MEPHISTOPHELES

He sleeps!  Enough, ye fays! your airy number
Have sung him truly into slumber: 
For this performance I your debtor prove.—­
Not yet art thou the man, to catch the Fiend and hold him!—­
With fairest images of dreams infold him,
Plunge him in seas of sweet untruth! 
Yet, for the threshold’s magic which controlled him,
The Devil needs a rat’s quick tooth. 
I use no lengthened invocation: 
Here rustles one that soon will work my liberation.

The lord of rats and eke of mice,
Of flies and bed-bugs, frogs and lice,
Summons thee hither to the door-sill,
To gnaw it where, with just a morsel
Of oil, he paints the spot for thee:—­
There com’st thou, hopping on to me! 
To work, at once!  The point which made me craven
Is forward, on the ledge, engraven. 
Another bite makes free the door: 
So, dream thy dreams, O Faust, until we meet once more!

FAUST (awaking)

Am I again so foully cheated? 
Remains there naught of lofty spirit-sway,
But that a dream the Devil counterfeited,
And that a poodle ran away?

[Illustration]

IV

THE STUDY

FAUST MEPHISTOPHELES

FAUST

A knock?  Come in!  Again my quiet broken?

MEPHISTOPHELES

’Tis I!

FAUST

Come in!

MEPHISTOPHELES

Thrice must the words be spoken.

FAUST

Come in, then!

MEPHISTOPHELES

Thus thou pleasest me. 
I hope we’ll suit each other well;
For now, thy vapors to dispel,
I come, a squire of high degree,
In scarlet coat, with golden trimming,
A cloak in silken lustre swimming,
A tall cock’s-feather in my hat,
A long, sharp sword for show or quarrel,—­
And I advise thee, brief and flat,
To don the self-same gay apparel,
That, from this den released, and free,
Life be at last revealed to thee!

FAUST

This life of earth, whatever my attire,
Would pain me in its wonted fashion. 
Too old am I to play with passion;
Too young, to be without desire. 
What from the world have I to gain? 
Thou shalt abstain—­renounce—­refrain! 
Such is the everlasting song
That in the ears of all men rings,—­
That unrelieved, our whole life long,
Each hour, in passing, hoarsely sings. 
In very terror I at morn awake,
Upon the verge of bitter weeping,
To see the day of disappointment break,
To no one hope of mine—­not one—­its promise keeping:—­
That even each joy’s presentiment