©Biblioteca Nacional de Colombia

FAUST'S STUDY 117
A?d hail the happy moment in its course,
BIdding it linger with me-' Oh, how fair
Art thou, delicious moment! '-' Happy days,
Why will ye flee? '-' Fair visions! yet a little
-Abide with me, and bless me-fly not yet,'
Or words like these-then throw me into fetters­
~en willingly do I consent to perish;
Then may the death-bell peal its heavy sounds;
Then is thy service at an end-and then
!he clock may cease to strike-the hand to move­
,£jor me be time then passed away for ever!
AlEPHISTOPHELES_ Think well upon it------we will not
forget_
I FAUST_ Remember, or forget it, as you please;
, have resolved-and that not rashly: here,
'Vhile I remain, I needs must be a slave-
\"\nat matter, therefore, whether thine, or whose 1
AlEPHISTOPHELES_ I'll then, belike, at the DOCTORS'
li'east to-day
Attend, your humble friend and servitor_
Jr,ust one thing more-as life and death 's uncertain,
d wish to have a line or two in writing_
FAUST_ And dost thou ask a writing, too, poor
• pedant?
~\..n_(n\' you not Man? Man's nature? or Man's word?
l\~ It not enough that I have spoken it ?
~~ very life-all that I have and am,
yv nat is it but an echo of my word,
irledge of the will that gives it utterance?
Words be nothing, what is writing more?
is the ,.... orld's course one sea of stormy madness,-
ts thousand streams, in conflict everlasting,
~aving regardlessly? roll they not on ?
• ust they not roll ?-and can it be that I,
In ihis perpetual movement, shall not move­
~eld_ back, the slave and prisoner of a promise T
1 et ill this fancy all believe alike:
f 11 delusion, all men are deluded-
~nd is there one that would be undeceived 1
ruth and the feeling of integrity
©Biblioteca Nacional de Colombia