by Lord Byron
Man. I knew, and know my hour is come, but not
To render up my soul to such as thee:
Away! I’ll die as I have lived — alone. 90
Spirit. Then I must summon up my brethren. — Rise!
[Other Spirits rise.
Abbot. Avaunt! ye evil ones! — Avaunt! I say, —
Ye have no power where Piety hath power,
And I do charge ye in the name —
Spirit. Old man!
We know ourselves, our mission, and thine order;
Waste not thy holy words on idle uses,
It were in vain: this man is forfeited.
Once more — I summon him — Away! Away!
Man. I do defy ye, — though I feel my soul
Is ebbing from me, yet I do defy ye; 100
Nor will I hence, while I have earthly breath
To breathe my scorn upon ye — earthly strength
To wrestle, though with spirits; what ye take
Shall be ta’en limb by limb.
Spirit. Reluctant mortal!
Is this the Magian who would so pervade
The world invisible, and make himself
Almost our equal? Can it be that thou
Art thus in love with life? the very life
Which made thee wretched?
Man. Thou false fiend, thou liest!
My life is in its last hour, — that I know, 110
Nor would redeem a moment of that hour;
I do not combat against Death, but thee
And thy surrounding angels; my past power
Was purchased by no compact with thy crew,
But by superior science — penance, daring,
And length of watching, strength of mind, and skill
In knowledge of our Fathers — when the earth
Saw men and spirits walking side by side,
And gave ye no supremacy: I stand
Upon my strength — I do defy — deny — 120
Spurn back, and scorn ye! —
Spirit. But thy many crimes
Have made thee —
Man. What are they to such as thee?
Must crimes be punished but by other crimes,
And greater criminals? — Back to thy hell!
Thou hast no power upon me, that I feel;
Thou never shalt possess me, that I know:
What I have done is done; I bear within
A torture which could nothing gain from thine:
The Mind which is immortal makes itself
Requital for its good or evil thoughts, — 130
Is its own origin of ill and end —
And its own place and time: its innate sense,
When stripped of this mortality, derives
No colour from the fleeting things without,
But is absorbed in sufferance or in joy,
Born from the knowledge of its own desert.
Thou didst not tempt me, and thou couldst not tempt me;
I have not been thy dupe, nor am thy prey —
But was my own destroyer, and will be
My own hereafter. — Back, ye baffled fiends! 140
The hand of Death is on me — but not yours!
[The Demons disappear.
Abbot. Alas! how pale thou art — thy lips are white —
And thy breast heaves — and in thy gasping throat
The accents rattle: Give thy prayers to Heaven
Pray — albeit but in thought, — but die not thus.
Man. ‘Tis over — my dull eyes can fix thee not;
But all things swim around me, and the earth
Heaves as it were beneath me. Fare thee well —
Give me thy hand.
Abbot. Cold — cold — even to the heart —
But yet one prayer — Alas! how fares it with thee? 150
Man. Old man! ‘tis not so difficult to die.
[Manfred expires.
Abbot. He’s gone — his soul hath ta’en its earthless flight;
Whither? I dread to think — but he is gone.
MARINO FALIERO
DOGE OF VENICE;
AN HISTORICAL TRAGEDY,
IN FIVE ACTS.
“Dux inquieti turbidus Adria.”
Horace, [Od. III. c. iii. line 5]
INTRODUCTION
Byron had no sooner finished the first draft of Manfred than he began (February 25, 1817) to lay the foundation of another tragedy. Venice was new to him, and, on visiting the Doge’s Palace, the veiled space intended for the portrait of Marin Falier, and the “Giants’ Staircase,” where, as he believed, “he was once crowned and afterwards decapitated,” had laid hold of his imagination, while the legend of the Congiura, “an old man jealous and conspiring against the state of which he was … Chief,” promised a subject which the “devil himself” might have dramatized con amore.
But other interests and ideas claimed his attention, and for more than three years the project slept. At length he slips into the postscript of a letter to Murray, dated, “Ravenna, April 9, 1820” (Letters, 1901, v. 7), an intimation that he had begun “a tragedy on the subject of Marino Faliero, the Doge of Venice.” The “Imitation of Dante, the Translation of Pulci, the Danticles,” etc., were worked off, and, in prospecting for a new vein, a fresh lode of literary ore, he passed, by a natural transition, from Italian literature to Italian history, from the romantic and humorous epopee of Pulci and Berni, to the pseudo-classic drama of Alfieri and Monti.
