Complete Works of Samuel Johnson

by Samuel Johnson

My zeal marks gladness dawning on thy cheek,

  With raptures, such as fire the pagan crowds,

  When, pale and anxious for their years to come,

  They see the sun surmount the dark eclipse,

  And hail, unanimous, their conqu’ring god.

  MAHOMET.

  My vows, ’tis true, she hears with less aversion;

  She sighs, she blushes, but she still denies.

  CALI.

  With warmer courtship press the yielding fair:

  Call to your aid, with boundless promises,

  Each rebel wish, each traitor inclination,

  That raises tumults in the female breast,

  The love of pow’r, of pleasure, and of show.

  MAHOMET.

  These arts I try’d, and, to inflame her more,

  By hateful business hurried from her sight,

  I bade a hundred virgins wait around her,

  Sooth her with all the pleasures of command,

  Applaud her charms, and court her to be great.

  [Exit Mahomet.

  SCENE VI.

  CALI, solus.

  He’s gone — Here rest, my soul, thy fainting wing;

  Here recollect thy dissipated pow’rs. —

  Our distant int’rests, and our diff’rent passions.

  Now haste to mingle in one common centre.

  And fate lies crowded in a narrow space.

  Yet, in that narrow space what dangers rise! —

  Far more I dread Abdalla’s fiery folly,

  Than all the wisdom of the grave divan.

  Reason with reason fights on equal terms;

  The raging madman’s unconnected schemes

  We cannot obviate, for we cannot guess.

  Deep in my breast be treasur’d this resolve,

  When Cali mounts the throne, Abdalla dies,

  Too fierce, too faithless, for neglect or trust.

  [Enter Irene with attendants.

  SCENE VII.

  CALI, IRENE, ASPASIA, &c.

  CALI.

  Amidst the splendour of encircling beauty,

  Superiour majesty proclaims thee queen,

  And nature justifies our monarch’s choice.

  IRENE.

  Reserve this homage for some other fair;

  Urge me not on to glitt’ring guilt, nor pour

  In my weak ear th’ intoxicating sounds.

  CALI.

  Make haste, bright maid, to rule the willing world;

  Aw’d by the rigour of the sultan’s justice,

  We court thy gentleness.

  ASPASIA.

  Can Cali’s voice

  Concur to press a hapless captive’s ruin?

  CALI.

  Long would my zeal for Mahomet and thee

  Detain me here. But nations call upon me,

  And duty bids me choose a distant walk,

  Nor taint with care the privacies of love.

  SCENE VIII.

  IRENE, ASPASIA, attendants.

  ASPASIA.

  If yet this shining pomp, these sudden honours,

  Swell not thy soul, beyond advice or friendship,

  Nor yet inspire the follies of a queen,

  Or tune thine ear to soothing adulation,

  Suspend awhile the privilege of pow’r,

  To hear the voice of truth; dismiss thy train,

  Shake off th’ incumbrances of state, a moment,

  And lay the tow’ring sultaness aside,

  Irene signs to her attendants to retire.

  While I foretell thy fate: that office done, —

  No more I boast th’ ambitious name of friend,

  But sink among thy slaves, without a murmur.

  IRENE.

  Did regal diadems invest my brow,

  Yet should my soul, still faithful to her choice,

  Esteem Aspasia’s breast the noblest kingdom.

  ASPASIA.

  The soul, once tainted with so foul a crime,

  No more shall glow with friendship’s hallow’d ardour:

  Those holy beings, whose superiour care

  Guides erring mortals to the paths of virtue,

  Affrighted at impiety, like thine,

  Resign their charge to baseness and to ruin.

  In the original copy of this tragedy, given to Mr. Langton, the above speech is as follows; and, in Mr. Boswell’s judgment, is finer than in the present editions:

  ”Nor think to say, here will I stop;

  Here will I fix the limits of transgression,

  Nor farther tempt the avenging rage of heaven.

  When guilt, like this, once harbours in the breast,

  Those holy beings, whose unseen direction

  Guides, through the maze of life, the steps of man.

