KING [_with a look of expectation_]. Well?

MAR. The servant of a prince I cannot be. [_The King looks at him with astonishment._ I will not cheat my merchant: If you deign to take me as your servant, You expect, you wish, my actions only; You wish my arm in fight, my thought in counsel; Nothing more you will accept of: not my actions, Th' approval they might find at Court becomes The object of my acting. Now for me Right conduct has a value of its own: The happiness my king might cause me plant I would myself produce; and conscious joy, And free selection, not the force of duty, Should impel me. Is it thus your Majesty Requires it? Could you suffer new creators In your own creation? Or could I Consent with patience to become the chisel, When I hoped to be the statuary?

I love mankind; and in a monarchy, Myself is all that I can love.

KING. This fire Is laudable. You would do good to others; How you do it, patriots, wise men think Of little moment, so it be but done.

Seek for yourself the office in my kingdoms That will give you scope to gratify This n.o.ble zeal.

MAR. There is not such an office.

KING. How?

MAR. What the king desires to spread abroad Through these weak hands, is it the good of men?

That good which my unfetter'd love would wish them?

Pale majesty would tremble to behold it!

No! Policy has fashioned in her courts Another sort of human good; a sort Which _she_ is rich enough to give away, Awakening with it in the hearts of men New cravings, such as _it_ can satisfy.

Truth she keeps coining in her mints, such truth As she can tolerate; and every die Except her own she breaks and casts away.

But is the royal bounty wide enough For me to wish and work in? Must the love I hear my brother pledge itself to be My brother's jailor? Can I call him happy When he dare not think? Sire, choose some other To dispense the good which _you_ have stamped for us.

With me it tallies not; a prince's servant I cannot be.

KING [_rather quickly_].

You are a Protestant.

MAR. [_after some reflection_]

Sire, your creed is also mine. [_After a pause._ I find I am misunderstood: 'tis as I feared.

You see me draw the veil from majesty, And view its mysteries with steadfast eye: How should you know if I regard as holy What I no more regard as terrible?

Dangerous I seem, for bearing thoughts too high: My King, I am not dangerous: my wishes Lie buried here. [_Laying his hand on his breast._ The poor and purblind rage Of innovation, that but aggravates The weight o' th' fetters which it cannot break, Will never heat _my_ blood. The century Admits not my ideas: I live a citizen Of those that are to come. Sire, can a picture Break your rest? Your breath obliterates it.

KING. No other knows you harbour such ideas?

MAR. Such, no one.

KING [_rises, walks a few steps, then stops opposite the Marquis.

-Aside_]. New at least, this dialect!

Flattery exhausts itself: a man of parts Disdains to imitate. For once let's have A trial of the opposite! Why not?

The strange is oft the lucky.-If so be This is your principle, why let it pa.s.s!

I will conform; the crown shall have a servant New in Spain,-a liberal!

MAR. Sire, I see How very meanly you conceive of men; How, in the language of the frank true spirit You find but another deeper artifice Of a more practis'd coz'ner: I can also Partly see what causes this. 'Tis men; 'Tis men that force you to it: they themselves Have cast away their own n.o.bility, Themselves have crouch'd to this degraded posture.

Man's innate greatness, like a spectre, frights them; Their poverty seems safety; with base skill They ornament their chains, and call it virtue To wear them with an air of grace. Twas thus You found the world; thus from your royal father Came it to you: how in this distorted, Mutilated image could you honour man?

KING. Some truth there is in this.

MAR. Pity, however, That in taking man from the Creator, And changing him into _your_ handiwork, And setting up yourself to be the G.o.d Of this new-moulded creature, you should have Forgotten one essential; you yourself Remained a man, a very child of Adam!

You are still a suffering, longing mortal, You call for sympathy, and to a G.o.d We can but sacrifice, and pray, and tremble!

O unwise exchange! unbless'd perversion!

When you have sunk your brothers to be play'd As harp-strings, who will join in harmony With you the player?

