus disappears.

(Enter Polemius.)

POLEMIUS.

What has happened?

AURELIUS.

Oh! a wonder.--

We Carpophorus arrested,

And with him this other Christian;

Both we held here bound and fettered,

When from out our hands he vanished.

POLEMIUS.

By some sorcery 't was effected,

For those Christians use enchantments,

And then miracles pretend them.

A SOLDIER.

See, a crowd of them there flying

To the mountains.

POLEMIUS.

Intercept them,

And secure the rabble rout;

This one I shall guard myself here:-- [Exeunt Aurelius and soldiers.

Miserable wretch! who art thou?

Thus that I may know thee better,

Judging from thy face thy crimes,

I unveil thee. Gracious heaven!

My own son!

CHRYSANTHUS.

Oh! heavens! my father!

POLEMIUS.

Thou with Christians here detected?

Thou here in their caverns hidden?

Thou a prisoner? Wherefore, wherefore,

O immense and mighty Jove,

Are thy angry bolts suspended?

CHRYSANTHUS.

'T was to solve a certain doubt

Which some books of thine presented,

That I sought Carpophorus,

That I wandered to these deserts,

And . . .

POLEMIUS.

Cease, cease; for now I see

What has led to this adventure:

Thou unhappily art gifted

With a genius ill-directed;

For I count as vain and foolish

All the lore that lettered leisure

Has in human books e'er written;

But this passion has possessed thee,

And to learn their magic rites

Here, a willing slave, has led thee.

CHRYSANTHUS.

No, not magic was the knowledge

I came here to learn--far better--

The high mysteries of a faith

Which I reverence, while I dread them.

POLEMIUS.

Cease, oh! cease once more, nor let

Such vile treason find expression

On thy lips. What! thou to praise them!

AURELIUS (within).

Yonder wait the two together.

POLEMIUS.

Cover up thy face once more,

That the soldiers, when they enter,

May not know thee, may not know

How my honour is affected

By this act, until I try

Means more powerful to preserve it.

CHRYSANTHUS (aside).

God, whom until now I knew not,

Grant Thy favour, deign to help me:

Grant through suffering and through sorrow

I may come to know Thee better.

(Enter Aurelius and Soldiers.)

AURELIUS.

Though we searched the whole of the mountain,

Not one more have we arrested.

POLEMIUS.

Take this prisoner here to Rome,

And be sure that you remember

All of you my strict commands,

That no hand shall dare divest him

Of his veil:-- [Chrysanthus is led out.

Why, why, O heavens! [aside.

Do I pause, but from my breast here

Tear my bleeding heart? How act

In so dreadful a dilemma?

If I say who he is, I tarnish

With his guilt my name for ever,

And my loyalty if I 'm silent,

Since he being here transgresses

By that fact alone the edict:

Shall I punish him? The offender

Is my son. Shall I free him? He

Is my enemy and a rebel:--

If between these two extremes

Some mean lies, I cannot guess it.

As a father I must love him,

And as a judge I must condemn him. [Exeunt.

ACT THE SECOND.

SCENE I.

A hall in the house of Polemius.

Enter Claudius and Escarpin.

CLAUDIUS.

Has he not returned? Can no one

Guess in the remotest manner[8]

Where he is?

ESCARPIN.

Sir, since the day

That you left me with my master

In Diana's grove, and I

Had with that divinest charmer

To leave him, no eye has seen him.

Love alone knows how it mads me.

CLAUDIUS.

Of your loyalty I doubt not.

ESCARPIN.

Loyalty 's a different matter,

'T is not wholly that.

CLAUDIUS.

What then?

ESCARPIN.

Dark suspicions, dismal fancies,

That perhaps to live with her

He lies hid within those gardens.

CLAUDIUS.

If I could imagine that,

I, Escarpin, would be gladdened

Rather than depressed.

ESCARPIN.

I 'm not:--

I am filled, like a full barrel,

With depressions.

CLAUDIUS.

And for what?

ESCARPIN.

Certain wild chimeras haunt me,

Jealousy doth tear my heart,

And despairing love distracts me.

CLAUDIUS.

You in love and jealous?

ESCARPIN.

I

Jealous and in love. Why marvel?

Am I such a monster?

CLAUDIUS.

What!

With Daria?

ESCARPIN.

'T is no matter

What her name is, or Daria

Or Maria, I would have her

Both subjective and subjunctive,

She verb passive, I verb active.

CLAUDIUS.

You to love so rare a beauty?

ESCARPIN.

Yes, her beauty, though uncommon,

Would lack something, if it had not

My devotion.

CLAUDIUS.

How? explain:--

ESCARPIN.

Well, I prove it in this manner:--

Mr. Dullard fell in love

(I do n't tell where all this happened,

Or the time, for of the Dullards

Every age and time give samples)

With a very lovely lady:

At her coach-door as he chattered

One fine evening, he such nonsense

Talked, that one who heard his clatter,

Asked the lady in amazement

If this simpleton's advances

Did not make her doubt her beauty?--

But she quite gallantly answered,

Never until now have I

Felt so proud of my attractions,

For no beauty can be perfect

That all sorts of men do n't flatter.

CLAUDIUS.

What a feeble jest!

ESCARPIN.

This feeble?--

CLAUDIUS.

Yes, the very type of flatness:--

Cease buffooning, for my uncle

Here is coming.

ESCARPIN.

Of his sadness

Plainly is his face the mirror.

Enter Polemius and servants.

CLAUDIUS.

Jupiter doth know the anguish,

My good lord, with which I venture

To approach thee since this happened.

POLEMIUS.

Claudius, as thine own, I 'm sure,

Thou dost feel this great disaster.

CLAUDIUS.

I my promise gave thee that

To Chrysanthus . . .

POLEMIUS.

Cease; I ask thee

Not to proffer these excuses,

Since I do not care to have them.

CLAUDIUS.

Then it seems that all thy efforts

Have been useless to unravel

The strange mystery of his fate?

POLEMIUS.

With these questions do not rack me;

For, though I would rather not

Give the answer, still the answer

Rises with such ready aptness

To my lips from out my heart,

That I scarcely can withstand it.

CLAUDIUS.

Why conceal it then from me,

Knowing that thy blood meanders

Through my veins, and that my life

Owns thee as its lord and master?--

Oh! my lord, confide in me,

Let thy tongue speak once the language

That thine eyes so oft have spoken.

POLEMIUS.

Let the servants leave the apartment.

ESCARPIN (aside).

Ah! if beautiful Daria

Would but favour my attachment,

Though I have no house to give her,

Lots of stories I can grant her:-- [Exeunt Escarpin and servants.

CLAUDIUS.

Now, my lord, we are alone.

POLEMIUS.

Listen then; for though to baffle

Thy desire were my intention,

By my miseries overmastered,

I am forced to tell my secret;

Not so much have I been granted

License to avow my sufferings,

But I am, as 't were commanded

Thus to break my painful silence,

Doing honestly, though sadly,

Willingly the fact disclosing,

Which by force had been extracted.

Hear it, Claudius: my Chrysanthus,

My Chrysanthus is not absent:

In this very house he 's living!--

Would the gods, ah! me, had rather

Made a tomb and not a prison

Of his present locked apartment!

Which is in this house, within it

Is he prisoned, chained, made captive.

This surprises thee, no wonder:

More surprised thou 'lt be hereafter,

When thou com'st to know the reason

Of a fact so strange and startling.

On that fatal day, when I

Sought the mount and thou the garden,

Him I found where thou didst lose him,

Near the wood where he had rambled:

He was taken by my soldiers

At the entrance of a cavern,

With Carpophorus:--oh! here

Patience, patience may heaven grant me!--

It was lucky that they did not

See his face, for thus it happened

That the front of my dishonour

Was not in his face made patent:

Him they captured without knowing

Who he was, it being commanded

That the faces of the prisoners

Should be covered, but ere captured

This effectually was done

By themselves, they flying backward

With averted faces; he

Thus was taken, but his partner,

That strange prodigy of Rome--

Man in mind, wild beast in manners,

Doubly thus a prodigy--

Saved himself by power of magic.

Thus Chrysanthus was sole prisoner,

While the Christian crowd, disheartened,

Fled for safety to the mountains

From their grottoes and their caverns.

These the soldiers quickly followed,

And behind in that abandoned

Savage place remained but two--

Two, oh! think, a son and father.--

One a judge, too, in a cause

Wicked, bad, beyond example,

In a cause that outraged Caesar,

And the gods themselves disparaged.

There with a delinquent son

Stood I, therefore this should happen,

That both clemency and rigour

In my heart waged fearful battle--

Clemency in fine had won,

I would have removed the bandage

From his eyes and let him fly,

But that instant, ah! unhappy!

Came the soldiers back, and then

It were but more misery added,

If they knew of my connivance:

All that then my care could manage

To protect him was the secret

Of his name to keep well guarded.

Thus to Rome I brought him prisoner,

Where pretending great exactness,

That his friends should not discover

Where this Christian malefactor

Was imprisoned, to this house,

To my own house, I commanded

That he should be brought; there hidden

And unknown, a few days after

I in his place substituted . . .

