Festus · Scene 23 (2/2) (2/2)

| Festus | But I am here; what recks it how or why? Ye care not and I know not. It is fate: The will of God and him who sets me here; And which I question not. It must be good, Whether decreed that I be saved or lost. But I have poor pretensions for this place; And none, I hope, have worse that are to come. For I have never mocked the word of God, Nor torn it into fuel for my scorn: Nor doubted, saving tremblingly, His being:⁠— His love to man⁠—His right to be adored⁠— Never have hated, never wronged my race⁠— Deluded nor rejoiced in their delusion; Never have beckoned off the good from good⁠— Never have mocked nor scattered hopes⁠—nor e’er Have wasted hearts, nor desolated hearths; And if I have once, twice, as who hath not? Toyed with temptation, yet even he will say Who standeth there, that I have never given Up to his burning dalliance my soul. And yet he is my friend, the Evil one. And why is wondrous; judge ye wherefore too. I have no malice, envy, nor revenge; None of those petty passions which bad hearts Scourge red into themselves⁠—for passions are Sufferings⁠—and which to nourish is his want; Wherein doth lie his power: these I have not. And save enjoying earth, I have done never Aught that he could take part in. But he came From God he said, to give; and I believed;⁠— Great spirits lie not⁠—doubt not. | | Lucifer | He says truth. But it is not for him nor you to know The reason of my doings: it is the thing Unfeared and unforethought which tempts, betrays. It is I who bait the world to do its will. As to this mortal, God hath sanctioned all That I have done, or may do to the end; Which I have nought to do with. Son of God! Go on redeeming!⁠—I will go on damning. God! go on making!⁠—I will go on marring. Go on believing, man!⁠—I go on tempting. Saint! angel! cherub! seraph! and archangel! Go ye on blessing!⁠—I will go on cursing! I now retrack my course to earth; therein To work out what remaineth of the fate Of this man, and await his world’s destruction. What next may hap I care not. | | Festus | Let us hence! | | Lucifer | Where is He? | | Festus | There⁠—see many do believe. Orb of perdition! thou too shalt die out, And thy red sheeted flames shall fail for aye. Thy palpitating piles of ruin, hot With ever active agony, and quick With soul immortal, down whose midnight heights The wrath of God in cataracts of fire Precipitates itself unceasingly, Shall rush into destruction as a steed Rushes into the battle, there to die. Thy quivering hills of black and bloody hue, Death-breathing, shall collapse like lifeless lungs, And end in air and ashes. Thou shall be Dashed from creation spark-like from a hand Scarless: pass like a rolled syllable Of midnight thunder from the coming day. The river of all life, which flows through Heaven, Shall yet reach thee and overflood thy flames!⁠— Thou shalt no more vex God nor man; nor all The seekings of the soul shall hunt thee out. Thy day is sometime over. Be it soon! And thou the lost world which the world hath lost! |