Faust Read Online Free PDF Page A

to accuse?
 
Is nothing ever right for you on earth?
    MEPHISTOPHELES.
 
No, my Lord. I find it there, as always, thoroughly revolting.
 
I pity men in all their misery
 
and actually hate to plague the wretches.
    THE LORD.
 
Do you know Faust?
    MEPHISTOPHELES.
 
                                   The doctor?
    THE LORD.
 
                                                  My servant!
    MEPHISTOPHELES.
300
Indeed! He serves you in peculiar ways.
 
He eats and drinks no earthly nourishment, the fool.
 
The ferment in him drives him on and on,
 
and yet he half-knows that he’s mad.
 
He demands the fairest stars from heaven
 
and every deepest lust from earth.
 
The nearest and the farthest
 
leave his churning heart dissatisfied.
    THE LORD.
 
If now he serves me only gropingly,
 
I soon shall lead him into clarity.
310
The gardener knows that when his sapling greens
 
the coming years will see it bloom and bear.
    MEPHISTOPHELES.
 
What will you bet? You’ll lose him in the end,
 
if you’ll just give me your permission
 
to lead him gently down my street.
    THE LORD.
 
So long as he walks the earth,
 
so long may your wish be granted;
 
man will stray so long as he strives.
    MEPHISTOPHELES.
 
I thank you kindly; for I have never
 
enjoyed involvement with the dead.
320
I prefer the full and rosy cheek,
 
and I’m simply not at home to corpses.
 
Cats like mice alive—and so do I.
    THE LORD.
 
Very well. I leave this much to you.
 
Draw this spirit from his primal source
 
and—if you can hold him—
 
lead him downward on your road;
 
but stand ashamed when in the end you must confess:
 
a good man in his dark and secret longings
 
is well aware which path to go.
    MEPHISTOPHELES.
330
True enough! Except, it won’t be true for long.
 
I’m not concerned about the outcome of my wager,
 
and once I have attained my goal,
 
please let me have my heartfelt triumph!
 
Dust shall he eat, and that with pleasure,
 
as did my relative, the celebrated snake.
    THE LORD.
 
I am glad to let you have apparent freedom;
 
I hold no hatred for the like of you.
 
Of all the spirits that negate,
 
the rogue to me is the least burdensome.
340
Man’s diligence is easily exhausted,
 
he grows too fond of unremitting peace.
 
I’m therefore pleased to give him a companion
 
who must goad and prod and be a devil.—
 
But you, my own true sons of Heaven,
 
rejoice in Beauty’s vibrant wealth.
 
That which becomes will live and work forever;
 
let it enfold you with propitious bonds of Love.
 
And what appears as flickering image now,
 
fix it firmly with enduring thought.
 
        (
The heavens close; the Archangels separate
.)
    MEPHISTOPHELES.
350
From time to time it’s good to see the Old Man;
 
I must be careful not to break with him.
 
How decent of so great a personage
 
to be so human with the devil.

THE FIRST PART OF THE TRAGEDY
 
NIGHT
    A high-vaulted, narrow, Gothic room
.
    Faust, restless, in an armchair at his desk
.
    FAUST.
 
Alas, I have studied philosophy,
 
the law as well as medicine,
 
and to my sorrow, theology;
 
studied them well with ardent zeal,
 
yet here I am, a wretched fool,
 
no wiser than I was before.
360
They call me Magister, even Doctor,
 
and for some ten years now
 
I’ve led my students by the nose,
 
up and down, across, and in circles—
 
all I see is that we cannot know!
 
This burns my heart.
 
Granted I am smarter than all those fops,
 
doctors, masters, scribes, and preachers;
 
I am not afflicted by scruples and doubts,
 
not afraid of Hell or the devil—
370
but in return all joy is torn from me,
 
I don’t pretend to know a thing worth knowing,
 
I don’t pretend that I can teach,
 
improve, or convert my fellow men.
 
Nor have I