Ah! what will not the untrammelled

Strength of arbitrary power

Dare attempt? what law not trample?

Substituted, I repeat,

For my son a slave, whose strangled,

Headless corse thus paid the debt

Which from me were else exacted.

You will say, "Since fortune thus

Has the debt so happily cancelled,

Why imprison or conceal him?"--

And, thus, full of doubts, I answer

That though it is true I wished not,

Woe is me! the common scaffold

Should his punishment make public,

I as little wished his hardened

Heart should know my love and pity

Since it did not fear my anger:

Ah! believe me, Claudius,

'Twixt the chastisement a father

And an executioner gives,

A great difference must be granted:

One hand honours what it striketh,

One disgraces, blights, and blackens.

Soon my rigour ceased, for truly,

In a father's heart it lasteth

Seldom long: but then what wonder,

If the hand that in its anger

Smites his son, in his own breast

Leaves a wound that ever rankles--

I one day his prison entered

With the wish (I own it frankly)

To forgive him, and when I

Thought he would have even thanked me

For receiving a reproof,

Not severe, too lenient rather,

He began to praise the Christians

With such earnestness and ardour,

In defence of their new law,

That my clemency departed,

And my angrier mood returned.

I his doors and windows fastened.

In the room where he is lying,

Well secured by gyves and shackles,

Sparingly his food is given him,

Through my hands alone it passes,

For I dare not to another

Trust the care his state demandeth.

You will think in this I reached to

The extreme of my disasters--

The full limits of misfortune,

But not so, and if you hearken,

You 'll perceive they 're but beginning,

And not ended, as you fancied.

All these strange events so much

Have unnerved him and unmanned him,

That, forgetful of himself,

Of himself he is regardless.

Nothing to the purpose speaks he.

In his incoherent language

Frenzy shows itself, delusion

In his thoughts and in his fancies:--

Many times I 've listened to him,

Since so high-strung and abstracted

Is his mind, he takes no note of

Who goes in or who departeth.

Once I heard him deprecating

Some despotic beauty's hardness,

Saying, "Since I die for thee,

Thou thy favour sure wilt grant me".

At another time he said,

"Three in one, oh! how can that be?"

Things which these same Christian people

In their law hold quite established.

Thus it is my life is troubled,

Lost in doubts, emeshed, and tangled.

If to freedom I restore him,

I have little doubt that, darkened

By the Christian treachery, he

Will declare himself instanter

Openly a Christian, which

Would to me be such a scandal,

That my blood henceforth were tainted,

And my noble name were branded.

If I leave him here in prison,

So excessive is his sadness,

So extreme his melancholy,

That I fear 't will end in madness.

In a word, I hold, my nephew,

Hold it as a certain axiom,

That these dark magician Christians

Keep him bound by their enchantments;

Who through hatred of my house,

And my office to disparage,

Now revenge themselves on me

Through my only son Chrysanthus.

Tell me, then, what shall I do;

But before you give the answer

Which your subtle wit may dictate,

I would with your own eyes have thee

See him first, you 'll then know better

What my urgent need demandeth.

Come, he 's not far off, his quarter

Is adjoining this apartment;

When you see him, I am certain

You will think it a disaster

Far less evil he should die,

Than that in this cruel manner

He should outrage his own blood,

And my bright escutcheon blacken.

[He opens a door, and Chrysanthus is seen seated in a chair, with his

hands and feet in irons.]

CLAUDIUS.

Thus to see my friend, o'erwhelms me

With a grief I cannot master.

POLEMIUS.

Stay, do not approach him nearer;

For I would not he remarked thee,

I would save him the disgrace

Of being seen by thee thus shackled.

CLAUDIUS.

What his misery may dictate

We can hear, nor yet attract him.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Was ever human fate so strange as mine?

Were unmatched wishes ever mated so?

Is it not enough to feel one form of woe,

Without being forced 'neath opposite forms to pine?

A triune God's mysterious power divine,

From heaven I ask for life, that I may know,

From heaven I ask for death, life's grisly foe,

A fair one's favour in my heart to shrine:

But how can death and life so well agree,

That I can ask of heaven to end their strife,

And grant them both in pitying love to me?

Yet I will ask, though both with risks are rife,

Neither shall hinder me, for heaven must be

The arbiter of death as well as life.

POLEMIUS.

See now if I spoke the truth.

CLAUDIUS.

I am utterly distracted. (The door closes.

POLEMIUS.

Lest perhaps he should perceive us,

Let us move a little further.

Now advise me how to act,

Since you see the grief that racks me.

CLAUDIUS.

Though it savours of presumption

To white hairs like yours, to hazard

Words of council, yet at times

Even a young man may impart them:

Well-proportioned punishment

Grave defects oft counteracteth.

But when carried to extremes,

It but irritates and hardens.

Any instrument of music

Of this truth is an example.

Lightly touched, it breathes but sweetness,

Discord, when 't is roughly handled.

'T is not well to send an arrow

To such heights, that in discharging

The strong tension breaks the bowstring,

Or the bow itself is fractured.

These two simple illustrations

Are sufficiently adapted

To my purpose, of advising

Means of cure both mild and ample.

You must take a middle course,

All extremes must be abandoned.

Gentle but judicious treatment

Is the method for Chrysanthus.

For severer methods end in

Disappointment and disaster.

Take him, then, from out his prison,

Leave him free, unchecked, untrammelled,

For the danger is an infant

Without strength to hurt or harm him.

Be it that those wretched Christians

Have bewitched him, disenchant him,

Since you have the power; for Nature

With such careful forethought acteth,

That an antidotal herb

She for every poison planteth.

And if, finally, your wish

Is that he this fatal sadness

Should forget, and wholly change it

To a happier state and gladder,

Get him married: for remember

Nothing is so well adapted

To restrain discursive fancies

As the care and the attachment

Centered in a wife and children;

Taking care that in this matter

Mere convenience should not weigh

More than his own taste and fancy:

Let him choose his wife himself.

Pleased in that, to rove or ramble

Then will be beyond his power,

Even were he so attracted,

For a happy married lover

Thinks of naught except his rapture.

POLEMIUS.

I with nothing such good counsel

Can repay, except the frankness

Of accepting it, which is

The reward yourself would ask for.

And since I a mean must choose

Between two extremes of action,

From his cell, to-day, my son

Shall go forth, but in a manner

That will leave his seeming freedom

Circumscribed and safely guarded.

Let that hall which looketh over

Great Apollo's beauteous garden

Be made gay by flowing curtains,

Be festooned by flowery garlands;

Costly robes for him get ready;

Then invite the loveliest damsels

Rome can boast of, to come hither

To the feasts and to the dances.

Bring musicians, and in fine

Let it be proclaimed that any

Woman of illustrious blood

Who from his delusive passions

Can divert him, by her charms

Curing him of all his sadness,

Shall become his wife, how humble

Her estate, her wealth how scanty.

And if this be not sufficient,

I will give a golden talent

Yearly to the leech who cures him

By some happy stroke of practice. [Exit.

CLAUDIUS.

Oh! a father's pitying love,

What will it not do, what marvel

Not attempt for a son's welfare,

For his life?

Enter ESCARPIN.

ESCARPIN.

My lord 'por Baco!'

(That 's the god I like to swear by,

Jolly god of all good rascals)

May I ask you what 's the secret?

CLAUDIUS.

You gain little when you ask me

For a secret all may know.

After his mysterious absence

Your young lord 's returned home ill.

ESCARPIN.

In what way?

CLAUDIUS.

That none can fathom,

Since he does not tell his ailment

Save by signs and by his manner.

ESCARPIN.

Then he 's wrong, sir, not to tell it

Clearly: with extreme exactness

Should our griefs, our pains be mentioned.

A back tooth a man once maddened,

And a barber came to draw it.

As he sat with jaws expanded,

"Which tooth is it, sir, that pains you?"

Asked of him the honest barber,

And the patient in affected

Language grandly thus made answer,

"The penultimate"; the dentist

Not being used to such pedantic

Talk as this, with ready forceps

Soon the last of all extracted.

The poor patient to be certain,

With his tongue the spot examined,

And exclaimed, his mouth all bleeding,

"Why, that 's not the right tooth, master".

"Is it not the ultimate molar?"

Said the barber quite as grandly.

"Yes" (he answered), "but I said

The penultimate, and I 'd have you

Know, your worship, that it means

Simply that that 's next the farthest".

Thus instructed, he returned

To the attack once more, remarking

"In effect then the bad tooth

Is the one that 's next the last one?"

"Yes", he said, "then here it is",

Spoke the barber with great smartness,

Plucking out the tooth that then

Was the last but one; it happened

From not speaking plain, he lost

Two good teeth, and kept his bad one.

CLAUDIUS.

Come and something newer learn

In the stratagem his father

Has arranged to cure the illness

Of Chrysanthus, whom he fancies . . .

ESCARPIN.

What?

CLAUDIUS.

Is spell-bound by the Christians

Through the power of their enchantments:--

(Since to-day I cannot see thee, [aside.

