MEPHISTOPHELES

Yet did a certain man refrain one night
Of its brown juice to drain the crystal bowl.

FAUST

To play the spy diverts you then?

MEPHISTOPHELES

I own,
Though not omniscient, much to me is known.

FAUST

If o’er my soul the tone familiar, stealing,
Drew me from harrowing thought’s bewild’ring maze,
Touching the ling’ring chords of childlike feeling,
With the sweet harmonies of happier days: 
So curse I all, around the soul that windeth
Its magic and alluring spell,
And with delusive flattery bindeth
Its victim to this dreary cell! 
Curs’d before all things be the high opinion
Wherewith the spirit girds itself around! 
Of shows delusive curs’d be the dominion,
Within whose mocking sphere our sense is bound! 
Accurs’d of dreams the treacherous wiles,
The cheat of glory, deathless fame! 
Accurs’d what each as property beguiles,
Wife, child, slave, plough, whate’er its name! 
Accurs’d be mammon, when with treasure
He doth to daring deeds incite: 
Or when to steep the soul in pleasure,
He spreads the couch of soft delight! 
Curs’d be the grape’s balsamic juice! 
Accurs’d love’s dream, of joys the first! 
Accurs’d be hope! accurs’d be faith! 
And more than all, be patience curs’d!

CHORUS OF SPIRITS (invisible)

 Woe! woe! 
 Thou hast destroy’d
 The beautiful world
 With violent blow;
 ’Tis shiver’d! ’tis shatter’d! 
 The fragments abroad by a demigod scatter’d! 
 Now we sweep
 The wrecks into nothingness! 
 Fondly we weep
 The beauty that’s gone! 
 Thou, ’mongst the sons of earth,
 Lofty and mighty one,
 Build it once more! 
 In thine own bosom the lost world restore! 
 Now with unclouded sense
 Enter a new career;
 Songs shall salute thine ear,
 Ne’er heard before!

MEPHISTOPHELES

My little ones these spirits be. 
Hark! with shrewd intelligence,
How they recommend to thee
Action, and the joys of sense! 
In the busy world to dwell,
Fain they would allure thee hence
For within this lonely cell,
Stagnate sap of life and sense. 
Forbear to trifle longer with thy grief,
Which, vulture-like, consumes thee in this den. 
The worst society is some relief,
Making thee feel thyself a man with men. 
Nathless, it is not meant, I trow,
To thrust thee ’mid the vulgar throng. 
I to the upper ranks do not belong;
Yet if, by me companion’d, thou
Thy steps through life forthwith wilt take,
Upon the spot myself I’ll make
Thy comrade;—­Should it suit thy need,
I am thy servant, am thy slave indeed!