The Tragedy of Man

[_ludwigm]

Years ago, I've written this on Celestial. As I think nobody has read it, here is again. Maybe...

To save bandwidth, I delete them from Cele.

FYI - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tragedy_of_Man -

[_ludwigm]

IMRE MADÁCH: (link)
"THE TRAGEDY OF MAN" 1861 (link)

SCENE I - IN THE BEGINNING…
- In Heaven, immediately following the creation.

************************************************************

In Heaven. The LORD on His throne, surrounded with glory. A host of ANGELS kneeling before him. The FOUR ARCHANGELS stand by the throne. There shines a great radiance.

THE CHOIR OF ANGELS
Glory and praise to God on high eternal,
Let earth and heaven laud the majesty
Of Him Who hath called all things into being,
And on Whose will depends their destiny.
He the whole sum of might, and bliss and knowledge,
Our part but His great shadow on us thrown,
Praise Him Who in His boundless mercy grants us
A measure of that light which is His own.
The everlasting thought issues incarnate,
The high task of creation is complete,
The Lord awaits from every creature breathing
A worthy tribute at His holy feet.

THE LORD
The task is done; the Maker rests. And lo!
The engine turns. A million years shall flow,
Ere round its axle shall the wheel run slow,
And a new cog be needed. Up, away,
Spirits who guard my world, rest not nor stay,
Rush on your timeless race with pinions fleet,
And let me once again delight to see
Your whirring wings in flight beneath my feet.
The Guardian Spirits of the stars, driving before them spheres, constellations and comets of diverse greatness and colour, race away from before the throne. The music of the spheres is heard as a murmur.

THE CHOIR OF ANGELS
See how proudly whirls your planet,
Confident in flaming glory,
Yet but the unwitting servant
Of a dim, far constellation.
Lo, this little star that glimmers,
Seems a pale lamp, yet the vast world
Of a myriad creation.
Two spheres strive against each other,
Rush together, fly asunder,
Yet a wondrous brake the combat,
Guiding both along their orbit.
One speeds past in roaring thunder,
And the distant gazer shudders,
Yet a million on that mighty
Star find peace and joy abundant.
See how modest shines the destined
Star of love. To mankind ever
May the guiding hand preserve it
An eternal consolation.
There are worlds born into being,
Here the tomb of worlds that perish;
To the vain a solemn warning,
To despairing souls a promise.
Swiftly speeds the fearful comet
Raging through the troubled heaven,
Yet the Lord’s command directs it
On its endless curve revolving.
Come, beloved, youthful spirit,
With thy orb that ever changes,
Wearing now the cloak of sadness,
Now of joy, now white, now verdant,
Come, receive high heaven’s blessing.
Onward, onward, ne’er despairing.
Mighty powers shall strive together
In thy narrow boundaries wrestling.
Fair and foul, and tears and laughter,
Spring and winter shall possess thee,
Light and shade shall come upon thee,
The Lord’s favour and His anger.
The Guardian Spirits of the stars withdraw.

THE ARCHANGEL GABRIEL
Thou that infinite space hath measured,
Framing matter in void primaeval,
And the depth and the height hath called
With Thy word alone into being,
Hail to Thee, Mind Eternal.
Prostrates himself.

THE ARCHANGEL MICHAEL
Thou, uniting the ever-changing,
With the changeless, hath time created,
And eternity, formed of mankind
Single members and mighty nations,
Hail to Thee, Strength Eternal.
Prostrates himself.

THE ARCHANGEL RAPHAEL
Thou hast compassed all things with glory.
Raised the body to conscious knowledge;
Thou hast made the world a partaker
Of Thy wisdom divine, eternal.
Hail to Thee ever, Goodness.
Prostrates himself. Pause.

THE LORD
Thou, Lucifer, art silent. In thy pride
Thou standest confident. Hast thou no word
Of praise? Doth my creation please thee not?

LUCIFER
What should then please me? That Thou hast endued
A little dust with diverse qualities,
Which, ere they shewed themselves, Thou hadst perchance
Not felt, or if Thou hadst, Thou couldst not change;
That a few spheres this way or that revolve,
That one attracts another or repels,
That in a few worms dawns a consciousness,
Till all be fulfilled and till all grow cold
And only indistinguishable dust remain?
Why, man too, almost, if he should but learn,
Might in his kitchen seethe as good a broth,
In Thy great kitchen Thou hast placed man
And seest, indulgent, how he spoils the food,
A very bungler, thinks himself a god.
But if he prove a waster, and shall mar
What Thou Thyself hast cooked, then shall flame forth
Thy wrath, too late; yet what couldest Thou hope
From a vain dabbler else than foolishness?
What purpose doth thy whole creation serve?
Thou hast a poem written to Thy praise,
And placed the record in a bad machine,
And art not wearied yet eternally
That the song rings unchanging in thine ears.
Is such a plaything worthy of ripe age
On which a child alone could set its heart,
A spark of life within a little clay
Aping its Lord, a wretched counterfeit,
No image of its Master; Liberty
Striving with Fate, and Fate with Liberty,
And no resolving chord of harmony?

THE LORD
Thy part is to pay homage, not to judge.

LUCIFER
The fruit of mine own nature, nought beside
Can I give Thee;
pointing to the angels
this abject band may give
Thee praise enough, and it beseems them so.
For Thou has formed them as the light the shade,
But I live ageless from eternity.

THE LORD
Ah, insolent, where was thy realm, thy might,
Before primaeval matter first was born?

LUCIFER
That I might peradventure ask of Thee.

THE LORD
Before time was I purpose. That which now
Is perfected, lived in my thought before.

LUCIFER
And hast Thou not felt in Thy consciousness
A void, a barrier to all that is,
That yet through it compelled Thee to create?
That barrier was called Lucifer,
The ancient spirit of age-old denial.
Thou hast prevailed, for so my fate is set
That in my conflict I should ever fall,
Yet rise again to fight with strength renewed.
Thou hast the substance formed; the gain is mine.
For there beside life, death stands; grief by joy,
The shadow by the light, despair by hope,
And where Thou art, there I am, everywhere;
And he who knows Thee, shall he homage pay?

THE LORD
Rebellious spirit, forth from me, begone!
I could destroy thee, yet, I will not so.
Fight on amid the mire, outcast, abhorred,
A homeless exile from the spirit host,
And may this thought eternally torment
The desolation of thy heart: in vain
The fetters thou dost shake, thou can’st not win
The victory in battle with the Lord.

LUCIFER
Thou can’st not me so lightly cast aside,
Like some poor paltry tool grown valueless.
For we both have created, and I claim
My part.

THE LORD with scorn
Then as thou willest, let it be.
Look on the earth. Two slender trees among
The trees of Eden, in the garden’s midst
I curse. Henceforth they are thine, Lucifer.

LUCIFER
Thou measurest with niggard hands. Thou art
A great Lord, and an inch sufficeth me.
Where the eternal ‘Nay’ his foot shall set,
Thy world shall at his treading crumble yet.
He departs.

THE CHOIR OF ANGELS
Away, accursed from before the Throne,
Hail to the Lawgiver, our God alone.

************************************************************

Music and a jubilant singing of choirs: Gloria in Excelsis Deo. On the half-curtain sequences of exploding volcanoes, atomic structures, planets, galaxies etc. are seen projected. When the half-curtain is raised, a dark, flat, featureless area is discovered. Shapeless, recumbent figures are scattered over it, wrapped in some grey material. Slowly the semi-circular cyclorama builds up a deep blue radiance. The figures start moving, very slowly at first, standing up one by one, seen in silhouette, then, as the spotlights pick them out, they shed their grey colouring and reveal their colourful attire. Leotards are worn. (See note opposite.) Some of the figures form a throne with their bodies, and the Lord, having shed His grey covering, promptly occupies it and puts a halo on His own head. He wears a gold leotard with a white cape. Other figures on their knees are grouped around His throne. The four Archangels stand beside the throne, having shed their grey covering, but still wrapped in their dark capes. They do not reveal their colours, blue, red and green respectively, until it is their turn to pay homage before the Lord. Lucifer’s colour is a rich yellow. All characters wear masks.

THE CHOIR OF ANGELS
[singing]
Sing to the Lord: Hosanna in the highest!
Praise Him on earth and in the firmament!
His single word engendered our beginning,
and in His merest glance awaits the end.
He is the sum of wisdom, might and beauty:
we are but humble shadows in His sight.
Exalt the Lord for His amazing favour,
for sharing out His all-pervading light!
The everlasting Principle incarnate,
the wonder of creation is complete:
let all who draw a breath of life in Heaven
pay God their tribute at His holy feet!

THE LORD
The vast construction’s come to life, indeed.
His labours done, the Architect relaxes.
For aeons shall the giant wheel revolve
before a spoke may falter round its axis.
Arise, you guardian spirits of the stars,
bestir yourselves, begin your ceaseless flight,
and as you thunder past before my throne,
display your pageantry for my delight!
Guardian spirits of the stars, deriving before them spheres, representing constellations, comets and nebulae of different size and colour, move across the stage in front of the throne, dancing to the accompaniment of music. The Choir of Angels chant their verses in time with the music, while the shadow of a gigantic wheel projected over the whole area revolves slowly.

THE CHOIR OF ANGELS
[singing]
Come, you haughty ball of fire,
flaunt your heavenly conflagration:
you’re a mere unwitting servant
of a minor constellation.
See that twinkling, feeble lantern
shining there, a tiny planet:
it’s a world of light to countless
creatures which depend upon it.
Double stars whom their endeavour
now attracts and now repulses,
while their strife, the wondrous power,
pre-appoints their mutual courses.
Rolling with his claps of thunder
there’s a frightful apparition
destined to dispense to millions
tranquil minds and high religion.
Unassuming this approaches,
star of love by designation:
providential hands preserve it
to be mankind’s consolation.
There new worlds await their coming,
here’s the grave for worlds to perish:
this gives pride a sharp reminder,
that brings fainthearts hope to relish.
Now the comet shows disorder,
awe-inspiring shape to look at,
yet the Lord’s will into orbit
bends it though its course is crooked.
Come, you gracious, youthful spirit,
with your globe forever changing,
on whose cloak of light and darkness
white and blue are alternating.
Blessing of the Heavens upon you!
Keep your destined course undaunted:
in your small world great ideas
will be locked in deadly combat.
Fair with foul, and tears with laughter,
winter, spring will take their chances,
as the Lord His wrath and favour,
light and dark, in turn advances.
[The guardian spirits of the stars vanish.]

THE ARCHANGEL GABRIEL
You measured the immeasurable
and bodied forth the element
in which dimensions manifested
submitting to your prime command.
Hail, Supreme Intellect!
[Prostrates himself before the throne.]

THE ARCHANGEL MICHAEL
You’ve altered the unalterable,
duration, transience combined,
so temporal within the timeless,
the specimen conforms to kind.
Hail, Supreme Power’s
[Prostrates himself before the throne.]

THE ARCHANGEL RAPHAEL
You’ve granted a share of your wisdom
to creatures of the universe
and raised awareness in the best one
to propagate your happiness.
Hail, Supreme Goodness!
[Prostrates himself before the throne.]

THE LORD
And you, Lucifer, standing there aloof,
can you not find a word of praise to offer?
Perhaps you don’t approve of my creation.

LUCIFER
Approve of what? The various elements
displaying their inherent properties? -
A circumstance you couldn’t have seen evolving
until the fact was plainly manifest,
and there was nothing you could do about it.
Meanwhile this matter, kneaded into globes,
unfolds, attracts, repulses, whirls around,
till in some beast a conscious thought is kindled…
Then all fulfilled and all its heat expended,
indifferent, the neutral dust remains.
One day, man may himself acquire the knack
and plagiarize this crude experiment,
if you allow him in your cosmic workshop,
indulgently you leave him room to blunder,
concoct and scheme and think himself a god -
until the poor apprentice spoils the broth!
Then will he rouse you to belated anger.
Yet could you blame a feckless amateur?
And as for this creation - what’s the purpose?
To your own glory you composed a song
and placed the record on a botched machine,
and now you’re never done with this delight,
though old the tune - the lyrics much the same.
Does this become your age, integrity,
this comedy, which might amuse a child,
to see his clay creation mime the maker,
no likeness, but a crude caricature
that flits between free will and destiny,
lacking the overall intelligence?

THE LORD
To pay homage is your part, not to judge me.

LUCIFER
That would be out of keeping with my nature.
[pointing at the angels]
Your paltry hosts will give you all the praise
that is appropriate for them to give you
who gave them life, as light begets its shadow,
for I have lived through all eternity.

THE LORD
Conceit! Was it not matter that begot you?
Where was your sphere? Where were your powers before?

LUCIFER
These questions I could well have asked of you.

THE LORD
Through limitless aeons did I design
and bear within me this that I’ve created.

LUCIFER
In your design couldn’t you discern the gaps,
the obstacles to every form of being,
those which in turn compelled you to create?
For that resistance was I - Lucifer,
the genius forever - of Negation.
You won the round, that was my destiny,
eternally to fight a losing battle
and rise again still spoiling for a fight.
Where you have matter, I have scope to strive!
Where there is life, death needs must counter it,
elation must succumb to disenchantment,
as light to darkness also, hope to doubt…
I stand where you do, being everywhere:
knowing you thus - am I to pay you homage?

THE LORD
What’s this? Rebellious spirit! Out of here!
I could destroy you, but I will desist:
I’ll let you toil amidst the dust, detested,
an outcast of the spirit world, an alien,
condemned to suffer utter loneliness
with this persistent thought to brood upon:
however much you shake your earthly fetters,
futile the war you wage against the Lord.

LUCIFER
I will not be so lightly set aside
like some utensil that has served your purpose…
Jointly we have created: I demand
my proper share.

THE LORD
Let it be as you wish.
There is the earth; you see the groves of Eden;
I give you two trees standing in the middle:
may they be cursed - and then belong to you.

LUCIFER
Niggardly dole, indeed, a Lordly gesture!
Still, that terrestial foothold will suffice:
there let Negation stand to see the day
when your creation shall be blown away.
[Exit.]

THE CHOIR OF ANGELS
Out of this Heavenly Court, accurs’d, abhorr’d!
The Lord’s pronounced His judgement. Praise the Lord!

************************************************************

In Heaven. THE LORD, resplendent in His glory, sits upon his throne, the ANGELIC HOST kneeling before Him. The four ARCHANGELS are standing beside the throne. Intense light.

ANGELIC HOST
Glory to God in the highest,
Heaven and earth do both Him praise,
Who with one Word brought all things into being
And continues to uphold them with His gaze.
He all Power, all Knowledge and all Rapture,
We the merest shadow of His splendour,
O come let us adore him in His Grace
Of which we may partake by His sweet tender.
The Eternal Concept is made flesh, behold
The consummation of His will to form
As from His creatures now The Lord awaits
Appropriate homage to His Seat of State.

THE LORD
It’s done, the great act of creation.
The maker rests. The wheel’s in motion
And will rotate upon its axle for
A hundred million years before
A single cog wears out. Take wing
My sentinels, begin your orbiting.
Once more let me admire and hear the sweet
Sound of your circuit, smooth beneath my feet.
The Guardian Spirits of the stars pass by the throne, rolling before them one or two planets, comets and nebulae of various colours and sizes. The music of the spheres is faintly heard.

ANGELIC HOST
Look at that brave ball of fire:
So overweening its effulgence,
Unaware it merely serves
Some distant galaxy’s indulgence.
This you’d think a feeble lantern
A winking-blinking little planet,
But O how huge it seems to those
Unnumbered souls that thrive upon it.
Two spheres contend with one another,
Rush close, repel and sharply veering
Spin away. Their opposition
Steers them through such wild careering.
Terrifying all observers,
Thunderously one helter-skelters
Downward-yet what peace and joy
It offers to those hordes it shelters.
How humble is this other’s bearing -
A star of love in preparation,
Tender be the hands that nurture
Humankind’s own consolation.
There worlds labouring to be born
Here the tombs of worlds departed:
A warning to the overweening,
Encouragement for the faint-hearted.
A monstrous comet hurtles madly
Out of chaos to disaster:
But see! it mends its crooked motion
When bidden by its Heavenly Master.
Come beloved, youthful spirit
With your changing sempiternal
Sphere of woe and celebration,
Cloaked in white or green and vernal.
High heaven shower blessings on you,
Onward, undaunted: what collisions
Your narrow shores are doomed to witness,
What wars, between conflicting visions.
Fair and foul, and tears and laughter,
The winter’s and the spring’s endeavour,
Constitute the light and shadow
Of our Master’s wrath or favour.
The Guardian Spirits of the stars withdraw

ARCHANGEL GABRIEL
Thou who compassed the infinitudes,
Creating matter out of nothing,
And with one word wrought out of matter’s being
Both measure and weight, we offer to Thee
Our hosannas, Concept Eternal.
He falls to his knees

ARCHANGEL MICHAEL
Thou who fused the changeless and the changing,
Establishing both perpetuity
And time itself, uniting entity
And nationhood, we offer to Thee
Our hosannas, Power Eternal.
He falls to his knees

ARCHANGEL RAPHAEL
Thou flood and fountain of our happiness,
Bringer of the body to self-consciousness,
Allowing the entire world to partake
Of Thy wisdom, we offer to Thee
Our hosannas, Virtue Eternal.
He falls to his knees.
Silence

THE LORD
You there, Lucifer, proudly standing apart,
No word of praise from you? Are you still silent?
Does something in my work, perhaps, displease you?

LUCIFER
And what should please me? That certain substances,
Having been imbued with properties
Of whose existence You were ignorant
Until, perhaps, they revealed themselves to You,
(Though it may well be You had no power to change them)
Are now screwed up into these tiny globes
That chase, attract or else repel each other,
Awaking a few worms to consciousness
Till all of space is tilled at last, grows cold,
And only the indifferent slag is left?
If man’s at all observant he’ll concoct
Some hash like this with his poor instruments.
Having placed him in your cosmic kitchen
You now indulge his bungling awkwardness,
His godlike postures, his botched cookery.
But when he comes to spoil your favourite dish
You’ll flare up in a rage-too late by then.
But what can You expect from such a dabbler?
What is the point of the whole exercise?
A poem of self-praise is all it is -
You match it to this feeble hurdy-gurdy
And listen to the same old weary tune
Whine on and on in endless repetition.
Is it becoming to Your ripe old age
To play with this contraption fit for children?
A spark of life within a little clay,
A simulacrum, not a faithful likeness;
Free-will and fate in mutual pursuit:
It lacks all harmony, all sense of meaning.

THE LORD
I merit praise alone, not condemnation.

LUCIFER
I only render what is in my nature.
Pointing to the angels
This wretched crew will serve to flatter You,
Not surprisingly since they’re Your creatures.
You begat them as light begets a shadow
But I had pre-existence, and am ageless.

THE LORD
Such impudence! Were you not born of matter?
What power had you before? What sphere? What realm?

LUCIFER
I might perhaps enquire the same of You.

THE LORD
What here is bodied forth into existence
Had life in me before the dawn of time.

LUCIFER
You never sensed that void in Your conceptions,
That barrier to every mode of being
Whose very presence compelled You to create?
That barrier was one named Lucifer,
The underlying spirit of negation.
You triumphed over me since it’s my fate
Incessantly to fail in all my struggles
But then, revitalized, to rise again,
When You made matter I gained my estate;
There stands life, and there beside it, death,
Joy on the one hand, discord on the other,
Shade follows light, and doubt succeeds to hope -
And see, I’m always with You everywhere.
Knowing You as I do, why pay homage?

THE LORD
Out of my sight, you spirit of sedition!
I could destroy you utterly - but no,
Fight on, abhorred, in exile, in the mire,
Forbidden every solace of the spirit,
And in your bleak and anguished solitude
Let this one thought be an eternal torment:
However you may shake your chains of dust
Your struggle with the Lord is doomed to failure.

LUCIFER
No, not so fast-I won’t go just like that,
You can’t discard me like a broken tool.
We are both creative spirits - I demand
My portion.

THE LORD scornfully
Just as you wish. Look down to earth:
In the heart of Eden stand two slender trees.
I curse the pair of them: now they are yours.

LUCIFER
No wonder you are mean, you have the means.
The merest patch of ground will do for me.
A foothold I require, no more, you’ll see,
To sow negation and spread anarchy.
He sets off

ANGELIC HOST
Out of the sight of God, accursed traitor?
All praise to the Almighty Legislator.

************************************************************

The Heaven. The LORD encircled by glory is sitting on his throne. ANGELS are kneeling. The four ARCHANGELS are standing near the throne. Great brightness.

ANGELS' CHOIR

Eternal glory be to our God on High,
Let him be prais'd by the earth and heaven,
Who created the Universe by one word
And his glance has govern'd the end again.
He is the power, knowledge and happiness,
Our share's only his shade cast over us,
We adore Him for his endless patronage
For having this allotment in his light.
Yes, the great Thought has become incarnated,
Complete is, as a whole, the Creation
The Lord waits at his holy hassock from all
Living creations their due devotion.

THE LORD

The work, the great work is now completed,
Machine is running, the creator rests.
It will move for some millions of years
Till one of its cogs will need some repairs.
Up! Guardian spirits of my world! Arise!
Let you start your never-ending orbit.
As you whizzing past under my feet
Let me be with you highly delighted.

(The spirits of stars rolling single, double star spheres, comets and nebulae of different size and colour rush in front of the throne. Music of spheres in a subdued voice.)

ANGELS' CHOIR

What a stately flare-ball's coming
In its brightness pretentiously,
Though it serves to a modest group
Of stars just now unconsciously.
Like a lamp of glimmery light
This tiny star twinkles only
Yet millions of creatures
Are living on its globe lonely. -
Two balls fight against each other
To disjoint and to encounter
And this struggle is the grand curb
In its orbit it to govern. -
That will rush down with a thunder,
You look at it with some fearing,
In its bosom millions find
Happiness and peaceful being. -
How simple's it - though it some time
Will be lustrous star of the love,
As solace to the earthly life
Be it protected from above. -
There are small worlds all to be born,
Here's the coffin for extinction,
Warning voice to all conceited
For despondings' stimulation. -
Disturbing all comes the comet
With exorbitant appearing,
And its path becomes just order'd
When hears the Lord's voice of warning. -
Come along, thou young nice spirit
With your globe that's always changing,
Who both sorrow and the light-pall
With a white guise are exchanging.
Be bless'd by God! And go ahead
Without disbar: that is your fate,
In your tiny quiet realm
Great ideas will militate.
Though smile and tear like the winter
And like spring will you inundate,
Light and shade will be together
On it the Lord's favour and rage.

(Spirits of stars marched off.)

GABRIEL ARCHANGEL

Thou, who the endless space have measur'd
And created in it the Substance,
Thou, who by one word generated
All the mightiness and the distance:
Hosanna be to Thee, Thought! (Throws himself down.)

MICHAEL ARCHANGEL

Who unifies the eternally
Changing and the unchanging nations,
Creating infinity and time
And entities and generations:
Hosanna to Thee, Power! (Throws himself down.)

RAPHAEL ARCHANGEL

Thou, who irradiates blessedness
Bringing to consciousness the body,
And allows piously the whole world
Your wisdom forever to study:
Hosanna to Thee, Goodness! (Throws himself down.)

(Pause.)

THE LORD

You, Lucifer, are silent, proudly stand,
Or you have no words to my laudation?
Or you dislike what I have created?

LUCIFER

And what to like in it? That some matter
Endowed with different characteristics
That before being manifested maybe
You did not foresee in them and if yes,
You possess now no power to change them,
Being moulded in some balls by fits and starts,
These attract, pursue, repel one another
And become conscious in some sorry worms,
Till all will be fill'd and all will be cool'd
And there remains the neutral slag only. - -
Man will certainly learn this by watching
And will simulate it in his kitchen. -
You put into your great kitchen your man
And of his bungling you take no notice,
He brews and fancies himself to be God.
But when he wastes and damages the brew
You will fly into a passion afterwards.
Albeit, what do you expect for dilettants? -
And for what purpose is the whole creation?
You wrote a nice ode to your own glory,
Put it into a useless machinery
And don't lose your interest endlessly
In the same song always with the same tune.
Is this toy worthy of such a greybeard
That may divert only infantile children?
Where only a pugged spark imitates
His Lord, but is his misbirth, not his wraith;
Fate and freedom are hunting each other:
And the concordant judgement is missing. -

THE LORD

I can only be respected, not be judged.

LUCIFER

I can pass nothing except my essence.
(Pointing to the angels.)
You are praised enough by this caddish crowd,
As to praise you is only fair of them.
You gave birth to them as light to shadow,
But I've been living since eternity.

THE LORD

Insolent! Were not you born by matter,
Where did your power, you exist before?

LUCIFER

This my question would be to You, as well.

THE LORD

I have planned it since eternity
And lived inside me what's now created.

LUCIFER

And did not you feel gap among your thoughts
That encumbered all life you wanted
And forced you to perform the creation?
Lucifer has been the name of this gap,
Who has been the spirit of negation.
You triumph'd over me since it's my fate
As to go under always in my fights,
But revive and be reinforc'd again.
You gave birth to matter - I won the space,
Life is accompanied always by death,
Happiness always by deep depression,
Light always by shade and so doubt by hope. -
That's all. I stand in all time where you are:
Thus, who knows you so, should I respect you?

THE LORD

Get out! Rebellious spirit! Get out!
I could annihilate you but I won't,
Hunting out of all the mental relations
You have to struggle in the dirtiness,
In painful feeling of your bare loneliness
You must be anguished by the endless thought:
That it is useless to shake your shackles,
Your fight is illusory against the Lord.

LUCIFER

No! You daren't jostle me out of the way
Like wretched tool that became superfluous. -
The creation is ours. I do clamour
For my share.

THE LORD (with irony)

Well, be as you want it. Look at
The Earth. Among the trees of Eden, now
Just in the middle the two slender fruit-trees
I damn and these will be yours forever.

LUCIFER

You are hard-fisted, why you're powerful Lord,
And I need only the soil underfoot,
Where negation gains only a foothold,
It will certainly overthrow your world. (Starts to exit.)

ANGELS' CHOIR

Be off the presence of our Lord! You damn'd!
Hosanna to Him who has us govern'd. -

************************************************************

A mennyekben. Az Úr dicstől környezetten trónján. Angyalok serege térden. A négy főangyal a trón mellett áll. Nagy fényesség

Angyalok kara

Dicsőség a magasban Istenünknek,
Dicsérje őt a föld és a nagy ég,
Ki egy szavával híva létre mindent,
S pillantásától függ ismét a vég.
Ő az erő, tudás, gyönyör egésze,
Részünk csak az árny, melyet ránk vetett,
Imádjuk őt a végtelen kegyért, hogy
Fényében íly osztályrészt engedett.
Megtestesült az örökös nagy eszme,
Im a teremtés béfejezve már,
S az Úr mindentől, mit lehelni enged
Méltó adót szent zsámolyára vár.

