Transcriber's Notes:

Bewundert viel und viel gescholten Helena.

That is the well-knowniambic trimeter,i.e.the metre of six feet (twelve syllables) used in all the speeches in Greek tragedy.

Thus theOedipus Tyrannosof Sophocles begins:

Ὦ τέκνα͵ Καδμου τοῦ πάλαι νέα τροϕὴ

and so on. It has twelve syllables, mostly (iambics) as in our blank verse. But blank verse has only ten syllables: 'I cannot tell what you and other men.' If one adds two syllables one gets the Greek iambic verse, thus: 'I cannot tell what you and other men believe.' The Chorus in theHelenauses various rhythms such as are found in the choruses of Greek tragedy:

Schweige, schweige,Missblickende, missredende du!Aus so grässlichen, einzahnigenLippen was enthaucht wohlSolchem furchtbaren Greuelschlund!

Then Mephistopheles, as the Phorkyad, when Helen falls fainting, addresses her suddenly in another measure—a longer verse, such as is sometimes used by the Greek tragedians and comedians when something new occurs in the play. It is called atetrameter, and consists of fifteen syllables (mostly —∪, calledtrochees). Thus, in Greek,οἱ γέροντες οἱ παλαιοὶ μεμΦὄμεσθα τῇ πόλει—and in German:

Tritt hervor aus flüchtigen Wolken hohe Sonne dieses Tags—

or the fine lines spoken by Helen:

Doch es ziemet Königinnen, allen Menschen ziemt es wohl,Sich zu fassen, zu ermannen, was auch drohend überrascht.

When Faust appears he begins to speak at once in modern blank verse of ten syllables, such as we know in Milton and Shakespeare and Schiller. One might have expected him to speak in some earlier romantic measure, to have used perhaps the metre of the old Nibelungenlied, as in

Es ist in alten Mähren wunders viel geseit,Von Heleden lobebären, von grosser Arebeit,

which is supposed to date from about 1150; or in Dante'sterza rima, of about 1300, as

Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita.

But blank verse is after all the metrepar excellenceof the Renaissance, that is of the revival of Greek influence, and Goethe chose it for this reason.

Now the Watchman Lynceus ('the keen-eyed,' as the word means—and you perhaps remember him as the watchman of the Argonauts on the good ship Argo) represents here the early pre-Renaissance poets of Italy and Provence and Germany—the Troubadours and Trouvères and Minnesinger, who were so surprised and dazzled by the sudden sunrise of the Renaissance with its wonderful new apparition of Greek art that they (as Lynceus inFaust) failed to announce its coming; and therefore Lynceus here speaks in a kind of early Troubadour metre, withrime. In classical poetry there is no rime. They did not like it; they even ridiculed it. For instance Cicero, the great orator, once tried to write poetry, and produced a line that said 'O fortunate Rome, when I was consul!' This was not only conceited of him but unfortunately the line contained a rime and this rime brought down an avalanche of ridicule on his head. 'O fortunatam natam me consule Romam' was this unfortunate line. Rime was probably first adopted by the monks in their medieval Latin hymns and was used by the Troubadours and early Italian poets when they began to write in the vulgar tongue. Dante uses it in his canzoni and sonnets and ballads, as well of course as in his great poem. So it is quite right to make Lynceus speak in rime. Helen of course has never heard rime before, and she turns to Faust and asks him what it is that sounds so strange and beautiful in this song of Lynceus; and she wants to know howshetoo can learn the art. So Faust tells her just to try and the rimes will come of their own accord. But I will quote the passage, for it is very pretty; and I will add a rough translation.