Jealousy, as “Monk” Lewis had advised him (August, 1817), was an “exhausted passion” in the drama, and to lay the scene in Venice was to provoke comparison with Shakespeare and Otway; but the man himself, the fiery Doge, passionate but not jealous, a noble turned democrat pro hac vice, an old man “greatly” finding “quarrel in a straw,” afforded a theme historically time-honoured, and yet unappropriated by tragic art.
There was, too, a living interest in the story. For history was repeating itself, and “politics were savage and uncertain.” “Mischief was afoot,” and the tradition of a conspiracy which failed might find an historic parallel in a conspiracy which would succeed. There was “that brewing in Italy” which might, perhaps, inspire “a people to redress itself,” “and with a cry of, ‘Up with the Republic!’ ‘Down with the Nobility!’ send the Barbarians of all nations back to their own dens!” {Letters, 1901, v. 10, 12, 19.)
In taking the field as a dramatist, Byron sought to win distinction for himself — in the first place by historical accuracy, and, secondly, by artistic regularity — by a stricter attention to the dramatic “unities.” “History is closely followed,” he tells Murray, in a letter dated July 17, 1820; and, again, in the Preface (vide post, pp. -), which is an expansion of the letter, he gives a list of the authorities which he had consulted, and claims to have “transferred into our language an historical fact worthy of commemoration.” More than once in his letters to Murray he reverts to this profession of accuracy, and encloses some additional note, in which he points out and rectifies an occasional deviation from the historical record. In this respect, at any rate, he could contend on more than equal terms “with established writers,” that is, with Shakespeare and Otway, and could present to his countrymen an exacter and, so, more lifelike picture of the Venetian Republic. It is plain, too, that he was bitten with the love of study for its own sake, with a premature passion for erudition, and that he sought and found relief from physical and intellectual excitement in the intricacies of research. If his history is at fault, it was not from any lack of diligence on his part, but because the materials at his disposal or within his cognizance were inaccurate and misleading. He makes no mention of the huge collection of Venetian archives which had recently been deposited in the Convent of the Frari, or of Doria’s transcript of Sanudo’s Diaries, bequeathed in 1816 to the Library of St. Mark; but he quotes as his authorities the Vitæ Ducum Venetorum, of Marin Sanudo (1466-1
535), the Storia, etc., of Andrea Navagero (1483-1529), and the Principj di Storia, etc., of Vettor Sandi, which belongs to the latter half of the eighteenth century. Byron’s chroniclers were ancient, but not ancient enough; and, though they “handed down the story” (see Medwin, Conversations, p. 173), they depart in numerous particulars from the facts recorded in contemporary documents. Unquestionably the legend, as it appears in Sanudo’s perplexing and uncritical narrative (see, for the translation of an original version of the Italian, Appendix, pp. -), is more dramatic than the “low beginnings” of the myth, which may be traced to the annalists of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries; but, like other legends, it is insusceptible of proof. Byron’s Doge is almost, if not quite, as unhistorical as his Bonivard or his Mazeppa. (See Nuovo Archivio Veneto, 1893, vol. v. pt. i. pp. 95-197; 1897, vol. xiii. pt. i. pp. 5-107; pt. ii. pp. 277-374; Les Archives de Venise, par Armand Baschet, 1870; Storia della Repubblica di Venizia, Giuseppe Cappelletti, 1849, iv. pp. 262-317.)
At the close of the Preface, by way of an afterthought, Byron announces his determination to escape “the reproach of the English theatrical compositions” “by preserving a nearer approach to unity,” by substituting the regularity of French and Italian models for the barbarities of the Elizabethan dramatists and their successors. Goethe (Conversations, 1874, p. 114) is said to have “laughed to think that Byron, who, in practical life, could never adapt himself, and never even asked about a law, finally subjected himself to the stupidest of laws — that of the three unities.” It was, perhaps, in part with this object in view, to make his readers smile, to provoke their astonishment, that he affected a severity foreign to his genius and at variance with his record. It was an agreeable thought that he could so easily pass from one extreme to another, from Manfred to Marino Faliero, and, at the same time, indulge “in a little sally of gratuitous sauciness” (Quarterly Review, July, 1822, vol. xxvii, p. 480) at the expense of his own countrymen. But there were other influences at work. He had been powerfully impressed by the energy and directness of Alfieri’s work, and he was eager to emulate the gravity and simplicity, if not the terseness and conciseness, of his style and language. The drama was a new world to conquer, and so far as “his own literature” was concerned it appeared that success might be attainable by “a severer approach to the rules” (Letter to Murray, February 16, 1821) — that by taking Alfieri as his model he might step into the first rank of English dramatists.