Az Úr

Be van fejezve a nagy mű, igen.
A gép forog, az alkotó pihen.
Év-milliókig eljár tengelyén,
Míg egy kerékfogát ujítni kell.
Fel hát, világim véd-nemtői, fel,
Kezdjétek végtelen pályátokat.
Gyönyörködjem még egyszer bennetek,
Amint elzúgtok lábaim alatt.

A csillagok védszellemei különböző nagyságú, színű, egyes, kettes csillaggömböket, üstökösöket és ködcsillagokat görgetve rohannak el a trón előtt. Szférák zenéje halkan

Angyalok kara

Milyen büszke láng-golyó jő
Önfényében elbizottan,
S egy szerény csillagcsoportnak
Ép ő szolgál öntudatlan. -
Pislog e parányi csillag,
Azt hinnéd, egy gyönge lámpa,
S mégis millió teremtés
Mérhetetlen nagy világa. -
Két golyó küzd egymás ellen
Összehullni, szétsietni:
S e küzdés a nagyszerű fék,
Pályáján tovább vezetni. -
Mennydörögve zúg amaz le,
Távulnan rettegve nézed:
S kebelében milljó lény lel
Boldogságot, enyhe béket. -
Mily szerény ott - egykor majdan
Csillaga a szerelemnek,
Óvja őt meg ápoló kéz
Vígaszúl a földi nemnek. -
Ott születendő világok,
Itt enyészők koporsója:
Intő szózat a hiúnak,
Csüggedőnek biztatója. -
Rendzavarva jő amott az
Üstökös rettentő képe:
S ím, az Úr szavát meghallva,
Rend lesz útja ferdesége. -
Jöszte, kedves ifjú szellem,
Változó világgömböddel,
Aki gyászt és fénypalástot,
Zöld s fehér mezt váltogatsz fel.
A nagy ég áldása rajtad!
Csak előre csüggedetlen;
Kis határodon nagy eszmék
Fognak lenni küzdelemben.
S bár a szép s rút, a mosoly s könny,
Mint tavasz s tél, kört vesz rajta,
Fénye, árnya lészen együtt:
Az Úr kedve és haragja.

A csillagok védszellemei elvonultak

Gábor főangyal

Ki a végtelen ürt kimérted,
Anyagot alkotván beléje,
Mely a nagyságot s messzeséget
Egyetlen szódra hozta létre:
Hozsána néked, Eszme!
Leborul

Mihály főangyal

Ki az örökké változandót,
S a változatlant egyesíted,
Végetlent és időt alkotva,
Egyéneket és nemzedéket:
Hozsána néked, Erő!
Leborul

Ráfael főangyal

Ki boldogságot árjadoztatsz,
A testet öntudatra hozva,
És bölcsességed részesévé
Egész világot felavatva:
Hozsána néked, Jóság!
Leborul

Szünet

Az Úr

S te, Lucifer, hallgatsz, önhitten állsz,
Dicséretemre nem találsz-e szót,
Vagy nem tetszik tán, amit alkoték?

Lucifer

S mi tessék rajta? Hogy nehány anyag
Más-más tulajdonokkal felruházva,
Miket előbb, hogysem nyilatkozának,
Nem is sejtettél bennök, úgy lehet,
Vagy, ha igen, másítni nincs erőd,
Nehány golyóba összevissza gyúrva,
Most vonzza, űzi és taszítja egymást,
Nehány féregben öntudatra kél,
Míg minden megtelt, míg minden kihűlt,
És megmarad a semleges salak. -
Az ember ezt, ha egykor ellesi,
Vegykonyhájában szintén megteszi. -
Te nagy konyhádba helyzéd embered,
S elnézed néki, hogy kontárkodik,
Kotyvaszt s magát istennek képzeli.
De hogyha elfecsérli s rontja majd
A főztet, akkor gyúlsz késő haragra.
Pedig mit vársz mást egy műkedvelőtől? -
Aztán mi végre az egész teremtés?
Dicsőségedre írtál költeményt,
Beléhelyezted egy rossz gépezetbe,
És meg nem únod véges-végtelen,
Hogy az a nóta mindig úgy megyen.
Méltó-e ilyen aggastyánhoz e
Játék, melyen csak gyermekszív hevülhet?
Hol sárba gyúrt kis szikra mímeli
Urát, de torzalak csak, képe nem;
Végzet, szabadság egymást üldözi,
S hiányzik az összhangzó értelem. -

Az Úr

Csak hódolat illet meg, nem bírálat.

Lucifer

Nem adhatok mást, csak mi lényegem.
Az angyalokra mutatva
Dicsér eléggé e hitvány sereg,
És illik is, hogy ők dicsérjenek.
Te szülted őket, mint árnyát a fény,
De mindöröktől fogva élek én.

Az Úr

Hah, szemtelen! Nem szült-e az anyag,
Hol volt köröd, hol volt erőd előbb?

Lucifer

Ezt tőled én is szintúgy kérdhetem.

Az Úr

Én végtelen időtől tervezem,
S már bennem élt, mi mostan létesűlt.

Lucifer

S nem érzéd-e eszméid közt az űrt,
Mely minden létnek gátjaul vala,
S teremtni kényszerültél általa?
Lucifer volt e gátnak a neve,
Ki a tagadás ősi szelleme. -
Győztél felettem, mert az végzetem,
Hogy harcaimban bukjam szüntelen,
De új erővel felkeljek megint.
Te anyagot szültél, én tért nyerék,
Az élet mellett ott van a halál,
A boldogságnál a lehangolás,
A fénynél árnyék, kétség és remény. -
Ott állok, látod, hol te, mindenütt,
S ki így ösmérlek, még hódoljak-e?

Az Úr

Hah, pártos szellem! El előlem, el,
Megsemmisíthetnélek, de nem teszem,
Száműzve minden szellemkapcsolatból
Küzdj a salak közt, gyűlölt, idegen.
S rideg magányod fájó érzetében
Gyötörjön a végetlen gondolat:
Hogy hasztalan rázod porláncodat,
Csatád hiú az Úrnak ellenében.

Lucifer

Nem úgy, ily könnyen nem löksz el magadtól,
Mint hitvány eszközt, mely felesleges lett. -
Együtt teremténk: osztályrészemet
Követelem.

Az Úr gúnnyal

Legyen, amint kivánod.
Tekints a földre, Éden fái közt
E két sudar fát a kellő középen
Megátkozom, aztán tiéd legyen.

Lucifer

Fukar kezekkel mérsz, de hisz nagy úr vagy -
S egy talpalatnyi föld elég nekem.
Hol a tagadás lábát megveti,
Világodat meg fogja dönteni.
Indul

Angyalok kara

El Isten színétől, megátkozott,
Hozsán' az Úrnak, ki törvényt szabott. -

************************************************************

[_ludwigm]

SCENE I - IN THE BEGINNING…
- In Heaven, immediately following the creation.
- [#img] http://www.hung-art.hu/kep/z/zichy/muve ... h/01_1.jpg[˛img] -

[_ludwigm]

IMRE MADÁCH: (link)
"THE TRAGEDY OF MAN" 1861 (link)

SCENE II - THE GARDEN OF EDEN
- In the Garden of Eden at the Beginning of Time.

************************************************************

In Paradise. In the centre the Tree of Knowledge and the Tree of Eternal Life. ADAM and EVE enter. Animals of various kinds surround them in calm trust and without fear. Through the open door of heaven shines the glory, and the soft music of angelic choirs is heard. Sunshine.

EVE
Ah life, ah life, how sweet, how beautiful.

ADAM
And to be lord and master over all!

EVE
To feel that we are cared for, and that God
Only our simple thanks would have us give
For all the blessings He hath given us.

ADAM
Thy nature is to lean on others, Eve.
But I grow thirsty: see how temptingly
This fruit hangs from the bough.

EVE
I’ll pluck for thee.

THE VOICE OF THE LORD
Stay, Adam, stay! The whole world gave
I thee, But touch not these two trees, touch not, touch not!
Another spirit guards their tempting fruit,
And he who eats thereof shall die the death.
There, on the vine, the purple clusters hang,
And yonder, cooling shade may yield thee rest
Where the noon glows in burning radiance.

ADAM
A strange command, but yet a solemn one.

EVE
Why is it that these two trees fairer are
Than others? Why are they forbidden us?

ADAM
The sky, why is it blue? Why green the grove?
It is enough they are so. Let us bow
To the command. Come, follow after me.
They rest in an arbour.

EVE
Lean on my breast, and let me cool thy brow.
A great gust of wind. LUCIFER appears amidst the leaves.

ADAM
Hark, Eve! What is that sound? I never heard
Its like. As though some strange and evil force
Had broken forth on us.

EVE
I am afraid.
The music of the Heaven, too, has ceased.

ADAM
It seems I hear it in thy bosom yet.

EVE
If there above the light is veiled with cloud,
I find it, Adam, in thine eyes below;
And where else should I find it save in thee,
Since thy fierce longing called me into life,
As when the lordly sun, proud in his strength,
Lest in the universe he stand alone,
Paints his own likeness on the water’s breast,
And dallies with it, overjoyed to think
He has a comrade, and forgets it is
Nought but a pale reflection of his fire,
That would with his own glory pass away.

ADAM
Speak not in this wise: make me not ashamed.
What is the voice, if none can understand?
What is the light, if it illumine not?
What should I be, if I found not in thee,
As finds a voice its echo, or the light
The bloom it nurtures, myself fairer grown.
In thee in whom my own self I may love?

LUCIFER
Why do I hearken to this tender play?
I will not look, for else such shame it were
That cold and calculating intellect
Should gaze with envy on their childish hearts.
A bird begins to sing on a bough near-by.

EVE
Hark, Adam! Tell me, dost thou understand
This little merry love song trilling forth?

ADAM
I listened to the babbling of the stream,
And as I think it sang the same sweet song.

EVE
What strange and wondrous harmony is this,
A single meaning in a thousand tongues.

LUCIFER
Why do I thus delay? On, straightway to the task.
I swore destruction and I must destroy.
And yet now do I stand, and hesitate:
Knowledge, ambition: Weapons that beguile:
Yet fight I not anew with them, in vain
Against that strength which guards them, that which keeps
Their souls from languor, faintness and despair,
Raising the fallen once again - the heart?
But why this brooding - who dares, gains the fight.
A new blast of wind. LUCIFER appears before the terrified pair. The glory is veiled. LUCIFER laughs.
Why are ye so afraid?
EVE starts to flee.
to EVE
Stay, beautiful!
Let mine eyes look upon thy loveliness.
EVE stays and slowly gathers courage.
aside
The pattern of this excellence shall be
A million times renewed.
aloud
Dost thou fear me,
Adam?

ADAM
I fear thee, miserable one!

LUCIFER
aside
A worthy ancestor of the proud race
Of men.
aloud
Hail, brother spirit!

ADAM
Who art thou?
Dost thou come from beneath or from above?

LUCIFER
As thou wilt have it. ’Tis the same to us.

ADAM
I knew not there were others of our kind.

LUCIFER
Ah! There are many things thou knowest not,
And thou shalt not know. Hath the Ancient then,
Created thee from dust for thee to share
The vast and mighty universe with him?
Thou praisest him and he maintaineth thee,
Telleth thee what to take and what to shun,
And guardeth thee as he would guard a sheep.
Thou has no need of thought or Consciousness.

ADAM
Of Consciousness? Am I not conscious then?
Do I not feel the blessed light of day,
And the delight of knowing that I live,
And all the boundless favour of my God,
Who of this earth hath made me overlord?

LUCIFER
So might this little maggot also feel
That eats the fruit before thou taste thereof;
So might the eagle swooping on his prey.
What renders thee more noble then than these?
A little spark, a light that dawns in you,
The stir of an immeasurable force,
Like to the single wavelets of a brook
That glitter for a second, and fall back
Into the grey depth of their common bed.
Yea, there may well be, one thing, Consciousness,
Yet stiff and numb in thy unwitting heart,
Maturity would give, thee, trust to stand
In thine own strength, to choose betwixt the Good
And Evil, that thou should’st command thy fate,
And free thee from the care of Providence.
Yet, peradventure, it were best for thee
In the warm shelter of thy little world
To increase, like the worm, and live thy life
Unknowingly, until thy days shall end.
Contentment in our trust doth bring great ease:
Noble, but hard it is, to stand alone.

ADAM
Thou speakest great things, and my head grows faint.

EVE
I listen to thy words with eagerness.
Thou tellest of things new and beautiful.

LUCIFER
Yet knowledge only were not strong enough,
And for the mind, its great works to achieve,
Knowledge must join with immortality.
What can he do who lives but for a day?
Knowledge and life lie in these two trees hid.
And he who formed them has forbidden them.
Of this, if thou taste, thou shalt know, as God;
Of that, if thou taste, thou shalt e’er be young.

EVE
How harsh is our Creator, and how stern.

ADAM
But if thou dost deceive us?
The glory shines faintly.

THE HEAVENLY CHOIR
Woe to thee,
Woe to thee, World, Age Old Denial tempst!

THE VOICE OF THE LORD
Oh man beware!

ADAM
What is that voice again?

LUCIFER
The wind that shakes the branches.
Sun, wind and rain
Help not in vain
Man’s race to gain.
A blast of wind; the glory is veiled.
Mine are these two trees, mine!

ADAM
Who art thou then?
Since thou art like to us to look upon.

LUCIFER
See how the eagle soars amid the clouds,
Look on the mole that blindly turns the soil,
Each has its own horizon, and the land
Of spirits lies far, beyond thy sight.
Man is the noblest thing to thee, a man.
So to a dog the highest is a dog.
And he would honour thee if he should greet
Thee comrade-wise. But as thou lookest down
Upon a dog, and higher far than he,
Standest above him, like his destiny,
And dealest him a blessing or a curse,
As if a god, so, on the race of man
Look down the proud and mighty spirit host.

ADAM
And art thou of that host a member then?

LUCIFER
Yea, mightiest among that mighty throng,
I stood in Heaven beside the throne of God
And in His glory once I held my part.

ADAM
Why did’st thou not remain in Heaven’s light,
Why hast thou come down to our realm of earth?

LUCIFER
It wearied me to take the second place,
To live a life unchanged, monotonous,
To hearken to the childish minstrelsy
Of angel choirs that praise unceasingly
And nothing hold as bad. Conflict, discord,
These would I have, that new force bring to birth,
New worlds create, where in itself the soul
Can great be, where the bold may join with me.

ADAM
If we should choose the course God hath not set
He hath declared that he would punish us.

EVE
Why should he punish? For if he hath fixed
The way that he would have us follow, so
He hath ordained it, that no sinful lure
Should draw us otherwhere; why hath he set
The path athwart a giddy yawning gulf
To doom us to destruction? If, likewise,
Sin hath a place in the eternal plan,
As storm amid the days of sunlit warmth,
Who would the angry storm more guilty deem
Than the life-giving brightness of the sun?

LUCIFER
Lo, now appears the first philosopher.
Fair sister, many shall succeed to thee
And argue in a million ways anew,
And many shall go mad with reasoning
And many shall turn back afraid; not one
Shall reach their haven. Let us leave aside
This speculation. For to everything
So many facets are there, that should we
Strive to find out the nature of this all
We should know less than when we first began
And never seize the hour to act and dare,
For speculation stifles bold resolve.

EVE
Then will I pluck a fruit from this fair tree.

ADAM
God’s curse lies on it.
LUCIFER laughs.
Yet reach forth thine hand.
Come on us what may come. Let us be wise
And know all things, as God.
First EVE and then ADAM taste of the Fruit of the Tree of Knowledge.

EVE
But let us too
Be ever young.

LUCIFER
Haste, hither, hither come.
This is the tree of immortality.
But hasten!
He leads them to the second tree. A CHERUB with a flaming sword stands in their way.

THE CHERUB
Hence, hence sinners, hence, away!

THE VOICE OF THE LORD
Adam, Adam, thou hast forsaken me.
And I leave thee; see what thou dost alone.

EVE
We perish.

LUCIFER
Ye despair?

ADAM
Believe it not.
’Tis but the shudder of awakening. Hence,
Hence, Eve, no matter whither, let us go.
This place is alien and desolate.

THE CHOIR OF ANGELS
Ah, weep ye, angels, joy is fled, and mirth.
Falsehood prevails, and hath destroyed the earth.

************************************************************

Medieval pictures of Adam, Eve and the Temptation narrative are projected on the half-curtain. The set consists of two trees and further downstage a few vines, the whole area surrounded by the radiant blue, semi-circular cyclorama. The trees and the vines are to be of some abstract of stylised design. Under these Trees of Knowledge and of Eternal Life, Adam and Eve, both nude, are discovered relaxing, living in childlike innocence, surrounded by various wild animals which display no aggression or fear. The tame animals are represented by dancers in leotards carrying heads of animals made of some suitable material, and showing, if possible, some of their characteristic features. Soft music. Brilliant sunshine.

EVE
Life! Life! Sweet life! It’s good to be alive!

ADAM
To be the master of the living world.

EVE
To feel secure, to be provided for,
and all we have to offer in return
is gratitude to Him for these delights.

ADAM
I see, dependence is your nature, Eve.
But I feel thirsty. See this fruit above me?
It tempts the appetite.

EVE
I’ll pick you one.

THE LORD’S VOICE
Adam, I’ve given all the world to you,
But those accursed trees you must avoid.
An alien spirit tends their fruit to tempt you:
whoever tastes of them, shall taste death also.
Go, seek the ripening grapes among the vines
and in their cooling shade in restful ease
escape the radiant midday’s sweltering heat.

ADAM
A strange command. He means it I believe.

EVE
But why are these the best - of all the trees?
And yet forbidden!

ADAM
Why! The sky is blue.
The woodland green. It is so. That’s enough.
Let’s heed the warning, Eve. Come, follow me!
[They settle down under the shade of the vines.]

EVE
Here, lean your head against my breast. I’ll fan you.
In a sudden gust of wind Lucifer appears among the branches, wearing a black leotard and a black cape with a rich yellow lining.

ADAM
What’s this? A noise I’ve never heard before.
It sounded, Eve, as if some alien force
had broken loose upon the world.

EVE
I’m frightened!
The heavenly hosts have fallen silent. Listen!

ADAM
My cheek against your breast I can still hear them.

EVE
Should all the lights of Heaven be blotted out,
I could still see their glitter in your eyes.
What other source of light were I to seek,
born as I am of your intense desire?
As if that lordly sun in radiant glory,
shunning his lonely vigil in the skies,
had thrown his likeness on the glassy water,
made love to her, fond of her company,
forgetting generously what she was:
a pale reflection of his radiance.
Were he to wane, she too would come to nought.

ADAM
Hush, Eve! Don’t talk like that. You make me blush.
Futile the sound with no one there to hear it,
the light without a pleasing shape to shine on,
and so would I be, were it not for you,
my better self, my more accomplished image,
in whom I may adore what is my own.

LUCIFER
It’s meant to be in private, I suppose.
I’ll turn my back, lest I provoke a tattle.
Think of the cold and wily Lucifer
seduced to dabble in these childish games!
[A bird starts singing on a bough.]

EVE
You hear it, Adam? Can you understand
the happy love-song of this little bird?

ADAM
I’ve heard the soothing murmur of the brook:
its message sounded much the same to me.

EVE
How wonderful it is - this harmony!
So many voices on a single theme.

LUCIFER
We’ve heard enough of nonsense. Down to business.
I swore they’d perish, and perish they must.
Yet I’m unsettled on my course of action.
Ambition, knowledge: tempting propositions,
but are they likely to impress the creatures,
both charged with passion, as it would appear,
who, thus protected by this - aptitude
for mutual love, may well frustrate my efforts?
No time to vacillate. I’ll take my chance.
Another gust of wind. Lucifer walks up to the terrified couple. A lurid light envelops the scene. Lucifer laughs.
Are you dismayed?
[to Eve, who is about to run away]
Don’t go, my charming lady!
Allow me to admire you for a moment.
Eve stops, slowly gathering courage. Lucifer to the audience.
This stratagem will work a million times.
[to Adam]
Afraid, Adam?

ADAM
Of you, unsightly creature?

LUCIFER
[to the audience]
A fine progenitor of haughty males.
[to Adam]
Hail, brother spirit!

ADAM
Tell me, who are you?
Are you from down below or from above?

LUCIFER
Just as you like: it’s all the same with us.

ADAM
I’ve never heard of any other humans.

LUCIFER
There are a few things yet you haven’t heard of,
and won’t hear either. No! The Old One up there,
he didn’t create you out of dust, you know,
only to share the universe with you.
Indeed, he’ll keep you while you worship him,
and tell you what to eat or stay away from,
protect you, lead you like some woolly beast…
No need at all for you - to be aware.

ADAM
To be aware? What am I not aware of?
Don’t I appreciate that blessed sun,
the sweet delight of being and the graces
which God bestowed on us in great abundance?
He made me lord and master of the earth.

LUCIFER
That is perhaps the view the maggots take
nibbling the fruit which you might want to eat,
or birds of prey stooping to make a kill.
What’s there to make you feel superior?
In you and them there glows a tiny spark,
the stirring of the same eternal power,
which, like so many wavelets of a stream,
now sparkle for a while, then lost to sight
sink in the merging currents’ murky depths.
There is, indeed, one thing: the power to know,
lying dormant in your subconscious mind.
Now, that could make you come of age: the choice,
the gift of knowing right and wrong, the freedom,
to be the master of your destiny,
unshackled from the leash of providence…
Of course, you may prefer to be a worm
which breeds contented in its cosy dungheap
with not a thought till life will pass it by.
Where resignation may console the weak,
the strong will stand his own ground, resolute.

ADAM
Amazing words. You leave me quite bewildered.

EVE
Exciting, Adam, new and beautiful!

LUCIFER
Of course, knowledge itself will not suffice:
you can’t aspire to work in large dimensions
without attaining - immortality.
What scope is there to find in transient life?
This is the secret of that very fruit
your master has forbidden you to eat:
this gives you god-like, all-pervading knowledge,
and this gives beauty that will never fade.

EVE
To think our Maker could’ve been so mean!

ADAM
Aren’t you deceiving me?
[A shaft of light breaks through the eerie darkness.]

THE CHOIR OF ANGELS
Unhappy world,
you’re tempted by Negation!

THE LORD’S VOICE
Man, beware!

ADAM
That sound again!

LUCIFER
It’s wind among the branches.
[chanting]
Rise, elements
without delay
mankind to win
for us today!
[Gusts of wind. The shaft of light fades out.]
These trees belong to me.

ADAM
But who are you?
Considering you look like one of us.

LUCIFER
Look at the eagle, soaring in the clouds,
or at the mole, burrowing in the soil:
each has its sphere, its point of reference.
The spirit world’s beyond your comprehension,
therefore to you your own kind seems supreme.
And yet, since dogs’ ideals must be canine,
dogs do you honour thinking you’re a dog.
As you regard them your inferior,
and tower above them as their destiny
to mete out curse or blessing like a god,
so we consider your estate below us,
the proud denizens of the realm of spirits.

ADAM
Then you’re one of them?

LUCIFER
That I am, indeed,
the foremost power of all the potentates,
who stood beside the very throne of God
and in his highest glory claimed a share.

ADAM
Then why don’t you stay in the lofty skies?
Why come to us who dwell amongst the dust?

LUCIFER
I’m tired of being second in command,
that dull, routine life, and that puerile band
of heavenly choristers with children’s voices,
the host which never doubts, always rejoices.
I long for strife, I want disharmony,
to stir the powers, to found a world for me
for independent souls to flourish there -
I welcome all who join me - all who dare.

ADAM
But if we left the path He had appointed,
God promised He would punish us for it.

EVE
Why should He punish us? If He appointed
a path upon which we were meant to walk,
most likely He would have us so created
that no enticement could prompt us to leave it.
Or would He have us perched above the gulf
without a head for height and doomed to fall?
But if our trespass were of His designing,
like storms which rumble in the sunny season,
then who could allocate the rights and wrongs
between the days of thunder and of heat?

LUCIFER
Behold the first of all philosophers!
Madam, scholars will follow up your thesis
and argue and debate it through the ages:
some will take fright, some end up in asylums,
but none of them will ever find the answer.
You could as well abandon speculation.
A given thing has far too many aspects:
when you’ve considered all in turn, you find
you end up less informed than when you started,
and you have no time left to make your point.
Reflection is the bane of active minds.

EVE
In that case I shall go and take the fruit.

ADAM
But God has cursed it!
[Lucifer laughs.]
Go on! Give me one!
And come what may, we face the consequences.
They taste the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge: first Eve, then Adam.
Here’s knowledge, God’s prerogative!

EVE
Moreover,
here’s youth for ever!

LUCIFER
Come! Here lies your way.
This is the Tree of Immortality.
Quick! Quick! Come on!
As Lucifer is trying to hurry the couple to the second tree, a Cherub in red leotard, wearing a mask and holding a flaming sword, stands in their way.

CHERUB
This road is barred to you!

THE LORD’S VOICE
Adam, Adam, you have deserted me:
now I renounce you. Learn as best you may.

EVE
We’re finished!

LUCIFER
You despair?

ADAM
Me? Not at all.
It’s just the shock of my awakening.
Come, Eve! We have to go. Let’s turn our face
away from this inhospitable place.

THE CHOIR OF ANGELS
Mourn, kindred spirits, all! Mourn, everyone!
The earth is lost. The ancient lie has won.

************************************************************

Paradise. Centre stage the Trees of Knowledge and Eternal Life. Enter ADAM and EVE, surrounded by various animals, tame and trusting. Through the open gates of Heaven shines the light of glory. Soft harmonies of the ANGELIC HOST are heard. Bright, blazing sunshine.

EVE
Ah Life, how sweet to be alive!

ADAM
The lord and master of the world!

EVE
To feel that they are fending for us,
That all we need to do is show Him
How bounden we are to His favour.

ADAM
To lean on others is your law, I see.
I’m thirsty, Eve. Just look how temptingly
That fruit leers down at us.

EVE
I’ll pluck it with my hand.

THE VOICE OF THE LORD
Beware! beware! The whole wide world is yours
But those two trees you must shun.
An alien spirit guards their tender fruit,
And those who taste it find their life undone.
Look there instead - wine ripening in clusters
And temperate shadows offering relief
From the high parching brilliance of noon.

ADAM
A strange command. How stern it seems.

EVE
Why are those two trees more lovely?
Why are they the ones forbidden?