Doch wünscht' ich Unterricht warum die RedeDes Manns mir seltsam klang, seltsam und freundlich—Ein Ton scheint sich dem and'ren zu bequemen;Und hat ein Wort zum Ohre sich gesellt,Ein andres kommt, dem ersten liebzukosen....So sage denn, wie spräch' ich auch so schön.Faust.Das ist gar leicht—es muss vom Herzen geh'n.Und wenn die Brust von Sehnsucht überfliesstMan sieht sich um, und fragt....Helen.wer mitgeniesst.Faust.Nun schaut der Geist nicht vorwärts, nicht zurück—Die Gegenwart allein ...Helen.ist unser Glück—Faust.Schatz ist sie, Hochgewinn, Besitz und Pfand.Bestätigung, wer gibt sie?Helen.Meine Hand.(Helen.I fain would ask thee why the watchman's songSo strangely sounded—strange but beautiful.Tones seemed to link themselves in harmony.One word would come and nestle in the ear,Then came another and caressed it there.But say—how can I also learn the art?Faust.Quite easily—one listens to one's heart,And when its longings seem too great to bearWe look around for one ...Helen.our joy to share.Faust.Not past nor future loving hearts can bless,Thepresent—Helen.is alone our happiness.Faust.Before the prize of beauty, lo I stand,But who assures the prize to me?Helen.My hand!)

In the midst of this life of chivalrous love and romance Faust and Helen pass a period of ecstatic bliss. But, as Goethe himself found, such ecstasies are only a passing phase. The end comes inevitably and suddenly. A son is born to them, Euphorion by name (the name of the winged son of Helen and Achilles, according to one legend). He isno common human child. As a butterfly from its chrysalis he bursts at once into fully developed existence. He is of enchanting beauty but wild and capricious; spurning the common earth he climbs ever higher and higher amidst the mountain crags, singing ravishing melodies to his lyre. He reaches the topmost crag and casts himself into the air. A flame flickers upwards, and the body of a beautiful youth 'in which one seems to recognize a well-known form' falls to the ground, at the feet of Faust and Helen.

Euphorion symbolizes modern poetry, and the well-known form is that of Byron. For a moment the body lies there; it then dissolves in flame, which ascends to heaven, and a voice is heard calling on Helen to follow.

Yes, she must follow. As flame she must return to her home in the Empyrean—the home of ideal beauty and all other ideals. However much we strive to realize ideal beauty in art or in our lives, however we may hold it to our hearts as a warm and living possession, it always escapes our grasp. The short-lived winged child of poetic inspiration gleams but for a momentand disappears, as a flame flickering back to its native empyrean. And she, the mother, she too must follow, leaving us alone to face the stern reality of life and of death.

In the embrace of Faust Helen melts away into thin air, leaving in his arms her robe and veil. These change into a cloud, which envelops him, raises him into the air and bears him also away. The Phorkyad picks up Euphorion's lyre and mantle; he steps forward and addresses the audience, assuring them that in the leavings of poetic genius he has got enough to fit out any number of modern poets, and is open to a bargain. He then swells up to a gigantic height, removes the Gorgon-mask, and reveals himself as Mephistopheles once more the northern modern devil; and the curtain falls.

When it rises for the Fourth Act we see a craggy mountain peak before us. A cloud approaches, and deposits Faust on the topmost crag. It lingers for a time, assuming wondrous shapes and then gradually melts away into the blue. Faust gazes at it. In its changing outlines he seems to discern first the regal forms of Olympian goddesses,of Juno, of Leda—then of Helen. But they fade away and, ere it disappears, the cloud assumes the likeness of that other half-forgotten human form which once had aroused in his heart that which he now feels to have been a love far truer and deeper than all his passion for ideal beauty—that 'swiftly felt and scarcely comprehended' love for a human heart which, as he now confesses to himself, 'had it been retained would have been his most precious possession.'

A seven-league boot now passes by—followed in hot haste by another. Out of the boots steps forth Mephistopheles. He asks contemptuously if Faust has had enough of heroines and all such ideal folly. He cannot understand why Faust is still dissatisfied with life. Surely he has seen enough of its pleasures. He advises him, if he is weary of court life, to build himself a Sultan's palace and harem and live in retirement—as Tiberius did on the island of Capri. 'Not so,' answers Faust. 'This world of earthly soil Still gives me room for greater action. I feel new strength for nobler toil—Toil that at length shall bring me satisfaction.'