Cynthia fair, forgive my absence). [Exit.

ESCARPIN.

While these matters thus proceed,

I shall try, let what will happen,

Thee to see, divine Daria:--

At my love, oh! be not angered,

Since the penalty of beauty

Is to be beloved: then pardon. [Exit.

SCENE II.--The Wood.

Enter DARIA from the chase with bow and arrows.

DARIA.

O stag that swiftly flying

Before my feathered shafts the winds outvieing,

Impelled by wings, not feet,

If in this green retreat

Here panting thou wouldst die,

And stain with blood the fountain murmuring by,

Await another wound, another friend,

That so with quicker speed thy life may end;

For to a wretch that stroke a friend must be

That eases death and sooner sets life free.

[She stumbles and falls near the mouth of a cave.]

But, bless me, heaven! I feel

My brain grow hot, my curdling blood congeal:

A form of fire and snow

I seem at once to turn: this sudden blow,

This stumbling, how I know not, by this stone,

This horrid mouth in which my grave is shown,

This cave of many shapes,

Through which the melancholy mountain gapes,

This mountain's self, a vast

Abysmal shadow cast

Suddenly on my heart, as if 't were meant

To be my rustic pyre, my strange new monument,

All fill my heart with wonder and with fear,

What buried mysteries are hidden here

That terrify me so,

And make me tremble 'neath impending woe.

[A solemn strain of music is heard from within.]

Nay more, illusion now doth bear to me

The sweetest sounds of dulcet harmony,

Music and voice combine:--

O solitude! what phantasms are thine!

But let me listen to the voice that blent

Sounds with the music of the instrument.

Music from within the cave.

SONG.

Oh! be the day for ever blest,

And blest be pitying heaven's decree,

That makes the darksome cave to be

Daria's tomb, her place of rest!

DARIA.

Blest! can such evil auguries bless?

And happy can that strange fate be

That gives this darksome cave to me

As monument of my sad life?

MUSIC.

Yes.

DARIA.

Oh! who before in actual woe

The happier signs of bliss could read?

Will not a fate so rigorous lead

To misery, not to rapture?--

MUSIC.

No.

DARIA.

O fantasy! unwelcome guest!

How can this cave bring good to me?

MUSIC.

Itself will tell, when it shall be

Daria's tomb, her place of rest.

DARIA.

But then, who gave the stern decree,

That this dark cave my bones should hide?

MUSIC.

Daria, it was he who died,

Who gave his life for love of thee.

DARIA.

"Who gave his life for love of me!"

Ah! me, and can it be in sooth

That gentle noble Roman youth

I answered with such cruelty

In this same wood the other day,

Saying that I his love would be

If he would only die for me!

Can he have cast himself away

Down this dark cave, and there lies dead,

Buried within the dread abyss,

Waiting my love, his promised bliss?--

My soul, not now mine own, has fled!

CYNTHIA (within).

Forward! forward! through the gloom

Every cave and cavern enter,

Search the dark wood to its centre,

Lest it prove Daria's tomb.

DARIA.

Ah! me, the sense confounding,

Both here and there are opposite voices sounding.

Here is my name in measured cadence greeted,

And there in hollow echoes oft repeated.

Would that the latter cries that reach my ear

Came from my mates in this wild forest sphere,

In the dread solitude that doth surround me

Their presence would be welcome.

[Enter Cynthia with bow and arrows.]

CYNTHIA.

Till I found me,

Beauteous Daria, by thy side once more,

Each mountain nook my search had well gone o'er.

DARIA (aside).

Let me dissemble

The terror and surprise that make me tremble,

If I have power to feign

Amid the wild confusion of my brain:--

Following the chase to-day,

Wishing Diana's part in full to play,

So fair the horizon smiled,

I left the wood and entered on the wild,

Led by a wounded deer still on and on.

And further in pursuit I would have gone,

Nor had my swift career

Even ended here,

But for this mouth that opening in the rock,

With horrid gape my vain attempt doth mock,

And stops my further way.

CYNTHIA.

Until I found thee I was all dismay,

Lest thou some savage beast, some monstrous foe,

Hadst met.

DARIA (aside).

Ah! would to Jove 't were so!

And that my death in his wild hands had paid

For future chastisement by fate delayed!

But ah! the wish is vain,

Foreboding horror fills my heart and brain,

This mystic music borne upon the air

Must surely augur ill.

(Enter NISIDA.)

NISIDA.

Daria fair,

And Cynthia wise, I come to seek ye two.

CYNTHIA.

Has any thing occurred or strange or new?

NISIDA.

I scarce can tell it. As I came along,

I heard a man, in a clear voice and strong,

Proclaiming as he went

Through all the mountain a most strange event:

Rome hath decreed

Priceless rewards to her whose charms may lead

Through lawful love and in an open way

By public wedlock in the light of day,

The son of proud Polemius from the state

Of gloom in which his mind is sunk of late.

CYNTHIA.

And what can be the cause that he is so?

NISIDA.

Ah! that I do not know,

But yonder, leaving the Salarian Way,

A Roman soldier hitherward doth stray:

He may enlighten us and tell us all.

CYNTHIA.

Yes, let us know the truth, the stranger call.

DARIA (aside).

Ah! how distinct the pain

That presses on my heart, and dulls my wildered brain!

(Enter Escarpin.)

NISIDA.

Thou, O thou, whose wandering footsteps

These secluded groves have entered . . .[9]

ESCARPIN.

Thou four hundred times repeated--

Thou and all the thous, your servant.

NISIDA.

Tell us of the proclamation

Publicly to-day presented

To the gaze of Rome.

ESCARPIN.

I 'll do so;

For there 's nothing I love better

Than a story (aside, if to tell it

In divine Daria's presence

Does not put me out, for no one,

When the loved one listens, ever

Speaks his best): Polemius,

Rome's great senator, whose bended

Shoulders, like an Atlas, bear

All the burden of the empire,

By Numerian's self entrusted,

He, this chief of Rome's great senate,

Has a son, by name Chrysanthus,

Who, as rumour goes, at present

Is afflicted by a sadness

So extreme and so excessive,

That 't is thought to be occasioned

By the magic those detested

Christians (who abhor his house,

And his father, who hath pressed them

Heavily as judge and ruler)

Have against his life effected,

All through hatred of our gods.

And so great is the dejection

That he feels, there 's nothing yet

Found to rouse him or divert him.

Thus it is Numerianus,

Who is ever well-affected

To his father, hath proclaimed

All through Rome, that whosoever

Is so happy by her beauty,

Or so fortunately clever

By her wit, or by her graces

Is so powerful, as to temper

His affliction, since love conquers

All things by his magic presence,

He will give her (if a noble)

As his wife, and will present her

With a portion far surpassing

All Polemius' self possesses,

Not to speak of what is promised

Him whose skill may else effect it.

Thus it is that Rome to-day

Laurel wreaths and crowns presenteth

To its most renowned physicians,

To its sages and its elders,

And to wit and grace and beauty

Joyous feasts and courtly revels;

So that there is not a lady

In all Rome, but thinks it certain

That the prize is hers already,

Since by all 't will be contested,

Some through vanity, and some

Through a view more interested:

Even the ugly ones, I warrant,

Will be there well represented.

So with this, adieu. (Aside, Oh! fairest

Nymph Daria, since I ventured

Here to see thee, having seen thee

Now, alas! I must absent me!) [Exit.

CYNTHIA.

What strange news!

NISIDA.

There 's not a beauty

But for victory will endeavour

When among Rome's fairest daughters

Such a prize shall be contested.

CYNTHIA.

Thus by showing us the value

Thou upon the victory settest,

We may understand that thou

Meanest in the lists to enter.

NISIDA.

Yes, so far as heaven through music

Its most magic cures effecteth,

Since no witchcraft is so potent

But sweet music may dispel it.

It doth tame the raging wild beast,

Lulls to sleep the poisonous serpent,

And makes evil genii, who

Are revolted spirits--rebels--

Fly in fear, and in this art

I have always been most perfect:

Wrongly would I act to-day,

In not striving for the splendid

Prize which will be mine, when I

See myself the loved and wedded

Wife of the great senator's son,

And the mistress of such treasures.

CYNTHIA.

Although music is an art

Which so many arts excelleth,

Still in truth 't is but a sound

Which the wanton air disperses.

It the sweet child of the air

In the air itself must perish.

I, who in my studious reading

Have such learn`ed lore collected,

Who in poetry, that art

Which both teacheth and diverteth,

May precedence claim o'er many

Geniuses so prized at present,

Can a surer victory hope for

In the great fight that impendeth,

Since the music of the soul

Is what keeps the mind suspended.

In one item, Nisida,

We two differ: thy incentive

Thy chief motive, is but interest:

Mine is vanity, a determined

Will no other woman shall

Triumph o'er me in this effort,

Since I wish that Rome should see

That the glory, the perfection

Of a woman is her mind,

All her other charms excelling.

DARIA.

Interest and vanity

Are the two things, as you tell me,

That, O Cynthia! can oblige thee,

That, O Nisida, can compel thee

To attempt this undertaking

By so many risks attended.