ADAM
Why is sky blue or grass green?
That’s just their way. Let’s heed the voice.
Come along, Eve, follow me.
They settle in an arbour

EVE
Lay your head against my breast,
I’ll gently fan you while you rest.
A violent gust of wind. LUCIFER appears among the leaves

ADAM
What’s that? I’ve heard nothing like it.
I feel as if some foreign force
Had broken bounds.

EVE
I tremble, Adam.
And heaven too has fallen silent.

ADAM
I hear it still within your breast.

EVE
When clouds obscure the eye of heaven
I see it still within your eyes,
And where else should I hope to find it,
Than in you whose deep desire
Begat my birth. You are the sun
Who at his peak pines all alone
And paints his image on the water
Flirting, flushed, with his companion
Who in his bounty fast forgets
That she is but the palest fire,
A mere reflection who must fade
To nought at night with his own shade.

ADAM
Hush now, Eve, you will abash me.
What is a voice if no one hears it?
A beam without its bead of colour?
What would I be were you absent?
My life unfolds in you, a flower,
My voice resounds in you, an echo.
How learn to love myself without you?

LUCIFER
Why should I listen to these soft endearments?
I’ll turn away in case I am dishonoured;
My cold and calculating intellect
Might fall to envying such childlike spirits.
A little bird begins to sing on a nearby branch

EVE
O Adam, can you understand
This little lover’s clownish lisping?

ADAM
I’ve heard the twittering of waters.
Their song was similar to his.

EVE
What miracle, what harmony,
So many words with but one meaning!

LUCIFER
Why delay? Now rouse yourself.
Ruin I vowed, they must be ruined.
And yet again I hesitate:
Will knowledge be the way to woo them
Or ambition to assault them,
These whom tender feelings tend
And harbour like a sacred shrine
To shield their hearts and raise their spirits
Each time they fall? But why be faint
When courage carries all before it!
Another gust of wind. LUCIFER appears before the terrified pair. The sky darkens. LUCIFER laughs
Why stare?
To EVE, who is about to flee
Ah lovely lady, wait!
A moment I beg to marvel at you.
EVE stops and slowly plucks up courage
aside
A pretty pattern of perfections.
Aloud
Frightened, Adam?

ADAM
Of you, low creature?

LUCIFER
aside
A father fit to sire proud men.
Aloud
Greetings to you, brother spirit!

ADAM
Who are you, tell me?
From worlds below ours or above?

LUCIFER
Precisely as you please, to us
There is no difference in degree.

ADAM
I did not know that other men could be.

LUCIFER
But there is so much more you do not know
And never will. Do you suppose
The Ancient in simplicity
Created you from dust that you
Might share His world? You give Him praise:
He keeps you well supplied in turn.
He says to you, Take this, Leave that,
And tends and leads you like a sheep;
You have no need for wit at all.

ADAM
For wit? Do I not have my wits?
Do I not feel the blessed daylight,
The sweet delight of being alive,
The endless goodness of my God
Who placed me here as the world’s prince?

LUCIFER
The tiny maggot, who consumes
The fruit before you, thinks the same,
As does the eagle seizing on his prey.
What makes you nobler then than they?
One common spark burns in you all,
The stirring of one universal power;
Like individual ripples in a brook
You leap to light, then swiftly sink
Deep in your swart and common bed.
One thing only, the power of thought,
Which languishes in you, unwitting,
Might help you grow to proper manhood,
To trust in your own strength, to choose
Between the evil and the good,
To take charge of your destiny,
And free you from God’s charity.
You might prefer to go on breeding
Like any worm in a warm dungheap,
Lapped within your feeble limits,
And waste your life in ignorance.
A satisfying faith is nice and neat:
It’s nobler but harder to stand on your own feet.

ADAM
How you speak! it makes my head spin.

EVE
These beautiful new things you say inspire me.

LUCIFER
But knowledge alone is not enough;
For if it is to bear fruit in great deeds,
Eternal life is something else you need.
What can you do with this mere thimbleful?
These two trees here will make you lords of all,
The very two forbidden you
By God who first created you,
Taste this and you will equal God in wisdom,
Taste that, eternal youth and grace are yours.

EVE
How mean is our Master, after all!

ADAM
But what if you deceive us?
The heavens grow a little brighter

ANGELIC HOST
Alas, poor world,
The ancient spirit of denial tempts you.

THE VOICE OF THE LORD
Adam, take heed!

ADAM
What is that voice again?

LUCIFER
Only the wind shaking the branches.
You elements,
Lend aid, arise -
Humanity
Will be your prize.-
A blast of wind. It grows darker
These two trees are mine!

ADAM
But who, then, are you?
To all appearances you’re just like us.

LUCIFER
See there, the eagle circling in the clouds;
And there the mole blindly turning the soil-
Each is bound by its own horizon.
The world of spirits lies beyond your sight,
And man appears to you the very peak
Of God’s creation. Dogs seem so to dogs,
They favour you with their companionship.
But just as you despise the dog
And, like a god, control his fate
With here a curse and there a word of praise,
So we, proud natives of the realm
Of pure spirit, look down on you.

ADAM
And you are one of these pure spirits?

LUCIFER
Indeed I am, the mightiest of the mighty,
Who stood beside the throne of God
And had a portion of his great effulgence.

ADAM
Then why did you not stay in the bright heavens,
Why descend into this world of dust?

LUCIFER
I grew tired of second place,
Of life’s unchanging ordered pace,
The piping choirs, their childish song
Of praise without a word of wrong.
I long for conflict and for strife
To bring new potent worlds to life
Where souls might grow in probity,
Where some brave souls might follow me.

ADAM
But God said He would punish us
If we should stray from our appointed path.

EVE
Why should he punish us? If He has set
The path we are to follow, surely He
Will have arranged that we can choose no other.
Why leave us standing above the deep,
Dizzy and abandoned to our doom?
Or if sin too is part of His design
As storms are of hot days,
Why blame the roll of thunder more
Than heat which gives us life?

LUCIFER
I see we have our first philosopher.
You are the first of many, my fair sister,
Who’ll argue the same point a million ways.
A few of them will end their days in bedlam.
Others stop short, but none will find a refuge.
Do put aside this futile speculation,
There are so many fine shades of opinion
On every issue that if you try them all
You end up knowing less than when you started
Without a hope of reaching a conclusion.
Contemplation means the death of action.

EVE
In that case I will pluck the fruit.

ADAM
The Lord has put His curse on them.
LUCIFER laughs
But pluck.
Whatever happens to us, let it happen.
Let us be wise, like God.
First EVE, then ADAM taste of the apple

EVE
Above all
Eternally young.

LUCIFER
This way, this way, quickly.
Here is the Tree of Eternal Life,
Now hurry!
He pulls them toward the other tree, but a CHERUB with a flaming sword bars their way

CHERUB
Back with you, transgressors, back!

THE VOICE OF THE LORD
Adam, Adam, you have abandoned me
So I abandon you. Go, try your strength.

EVE
We’re finished.

LUCIFER
You are discouraged?

ADAM
Not at all.
That shudder was my first awakening.
We’re going, Eve. No matter where, Away!
This place already feels barren and strange.

ANGELIC HOST
Ah, weep for them, Angelic Host,
The lie prevails - the earth is lost.

************************************************************

In the Paradise. In the middle the trees of knowledge and of immortality. ADAM and EVE come, different animals surround them with gentle confidence. Glory radiates through the open gate of Heaven and the soft harmonic voice of angels' choir is heard. Sunny day.

EVE

To live, to live: how sweet, how delightful!

ADAM

And to feel to be lord of everything.

EVE

To feel that we are protected from above
And we have to give for this only pure love
To Him who provides us all these delights.

ADAM

Being subordinated: that's your style. -
I'm thirsty, Eve. Look, how temptingly
This fruit is smiling.

EVE

I'll pluck one of them.

THE LORD'S VOICE

Stop there! Look out! I gave you the whole Earth,
Adam, but keep clear of the two trees there,
Their bewitching fruits serve other powers
And will surely die who does savour it. -
Here the reddening bunch of grapes you find,
There you get gentle shade with tranquillity
In outrageous heat of the shining noontide.

ADAM

That's strange command but seems to be true.

EVE

Why are these trees nicer than others or why
Are these forbidden?

ADAM

Why is the sky blue?
Why is the bosk green? - It is so, it's enough.
Let's follow this warning, come, come with me, Eve.

(They seat themselves in a bower.)

EVE

Come to my arms and I will gently fan you.

(Strong flurry, LUCIFER appears among the leaves.)

ADAM

Ah! What's that! I have not heard something like this,
Like an inimical and strange force would
Suddenly spring on us.

EVE

I am trembling.
The heavenly voice became silent, too.

ADAM

Here in your arms it seems to me to hear it.

EVE

And I find it in your bright eyes, Adam,
When glory above will become overcast.
Ah, where could I find it besides you, where?
Who was born only due to your craving
Like in its flood of light the princely sun
Takes the colour of water - as lonely not
To be in infinite universe - plays
With it, enjoys to be accompanied,
Forgetting generously that it is
Only the pale image of its own fire
That would disappear together with it.

ADAM

Do not say that, Eve, don't put me to shame.
What's the voice when nobody understands?
And tell me what is beam without colour?
What would I be when not be mirror'd
In you, like both the echo and the flowers
In which I can adore only myself?

LUCIFER

Why do I listen to this mild flirting?
I look away otherwise I'll be ashamed:
The cold and self-seeking reasoning will
Become envious of the artless mind.

(A tiny bird begins to sing on a twig.)

EVE

Adam, listen to it, tell me, do you
Perceive the song of this merry lover?

ADAM

I listen'd to the babbling of the creek
And found it to sing the same merry song.

EVE

Darling, this is wonderful harmony,
These diverse words and one reason only. -

LUCIFER

Why do I tarry? Let me start to work.
I swore to seduce them, they should be perish'd.
And now I'm doubting again and again,
Is it not useless to fight against them
With fascinating arms of the knowledge
And ambition, against their emotion
That like an asylum is protecting
And supports who's ruin'd. But away with care!
Only none but the brave deserve the fair!

(Strong flurry again. LUCIFER occurs before the frightened human couple. The glory grows dark. LUCIFER laughs.)

LUCIFER

What do you gaze at? (To EVE who starts to run.)
Stop! You graceful lady!
Let me admire you for a short moment.

(EVE stops and takes courage.)

LUCIFER (aside)

This pattern will repeat for million times. (Aloud.)
Adam, you fear?

ADAM

You? You shabby fellow?

LUCIFER (aside)

He is good forefather of the proud mankind. (Aloud)
Hail to thee! Brother-in-mind!

ADAM

Who you are?
From where you come? From above or below?

LUCIFER

As you like it. It's all the same for me.

ADAM

I didn't know that man's living except us.

LUCIFER

Oho! There's a lot that you do not know and
Will not forever. Or the kind old man
Would create you from this penurious clay
To give a share you in the Universe?
You praise Him, and He keeps you in exchange,
He says: take this and be afraid of that,
He guards and governs you as a brute beast;
To have cognition, you do not have need.

ADAM

To cogitate? - Do you think I do not?
And I do not feel the blessing sunshine,
Pleasant happiness of my existence,
And endless benevolence of my Lord
Who created me as God of this realm?

LUCIFER

Maybe small worms that are eating your fruit
And the eagle that swoops on the tiny bird
Hold both the same opinion of these.
Or why you would be nobler than others?
That's a gleam glimmering in your dim mind,
That is a stirring move of an endless force,
Like tiny drops of wave that having flash'd
For a moment, fall back imperceptibly
Into dark grey depth of their common bed. -
Maybe, there will be one thing, yes, the thought
That's slumbering in your unconscious heart,
This would emancipate you entrusting to
Your self-effort to choose the right or wrong,
To govern your fate only by yourself:
This would absolve you from the providence.
But it's better for you to flourish like a
Dung-worm in the mild lap of your own small scope
And to burn out with your life without knowledge. -
It's easy to resign to your confession;
It's nobler but hard to be your own master. -

ADAM

You tell us great words, these make my head swim.

EVE

I'm keen on these, you tell nice and new things.

LUCIFER

But knowledge in itself is not enough
To be realized in magnificent works.
Immortality is also needed.
What the short life is able to produce?
These two trees possess this ability
And Lord has forbade you to have their taste.
If you would taste it you would know as Lord
And your grace would be agelessly preserved.

EVE

Our Lord has been even cruel to us!

ADAM

And maybe you betray?

(Glory is somewhat clarified.)

HEAVENLY CHOIR

Woe is thee, world,
The true negation is haunting.

THE LORD'S VOICE

Man! Look out!

ADAM

What's that voice again?

LUCIFER

Wind is shaking the twigs.
Help! My forces!
Help! Elements!
To bag the man
For all events!

(Flurry, the glory grows dark.)

These two trees are mine.

ADAM

Who are you after all?
Since you seem to be similar to us.

LUCIFER

Look at the eagle as wheeling among clouds,
Look at this mole rooting down in the soil,
Both of them are of different horizons.
The spiritual world lies out of your scene
And man does mean you the highest known grade.
Dog takes only a dog as its idol and
Honours you with its companionship.
But as you are endlessly scornful of it
And you overhang it like its ill fate
Hailing down blessing and curses on its head,
So we, stately sharers of the world of
Spirits, have been superior to you.

ADAM

You would be one of these higher powers?

LUCIFER

Oh yes, most powerful among the mighty,
I stood there, close to the throne of the Lord
And got my share of his greatest glory.

ADAM

Why did you not remain in the bright heaven?
Why did you descend to this vale of dust?

LUCIFER

I had enough there of the second site,
Of the monotonous regular life,
The immature choir with infantile voice
That always praises but has no free choice.
I want struggle and fight against the old
That generates new power and new world,
Where the soul may be in itself mighty
And where me the brave can accompany.

ADAM

Lord said that he will strictly punish us
When do not follow the way that He has mark'd.

EVE

Why would he do? - When He set out the way
For us to go along as He it wanted,
His creatures are certainly made so
Not to be obedient to vicious bents.
Or why He put us above deep whirl with
Dizzy head, being sentenc'd to perdition. -
Yet, if He figur'd in to be sinful
Like the storm occurs between sunshinny days,
Who believes more sinful while it jangles
Than this for its animating ardour?

LUCIFER

Well, the first philosopher has appear'd. -
You'll have, my dear, a lot of inherents
Who will debate this in million manners;
Many of them will stray wobbly in madhouse,
Many will shy off, none of them get home.
Now, give up this meaningless meditation,
All the things bear many-many colours,
Who does want to know it all in detail,
Will know less than he knew at the first moment,
And will have no time to decide what's it.
Meditation is the death of action. -

EVE

Well, I decided to pluck one of these fruits.

ADAM

The Lord damn'd it.
(LUCIFER laughs)
But never mind. Pick it.
Come what may, let us be as wise as our
Lord: to know everything.

(First EVE then ADAM taste the apple of knowledge.)

EVE

And above all
For ever young.

LUCIFER

This way, come, here you are,
This is the tree of immortality.
Come along! Be quick!

(He draws them to the other tree, a CHERUB blocks their way with a blazing sword.)

CHERUB

Off with you, sinners!

THE LORD'S VOICE

Adam, Adam! You have abandon'd me,
I also leave you. See what you are alone.

EVE

We are lost.

LUCIFER

You despair?

ADAM

No, not at all.
That's the shiver of walking of my mind. -
Let's get out from here, my lady, get out!
This land is desolate and unwonted.

HEAVENLY CHOIR

Ah! Be the whole world tear-stain'd wherever,
Lie's winning - the Earth is lost forever.

************************************************************

The Hungarian version can be read here... -

[_ludwigm]

SCENE II - THE GARDEN OF EDEN
- In the Garden of Eden at the Beginning of Time.

- [#img] http://www.hung-art.hu/kep/z/zichy/muvek/madach/02.jpg[/img] -

[_ludwigm]

IMRE MADÁCH: (link)
"THE TRAGEDY OF MAN" 1861 (link)

SCENE III - BEFORE HISTORY STARTED
- Outside the Garden of Eden at the Beginning of Time.

************************************************************

A rich landscape outside Paradise. A little rough hut. ADAM is driving stakes into the ground to make a fence. EVE is making an arbour. LUCIFER.

ADAM
This place is mine. Instead of the great world
This plot shall be my home, my own domain.
I guard it from the prowling beasts of prey
And have it yield me fruit in harvest time.

EVE
I build a shady arbour, like the first
In that fair garden, for I would bring back
The lost delight of Eden.

LUCIFER
Ah, great things
Ye speak of. Family, possession, these
Shall be twin levers that shall move the world,
All weal and woe shall from these twain be born,
Twin forces, these shall grow unceasingly
Till nations rise, and trade and commerce come,
Twain parents of all great and noble things,
Twain parents who their offspring shall devour.

ADAM
Thou speakest riddles. Thou didst promise me
Knowledge, and I renounced the happiness
Of trust instinctive, that I might be great.
What have I gained?

LUCIFER
Dost thou not feel it, then?

ADAM
I feel that as God cast me off from Him,
And thrust me out with empty hands to roam
The waste, I left God, too. I have, myself
Become my own god, and what I attain,
Is mine, and fitly. This, my strength and pride.

LUCIFER aside
Vain puppet, that would mock at Heaven now;
Wilt thou so bold be when the lightning glares?

EVE
And I am proud in this one thought alone
That I shall be the mother of the world.

LUCIFER aside
A glorious ideal of woman’s heart
The curse of sinners to perpetuate.

ADAM
What owe I God? Existence, nought beside.
Life, to be worth the burden ’tis to live,
Must be the recompense of weary toil.
The pleasure that a draught of water gives
I must earn thirsty in the heat of noon.
The honey of a kiss is bought with that
Which follows on the kiss - despondency.
And if the bonds of thankfulness are loosed
And fallen from me, if I freedom have
To build my destiny, or cast it down,
Stretching with groping fingers towards my goal,
There was no need, it may be, of thy help,
For this I could have done by mine own strength.
Thou hast not freed me from the heavy chains
Which bind my straining body to the earth.
I feel a bond, no stronger than a hair,
How it be named, I know not, that prevents
My longing soul from soaring proud and free.
See, if I leapt, my body would fall back,
If what the distance hides I strove to seek,
My eyes and ears their service would deny,
And if imagination raises me
To higher spheres, then hunger drags me down
An abject creature to the earth again.

LUCIFER
Stronger than I the bond that fetters thee.

ADAM
Ah, then thou art a spirit weak indeed:
This spider’s web unseen, this thing of nought
Which ten score thousand creatures would not mark,
For though they struggle, taken in its net,
They yet believe they are at liberty,
This thing which only some few chosen souls perceive
Defies thee, and thou can’st not vanquish it.

LUCIFER
And this alone hath strength to challenge me,
For ’tis a spirit, like to me. Because
It works in silence, hidden, dost thou think
It is not strong? Believe it not; that which
A world doth shatter and a world create,
Is hidden in a darkness absolute.
For who should view it would grow faint with fear.
The work of man doth sparkle and resound,
Enduring but an hour, and then is gone.

ADAM
Grant me to gaze upon this hidden force,
A moment’s glance, thou know’st my heart is bold,
Which thus can sway me. For I am myself
A unity complete and separate.

LUCIFER
‘I am.’ Vain words. Thou wert and thou shalt be.
All life is an eternal rise and fall,
Yet gaze around and see with spirit eyes.
As ADAM speaks the following lines everything becomes visible.

ADAM
What stream is this that wells up ceaselessly,
Swift flowing ever upward to the height,
Then parts in twain, and with deep thunder falls
Upon the twin poles of the earth?

LUCIFER
’Tis heat,
Which life brings to the land of snow and ice.

ADAM
And these two flaming streams that roar and flow
So near, I fear lest I be swept away,
And yet I feel their quickening glow and force,
What are they? Lo, their glory makes me swoon.

LUCIFER
What thou dost see is Magnetism named.

ADAM
The earth beneath me quakes. That which before
I held as formless and immovable,
Is seething matter, irresistibly
Striving for ordered shape, and life. Lo, here
It cools to crystal, there it doth become
A tender bud. Ah, in this tumult wild,
What shall become of that self locked in me,
In which I trusted, foolish that I was,
As in a solid and enduring tool,
To serve me in my longing and intent?
Poor pampered child that sorrow and delight
Alike dost bring me, wilt thou only sink
To be a little dust, while what of thee
Remains yet, water, and thin, formless air
Which, but a while since, glowed with joy of life,
With mine own being, cloudward mounts on high
In aery vapour? Lo, my every word,
My every thought consumes a part of me.
I burn! And it may be, the baleful fire
A hidden spirit fans, that he may warm
Himself beside my ashes. Hence, dire vision, hence,
Lest I go mad. Ah, frightful ’tis to stand
In battle midst a hundred elements,
Tortured by desolation and despair.
Why did I cast away that providence
Which instinct felt, yet knew the value not
That providence, which wisdom seeks, in vain!

EVE
My heart is troubled likewise, for if thou
Shalt fight in battle with fierce beasts of prey,
And I our garden tend in weariness,
I lift my eyes, and in the whole wide world
No kinsman is there in the earth or heaven,
No friend to strengthen and protect. Not thus
Once was it in more happy days of peace.

LUCIFER scornfully
If then so puny are your souls, forsooth,
That ye should shrink without a hand to guide,
If ye must needs be subject and obey,
Behold, I give to you a demigod
Who shall more kindly than the Ancient be.
The spirit of this earth; I know him well,
A fair and modest youth from Heaven’s choir.
Come, spirit, come straightway,
Know, thou can’st not forbear:
The everlasting Nay
Calleth, none else would dare.
Flames burst from the earth; a heavy dun cloud appears girt with a rainbow and sounding with thunder.

LUCIFER recoiling
Who art thou, shape of fear? Not thee I called.
The genius of the earth is calm and mild.

THE VOICE OF THE SPIRIT OF THE EARTH
He whom in Heaven’s choir thou heldest weak
Is in his own sphere strong and infinite.
Lo! I am here, since I must needs obey
The spirit’s word, yet know, one thing it is
To summon, but another to command.
Thou wilt fall back, if mine own form I take
And these two worms here perish, crushed and slain.

LUCIFER
How shall man in thy haughty presence stand,
If he would pay thee homage as a god?

THE VOICE OF THE SPIRIT OF THE EARTH
In water, in the clouds and in the trees,
In all things I am immanent, where’re
He gaze with strong intent and trusting heart.
He vanishes. The springs and groves are peopled with fleeting nymphs.

EVE
Ah, look on these fair faces greeting us
In smiling comradeship. No more is there
Lonely despair in desert wilderness.
For happiness is come to us in them.
They give us courage in the time of grief
And wholesome counsel in perplexity.

LUCIFER
And nowhere better can ye counsel ask,
Who, what ye ask, already have resolved,
Than from these kindly fleeting presences
that speak in answer as ye ask of them,
And smiling gaze on him whose heart is pure,
Yet shrink appalled from the despairing soul.
These wait upon you in a hundred shapes
And ever changing in a hundred ways;
The hale form of the wise philosopher,
And the ideal of hearts forever young.

ADAM
What profiteth the glitter of these shapes
That like a mirage fade as I draw near
And add one riddle more to vex my brain?
Beguile my heart no further, Lucifer.
Let me know all as thou did’st promise me.

LUCIFER
aside
One day thy knowledge shall prove bitterness,
And thou shalt yearn for ignorance again.
aloud
Have patience, yet. Thou knowest, thou must earn
Through weary fight a moment’s ecstasy.
Thou must through many schools pass, many times
Cherish false hope ere all things thou shalt know.

ADAM
For thee of patience easy ’tis to speak
For thee before doth stretch eternity.
I have not eaten of the Tree of Life,
Time hastens and my days pass fleeting by.

LUCIFER
All that hath life, hath equal part in life;
The hoary tree, the moth that lives a day,
Feel, love, rejoice, and perish, when each one
Its life hath led, its purpose hath fulfilled.
Not time progresseth; it is we who change;
A century the same is as a day.
Fear not, thou shalt accomplish thy desire,
But think not that man’s essence is enclosed
In this mean body formed of dust and clay.
Look on the anthill or the swarm of bees,
A thousand workers hasten to and fro,
Blindly perform their task, then pass away,
Yet the whole mass endures, a unity,
And, with a common spirit, lives and works,
Brings to accomplishment a conscious plan,
Until the end come and the whole doth cease.
’Tis true thy earthly body shall decay,
But thou shalt live on in a hundred forms,
And nothing need begin once more anew.
If thou sin, in thy son thou shalt atone,
In him thy body’s weakness shalt prolong;
What thou hast felt and learned and come to know
Shall be thy portion for a million years.

ADAM
To age belongeth it to view the past:
Not thus the longing of my flaming heart,
For on my future I would gaze to know
What I must suffer and wherefore I fight.

EVE
And if then life shall be so oft renewed
I would know if my beauty shall endure.

LUCIFER
So be it. I will lay a spell on you.
Ye shall look on the future to its end,
Viewed in the flitting phantoms of a dream.
But when ye see how foolish the intent,
How grievous is the conflict to be fought,
Lest ye be overwhelmed in grey despair,
And leave the battle, smitten to the heart,
I give to you one little shining ray,
To comfort you, that all things which ye saw
Were but illusion. Lo, this ray is hope.
LUCIFER leads ADAM and EVE into the hut. They fall asleep.

************************************************************

Drawing of prehistoric man and of artifacts used by primitive religious cults are shown projected on the half-curtain. Behind the half-curtain the set should consist of highly stylized artistic representations of the items indicated. On no account should the stage properties, unless they are actually used or worn, be made to appear realistic. When the half-curtain is raised, a landscape is discovered with palm trees, outside the Garden of Eden. In the background a rough wooden shack is seen. Adam and Eve, now clothed in animal skins, are hard at work: Adam, driving a stake into the ground to make a fence, and Eve, trying to construct a shady retreat vaguely resembling the one in Eden. Meanwhile Lucifer, wearing the same costume as before, is watching them.

ADAM
I stake my claim: no mastery of the world,
but this shall be my home. It’s my possession.
I shall protect it from marauding creatures
and have this pasture yield its crops to me.

EVE
And this retreat I’m making in the garden
will conjure up the memory of Eden.

LUCIFER
You two have spoken better than you know.
Momentous words. Family and possession
will be the two mainsprings of history,
the source of all the weal and woe to come.
These concepts will develop and appear
as industry and nation in the future:
they’ll foster countless splendid, great achievements,
and yet devour their charges in the process.

ADAM
You talk in riddles. It’s knowledge you offered:
for that and in pursuit of self-esteem
I’ve learned to master my instinctive urges.
But where’s my gain?

LUCIFER
Aren’t you aware of it?

