Man.                      It is well: 
Thou may’st retire.            [Exit HERMAN.

Man. (alone.) There is a calm upon me—­
Inexplicable stillness! which till now
Did not belong to what I knew of life. 
If that I did not know philosophy
To be of all our vanities the motliest,
The merest word that ever fool’d the ear
From out the schoolman’s jargon, I should deem
The golden secret, the sought ‘Kalon,’ found,
And seated in my soul.  It will not last,
But it is well to have known it, though but once: 
It hath enlarged my thoughts with a new sense,
And I within my tablets would note down
That there is such a feeling.  Who is there?

      Re-enter HERMAN.

Her. My lord, the Abbot of St. Maurice craves To greet your presence.

      Enter the ABBOT OF ST. MAURICE.

Abbot. Peace be with Count Manfred!

Man. Thanks, holy father! welcome to these walls; Thy presence honours them, and blesseth those Who dwell within them.

Abbot. Would it were so, Count!  But I would fain confer with thee alone.

Man. Herman, retire.  What would my reverend guest?

[Exit HERMAN.

Abbot. Thus, without prelude:—­Age and zeal, my office,
And good intent, must plead my privilege;
Our near, though not acquainted neighbourhood,
May also be my herald.  Rumours strange,
And of unholy nature, are abroad,
And busy with thy name—­a noble name
For centuries; may he who bears it now
Transmit it unimpair’d.

Man. Proceed,—­I listen.

Abbot. ’Tis said thou boldest converse with the things
Which are forbidden to the search of man;
That with the dwellers of the dark abodes,
The many evil and unheavenly spirits
Which walk the valley of the shade of death,
Thou communest.  I know that with mankind,
Thy fellows in creation, thou dost rarely
Exchange thy thoughts, and that thy solitude
Is as an anchorite’s, were it but holy.

Man. And what are they who do avouch these things?

Abbot. My pious brethren—­the scared peasantry—­
Even thy own vassals—­who do look on thee
With most unquiet eyes.  Thy life’s in peril.

Man. Take it.

Abbot. I come to save, and not destroy—­
I would not pry into thy secret soul;
But if these things be sooth, there still is time
For penitence and pity:  reconcile thee
With the true church, and through the church to heaven.

Man. I hear thee.  This is my reply; Whate’er
I may have been, or am, doth rest between
Heaven and myself.—­I shall not choose a mortal
To be my mediator.  Have I sinn’d
Against your ordinances? prove and punish![1]

Abbot. Then, hear and tremble!  For the headstrong wretch
Who in the mail of innate hardihood
Would shield himself, and battle for his sins,
There is the stake on earth, and beyond earth eternal—­