  Fly the detested mansions of impiety,

  And quit their charge to horrour and to ruin.”

  See Boswell, i. for other compared extracts from the first sketch.

  — ED.

  IRENE.

  Upbraid me not with fancied wickedness;

  I am not yet a queen, or an apostate.

  But should I sin beyond the hope of mercy,

  If, when religion prompts me to refuse,

  The dread of instant death restrains my tongue?

  ASPASIA.

  Reflect, that life and death, affecting sounds!

  Are only varied modes of endless being;

  Reflect, that life, like ev’ry other blessing,

  Derives its value from its use alone;

  Not for itself, but for a nobler end,

  Th’ Eternal gave it, and that end is virtue.

  When inconsistent with a greater good,

  Reason commands to cast the less away:

  Thus life, with loss of wealth, is well preserv’d,

  And virtue cheaply say’d, with loss of life.

  IRENE.

  If built on settled thought, this constancy

  Not idly flutters on a boastful tongue,

  Why, when destruction rag’d around our walls,

  Why fled this haughty heroine from the battle?

  Why, then, did not this warlike amazon

  Mix in the war, and shine among the heroes?

  ASPASIA.

  Heav’n, when its hand pour’d softness on our limbs,

  Unfit for toil, and polish’d into weakness,

  Made passive fortitude the praise of woman:

  Our only arms are innocence and meekness.

  Not then with raving cries I fill’d the city;

  But, while Demetrius, dear, lamented name!

  Pour’d storms of fire upon our fierce invaders,

  Implor’d th’ eternal pow’r to shield my country,

  With silent sorrows, and with calm devotion.

  IRENE.

  O! did Irene shine the queen of Turkey,

  No more should Greece lament those pray’rs rejected;

  Again, should golden splendour grace her cities,

  Again, her prostrate palaces should rise,

  Again, her temples sound with holy musick:

  No more should danger fright, or want distress

  The smiling widows, and protected orphans.

  ASPASIA.

  Be virtuous ends pursued by virtuous means,

  Nor think th’ intention sanctifies the deed:

  That maxim, publish’d in an impious age,

  Would loose the wild enthusiast to destroy,

  And fix the fierce usurper’s bloody title;

  Then bigotry might send her slaves to war,

  And bid success become the test of truth:

  Unpitying massacre might waste the world,

  And persecution boast the call of heaven.

  IRENE.

  Shall I not wish to cheer afflicted kings,

  And plan the happiness of mourning millions?

  ASPASIA.

  Dream not of pow’r, thou never canst attain:

  When social laws first harmoniz’d the
world,

  Superiour man possess’d the charge of rule,

  The scale of justice, and the sword of power,

  Nor left us aught, but flattery and state.

  IRENE.

  To me my lover’s fondness will restore

  Whate’er man’s pride has ravish’d from our sex.

  ASPASIA.

  When soft security shall prompt the sultan,

  Freed from the tumults of unsettled conquest,

  To fix his court, and regulate his pleasures,

  Soon shall the dire seraglio’s horrid gates

  Close, like th’ eternal bars of death, upon thee.

  Immur’d, and buried in perpetual sloth,

  That gloomy slumber of the stagnant soul,

  There shalt thou view, from far, the quiet cottage,

  And sigh for cheerful poverty in vain;

  There wear the tedious hours of life away,

  Beneath each curse of unrelenting heav’n,

  Despair and slav’ry, solitude and guilt.

  IRENE.

  There shall we find the yet untasted bliss

  Of grandeur and tranquillity combin’d.

  ASPASIA.

  Tranquillity and guilt, disjoin’d by heaven,

  Still stretch in vain their longing arms afar;

  Nor dare to pass th’ insuperable bound.

  Ah! let me rather seek the convent’s cell;

  There, when my thoughts, at interval of prayer,

  Descend to range these mansions of misfortune,

  Oft shall I dwell on our disastrous friendship,

  And shed the pitying tear for lost Irene.