ADAM
All I can say is this: as God renounced me
and turned me out, forsaken, empty-handed,
so I renounced Him too. I’ve now become
my own god, and whatever I achieve,
I claim it as my own. I’m proud of it.

LUCIFER
[to the audience]
Go, blow your trumpet to your heart’s content:
we’ll see your courage tested - in the end!

EVE
And I have reason to be proud of this:
I’ll be the mother of the human race.

LUCIFER
[to the audience]
This great ambition in the female mind:
to propagate her sinful, wretched kind!

ADAM
What do I owe to God? My mere existence?
If it is worth my daily toil and trouble,
then my existence is my just reward.
So is the pleasure from a drink of water
that’s merited by thirst which comes before,
and the rapture of a kiss that is requited
by disillusionment which follows after…
And if at last I’ve cast away the shackles
of gratitude, and if I have the power
to shape my destiny, or to destroy it,
feeling my way, planning my course of action,
perhaps I might have done without your service:
I might have coped, had it been left to me.
You’ve never tried to help me break this bondage
my body has in common with the soil,
for here it is, I don’t know what to call it,
this thread, this gossamer, the shame of it,
spreading its net about my haughty soul.
I would leap up: my body pulls me down;
my eyes, my ears relinquish their obedience
when I would wish to know what lies beyond;
should then imagination set me soaring,
sheer hunger must compel me to surrender
and cast me on the trodden dust again.

LUCIFER
This fibre is too strong for me to break.

ADAM
Ha! You a weakling, Spirit Lucifer?
This spider’s web, this next to nullity,
sensed only by the most perceptive few,
while others, myriads, unaware of it,
will wriggle on in their illusive freedom,
caught in the net - too strong for you to break?

LUCIFER
Precisely, for it is a spirit’s power.
We’re not unlike, except he works in secret.
But don’t you think he lacks the power to wield:
like other potentates who shape the world,
immensely strong, he labours out of sight.
The merest glimpse of him would make you stagger.
It’s only humans blazon their achievements
hopelessly hemmed in by their fleeting life.

ADAM
Then let me have that glimpse, however brief,
inside the works. You know I have the courage.
Let’s see how it affects my own existence,
complete and independent as I am.

LUCIFER
There’s no “I am”! You have been and you shall be:
all life is only emergence and decay.
Now, look and see a spirit’s view of things.
Whatever Adam mentions in the following lines becomes at once visible.

ADAM
I see a tide which wells up all around us:
it surges up as if to drown the skies,
then it divides and in a twofold current
it floods towards the poles.

LUCIFER
It’s only heat,
supplying energy to frozen regions.

ADAM
And what are these? Like streams of living fire
they roll along as if to overwhelm me,
yet with a strange sustaining influence.
I’m all but mesmerised!

LUCIFER
Magnetic flux.

ADAM
The very ground dissolves beneath my feet:
what once appeared solid, without a form,
is now a turmoil of convulsive matter
struggling to take shape. Irresistible!
Coming to life: now turning into crystals,
now into buds. Amidst these whirling forces
what’s happened to my independent self?
O, wretched body, what’s become of you?
What folly to mistake you for a fastness
of lofty thoughts and noble aspirations!
Look at you now, you pampered child, the author
of so much pleasure and calamity,
reduced to a handful of dust as you are,
and see your better part, robust, elated
a while before, now vapour, empty air,
dispersing with my self among the clouds.
The words I speak consume my very being,
as if a part dissolved with every thought.
I’m all aflame! O, what a baleful fire!
Perhaps that unknown spirit kindles it
to warm his ghastly mansions with my embers.
Remove this sight! This is insanity!
This fight, harassed by elemental forces,
tormented by the pangs of desolation…
Appalling, hideous predicament!
Too late to call on kindly Providence
which I innately felt but still decried!
O, tardy knowledge! O, futile remorse!

EVE
How right you are! I too have my regrets.
When you’re away to fight some beast of prey,
and while I work at home or tend the garden,
I look around to face an empty world:
no kinsman here on earth or in the sky,
no friend to reassure us or to help…
It wasn’t like this before - in happier days.

LUCIFER
[scornfully]
If you’re so immature you need a nursemaid
to coddle you and keep you from the cold,
and if you languish for subordination,
I can invoke a lenient god for you.
Unlike your Old Disciplinarian,
the Spirit of the Earth is unpretentious:
a handsome stripling from the heavenly choir.
[chanting]
Arise, Spirit, appear!
Negation has no fear
to call upon you thus:
arise, appear to us!
Flames burst from the earth and with a terrible thunder a black cloud appears under the arc of a rainbow. Lucifer recoils, somewhat surprised.

LUCIFER
Who are you, fearsome shape? I called another.
The genius of the Earth is meek and mild.

THE VOICE OF THE SPIRIT OF THE EARTH
The spirit you met in the heavenly choir
within his sphere is infinitely strong.
I’ve come, for by the rules I must acknowledge
a spirit’s call, but let me tell you this:
to be harassed is not to be commanded.
You would be awed yourself to see my features,
and these two worms would be annihilated.

LUCIFER
Tell me, if man should take you for a god,
how could he then approach your lordly self?

THE VOICE OF THE SPIRIT OF THE EARTH
He’ll find me in the clouds, in fire or water,
in woodlands, everywhere, if he desires
to seek my presence with uplifted heart.
The cloud vanishes. Springs and groves appear peopled with graceful nymphs, who dance, in the nude, to music, while Eve and Lucifer recite their couplets. Movement, sound and verse keep time.

EVE
Look, fairy-people rising from the ground
with smiling faces dancing all around!
We’ll never need be lonely any more,
with happiness abundant as before.
Here comes our comfort with alacrity,
and willing counsel in perplexity.

LUCIFER
For you, no better counsel for the task,
since you make up your minds before you ask.
These graceful shapes can please you every way
and say what you’re expecting them to say:
seek merriment, they’ll make you merry faster,
despair at all, they’ll prophesy disaster.
They may appear, for they can so arrange,
in any form, themselves without a change:
to thinking minds a subject for reflection,
to youthful hearts - a pleasing predilection.

ADAM
But what’s the use of all this gaudy show
if I can’t fathom what it’s all about?
It seems to worsen my perplexity!
Please, don’t beguile me further, Lucifer,
but give me knowledge as you promised me.

LUCIFER
[to the audience]
You’ll pay a bitter fee for this tuition,
and long to have your former ignorance.
[to Adam]
Have patience, man! Even moments of delight
are won with toil and effort, as you know.
For knowledge is achieved through education,
and disappointment is to be your school.

ADAM
How glibly you can lecture me on patience!
You have eternal life! But what of mine?
I haven’t tasted Immortality!
Time passes: I must make the most of it.

LUCIFER
All living things have equal share of life,
the same chance of achieving their potential:
the age-old tree, the fly which lives a day,
feel, love, rejoice and die, their stint completed.
Days, centuries make little difference.
It’s not time passing, but ourselves who change.
Then be assured, you will fulfil your purpose,
but don’t expect your personality
will linger in this human lump of clay.
Look at the ants, or take a swarm of bees.
A thousand workers throng without directive:
some, toiling blindly, fail and come to grief,
but as a whole, a working unity,
they can survive and, as of one accord,
act and assuredly achieve their goal -
until the end when all expire together…
Although your earthly body will decay,
you will survive in countless other forms,
no need to make a fresh start every time:
your sins shall visit you in your descendants,
in them you will have your disease prolonged,
whatever you’ve encountered, felt or learnt,
is yours to keep until the end of days.

ADAM
This is the retrospection of an old man.
I’m young yet and my heart says otherwise:
it’s burning with desire to see the future
my strife and suffering will bring to pass.

EVE
I’d love to see these changes working through:
if I shall always look - the way I do.

LUCIFER
So be it. Through my spell you’ll have the chance
to see your distant future in a trance,
in fleeting visions, even to the end.
But should they prove so daunting for your mettle
that you might run away before the battle
commences - once you’ve come to comprehend
how profitless the goal, how grim the fight,
I’ll set before your eyes this beam of light
whereby you’ll see all things within your scope
as mere illusion. There’s your ray of hope.
Meantime Lucifer ushers Adam and Eve into the hut, where they both fall asleep.

************************************************************

A landscape with palms, outside Eden. A small crude wooden hut. ADAM is driving stakes into the ground to make a fence. EVE is building a bower. LUCIFER overlooks them.

ADAM
So this is mine. The wide world is behind me.
This plot shall be my home. I’ll master it,
Defend it from all harm of fowl or brute
And force the field to yield its fairest fruit.

EVE
And I will build a bower like that before
To conjure the Eden that is ours no more.

LUCIFER
What potent words are kin and property,
Like two great levers that shall move the world,
They will give birth to every pain and pleasure.
The two ideas will grow continuously,
Creating nations and industries,
Begetting greatness and nobility,
Devouring, in time, their own progeny.

ADAM
You speak in riddles. You promised wisdom -
I put aside instinctive joys,
Prepared to struggle, to be great. What for?

LUCIFER
You feel no different from before?

ADAM
I feel that when the Lord abandoned me
And thrust me into the desert, empty handed,
I too abandoned him. My God is me,
Whatever I regain is mine by right.
This is the source of all my strength and pride.

LUCIFER aside
Thumb your nose at heaven, vain puppet, you!
We’ll see your mettle when storms buffet you.

EVE
My only source of pride is to know
That I shall be the mother of the world.

LUCIFER aside
What fine ideals fill her heart. To be
The carrier of sin and misery.

ADAM
What should I thank Him for? This mere existence?
If mere existence can be justified
The fruits of my exertions must suffice.
In order to take pleasure in plain water
I have to work and feel my thirst the keener.
Each honeyed kiss untunes us, the price of that
Is what it brings in tow: it leaves us flat.
But though the bonds of gratitude have snapped
And fallen from me, and though I am free
To reconstruct my fate or wreck it again,
Stumbling in my efforts at perfection,
I doubt if help were needed to get this far,
To do this much was quite within my power.
You haven’t freed me from the heavy chains
That bind my mortal body to the dust.
I feel entwined by something I can’t name,
One hair, or something frailer, to my shame,
A curb on my ambitious spirit. Look,
I try to leap: my body drags me down,
My eyes and ears refuse to serve me when
I would be prying into hidden knowledge,
And even when imagination raises me
Mere hunger plucks me down and humbles me,
And makes me descend once more into base matter.

LUCIFER
That single strand has greater strength than I have.

ADAM
You must be weak indeed to be defeated
By this invisible web, this piece of nothing
Among whose strands a million creatures feel
At liberty to frolic as they please,
Whose presence is suspected by no more
Than a few exalted spirits at the most.

LUCIFER
It is the only thing that can defy me,
Because, like me, it is pure spirit. You think
It frail because it seems to work obscurely?
Not in the least: it sits and waits in darkness,
Creating or destroying galaxies.
Your head would spin if you could see it plain.
Man’s work alone depends on sound and fury
And that can be contained in a mere thimble.

ADAM
You know how strong I am, so let me see -
A glimpse is all I want - that mechanism
Which so effects me, though I am expressly
Designed for self-sufficiency.

LUCIFER
“I am” - what foolish words! You were, you will be.
All life is an eternal ebb and flow.
But go on, look, my spirits will lend you eyes.

ADAM
who, as he speaks, begins to see what be describes
What flood is boiling up and rising
Ever higher all about me,
Dividing into two and rumbling
Like thunder towards the Poles?

LUCIFER
Heat quickening a land of ice.

ADAM
And those two streams of fire roaring
And racing beside me, I fear they’ll sweep me away
Although I feel their generative power.

LUCIFER
Magnetism. Fields of force.

ADAM
The earth is shaking. What seemed firm and boundless
Is seething matter, irresistibly
Striving for form, struggling to be born.
See, here it shapes a flower, there a crystal.
But in all this wild confusion what becomes
Of me, of my self-image, of that body
In which I fondly trusted, like a child,
Imagining it was a worthy tool
To help me gain my ends and my desires?
Spoilt infant, pampered brat, who brings me pain
And pleasure, indiscriminate in both,
Are you to be reduced to a few handfuls
Of fine dust, a residue of water
And thin air? So radiant and glowing
Even now, are you to dissolve in clouds?
Each word I speak, each thought I form, consumes
My being drop by drop, I burn away!
Perhaps some hidden and mysterious spirit
Fans these fearsome flames, hoping to warm
Himself beside my ashes. Take it away!
Oh take away this dream which drives me mad.
It is terrible to stand alone among
A hundred warring elements and feel
That sense of sharp and utter desolation!
O why did I dismiss that providence
I felt instinctively but could not prize.
My intellect now yearns in vain for it.

EVE
Yes, yes, I too feel the same.
While you are striving against beasts of prey
And I am wearily toiling in the garden,
I look about me, searching the horizon,
But neither on earth nor in heaven do I see
A single friend to cheer or comfort me.
How different it was in the good old days.

LUCIFER mocking
Well then, if you’re both so feeble minded
That you catch cold without a nurse or mother,
And if you must serve someone,
I’ll summon up a god to suit your needs,
Someone nicer than old Nobodaddy:
The Spirit of the Earth, a decent lad -
I used to know him in the Heavenly Choir.
Spirit, no one else would dare
To summon from the Earth, appear!
The Spirit of Denial’s voice
Takes no deny and leaves no choice.
Flames shoot from the ground, a thick black cloud appears with a rainbow, rolling with thunder

LUCIFER stepping back
Who are you, Terror? I did not call you.
The Spirit of the Earth is meek and mild.

SPIRIT OF THE EARTH
What in the Heavenly Choir seemed weak to you
Is infinite and strong in its own sphere -
Now here I am because I must obey
The words of spirits, but take note of this:
To rouse is one thing, to control another.
My true form is too harsh a sight for you -
And as for these two worms, it would destroy them.

LUCIFER
Inform me then, if man would worship you
And make you his god, how may he approach you?

SPIRIT
Dispersed among the waters and the clouds,
In groves, in every place that man surveys
With strong desire and elevated spirits.
The SPIRIT disappears. The springs and groves are peopled with playful nymphs

EVE
Ah look at those sweet kindred faces,
Look, just look, how charmingly they greet us,
Now farewell wilderness and desolation,
True happiness has come to dwell among us.
They’ll comfort us when we are low
And give us good advice when we’re in doubt.

LUCIFER
Nor could you wish for better counsellors,
Since by the time you ask you have decided -
And these delightful evanescent creatures
Will answer in the spirit of the question.
They smile benignly on the pure in heart
But seem horrendous to the desperate,
They’ll company you in a myriad shapes,
A hundred transformations, till you die.
They offer cooling shade to fevered minds,
Ideals to the eternal young-in-heart.

ADAM
What’s that to me? What is this mirage,
This glittering display I cannot grasp?
To me it’s yet another mystery.
Don’t monkey with me, Lucifer. Enough!
Where is the knowledge that you promised me?

LUCIFER
aside
Bitter enough will it seem in time to come -
You’ll wish for ignorance before we’re through.
aloud
Have patience please. You know you have to struggle
’To earn even your momentary pleasures.
You have so much to learn yet. Be prepared
For many disappointments on the way.

ADAM
It’s easy enough for you to talk of patience -
Eternity’s vast store is laid before you.
But I’ve not tasted of the Tree of Life;
A thimbleful of time means I must hurry.

LUCIFER
All creatures have an equal share in time,
The hundred year old tree, ephemeral flies,
All feel, take pleasure, propagate and die
Having fulfilled their needs, used up their day.
It is not time that moves, but we who change.
A century, a day - it makes no difference.
So never fear, you too will run your race,
But do not think that man’s entire self
Is bound up with this lump of clay, the body.
You’ve seen the anthill, no doubt, and the beehive:
A thousand workers stumbling to and fro,
Unconsciously they do, they err, they die.
The organism though, the One, lives on
By instinct shaped into a single mass,
Fulfilling its delineated purpose
Until the day when everything must end.
You too will come to dust, it is quite true,
But in a hundred forms you’ll live again
And never will you have to start afresh
Since when you err, your son will bear the blame,
You pass on to him your feebleness, your gout -
All that you feel, experience and learn
Remains your own throughout a million years.

ADAM
This backward glance might satisfy an old man:
My heart is young, its passions are quite different.
I want to see the future, to discover
What I must struggle for, what I must suffer.

[EVE]
Let me see too, if I am to retain
My charm through all the changes that remain.

LUCIFER
So let it be. I’ll cast a spell on you
And you will see unto the end of time
As in a dream, in fleeting images.
But when you see how foolish are your aims,
How fierce the war in which you are engaged,
I’ll grant you - to prevent you from despair
And to maintain your courage in the battle -
A tiny ray of light there in the sky,
That you might think the whole dream was a mirage.
That tiny ray of light will be called Hope.
LUCIFER leads ADAM and EVE into the hut. They fall asleep.

************************************************************

Picturesque landscape outside the Paradise. Small, clumsy wooden hovel. ADAM sticks pegs for closure, EVE builds a bower. LUCIFER

ADAM

This is mine. Instead of the roomy world
This scene will be my home. I'll cultivate
And will guard it from all the wild animals
And will compel it to give me harvest.

EVE

I will build a bower similar to the
Former and so I try to retrieve for us
The lost Paradise.

LUCIFER

Ah! How great words you
Have said. Family and private ownership
Will be the twofold promoter of the world,
That generates all pleasures and torments.
These two ideas will grow unbroken
While producing homeland and industry,
All that is generous and magnificent
That engorges its own individuals.

ADAM

You tell mysteries. You have promised me
Knowledge, I gave up the pleasures of instinct
That though struggling hardly, to be mighty.
And what's the outcome.

LUCIFER

Do you not feel it?

ADAM

I feel that as my Lord left me plunging
Into the bare loneliness by empty hands,
I left him, too. I became myself to
My own God and all what I'll attain, will be
Justly mine. This is my power and self-pride.

LUCIFER (aside)

You vain pawn, you flout now the heaven proudly,
Let us see your heart when thunders flash loudly.

EVE

And it's just only proper pride of mine
To be ancestress of the whole mankind.

LUCIFER (aside)

Glorious is her thought, that's really,
To hand down evil sinful misery.

ADAM

What should I thank to Him? My bare existence?
But this being if would be worthy of
Its share, will be the outcome of my labours.
The delight to drink a glass of water
I have to deserve by the glow of my thirst,
The price of savouring a kiss is where
It is wandering: in deep despondency.
Though the mask of gratefulness is off me
And became free to govern my own fate
And to deteriorate what I've planned
Soundly again and again - maybe your
Help should not have been truly provided,
I could have made it alone, by my force.
And you did not save me from the heavy bond
That binds my body to this dusty ground.
Though I don't know its name, I feel what's it,
Maybe it's a thread - and it's all the more
Infamous - that restraints my proud being.
Look, I try to spring but I'm falling back,
My eyes and my ears are out of their duty
When I sound secrets of the remoteness;
If my soul wants to reach higher levels
Hunger forces to be humiliated
And return again to the trampled matter.

LUCIFER

This bond is stronger than I ever be.

ADAM

You are a very infirm spirit, yes,
If this obscure thin spider-work, this nothing
That cannot be seen by the millions
Who gambol with the feeling of freedom
In this net being suspected by some
Higher spirits only, is flouting you.

LUCIFER

And only this, this is able to flout me
'Cause it's spirit like me. Or do you think
That though being still and of hidden act
It's not strong? - Don't think, it's sitting in mist
Who staggers and shakes and creates a world:
Its visual appearance would swim your head.
Only the man-made things curtail'd by the
Limited life are glinting and rattling.

ADAM

This running operation let me see
- For a moment only, I'm strong, you know -
How it acts on me who in myself am
So alone but am the totality.

LUCIFER

"I am" - it's mad word. You were and will be,
Life is eternal ring of being and death.
But let you look 'round and see with spirits' eyes.

ADAM (What he says in the following, become visible)

What a flow is so springing up around me
Prograding continuously upwards,
Aspires high, where it bifurcates and runs
As a storm up to the poles.

LUCIFER

This is the warmth
That brings life to permanently frozen lands.

ADAM

And these two fire streams roaring beside me,
I'm afraid it will carry me away
And yet, I feel its animating effects.
What's that? What's that? It makes me feel dizzy.

LUCIFER

That's the magnet.

ADAM

The ground's quaking below.
What I believed to be constant, amorphous:
Becomes bubbling, elementary matter
That's trying hard for individual shape
And life. Here it takes the form of crystal,
There that of a bud. In this confusion
Where will I find the unique presence of mine,
What you'll be my frame, I trust crazily
As a firm footing in my ambitions,
Imaginations and pretentious desires?
You overindulg'd body, who makes me
Both troubles and tears and some ecstasy,
You'll be debas'd to a handful of dust,
While your being that was reddening and
Glad like water and brilliant delusion
Will ascend with my own being to the clouds?
All my words and all the thoughts in my poor mind
Consume the single parts of my being,
I am burning! - And this disastrous fire
Is perhaps inflamed by a mystic spirit
To warm, while I am burning to ashes.
Off with this vision, 'cause I'm going mad.
To be at war with the awkward feeling
Of loneliness among thousand elements:
That's fearful, frightful! - Oh, why I dismiss'd the
Sheltering providence surmised by my
Instinct but never appreciated
And wanted by my knowledge - but in vain.

EVE

Aha! I have also similar feeling,
When you'll be fighting against the beasts of prey
Or when flagging I shall tend our garden
I will cast my eyes about the spacious world
And no kins in heaven and earth, no friend
Will be to encourage as shield me or you.
No, this was not the case in the good old times.

LUCIFER (with irony)

Ah, if your soul is so petty-minded
That you feel cold without paternal care,
Subordination is your only need:
I evoke a God for you who will be more
Friendly than the rigourous grim greybeard:
The spirit of this Earth, I know him from
The heaven's choir, he is very modest.
Come spirit, come, you see
You are no match for me,
Nobody dares to call
You except me, at all.

(Flames shoot up from the ground, a dense black cloud is formed with rainbow and with horrific thunder.)

Ghost, who are you - this is not you I call'd,
The spirit of Earth is tender and kind.

THE VOICE OF THE EARTH'S SPIRIT

What you saw in the heaven's choir to be weak
Is endless and strong in its own domain. -
Here I am, 'cause I had to listen the word
Of a spirit, but keep it for yourself:
It's another thing to thrill and govern.
If I take on my wraith, you will sink down and
These two worms will be annihilated.

LUCIFER

Tell me how man is able to reach your proud
Proximity if he takes you as God?

THE VOICE OF THE EARTH'S SPIRIT

Partitioned in waters, clouds and possets,
Everywhere he will enter with solid
Ardent eagerness and with bosom held up.

(Disappears. The bosk and spring are peopled by elfish playful nymphs.)

EVE

Ah! Look at these pleasant fraternal cheeks,
Look, look how charmingly they salute us,
We're beyond loneliness and solitude,
Happiness descended to us with them.
They give words of encouragement in grief
And a sound piece of advice in mistrust.

LUCIFER

That's the best to you to seek their wise advice
- Who when asking have come to a decision -
And these elfish phenomena will answer
In harmony as you have raised the question:
They look smiling at the pure guiltless heart
And are frightful phantoms for those in despair;
They will accompany you along your life
In hundreds of differently transform'd shapes,
This is the fresh shade of the inquiring sage
And the ideal of ageless hearts and souls.

ADAM

What do I care for this, this glittering joke
That passes off me but I can't grip it -
And I will have a mystery one more.
Don't beguile with promises, Lucifer,
But let me know everything as you promised.

LUCIFER (aside)

Your knowledge will be sorrowful, you will see
And you'll hunker after the fool's paradise.
(aloud)
Have patience. You know you have to merit
Even the seconds of delight by fighting;
You have to complete your studies and you'd be
Disappoint'd till understand everything.

ADAM

It's easy for you to talk about patience,
Your perspectives possess immortality,
But I did not eat fruit of the tree of life,
The short being forces me to hasten.

LUCIFER

All being that lives will live for the same length,
Secular trees and the tiny may-fly:
Is born, rejoices, loves and comes to grief,
Having perform'd its labour and eagerness.
Not time is running: we are those who change,
A century or a day, that's the same.
Never fear, you will also fill your part,
Don't believe that man's personality
Is roll'd only into this dirt-made body.
You saw the ant and the cluster of bees:
Thousands of neuters wander by fits and starts,
They act at a venture, blunder and fail,
But the whole as a constant entity
Lives and acts in a collective intellect,
It performs perfectly the plan determined
Till the end comes and whole comes to rest.
Your remains will disintegrate, as well,
But you will revive in thousands of forms,
And you need not start anything afresh:
You were guilty, you'll suffer in your son,
And your gout you will continue in him,
All things you will feel and perceive and learn
Will be your own for millions of years.

ADAM

That is only the reminiscence of Lord,
But my bosom has an eager desire:
To have a look at my future to see
Why I am struggling, why I'm suffering.

EVE

Let me see, too, in this regeneration
Will be preserv'd or not my fascination.

LUCIFER

So be it. My witchcraft gives the wanted charms
And you will have a look at future by chance,
In the ideas of fugacious dreams;
But if you will see how crazy is your aim,
How grave's your action to fight again, again;
So, that you don't show the lack of spirit
And don't give up the struggle you've to fight:
I'll charm you a tiny beam that is bright,
It will encourage you: it's a vain scope
All what you see - and this beam is the hope.

(Meanwhile he leads ADAM and EVE into the hovel who fall asleep there.)

[_ludwigm]

IMRE MADÁCH: (link)
"THE TRAGEDY OF MAN" 1861 (link)

SCENE IV - EGYPT
- Egypt, c. 2650 BC. Adam is a Pharaoh, most likely Djoser; Lucifer his Vizier; Eve is the wife of a slave.

************************************************************

In Egypt. Before an open porch. ADAM, as Pharaoh, young, sits on a throne. LUCIFER as his minister. At a respectful distance a magnificent retinue. In the background, slaves at work on a pyramid under Overseers with whips. Bright sunshine.

LUCIFER
My lord, thy people who would happy be
To shed their blood for thee, disquieted ask
Why doth great Pharaoh, lord of all the earth
Brood, pensive, on his throne, and take no rest.
Why dost thou sacrifice the joys of day,
The fair dream visions of cool dusky night,
And dost not to thy slave, whom it beseems,
Commit the care of thy great purposes?
Since on the whole earth all that man may find
Of glory, might and happiness is thine:
A thousand rich dominions own thee lord,
For thee alone the fragrant flowers blow,
For thee alone the fruit glows on its bough;
A thousand women sigh for love of thee;
The fair-haired beauty with her drooping eyes,
Slender and frail as some shy, fleeting nymph,
The dark enchantress, of the burning lips,
And eyes aflame with passion’s glowing fire:
All, all are thine: thy passing whim their fate;
All feel they have their life work well performed
If they have given thee a moment’s joy.

