Quite overcome, has stretched himself upon
The enamelled tapestry of this mossy mountain,
And feeds and rests at the same time. I was 65
Upon my way to Antioch upon business
Of some importance, but wrapped up in cares
(Who is exempt from this inheritance?)
I parted from my company, and lost
My way, and lost my servants and my comrades. 70
CYPRIAN:
‘Tis singular that even within the sight
Of the high towers of Antioch you could lose
Your way. Of all the avenues and green paths
Of this wild wood there is not one but leads,
As to its centre, to the walls of Antioch; 75
Take which you will, you cannot miss your road.
DAEMON:
And such is ignorance! Even in the sight
Of knowledge, it can draw no profit from it.
But as it still is early, and as I
Have no acquaintances in Antioch, 80
Being a stranger there, I will even wait
The few surviving hours of the day,
Until the night shall conquer it. I see
Both by your dress and by the books in which
You find delight and company, that you 85
Are a great student; — for my part, I feel
Much sympathy in such pursuits.
CYPRIAN:
Have you
Studied much?
DAEMON:
No, — and yet I know enough
Not to be wholly ignorant.
CYPRIAN:
Pray, Sir,
What science may you know? —
DAEMON:
Many.
CYPRIAN:
Alas! 90
Much pains must we expend on one alone,
And even then attain it not; — but you
Have the presumption to assert that you
Know many without study.
DAEMON:
And with truth.
For in the country whence I come the sciences 95
Require no learning, — they are known.
CYPRIAN:
Oh, would
I were of that bright country! for in this
The more we study, we the more discover
Our ignorance.
DAEMON:
It is so true, that I
Had so much arrogance as to oppose 100
The chair of the most high Professorship,
And obtained many votes, and, though I lost,
The attempt was still more glorious, than the failure
Could be dishonourable. If you believe not,
Let us refer it to dispute respecting 105
That which you know the best, and although I
Know not the opinion you maintain, and though
It be the true one, I will take the contrary.
CYPRIAN:
The offer gives me pleasure. I am now
Debating with myself upon a passage 110
Of Plinius, and my mind is racked with doubt
To understand and know who is the God
Of whom he speaks.
DAEMON:
It is a passage, if
I recollect it right, couched in these words
‘God is one supreme goodness, one pure essence, 115
One substance, and one sense, all sight, all hands.’
CYPRIAN:
‘Tis true.
DAEMON:
What difficulty find you here?
CYPRIAN:
I do not recognize among the Gods
The God defined by Plinius; if he must
Be supreme goodness, even Jupiter 120
Is not supremely good; because we see
His deeds are evil, and his attributes
Tainted with mortal weakness; in what manner
Can supreme goodness be consistent with
The passions of humanity?
DAEMON:
The wisdom 125
Of the old world masked with the names of Gods
The attributes of Nature and of Man;
A sort of popular philosophy.
CYPRIAN:
This reply will not satisfy me, for
Such awe is due to the high name of God 130
That ill should never be imputed. Then,
Examining the question with more care,
It follows, that the Gods would always will
That which is best, were they supremely good.
How then does one will one thing, one another? 135
And that you may not say that I allege
Poetical or philosophic learning: —
Consider the ambiguous responses
Of their oracular statues; from two shrines
Two armies shall obtain the assurance of 140
One victory. Is it not indisputable
That two contending wills can never lead
To the same end? And, being opposite,
If one be good, is not the other evil?
Evil in God is inconceivable; 145
But supreme goodness fails among the Gods
Without their union.
DAEMON:
I deny your major.
These responses are means towards some end
Unfathomed by our intellectual beam.
They are the work of Providence, and more 150
The battle’s loss may profit those who lose,
Than victory advantage those who win.
CYPRIAN:
That I admit; and yet that God should not
(Falsehood is incompatible with deity)
Assure the victory; it would be enough 155
To have permitted the defeat. If God
Be all sight, — God, who had beheld the truth,
Would not have given assurance of an end
Never to be accomplished: thus, although
The Deity may according to his attributes 160
Be well distinguished into persons, yet
Even in the minutest circumstance
His essence must be one.
DAEMON:
To attain the end
The affections of the actors in the scene
Must have been thus influenced by his voice. 165
CYPRIAN:
But for a purpose thus subordinate
He might have employed Genii, good or evil, —
A sort of spirits called so by the learned,
Who roam about inspiring good or evil,
And from whose influence and existence we 170
May well infer our immortality.
Thus God might easily, without descent
To a gross falsehood in his proper person,
Have moved the affections by this mediation
To the just point.