But I think you both are wrong,

Since in this case, having heard that

The affliction this man suffers

Christian sorcery hath effected

Through abhorrence of our gods,

By that atheist sect detested,

Neither of these feelings should

Be your motive to attempt it.

I then, who, for this time only

Will believe these waves that tell me--

These bright fountains--that the beauty

Which so oft they have reflected

Is unequalled, mean to lay it

As an offering in the temple

Of the gods, to show what little

Strength in Christian sorcery dwelleth.

NISIDA.

Then 't is openly admitted

That we three the list will enter

For the prize.

CYNTHIA.

And from this moment

That the rivalry commences.

NISIDA.

Voice of song, thy sweet enchantment

On this great occasion lend me,

That through thy soft influence

Rank and riches I may merit. [Exit.

CYNTHIA.

Genius, offspring of the soul,

Prove this time thou 'rt so descended,

That thy proud ambitious hopes

May the laurel crown be tendered. [Exit.

DARIA.

Beauty, daughter of the gods,

Now thy glorious birth remember:

Make me victress in the fight,

That the gods may live for ever. [Exit.

SCENE III.--A hall in the house of Polemius, opening at the end upon a

garden.

(Enter Polemius and Claudius.)

POLEMIUS.

Is then everything prepared?--

CLAUDIUS.

Everything has been got ready

As you ordered. This apartment

Opening on the garden terrace

Has been draped and covered over

With the costliest silks and velvets,

Leaving certain spaces bare

For the painter's magic pencil,

Where, so cunning is his art,

That it nature's self resembles.

Flowers more fair than in the garden,

Pinks and roses are presented:

But what wonder when the fountains

Still run after to reflect them?--

All things else have been provided,

Music, dances, gala dresses;

And for all that, Rome yet knows not

What in truth is here projected;

'T is a fair Academy,

In whose floral halls assemble

Beauty, wit, and grace, a sight

That we see but very seldom.

All the ladies too of Rome

Have prepared for the contention

With due circumspection, since

As his wife will be selected

She who best doth please him; thus

There are none but will present them

In these gardens, some to see him,

Others to show off themselves here.

POLEMIUS.

Oh, my Claudius, would to Jove

That all this could dispossess me

Of my dark foreboding fancies,

Of the terrors that oppress me!--

(Enter Aurelius.)

AURELIUS.

Sir, a very learned physician

Comes to proffer his best service

To Chrysanthus, led by rumour

Of his illness.

POLEMIUS.

Bid him enter.

[Aurelius retires, and returns immediately with Carpophorus, disguised

as a physician.]

CARPOPHORUS (aside).

Heaven, that I may do the work

That this day I have attempted,

Grant me strength a little while;

For I know my death impendeth!--

Mighty lord, thy victor hand, [aloud.

Let me kiss and kneeling press it.

POLEMIUS.

Venerable elder, rise

From the ground; thy very presence

Gives me joy, a certain instinct

Even at sight of thee doth tell me

Thou alone canst save my son.

CARPOPHORUS.

Heaven but grant the cure be perfect!

POLEMIUS.

Whence, sir, art thou?

CARPOPHORUS.

Sir, from Athens.

POLEMIUS.

'T is a city that excelleth

All the world in knowledge.

CARPOPHORUS.

There

All are teachers, all are learners.

The sole wish to be of use

Has on this occasion led me

From my home. Inform me then

How Chrysanthus is affected.

POLEMIUS.

With an overwhelming sadness;

Or to speak it more correctly

(Since when we consult a doctor

Even suspicions should be mentioned),

He, my son, has been bewitched;--

Thus it is these Christian perverts

Take revenge through him on me:

In particular an elder

Called Carpophorus, a wizard . . .

May the day soon come for vengeance!

CARPOPHORUS.

May heaven grant it . . . (aside, For that day

I the martyr's crown may merit).

Where at present is Chrysanthus?

POLEMIUS.

He is just about to enter:--

You can see him; all his ailment

In the soul you 'll find is centered.

CARPOPHORUS.

In the soul then I will cure him,

If my skill heaven only blesses. [Music is heard from within.

CLAUDIUS.

That he 's leaving his apartment

This harmonious strain suggesteth,

Since to counteract his gloom

He by music is attended.

(Enter Chrysanthus richly dressed, preceded by musicians playing and

singing, and followed by attendants.)

CHRYSANTHUS.

Cease; my pain, perchance my folly,

Cannot be by song diverted;

Music is a power exerted

For the cure of melancholy,

Which in truth it but augmenteth.

A MUSICIAN.

This your father bade us do.

CHRYSANTHUS.

'T is because he never knew

Pain like that which me tormenteth.

For if he that pang incessant

Felt, he would not wish to cure it,

He would love it and endure it.

POLEMIUS.

Think, my son, that I am present,

And that I am not ambitious

To assume your evil mood,

But to find that it is good.

CHRYSANTHUS.

No, sir, you mistake my wishes.

I would not through you relieve me

Of my care; my former state

Seemed, though, more to mitigate

What I suffer: why not leave me

There to die?

POLEMIUS.

That yet I may,

Pitying your sad condition,

Work your cure:--A great physician

Comes to visit you to-day.

CHRYSANTHUS (aside).

Who do I behold? ah, me!

CARPOPHORUS.

I will speak to him with your leave.

CHRYSANTHUS (aside).

No, my eyes do not deceive,

'T is Carpophorus that I see!

I my pleasure must conceal.

CARPOPHORUS.

Sir, of what do you complain?

CHRYSANTHUS.

Since you come to cure my pain,

I will tell you how I feel.

A great sadness hath been thrown

O'er my mind and o'er my feelings,

A dark blank whose dim revealings

Make their sombre tints mine own.

CARPOPHORUS.

Can you any cause assign me

Whence this sadness is proceeding?

CHRYSANTHUS.

From my earliest years to reading

Did my studious tastes incline me.

Something thus acquired doth wake

Doubts, and fears, and hopes, ah me!

That the things I read may be.

CARPOPHORUS.

Then from me this lesson take.

Every mystery how obscure,

Is explained by faith alone;

All is clear when that is known:

'T is through faith I 'll work your cure.

Since in that your healing lies,

Take it then from me.

CHRYSANTHUS.

From you

I infer all good: that true

Faith I hope which you advise.

CARPOPHORUS (to Polemius).

Give me leave, sir, to address

Some few words to him alone,

Less reserve will then be shown. (The two retire to one side.

Have you recognized me?

CHRYSANTHUS.

Yes,

Every sign shows you are he

Who in my most perilous strait

Fled and left me to my fate.

CARPOPHORUS.

God did that; and would you see

That it was His own work, say,

If I did not then absent me

Through His means, could I present me

As your teacher here to-day?

CHRYSANTHUS.

No.

CARPOPHORUS.

How just His providence!

Since I was preserved, that I

Here might seek you, and more nigh

Give you full intelligence

Leisurely of every doubt

Which disturbs you when you read.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Mysteries they are indeed,

Difficult to be made out.

CARPOPHORUS.

To the believer all is plain.

CHRYSANTHUS.

I would believe, what must I do?--

CARPOPHORUS.

Your intellectual pride subdue.

CHRYSANTHUS.

I will subdue it, since 't is vain.

CARPOPHORUS.

Then the first thing to be done

Is to be baptized.

CHRYSANTHUS.

I bow,

Father, and implore it now.

CARPOPHORUS.

Let us for the present shun

Further notice; lest suspicion

Should betray what we would smother;

Every day we 'll see each other,

When I 'll execute my mission:

I, to cure sin's primal scath,

Will at fitting time baptize you,

Taking care to catechise you

In the principles of the faith;

Only now one admonition

Must I give; be armed, be ready

For the fight most fierce and steady

Ever fought for man's perdition;

Oh! take heed, amid the advances

Of the fair who wish to win you,

'Mid the fires that burn within you,

'Mid lascivious looks and glances,

'Mid such various foes enlisted,

That you are not conquered by them.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Women! oh! who dare defy them

By such dread allies assisted?

CARPOPHORUS.

He whom God assists.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Be swayed

By my tears, and ask him.

CARPOPHORUS.

You

Must too ask him: for he who

Aids himself, him God doth aid.

POLEMIUS.

What, sir, think you of his case?

CARPOPHORUS.

I have ordered him a bath,

Strong restoring powers it hath,

Which his illness must displace:--

POLEMIUS.

Sir, relying on you then,

I will give you ample wealth,

If you can restore his health.

CARPOPHORUS.

Still I cannot tell you when,

But I shall return and see him

Frequently; in fact 'till he

Is from all his ailment free,

From my hand I will not free him.

POLEMIUS.

For your kindness I am grateful.

CHRYSANTHUS.

He alone has power to cure me.

Since he knows what will allure me,

When all other modes are hateful. [Exit Carpophorus.

(Enter Escarpin.)

ESCARPIN.

All this garden of delight

Must be beauty's birth-place sure,

Here the fresh rose doubly pure,

Here the jasmin doubly white,

Learn to-day a newer grace,

Lovelier red, more dazzling snow.

