Prefixed to the Later Editions of Faust.
Ye hover nigh, dim-floating shapes again,
That erst the misty eye of Fancy knew!
Shall I once more your shadowy flight detain,
And the fond dreamings of my youth pursue?
Ye press around!-resume your ancient reign-
As from the hazy past ye rise to view;
The magic breath that wafts your airy train
Stirs in my breast long-slumbering chords again.
Ye raise the pictured forms of happy days,
And many a dear loved shade comes up with you;
Like the far echo of old-memoried lays,
First love and early friendship ye renew.
Old pangs return; life's labyrinthine maze
Again the plaint of sorrow wanders through,
And names the loved ones who from Fate received
A bitter call, and left my heart bereaved.
They hear no more the sequel of my song,
Who heard my early chant with open ear;
Dispersed forever is the favoring throng,
Dumb the response from friend to friend so dear.
My sorrow floats an unknown crowd among,
Whose very praise comes mingled with strange fear;
And they who once were pleased to hear my lay,
If yet they live, have drifted far away.
And I recall with long-unfelt desire
The realm of spirits, solemn, still, serene;
My faltering lay, like the Æolian lyre,
Gives wavering tones with many a pause between;
The stern heart glows with youth's rekindled fire,
Tear follows tear, where long no tear hath been;
The thing I am fades into distance gray;
'And the pale Past stands out a clear to-day.
MANAGER.-Ye twain, in good and evil day
So oft my solace and my stay,
Say, have ye heard sure word, or wandering rumor
How our new scheme affects the public humor?
Without the multitude we cannot thrive,
Their maxim is to live and to let live.
The posts are up, the planks are fastened, and
Each man's agog for something gay and grand.
With arched eyebrows they sit already there,
Gaping for something new to make them stare.
I know the public taste, and profit by it;
But still to-day I've fears of our succeeding:
'Tis true they're customed to no dainty diet,
But they've gone through an awful breadth of reading.
How shall we make our pieces fresh and new,
And with some meaning in them, pleasing too?
In sooth, I like to see the people pouring
Into our booth, like storm and tempest roaring,
While, as the waving impulse onward heaves them,
The narrow gate of grace at length receives them,
When, long ere it be dark, with lusty knocks
They fight their way on to the money-box,
And like a starving crowd around a baker's door,
For tickets as for bread they roar.
So wonder-working is the poet's sway
O'er every heart-so may it work to-day!
POET.-O mention not that motley throng to me,
Which only seen makes frighted genius pause;
Hide from my view that wild and whirling sea
That sucks me in, and deep and downward draws.
No! let some noiseless nook of refuge be
My heaven, remote from boisterous rude applause, Where Love and Friendship, as a God inspires, Create and fan the pure heart's chastened fires. Alas! what there the shaping thought did rear, And scarce the trembling lip might lisping say, To Nature's rounded type not always near, The greedy moment rudely sweeps away. Ofttimes a work, through many a patient year Must toil to reach its finished fair display; The glittering gaud may fix the passing gaze, But the pure gem gains Time's enduring praise. MERRYFELLOW.-Pshaw! Time will reap his own; but in our
The moment lies, and we must use the hour.
The Future, no doubt, is the Present's heir,
But we who live must first enjoy our share.
Methinks the present of a goodly boy
Has something that the wisest might enjoy.
Whose ready lips with easy lightness brim,
The people's humor need not trouble him;
He courts a crowd the surer to impart
The quickening word that stirs the kindred heart.
Quit ye like men, be honest bards and true,
Let Fancy with her many-sounding chorus,
Reason, Sense, Feeling, Passion, move before us,
But, mark me well-a spice of folly too!
MANAGER.-Give what you please, so that you give but plenty;
They come to see, and you must feed their eyes;
Scene upon scene, each act may have its twenty,
To keep them gaping still in fresh surprise:
This is the royal road to public favor;
You snatch it thus, and it is yours forever.
A mass of things alone the mass secures;
Each comes at last and culls his own from yours.
Bring much, and every one is sure to find,
In your rich nosegay, something to his mind.
You give a piece, give it at once in pieces;
Such a ragout each taste and temper pleases,
And spares, if only they were wise to know it,
Much fruitless toil to player and to poet.
In vain into an artful whole you glue it;
The public in the long run will undo it.
POET.-What? feel you not the vileness of this trade?
How much the genuine artist ye degrade?
The bungling practice of our hasty school
You raise into a maxim and a rule.
MANAGER.-All very well!-but when a man
Has forged a scheme, and sketched a plan
He must have sense to 'ise the tool
The best that for the job is fit.
Consider what soft wood you have to split,
And who the people are for whom you write.
One comes to kill a few hours o' the night;
Another, with his drowsy wits oppressed,
An over-sated banquet to digest;
And not a few, whom least of all we choose,
Come to the play from reading the "Reviews."
They drift to us as to a masquerade;
Mere curiosity wings their paces;
The ladies show themselves, and show their silks and
And play their parts well, though they are not paid.
What dream you of, on your poetic height?
A crowded house, forsooth, gives you delight!
Look at your patrons as you should,
You'll find them one-half cold, and one-half crude.
One leaves the play to spend the night
Upon a wench's breast in wild delight;
Another sets him down to cards, or calls
For rattling dice, or clicking billiard balls.
For such like hearers, and for ends like these
Why should a bard the gentle Muses tease?
I tell you, give them more, and ever more, and still
A little more, if you would prove your skill.
And since they can't discern the finer quality,
Confound them with broad sweep of triviality-
But what's the matter?-pain or ravishment?
POET.-If such your service, you must be content
With other servants who will take your pay!
Shall then the bard his noblest right betray?
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