Faust Read Online Free PDF

property or gold,
 
or honor and glories of this world;
 
no dog would choose to live this way!
 
Therefore I have turned to magic,
 
so that by the spirit’s might and main
 
I might yet learn some secret lore;
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that I need no longer sweat and toil
 
and dress my ignorance in empty words;
 
that I might behold the warp and the woof
 
of the world’s inmost fabric,
 
of its essential strength and fount
 
and no longer dig about in words.
 
O gentle moonlight, how I wish that you
 
could see the end of all my misery!
 
How often at this desk I sat
 
into the depth of night and looked for you
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until over these books and papers
 
you appeared to me, my melancholy friend.
 
If I could roam on mountain heights in
 
your dear light,
 
drift with hovering spirits over caverns,
 
weave over meadows in your twilight glow,
 
I would expel the smoke of learning
 
and be drenched to wholeness in your dew.
 
Alas! am I still wedged within this prison cell?
 
You cursed, dank hole in the wall,
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where even the sweet light of heaven
 
breaks wanly through the painted glass!
 
I’m cooped in heaps of worm-eaten books
 
thickly laden with dust,
 
with sooty papers fastened all around,
 
extending to the vaulted arches—
 
retorts and boxes strewn about
 
with pyramids of instruments,
 
the stuffing of ancestral rubbish—
 
This is my world! I must call it a world!
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And still you wonder why your heart
 
claws anxiously against your breast?
 
And why a misery yet unexplored
 
stands in the way of stirring life?
 
Instead of pulsing nature,
 
where God had once placed man,
 
you’re thrust into this soot and mold
 
and ringed by sundry bones and parched cadavers.
 
Away! Escape! Go out into the open fields!
 
And this volume of mysterious lore
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in Nostradamus’s 3 hand and pen—
 
is it not sufficient company?
 
Once you know the stars’ procession,
 
and Nature is your guide and master,
 
when spirits speak to spirit—
 
your soul will then unfold its strength.
 
My barren thoughts are wasted
 
within the sight of sacred signs:
 
Spirits, now you hover close to me;
 
if you hear me, answer me!
 
        (
He opens the book and sees the sign of the macrocosm
.)
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Ha! A rush of bliss
 
flows suddenly through all my senses!
 
I feel a glow, a holy joy of life
 
which sets my veins and flesh afire.
 
Was it a god that drew these signs
 
which soothe my inward raging
 
and fill my wretched heart with joy,
 
and with mysterious strength
 
reveal about me Nature’s pulse?
 
Am I a god? The light pervades me so!
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In these pure ciphers I can see
 
living Nature spread out before my soul.
 
At last I understand the sage’s words:
 
“The world of spirits is not closed;
 
your mind is shut, your heart is dead!
 
Pupil, stand up and unafraid
 
bathe your earthly breast in morning light!”
 
        (
He gazes at the sign
.)
 
How all things are weaving one in one;
 
each lives and works within the other.
 
Heaven’s angels dip and soar
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and hold their golden pails aloft;
 
with fragrant blessings on their wings,
 
they penetrate the earthly realm from Heaven
 
and all make all resound in harmony.
 
What pageantry! But alas, a pageant and no more!
 
Where shall I clasp you, infinity of Nature?
 
You breasts, where? You wellsprings of all life?
 
Heaven and earth depend on you—
 
toward you my parched soul is straining.
 
You flow, you nourish, yet I crave in vain.
 
        (
He reluctantly turns the pages of the book and perceives the sign of the Earth Spirit
.)
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How differently this new sign works on me!
 
You are nearer to me, spirit of the earth;
 
even now I feel my powers rise
 
and glow as from new wine.
 
I feel new strength to face the world,
 
to endure its woe and happiness,
 
to brave the blasts of hurricanes,
 
to scoff at my splintering ship.
 
The airs above me