ADAM
My heart finds no delight in all these things.
They come but as a due that must be paid.
I fight not for them, and I cannot thank
Myself for them. But in this mighty work
Which I do build, I deem that I have found
The path that leads to greatness which is true.
For nature at this art of man is dumb,
Which for a thousand years shall voice my name.
No earthquake, no wild storm shall cast it down.
Man has become more powerful than God.

LUCIFER
Ah Pharaoh, lay thy hand upon thy heart,
Say, does this vision bring thee happiness?

ADAM
Nay, for I feel a void, a void unnameable,
But yet I care not: bliss I did not seek,
Glory alone, and that before me shines.
But let my grief my people never know,
For should they pity, they would not adore.

LUCIFER
How if thou shouldst that glory find to be
A foolish toy that charms but for an hour?

ADAM
It cannot be.

LUCIFER
But if it were?

ADAM
Why, then
I would leave life, and dying, curse the world.

LUCIFER
Thou wilt not die, though thou shalt come to know.
Nay, with thy old success, begin anew.
The Overseers beat one of the working slaves so fiercely that he runs in anguish to the porch of Pharaoh and falls before the throne.

SLAVE
Mercy, great lord!
EVE, as his wife, rushes forward front the workers, and embraces her husband with passionate sobs.

EVE
Thou askest but in vain.
He understands not who hath never known
Our suffering. The cry of woe is faint,
And high the throne. Why callest thou not me,
For I will shield thee, and the blows shall fall
Upon my body.

ADAM
to the Overseers who press forward and would tear her away.
Let her be. Begone!
They go.
aside
What strange emotion steals upon my heart?
Who is this woman and what spell hath she
To draw great Pharaoh from his mighty throne
To seek her lying lowly in the dust.
Rises.

LUCIFER
Lo, this again is one of those frail threads
With which thy Lord hath compassed thee around
To mock thee, and to have thee bear in mind
Thou wert a sluggish caterpillar once,
If thou would’st spread thy wings, a butterfly.
This little thread, but mark how strong it is,
It slips from out the fingers and therefore
I cannot snap it.

ADAM descends from the throne.
See thou break it not.
For all its wounding, it is sweet to me.

LUCIFER
But yet it ill becomes a great, wise king
To groan beneath it.

ADAM
What then should I do?

LUCIFER
A wise man can do nought else than deny
This hidden thread exists: Matter and strength
Must sweep it roughly, with a laugh away.

ADAM
I cannot laugh and I cannot deny.

EVE
Thy blood, beloved, trickles from thy wounds,
See I will stanch it. Dost thou suffer sore?

SLAVE
My life is pain: the pain will not be long.

EVE
Ah nay, why hast thou lived till now to die
In suffering, now, when thou hast found me?

SLAVE
Why lives the slave? To carry stone to raise
The pyramid of Pharaoh, and to leave
His offspring for the yoke, and then to die.
A million for one!

ADAM
Ah, Lucifer,
How terrible these words from fading lips!

LUCIFER
’Tis but the raving of a slave that dies.

ADAM
But what said he?

LUCIFER
Great Pharaoh, it is nought.
And I am satisfied to think there is
One slave the less upon this crowded earth.

EVE
One wretched slave to thee. To me the world.
Alas, beloved, who will love me now?

SLAVE
Not I. Forget me evermore, forget.
Dies.

ADAM
Lo, I will love thee. Bear the dead man hence.
They take up the corpse.
Come, lady, by my side upon the throne
Thy place shall be: for thou art queen of grace
As I am lord of strength: fate hath decreed
That we should find each other.

EVE
Mighty king,
I know thy word ordains my destiny.
I am thy slave: yet grant a little while
For me to grieve, and then speak thy command.

ADAM
No more that word. Oh, shall my power, then,
Never exceed that word, the word ‘command’?

EVE
Let it suffice if, for the present hour,
That which thou dost command grieve not my heart.
Great Pharaoh, be not jealous that I weep
In sorrow’s first regret for my dead love.
How fair he is in death, how beautiful.
Flings herself on him.

ADAM
How fair in death? The dead cannot be fair.
This tranquil stillness mocks our purposes,
And smiles in pity on our vanity.

LUCIFER
A slave who thee defieth, and hath said
‘Lo, I was stronger than thy chains, o King!’

ADAM
Peace to the dead, but to the living, hail!
He cannot feel thy tear: without thy smile
I suffer torment.
They bear away the dead man. ADAM leads EVE to the throne.
Woman, come to me!
How sweet it is to rest upon thy breast.
A cry of pain from amongst the workers. EVE shudders.
Why dost thou shudder?

EVE
Dost thou not hear, then,
The people’s cry?

ADAM
I had not heard before.
The music is not sweet. But pay no heed.
Kiss me, and yet again: forget the world!
to Lucifer
Silence this wailing, let it cease forthwith.

LUCIFER
I cannot still it. ’Tis the people’s right,
And, with the yoke, is its inheritance.
Again a moan. EVE utters a cry. ADAM rises up.

ADAM
Lady, thou sufferest: and I know not how
To help thee. Through thy heart this cry of pain
Strikes like a flash of lightning on my head.
And, as I feel, the whole world cries for aid.

EVE
Oh, Pharaoh, crush me, but forgive it me,
If, when the people moan, I cannot rest.
I know full well I am thy slave. To give
Thee pleasure is the purpose of my life.
All I forget beside, greatness, despair,
Hopes, visions, and the dead, that I may smile
And yield my lips to thee. But when I hear
The people, with its million outstretched arms,
Groaning beneath the lash of hissing scourge,
As doth the smallest member feel the pain
Of the whole aching body, so I too,
A daughter of the people, in my heart
Suffer the torment of its grievous woe.

ADAM
And I with thee. A million for one!
So spake the dead man too.

EVE
Pharaoh, great King,
Thy face is darkened, and I am the cause.
Drive me from thee, or teach me to grow deaf.

ADAM
Thou should’st thyself a better teacher prove,
For I have learned of thee to hear this cry.
But no more will I hear it. Let the slaves
Be free. What doth the glory profit then,
Which, if a million perish, one shall gain?
Shall one be happy if a million weep,
In whom, too, breathes the breath of that one man?
Joy once, torment a million times I feel.

LUCIFER
Pharaoh, thou art beside thyself. Lo, fate
The common herd dooms, like a beast, to turn
The mill of any sovereignty that rules;
To this end was it formed: deliver it,
It will not gain by what thou throwst away,
And will tomorrow seek another lord.
Couldest thou set thy foot upon its neck
Unless it felt the need to serve a lord,
If, in its breast it did but know itself?

ADAM
Why groaneth it then, as if servitude
Caused it to suffer?

LUCIFER
Suffering it feels,
Yet knows the reason not. For all men strive
For power; and this longing, not the love
Of man for man, the people driveth on
To follow freedom, though to consciousness
This longing wakes not; only ’tis an urge
Driving it onward to seek all such things
As shall be new, and shall repudiate
That which exists already, and therein
It hopeth to see realised the dreams
It ever cherisheth of happiness.
The people is an ocean, and no ray
Of light can pierce its depths for ever dark,
Only the wave upon its surface shines,
And, it may be, thou art that wave, o King.

ADAM
And wherefore I?

LUCIFER
Thou, or one like to thee,
In whom the instinct of the people grows
To consciousness, who to thy splendid throne
Doth force his way, the champion adored
Of freedom, while the people nought achieves,
For though his name be changed, the lord remains.

ADAM
Thy logic doth an endless circle trace,
From which it doth seem, there is no escape.

LUCIFER
There is escape. Give to a chosen few
A ring, a chain, or any other toy,
And say ‘Lo, I do raise thee from the crowd,
And dub thee noble.’ They shall deem they are,
And look upon the people with disdain,
Yet gladly brook that thou shouldst hold them mean.

ADAM
Beguile me with no specious argument.
Away with servitude. Let all be free.
Proclaim it them; but hasten, so it be
Too late already if I should repent.

LUCIFER aside
Speed on in thy vain pride upon thy way,
Deem that thou goest, though fate driveth thee.
LUCIFER goes out.

ADAM
And let this work cease, ere it be complete,
A warning sign to him who would be great,
The riddle of our weakness and our strength.
Outside, a great cry of joy. The workmen disperse. LUCIFER returns.
Rejoice, o slave, for greatness bows to thee,
Yet think not greatness was constrained to bow.

EVE
Be comforted, beloved of my soul.
Ah, Pharaoh, what doth glory profit thee,
That glides between us like a serpent cold?

ADAM
But it is great, yea great!

EVE
Away with it.
The cry of grief is dumb and troubles not
Our bliss. When thou dost lean upon my breast
What wouldst thou else?

ADAM
Oh, woman, seest thou
So little and so dimly? Yet therefore
Is proud ambitious man toward thee drawn,
For only weakness can be loved by strength.
So in protecting arms the mother bears
Her little child so helpless and so frail.

EVE
Ah, Pharaoh, with this idle, witless talk
I weary thee already, it may be.
But if I be no wiser, pardon me.

ADAM
Ah, strive not to be wiser, dearest love,
Of knowledge have I for myself enough,
I lean not on thy breast because thou art
Mighty and great, and wise all things to know,
For in my books I may find wisdom writ.
Speak, only speak and let me hear thy voice,
And let its music stream into my heart.
I care not what thou speakest, for who asks
What sings a little bird, yet with delight
We hearken to its liquid melody.
A flower be thou only, profitless
Yet beautiful, and therefore love I thee.
to Lucifer
For one thing only long I in my heart,
Madly it may be, but yet grant it me,
I would upon the future boldly gaze
To know, when some few thousand years have passed,
Shall my renown endure?

LUCIFER
While thou didst kiss,
Didst thou not feel a gentle, cooling breeze
That swept across thy face and then flew on?
A little wave of dust doth mark its flight,
That mounts a few short inches in a year,
And some few cubits in a thousand years;
Yet a few thousand years shall overwhelm
Thy pyramids, and thy great name shall be
Buried beneath a barrier of sand.
Jackals shall in thy pleasure gardens howl,
And, in the desert, dwell a servile race.
While Lucifer speaks all this becomes visible.
All this no raging storm shall bring to pass,
No shuddering upheaval of the earth,
Only a little breeze that gently plays!

ADAM
Dread vision!

LUCIFER with scorn
But yet fear not, for alone
Thy spirit perisheth, thy body stays,
A mummy, a quaint show for heedless boys
The writing faded from its wizened brow,
To show if thou of old wert slave or king.
A Mummy rises up and appears before the throne, and slowly rolls down the steps of it.

ADAM recoiling
Back, foul delusion, hellish form! Begone!
Ambition is but folly, striving vain.
Ever I hear ‘A million for one!’
A million must live and live through me.
And in a free land only may they dwell.
Let the one perish if the many live,
Which maketh of its units one great whole.

EVE
Dost thou forsake me too who am thy love?

ADAM
Thee, and my throne, and all things do I leave.
Lead on, lead on, to new goals, Lucifer,
Much time already have I tarried here
In this blind path.
Goes forward with a drawn sword.

EVE
O King, if thou return
With shattered hope, thy heart shall find in mine
A refuge.

ADAM
Yea, I feel that I shall find
Thee once again, and in a nobler form,
And then thou shalt not kiss me as a slave,
But as an equal with a happy heart.
Departs.

LUCIFER
Haste not so fast: the time sufficeth thee;
And nearer than thy hopes the goal may be:
And thou shalt weep its foolishness to know,
While I shall laugh. Come, let us onward go.

************************************************************

A spacious court in the foreground. Adam, as a young Pharaoh, is seated on a throne, with Lucifer, as his minister, standing in front of him, delivering a flattering speech, whose spurious, ready-made language barely disguises the underlying irony intended. At a respectful distance a splendid retinue is seen waiting. In the background slaves are at work on a pyramid under the supervision of overseers who apply their whips freely. Bright sunshine.

LUCIFER
My Lord, your people are anxious to know -
who’d gladly die if it would please you so -
what makes the mighty Pharoah ill at ease,
unhappy on the velvet of his throne?
Why have you laid aside the day’s delight,
dispensed with dream-spun pictures of the night?
Excess of work why don’t you delegate
to bondsmen - as would seem appropriate?
Already what this great, wide world can offer -
the power and glory - all belong to you;
yes, all the pleasures can delight a man.
A hundred rich dominions call you Lord;
their scented flowers bloom for you alone;
for you they ripen fruit upon the bough.
A thousand women crave for your desire:
the fair-haired beauty with her languid eyes,
delicious, gentle, like a happy dream;
the dark enchantress, burning lips apart,
with frenzied passion glowing in her eyes…
All this is yours. Your whim’s their destiny.
Their little lives will have fulfilled their purpose
by seasoning your single moments’ pleasures…

ADAM
For such as these I’ve no desire at all.
They are my dues as tax, compulsory,
no fruit of self-endeavour, no achievement.
But this immense creation, I believe,
this giant work of art I’m set to build,
can point the way to everlasting greatness.
Nature herself admires the handiwork
in which my name shall stand perpetually.
No earthquake shall displace it, no disaster:
man has become more powerful than god.

LUCIFER
And - you’ve found happiness in this conceit?
Come, Pharaoh, put your hand upon your heart.

ADAM
I’ve found a gap, a void, I can’t describe it.
But, after all, who prayed for happiness?
It’s glory that I’ve wanted - and attained.
Even so, don’t let the people see my anguish:
they’d sooner pity than revere their master.

LUCIFER
What if you find one day, as find you will,
that glory’s only a short-lived, empty plaything.

ADAM
Impossible.

LUCIFER
But if you did?

ADAM
I’d die
and curse the world I had to leave behind.

LUCIFER
You won’t, although you’ll see the point - in vain,
for you’ll persist and court success again.
The overseers beat one of the workers so savagely that with a cry of anguish he runs into the Pharaoh’s court-room, followed by his persecutors, and collapses in front of the throne.

SLAVE
Help me, my Lord!
Eve, as the slave’s wife, rushes forward from among the workers and with a tortured scream she throws herself on her husband’s body.

EVE
No use! Why ask the Pharaoh?
How could he understand? He feels no pain
like one of us. Our groan’s not loud enough;
his throne’s too high above us. Call for me,
and I’ll protect you from the cruel scourges
with my own body.

ADAM
[to the overseers who press forward to drag them away]
Let them be! Get out!
[to himself]
What is this strange upsurge of sympathy?
Who is this woman here? Where has she come by
the charms which all but overwhelm the Pharaoh
and drag him down to join her in the dust?
[Adam rises.]

LUCIFER
That subtle gossamer you’ve seen before -
in which your master trapped you for a jest.
It’s to remind you that you’d been a worm,
when like a butterfly you proudly flutter.
You must have seen how strong this fibre is:
so delicate, it slips between the fingers
and can’t be torn apart.

ADAM
[descending from the throne]
Don’t try it either.
Although it hurts, it gives me pleasure too.

LUCIFER
A shame to find a thinker and a king
enmeshed in it.

ADAM
Then what’s the remedy?

LUCIFER
Let scholarship concoct an argument
against the existence of these occult tangles,
then crude materialism can shrug it off.

ADAM
I doubt if I could stoop to either of these.

EVE
My love, you’re bleeding. Let me help you. Come!
I’ll have to wipe this blood. There! Does it hurt?

SLAVE
It’s life that hurts, but cannot hurt much longer.

EVE
No! No! You’ll live! You mustn’t talk of dying.
Why should you die? You’ve just come back to life!

SLAVE
Why should I live, a slave? To build the Pharaoh
his pyramid, raise children for his bondage
and then to die? A million dies for one!

ADAM
O Lucifer, these words! What does he mean?

LUCIFER
Wild ramblings only of a dying man.

ADAM
What did he mean?

LUCIFER
Great Pharaoh, what’s the matter?
Is this indeed a thing of some importance?
The world’s about to lose - another slave.

EVE
To you he’s just a number, but to me
he’s all I have. And who will love me now?

SLAVE
I’m dying, woman. Put me out of mind.
[He dies.]

ADAM
Then I will love you. Take away the corpse.
[Attendants lift the body to take it out.]
Come, here’s your proper place upon this throne,
for you’re as much a sovereign queen of graces
as I’m a sovereign power. This was to be.
We had to meet each other.

EVE
Mighty Pharaoh
I know your will commands our destiny.
I’m not reluctant either, only grant me
a little time and then do as you will.

ADAM
Don’t use that word: “command”. For all my kingdom
can I obtain nothing without command?

EVE
A good thing, Pharaoh, that the words you’re saying
even now don’t seem to hurt, but for the moment
do not begrudge my first tears for the dead.
How handsome, and he’s dead. O, gods, he’s dead!
[She throws herself on the body.]

ADAM
He’s handsome, and he’s dead. It doesn’t follow.
He’s sneering at our strife in his repose,
or sadly smiling at our vanities.

LUCIFER
A slave, a runaway who still defies you:
he’s bragging that he’s overcome your chains.

ADAM
Peace to the dead, and to the living - pleasure!
He won’t appreciate your tears, my lady,
whereas I miss your smiles.
The corpse is taken out. Adam leads Eve to the throne.
Here, sit beside me.
How wonderful to hold you in my arms!
A sudden cry of anguish among the workers. Eve shudders.
What’s wrong, my love?

EVE
Your people cry with pain.
O, can’t you hear?

ADAM
I’ve heard it for the first time.
It’s not a pleasing sound: try not to listen.
Come, kiss me and forget about the world.
[to Lucifer]
And you there, go and silence that commotion!

LUCIFER
I can’t do that. It’s their prerogative.
Groans go with chains, inherited together.
Another groan from the workers. Eve cries out in pain. Adam rises.

ADAM
What can I do to ease your suffering?
Rebounding from your heart these cries of anguish,
like thunderbolts, have struck me by the head.
I think the world is crying out for help.

EVE
Destroy me, Pharaoh, but forgive me this:
the people’s cries won’t Let me rest at ease.
I am your bondslave, as I surely know;
my single aim in life is your delight.
I would forget, I would shut out the world,
my misery, my dreams, my dead one even,
that I won’t lack the fun, my lips the fire,
but when I hear that million-handed creature,
the toiling people groan beneath the scourges,
as from the body’s harm all members suffer,
even I, forsaken daughter of your people,
within my throbbing heart I feel the pain.

ADAM
I see it now. A million dies for one.
That’s what the dead man said.

EVE
O, noble Pharaoh,
you look unhappy and I am to blame…
Drive me from you or teach me not to hear.

ADAM
It’s you who are by far the better teacher,
for you could teach me how to hear that cry.
I’ll have no more of that. Release the slaves!
Let them be free. There’s no delight in glory
attained to gratify a single human
if millions die for it and millions groan
in whom the human cries out to be heard.
I’m plagued a million times for all my pleasures.

LUCIFER
Pharaoh, you must be raving! Look, the masses
are only beasts of burden pre-appointed
by fate to tread the mills of all regimes.
They’re made for that. Give them today their freedom,
from all your loss no gain, no profit made,
they’ll find another master by tomorrow.
You think that you could ride them as you do
if they did not require an overlord,
or had self-conscious, independent minds?

ADAM
But don’t they groan as if their bondage hurt them?

LUCIFER
Indeed, it hurts them, but they don’t know why.
In every human there’s a lust for power:
that is the spur, not solidarity,
which rallies multitudes to flags of freedom,
unable as they are to comprehend
the motive which still drives them like a goad.
Hence their rejection of existing order,
and their innate obsession with the new,
in whose pursuit they hope to realise
the dreams they entertain of happiness.
O, yes, the masses are a murky ocean:
no light can penetrate that darksome gulf.
It’s waves that glitter, tossing on the surface,
and by a happy chance - you are a wave.

ADAM
Why me?

LUCIFER
Well, you, or someone not unlike you,
who’s grown aware of that instinctive urge
and fights his way to your resplendent place
acclaimed by all the champion of the people.
Meanwhile the herd, with no advantage gained,
will change its name and serve another master.

ADAM
There’s no escaping from your disputation:
it’s going round and round, a vicious circle.

LUCIFER
There’s one escape, though. Should you give the few
aspiring characters some chains or rings
or other baubles, saying, “I create you
an overlord! You are a nobleman!” -
they’ll take your words, and while they spurn the mob,
they suffer you to hold them in contempt.

ADAM
Don’t tease me with your specious arguments.
No slaves, I say. Let every one be free
Give out this proclamation to the people.
Have done with it before I change my mind.

LUCIFER
[to the audience]
Conceited man, you’ll no doubt postulate
that you have made this move, and not your fate!
[Exit.]

ADAM
Now, let this artifice stand unaccomplished,
colossal ruin to warn ambitious men,
a question mark against our strengths and failings.
Great cheering outside. The workers disperse and Lucifer returns.
Slavedom, rejoice! A Pharaoh stoops to you.
But don’t presume he’s been compelled to stoop.

EVE
Take heart, my love, and put your mind at ease.
Why must you long for some relentless glory
which creeps between us like a deadly snake?

ADAM
It’s a stupendous thing!

EVE
Don’t think of it.
The groans are hushed, our bliss is undisturbed.
Lean on my breast. What more can you desire?

ADAM
How narrow is your feminine horizon!
And yet it does attract the haughty male,
for frailty holds the strong infatuated.
As wary parents grow the more protective
the more forlorn their child appears to them.

EVE
O, Pharaoh, it’s a shame to weary you
with all this useless, idle talk of mine.
I’m not too clever, but I cannot help it.

ADAM
Don’t try to help it either, lovely one,
for brains I have myself which will suffice.
You think I mean to linger on your breast
for power or greatness, or indeed for knowledge,
which, I believe, is better found in books?
Just talk to me and let me hear your voice,
let its vibrations penetrate the heart;
the subject-matter makes no difference.
What has the nightingale to say? Who cares?
One hears the song transported with delight.
Be like a flower, a darling ornament,
useless, but for the single virtue - beauty.
[to Lucifer]
There’s one more thing that mars our perfect bliss,
a fatuous wish, perhaps, but yours to grant.
Give us a daring glimpse into the future.
Let’s see our name go down the centuries
into posterity.

LUCIFER
While you embraced,
a gentle breeze stirred up - you might have felt it.
It lighted on your face, then passed away,
but left a tiny layer of dust behind.
Within a year this dust can grow to inches;
increase a few feet in a hundred years;
some thousand years shall top your pyramids
and have your name engulfed in mounds of sand.
The jackal’s howl shall fill your pleasure-gardens
and vagabonds shall roam the wilderness…
[While Lucifer speaks all this becomes visible.]
All this through no upheavals of the sky,
or shattering convulsions of the earth,
but by this gentle breeze which plays around.

ADAM
How dreadful!

LUCIFER
[with a sneer]
Don’t despair! Your spirit lost,
your body shall endure, preserved a mummy,
a curiosity for boys at school,
its face deformed and the inscription faded:
no one to know if it spelt king or slave.
He hicks at the mummy which has appeared in front of the throne. Slowly it rolls down the steps. Startled by this, Adam jumps to his feet.

ADAM
Take this away! Your curst infernal visions!
O, false ambitions, unavailing strife!
I still can hear: “A, million dies for one!”
Why, then, I must emancipate those millions.
No other way: a free society!
Self interest must yield to common cause:
the many parts will make a healthy total.

EVE
And will you leave your love behind so soon?

ADAM
Yes. I must leave you, throne and everything,
To new horizons! Lead me, Lucifer!
I’ve wasted too much time in this blind alley.
[He is about to leave.]

EVE
If you return, my Lord, with shattered hopes,
you’ll find a shelter in my love.

ADAM
Indeed,
I can foresee that in the distant future
I’ll meet you in a more exalted form:
then you will love me - no more in obedience,
but as my equal, partner of my joy.
[Exit.]

LUCIFER
Not so much haste. There’s time enough to spare.
You’ll reach the goal before you think you’re there -
and break your heart to find it so inane.
I’ll have my laughs. Meantime - we’ll try again.

************************************************************

In Egypt. Before an open hall. ADAM, as a youthful PHARAOH, seated on a throne. LUCIFER is his minister. A magnificent retinue attends at a respectable distance. In the background, slaves are building a pyramid driven on by guards with whips. Clear daylight.

LUCIFER
My lord, your subjects who would gladly shed
Their life-blood for you are concerned to know
What prevents great Pharaoh from enjoying
Tranquil rest upon his pillowed throne?
Why renounce, they ask, the joys of daylight,
The charming dreams and images of night,
Why not instead allow some useful slave
To bear the burden of your grand design,
Since every honour, every potency
The world can offer is already yours,
As well as all the pleasures man can bear.
A hundred rich dominions call you master,
For you their flowers offer up their fragrance,
For you alone the sweet fruit grows and ripens,
It is for you a thousand women sigh,
The flaxen beauty with her languid eyes,
So delicate and fair, a vision dancing,
The girl with auburn hair and panting lips,
Whose burning eyes are maddened with desire -
All yours, my lord. Your whims dictate their fate,
And each of them will feel herself fulfilled
If she may tender you a moment’s pleasure.

ADAM
Not one of these things takes my fancy now,
They are my due, like taxes. I don’t earn them
Through my own exertions or in heat of battle. -
But with this work which occupies me now
I do believe I’ve found the way to greatness.
Nature herself will wonder at such skill,
And ring my name down the millennia.
Earthquake or tempest - nothing can destroy it.
Man has become more powerful than God.

LUCIFER
But Pharaoh, lay your hand upon your heart
And tell me if this prospect makes you happy.

ADAM
Ah no, there is an untold emptiness,
Some awful void. No matter, it is glory
I want, not happiness. And glory waits.
If only they knew nothing of my sorrow:
The masses cease to worship when they pity.

LUCIFER
But what if one day you should see through glory
And find it a mere transitory plaything.

ADAM
Impossible!

LUCIFER
But all the same.

ADAM
I’d die
And curse the world to come.

LUCIFER
You will see through it,
But you’ll not die - in fact you’ll start upon
A fresh career. With much the same success.
The overseers beat one of the SLAVES so fiercely that he runs in anguish into the hall and falls before the throne

SLAVE
My lord, your help!
EVE, as his bride, rushes forward from the ranks of the workers and embraces her husband, weeping passionately

EVE
It’s no use asking him.
How could one who has never felt our pain
Begin to understand it. The higher the throne
The fainter sounds the cry. Why not call me?
My body covers yours and takes the force
Of every blow.

ADAM
to the overseers who crowd forward to take the pair away
Leave her. Off with you!
They go
What strange emotion flutters at my heart?
Who is this woman, and what kind of charm
Does she possess that she can drag great Pharaoh
Down to the dust beside her with its chains?
He rises

LUCIFER
Another piece of webbing, that is all,
Which God, in mockery, has wound about you,
So that, when in your vanity, you play
At butterflies, you’ll not forget that you
Were once a grub. You saw before how strong
This slender thread can be, which slips through fingers
So I cannot tear it.

