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[HEAVEN CLOSES; THE ARCHANGELS EXEUNT.]

MEPHISTOPHELES:
From time to time I visit the old fellow, 110
And I take care to keep on good terms with Him.
Civil enough is the same God Almighty,
To talk so freely with the Devil himself.

SCENE 2.–MAY-DAY NIGHT

THE HARTZ MOUNTAIN, A DESOLATE COUNTRY.

FAUST, MEPHISTOPHELES.

MEPHISTOPHELES:
Would you not like a broomstick? As for me
I wish I had a good stout ram to ride;
For we are still far from the appointed place.

FAUST:
This knotted staff is help enough for me,
Whilst I feel fresh upon my legs. What good 5
Is there in making short a pleasant way?
To creep along the labyrinths of the vales,
And climb those rocks, where ever-babbling springs,
Precipitate themselves in waterfalls,
Is the true sport that seasons such a path. 10
Already Spring kindles the birchen spray,
And the hoar pines already feel her breath:
Shall she not work also within our limbs?

MEPHISTOPHELES:
Nothing of such an influence do I feel.
My body is all wintry, and I wish 15
The flowers upon our path were frost and snow.
But see how melancholy rises now,
Dimly uplifting her belated beam,
The blank unwelcome round of the red moon,
And gives so bad a light, that every step 20
One stumbles ‘gainst some crag. With your permission,
I’ll call on Ignis-fatuus to our aid:
I see one yonder burning jollily.
Halloo, my friend! may I request that you
Would favour us with your bright company? 25
Why should you blaze away there to no purpose?
Pray be so good as light us up this way.

IGNIS-FATUUS:
With reverence be it spoken, I will try
To overcome the lightness of my nature;
Our course, you know, is generally zigzag. 30

MEPHISTOPHELES:
Ha, ha! your worship thinks you have to deal
With men. Go straight on, in the Devil’s name,
Or I shall puff your flickering life out.

NOTE:
33 shall puff 1824; will blow 1822.

IGNIS-FATUUS:
Well,
I see you are the master of the house;
I will accommodate myself to you. 35
Only consider that to-night this mountain
Is all enchanted, and if Jack-a-lantern
Shows you his way, though you should miss your own,
You ought not to be too exact with him.

FAUST, MEPHISTOPHELES, AND IGNIS-FATUUS, IN ALTERNATE CHORUS:
The limits of the sphere of dream, 40
The bounds of true and false, are past.
Lead us on, thou wandering Gleam,
Lead us onward, far and fast,
To the wide, the desert waste.

But see, how swift advance and shift 45
Trees behind trees, row by row,–
How, clift by clift, rocks bend and lift
Their frowning foreheads as we go.
The giant-snouted crags, ho! ho!
How they snort, and how they blow! 50

Through the mossy sods and stones,
Stream and streamlet hurry down–
A rushing throng! A sound of song
Beneath the vault of Heaven is blown!
Sweet notes of love, the speaking tones 55
Of this bright day, sent down to say
That Paradise on Earth is known,
Resound around, beneath, above.
All we hope and all we love
Finds a voice in this blithe strain, 60
Which wakens hill and wood and rill,
And vibrates far o’er field and vale,
And which Echo, like the tale
Of old times, repeats again.