Goethe thought that Byron failed “to understand the purpose” of the “three unities,” that he regarded the law as an end in itself, and did not perceive that if a play was comprehensible the unities might be neglected and disregarded. It is possible that his “blind obedience to the law” may have been dictated by the fervour of a convert; but it is equally possible that he looked beyond the law or its fulfilment to an ulterior object, the discomfiture of the romantic school, with its contempt for regularity, its passionate appeal from art to nature. If he was minded to raise a “Grecian temple of the purest architecture” (Letters, 1901, v. Appendix III. p. 559), it was not without some thought and hope of shaming, by force of contrast, the “mosque,” the “grotesque edifice” of barbarian contemporaries and rivals. Byron was “ever a fighter,” and his claim to regularity, to a closer preservation of the “unities,” was of the nature of a challenge.
Marino Faliero was dedicated to “Baron Goethe,” but the letter which should have contained the dedication was delayed in transit. Goethe never saw the dedication till it was placed in his hands by John Murray the Third, in 1831, but he read the play, and after Byron’s death bore testimony to its peculiar characteristics and essential worth. “Lord Byron, notwithstanding his predominant personality, has sometimes had the power of renouncing himself altogether, as may be seen in some of his dramatic pieces, particularly in his Marino Faliero. In this piece one quite forgets that Lord Byron, or even an Englishman, wrote it. We live entirely in Venice, and entirely in the time in which the action takes place. The personages speak quite from themselves and their own condition, without having any of the subjective feelings, thoughts, and opinions of the poet” (Conversations, 1874, p. 453).
Byron spent three months over the composition of Marino Faliero. The tragedy was completed July 17 (Letters, 1901, v. 52), and the copying (vide post, ) a month later (August 16, 17, 1820). The final draft of “all the acts corrected” was despatched to England some days before October 6, 1820.
Early in January, 1821 (see Letters to Murray, January 11, 20, 1821, Letters, 1901, v. 221-228), an announcement reached Byron that his play was to be brought out at Drury Lane Theatre, by Elliston. Against this he protested by every means in his power, and finally, on Wednesday, April 25, four days after the publication of the first edition (April 21, 1821), an injunction was obtained from Lord Chancellor Eldon, prohibiting a performance announced for that evening. Elliston pursued the Chancellor to the steps of his own house, and at the last moment persuaded him to allow the play to be acted on that night only. Legal proceeedings were taken, but, in the end, the injunction was withdrawn, with the consent of Byron’s solicitors, and the play was represented again on April 30, and on five nights in the following May. As Byron had foreseen, Marino Faliero was coldly received by the playgoing public, and proved a loss to the “speculating buffoons,” who had not realized that it was “unfit for their Fair or their booth” (Letter to Murray, January 20, 1821, Letters, 1901, v. 228, and p. 226, note 2. See, too, Memoirs of Robert W. Elliston, 1845, pp. 268-271).
Byron was the first to perceive that the story of Marino Faliero was a drama “ready to hand;” but he has had many followers, if not imitators or rivals.
“Marino Faliero, tragédie en cinq actes,” by Casimir Jean François Delavigne, was played for the first time at the Theatre of Porte Saint Martin, May 31, 1829.
In Germany tragedies based on the same theme have been published by Otto Ludwig, Leipzig, 1874; Martin Grief, Vienna, 1879; Murad Effendi (Franz von Werner), 1881, and others (Englische Studien, vol. xxvii. pp. 146, 147).
Marino Faliero, a Tragedy, by A. C. Swinburne, was published in 1885.
Marino Faliero was reviewed by Jeffrey, in the Edinburgh Review, July 21, 1821, vol. 35, pp. 271-285; by Heber, in the Quarterly Review, July, 1822, vol. xxvii. pp. 476-492; and by John Wilson, in Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, April, 1821, vol. 9, pp. 93-103. For other notices, vide ante (“Introduction to The Prophecy of Dante”), .
PREFACE
The conspiracy of the Doge Marino Faliero is one of the most remarkable events in the annals of the most singular government, city, and people of modern history. It occurred in the year 1355. Every thing about Venice is, or was, extraordinary — her aspect is like a dream, and her history is like a romance. The story of this Doge is to be found in all her Chronicles, and particularly detailed in the “Lives of the Doges,” by Marin Sanuto, which is given in the Appendix. It is simply and clearly related, and is perhaps more dramatic in itself than any scenes which can be founded upon the subject.