POLEMIUS.

Why?

ESCARPIN.

Because the world doth show

Naught so fair as this sweet place.

Falsely boasts th' Elysian bower

Peerless beauty, here to-day

More, far more, these groves display:--

Not a fountain, tree, or flower . . .

POLEMIUS.

Well?

ESCARPIN.

But by a nymph more fair

Is surpassed.

POLEMIUS.

Come, Claudius, come,

He will be but dull and dumb,

Shy the proffered bliss to share,

Through the fear and the respect

Which, as son, he owes to me.

CLAUDIUS.

He who gave the advice should see

Also after the effect.

Let us all from this withdraw.

POLEMIUS.

Great results I hope to gather:

ESCARPIN (aside).

Well, you 're the first pander-father

Ever in my life I saw.

CHRYSANTHUS.

What, Escarpin, you, as well,

Going to leave me? Mum for once.

ESCARPIN.

Silence suits me for the nonce.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Why?

ESCARPIN.

A tale in point I 'll tell:

Once a snuffler, by a pirate

Moor was captured, who in some

Way affected to be dumb,

That his ransom at no high rate

Might be purchased: when his owner

This defect perceived, the shuffle

Made him sell this Mr. Snuffle

Very cheaply: to the donor

Of his freedom, through his nose,

Half in snuffle, half in squeak,

Then he said, "Oh! Moor, I speak,

I 'm not dumb as you suppose".

"Fool, to let your folly lead you

So astray", replied the Moor.

"Had I heard you speak, be sure

I for nothing would have freed you".

Thus it is I moderate me

In the use of tongue and cheek,

Lest when you have heard me speak,

Still more cheaply you may rate me.

CHRYSANTHUS.

You must know the estimation

I have held you in so long.

ESCARPIN.

Well, my memory is not strong.

It requires consideration

To admit that pleasant fact.

CHRYSANTHUS.

What of me do people say?--

ESCARPIN.

Shall I speak it?

CHRYSANTHUS.

Speak.

ESCARPIN.

Why, they

Say, my lord, that you are cracked.

CHRYSANTHUS.

For what reason? Why this blame?

ESCARPIN.

Reason, sir, need not be had,

For the wisest man is mad

If he only gets the name.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Well, it was not wrongly given,

If they only knew that I

Have consented even to die

So to reach the wished-for heaven

Of a sovereign beauty's favour.

ESCARPIN.

For a lady's favour you

Have agreed to die?

CHRYSANTHUS.

'T is true.

ESCARPIN.

Does not this a certain savour

Of insanity give your sadness?

CHRYSANTHUS.

Were I certain as of breath

I could claim it after death,

There was method in my madness.

ESCARPIN.

A brave soldier of the line,

On his death-bed lying ill,

Spoke thus, "Item, 't is my will,

Gallant friends and comrades mine,

That you 'll bear me to my grave,

And although I 've little wealth,

Thirty reals to drink my health

Shall you for your kindness have".

Thus the hope as vain must be

After death one's love to wed,

As to drink one's health when dead.

[Nisida advances from the garden.]

CHRYSANTHUS.

But what maid is this I see

Hither through the garden wending?

ESCARPIN.

If you take a stroll with me

Plenty of her sort you 'll see.

NISIDA.

One who would effect the ending

Of thy sadness.

CHRYSANTHUS (aside).

Now comes near thee,

O my heart, thy threatened trial!

Lady, pardon the denial,

But I would nor see nor hear thee.

NISIDA.

Not so ungallantly surely

Wilt thou act, as not to see

One who comes to speak with thee?

CHRYSANTHUS.

To see one who thinks so poorly

Of herself, and with such lightness

Owns she comes to speak with me,

Rather would appear to be

Want of sense than of politeness.

NISIDA.

All discourse is not so slight

That thou need'st decline it so.

CHRYSANTHUS.

No, I will not see thee, no.

Thus I shut thee from my sight.

NISIDA.

Vainly art thou cold and wise,

Other senses thou shouldst fear,

Since I enter by the ear,

Though thou shut me from the eyes.

Sings.

"The bless`ed rapture of forgetting

Never doth my heart deserve,

What my memory would preserve

Is the memory I 'm regretting".

CHRYSANTHUS.

That melting voice, that melody

Spell-bound holds th' entranc`ed soul.

Ah! from such divine control

Who his fettered soul could free?--

Human Siren, leave me, go!

Too well I feel its fatal power.

I faint before it like a flower

By warm-winds wooed in noontide's glow.

The close-pressed lips the mouth can lock,

And so repress the vain reply,

The lid can veil th' unwilling eye

From all that may offend and shock,--

Nature doth seem a niggard here,

Unequally her gifts disposing,

For no instinctive means of closing

She gives the unprotected ear.

(Enter Cynthia.)

CYNTHIA.

Since then the ear cannot be closed,

And thou resistance need'st not try,

Listen to the gloss that I

On this sweet conceit composed:

"The bless`ed rapture of forgetting

Never doth my heart deserve;

What my memory would preserve

Is the memory I 'm regretting".

When Nature from the void obscure

Her varied world to life awakes,

All things find use and so endure:--

Thus she a poison never makes

Without its corresponding cure:

Each thing of Nature's careful setting,

Each plant that grows in field or grove

Hath got its opposite flower or weed;

The cure is with the pain decreed;

Thus too is found for feverish love

'The bless`ed rapture of forgetting.'

The starry wonders of the night,

The arbiters of fate on high,

Nothing can dim: To see their light

Is easy, but to draw more nigh

The orbs themselves, exceeds our might.

Thus 't is to know, and only know,

The troubled heart, the trembling nerve,

To sweet oblivion's blank may owe

Their rest, but, ah! that cure of woe

'Never doth my heart deserve.'

Then what imports it that there be,

For all the ills of heart or brain,

A sweet oblivious remedy,

If it, when 't is applied to me,

Fails to cure me of my pain?

Forgetfulness in me doth serve

No useful purpose: But why fret

My heart at this? Do I deserve,

Strange contradiction! to forget

'What my memory would preserve?'

And thus my pain in straits like these,

Must needs despise the only sure

Remedial means of partial ease--

That is--to perish of the cure

Rather than die of the disease.

Then not in wailing or in fretting,

My love, accept thy fate, but let

This victory o'er myself, to thee

Bring consolation, pride, and glee,

Since what I wish not to forget

'Is the memory I 'm regretting.'

CHRYSANTHUS.

'T is not through the voice alone

Music breathes its soft enchantment.[10]

All things that in concord blend

Find in music their one language.

Thou with thy delicious sweetness [To Nisida]

Host my heart at once made captive;--

Thou with thy melodious verses [To Cynthia]

Hast my very soul enraptured.

Ah! how subtly thou dost reason!

Ah! how tenderly thou chantest!

Thou with thy artistic skill,

Thou with thy clear understanding.

But what say I? I speak falsely,

For you both are sphinxes rather,

Who with flattering words seduce me

But to ruin me hereafter:--

Leave me; go: I cannot listen

To your wiles.

NISIDA.

My lord, oh! hearken

To my song once more.

CYNTHIA.

Wait! stay!

NISIDA.

Why thus treat with so much harshness

Those who mourn thy deep dejection?

ESCARPIN.

Oh! how soon they 'd have an answer

If they asked of me these questions.

I know how to treat such tattle:

Leave them, sir, to me.

CHRYSANTHUS.

My senses

'Gainst their lures I must keep guarded:

They are crocodiles, but feigning

Human speech, so but to drag me

To my ruin, my destruction.

NISIDA.

Since my voice will still attract thee,

'T is of little use to fly me.

CYNTHIA.

Though thou dost thy best to guard thee,

While I gloss the words she singeth

To my genius thou must hearken.

CHRYSANTHUS (aside.)

God whom I adore! since I

Help myself, Thy help, oh! grant me!

NISIDA.

"Ah! the joy" . . . . (she becomes confused.

But what is this?

Icy torpor coldly fastens

On my hands; the lute drops from me,

And my very breath departeth.

CYNTHIA.

Since she cannot sing; then listen

To this subtle play of fancy:

"Love, if thou 'rt my god" . . . . (she becomes confused.

But how,

What can have my mind so darkened

What my memory so confuses,

What my voice can so embarrass?

NISIDA.

I am turned to frost and fire,

I am changed to living marble.

CYNTHIA.

Frozen over is my breast,

And my heart is cleft and hardened.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Thus to lose your wits, ye two,

What can have so strangely happened?

ESCARPIN.

Being poets and musicians,

Quite accounts, sir, for their absence.

NISIDA.

Heavens! beneath the noontide sun

To be left in total darkness!

CYNTHIA.

In an instant, O ye heavens!

O'er your vault can thick clouds gather?

NISIDA.

'Neath the contact of my feet

Earth doth tremble, and I stagger.

CYNTHIA.

Mountains upon mountains seem

On my shoulders to be balanced.

ESCARPIN.

So it always is with those

Who make verses, or who chant them.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Of the one God whom I worship

These are miracles, are marvels.

