Faust.
Hence from my sight!
Spirit.
Thy panting prayer besought my might to view,
To hear my voice, and know my semblance too;
Now bending from my native sphere to please thee,
Here am I!—ha! what pitiful terrors seize thee,
And overman thee quite! where now the call
Of that proud soul, that scorned to own the thrall
Of earth, a world within itself created,
And bore and cherished? that with its fellows sated
Swelled with prophetic joy to leave its sphere,
And live a spirit with spirits, their rightful peer.
Where art thou, Faust? whose invocation rung
Upon mine ear, whose powers all round me clung?
Art thou that Faust? whom melts my breath away,
Trembling even to the life-depths of thy frame,
Like a poor worm that crawls into his clay!
Faust.
Shall I then yield to thee, thou thing of flame?
I am that Faust, and Spirit is my name!
Spirit.
Where life’s floods flow
And its tempests rave,
Up and down I wave,
Flit I to and fro!
Birth and the grave,
Life’s hidden glow,
A shifting motion,
A boundless ocean
Whose waters heave
Eternally;
Thus on the sounding loom of Time I weave
The living mantle of the Deity.
Faust.
Thou who round the wide world wendest,
Thou busy Spirit, how near I feel to thee!
Spirit.
Thou’rt like the spirit whom thou comprehendest,
Not me! [Vanishes.
Faust.
Not thee!
Whom, then?
I, image of the Godhead,
Dwarfed by thee! [Knocking is heard.]
O death!—’tis Wagner’s knock—I know it well,
My famulus; he comes to mar the spell!
Woe’s me that such bright vision of the spheres
Must vanish when this pedant-slave appears!
Scene II.