Marino Faliero appears to have been a man of talents and of courage. I find him commander-in-chief of the land forces at the siege of Zara, where he beat the King of Hungary and his army of eighty thousand men, killing eight thousand men, and keeping the besieged at the same time in check; an exploit to which I know none similar in history, except that of Cæsar at Alesia, and of Prince Eugene at Belgrade. He was afterwards commander of the fleet in the same war. He took Capo d’Istria. He was ambassador at Genoa and Rome, — at which last he received the news of his election to the dukedom; his absence being a proof that he sought it by no intrigue, since he was apprised of his predecessor’s death and his own succession at the same moment. But he appears to have been of an ungovernable temper. A story is told by Sanuto, of his having, many years before, when podesta and captain at Treviso, boxed the ears of the bishop, who was somewhat tardy in bringing the Host. For this, honest Sanuto “saddles him with a judgment,” as Thwackum did Square;
but he does not tell us whether he was punished or rebuked by the Senate for this outrage at the time of its commission. He seems, indeed, to have been afterwards at peace with the church, for we find him ambassador at Rome, and invested with the fief of Val di Marino, in the march of Treviso, and with the title of count, by Lorenzo, Count-bishop of Ceneda. For these facts my authorities are Sanuto, Vettor Sandi, Andrea Navagero, and the account of the siege of Zara, first published by the indefatigable Abate Morelli, in his Monumenti Veneziani di varia Letteratura, printed in 1796, all of which I have looked over in the original language. The moderns, Darù, Sismondi, and Laugier, nearly agree with the ancient chroniclers. Sismondi attributes the conspiracy to his jealousy; but I find this nowhere asserted by the national historians. Vettor Sandi, indeed, says that “Altri scrissero che….dalla gelosa suspizion di esso Doge siasi fatto (Michel Steno) staccar con violenza,” etc., etc.; but this appears to have been by no means the general opinion, nor is it alluded to by Sanuto, or by Navagero; and Sandi himself adds, a moment after, that “per altre Veneziane memorie traspiri, che non il solo desiderio di vendetta lo dispose alla congiura ma anche la innata abituale ambizion sua, per cui aneleva a farsi principe independente.” The first motive appears to have been excited by the gross affront of the words written by Michel Steno on the ducal chair, and by the light and inadequate sentence of the Forty on the offender, who was one of their “tre Capi.” The attentions of Steno himself appear to have been directed towards one of her damsels, and not to the “Dogaressa” herself, against whose fame not the slightest insinuation appears, while she is praised for her beauty, and remarked for her youth. Neither do I find it asserted (unless the hint of Sandi be an assertion) that the Doge was actuated by jealousy of his wife; but rather by respect for her, and for his own honour, warranted by his past services and present dignity.
I know not that the historical facts are alluded to in English, unless by Dr. Moore in his View of Italy. His account is false and flippant, full of stale jests about old men and young wives, and wondering at so great an effect from so slight a cause. How so acute and severe an observer of mankind as the author of Zeluco could wonder at this is inconceivable. He knew that a basin of water spilt on Mrs. Masham’s gown deprived the Duke of Marlborough of his command, and led to the inglorious peace of Utrecht — that Louis XIV. was plunged into the most desolating wars, because his minister was nettled at his finding fault with a window, and wished to give him another occupation — that Helen lost Troy — that Lucretia expelled the Tarquins from Rome — and that Cava brought the Moors to Spain — that an insulted husband led the Gauls to Clusium, and thence to Rome — that a single verse of Frederick II. of Prussia on the Abbé de Bernis, and a jest on Madame de Pompadour, led to the battle of Rosbach — that the elopement of Dearbhorgil with Mac Murchad conducted the English to the slavery of Ireland that a personal pique between Maria Antoinette and the Duke of Orleans precipitated the first expulsion of the Bourbons — and, not to multiply instances of the teterrima causa, that Commodus, Domitian, and Caligula fell victims not to their public tyranny, but to private vengeance — and that an order to make Cromwell disembark from the ship in which he would have sailed to America destroyed both King and Commonwealth. After these instances, on the least reflection it is indeed extraordinary in Dr. Moore to seem surprised that a man used to command, who had served and swayed in the most important offices, should fiercely resent, in a fierce age, an unpunished affront, the grossest that can be offered to a man, be he prince or peasant. The age of Faliero is little to the purpose, unless to favour it —