He has determined to devote the rest of hislife to humanity, to the good of the human race. It is a project with which Mephistopheles naturally has little sympathy. But he is forced to acquiesce, and, being bound to serve Faust even in this, he suggests a plan. The young Kaiser is at present in great difficulties. He is hard pressed by a rival Emperor—a pretender to the Imperial crown. Mephisto will by his magic arts secure the Kaiser the victory over this pretender, and then Faust will claim as recompense a tract of country bordering on the ocean. Here by means of canals and dykes, dug and built by demonic powers, Faust is to reclaim from the sea a large region of fertile country and to found a kind of model republic, where peace and prosperity and every social and political blessing shall find a home. The plan is carried out. At the summons of Mephistopheles appear three gigantic warriors by whose help the battle is won, and Faust gains his reward—the stretch of land on the shore of the ocean. And he is not the only gainer. The Archbishop takes the opportunity of extracting far more valuable concessions of land from the young Kaiser as penance for his having associated himselfwith powers of darkness. The prelate even extracts the promise of tithes and dues from all the land still unclaimed by Faust. As Mephistopheles aptly remarks, the Church seems to have a good digestion.

Many years are now supposed to elapse. Faust has nearly completed his task of expelling the sea and founding his ideal state. What had been a watery waste is now like the garden of Eden in its luxuriant fertility. Thousands of industrious happy mortals have found in this new country a refuge and a home. Ships, laden with costly wares, throng the ports. On an eminence overlooking the scene stands the castle of Faust, and not far off are a cottage and a chapel. On this scene the last act opens. A wanderer enters. He is seeking the cottage which once used to stand here, on the very brink of the ocean. It was here that he was shipwrecked: here, on this very spot, the waves had cast him ashore: here stands still the cottage of the poor old peasant and his wife who had rescued him from death. But now the sea is sparkling in the blue distance and beneath him spreads the new country with its waving cornfields. He enters the cottage and iswelcomed by the poor old couple (to whom Goethe has given the names Philemon and Baucis, the old peasant and his wife who, according to the Greek legend, were the only Phrygians who offered hospitality to Zeus, the King of the Gods, as he was wandering about in disguise among mortals).

Faust comes out on to the garden terrace of his castle. He is now an old man—close upon a hundred years of age. He gazes with a feeling of happiness and satisfaction at the scene that lies below him—the wide expanse of fertile land, the harbours and canals filled with shipping. Suddenly the bell in the little chapel begins to ring for Vespers.

Faust's happiness is in a moment changed into bitterness and anger. This cottage, this chapel, this little plot of land are as thorns in his side: they are the Naboth's vineyard which he covets and which alone interferes with his territorial rights. He has offered large sums of money, but the peasant will not give up his home.

Mephistopheles and his helpers (the same three gigantic supernatural beings who took part in the battle) appear. Faust vents his anger and chagrin with regard to the peasantand the irritating ding-dong-dell of the vesper bell. He commissions Mephistopheles to persuade the peasant to take the money and to make him turn out of his wretched hut. Mephistopheles and his mates go to carry out the order. A few moments later flames are seen to rise from the cottage and chapel. Mephistopheles returns to relate that the peasant and the wanderer proved obstinate: in the scuffle the wanderer had been killed; the cottage had caught fire, and old Philemon and his wife had both died of terror.

Faust turns upon Mephistopheles with fierce anger and curses him. 'I meant exchange!' he exclaims. 'I meant tomake it good with money! I meant not robbery and murder. I curse the deed. Thou, not I, shalt bear the guilt.'

Here I do not find it easy to follow Faust's line of argument. Fair exchange is certainly said to be no robbery—but this theory of 'making everything good with money' is one which the average foreigner is apt to attribute especially to the average Britisher, and it does not raise Faust in one's estimation. I suppose he thinks he is doing the poor old couple a blessing indisguise by ejecting them out of their wretched hovel and presenting them with a sum of money of perhaps ten times its value.

Possibly Goethe means it to be a specimen of the kind of mistake that well-meaning theoretical philanthropists are apt to commit with their Juggernaut of Human Progress. Faust is filled with great philanthropic ideas—but perhaps he is a little apt to ignore the individual. Anyhow his better self 'meant not robbery and murder' and is perhaps quite justified in cursing its demonic companion and giving him the whole of the guilt.

