The Faust-Legend and Goethe's 'Faust' Part 7

Faust kneels in homage before the impersonation of ideal beauty, and Helen feels that she is _now_ no longer a mere ideal, a mere phantom.

She clings to her new, unknown lover, as to one who will make her realize her own existence. It is an allegory of modern art--the art of Dante, Giotto, Raphael, Shakespeare and Goethe--receiving as its queen the ideal of Greek imagination and inspiring, as it were, the cold statue with the warm vitality of a higher conception of chivalrous love and perfect womanhood.

I have mentioned how the stately Greek measures in the _Helena_ give way to the metres of Romance and Chivalry. Perhaps it may be well to explain some of these various metres.

The scene opens, as you know, with Helen's dignified and beautiful speech:

Bewundert viel und viel gescholten Helena.

That is the well-known _iambic trimeter_, _i.e._ the metre of six feet (twelve syllables) used in all the speeches in Greek tragedy.

Thus the _Oedipus Tyrannos_ of Sophocles begins:

[Greek: o tekna, Kadmou tou palai nea trophe]

and so on. It has twelve syllables, mostly (iambics) as in our blank verse. But blank verse has only ten syllables: 'I cannot tell what you and other men.' If one adds two syllables one gets the Greek iambic verse, thus: 'I cannot tell what you and other men believe.' The Chorus in the _Helena_ uses various rhythms such as are found in the choruses of Greek tragedy:

Schweige, schweige, Missblickende, missredende du!

Aus so gra.s.slichen, einzahnigen Lippen was enthaucht wohl Solchem furchtbaren Greuelschlund!

Then Mephistopheles, as the Phorkyad, when Helen falls fainting, addresses her suddenly in another measure--a longer verse, such as is sometimes used by the Greek tragedians and comedians when something new occurs in the play. It is called a _tetrameter_, and consists of fifteen syllables (mostly - U, called trochees). Thus, in Greek, [Greek: oi gerontes oi palaioi memphomestha te polei]--and in German:

Tritt hervor aus fluchtigen Wolken hohe Sonne dieses Tags--

or the fine lines spoken by Helen:

Doch es ziemet Koniginnen, allen Menschen ziemt es wohl, Sich zu fa.s.sen, zu ermannen, was auch drohend uberrascht.

When Faust appears he begins to speak at once in modern blank verse of ten syllables, such as we know in Milton and Shakespeare and Schiller.

One might have expected him to speak in some earlier romantic measure, to have used perhaps the metre of the old Nibelungenlied, as in

Es ist in alten Mahren wunders viel geseit, Von Heleden lobebaren, von grosser Arebeit,

which is supposed to date from about 1150; or in Dante's _terza rima_, of about 1300, as

Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita.

But blank verse is after all the metre _par excellence_ of the Renaissance, that is of the revival of Greek influence, and Goethe chose it for this reason.

Now the Watchman Lynceus ('the keen-eyed,' as the word means--and you perhaps remember him as the watchman of the Argonauts on the good ship Argo) represents here the early pre-Renaissance poets of Italy and Provence and Germany--the Troubadours and Trouveres and Minnesinger, who were so surprised and dazzled by the sudden sunrise of the Renaissance with its wonderful new apparition of Greek art that they (as Lynceus in _Faust_) failed to announce its coming; and therefore Lynceus here speaks in a kind of early Troubadour metre, with _rime_. In cla.s.sical poetry there is no rime. They did not like it; they even ridiculed it.

For instance Cicero, the great orator, once tried to write poetry, and produced a line that said 'O fortunate Rome, when I was consul!' This was not only conceited of him but unfortunately the line contained a rime and this rime brought down an avalanche of ridicule on his head. 'O fortunatam natam me consule Romam' was this unfortunate line. Rime was probably first adopted by the monks in their medieval Latin hymns and was used by the Troubadours and early Italian poets when they began to write in the vulgar tongue. Dante uses it in his canzoni and sonnets and ballads, as well of course as in his great poem. So it is quite right to make Lynceus speak in rime. Helen of course has never heard rime before, and she turns to Faust and asks him what it is that sounds so strange and beautiful in this song of Lynceus; and she wants to know how _she_ too can learn the art. So Faust tells her just to try and the rimes will come of their own accord. But I will quote the pa.s.sage, for it is very pretty; and I will add a rough translation.

