The Complete Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge (Illustrated Edition). Samuel Taylor Coleridge

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СКАЧАТЬ Into one web of treason; all will be plan,

       My eye ne’er absent from the far-off mark, 45

       Step tracing step, each step a politic progress;

       And out of all they’ll fabricate a charge

       So specious, that I must myself stand dumb.

       I am caught in my own net, and only force,

       Naught but a sudden rent can liberate me. 50

       How else! since that the heart’s unbiass’d instinct

       Impelled me to the daring deed, which now

       Necessity, self-preservation, orders.

       Stern is the On-look of Necessity,

       Not without shudder many a human hand 55

       Grasps the mysterious urn of destiny.

       My deed was mine, remaining in my bosom,

       Once suffered to escape from its safe corner

       Within the heart, its nursery and birthplace,

       Sent forth into the Foreign, it belongs 60

       For ever to those sly malicious powers

       Whom never art of man conciliated.

       What is thy enterprize? thy aim? thy object?

       Hast honestly confessed it to thyself?

       Power seated on a quiet throne thou’dst shake, 65

       Power on an ancient consecrated throne,

       Strong in possession, founded in old custom;

       Power by a thousand tough and stringy roots

       Fixed to the people’s pious nursery-faith.

       This, this will be no strife of strength with strength. 70

       That feared I not. I brave each combatant,

       Whom I can look on, fixing eye to eye,

       Who full himself of courage kindles courage

       In me too. ‘Tis a foe invisible,

       The which I fear — a fearful enemy, 75

       Which in the human heart opposes me,

       By its coward fear alone made fearful to me.

       Not that, which full of life, instinct with power,

       Makes known its present being, that is not

       The true, the perilously formidable. 80

       O no! it is the common, the quite common,

       The thing of an eternal yesterday,

       What ever was, and evermore returns,

       Sterling tomorrow, for to-day ‘twas sterling!

       For of the wholly common is man made, 85

       And custom is his nurse! Woe then to them,

       Who lay irreverent hands upon his old

       House furniture, the dear inheritance

       From his forefathers. For time consecrates;

       And what is grey with age becomes religion. 90

       Be in possession, and thou hast the right,

       And sacred will the many guard it for thee!

      [To the Page, who here enters.

      The Swedish officer? — Well, let him enter.

      [The Page exit, WALLENSTEIN fixes his eye in deep

       thought on the door.

      Yet is it pure — as yet! — the crime has come

       Not o’er this threshold yet — so slender is 95

       The boundary that divideth life’s two paths.

      [Before 1] Wallenstein (in soliloquy). 1800, 1828, 1829.

      [After 25] [Pauses and remains in deep thought. 1800, 1828, 1829.

      [After 50] [Pauses again. 1800, 1828, 1829.

      [After 62] [Paces in agitation through the chamber, then pauses, and,

       after the pause, breaks out again into audible soliloquy. 1800, 1828,

       1829.

SCENE V

       Table of Contents

      WALLENSTEIN and WRANGEL.

      Wallenstein. Your name is Wrangel?

      Wrangel. Gustave Wrangel, General

       Of the Sudermanian Blues.

      Wallenstein. It was a Wrangel

       Who injured me materially at Stralsund,

       And by his brave resistance was the cause

       Of the opposition which that seaport made. 5

      Wrangel. It was the doing of the element

       With which you fought, my Lord! and not my merit.

       The Baltic Neptune did assert his freedom,

       The sea and land, it seemed, were not to serve

       One and the same.

      Wallenstein (makes a motion for him to take a seat, and seats

       himself). And where are your credentials? 10

       Come you provided with full powers, Sir General?

      Wrangel. There are so many scruples yet to solve ——

      Wallenstein (having read the credentials). An able

       letter! — Ay — he is a prudent,

       Intelligent master, whom you serve, Sir General!

       The Chancellor writes me, that he but fulfils 15

       His late departed Sovereign’s own idea

       In helping me to the Bohemian crown.

      Wrangel. He says the truth. Our great King, now in heaven,

       Did ever deem most highly of your Grace’s

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