(Enter Daria.)

DARIA.

Here, Chrysanthus, I have come . . .

NISIDA.

Stay, Daria.

CYNTHIA.

Stay, 't is rashness

Here to come, for, full of wonders,

Full of terrors is this garden.

ESCARPIN.

Do not enter: awful omens

Threat'ning death await thy advent.

NISIDA.

By my miseries admonished . . . .

CYNTHIA.

By my strange misfortune startled . . .

NISIDA.

Flying from myself, I leave

This green sphere, dismayed, distracted.

CYNTHIA.

Without soul or life I fly,

Overwhelmed by this enchantment.

NISIDA.

Oh! how dreadful!

CYNTHIA.

Oh! how awful!

NISIDA.

Oh! the horror!

CYNTHIA.

Oh! the anguish! [Exeunt Cynthia and Nisida.]

ESCARPIN.

Mad with jealousy and rage

Have the tuneful twain departed.

DARIA (aside).

Chastisements for due offences

Do not fright me, do not startle,

For if they through arrogance

And ambition sought this garden,

Me the worship of the gods

Here has led, and so I 'm guarded

'Gainst all sorceries whatsoever,

'Gainst all forms of Christian magic:--

Art thou then Chrysanthus?

CHRYSANTHUS.

Yes.

DARIA.

Not confused or troubled, rather

With a certain fear I see thee,

For which I have grounds most ample.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Why?

DARIA.

Because I thought thou wert

One who in a darksome cavern

Died to show thy love for me.

CHRYSANTHUS.

I have yet been not so happy

As to have a chance, Daria,

Of thus proving my attachment.

DARIA.

Be that so, I 've come to seek thee,

Confident, completely sanguine,

That I have the power to conquer,

I alone, thy pains, thy anguish;

Though against me thou shouldst use

The Christian armoury--enchantments.

CHRYSANTHUS.

That thou hast alone the power

To subdue the pains that wrack me,

I admit it; but in what

Thou hast said of Christian magic

I, Daria, must deny it.

DARIA.

How? from what cause else could happen

The effects I just have witnessed?

CHRYSANTHUS.

Miracles they are and marvels.

DARIA.

Why do they affect not me?

CHRYSANTHUS.

'T is because I do not ask them

Against thee; because from aiding

Not myself, no aid is granted.

DARIA.

Then I come here to undo them.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Most severe will be the battle,

Upon one side their due praises

On the other side thy anger.

DARIA.

I would have thee understand

That our gods are sorely damaged

By thy sentiments.

CHRYSANTHUS.

And I

That those gods are false--mere phantoms.

DARIA.

Then get ready for the conflict,

For I will not lower my standard

Save with victory or death.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Though thou makest me thy captive,

Thou my firmness wilt not conquer.

DARIA.

Then to arms! I say, to arms, then!

CHRYSANTHUS.

Though the outposts of the soul,

The weak heart, by thee be captured;

Not so will the Understanding,

The strong warden who doth guard it.

DARIA.

Thou 'lt believe me, if thou 'lt love me.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Thou not me, 'till love attracts thee.

DARIA.

That perhaps may be; for I

Would not give thee this advantage.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Oh! that love indeed may lead thee

To a state so sweet and happy!

DARIA.

Oh! what power will disabuse thee

Of thy ignorance, Chrysanthus?

CHRYSANTHUS.

Oh! what pitying power, Daria,

Will the Christian faith impart thee?

ACT THE THIRD.

SCENE I.--The Garden of Polemius.

Enter POLEMIUS, AURELIUS, CLAUDIUS, and ESCARPIN.

POLEMIUS.

All my house is in confusion,

Full of terrors, full of horrors;[11]

Ah! how true it is a son

Is the source of many sorrows!--

CLAUDIUS.

But, my lord, reflect . . .

ESCARPIN.

Consider . . .

Think . . .

POLEMIUS.

Why think, when misery follows?--

Cease: you add to my affliction,

And in no way bring me solace.

Since you see that in his madness

He is now more firm and constant,

Falling sick of new diseases,

Ere he 's well of old disorders:

Since one young and beauteous maiden,

Whom love wished to him to proffer,

Free from every spot and blemish,

Pure and perfect in her fondness,

Is the one whose fatal charms

Give to him such grief and torment,

That each moment he may perish,

That he may expire each moment;

How then can you hope that I

Now shall list to words of comfort?--

CLAUDIUS.

Why not give this beauteous maiden

To your son to be his consort,

Since you see his inclination?

POLEMIUS.

For this reason: when the project

I proposed, the two made answer,

That before they wed, some problem,

Some dispute that lay between them

Should be settled: this seemed proper:

But when I would know its nature

I could not the cause discover.

From this closeness I infer

That some secret of importance

Lies between them, and that this

Is the source of all my sorrows.

AURELIUS.

Sir, my loyalty, my duty

Will not let me any longer

Silence keep, too clearly seeing

How the evil has passed onward.

On that day we searched the mountain. . . .

POLEMIUS (aside).

Woe is me! could he have known then

All this time it was Chrysanthus?

AURELIUS.

I approaching, where with shoulders

Turned against me stood one figure,

Saw the countenance of another,

And methinks he was . . .

POLEMIUS (aside).

Ye gods!

Yes, he saw him! help! support me!

AURELIUS.

The same person who came hither

Lately in the garb of a doctor,

Who to-day to cure Chrysanthus

Such unusual treatment orders.

Do you ascertain if he

Is Carpophorus; let no portent

Fright you, on yourself rely,

And you 'll find that all will prosper.

POLEMIUS.

Thanks, Aurelius, for your warning,

Though 't is somewhat tardily offered.

Whether you are right or wrong,

I to-day will solve the problem.

For the sudden palpitation

Of my heart that beats and throbbeth

'Gainst my breast, doth prove how true

Are the suspicions that it fostered.

And if so, then Rome will see

Such examples made, such torments,

That one bleeding corse will show

Wounds enough for myriad corses. [Exeunt Aurelius and Polemius.

CLAUDIUS.

Good Escarpin . . .

ESCARPIN.

Sir.

CLAUDIUS.

I know not

How to address you in my sorrow.

Do you say that Cynthia was

One of those not over-modest

Beauties who to court Chrysanthus

Hither came, and who (strange portent!)

Had some share of his bewitchment

In the stupor that came on them?

ESCARPIN.

Yes, sir, and what 's worse, Daria

Was another, thus the torment

That we both endure is equal,

If my case be not the stronger,

Since to love her would be almost

Less an injury than to scorn her.

CLAUDIUS.

Well, I will not quarrel with you

On the point (for it were nonsense)

Whether one should feel more keenly

Love or hate, disdain or fondness

Shown to one we love; enough

'T is to me to know, that prompted

Or by vanity or by interest,

She came hither to hold converse

With him, 't is enough to make me

Lose the love I once felt for her.

ESCARPIN.

Sir, two men, one bald, one squint-eyed,

Met one day . . .

CLAUDIUS.

What, on your hobby?

A new story?

ESCARPIN.

To tell stories,

Sir, is not my 'forte', 'pon honour:--

Though who would n't make a hazard

When the ball is over the pocket?--

CLAUDIUS.

Well, I do not care to hear it.

ESCARPIN.

Ah, you know it then: Another

Let me try: A friar once . . .

Stay though, I have quite forgotten

There are no friars yet in Rome:

Well, once more: a fool . . .

CLAUDIUS.

A blockhead

Like yourself, say: cease.

ESCARPIN.

Ah, sir,

My poor tale do n't cruelly shorten.

While the sacristan was blowing . . .

CLAUDIUS.

Why, by heaven! I 'll kill you, donkey.

ESCARPIN.

Hear me first, and kill me after.

CLAUDIUS.

Was there ever known such folly

As to think 'mid cares so grave

I could listen to such nonsense? (exit.

[Enter Chrysanthus and Daria, at opposite sides.]

DARIA (to herself).

O ye gods, since my intention

Was in empty air to scatter

All these prodigies and wonders

Worked in favour of Chrysanthus

By the Christians' sorcery, why,

Having you for my copartners,

Do I not achieve a victory

Which my beauty might make facile?

CHRYSANTHUS.

O ye heavens, since my ambition

Was to melt Daria's hardness,

And to bring her to the knowledge

Of one God who works these marvels,

Why, so pure is my intention,

Why, so zealous and so sanguine,

Does not easy victory follow,

Due even to my natural talent?

DARIA (aside).

He is here, and though already

Even to see him, to have parley

With him, lights a living fire

In my breast, which burns yet glads me,

Yet he must confess my gods,

Ere I own that I am vanquished.

CHRYSANTHUS (aside).

She comes hither, and though I

By her beauty am distracted,

Still she must become a Christian

Ere a wife's dear name I grant her.

DARIA (aside).

Venus, to my beauty give

Power to make of him my vassal.

CHRYSANTHUS (aside).

Grant, O Lord, unto my tongue

Words that may dispel her darkness.

DARIA (aside).

To come near him makes me tremble.

CHRYSANTHUS (aside).