ADAM descending from the throne
Do not even try to.
It is as comforting as it is galling.

LUCIFER
Philosophers and kings, however, should not
Toil within its webs.

ADAM
Then what am I to do?

LUCIFER mocking
There’s nothing for it but for science to
Deny that such a hidden thread exists.
Let energy and matter scoff at it.

ADAM
But I can neither scoff at it nor deny it.

EVE
Ah dearest, how you bleed! I’ll staunch the flow.
Your suffering must be unbearable.

SLAVE
What hurts is life. Its pain is quickly over.

EVE
You must not say that! Why live just so long
To die but now when we have found each other?

SLAVE
A slave? Why does he live - to carry stones
And raise his master’s pyramid, to breed
His own successor for the yoke, and die.
A million souls for one.

ADAM
What awful words,
Oh Lucifer!

LUCIFER
The babbling of a corpse.

ADAM
What was he saying?

LUCIFER
Why should you care, Pharaoh?
It is, indeed, a most important matter
To see the rank of slaves reduced by one.

EVE
Only a sum to you, the world to me.
Merciful heavens, who will love me now?

SLAVE
Not I, no longer - you must forget me, woman.
He dies

ADAM
Then I will love you. Take away the body.
They raise the body
Arise, madam, your place is on the throne
Upon the cushion. You are the paragon:
Of beauty and I of power. We are fated
To meet each other everywhere.

EVE
Your highness,
I know too well that you command the fate
Of slaves. I do not question it. But wait -
Give me a little time, then I am yours.

ADAM
No, not that word again. Is everything
To come to me through that one word “command”?

EVE
Oh let it be enough that your command
Does not distress me - and do not be jealous
Of tears that I must shed for one who is dead.
How fair he is in death. My Lord, how fair!
She flings herself across the corpse

ADAM
Both fair and dead: how strange a contradiction.
Such stillness mocks at our ambition, smiles
With pity at our vanity.

LUCIFER
A slave,
One who escaped you, mocks at you and says,
My strength is greater now than all your fetters.

ADAM
Peace to the dead and greetings to the living.
He cannot feel your tears, but oh I suffer
Agonies without your smile.
They take the dead mare out. ADAM leads EVE to the throne
Come here.
How sweet to lay my head against your breast.
A cry of pain from among the workers. EVE shudders
What is it, my love?

EVE
Oh can’t you hear
The people’s cry of pain?

ADAM
It is the first time
I have noticed it. A sorry music -
But come and kiss me and forget the world.
To Lucifer
And you, please put an end to all this wailing.

LUCIFER
I can’t do that. It is the people’s birthright,
One that they inherit with the yoke.
Another cry of pain. EVE screams out. ADAM rises

ADAM
Oh lady, you are suffering and I
Hardly know how to help you. That cry, like lightning,
Pierces your heart and strikes at my head. It feels
As if the world were crying out for help.

EVE
Oh Pharaoh, crush me if you will - forgive me
If the people’s cry of woe won’t let me test.
I am your slave, as I know very well,
My life’s one purpose is to give you pleasure.
I will forget about the world outside:
The splendour, poverty, the dreams, the dead,
I’ll sweeten my smile and make my lips more luscious.
But when the people, that million-limbed creature
Begins to moan under the lash, then I,
Their exiled daughter, and a tiny part
Of that great aching body, feel each cry
Of every pain they suffer in my heart.

ADAM
I feel with you - a million souls for one -
The dead man’s words…

EVE
You are melancholy,
Great Pharaoh. It is my fault. Drive me off
Or teach me to be deaf.

ADAM
You’d make a finer tutor
For you can teach me how to hear such pain.
I’ve had enough. Oh, liberate the slaves,
Dismiss them all. What is the point of glory
If it can only be achieved through torture,
Through one man sacrificing millions
In whom there breathes the same clear human spirit?
I feel a million pains for each delight.

LUCIFER
Pharaoh, you are confused. The masses are
Mere creatures of fate, living under sentence.
You’d see them tread the mill in any system,
That is what they are made for. Free them now
And they’d gain nothing by your futile gesture -
Tomorrow they would seek another master.
Do you imagine you could sit astride them
Were they themselves not anxious to have masters?
If there were any consciousness in them?

ADAM
But why this wailing - could it be the yoke
Tormented them?

LUCIFER
Something hurts them, true,
But what, they could not tell you. Men seek power
And that is all there is. It is the spur.
It’s not fraternity that drives the masses
Towards the flag of freedom. I do not say
That they would recognize this - no; they itch
For novelty and spurn a settled order;
They hope to realize in novelty
Their dreams of happiness. An unplumbed sea
The people: sunbeams cannot penetrate
Their murky depths. But one wave scintillates,
A single fleeting brilliance. A wave like you.

ADAM
Why me?

LUCIFER
Or someone like you. One in whom
The people’s instinct comes to consciousness,
Some venerated champion of freedom
Who dares to oust you from your shining realm.
The masses, of course, never profit by it:
The names may change, the master still remains.

ADAM
Your logic runs in never ending circles
From which there seems no prospect of escape.

LUCIFER
Escape there is. Present a chosen few
With necklaces or rings or some such bauble,
And say to them: I raise you from the crowd,
You are hereby ennobled - they’ll believe you,
And looking down on others with disdain
Accept, without demur, your condescension.

ADAM
Please spare me all your specious arguments.
Away with slavery, let them all go free.
Inform them of this now, with greatest haste,
Immediately, before I change my mind.

LUCIFER aside
Proceed with all your vanity, be gone:
You think you act - it’s fate that draws you on.
He leaves

ADAM
The work must stop, unfinished as it is,
The fragments will serve to humble the ambitious,
A paradox of power and impotence.
Great joy outside as the workers disperse. LUCIFER returns
Rejoice, you slaves, your lord bows down before you.
But never think he was compelled to it.

EVE
Console yourself, my love, for after all
What earthly use are pomp and circumstance?
They creep and crawl between us like a snake.

ADAM
How vast, how vast it is!

EVE
Away with it.
You see, the cries have stopped. Our courting will
Be undisturbed. Oh Lean against my bosom -
What more can you desire?

ADAM
How restricted
Are your horizons, woman. And yet this
Precisely is what charms ambitious men -
The strong are fated to desire the weak.
It’s what a parent feels so ardently
When holding his helpless child within his arms.

EVE
Perhaps, O Pharaoh, I already bore you
With needless, incoherent chattering.
I cannot help it if I am no wiser.

ADAM
Do not even wish to be, my dearest.
One intellect is quite enough for me.
It’s not for power or majesty I seek
Your breast, nor knowledge. Books can grant me these
More readily. Simply continue talking,
Talk on, that I may ever hear your voice,
Suffuse my heart with its sweet resonance,
Say anything whatever. Oh, who wants
To know what little birds are singing when
They bring such intimations of delight.
Be but a flower, be charming bric-a-brac
Whose worth lies not in function but sheer beauty.
To Lucifer
But something bothers me and breaks the spell
Of sensuous reverie. It may be foolish
And yet, I beg you, satisfy this longing -
Let me cast just one intrepid glance
Into the future, a few millennia hence,
And know my reputation.

LUCIFER
Can you feel,
Even as you kiss, a light caressing
Breeze that touches your face, then flies away?
It leaves the faintest coating of fine dust.
Next year you’ll see it gathering in creases,
A century, you plunge your arm in it;
A thousand years, your pyramids are buried;
Great drifts of sand obliterate your name;
Your pleasure gardens fill with cries of jackals;
A race of slaves and beggars roam the desert.
All that LUCIFER describes becomes visible
No fearful cataclysm brings this on,
No thunderstorms or earthquakes are required;
A breeze, that’s all, the breeze which plays about you.

ADAM
A dreadful sight!

LUCIFER mocking
Why worry? It is only
Your soul that’s lost, your body stays intact
And perfectly preserved for curious schoolboys
To puzzle at your twisted face, to guess
From scuffed inscriptions if you’re slave or master?
He kicks at a mummy which has appeared before the throne. It rolls down the stairs

ADAM leaping up
Infernal image! Get away from me!
Vain strife and even emptier ambition -
A million souls for one - the words still ring.
And so I must emancipate the millions
In one free state. There’s nothing left for it.
Let one man die providing the state lives
And makes an entity of single men.

EVE
And will you leave me too, your own true love?

ADAM
Yes - you, the throne, I must leave everything.
Lead on, O Lucifer, to some new goal.
I’ve wasted too much time in this blind alley.
He sets out with drawn sword

EVE
My lord, remember - if you should return
With shattered hopes, my heart will offer shelter.

ADAM
Indeed, I think I will discover you
In purer form wherever we next meet,
But then you will embrace me not as slave
But as an equal with a sense of pleasure.
He goes

LUCIFER
Why all this haste? You’ll get there soon enough,
Sooner perhaps than you had hoped. Your folly
Will find you out and leave you melancholy.
It should be most amusing. Let’s be off.

************************************************************

Egypt. In the foreground an open hall. ADAM as PHARAOH is young and sits on the throne. LUCIFER as minister to him; in a respectful distance illustrious attendants. In the background slaves are building a pyramid under the control of supervisors with whips. Bright day.

LUCIFER

Your Majesty! The people who would be glad
To fail for you has asked full of anxiety,
What's that doesn't allow the great Pharaoh
To have a rest on the cushion of his throne?
Why do you sacrifice the day's delights
And the honey-sweet dreams of peaceful nights,
And why don't you leave troubles of your plans
To the slaves who would take this with heartful thanks,
When all honours, all dominations and all
Delights all over the world that can be
Ever tolerated: all these are yours.
Treasures of provinces proclaim your lordship,
For you the fragrant flowers open their bells,
Fruit-trees yield their sweetness only to you.
Thousand ladies fling out their arms to you:
The blond fairness with her fornicating eyes
Like a fond and charming graceful vision,
Brunettes wait for you with wheezing-throbbing lips
And with eyes misted by violent ardour -
All these are yours. Their fate is your fancy,
They feel their duty to be kindly performed
Having dulcified even some hours of you.

ADAM

My soul has no hunger for vanities
Like these taxes collected spontaneously,
I don't strive for it coming without my work. -
But this monument that I'm creating
Will certainly help me to find the way
Leading to the summit of true greatness.
Its art will now be marvellous to nature
And will preserve my name for thousand years,
No earthquake, no disaster will worsen it:
Man became much stronger than the Lord himself.

LUCIFER

And yet, Pharaoh, are you bestowed
On this fancy. Tell me in all honesty.

ADAM

No, I'm not. I feel extreme emptiness.
No matter, I did implore not happiness,
Only the fame, and this is open'd to me.
Crowd should not foresee my distress - if it
Would pity me, its adoration would cease.

LUCIFER

And if some time you will understand that
Fame has been a flashing silly-crazy fun?

ADAM

That's nonsense.

LUCIFER

And if it were so?

ADAM

I should die,
Having call'd down curses upon the whole world.

LUCIFER

You will not die, but understand it some time,
You'll even recommence with your past success.

(Supervisors beat one of the slaves so he runs wailing and persecuted by supervisors into the hall and falls down in front of the throne.)

THE SLAVE

Mylord! Help!

EVE (as wife to the slave parts from the workers and drops herself on his husband with heart-rending howl.)

You do implore him in vain!
Who never had share in our suffering
He's at a loss! The cry of pain is low
And throne stands too high. Why do you not call me
Who conceals you and holds off all the lashings
By her body.

ADAM (to the supervisors who crush in and want to drag away the slave and his wife)

Leave them there and get away.
(Supervisors exeunt)
What's the feeling in my heart unknown so far,
Who's this woman and what's her glamour which
Like a chain pulls down the great Pharaoh
To this worm who is rolling in dirty dust? (Stands up.)

LUCIFER

This is one of the threads again by which
Your Lord has scoffingly afflicted you,
To remember even if you flutter
Proudly: you are a small worm in yourself.
You saw how strong this slender thread may be,
It winds out always of your hands and hence
I can't tear it to bits.

ADAM (Walking down the throne's steps.)

You would be wrong.
It is as outrageous as it's pleasant.

LUCIFER

But it's befitting that a sage and king
Should suffer from it.

ADAM

What shall I do then?

LUCIFER

Ah, there is nothing for it but knowledge
Denies the existence of this hidden thread
That's laughed harshly by power and matter.

ADAM

I can neither laugh it off nor deny it.

EVE

Darling, your blood is running drop by drop,
I'll stop it, does it give much pain to you?

THE SLAVE

Life is painful to me but not for long.

EVE

This is not so, why would you have lived so far
When you would die now, as you have found me?

THE SLAVE

Why slaves have to live? - He bears stones to the
Pyramid for the mighty, when his issue
Is in his yoke, dies. - Millions for one.

ADAM

Oh, Lucifer, what outrageous words these are!

LUCIFER

That is feverish madness of agony.

ADAM

What did he say?

LUCIFER

Great Pharaoh, what's that?
Well I never! It is magnificent:
It is less by one slave who live on the Earth.

EVE

For you poor number, but for me the world,
Woe to me, oh woe to me, who will love me? -

THE SLAVE

Me not more. - Forget me, lady, for ever. (He dies.)

ADAM

It's me who does it. Hi, carry out the corpse!
(People lift up the corpse.)
Arise! My lady! The throne is your due,
You are the princess of fascination like
Me that of the power - we have to find each
Other anywhere.

EVE

Oh, great Pharaoh,
I know your order is fate of all slaves,
I don't make excuses, but allow me
A short time only, then I wait your orders.

ADAM

Let this word be off! Oh, the fate of my reign,
Not to go beyond the words of orders?

EVE

It's enough now that this order does not
Cause pain to me; oh, in this first moment
Don't be envious of my tears for this corpse. -
This corpse, how beautiful is it, my God!
(Drops herself on it.)

ADAM

Beautiful and dead: what contradiction!
Is this coolness mocking to our efforts
Or a woeful smile to our vanity?

LUCIFER

It's an escaped slave who flouts you proudly,
Saying: I became stronger than your shackles.

ADAM

Peace to his remains and hail to the life.
It's all very well for him, but I can't
Spare your smile.

(The corpse is carried out. ADAM leads EVE to the throne.)

Let you be, my lady, here!
Oh! It's wonderful to have a rest with you.

(Yammering among the workers. EVE shudders.)

What's amiss with you?

EVE

Oh, do you not hear
The people's woe?

ADAM

It's first that I perceive it.
It has an ominous ring, but never mind!
Kiss me, kiss me and forget, forget the world. (To LUCIFER)
And you stop the mouth of this crazy crowd.

LUCIFER

It is beyond me, this is people's right,
Together with yoke it's the heir of it.

(Yammering again. EVE cries out, ADAM rises.)

ADAM

Lady, you suffer and I do not know
How to help. The scream beats my head through your heart
Like the summer thunderbolt from the blue
And I feel so that the world cries for help.

EVE

Oh, Pharaoh, stamp flat but forgive me
When this people's wailing does not make me ease,
I'm aware of being your docile maid
And it's my aim to entertain your lordship.
I shall forget everything outside me:
Misery and greatness, reveries and corpse
For I've beatific smile and ardent lips;
But if the people of millions of arms
Suffers the cuts with whip and wails outside
Like small scraps of the ever-aching body,
Me, the renegade maiden of this people,
In my heart am a prey to these torments.

ADAM

And so do I. - The millions for one -
The dead also said. -

EVE

Oh, great Pharaoh!
Your brow darkened and this is my fault,
Cast me off or, please, instruct me how to be
Deaf as a stone.

ADAM

You've been much better master,
You have taught me to perceive the wailing. -
I'll hear it never again. - See! Be free
All the slaves. What good will the fame do to me
That I can catch up only as one person
Through ruination and wail of millions
Who breathe also like the human being;
I feel many times pain, but once the delight.

LUCIFER

Oh, Pharaoh, you are in clouds; the crowd
Is the brute beast of fate that will work hard
Under every types of every systems.
This is its fate. Let it be released from this:
What you fling away, it does not win it
And seeks for new lordship even tomorrow.
Do you believe to foist yourself on it
When does not feel to need master by all means?
Or when is self-respected by itself?

ADAM

Why is it wailing, why? As slavery
Would be painful?

LUCIFER

It doesn't know what's wailing.
Everybody has a desire to rule,
Only this and not fraternity will
Pursue the huge crowd to join and be behind
The banner of freedom, - this is fairly well
Free of consciousness and it worried by
Surmises for everything what is new
And negation of those existing so far.
This is the blind hope to see its dreams on the
Happiness to be vainly realized.
People: it's an abyssal sea being not
Translucent to sunbeam; it'll be always dark,
Only the wave is sparkling thrown in the air
And maybe just you'll be the gleaming wave.

ADAM

Why just me?

LUCIFER

All the same, akin to you
Who became conscious of the popular drive
And who as the beloved hero of freedom
Tries to replace you at your higher place.
Meanwhile, the crowd, winning but nothing, will
Change its name, the master is preserved.

ADAM

Your obstinacy runs in an endless ring,
Maybe there's no way to escape from it

LUCIFER

There is. Give these men endow'd with special
Privilege some armlets, rings or other
Knick-knacks, say: here you are, I prefer you
To the crowd and this is why you'll be nobler -
They take for granted and disdaining the crowd
Endure to be despised by you, as well.

ADAM

Don't tempt me with such fascinating fancies.
Get out with the slaves! Be free all of them.
Proclaim this to them, but be in hurry,
Not to be too late if I would regret it.

LUCIFER (aside)

Go ahead proudly, go about your way,
Think you're going when fate carries away.

ADAM

This object must remained uncompleted,
Warning ruin to megalomany,
Question-mark to our power and frailty.

(Outside shouts of joy, workers disperse. Re-enters LUCIFER.)

LUCIFER

Be glad you slaves, the mighty has bow'd down,
But don't believe it to act under pressure.

EVE

Be consoled, oh be consoled, my darling!
What good will the barren glory do to us
While creeping between us like a serpent.

ADAM

But it is great.

EVE

Get out with it! You see, wail
Became silent, will not disturb our delight.
What do you crave for when rest in my arms?

ADAM

Your horizon is narrow and flimsy,
And just this attracts the proud man to your arms -
Indulgence only can be loved by power
Like protecting parents support their son
Most heartily due to his resourcelessness.

EVE

Alas, Pharaoh! Maybe I bore you
With my idle talk and my empty chatter?
All is in vain! I am not more cultur'd.

ADAM

Don't want to be more clever, my darling.
I am sound of mind and that's enough to me.
I search your arms neither for power, neither
For greatness nor for knowledge, into all these
I can go further in my books. You have
To chatter so I listen to your voice
To be aware throughout me of its flutter.
It's the same what you tell, nobody will ask
What the tiny bird is singing. We shall
Listen to it with sweet expectations.
Be you only flower, a dear trinket
That's useless but fair: this is its merit. (To LUCIFER)
And yet, I am eagerly wishing something.
Maybe it's crazy - but please, meet my wish -
Let me have a fearless look in advance,
To several thousands of years: how my fame
Will live on afterwards?

LUCIFER

While you are kissing
Do you not feel lukewarm and gentle breeze
That lightly laps your face and flies away?
Thin layer is left where it is flying off,
This dust thickens a year only some inches,
But amounts to ells during centuries,
Millennia will bury your pyramids,
Your name will be sunk into the sand dunes,
Jackal howls in your gardens of delight,
Beggars, slaves will populate the desert

(What LUCIFER says, all become visible)

And this is done neither by sky-shaking
Tempests, nor by roaring and howling earthquakes:
Only by mild breeze that flutters round you.

ADAM

Dreadful picture!

LUCIFER (with irony)

Don't fear! Just your mind is lost,
Your body is preserv'd as a mummy:
Object of curiosity of school-boys,
With distorted face and without the faint script
Whether it was a slave or perhaps master.

(He kicks towards a mummy that occurred meanwhile in front of he throne and now is slowly rolling down on the throne's steps.)

ADAM (jumping up)

Infernal delusion! Get out! Get out!
Vain efforts, crazy megalomany -
It rings in my ear: millions for one.
I have to assert the right of millions
In free state - elsewhere that's impossible.
Be the person vanish'd when people lives
Making the whole from individuals.

EVE

And you leave also me, me, your true love?

ADAM

Indeed! I leave you, the throne, everything.
Guide me, Lucifer, to new intentions,
Anyhow, I fool away many time
In this wrong track.
(Starts, drawing his sword.)

EVE

Mylord! If you return with
Broken heart, you will find retreat in my arms.

ADAM

That's true, I suspect to find also you
In an image that is highly purified.
Then you'll hold me in your arms not by order
But - equal in rank - with feeling of delight. (exit)

LUCIFER

Don't be in hurry, you will run down your scope
In time, maybe much farther back than you hope,
You'll cry when you see, it is crazy and hard,
While I am laughing. - Let's go ahead. Forward!

************************************************************

[_ludwigm]

SCENE IV - EGYPT
- Egypt, c. 2650 BC. Adam is a Pharaoh, most likely Djoser; Lucifer his Vizier; Eve is the wife of a slave.

- [#img] http://www.hung-art.hu/kep/z/zichy/muve ... h/04_1.jpg[/img] -

[_ludwigm]

IMRE MADÁCH: (link)
"THE TRAGEDY OF MAN" 1861 (link)

SCENE V - ATHENS
- Athens, 489 BC. Adam is Miltiades the Younger; Lucifer is a guard; Eve is Miltiades' wife.

************************************************************

Athens. A public square with a tribune for speaking in the centre. In the foreground on one side the open porch of a temple with statues of gods, garlands, and an altar. EVE as Lucia, the wife of Miltiades, the commander of the army, with her son KIMON, accompanied by a few slaves who bear objects for sacrifice, comes before the temple. In the square people in rags are moving to and fro. A sunny morning.

EVE
Hither, come hither, dearest son, and see.
Thy father yonder in his speedy ship
Sailed forth to fight on a far, hostile land.
For there beyond, there dwells a cruel race
That threatens our fair nation’s liberty.
Come, Kimon, let us pray the mighty gods
That Heaven shall protect our people’s right
And bring thy valiant father safe again.

KIMON
Why hath my father fared so far away,
This ragged cowardly people to protect,
And left his lovely wife to grieve at home?

EVE
Nay, judge thy noble father not, for God
Doth on such children lay his heavy curse.
Only a loving woman hath the right
To mourn the mighty exploits of her lord,
And shame would feel if he did not such deeds.
Thy father hath done what befits a man.

KIMON
Then dost thou fear that he will vanquished be?

EVE
Nay, boy, he is a hero, and will gain
The victory; one thing I fear alone
That of himself he prove not vanquisher.

KIMON
How meanest thou?

EVE
There is a mighty word
That fires men’s hearts, ambition! In the slave
It sleeps; or in his narrow soul debased,
Sinks to be crime, but, nourished with the blood
Of freedom, grows to greatness, and the pride
Of citizenship; and all noble things
Waketh to life; but if it prove too strong,
It turneth on its mother, strives with her
Until one or the other bleed to death.
If in his heart ambition should wax bold,
And he should e’er this sacred land betray,
My curse were on him. Let us pray, my son.
They withdraw into the temple. Meanwhile the square becomes more and more thronged.

FIRST VOICE FROM THE CROWD
No stirring news of warfare, it would seem
Our army hath not met the enemy.

SECOND VOICE FROM THE CROWD
And in the city all men sleep. Does none
Perchance yet form a plan that, as of old,
Must, ere it may be carried out, receive
The sanction of the sovereign people’s voice?
To this place early am I come today,
Yet have I met no client for my vote.

FIRST VOICE FROM THE CROWD
A weary life, my friends, what shall we do?

THIRD VOICE FROM THE CROWD
A little uproar would not come amiss.
Meanwhile EVE has lit the fire on the altar, washed her hands and prepared for the sacrifice to be offered. Her Attendant Maidens begin a hymn which mingles, verse by verse, with the scene that follows. The square is filled with citizens and people. Two demagogues fight for the tribune.

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
Away, this place is mine, if I speak not,
The country is in peril, get thee gone!
The crowd cheer.

SECOND DEMAGOGUE
Nay, but the State will perish if thou speak.
The crowd laugh and clap.
Base hireling, get thee gone.

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
No hireling thou,
For none would hire thee. Citizens, in grief
I raise my voice, for to a noble mind
Woeful it is to bring a great man low.
And yet I must, before your judgement seat,
From his triumphal chariot drag him down.

SECOND DEMAGOGUE
Thou knave, a good beginning dost thou make,
Go, deck with bloom the beast thou hast ordained
For sacrifice.

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
Away from here, begone!

VOICES FROM THE CROWD
Why do we hearken to this scoffing rogue.
They try to pull the Second Demagogue down.

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
Yet though my heart is sad, I needs must speak,
For greater than its general do I hold
The welfare of the people’s sovereignty.

SECOND DEMAGOGUE
This hungry, venal rabble that doth watch,
Like to a dog, for broken bread that from
Its master’s table falls. Ye race of cowards,
I envy not the sorry meal ye make.

VOICES FROM THE CROWD
Down with the traitor! Down with him!
They grow more violent. EVE sacrifices two doves and incense on the altar.

EVE
O holy Aphrodite, hear my prayer,
Deign to accept the scent of sacrifice;
I ask thee not for laurels for my lord,
But peace at home to cheer his valiant heart.
In the smoke of the sacrifice EROS appears, smiling. The GRACES surround him and scatter roses on him. The group of worshippers are silent in devotion.

THE ATTENDANT MAIDENS
Oh, hear her prayer.

EROS
Thy pure heart shall be
A blessing on thee.

THE GRACES
And the Graces guard
And cherish thee.

THE ATTENDANT MAIDENS
Hail! Aphrodite, hail!

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
O people, hear the accusation, hear!
Miltiades the country hath betrayed.

SECOND DEMAGOGUE
Thou speakest falsehood; hear, o people, else
Too late shall ye repent of evil done.

FIRST VOICE FROM THE CROWD
Thou impudent deceiver, down from hence!
They pull him down into the crowd.

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
The flower of thy youth he doth command,
He, who has taken Lemnos at one blow,
Now, halting, waits at Paros, bought with bribes!

THIRD VOICE FROM THE CROWD
Death to him! Death!

FIRST CITIZEN
Cry death to him, ye knaves
Or never look to me for help again.
The sacrifice ends. The Deities vanish.

EVE rising
What tumult sounds without? Come, see my son.

KIMON
The people on a traitor sentence pass.
Advancing to the steps of the porch.

EVE
My heart doth ever tremble if I see
This hungry people judge the strong and great.
For if the noble fall into the mire,
The mob looks on with cruel joy and mocks,
As though it saw its baseness justified.