The scene changes. It is midnight. Faust, sleepless and restless, is pacing the hall in his castle. Outside, on the castle terrace, appear four phantom shapes clothed as women in dusky robes. They are Want, Guilt, Care, and Need. The four grey sisters make halt before the castle. In hollow, awe-inspiring tones they recite in turn their dirge-like strains: they chant of gathering clouds and darkness, and of their brother—Death. They approach the door of the castle hall. It is shut. Within lives a rich man, and none of them may enter, not even Guilt—none save only Care. She slipsthrough the keyhole. Faust feels her unseen presence.

'Is any one here?' he asks.

'The question demandethYes!'

'And thou ... who art thou?'

''Tis enough that I am here.'

'Avaunt!'

'I am where I should be.'

Faust defies the phantom. She, standing there invisible, recites in tones like the knell of a passing-bell the fate of a man haunted by Care: how he gradually loses sight of his high ideals and wanders blindly amid the maze of worldly illusions—how he loses faith and joy—how he starves amidst plenty—has no certain aim in life—burdening himself and others, breathing air that chokes him, living a phantom life—a dead thing, a death-in-life—supporting himself on a hope that is no hope, but despair—never content, never resigned, never knowing what he should do, or what he himself wishes.

'Accursed spectres!' exclaims Faust. 'Thus ye ever treat the human race. From demons, I know, it is scarce possible to free oneself. Butthypower, O Care—so great and so insidious though it be, I willnotrecognize it!'

'Sofeelit now!' answers the phantom. 'Throughout their whole existence men are mostlyblind—So let it be at last with thee!'

She approaches, breathes in Faust's face, and he is struck blind.

He stands there dazed and astounded. Thick darkness has fallen upon him. At last he speaks:

Still deeper seems the night to surge around me,But in my inmost spirit all is light.I'll rest not till the finished work has crown'd me.God's promise—that alone doth give me might.

He hastens forth, groping his way in blindness, to call up his workmen. His life is ending and he must end his work. It is midnight, but the light within him makes him think the day has dawned. In the courtyard there are awaiting him Mephistopheles and a band of Lemurs—horrible skeleton-figures with shovels and torches. They are digging his grave. Faust mistakes the sound for that of his workmen, and incites them to labour. He orders the overseer, Mephistopheles, to press on with the work ... to finish the last great moat—or 'Graben.'

'Man spricht,' answers Mephistophelessotto voce,

'Man spricht, wie man mir Nachricht gab,Von keinemGraben—doch vom Grab.'

It is no moat, no Graben, that is now being dug, but a grave—a Grab.

Standing on the very verge of his grave, Faust, reviewing the memories of his long life, feels thatat last, though old and blind, with no more hopes in earthly existence, he has won peace and happiness in having worked for others and in having given other human beings a measure of independence and of that true liberty and happiness which are gained only by honest toil. He alone trulypossessesand canenjoywho has made a thing his own by earning it.

Yes, to this thought I hold with firm persistence;The last result of wisdom stamps it true;He only earns his freedom and existenceWho daily conquers them anew.And such a throng I fain would see—Would stand on a free soil, with people free.

Standing there, on the very edge of his new-dug grave he blesses the present moment and bids it stay. The fatal words are spoken and according to the compact his life must end.

He sinks lifeless to the ground. The Lemurs lay him in the open grave. Mephistopheles, triumphant, looks on and exclaims:

No joy could sate him, no delight suffice.To grasp at empty shades was his endeavour.The latest, poorest emptiest moment—this—Poor fool, he tried to hold it fast for ever.Me he resisted in such vigorous wise;But Time is lord—and there the old man lies!The clock stands still.

'Stands still,' repeats a voice from heaven, 'still, silent, as the midnight.' 'It is finished,' says Mephistopheles. 'Nay. 'Tis but past,' answers the voice. 'Past!' exclaims Mephistopheles; 'howpastand yet notfinished?' ... He is enraged at the suspicion that life, though past, may not befinished—that Faust's human soul mayyetelude that hell to which he destines it ... that of annihilation.