DAEMON:
These trifling contradictions 175
Do not suffice to impugn the unity
Of the high Gods; in things of great importance
They still appear unanimous; consider
That glorious fabric, man, — his workmanship
Is stamped with one conception.
CYPRIAN:
Who made man 180
Must have, methinks, the advantage of the others.
If they are equal, might they not have risen
In opposition to the work, and being
All hands, according to our author here,
Have still destroyed even as the other made? 185
If equal in their power, unequal only
In opportunity, which of the two
Will remain conqueror?
DAEMON:
On impossible
And false hypothesis there can be built
No argument. Say, what do you infer 190
From this?
CYPRIAN:
That there must be a mighty God
Of supreme goodness and of highest grace,
All sight, all hands, all truth, infa
llible,
Without an equal and without a rival,
The cause of all things and the effect of nothing, 195
One power, one will, one substance, and one essence.
And, in whatever persons, one or two,
His attributes may be distinguished, one
Sovereign power, one solitary essence,
One cause of all cause.
(THEY RISE.)
DAEMON:
How can I impugn 200
So clear a consequence?
CYPRIAN:
Do you regret
My victory?
DAEMON:
Who but regrets a check
In rivalry of wit? I could reply
And urge new difficulties, but will now
Depart, for I hear steps of men approaching, 205
And it is time that I should now pursue
My journey to the city.
CYPRIAN:
Go in peace!
DAEMON:
Remain in peace! — Since thus it profits him
To study, I will wrap his senses up
In sweet oblivion of all thought but of 210
A piece of excellent beauty; and, as I
Have power given me to wage enmity
Against Justina’s soul, I will extract
From one effect two vengeances.
(ASIDE AND EXIT.)
CYPRIAN:
I never
Met a more learned person. Let me now 215
Revolve this doubt again with careful mind.
(HE READS.)
(FLORO AND LELIO ENTER.)
LELIO:
Here stop. These toppling rocks and tangled boughs,
Impenetrable by the noonday beam,
Shall be sole witnesses of what we —
FLORO:
Draw!
If there were words, here is the place for deeds. 220
LELIO:
Thou needest not instruct me; well I know
That in the field, the silent tongue of steel
Speaks thus, —
(THEY FIGHT.)
CYPRIAN:
Ha! what is this? Lelio, — Floro,
Be it enough that Cyprian stands between you,
Although unarmed.
LELIO:
Whence comest thou, to stand 225
Between me and my vengeance?
FLORO:
From what rocks
And desert cells?
(ENTER MOSCON AND CLARIN.)
MOSCON:
Run! run! for where we left
My master. I now hear the clash of swords.
CLARIN:
I never run to approach things of this sort
But only to avoid them. Sir! Cyprian! sir! 230
CYPRIAN:
Be silent, fellows! What! two friends who are
In blood and fame the eyes and hope of Antioch,
One of the noble race of the Colalti,
The other son o’ the Governor, adventure
And cast away, on some slight cause no doubt, 235
Two lives, the honour of their country?
LELIO:
Cyprian!
Although my high respect towards your person
Holds now my sword suspended, thou canst not
Restore it to the slumber of the scabbard:
Thou knowest more of science than the duel; 240
For when two men of honour take the field,
No counsel nor respect can make them friends
But one must die in the dispute.
FLORO:
I pray
That you depart hence with your people, and
Leave us to finish what we have begun 245
Without advantage. —
CYPRIAN:
Though you may imagine
That I know little of the laws of duel,
Which vanity and valour instituted,
You are in error. By my birth I am
Held no less than yourselves to know the limits 250
Of honour and of infamy, nor has study
Quenched the free spirit which first ordered them;
And thus to me, as one well experienced
In the false quicksands of the sea of honour,
You may refer the merits of the case; 255
And if I should perceive in your relation
That either has the right to satisfaction
From the other, I give you my word of honour
To leave you.
LELIO:
Under this condition then
I will relate the cause, and you will cede 260
And must confess the impossibility
Of compromise; for the same lady is
Beloved by Floro and myself.
FLORO:
It seems
Much to me that the light of day should look
Upon that idol of my heart — but he — 265
Leave us to fight, according to thy word.
CYPRIAN:
Permit one question further: is the lady
Impossible to hope or not?
LELIO:
She is
So excellent, that if the light of day
Should excite Floro’s jealousy, it were 270
Without just cause, for even the light of day
Trembles to gaze on her.
CYPRIAN:
Would you for your
Part, marry her?
FLORO:
Such is my confidence.