SECOND VOICE FROM THE CROWD
My master, I am hoarse, yet I would cry.

SECOND CITIZEN
Lo, here is something that shall ease thy throat.

SECOND VOICE FROM THE CROWD
What shall I speak?

SECOND CITIZEN
Why, cry death to the knave!

SECOND VOICE FROM THE CROWD
Death, death!

EVE
For whose death doth the people shout?

SECOND DEMAGOGUE stepping up to her.
For whose death else than his who stands a head
Above his fellows? That they cannot brook.

EVE
They seek to kill Miltiades! Ye gods!
And thou, Old Crispos, whom from slavery
My Lord did free, dost thou cry death to him?

CRISPOS
I ask forgiveness, lady; one alone
May live of us two. I three children have;
And he who bids me vote supports us all.

EVE
Woe to thee, if thy fate degrades thee so.
But yet I pardon thee if thou dost starve.
But thou, Thersites, and ye all, ye all,
Who sleep in peace, content and prosperous,
Because Miltiades your enemies
Hath driven from your gates! Oh, thankless men!

THERSITES
Ah, lady, though it grieves me to the heart,
What can we do? It is the people’s voice,
And who would risk the loss of all he hath
In rash defiance of the raging tide?

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
Then I the people’s sentence do declare.
LUCIFER, as a soldier with terrified face, rashes in.

LUCIFER
All, all is lost. The foe is at the gates.

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
It cannot be. Stands not our general
Victor before them?

LUCIFER
Lo, he is the foe.
What ye do plot against him he hath learned.
And noble anger stirs within his breast.
And whilst ye prate, he comes with fire and sword.

SECOND DEMAGOGUE
Ye traitors, ye have brought all this on us.

VOICES FROM THE CROWD
Down with them! Long live our great general!
Woe to us, let us flee, each for himself!
Oh, all is lost!

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
Nay, let us homage pay
And meet him at the gates.

EVE
O ye great gods!
Grievous the judgment of thy death, my lord,
But yet more bitter ’tis thou nast deserved
The condemnation - though thy life be spared.

FIRST VOICE FROM THE CROWD
Come, seize his wife; if any harm shall come
Upon our town, she and her son shall die.

EVE
For thee, my lord, I gladly yield my life.
But let my son be spared his country’s curse.

KIMON
Fear not for me, my mother, come with me.
This holy place shall shield us from all hurt.
They escape from the pursuers into the porch of the temple. Two Nymphs let fall a chain of roses behind them in front of the crowd, who thereon draw back. From without, trumpets sound, and the crowd with cries of fear disperse. The Nymphs vanish.

LUCIFER laughing, rubs his hands.
A good jest was it. Excellent it is
That when hearts break, the intellect doth laugh.
Turns towards the temple.
If but the sight of this for ever young,
Eternal beauty did disturb me not.
I shiver in this realm of mystery,
Which on the shameless casts a veil of shame,
Renders the sinner noble, destiny
Sublime makes, with the blossoms of the rose,
And with the kisses of simplicity.
Why doth my world its coming so delay,
Perverted form, and terror, doubt and fear
To put to flight this dream that raises man
When he doth faint, to rise to fight anew?
But we shall see, when death’s dark horror comes
And casts its shadow, if this tedious play
Of foolish puppets doth not reach its end.
He mingles with the Crowd.
ADAM, as Miltiades, is brought in wounded at the head of armed troops. The Crowd and the Demagogues in supplication before him.

VOICES FROM THE CROWD
Long live our general! Mercy, great lord!

ADAM
What have ye done, that mercy ye implore?
What can the strong ask of the weak? ’Tis strange,
My wife comes not to greet me, nor my son,
Some evil surely hath befallen them.

EVE
Why art thou come, Miltiades, if I
No joy may feel that thou art come? My son,
Succour thy mother, for she sinks in shame,
Thy father leaveth no good name to thee.

ADAM
What means this? At my feet the people fall,
My wife doth curse me, while my breast doth bleed,
Wounded in battle for my native land.

EVE
Thy country and my heart bleed more than thou.
Why comest thou with men in armour here?

ADAM
Doth not such escort then befit my rank?
I come, because my grievous wound forbids
That I my office rightly may perform.
I come to yield up my authority
Into the hands of those who sent me forth,
The sovereign people, and account to it.
to the soldiers
My valiant friends! I take my leave of you,
Well have ye merited your hearth and home.
Pallas Athene, lo, I dedicate
To thee, upon thine altar, this my sword.
He has himself conducted up the steps of the temple. The soldiers disperse.

EVE throwing herself upon his neck
Where is the wife more happy than thine own?
Beloved husband, great Miltiades,
See how thy son grows like thee, and how tall
And handsome is he!

ADAM
Ah, beloved ones!

KIMON
Well knew I that, whate’er my father does,
Is well done.

EVE
Kimon, make me not ashamed,
His wife should have had firmer faith than thee.

ADAM
My son, give to the gods thy father’s sword.

KIMON hangs the sword above the altar.
O Pallas, guard this precious sword until
The time shall come for me to seek it here.

EVE
And let the mother at this sacrifice
Twofold burn incense. Pallas, save and bless.
She sacrifices incense.

FIRST DEMAGOGUE on the tribune
Spake I not truth, that he a traitor is,
Bought by Darius? A pretence his wound,
He will not fight against the Persian host.

VOICES FROM THE CROWD
Death to him, death!

ADAM
What tumult sounds without?

EVE
Miltiades, that cry is terrible!
The crowd doth call thee traitor once again.

ADAM
The charge gives food for mirth, a traitor I,
The victor of the fight at Marathon?

EVE
Alas, an evil folk thou findest here!

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
Why tarry ye? Seize him!
The mob presses towards the temple, LUCIFER among them.

EVE
Miltiades,
Stay in this holy place, here art thou safe!
Ah, why hast thou disbanded all thy host?
Why didst thou not destroy this haunt of crime?
This rabble doth deserve nought else than chains,
Which feels that thou wert born to be its lord,
Since thou more great and noble art than all,
And slays thee lest it fall before thy feet.

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
Do ye hear what this traitor’s wife doth speak?

EVE
It is the woman’s right that she protect
Her husband, though he should a sinner prove,
And how much more Miltiades, my lord,
Whose heart is pure, from such base dogs as ye.

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
Why doth the people’s sovereignty permit
These insults?

FIRST VOICE FROM THE CROWD
How if she doth speak the truth?

FIRST CITIZEN
Who holds to them is suspect. Shout aloud,
Ye scurvy ragged knaves, or starve to death!

VOICES FROM THE CROWD
Death to him!

ADAM
Cover the boy’s eyes. My blood
He must not see; away, wife, from my breast.
Let not the lightning that the rock doth blast,
Smite thee. Alone I die - why should I live?
I mark how foolish is that liberty
Which I have ever striven to defend.

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
Why waver ye so long?

VOICES FROM THE CROWD
Death, death to him!

ADAM
I curse this craven people not; the fault
Lies not in them, by nature are they base,
Since misery hath branded them as slaves,
And slavery hath rendered them the tools
Of murder in a few proud rebels’ hands.
And I alone was mad that I believed
That such a people needed liberty.

LUCIFER aside
Thou hast thyself pronounced thine epitaph,
And that of many great ones after thee.

ADAM
Lead me down hence: no longer will I claim
This sanctuary.
He causes himself to be conducted down the steps. He gives EVE tenderly into the hands of her Attendant Maidens.
I am ready, come.

SECOND DEMAGOGUE
Lo, speak, defend thyself; all is not lost.

ADAM
My wound should sore torment me if I spake
In my defence.

SECOND DEMAGOGUE
Yet speak and save thyself.
A short while since the people fawned on thee.

ADAM
Ah, therefore were it vain; its own disgrace
This sullen people never will forgive.

LUCIFER
Thou art then undeceived?

ADAM
Ah, truly so.

LUCIFER
Thou seest that thou wert a nobler lord
To this besotted mob than it to thee?

ADAM
It may be, yet the ruin is the same;
And fate the same is, though its name be changed.
To strive with it is idle, and no more
Will I maintain the combat. But yet why
Should any noble heart strive toward the heights?
Ah, let him live for self and pleasure seek,
With which to gratify his fleeting life,
And stagger, drunken, to the land of shades.
To new ways lead me onward, Lucifer,
Onward, that I may gaze and laugh to see
The virtues and the woes of other men,
And pleasures only for myself desire.
Thou, woman, who, it seemeth to my heart,
Once, with thy magic, in the desert set
A garden for me, if thou, of my son,
Like a good mother, make a citizen;
Mad wert thou, worthy to be laughed to scorn
By any painted prostitute who sits
Within a tavern, fired with wine and lust,
Virtue deny, with pleasure sate thyself!
On, to the scaffold, to my punishment,
Not as for some base deed, but for the cause
That noble hopes and aims possessed my soul.
Meanwhile a block is brought before the steps. LUCIFER stands beside it with an axe. ADAM bends his head.

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
Let him be put to death. Long live the State!

LUCIFER in a whisper to ADAM
A fine farewell. But bravest warrior,
Doth not the horror of death’s icy blast
Make thee to shudder somewhat in strange dread?

EVE
Pallas, thou hast not hearkened to my prayer.
From the temple issues the Genius of Death as a gentle-eyed youth. He approaches Adam with a reversed torch and with a wreath.

ADAM
Pallas hath heard. The gods be with thee, wife.
My heart is now at peace, my Lucia.

LUCIFER
A curse on thee, world of illusion vain!
Thou hast my triumph thwarted once again.

EVE
A curse upon thee, people brutish, mean;
Thou hast destroyed the fount of happiness.
Its blossom fresh lies withered in the dust.
Yet not so sweet was liberty to thee,
As it was grievous to my mourning heart.

************************************************************

A square with a rostrum in the middle. To one side in the foreground the portico of a temple is seen with statues of gods, garlands and an altar. Eve, as Lucia, the wife of Miltiades, commander of the army, enters with Cimon, her son. They approach the temple accompanied by a few servants bearing objects to be presented for sacrifice. There is a shabby-looking crowd standing idle in the square. A sunny morning.

EVE
Come! Look, Cimon! That’s where your father went
the day his speedy warships took to sea
with sails set square against that paltry island
whose uncouth tribes in their audacity
threatened the freedom of this land of ours.
Let’s make our offerings and ask the gods
to look benignly on our country’s cause
and bring your valiant father safely home.

CIMON
But why should father want to sail abroad
and risk his life for these revolting people?
He’s bound to know you’re worried sick at home.

EVE
No, no, my dear! You mustn’t judge your father.
Unfilial acts provoke the wrath of gods.
For it’s the loving wife’s prerogative
to mourn her husband’s daring enterprises.
It would have been improper not to do so:
your father acted as befits a man.

CIMON
Aren’t you afraid that he might lose the battle?

EVE
Your father is a hero - bound to win.
His only foe I may have cause to fear
is that within himself.

CIMON
And what is that?

EVE
That strong persuasive agent in the soul
we call - Ambition. Dormant in the slave,
for lack of scope perhaps reduced to crime,
when nursed by freedom, given free expression
in moderation, it becomes a virtue,
the source of great things, noble, beautiful;
but in excess - it is a parasite,
and freedom or itself must bleed to death.
So, should ambition prove the better of him
and make your father turn against his country,
I’d curse the traitor. Now, let’s pray for him.
They enter the portico. Meanwhile more people gather in the square.

1ST MAN
There’s no excitement, news or anything.
You’d think the army’s got no one to fight.

2ND MAN
The place is dead, not like in days, remember,
when folk had, what d’you call them, propositions
to put before us, and to - ratify them
the sovereign people’s throat was called upon.
I’ve walked and hawked about the ruddy place,
and not a customer to buy my vote.

1ST MAN
A boring life! I’m tired of doing nothing.

3RD MAN
I wouldn’t mind creating some disturbance.
Meanwhile Eve has lit the fire on the altar, washed her hands and prepared the sacrifice to be offered. Her maidservants chant “Praise Aphrodite!” every now and again throughout the ensuing scene. The square by now is filled with people. Two demagogues are fighting for the rostrum.

1ST DEMAGOGUE
Give way! This stand is mine. The land’s imperilled
if I don’t speak.
[approving cheer among the crowd]

2ND DEMAGOGUE
You mean the land’s in peril
if you’re allowed to speak? Get off, you hireling!
[laughter and applause among the crowd]

1ST DEMAGOGUE
You’re not a hireling, eh? Not worth the hire!
My countrymen! With painful resolution
I come to raise my voice against a great man,
for so I must, although it breaks my heart:
from his triumphal chariot I must drag him
before your seat of judgement.

2ND DEMAGOGUE
Hear the rascal?
He decks with flowers the sacrificial beast
before he slaughters it.

1ST DEMAGOGUE
Take him away!

CROWD
Who wants to listen to that sneering bastard?
[They pull the 2nd Demagogue off the rostrum.]

1ST DEMAGOGUE
It is, I say, with heavy heart I speak,
and yet I must in duty, sovereign people,
defer to you - before your general.

2ND DEMAGOGUE
To this, this famished, mercenary rabble
which hangs about for scraps like hungry dogs
under their masters’ tables? O, you wheedler!
Your preference, not mine: to each his own.

CROWD
Another traitor! Get him! Pull him down!
The crowd treat the 2nd Demagogue roughly while Eve presents a sacrifice of two doves and some incense at the altar.

EVE
O, sacred Aphrodite, breathe benignly
the scent of sacrifice and hear my prayer:
it’s not a crown of laurel I request,
but safe return for him to love and rest.
In the smoke of the sacrifice Eros appears smiling, while the three Graces of Aphrodite surround him, showering him with rose petals. The worshippers stand in silent meditation.

MAIDSERVANTS
O, Goddess, hear her prayer!

EROS
Receive her blessing,
woman of guileless heart.

THE GRACES
And her protection
from her Three Graces too.

MAIDSERVANTS
Praise Aphrodite!

1ST DEMAGOGUE
My countrymen! I charge Miltiades
with treason!

2ND DEMAGOGUE
It’s a lie! A monstrous lie!
Now, listen to me.’ You may be ashamed
and have regrets too late…

CROWD
Pull down the bastard!
Pulled from the rostrum, the 2nd Demagogue is lost among the crowd.

1ST DEMAGOGUE
Our flower of young men under his command
had taken Lemnos with a single stroke:
at Paros now he falters… Why? He’s bribed!

3RD MAN
Traitor! Put him to death!

1ST CITIZEN
Give tongue, you dogs,
or get your baggage off my property.
The act of worship concluded, the Deities vanish. Eve is suddenly aware of the noise outside.

EVE
What’s that commotion there? Let’s go and see.

CIMON
Mother, some traitor’s been condemned to death.

EVE
[from the top of the stairs leading to the portico]
How much I hate to see the hungry mob
pass judgement on its betters with a vengeance:
another great name dragged into the mire
and scoffed at by the gloating populace,
as if their act could vindicate their baseness.

2ND MAN
My throat is hoarse, Sir, but I think I’ll manage
to raise a shout.

2ND CITIZEN
Here’s something for your throat.

2ND MAN
But what am I to shout

2ND CITIZEN
“Put him to death!”

CROWD
Kill him! Put him to death!

EVE
Who’s the accused?

2ND DEMAGOGUE
[coming up the stairs]
Who else but he who’s head and shoulder high
above this rabble? They won’t stand for that.

EVE
You mean Miltiades? O, mighty gods!
You, Crispos, there! My husband made you a freeman,
and you would want to see him put to death?

CRISPOS
I’m sorry, Lady. It’s his life or mine.
That’s how it lies. I’ve got a wife and children,
and this man’s bought my vote.

EVE
I pity you,
being so debased by fate, you cannot help it,
and your excuse, perhaps, is that you starve.
But what of you, Thersites, you and you?
You live in plenty now, you can relax:
Miltiades has purged the enemy
mobbing your gates? Is this your gratitude?

THERSITES
I must admit, Madam, we do not like this.
What’s to be done? Such is the people’s mood…
No one’s prepared to risk his property
in rash defiance of that raging torrent.

1ST DEMAGOGUE
Let me pronounce the judgement of the people!
Lucifer, as a soldier, rushes in with a terrified expression on his face.

LUCIFER
Disastrous news! The foe is at the gates!

1ST DEMAGOGUE
Impossible! Our valiant general
will surely bar its way.

LUCIFER
He is the foe.
For he had word of your conspiracy
outraged with indignation as he was,
and while you spoke he’s come with fire and sword.

2ND DEMAGOGUE
And this is all your doing, renegades!

CROWD
Bash out their brains! Long live Miltiades!
He’ll make us pay for this. Let’s run for it!
We’re done for!

1ST DEMAGOGUE
No, we’re not. He’s at the gates.
Pay homage to him there!

EVE
Immortal gods!
A grievous loss to have him put to death
condemned a traitor, but it grieves me more
to have him prove the charges, though he lives.

1ST MAN
Hey! Get his wife and child! They’ll die together
if city folk should come to harm for this.

EVE
I’ll gladly give my life to help my husband,
but let my country’s anger spare my son.

CIMON
No time to worry about me: come along!
We should be well protected in the shrine.
They escape from their pursuers by retreating into the temple. Immediately, two nymphs drop a garland of roses between them and the mob which promptly withdraws. At the sound of trumpets the crowd runs in terror. The nymphs vanish. Lucifer enters gleefully rubbing his hands. He addresses the audience.

LUCIFER
A timely joke. - This underlines the notion
that intellect can overreach emotion.
[indicating the temple]
I wish the cult of these perennial beauties
weren’t interfering though, left out of sight.
It’s alien to me, this - mystery
which makes propriety out of nakedness,
virtue of sin and bliss of destiny,
what with rose garlands, naïve utterances
from lips which one would rather kiss than hear…
O, let my kingdom come, my world to be,
that of perverted shapes and dubious terrors,
I’ll shatter all this trash, this make-believe,
which can incite Man on the point of falling
to rise again and fight the losing battle.
Yet we shall see one day, as see we must,
when face to face that monster Death is met,
will he not spoil and terminate for ever
this tedious dumb-show in silhouette?
Lucifer disappears among the crowd. Adam, as Miltiades, is led in, badly wounded, followed by armed troops, the crowd and the demagogues grovelling before him with gestures of supplication.

CROWD
Long live our leader! Valiant man, have mercy!

ADAM
What have you done? Why should you beg for mercy?
Does the body implore its weaker member?
And where’s my wife to greet me, and my son?
I hope they haven’t come to any harm.

EVE
Miltiades, you come in such a manner
that your own wife can’t welcome your return.
Cimon, your hand! I’m fainting! There’s your father
who can’t leave you an honourable name!

ADAM
I can’t see this. The people beg for mercy;
my wife denounces me; my wounds are bleeding…

EVE
This country bleeds! My heart bleeds even more
to see you come in front of troops in arms.

ADAM
My men here? I’m entitled to an escort.
I’ve come because I’ve been severely wounded
and can’t perform my duties any longer.
I’ve come to give account to them who sent me
and to return the same authority
invested in me by the sovereign people.
My fellow warriors, you are discharged!
You well deserve your rest and homely comforts.
And this, my sword, I dedicate to you,
Pallas Athene, and place it on your altar.
He is led up the stairs into the portico. The soldiers disperse. Eve throws her arms around him.

EVE
Is there a woman happier than I?
Miltiades, you great and noble man!
Look at your son! He’s not unlike you, is he?
He’ll be as tall and handsome.

ADAM
O, my darlings!

CIMON
I knew, didn’t I? Whatever father does,
is excellently done.

EVE
Don’t make me blush.
It is his loving wife who should have known it.

ADAM
[to Cimon]
Here, take my sword! Present it at the altar.

CIMON
[ceremonially laying the sword on the altar]
Goddess, Pallas Athene, guard this sword
until the time I come to take it up!

EVE
Now let your mother solemnize this act
and burn some incense. Hail, Pallas Athene!
While Eve makes an offering of incense, the 1st Demagogue occupies the rostrum.

1ST DEMAGOGUE
I’ve told you, haven’t I? He is a traitor.
I’m sure Darius bribed him. All those wounds
are just for show. He doesn’t want to fight.

CROWN
Put him to death!

ADAM
What’s all this noise about?

EVE
A baleful noise, Miltiades. I’m frightened.
The populace believes that you’re a traitor.

ADAM
A traitor? I - who won at Marathon?
This is absurd!

EVE
Absurd it is, indeed,
but it’s a foul and wicked world you find here.

1ST DEMAGOGUE
Come on! You’ll get him now!
The mob presses towards the portico. Lucifer is among them.

EVE
Miltiades! Don’t go outside! It’s safer in the shrine.
Alas, that you’ve disbanded all your men.
Why didn’t you set on fire this den of thieves?
This mob deserves nothing but whips and chains.
They sense it that you’re born to be their master,
that you’re above them all, all put together,
so they must kill you lest they kiss your feet.

1ST DEMAGOGUE
Hear that? Hear what the traitor’s wife is saying?
Listen!

EVE
It is the wife’s prerogative
to stand up for her husband, though he’s guilty,
then how much more I owe to one that’s blameless,
wrongly accused by scoundrels such as you.

1ST DEMAGOGUE
How can the sovereign people tolerate
this insolence?

1ST MAN
Suppose she could be right.

1ST CITIZEN
You dare speak up for these? You must be guilty.
Now, raise a shout, you scum, or starve to death!

CROWD
Kill him! Put him to death!

ADAM
Dear, let me go!
Look to the boy: don’t let him see me die.
The lightning is about to strike the crag;
you must avoid its aim. I’ve done with life.
No point in struggling, in sustaining freedom,
and watching it turned into mockery.

1ST DEMAGOGUE
What are you waiting for?

CROWD
Put him to death!

ADAM
I still can’t bring myself to curse the people,
for they are what they are - a mob by nature,
and destitution’s marked them out to serve,
to be the bloody instrument of terror
that’s managed by a few conspirators.
I curse my madness - to have ever thought
that masses could appreciate their freedom.

LUCIFER
[to the audience]
This pithy epitaph shall complement
the script on many a leader’s monument.

ADAM
I will not seek the shelter of this shrine.
You, help me down!
He puts Eve gently into the hands of her maidservants and has himself led down the steps.
Do as you like. I’m ready.

2ND DEMAGOGUE
No, don’t give in! Speak up! Defend yourself!

ADAM
No! No! These very wounds would gape with pain
if I should speak in my defence.

2ND DEMAGOGUE
You must!
This rabble kissed the dust before your feet…

ADAM
They did - and that no speech can abrogate:
the people won’t forgive the shame of it.

LUCIFER
Well, have you sobered up?

ADAM
I have, indeed.

LUCIFER
And don’t you think you were a nobler master
to this riff-raff than they have been to you?

ADAM
Perhaps. But - it’s confounded either way:
try this or that, you can’t escape your fate.
No use trying to fight it. What’s the point?
Enough’s enough. Why should a man aspire
to strive towards some goal beyond his reach?
But let him be sufficient to himself
and let him glut his fleeting Life with pleasure -
and stagger drunk towards his dismal Hades.
Lead on to that experience, Lucifer!
So I can laugh at other people’s virtues,
or agonies, and revel in delights.
And you, woman, I seem to recollect now,
you built a cooling shelter in the wasteland;
if you bring up my son esteeming virtue
desirable, acting the worthy matron,
you’ll be a fool, the laughing stock of whores
with painted faces and their lewd attire
waiting outside the brothel for the guest…
Enjoy yourself! Have fun! Confound all virtues!
Now, to the place of death to make amends
for no base deeds that I could be accused of,
but guilty of entertaining noble thoughts.
An executioner’s block is placed at the foot of the stairs, Lucifer standing by with an axe. Adam leans over the block.

1ST DEMAGOGUE
Long live the state! Perform the execution!

LUCIFER
[in a whisper]
A fine leave-taking this, my valiant Sir?
Well, doesn’t it make you cold about the neck
to face the eerie blast of phantom death?

EVE
You couldn’t have heard my prayers, Pallas Athene.
The Spirit of Death, in the shape of a youth with a mild, compassionate expression, appears from the temple and approaches Adam with a wreath and a torch turned upside down.

ADAM
The Goddess heard you, Lucia. Farewell!
A sense of comfort wells up in my heart.

LUCIFER
Curse these unseasonable fantasies -
intruding on my moments of delight!

EVE
May you be cursed, you soulless, common rout,
who violently wrecked my happiness,
its tender flower compounded with the dust.
Your freedom never was so dear to you,
as painful to me - to this bitter end.

************************************************************

Athens. A public square with a tribune in the centre. On one side, in the foreground, the open porch of a temple with statues of gods, garlands and an altar. EVE as LUCIA, wife of MILTIADES the general (ADAM), with her son KIMON, is accompanied by a few slaves bearing objects for sacrifice. She approaches the temple. A sunny morning. Ragged people are moving to and fro.

EVE
This way, dear son, this way. Now look out there -
Your father’s nimble craft took just that course,
Bound for a war beyond our own frontiers.
Barbarians live there, a reckless people,
Threatening our country’s liberty.
Pray, pray, my son, that heaven defend our cause
And bring your noble father safely home.

KIMON
But why should father travel all that way
To defend such cowardly and ragged people,
Leaving you, dear mother, to pine at home?

EVE
Hush! You must not judge your virtuous father -
The curse of heaven lies on such a child.
Only a doting woman has the right
To rue the greater actions of her husband
Which, were he to neglect, might bring disgrace.
Your father acted as becomes a man.

KIMON
You fear he’s weak, and might be beaten, mother?

EVE
Oh no, my son, your father’s brave, he’ll triumph.
There’s only one thing that I am afraid of,
That he may fail to conquer himself.

KIMON
But how?

EVE
In the human soul there dwells a powerful voice -
Ambition is its name. In slaves it’s dormant
Or else, for lack of scope, turns criminal.
But liberty enriches it with blood,
And it expands, attains to civic virtue
Which in its turn gives birth to all things sweet
And noble. Grown overweening though it turns
Against its mother, until one or the other
Bleeds to death. Should this voice strengthen in him
So he betrayed his sacred home, then I,
Yes, even I would curse him. Pray, my son.
They enter the temple. More people collect in the precinct

FIRST MAN
We never hear exciting news these days,
It seems our troops have failed to find the enemy.

SECOND MAN
And here at home the world has grown so sleepy,
Old habits of intrigue are quite neglected -
To put one into execution would
Give people’s throats at least some exercise.
All morning I’ve been up and down the agora
But nobody has tried to buy my vote.

FIRST MAN
A dull old life, but what are we to do?