  IRENE.

  Go, languish on in dull obscurity;

  Thy dazzled soul, with all its boasted greatness,

  Shrinks at th’ o’erpow’ring gleams of regal state,

  Stoops from the blaze, like a degen’rate eagle,

  And flies for shelter to the shades of life.

  ASPASIA.

  On me should providence, without a crime,

  The weighty charge of royalty confer;

  Call me to civilize the Russian wilds,

  Or bid soft science polish Britain’s heroes;

  Soon should’st thou see, how false thy weak reproach,

  My bosom feels, enkindled from the sky,

  The lambent flames of mild benevolence,

  Untouch’d by fierce ambition’s raging fires.

  IRENE.

  Ambition is the stamp, impress’d by heav’n

  To mark the noblest minds; with active heat

  Inform’d, they mount the precipice of pow’r,

  Grasp at command, and tow’r in quest of empire;

  While vulgar souls compassionate their cares,

  Gaze at their height, and tremble at their danger:

  Thus meaner spirits, with amazement, mark

  The varying seasons, and revolving skies,

  And ask, what guilty pow’r’s rebellious hand

  Rolls with eternal toil the pond’rous orbs;

  While some archangel, nearer to perfection,

  In easy state, presides o’er all their motions,

  Directs the planets, with a careless nod,

  Conducts the sun, and regulates the spheres.

  ASPASIA.

  Well may’st thou hide in labyrinths of sound

  The cause that shrinks from reason’s pow’rful voice.

  Stoop from thy flight, trace back th’ entangled thought,

  And set the glitt’ring fallacy to view.

  Not pow’r I blame, but pow’r obtain’d by crime;

  Angelick greatness is angelick virtue.

  Amidst the glare of courts, the shout of armies,

  Will not th’ apostate feel the pangs of guilt,

  And wish, too late, for innocence and peace,

  Curst, as the tyrant of th’ infernal realms,

  With gloomy state and agonizing pomp?

  SCENE IX.

  IRENE, ASPASIA, MAID.

  MAID.

  A Turkish stranger, of majestick mien,

  Asks at the gate admission to Aspasia,

  Commission’d, as he says, by Cali bassa.

  IRENE.

  Whoe’er thou art, or whatsoe’er thy message, [Aside.

  Thanks for this kind relief — With speed admit him.

  ASPASIA.

  He comes, perhaps, to separate us for ever;

  When I am gone, remember, O! remember,

  That none are great, or happy, but the virtuous.

  [Exit Irene; enter Demetrius.

  SCENE X.

  ASPASIA, DEMETRIUS.

  DEMETRIUS.

  ’Tis she — my hope, my happiness, my love!

  Aspasia! do I, once again, behold thee?

  Still, still the same — unclouded by misfortune!

  Let my blest eyes for ever gaze —

  ASPASIA.

  Demetrius!

  DEMETRIUS.

  Why does the blood forsake thy lovely cheek?

  Why shoots this chilness through thy shaking nerves?

  Why does thy soul retire into herself?

  Recline upon my breast thy sinking beauties:

  Revive — Revive to freedom and to love.

  ASPASIA.

  What well-known voice pronounc’d the grateful sounds,

  Freedom and love? Alas! I’m all confusion;

  A sudden mist o’ercasts my darken’d soul;

  The present, past, and future swim before me,

  Lost in a wild perplexity of joy.

  DEMETRIUS.

  Such ecstasy of love, such pure affection,

  What worth can merit? or what faith reward?

  ASPASIA.

  A thousand thoughts, imperfect and distracted,

  Demand a voice, and struggle into birth;

  A thousand questions press upon my tongue,

  But all give way to rapture and Demetrius.

  DEMETRIUS.

  O say, bright being, in this age of absence,

  What fears, what griefs, what dangers, hast thou known?

  Say, how the tyrant threaten’d, flatter’d, sigh’d!

  Say, how he threaten’d, flatter’d, sigh’d in vain!

