Pursuing his wonderful vagaries by means of a magic book that has come into his possession, Faust first experiments with the “sign” of the Macrocosm, but makes no attempt to summon its presiding genius, that is, the World-spirit.  He has a wonderful vision of the harmonious Cosmos, but it is “only a spectacle,” whereas he craves food for his soul.  So he turns to the sign of the Earth-spirit, whom he feels to be nearer to him.  By an act of supreme daring he utters the formula which causes the Spirit to appear in fire—­grand, awe-inspiring, terrible.  A colloquy ensues at the end of which the Spirit rebuffs the presumptuous mortal with the words:  “Thou art like the spirit whom thou comprehendest, not like me”—­and disappears.  The meaning is that Faust, who knows very little of the Earth, having always led the narrow life of a brooding scholar in one little corner of it, is not fit for intimacy with the mighty being who presides over the entire planet, with its rush and change, its life and death, its vast and ceaseless energy.  He must have a wider experience.  How shall he get it?

It is a moot question whether Goethe at first conceived Mephistopheles as the Earth-spirit’s envoy, sent for the express purpose of showing Faust about the world, or whether the Devil was thought of as coming of his own accord.  Be that as it may, Faust is an experience-drama, and the Devil’s function is to provide the experience.  And he is a devil, not the Devil, conceived as the bitter and malignant enemy of God, but a subordinate spirit whose business it is, in the world-economy, to spur man to activity.  This he does partly by cynical criticism and opposition, but more especially by holding out the lures of the sensual life.  At first Mephistopheles was not thought of as working solely for a reward in the shape of souls captured for eternity, but as playing his part for the diabolical pleasure of so doing.  In the course of time, however, Goethe invested him more and more with the costume and traits of the traditionary Devil.

After the Earth-spirit’s rebuff Faust is in despair.  He has set all his hope on help from the spirit-world, and the hope has failed.  His famulus Wagner, a type of the ardent and contented bookworm, comes in to get instruction on the art of public speaking, and Faust lays down the law to him.  After Wagner’s exit Faust is hopelessly despondent.  After a mournful arraignment of life he is about to swallow a cup of poison that he has concocted, when his hand is staid by the first notes of the Easter celebration in a neighboring church.  It reminds him of his happy youth when he, too, believed.