The Lemurs group themselves round the grave and chant with hollow voices, such as skeletons may be supposed to have, a funeral dirge. Meantime Mephistopheles is busy summoning his demons to keep watch over the dead body, lest the soul should escape like a mouse, or flicker up to heaven in a littleflamelet. Hideous forms of demons, fat and thin, with straight and crooked horns, tusked like boars and with claws like vultures, come thronging in, while the jaw of hell opens itself, showing in the distance the fiery city of Satan.

At this moment a celestial glory is seen descending from heaven and voices of angels are heard singing a song of triumph and salvation. They approach ever nearer—Mephistopheles rages and curses, but in vain. They come ever onward, casting before them roses, the flowers of Paradise, which burst in flame and scorch the demons, who, rushing at their angelic adversaries with their hellish prongs and forks and launching vainly their missiles of hell-fire, are hurled back by an invisible power and gradually driven off the stage, plunging in hideous ruin and combustion down headlong into the jaws of hell.

Mephistopheles alone remains, foaming in impotent rage. He is surrounded by the choir of white-robed angels. He stands powerless there, while they gather to themselves Faust's immortal part and ascend amidst songs of triumph to heaven.

Some of us, perhaps most of us—in certainmoods at least—feel inclined to close the book here, as we do withHamletat the words 'the rest is silence.' And this feeling is all the stronger when we have witnessed the stage decorator's pasteboard heaven, where Apostles and Fathers are posed artistically in rather perilous situations amid rocks and pine-trees, or balance themselves with evident anxiety mid-air on pendent platforms representing clouds. Altogether this stage-heaven is a very uncomfortable and depressing kind of place.

But when read in Goethe's poem and regarded as an allegorical vision the scene has a certain impressive grandeur, and some of the hymns of adoration and triumph are of exceeding beauty.

This Scene in Heaven opens with the songs of the three great Fathers, the Pater Ecstaticus, Pater Profundus, and Pater Seraphicus, symbolizing the three stages of human aspiration, namely ecstasy, contemplation and seraphic love. The Seraphic Father is of course St. Francis of Assisi. In heaven, as he did on earth, he sings of the revelation of Eternal Love.

Angels are now seen ascending and bearingFaust's immortal part, and as they rise they sing:

The noble spirit now is freeAnd saved from evil scheming.Whoe'er aspires unweariedlyIs not beyond redeeming,And if he feels the grace of LoveThat from on high is givenThe blessed hosts that wait aboveShall welcome him to heaven.

His yet unawakened soul is greeted by the heavenly choirs and by the three penitents, the Magdalene, the woman of Samaria and St. Mary of Egypt.

Then appears 'timidly stealing forth' the glorified form of her who on earth was called Gretchen. In words that remind one of her former prayer of remorse and despair in the Cathedral she offers her petition to the Virgin:

O Mary, hear me!From realms supernalOf light eternalIncline thy countenance upon my bliss!My loved, my lover,His trials overIn yonder world, returns to me in this.

The Virgin in her glory appears. She addresses Gretchen:

Come, raise thyself to higher spheres!For he will follow when he feels thee near.

Gretchen soars up to the higher heaven, and the soul of Faust, now awakening to consciousness, rises also heavenward following her, while the chorus of angels sings, in words the beauty and power of which I dare not mar by translation, telling how all things earthly are but a vision, and how in heaven the imperfect is made perfect and the inconceivable wins attainment, and how that which leads us upward and heavenward is immortal love.

Alles VergänglicheIst nur ein Gleichnis;Das Unzulängliche,Hier wird's Ereignis;Das Unbeschreibliche,Hier ist's getan;Das Ewig-weiblicheZieht uns hinan.

Transcriber's Notes:Page15: Full stop added after "dishes"Page117: "happended" amended to "happened"Page128: closing quote mark added after 'double'Hyphenation has generally been standardized. However, when hyphenated and unhyphenated versions of a word each occur an equal number of times, both versions have been retained (out-rivalling/outrivalling; up to date/up-to-date).

Page15: Full stop added after "dishes"

Page117: "happended" amended to "happened"

Page128: closing quote mark added after 'double'

Hyphenation has generally been standardized. However, when hyphenated and unhyphenated versions of a word each occur an equal number of times, both versions have been retained (out-rivalling/outrivalling; up to date/up-to-date).

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