Doch wunscht' ich Unterricht warum die Rede Des Manns mir seltsam klang, seltsam und freundlich-- Ein Ton scheint sich dem and'ren zu bequemen; Und hat ein Wort zum Ohre sich gesellt, Ein andres kommt, dem ersten liebzukosen....

So sage denn, wie sprach' ich auch so schon.

FAUST. Das ist gar leicht--es muss vom Herzen geh'n.

Und wenn die Brust von Sehnsucht uberfliesst Man sieht sich um, und fragt....

HELEN. wer mitgeniesst.

FAUST. Nun schaut der Geist nicht vorwarts, nicht zuruck-- Die Gegenwart allein ...

HELEN. ist unser Gluck--

FAUST. Schatz ist sie, Hochgewinn, Besitz und Pfand.

Bestatigung, wer gibt sie?

HELEN. Meine Hand.

(HELEN. I fain would ask thee why the watchman's song So strangely sounded--strange but beautiful.

Tones seemed to link themselves in harmony.

One word would come and nestle in the ear, Then came another and caressed it there.

But say--how can I also learn the art?

FAUST. Quite easily--one listens to one's heart, And when its longings seem too great to bear We look around for one ...

HELEN. our joy to share.

FAUST. Not past nor future loving hearts can bless, The _present_--

HELEN. is alone our happiness.

FAUST. Before the prize of beauty, lo I stand, But who a.s.sures the prize to me?

HELEN. My hand!)

In the midst of this life of chivalrous love and romance Faust and Helen pa.s.s a period of ecstatic bliss. But, as Goethe himself found, such ecstasies are only a pa.s.sing phase. The end comes inevitably and suddenly. A son is born to them, Euphorion by name (the name of the winged son of Helen and Achilles, according to one legend). He is no common human child. As a b.u.t.terfly from its chrysalis he bursts at once into fully developed existence. He is of enchanting beauty but wild and capricious; spurning the common earth he climbs ever higher and higher amidst the mountain crags, singing ravishing melodies to his lyre. He reaches the topmost crag and casts himself into the air. A flame flickers upwards, and the body of a beautiful youth 'in which one seems to recognize a well-known form' falls to the ground, at the feet of Faust and Helen.

Euphorion symbolizes modern poetry, and the well-known form is that of Byron. For a moment the body lies there; it then dissolves in flame, which ascends to heaven, and a voice is heard calling on Helen to follow.

Yes, she must follow. As flame she must return to her home in the Empyrean--the home of ideal beauty and all other ideals. However much we strive to realize ideal beauty in art or in our lives, however we may hold it to our hearts as a warm and living possession, it always escapes our grasp. The short-lived winged child of poetic inspiration gleams but for a moment and disappears, as a flame flickering back to its native empyrean. And she, the mother, she too must follow, leaving us alone to face the stern reality of life and of death.

In the embrace of Faust Helen melts away into thin air, leaving in his arms her robe and veil. These change into a cloud, which envelops him, raises him into the air and bears him also away. The Phorkyad picks up Euphorion's lyre and mantle; he steps forward and addresses the audience, a.s.suring them that in the leavings of poetic genius he has got enough to fit out any number of modern poets, and is open to a bargain.

He then swells up to a gigantic height, removes the Gorgon-mask, and reveals himself as Mephistopheles once more the northern modern devil; and the curtain falls.

When it rises for the Fourth Act we see a craggy mountain peak before us. A cloud approaches, and deposits Faust on the topmost crag. It lingers for a time, a.s.suming wondrous shapes and then gradually melts away into the blue. Faust gazes at it. In its changing outlines he seems to discern first the regal forms of Olympian G.o.ddesses, of Juno, of Leda--then of Helen. But they fade away and, ere it disappears, the cloud a.s.sumes the likeness of that other half-forgotten human form which once had aroused in his heart that which he now feels to have been a love far truer and deeper than all his pa.s.sion for ideal beauty--that 'swiftly felt and scarcely comprehended' love for a human heart which, as he now confesses to himself, 'had it been retained would have been his most precious possession.'