To address her, quite unmans me:--

Not in vain, O fair Daria, (aloud.

Does the verdure of this garden,

When it sees thee pass, grow young

As beneath spring's dewy spangles;

Not in vain, since though 't is evening,

Thou a new Aurora dazzleth,

That the birds in public concert

Hail thee with a joyous anthem;

Not in vain the streams and fountains,

As their crystal current passes,

Keep melodious time and tune

With the bent boughs of the alders;

The light movement of the zephyrs

As athwart the flowers they 're wafted,

Bends their heads to see thee coming,

Then uplifts them to look after.

DARIA.

These fine flatteries, these fine phrases

Make me doubt of thee, Chrysanthus.

He who gilds the false so well,

Must mere truth find unattractive.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Hast thou then such little faith

In my love?

DARIA.

Thou needst not marvel.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Why?

DARIA.

Because no more of faith

Doth a love deserve that acteth

Such deceptions.

CHRYSANTHUS.

What deceptions?

DARIA.

Are not those enough, Chrysanthus,

That thou usest to convince me

Of thy love, of thy attachment,

When my first and well-known wishes

Thou perversely disregardest?

Is it possible a man

So distinguished for his talents,

So illustrious in his blood,

Such a favourite from his manners,

Would desire to ruin all

By an error so unhappy,

And for some delusive dream

See himself abhorred and branded?

CHRYSANTHUS.

I nor talents, manners, blood,

Would be worthy of, if madly

I denied a Great First Cause,

Who made all things, mind and matter,

Time, heaven, earth, air, water, fire,

Sun, moon, stars, fish, birds, beasts, Man then.

DARIA.

Did not Jupiter, then, make heaven,

Where we hear his thunders rattle?

CHRYSANTHUS.

No, for if he could have made

Heaven, he had no need to grasp it

For himself at the partition,

When to Neptune's rule he granted

The great sea, and hell to Pluto;--

Then they were ere all this happened.[12]

DARIA.

Is not Ceres the earth, then?

CHRYSANTHUS.

No.

Since she lets the plough and harrow

Tear its bosom, and a goddess

Would not have her frame so mangled.

DARIA.

Tell me, is not Saturn time?

CHRYSANTHUS.

He is not, though he dispatcheth

All the children he gives birth to;

To a god no crimes should happen.

DARIA.

Is not Venus the air?

CHRYSANTHUS.

Much less,

Since they say that she was fashioned

From the foam, and foam, we know,

Cannot from the air be gathered.

DARIA.

Is not Neptune the sea?

CHRYSANTHUS.

As little,

For inconstancy were god's mark then.

DARIA.

Is not the sun Apollo?

CHRYSANTHUS.

No.

DARIA.

The moon Diana?

CHRYSANTHUS.

All mere babble.

They are but two shining orbs

Placed in heaven, and there commanded

To obey fixed laws of motion

Which thy mind need not embarrass.

How can these be called the gods--

Gods adulterers and assassins!

Gods who pride themselves for thefts,

And a thousand forms of badness,

If the ideas God and Sin

Are opposed as light to darkness?--

With another argument

I would further sift the matter.

Let then Jupiter be a god,

In his own sphere lord and master:

Let Apollo be one also:

Should Jove wish to hurl in anger

Down his red bolts on the world,

And Apollo would not grant them,

He the so-called god of fire;

From the independent action

Of the two does it not follow

One of them must be the vanquished?

Then they cannot be called gods,

Gods whose wills are counteracted.

One is God whom I adore . . .

And He is, in fine, that martyr

Who has died for love of thee!--

Since then, thou hast said, so adverse

Was thy proud disdain, one only

Thou couldst love with love as ardent

Almost as his own, was he

Who would . . .

DARIA.

Oh! proceed no farther,

Hold, delay thee, listen, stay,

Do not drive my brain distracted,

Nor confound my wildered senses,

Nor convulse my speech, my language,

Since at hearing such a mystery

All my strength appears departed.

I do not desire to argue

With thee, for, I own it frankly,

I am but an ignorant woman,

Little skilled in such deep matters.

In this law have I been born,

In it have been bred: the chances

Are that in it I shall die:

And since change in me can hardly

Be expected, for I never

At thy bidding will disparage

My own gods, here stay in peace.

Never do I wish to hearken

To thy words again, or see thee,

For even falsehood, when apparelled

In the garb of truth, exerteth

Too much power to be disregarded. [Exit.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Stay, I cannot live without thee,

Or, if thou wilt go, the magnet

Of thine eye must make me follow.

All my happiness is anchored

There. Return, Daria. . . .

(Enter Carpophorus.)

CARPOPHORUS.

Stay.

Follow not her steps till after

You have heard me speak.

CHRYSANTHUS.

What would you?

CARPOPHORUS.

I would reprimand your lapses,

Seeing how ungratefully

You, my son, towards me have acted.

CHRYSANTHUS.

I ungrateful!

CARPOPHORUS.

You ungrateful,

Yes, because you have abandoned,

Have forgotten God's assistance,

So effectual and so ample.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Do not say I have forgotten

Or abandoned it, wise master,

Since my memory to preserve it

Is as 't were a diamond tablet.

CARPOPHORUS.

Think you that I can believe you,

If when having in this garment

Sought you out to train and teach you,

In the Christian faith and practice,

Until deep theology

You most learnedly have mastered;

If, when having seen your progress,

Your attention and exactness,

I in secret gave you baptism,

Which its mark indelibly stampeth;

You so great a good forgetting,

You for such a bliss so thankless,

With such shameful ease surrender

To this love-dream, this attachment?

Did it strike you not, Chrysanthus,

To that calling how contrasted

Are delights, delirious tumults,

Are love's transports and its raptures,

Which you should resist? Recall too,

Can you not? the aid heaven granted

When you helped yourself, and prayed for

Its assistance: were you not guarded

By it when a sweet voice sung,

When a keen wit glowed and argued,

When the instrument was silenced,

When the tongue was forced to stammer,

Until now, when with free will

You succumb to the enchantment

Of one fair and fatal face,

Which hath done to you such damage

That 't will work your final ruin,

If the trial longer lasteth?--

CHRYSANTHUS.

Oh! my father, oh! my teacher,

Hear me, for although the charges

Brought against me thus are heavy,

Still I to myself have ample

Reasons for my exculpation.

Since you taught me, you, dear master,

That the union of two wills

In our law is well established.

Be not then displeased, Carpophorus . . .

(Aside.) Heavens! what have I said? My father!

(Enter Polemius.)

POLEMIUS (aside).

Ah! this name removes all doubt.

But I must restrain my anger,

And dissemble for the present,

If such patience Jove shall grant me:--

How are you to-day, Chrysanthus? (aloud.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Sir, my love and duty cast them

Humbly at your feet: (aside, Thank heaven,

That he heard me not, this calmness

Cannot be assumed).

POLEMIUS.

I value

More than I can say your manner

Towards my son, so kind, so zealous

For his health.

CARPOPHORUS.

Heaven knows, much farther

Even than this is my ambition,

Sir, to serve you: but the passions

Of Chrysanthus are so strong,

That my skill they overmaster.

POLEMIUS.

How?

CARPOPHORUS.

Because the means of cure

He perversely counteracteth.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Ah! sir, no, I 've left undone

Nothing that you have commanded.

CARPOPHORUS.

No, not so, his greatest peril

He has rashly disregarded.

POLEMIUS.

I implicitly can trust you,

Of whose courage, of whose talents

I have been so well informed,

That I mean at once to grant them

The reward they so well merit.

CARPOPHORUS.

Sir, may heaven preserve and guard you.

POLEMIUS.

Come with me; for I desire

That you should from my apartments

Choose what best doth please you; I

Do not doubt you 'll find an ample

Guerdon for your care.

CARPOPHORUS.

To be

Honoured in this public manner

Is my best reward.

POLEMIUS (aside).

The world

Shall this day a dread example

Of my justice see, transcending

All recorded in time's annals. (Exeunt Polemius and Carpophorus.)

CHRYSANTHUS.

Better than I could have hoped for

Has it happened, since my father

Shows by his unruffled face

That his name he has not gathered.

What more evidence can I wish for

Than to see the gracious manner

In which he conducts him whither

His reward he means to grant him?

Oh! that love would do as much

In the fears and doubts that rack me,

Since I cannot wed Daria,

And be faithful to Christ's banner.

(Enter Daria.)

DARIA (aside).

Tyrant question which methought

Timely flight alone could answer,

Once again, against my will

To his presence thou dost drag me.

CHRYSANTHUS (aside).

But she comes again: let sorrow

Be awhile replaced by gladness:--

Ah! Daria, so resolved[13] (aloud,

Not to see or hear me more,

Art thou here?

DARIA.

Deep pondering o'er,

As the question I revolved,

I would have the mystery solved:

'T is for that I 'm here, then see

It is not to speak with thee.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Speak, what doubt wouldst thou decide?

DARIA.

Thou hast said a God once died

Through His boundless love to me:

Now to bring thee to conviction

Let me this one strong point try . . .

CHRYSANTHUS.