KING [_aside_]. By Heaven, he touches me!

MAR. For you, however, this is unimportant; It but makes you separate, peculiar; 'Tis the price you pay for being a G.o.d.

And frightful were it if you failed in this!

If for the desolated good of millions, You the Desolator should gain-nothing!

If the very freedom you have blighted And kill'd were that alone which could exalt Yourself!-Sire, pardon me, I must not stay: The matter makes me rash: my heart is full, Too strong the charm of looking on the one Of living men to whom I might unfold it.

[_The Count de Lerma enters, and whispers a few words to the King. The latter beckons to him to withdraw, and continues sitting in his former posture._

KING [_to the Marquis, after Lerma is gone_].

Speak on!

MAR. [_after a pause_] I feel, Sire, all the worth-

KING. Speak on!

Y' had something more to say.

MAR. Not long since, Sire, I chanced to pa.s.s through Flanders and Brabant.

So many rich and flourishing provinces; A great, a mighty people, and still more, An honest people!-And this people's Father!

That, thought I, must be divine: so thinking, I stumbled on a heap of human bones.

[_He pauses; his eyes rest on the King, who endeavours to return his glance, but with an air of embarra.s.sment is forced to look upon the ground._

You are in the right, you _must_ proceed so.

That you _could_ do, what you saw you _must_ do, Fills me with a shuddering admiration.

Pity that the victim welt'ring in its blood Should speak so feeble an eulogium On the spirit of the priest! That mere men, Not beings of a calmer essence, write The annals of the world! Serener ages Will displace the age of Philip; these will bring A milder wisdom; the subject's good will then Be reconcil'd to th' prince's greatness; The thrifty State will learn to prize its children, And necessity no more will be inhuman.

KING. And when, think you, would those blessed ages Have come round, had I recoil'd before The curse of this? Behold my Spain! Here blooms The subject's good, in never-clouded peace: _Such_ peace will I bestow on Flanders.

MAR. Peace of a churchyard! And you hope to end What you have entered on? Hope to withstand The timeful change of Christendom; to stop The universal Spring that shall make young The countenance o' th' Earth? _You_ purpose, single In all Europe, alone, to fling yourself Against the wheel of Destiny that rolls For ever its appointed course; to clutch Its spokes with mortal arm? You may not, Sire!

Already thousands have forsook your kingdoms, Escaping glad though poor: the citizen You lost for conscience' sake, he was your n.o.blest.

With mother's arms Elizabeth receives The fugitives, and rich by foreign skill, In fertile strength her England blooms. Forsaken Of its toilsome people, lies Grenada Desolate; and Europe sees with glad surprise Its enemy faint with self-inflicted wounds.

[_The King seems moved: the Marquis observes it, and advances some steps nearer._

Plant for Eternity and death the seed?

Your harvest will be nothingness. The work Will not survive the spirit of its former; It will be in vain that you have labour'd; That you have fought the fight with Nature; And to plans of Ruin consecrated A high and royal lifetime. Man is greater Than you thought. The bondage of long slumber He will break; his sacred rights he will reclaim.

With Nero and Busiris will he rank The name of Philip, and-that grieves me, for You once were good.

KING. How know you that?

MAR. [_with warm energy_] You were; Yes, by th' All-Merciful! Yes, I repeat it.

Restore to us what you have taken from us.

Generous as strong, let human happiness Stream from your horn of plenty, let souls ripen Round you. Restore us what you took from us.

Amid a thousand kings become a king.

[_He approaches him boldly, fixing on him firm and glowing looks._

Oh, could the eloquence of all the millions, Who partic.i.p.ate in this great moment, Hover on my lips, and raise into a flame That gleam that kindles in your eyes!

Give up this false idolatry of self, Which makes your brothers nothing! Be to us A pattern of the Everlasting and the True!

Never, never, did a mortal hold so much, To use it so divinely. All the kings Of Europe reverence the name of Spain: Go on in front of all the kings of Europe!