Am I not blithe as bird the live-long day?

It pleases me to bear what you call pain, Therefore to me 'tis pleasure: joy and grief Are the will's creatures; martyrs kiss the stake-- The moorland colt enjoys the th.o.r.n.y furze-- The dullest boor will seek a fight, and count His pleasure by his wounds; you must forget, love, Eve's curse lays suffering, as their natural lot, On womankind, till custom makes it light.

I know the use of pain: bar not the leech Because his cure is bitter--'Tis such medicine Which breeds that paltry strength, that weak devotion, For which you say you love me.--Ay, which brings Even when most sharp, a stern and awful joy As its attendant angel--I'll say no more-- Not even to thee--command, and I'll obey thee.

Lewis. Thou casket of all graces! fourfold wonder Of wit and beauty, love and wisdom! Canst thou Beatify the ascetic's savagery To heavenly prudence? Horror melts to pity, And pity kindles to adoring shower Of radiant tears! Thou tender cruelty!

Gay smiling martyrdom! Shall I forbid thee?

Limit thy depth by mine own shallowness?

Thy courage by my weakness? Where thou darest, I'll shudder and submit. I kneel here spell-bound Before my bleeding Saviour's living likeness To worship, not to cavil: I had dreamt of such things, Dim heard in legends, while my pitiful blood Tingled through every vein, and wept, and swore 'Twas beautiful, 'twas Christ-like--had I thought That thou wert such:--

Eliz. You would have loved me still?

Lewis. I have gone mad, I think, at every parting At mine own terrors for thee. No; I'll learn to glory In that which makes thee glorious! n.o.ble stains!

I'll call them rose leaves out of paradise Strewn on the wreathed snows, or rubies dropped From martyrs' diadems, prints of Jesus' cross Too truly borne, alas!

Eliz. I think, mine own, I am forgiven at last?

Lewis. To-night, my sister-- Henceforth I'll clasp thee to my heart so fast Thou shalt not 'scape unnoticed.

Eliz [laughing] We shall see-- Now I must stop those wise lips with a kiss, And lead thee back to scenes of simpler bliss.

SCENE II

A Chamber in the Castle. Elizabeth--the Fool Isentrudis--Guta singing.

High among the lonely hills, While I lay beside my sheep, Rest came down and filled my soul, From the everlasting deep.

Changeless march the stars above, Changeless morn succeeds to even; Still the everlasting hills, Changeless watch the changeless heaven.

See the rivers, how they run, Changeless toward the changeless sea; All around is forethought sure, Fixed will and stern decree.

Can the sailor move the main?

Will the potter heed the clay?

Mortal! where the spirit drives, Thither must the wheels obey.

Neither ask, nor fret, nor strive: Where thy path is, thou shall go.

He who made the streams of time Wafts thee down to weal or woe.

Eliz. That's a sweet song, and yet it does not chime With my heart's inner voice. Where had you it, Guta?

Guta. From a nun who was a shepherdess in her youth--sadly plagued she was by a cruel stepmother, till she fled to a convent and found rest to her soul.

Fool. No doubt; nothing so pleasant as giving up one's will in one's own way. But she might have learnt all that without taking cold on the hill-tops.

Eliz. Where then, Fool?

Fool. At any market-cross where two or three rogues are together, who have neither grace to mend, nor courage to say 'I did it.' Now you shall see the shepherdess' baby dressed in my cap and bells.

[Sings.]

When I was a greenhorn and young, And wanted to be and to do, I puzzled my brains about choosing my line, Till I found out the way that things go.

The same piece of clay makes a tile, A pitcher, a taw, or a brick: Dan Horace knew life; you may cut out a saint, Or a bench, from the self-same stick.

The urchin who squalls in a gaol, By circ.u.mstance turns out a rogue; While the castle-bred brat is a senator born, Or a saint, if religion's in vogue.

We fall on our legs in this world, Blind kittens, tossed in neck and heels: 'Tis Dame Circ.u.mstance licks Nature's cubs into shape, She's the mill-head, if we are the wheels.

Then why puzzle and fret, plot and dream?

He that's wise will just follow his nose; Contentedly fish, while he swims with the stream; 'Tis no business of his where it goes.

Eliz. Far too well sung for such a saucy song.

So go.

Fool. Ay, I'll go. Whip the dog out of church, and then rate him for being no Christian. [Exit Fool.]

Eliz. Guta, there is sense in that knave's ribaldry: We must not thus baptize our idleness, And call it resignation: Which is love?

To do G.o.d's will, or merely suffer it?

I do not love that contemplative life: No! I must headlong into seas of toil, Leap forth from self, and spend my soul on others.

Oh! contemplation palls upon the spirit, Like the chill silence of an autumn sun: While action, like the roaring south-west wind, Sweeps laden with elixirs, with rich draughts Quickening the wombed earth.

Guta. And yet what bliss, When dying in the darkness of G.o.d's light, The soul can pierce these blinding webs of nature, And float up to The Nothing, which is all things-- The ground of being, where self-forgetful silence Is emptiness,--emptiness fulness,--fulness G.o.d,-- Till we touch Him, and like a snow-flake, melt Upon His light-sphere's keen circ.u.mference!

Eliz. Hast thou felt this?

Guta. In part.

Eliz. Oh, happy Guta!

Mine eyes are dim--and what if I mistook For G.o.d's own self, the phantoms of my brain?

And who am I, that my own will's intent Should put me face to face with the living G.o.d?

I, thus thrust down from the still lakes of thought Upon a boiling crater-field of labour.

No! He must come to me, not I to Him; If I see G.o.d, beloved, I must see Him In mine own self:--

Guta. Thyself?

Eliz. Why start, my sister?

G.o.d is revealed in the crucified: The crucified must be revealed in me:-- I must put on His righteousness; show forth His sorrow's glory; hunger, weep with Him; Writhe with His stripes, and let this aching flesh Sink through His fiery baptism into death, That I may rise with Him, and in His likeness May ceaseless heal the sick, and soothe the sad, And give away like Him this flesh and blood To feed His lambs--ay--we must die with Him To sense--and love--

Guta. To love? What then becomes Of marriage vows?

Eliz. I know it--so speak not of them.

Oh! that's the flow, the chasm in all my longings, Which I have spanned with cobweb arguments, Yet yawns before me still, where'er I turn, To bar me from perfection; had I given My virgin all to Christ! I was not worthy!

I could not stand alone!

Guta. Here comes your husband.

Eliz. He comes! my sun! and every thrilling vein Proclaims my weakness.

[Lewis enters.]