THIRD MAN
A little stirring would not come amiss.
EVE in the meantime has lit the altar fire, washed her hands, and prepared her sacrifice. Her attendants begin a chant which, verse by verse, blends into the next scene. The place is now filled with people. Two DEMAGOGUES contest the podium

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
Get off. This pitch is mine. If I don’t speak.
Our country’s threatened and might well be lost.
The people roar approval

SECOND DEMAGOGUE
It’s Lost each time you do. Get off, you hireling!
The people laugh and applaud

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
But you’re no hireling - nobody would hire you!
Dear citizens, it is with pain I speak,
Because it hurts a noble heart to bring
The mighty down to earth; and I must now
Drag one such man from his triumphal car
To face your judgment.

SECOND DEMAGOGUE
Well begun, you schemer.
Yes, deck the sacrificial beast with garlands
Before you lead him to the block.

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
Get off!

THE PEOPLE
Why should we listen to this renegade?
They begin to tug at the SECOND DEMAGOGUE

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
However it may hurt me, I must speak,
Because, O noble and all-powerful people
I prize you above any general.

SECOND DEMAGOGUE
This treacherous and undernourished rabble,
These dogs who Lick scraps from their master’s table?
You craven coward, I don’t envy your taste.

THE PEOPLE
Down with him, the traitor, down with him.
They treat him even more roughly. EVE sacrifices two doves and throws incense on the altar

EVE
O Holy Aphrodite, please accept
This smoke of sacrifice and hear my prayer.
I do not plead for laurel leaves to bless
My husband’s brow, but that his conquering breast
Might feel the warmth of homely tenderness.
A smiling EROS appears in the smoke of the sacrifice, surrounded by GRACES who cast rose petals over him. The group stands in deep devotion

ATTENDANTS
O hear her prayer!

EROS
A pure heart’s benediction
o you, woman.

GRACES
And the protection of the Graces.

ATTENDANTS
All hail, Aphrodite!

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
Hear my charge,
O people! Great Miltiades betrays
The country.

SECOND DEMAGOGUE
He is lying! He is lying!
Hear me out now, or later bear the shame
Of your remorse.

FIRST MAN
Get down from there, you scoundrel!
He is swept away into the crowd

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
The flower of our youth is in his hands.
Lemnos he took at one fell swoop, but now
He loiters at Pharos. He has been bought off.

THIRD MAN
He must be killed!

FIRST CITIZEN
That’s right, let’s hear your voice
Or else be off with you, and off my payroll.
The sacrifice is over, the gods are gone

EVE rising
What is that noise outside? Let’s see, my son.

KIMON
It is a traitor they’re condemning, mother.

EVE moving to the top of the steps
My heart quakes when I see a hungry people
Passing judgment on the high and mighty.
When the illustrious are dragged through mud
The mob looks on and gloats maliciously,
As if this somehow justified their filth.

SECOND MAN
My lord, I’d like to shout, but I am hoarse.

SECOND CITIZEN
Here you are, go lubricate your throat.

SECOND MAN
What should I cry?

SECOND CITIZEN
Demand the fellow’s death.

THE PEOPLE
Kill him! Kill him!

EVE
Who are they baying for?

SECOND DEMAGOGUE moving to her
Who else but him who towers a head above
His fellow men - something they can’t bear.

EVE
Miltiades? Great heavens! And you too,
Old Crispus, you who were a slave until
My husband freed you, you call for his death?

CRIUSPUS
Forgive me, lady, only one of us
May live. My paymaster helps to maintain
My children; three of them.

EVE
Alas, poor Crispus,
That fate should so degrade you. If you’re starving
I forgive you. But as for you, Thersites,
And for the rest of you who snoozed away
Your comfortable lives, without a care,
While he, my husband, beat back enemies
Outside the gate. - Oh, you ungrateful people!

THERSITES
It is indeed a bitter blow, my lady,
But what can we do in the current mood:
And who would dare to stake his whole estate
Against such scum, so hot with agitation!

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
I now pronounce the judgment of the people.
LUCIFER runs on in the guise of a terrified soldier

LUCIFER
I bring you news of danger. The enemy
Is at the gates!

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
Impossible! Is not
Our victorious commander at the head?

LUCIFER
Yes, the foe himself. He heard you plotting,
And in his heart there rose a righteous anger.
It’s the fire and the sword for you this time.

SECOND DEMAGOGUE
You traitors, you have brought all this on us!

THE PEOPLE
Destroy them now - hurrah for the commander!
God help us all, let’s run wherever we can.
The end is here!

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
No. Get before the gates
And render him homage!

EVE
Now, by all the gods!
The judgment hurt me when I lost you through it,
But though this reunites us, my dear husband,
How much the worse to know it was deserved.

FIRST MAN
Take the man’s wife: if the city comes to harm
We’ll execute the pair, both child and mother.

EVE
I’d be happy enough to die for you, dear husband,
But let the child escape this country’s curse.

KIMON
Have no fear for me, mother, come with me.
This holy place will shield us from assault.
They step into the temple where two nymphs lower rose garlands behind them to keep the people out, who immediately withdraw. Off stage the sound of trumpets, People scatter screaming. The nymphs too disappear

LUCIFER cackling and rubbing his hands
A delicious joke. Pure intellect finds all
Scenes of heartbreak immensely comical.
Facing the temple
If only the sight of this eternally
Refreshed and youthful beauty did not shake me,
Oh what a chill this strange power wakes in me
That lends a naked body modesty,
Ennobles sin and renders fate sublime
Covering it with roses and sweet kisses
Of simplicity. But why this long delay
Before my world with all its monstrous forms,
Of terror and uncertainty, can come
Into its own and frighten off this mirage,
Which reawakens humankind each time
I sense the victory at hand. But wait,
And we shall see when death in all its horror
Makes its appearance in a little while
Whether this poor shadow play has run
Its course and finally rung down the curtain.
He blends into the crowd. ADAM, in the guise of wounded MILTIADES, leads an armed company into the forum. The DEMAGOGUES and the crowd go pleading before him

THE PEOPLE
Long live the leader! Pardon us, my lord!

ADAM
What have you done that you should beg my pardon?
What can the strong require from the weak?
But where’s my wife to greet me, and my child -
Surely no harm can have befallen them?

EVE
O why return at all, Miltiades,
If I can take no pleasure in your coming?
My son, support your mother or she faints…
He leaves you nothing, not even his honour!

ADAM
What is this? I don’t understand. The people
Crawl before me, my own wife curses me
And all the while my wounds bleed for my country.

EVE
Your country and my heart both bleed the more.
Why come trailing battalions behind you?

ADAM
Is this so unbefitting to my rank?
I come because a serious wound prevents me
From exercising all my usual duties.
I come to lay my power before the feet
Of my commissioners, the mighty people,
To render up to them my true account.
You are discharged, my honourable fellows,
You’ve earned the sanctuary of hearth and home.
And as for me, I dedicate to thee,
Pallas Athene, my sword upon thine altar.
He is helped into the temple. His troops disperse

EVE embracing him
Miltiades, you great and noble man,
Show me a happier woman than your wife!
Look, look - your son, how he resembles you,
How tall he is, how handsome!

ADAM
Ah, my dears!

KIMON
Of course I knew whatever father did
Was sure to be done well. -

EVE
Oh do not shame me,
I should have known it better, being his wife.

ADAM
My son, present your father’s sword for him.

KIMON hanging up the sword
Take charge, O Goddess, of this precious sword
Until the time when I return for it.

EVE
This double sacrifice may I, as mother,
Strew with incense. Observe it, O Athene.
She sprinkles incense

FIRST DEMAGOGUE on the rostrum
Was I not right to say he was a traitor?
That Darius bribed him? The wound was a mere sham.
He simply does not wish to fight in battle.

THE PEOPLE
Then he must die!

ADAM
What is that noise outside?

EVE
Such dreadful words, Miltiades. The mob -
They still insist on calling you a traitor.

ADAM
Ridiculous! That I who gained the victory
At Marathon should now be called a traitor.

EVE
How true! The world has grown so wicked in your
Absence.

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
Why wait? Take him!
The people crowd before the temple, LUCIFER among them

EVE
Miltiades !
This sanctuary will shield us, stay in there. -
Oh, why did you dispense with all your troops?
And why did you not sack this den of vice?
These guttersnipes are only fit for shackles;
They realize that you were born to rule them,
Are nobler than the lot of them together,
And that is why they’d sooner murder you
Than worship at your feet.

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
You hear her words?
A traitor’s wife!

EVE
It is a woman’s right
To shield her husband even if he is guilty,
Then how much more when he is innocent
As my lord is, and his foes as foul as you.

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
O mighty populace! Why let yourself
Be so insulted by her?

FIRST MAN
Perhaps she’s right.

FIRST CITIZEN
Whoever speaks for them is suspect. Bawl
Your filthy lungs out or you’ll starve like beasts.

THE PEOPLE
Kill him! Kill him!

ADAM
Shield the boy, don’t let him
See my blood. Don’t cling to my breast, woman.
The lightning that’s about to strike the rock
Must not strike you. Now let me die alone -
Why strive to live when the idea of freedom
For which I always fought appears so senseless.

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
Why hesitate?

THE PEOPLE
Let’s kill him. Kill him now!

ADAM
I cannot bring myself to curse this rabble,
They’re not to blame, they were created craven.
Sheer misery has marked them down as slaves,
And slavery degrades them to this level -
The bloody tools of puffed-up demagogues.
And only I was fool enough to think
That people such as this would welcome freedom.

LUCIFER aside
The perfect epitaph! And it will do
For the tombs of many great men after you.

ADAM
Take me away. I make no further claim
Upon this sanctuary.
He allows himself to be taken away down the stairs, giving EVE tenderly over to the care of her attendants
I am ready now.

SECOND DEMAGOGUE
Defend yourself. Not everything is lost.

ADAM
This injury would cry out if I spoke
In my defence.

SECOND DEMAGOGUE
But speak. These very people
Grovelled before you just a while ago.

ADAM
That is why it’s useless. They won’t forgive
The victim of their own depravity.

LUCIFER
Then you are disillusioned?

ADAM
Yes, immensely.

LUCIFER
And you admit you were a nobler master
To foolish crowds like this than they to you?

ADAM
Quite possibly, but both are damnable:
The names have changed, the outcome is the same.
How vain to fight against it. From now on
I shall not even try, since after all
What is there for fervent hearts to strive for?
No, let them live entirely for pleasure
And fill their thimbleful of life with it,
Then they can stagger drunkenly to Hades.
Show me a new path, Lucifer. Lead on,
And I will shake with laughter at all virtue
And all suffering. Give me the sensual life.
And you, O woman, you, who I recall
Once conjured me a bower in the desert,
If you bring up my son a citizen
As honest mothers do, then you are mad.
The painted girl who sits in the bordello
With puckered lips, her passions roused by wine,
Is right to mock you. Laugh - deny your virtue.
And now the bloody scaffold for my sins,
Though not for petty crime but something graver,
For inspiration by a noble cause.
In the meantime a block is brought before the temple steps. LUCIFER stands beside it with an axe. ADAM bows his head

FIRST DEMAGOGUE
Deliver the blow, and long live our great country!

LUCIFER whispering to ADAM
A pretty farewell, don’t you think? And now
My noble sir, do you not feel the chill,
The shudder as that ugly creature Death
Blows ever nearer with his icy breath?

EVE
Pallas, you did not hear my prayer! -
From the temple issues the GENIUS OF DEATH in the guise of a mild looking youth. He approaches ADAM with a flaming torch held upside down, and a wreath

ADAM
She heard, -
Athene listened. Heaven will protect you.
Now suddenly my heart is calm, Lucia.

LUCIFER
A curse on you, O world of vain illusions,
Once again you’ve ruined my finest moment.

EVE
I curse this nation, a cold and common crew!
For happiness unfitted by demeanour,
Her fresh blossoms lie withered at your feet,
Although your freedom may seem sweet to you,
The bitterness for me is much the keener.

************************************************************

Athens. Agora with a platform in the middle. In the foreground aside an open temple with sculptures of gods, garlands and altar. EVE as LUCIA, wife to general MILTIADES, with her son CHIMON accompanied by servants bringing sacrificial vessels are coming towards the temple hall. In the agora people are standing in rags. Bright morning.

EVE

This way, this way my beloved little son.
Look, your father sailed to that direction
To battle at far frontiers of our home.
Rude people are there living who have been
Rashly a threat to our homeland and freedom.
Let's pray, let's pray my beloved son, so our
Justness be protected by the Heaven
And let your knight father return safe and sound.

CHIMON

Why my noble father has gone far away
To safeguard this ragged and coward people,
While his fair lady's eating out her heart?

EVE

Alas! Don't judge your generous father,
These children lie under the curse of god,
Only the woman in love has the right
To bewail the actions of her husband that
Would be missing, she would be made ashamed.
Your father did his duty as expected.

CHIMON

You fear, mother, he will be defeated?

EVE

Not at all, my son. Your father's hero,
He wins, but I fear for him he's unable
To triumph over himself.

CHIMON

How is that?

EVE

Soul has always a selfish word, this is
The ambition. It is asleep in all slaves
Or, when repress'd, is degraded to crime.
But getting warm it is made grow high by the
Freedom and is shown as civic virtues.
This generates all beauties and the great,
But if it's too strong, attacks its breeder
And will fight till one is bleeding to death. -
If this strong selfish word would him overcome
And if he would betray this holy land,
I would swear at him. Let's go to pray, son.

(They go into the temple, meanwhile more and more people come to the agora.)

FIRST FROM THE CROWD

There is no exciting news, as if our
Army would find the enemy nowhere near.

SECOND FROM THE CROWD

And also at home everybody's sleepy,
Maybe nobody's working on some plans
Like in days gone by, that to be realized
The howl of high people would be needed.
I am wandering since this morning here
And nobody wanted to buy my vote.

FIRST FROM THE CROWD

Monotonous life, what to do at all?

THIRD FROM THE CROWD

There would be no harm to make disorder.

(During this time EVE set light to the altar's fire, washed her hands and made herself ready to offer up the sacrifice. Servants to her start to sing hymns that lasts during the subsequent scene The agora is full with citizens and people; two DEMAGOGUES struggle for the platform.)

FIRST DEMAGOGUE

Get out! This is my place, this is my site,
Our land is endanger'd if I cannot speak.

(People howl acclamation.)

SECOND DEMAGOGUE

It will be lost if you speak. Agent, get out!

(People laugh and applaud.)

FIRST DEMAGOGUE

You are not agent since nobody buys you.
Citizens! It's painful to me to speak,
It is sorrowful to humiliate
Deeply the great and to be forced to drag
The grand soldier to your unfailing court
From the triumphal car.

SECOND DEMAGOGUE

That's good, evil!
Now trim with flowers the brute beast to be
Offered in sacrifice.

FIRST DEMAGOGUE

Get out of the way!

SOMEBODY FROM THE CROWD

Why we've to listen to that mad scoffer.

(People haul the second demagogue.)

FIRST DEMAGOGUE

Though I have aches in my heart, I have to speak,
Since you, glorious and princely people
I set above your military leader.

SECOND DEMAGOGUE

This mean-souled starving group in rags and tatters
That like a dog is on the outlook for
Garbage of its masters? - Oho, you poltroon,
I can't be envious of your fancy.

SOMEBODY FROM THE CROWD

Down with him! He's also traitor, down with him!

(He is much more insulted. EVE offers two pigeons and incense on the altar.)

EVE

Holy Aphrodite! Oh, take and accept
The smoke of this incense and answer my pray:
I want my man not to be crowned by laurel
To free but his heart from domestic troubles.

(EROS occurs smiling in the smoke of sacrifice, GRACES stand round it and scatter roses on it. Devoutly standing group.)

SERVANTS

Answer her!

EROS

Woman, be blessed by the
Pure heart!

GRACES

And the protection of Graces
Be with you!

SERVANTS

Thanks, thanks be to Aphrodite!

FIRST DEMAGOGUE

Now, let you hear the charge! Great Miltiades
Betrayed his country.

SECOND DEMAGOGUE

Oh, you lie, you lie!
Hold your tongue or else the shame of belated
Regret is yours.

FIRST FROM THE CROWD

Get out of there, rotter!

(He is whirled into the crowd)

FIRST DEMAGOGUE

He's holding your bloom in his hands, he captured
Lemnos with one stroke and now he's tarrying
At Paros. He is certainly bought over.

THIRD FROM THE CROWD

The death to him!

FIRST CITIZEN

Come on! Come on! Shout! Or
Get along with you of my reserved site.

(Sacrifice is ended, gods disappear.)

EVE

What's that buzz outside? Let me see, my son.

CHIMON

A traitor is condemn'd mother, I think.

EVE

My heart sinks when seeing the sentence of the
Starving crowd pass'd on the powers that be.
When mighty is defamed, the mob is gloating
Over and insult it with mockery
As it would verify its own aspersion.

SECOND FROM THE CROWD

My good sir! I am hoarse and I want to
Shout.

SECOND CITIZEN

Here you are! Drink and make your gorge wet.

SECOND FROM THE CROWD

And what should I shout then?

SECOND CITIZEN

Say death to his head.

SOMEBODY FROM THE CROWD

To death! To death!

EVE

About whom are they speaking?

SECOND DEMAGOGUE

About who else as about him, a head
Taller than others, they'll have none of it.

EVE

Miltiades? - Oh, my almighty gods!
And you, old Chrispos, who was liberated
From slavery by him, you shout also death?

CHRISPOS

Forgive me, lady, only one of us
May live. I'm sustain'd with three children by him
Who wants me to vote so.

EVE

Oh, woe to thee,
Chrispos, if your fate drags down you to depths!
Though I indulge seeing that you're starving.
But you, Thersites? And you all, you all,
Who sleep in the languishment of abundance
'Cause my husband dislodged the enemy
From your gates. - Oh, you're highly ungrateful! -

THERSITES

Oh, my lady, it is sorrow and painful
But what to do, that's the public anger:
Who will venture all what he possesses
Defying everything and braving the waves!

FIRST DEMAGOGUE

Now I declare the judgement of people.

(LUCIFER as soldier, comes running with distracted face.)

LUCIFER

To arms! To arms! Enemy is at the gates!

FIRST DEMAGOGUE

That's nonsense! Our victorious general
Is not there?

LUCIFER

Just he, he is the enemy.
He found out what you have contemplated,
The rightous anger flared up in his heart,
While you speak, he'll be here with fire and sword!

SECOND DEMAGOGUE

This misfortune is due to you, traitors!

SOMEBODY FROM THE CROWD

Let's knock them down! - Hail to the general! -
Oh, woe to us! Alas! Run for your lives! -
Everything is lost.

FIRST DEMAGOGUE

Not at all! To the gates,
Pay homage to him! -

EVE

Oh, almighty gods!
The judgement wail'd that took off you from me,
But it is to me more sorrowful that
You verified it - though I shall regain you. -

FIRST FROM THE CROWD

Take as hostage his wife: if our town will be
Damag'd, she must die together with her son.

EVE

I would die, husband, heartily for you
But curse of homeland must not fall on my son. -

CHIMON

Don't have fears for me, come with me, mother,
This shrine will protect us from all maltreatments.

(They go up to the hall from the pursueing group, two NYMPHS lower a rose-chain behind them, the pursueing group immediately stops. Trompets sound outside, people disperse with wailing. - NYMPHS disappear.)

LUCIFER (rubs his hands and laughs)

It was a nice joke. To laugh it is so kind
Where broken are the hearts and goes blank the mind.
(turning towards the temple)
But to see this ever rejuvenating,
Everlasting beauty always disturbs me.
I feel cold in its unfamiliar sphere
That makes prudish all those who have nothing on,
Makes all sins to be noble and the fate
To be majestic - with its pure roses
And inviting lips of simplicity. - -
Why my world is behind its time for so long,
The monster, the dreadfullness full with doubt
To frighten far away this delusion
Which always revives the man being on
The verge of going under in this long fight. -
But it remains to be seen whether soon
The horror of death comes certainly to us,
Your unentertaining phantom will be
Perish'd, when it goes to its utmost limits.
(He mingles in the crowd.)

(ADAM as MILTIADES is wounded and guided by an armed group. Before him the imploring crowd and the DEMAGOGUES)

SOMEBODY FROM THE CROWD

Long live our leader! Be merciful to us!

ADAM

What is your fault, and why do you implore me?
And what powerful may ask from the weak?
But my wife, my son don't come to meet me;
Are they insulted or perhaps injured! - -

EVE

Oh, Miltiades, why do you come when
Your wife can't rejoice at your arrival, -
My son, your mother sinks down, help me... Your
Father does not will a good name to you! -

ADAM

What's that? It is beyond me. Crowd implores,
My wife curses and my chest bleeds for the home. -

EVE

But both home and my heart bleed much stronger,
Why did you come at the head of your army?

ADAM

Is it not due to me to be escorted?
I've come, 'cause my heavy wound does not allow
To be equal farther to all my duties.
I've come that, as traditional, to give back
My power to majestic people, to put
It in its hands and account for my acts.
Now, I disband you my comrades in arms,
You have deserved the quietness of your heart.
And now, Athena Pallas, consecrating
This sword I hang it over your altar.

(He is guided into the temple's hall; his soldiers disperse.)

EVE (falls about the neck of her husband)

Oh, Miltiades, who is more happy than
Your wife, you noble and generous man!
Look at your son, he favours his father,
How beautiful he is!

ADAM

Oh, my dear ones!

CHIMON

I knew very well, my father knows what
To be done. -

EVE

Oh, don't make me ashamed of it,
His good lady ought to know it much better.

ADAM

My son, your father's sword offer you up.

CHIMON (hanging up the sword)

Protected be this dear sword by you, goddess,
Till some day I return to you for it.

EVE

Let the mother offer up this incense
To this sacrifice in pairs. Pallas, help us!
(She offers up incense.)

FIRST DEMAGOGUE (on the platform)

Was I at all right, that he's a traitor?
That Dareios bought over him? The wound is
Pretence, he does not want against him to fight.

SOMEBODY FROM THE CROWD

The death to him!

ADAM

What's all the noise about?

EVE

Alas, Miltiades, that is dreadful charge:
You're said a traitor by the crowd anew.

ADAM

It's a foolish charge; me to be a traitor
Who won the fight at Marathon?

EVE

Oh, that's true,
What you have found here, it's a depraved world.

FIRST DEMAGOGUE

Why do you wait? Arrest him?

(People crowd before the temple hall, LUCIFER among them.)

EVE

Miltiades!
In this shrine you are kept safe, do not leave it.
Why did you disband your comrades in arms?
Why you have had not burnt down this den of vice?
This mob deserves only to be shackled,
'Cause it feels that you are the born lord of it,
Who are nobler alone than they're together,
And will kill you but not to fall at your feet.

FIRST DEMAGOGUE

Do you hear how the wife to a traitor
Is speaking?

EVE

That's the right of woman to
Defend her husband even he's guilty,
Even he's morally high as he is!
And his enemy as freak as you are. -

FIRST DEMAGOGUE

Why majestic people lets itself to
Be dispraised.

FIRST FROM THE CROWD

Maybe it is right what she says.

FIRST CITIZEN

Suspects are who vote for them. Shout and cry,
You dirty dogs or starve to death, you wasters.

SOMEBODY FROM THE CROWD

To death!

ADAM

Veil my son, oh, I want him not
To see my blood - leave me, my lady, leave me,
Not to be touched by thunderbolt that comes.
Let die alone me - but why I have to live
When I find the liberty, the reason why
I've striven for a lifetime, to be absurd.

FIRST DEMAGOGUE

Why do you hesitate?

SOMEBODY FROM THE CROWD

To him the death!

ADAM

I do not swear at this infamous crowd,
The blame lies wholly with its weak nature:
To be denounced by destitution as slave
And slavery perverts it as to be the
Bloodthirsty pawn of some insolent rebels.
Only me alone, only me was fool
To think that such a freak crowd needs liberty.

LUCIFER (aside)

You recited the rhym'd epitaph for you
And for some large graves of your late descendants.

ADAM

Let me lead down from here. I don't have recourse
To this shrine.

(He lets himself lead down the steps putting EVE tenderly into the servant' arms.)

Here you are - I am ready. -

SECOND DEMAGOGUE

Defend yourself, nothing is lost at all now.

ADAM

I would be heavily wounded if I would
Speak up for me.

SECOND DEMAGOGUE

Do it, surely this crowd
Has just been crawling in the dust before you.

ADAM

Oh, this is why everything is in vain,
The crowd does not overlook its self-disgrace.

LUCIFER

Did you undeceive yourself?

ADAM

Oh, far too.

LUCIFER

Did you understand that you were nobler lord
Of this crowd than it was noble to you?

ADAM

Maybe, but both of them are damnations;
Fate is the same but with different names.
It is a vain hope to fight against it,
And I'll never do. - Why would any hot heart
Have high aspirations, why would it do?
Be it retiring, be it search of delight
To fill somehow the very short being, to
Stagger deliriously to Hades. -
Guide me, Lucifer, guide me to new ways
And I will laugh to see the virtues and
Pains of others, while wishing delights only.
And you, lady, who - I seem to remember -
Conjured a bower out of the desert,
If you want as respectable mother bring
Up my son to be a brave citizen,
You're mad, are justly mocked by the maid
Sitting in the brothel with painted face
And with wine-excited and inviting lips.
Enjoy and pass time and deny virtue. -
Let me mount the scaffold, as I'm sentenc'd,
Not because I could do any sordidness,
But 'cause could be inspir'd by the great thoughts. -

(Meanwhile a block is brought in front of the steps, LUCIFER stands close to it with a hatchet. ADAM lowers his head.)

FIRST DEMAGOGUE

Put to death! The fatherland for ever!

LUCIFER (whispering to ADAM)

Nice farewell, it is. - Well, my fearless sir,
Are you not thrill'd now oddly enough by the
Unfriendly wind of the wry-faced cold death? -

EVE

Oh, Pallas! You did not answer my prayer. -

(The spirit of death like a gentle young man comes out of the temple and walks up to ADAM with torch and wreath.)

ADAM

Pallas answered me. - Good-bye, good-bye,
Lucia, my poor heart is satisfied.

LUCIFER

Be you damn'd, illusory world of dreams,
You spoiled my most beautiful hours again. -

EVE

Be you damn'd, you plebeian and rigid crowd,
You treated brutally the happiness
And its sweet flower was just stamp'd in dust.
Albeit, liberty is not so sweet to you
As painful and dolorous it was to me.

***********************************************************

[_ludwigm]

IMRE MADÁCH: (link)
"THE TRAGEDY OF MAN" 1861 (link)

SCENE V - ATHENS
- Athens, 489 BC. Adam is Miltiades the Younger; Lucifer is a guard; Eve is Miltiades' wife.
- [#img] http://www.hung-art.hu/kep/z/zichy/muvek/madach/05.jpg[/img] -