A seven-league boot now pa.s.ses by--followed in hot haste by another. Out of the boots steps forth Mephistopheles. He asks contemptuously if Faust has had enough of heroines and all such ideal folly. He cannot understand why Faust is still dissatisfied with life. Surely he has seen enough of its pleasures. He advises him, if he is weary of court life, to build himself a Sultan's palace and harem and live in retirement--as Tiberius did on the island of Capri. 'Not so,' answers Faust. 'This world of earthly soil Still gives me room for greater action. I feel new strength for n.o.bler toil--Toil that at length shall bring me satisfaction.'

He has determined to devote the rest of his life to humanity, to the good of the human race. It is a project with which Mephistopheles naturally has little sympathy. But he is forced to acquiesce, and, being bound to serve Faust even in this, he suggests a plan. The young Kaiser is at present in great difficulties. He is hard pressed by a rival Emperor--a pretender to the Imperial crown. Mephisto will by his magic arts secure the Kaiser the victory over this pretender, and then Faust will claim as recompense a tract of country bordering on the ocean. Here by means of ca.n.a.ls and d.y.k.es, dug and built by demonic powers, Faust is to reclaim from the sea a large region of fertile country and to found a kind of model republic, where peace and prosperity and every social and political blessing shall find a home. The plan is carried out. At the summons of Mephistopheles appear three gigantic warriors by whose help the battle is won, and Faust gains his reward--the stretch of land on the sh.o.r.e of the ocean. And he is not the only gainer. The Archbishop takes the opportunity of extracting far more valuable concessions of land from the young Kaiser as penance for his having a.s.sociated himself with powers of darkness. The prelate even extracts the promise of t.i.thes and dues from all the land still unclaimed by Faust. As Mephistopheles aptly remarks, the Church seems to have a good digestion.

Many years are now supposed to elapse. Faust has nearly completed his task of expelling the sea and founding his ideal state. What had been a watery waste is now like the garden of Eden in its luxuriant fertility.

Thousands of industrious happy mortals have found in this new country a refuge and a home. Ships, laden with costly wares, throng the ports. On an eminence overlooking the scene stands the castle of Faust, and not far off are a cottage and a chapel. On this scene the last act opens. A wanderer enters. He is seeking the cottage which once used to stand here, on the very brink of the ocean. It was here that he was shipwrecked: here, on this very spot, the waves had cast him ash.o.r.e: here stands still the cottage of the poor old peasant and his wife who had rescued him from death. But now the sea is sparkling in the blue distance and beneath him spreads the new country with its waving cornfields. He enters the cottage and is welcomed by the poor old couple (to whom Goethe has given the names Philemon and Baucis, the old peasant and his wife who, according to the Greek legend, were the only Phrygians who offered hospitality to Zeus, the King of the G.o.ds, as he was wandering about in disguise among mortals).

Faust comes out on to the garden terrace of his castle. He is now an old man--close upon a hundred years of age. He gazes with a feeling of happiness and satisfaction at the scene that lies below him--the wide expanse of fertile land, the harbours and ca.n.a.ls filled with shipping.

Suddenly the bell in the little chapel begins to ring for Vespers.

Faust's happiness is in a moment changed into bitterness and anger. This cottage, this chapel, this little plot of land are as thorns in his side: they are the Naboth's vineyard which he covets and which alone interferes with his territorial rights. He has offered large sums of money, but the peasant will not give up his home.

Mephistopheles and his helpers (the same three gigantic supernatural beings who took part in the battle) appear. Faust vents his anger and chagrin with regard to the peasant and the irritating ding-dong-dell of the vesper bell. He commissions Mephistopheles to persuade the peasant to take the money and to make him turn out of his wretched hut.