CYPRIAN:
And you?
LELIO:
Oh! would that I could lift my hope
So high, for though she is extremely poor, 275
Her virtue is her dowry.
CYPRIAN:
And if you both
Would marry her, is it not weak and vain,
Culpable and unworthy, thus beforehand
To slur her honour? What would the world say
If one should slay the other, and if she 280
Should afterwards espouse the murderer?
(THE RIVALS AGREE TO REFER THEIR QUARREL TO CYPRIAN; WHO IN CONSEQUENCE VISITS JUSTINA, AND BECOMES ENAMOURED OF HER; SHE DISDAINS HIM, AND HE RETIRES TO A SOLITARY SEA-SHORE.)
SCENE 2.
CYPRIAN:
O memory! permit it not
That the tyrant of my thought
Be another soul that still
Holds dominion o’er the will,
That would refuse, but can no more, 5
To bend, to tremble, and adore.
Vain idolatry! — I saw,
And gazing, became blind with error;
Weak ambition, which the awe
Of her presence bound to terror! 10
So beautiful she was — and I,
Between my love and jealousy,
Am so convulsed with hope and fear,
Unworthy as it may appear; —
So bitter is the life I live, 15
That, hear me, Hell! I now would give
To thy most detested spirit
My soul, for ever to inherit,
To suffer punishment and pine,
So this woman may be mine. 20
Hear’st thou, Hell! dost thou reject it?
My soul is offered!
DAEMON (UNSEEN):
I accept it.
(TEMPEST, WITH THUNDER AND LIGHTNING.)
CYPRIAN:
What is this? ye heavens for ever pure,
At once intensely radiant and obscure!
Athwart the aethereal halls 25
The lightning’s arrow and the thunder-balls
The day affright,
As from the horizon round,
Burst with earthquake sound,
In mighty torrents the electric fountains; — 30
Clouds quench the sun, and thunder-smoke
Strangles the air, and fire eclipses Heaven.
Philosophy, thou canst not even
Compel their causes underneath thy yoke:
F
rom yonder clouds even to the waves below 35
The fragments of a single ruin choke
Imagination’s flight;
For, on flakes of surge, like feathers light,
The ashes of the desolation, cast
Upon the gloomy blast, 40
Tell of the footsteps of the storm;
And nearer, see, the melancholy form
Of a great ship, the outcast of the sea,
Drives miserably!
And it must fly the pity of the port, 45
Or perish, and its last and sole resort
Is its own raging enemy.
The terror of the thrilling cry
Was a fatal prophecy
Of coming death, who hovers now 50
Upon that shattered prow,
That they who die not may be dying still.
And not alone the insane elements
Are populous with wild portents,
But that sad ship is as a miracle 55
Of sudden ruin, for it drives so fast
It seems as if it had arrayed its form
With the headlong storm.
It strikes — I almost feel the shock, —
It stumbles on a jagged rock, — 60
Sparkles of blood on the white foam are cast.
(A TEMPEST.)
ALL EXCLAIM (WITHIN):
We are all lost!
DAEMON (WITHIN):
Now from this plank will I
Pass to the land and thus fulfil my scheme.
CYPRIAN:
As in contempt of the elemental rage
A man comes forth in safety, while the ship’s 65
Great form is in a watery eclipse
Obliterated from the Oceans page,
And round its wreck the huge sea-monsters sit,
A horrid conclave, and the whistling wave
Is heaped over its carcase, like a grave. 70
(THE DAEMON ENTERS, AS ESCAPED FROM THE SEA.)
DAEMON (ASIDE):
It was essential to my purposes
To wake a tumult on the sapphire ocean,
That in this unknown form I might at length
Wipe out the blot of the discomfiture
Sustained upon the mountain, and assail 75
With a new war the soul of Cyprian,
Forging the instruments of his destruction
Even from his love and from his wisdom. — O
Beloved earth, dear mother, in thy bosom
I seek a refuge from the monster who 80
Precipitates itself upon me.
CYPRIAN:
Friend,
Collect thyself; and be the memory
Of thy late suffering, and thy greatest sorrow
But as a shadow of the past, — for nothing
Beneath the circle of the moon, but flows 85
And changes, and can never know repose.
DAEMON:
And who art thou, before whose feet my fate
Has prostrated me?
CYPRIAN:
One who, moved with pity,
Would soothe its stings.
DAEMON:
Oh, that can never be!
No solace can my lasting sorrows find. 90
CYPRIAN:
Wherefore?
DAEMON:
Because my happiness is lost.
Percy Bysshe Shelley Page 92