  Say, how the hand of violence was rais’d!

  Say, how thou call’dst in tears upon Demetrius!

  ASPASIA.

  Inform me rather, how thy happy courage

  Stemm’d in the breach the deluge of destruction,

  And pass’d, uninjur’d, through the walks of death.

  Did savage anger and licentious conquest

  Behold the hero with Aspasia’s eyes?

  And, thus protected in the gen’ral ruin,

  O! say, what guardian pow’r convey’d thee hither.

  DEMETRIUS.

  Such strange events, such unexpected chances,

  Beyond my warmest hope, or wildest wishes,

  Concurr’d to give me to Aspasia’s arms,

  I stand amaz’d, and ask, if yet I clasp thee.

  ASPASIA.

  Sure heav’n, (for wonders are not wrought in vain!)

  That joins us thus, will never part us more.

  SCENE XI.

  DEMETRIUS, ASPASIA, ABDALLA.

  ABDALLA.

  It parts you now — The hasty sultan sign’d

  The laws unread, and flies to his Irene.

  DEMETRIUS.

  Fix’d and intent on his Irene’s charms,

  He envies none the converse of Aspasia.

  ABDALLA.

  Aspasia’s absence will inflame suspicion;

  She cannot, must not, shall not, linger here;

  Prudence and friendship bid me force her from you.

  DEMETRIUS.

  Force her! profane her with a touch, and die!

  ABDALLA.

  ’Tis Greece, ’tis freedom, calls Aspasia hence;

  Your careless love betrays your country’s cause.

  DEMETRIUS.

 
If we must part —

  ASPASIA.

  No! let us die together.

  DEMETRIUS.

  If we must part —

  ABDALLA.

  Despatch; th’ increasing danger

  Will not admit a lover’s long farewell,

  The long-drawn intercourse of sighs and kisses.

  DEMETRIUS.

  Then — O! my fair, I cannot bid thee go.

  Receive her, and protect her, gracious heav’n!

  Yet let me watch her dear departing steps;

  If fate pursues me, let it find me here.

  Reproach not, Greece, a lover’s fond delays,

  Nor think thy cause neglected, while I gaze;

  New force, new courage, from each glance I gain,

  And find our passions not infus’d in vain. [Exeunt.

  ACT IV. — SCENE I.

  DEMETRIUS, ASPASIA, enter as talking.

  ASPASIA.

  Enough — resistless reason calms my soul —

  Approving justice smiles upon your cause,

  And nature’s rights entreat th’ asserting sword.

  Yet, when your hand is lifted to destroy,

  Think, but excuse a woman’s needless caution, —

  Purge well thy mind from ev’ry private passion,

  Drive int’rest, love, and vengeance, from thy thoughts;

  Fill all thy ardent breast with Greece and virtue;

  Then strike secure, and heav’n assist the blow!

  DEMETRIUS.

  Thou kind assistant of my better angel,

  Propitious guide of my bewilder’d soul,

  Calm of my cares, and guardian of my virtue!

  ASPASIA.

  My soul, first kindled by thy bright example,

  To noble thought and gen’rous emulation,

  Now but reflects those beams that flow’d from thee.

  DEMETRIUS.

  With native lustre and unborrow’d greatness,

  Thou shin’st, bright maid, superiour to distress;

  Unlike the trifling race of vulgar beauties,

  Those glitt’ring dewdrops of a vernal morn,

  That spread their colours to the genial beam,

  And, sparkling, quiver to the breath of May;

  But, when the tempest, with sonorous wing,

  Sweeps o’er the grove, forsake the lab’ring bough,

  Dispers’d in air, or mingled with the dust.

  ASPASIA.

  Forbear this triumph — still new conflicts wait us,

  Foes unforeseen, and dangers unsuspected.

  Oft, when the fierce besiegers’ eager host

  Beholds the fainting garrison retire,

  And rushes joyful to the naked wall,

  Destruction flashes from th’ insidious mine,

  And sweeps th’ exulting conqueror away.