What?

DARIA.

To be a God, and die,

Doth imply a contradiction.

And if thou dost still deny

To my god the name divine,

And reject him in thy scorn

For beginning, I opine,

If thy God could die, that mine

Might as easily be born.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Thou dost argue with great skill,

But thou must remember still,

That He hath, this God of mine,

Human nature and divine,

And that it has been His will

As it were His power to hide--

God made man--man deified--

When this sinful world He trod,

Since He was not born as God,

And it was as man He died.

DARIA.

Does it not more greatness prove,

As among the beauteous stars,

That one deity should be Mars,

And another should be Jove,

Than this blending God above

With weak man below? To thee

Does not the twin deity

Of two gods more power display,

Than if in some mystic way

God and man conjoined could be?

CHRYSANTHUS.

No, I would infer this rather,

If the god-head were not one,

Each a separate course could run:

But the untreated Father,

But the sole-begotten Son,

But the Holy Spirit who

Ever issues from the two,

Being one sole God, must be

One in power and dignity:--

Until thou dost hold this true,

Till thy creed is that the Son

Was made man, I cannot hear thee,

Cannot see thee or come near thee,

Thee and death at once to shun.

DARIA.

Stay, my love may so be won,

And if thou wouldst wish this done,

Oh! explain this mystery!

What am I to do, ah! me,

That my love may thus be tried?

CARPOPHORUS (within).

Seek, O soul! seek Him who died

Solely for the love of thee.

CHRYSANTHUS.

All that I could have replied

Has been said thus suddenly

By this voice that, sounding near,

Strikes upon my startled ear

Like the summons of my death.

DARIA.

Ah! what frost congeals my breath,

Chilling me with icy fear,

As I hear its sad lament:

Whence did sound the voice? [Enter Polemius and soldiers.

POLEMIUS.

From here:

'T is, Chrysanthus, my intent

Thus to place before thy sight--

Thus to show thee in what light

I regard thy restoration

Back to health, the estimation

In which I regard the wight

Who so skilfully hath cured thee.

A surprise I have procured thee,

And for him a fit reward:

Raise the curtain, draw the cord,

See, 't is death! If this . . .

(A curtain is drawn aside, and Carpophorus is seen beheaded, the head

being at some distance from the body.)

CHRYSANTHUS.

I freeze!--

POLEMIUS.

Is the cure of thy disease,

What must that disease have been!

'T is Carpophorus. . . .

DARIA.

Dread scene!

POLEMIUS.

He who with false science came

Not to give thee life indeed,

But that he himself should bleed:--

That thy fate be not the same,

Of his mournful end take heed:

Do not thou that dost survive,

My revenge still further drive,

Since the sentence seems misread--

The physician to be dead,

And the invalid alive.--

CHRYSANTHUS.

It were cruelty extreme,

It were some delirious dream,

That could see in this the cure

Of the ill that I endure.

POLEMIUS.

It to him did pity seem,

Seemed the sole reward that he

Asked or would receive from me:

Since when dying, he but cried . .

THE HEAD OF CARPOPHORUS.

Seek, O soul! seek Him who died

Solely for the love of thee!--

CHRYSANTHUS.

What a portent!

DARIA.

What a wonder!

ESCARPIN.

Jove! my own head splits asunder!--

POLEMIUS.

Even though severed, in it dwells

Still the force of magic spells.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Sir, it were a fatal blunder

To be blind to this appalling

Tragedy you wrong by calling

The result of spells--no spells

Are such signs, but miracles

Outside man's experience falling.

He came here because he yearned

With his pure and holy breath

To give life, and so found death.

'T is a lesson that he learned--

'T is a recompense he earned--

Seeing what his Lord could do,

Being to his Master true:

Kill me also: He had one

Bright example: shall I shun

Death in turn when I have two?

POLEMIUS.

I, in listening to thy raving,

Scarce can calm the wrath thou 'rt braving.

Dead ere now thou sure wouldst lie,

Didst thou not desire to die.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Father, if the death I 'm craving . . .

POLEMIUS.

Speak not thus: no son I know.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Not to thee I spoke, for though

Humanly thou hast that name,

Thou hast forfeited thy claim:

I that sweet address now owe

Unto him whose holier aim

Kindled in my heart a flame

Which shall there for ever glow,

Woke within me a new soul

That thou 'rt powerless to control--

Generated a new life

Safe against thy hand or knife:

Him a father's name I give

Who indeed has made me live,

Not to him whose tyrant will

Only has the power to kill.

Therefore on this dear one dead,

On this pallid corse laid low,

Lying bathed in blood and snow,

By this lifeless lodestone led,

I such bitter tears shall shed,

That my grief . . .

POLEMIUS.

Ho! instantly

Tear him from it.

DARIA (aside).

Thus to be

By such prodigies surrounded,

Leaves me dazzled and confounded.

POLEMIUS.

Hide the corse.

ESCARPIN.

Leave that to me

(The head and body are concealed).

POLEMIUS.

Bear Chrysanthus now away

To a tower of darksome gloom

Which shall be his living tomb.

CHRYSANTHUS.

That I hear with scant dismay,

Since the memory of this day

With me there will ever dwell.

Fair Daria, fare thee well,

And since now thou knowest who

Died for love of thee, renew

The sweet vow that in the dell

Once thou gav'st me, Him to love

After death who so loved thee.

POLEMIUS.

Take him hence.

DARIA.

Ah! suddenly

Light descendeth from above

Which my darkness doth remove.

Now thy shadowed truth I see,

Now the Christian's faith profess.

Let thy bloody lictors press

Round me, racking every limb,

Let me only die with him,

Since I openly confess

That the gods are false whom we

Long have worshipped, that I trust

Christ alone--the True--the Just--

The One God, whose power I see,

And who died for love of me.

POLEMIUS.

Take her too, since she in this

Boasts how dark, how blind she is.

DARIA.

Oh! command that I should dwell

With Chrysanthus in his cell.

In our hearts we long are mated,

And ere now had celebrated

Our espousals fond and true,

If the One same God we knew.

CHRYSANTHUS.

This sole bliss alone I waited

To die happy.

POLEMIUS.

How my heart

Is with wrath and rage possest!--

Hold thy hand, present it not,

For I would not have thy lot

By the least indulgence blest;

Nor do thou, if thy wild brain

Such a desperate course maintain,

Hope to have her as thy bride--

Trophy of our gods denied:--

Separate them.

CHRYSANTHUS.

O the pain!

DARIA.

O the woe! unhappy me!

POLEMIUS.

Take them hence, and let them be

(Since my justice now at least

Makes amends for mercy past)

Punished so effectually

That their wishes, their desires,

What each wanteth or requires,

Shall be thwarted or denied,

That between opposing fires

They for ever shall be tried:--

Since Chrysanthus' former mood

Only wished the solitude

Whence such sorrows have arisen,

Take him to the public prison,

And be sure in fire and food

That he shall not be preferred

To the meanest culprit there.

Naked, abject, let him fare

As the lowest of the herd:

There, while chains his body gird,

Let him grovel and so die:--

For Daria, too, hard by

Is another public place,

Shameful home of worse disgrace,

Where imprisoned let her lie:

If, relying on the powers

Of her beauty, her vain pride

Dreamed of being my son's bride,

Never shall she see that hour.

Soon shall fade her virgin flower,

Soon be lost her nymph-like grace--

Roses shall desert her face,

Waving gold her silken hair.

She who left Diana's care

Must with Venus find her place:

'Mong vile women let her dwell,

Vile, abandoned even as they.

ESCARPIN (aside).

There my love shall have full play.

O rare judge, you sentence well!

CHRYSANTHUS.

Sir, if thou must have a fell

Vengeance for this act of mine,

Take my life, for it is thine;

But my honour do not dare

To insult through one so fair.

DARIA.

Wreak thy rage, if faith divine

So offends thee, upon me,

Not upon my chastity:--

'T is a virtue purer far

Than the light of sun or star,

And has ne'er offended thee.

POLEMIUS.

Take them hence.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Ah me, to find

Words, that might affect thy mind!

Melt thy heart!

DARIA.

Ah, me, who e'er

Saw a martyrdom so rare?--

POLEMIUS.

Wouldst thou then the torment fly,

Thou hast only to deny

Christ.

CHRYSANTHUS.

The Saviour of mankind?

This I cannot do.

DARIA.

Nor I.

POLEMIUS.

Let them instantly from this

To their punishment be led.--

ESCARPIN.

Do not budge from what you said.

It is excellent as it is.

CHRYSANTHUS.

Woe is me! but wherefore fear,

O beloved betroth`ed mine?--

Trust in God, that power divine

For whose sake we suffer here:--

HE will aid us and be near:--

DARIA.

In that confidence I live,

For if He His life could give

For my love, and me select,

He His honour will protect.

CHRYSANTHUS.

These sad tears He will forgive.

Ne'er to see thee more! thus driven. . .

DARIA.

Cease, my heart like thine is riven,

But again we 'll see each other,

When in heaven we 'll be, my brother,

The two lover saints of Heaven. (They are led out.