Three short works | Page 2

gathered many lives, a weariness
assails me, and I long to rest.
But on my work must go; my path I must pursue; it leads through
infinite space and all the worlds. I sweep away men's plans together
with their triumphs, their loves together with their crimes, their very all.
I rend my winding-sheet; a frightful craving tortures me incessantly, as
if some serpent stung continually within.
I throw a backward glance, and see the smoke of fiery ruins left behind;
the darkness of the night; the agony of the world. I see the graves that
are the work of these, my hands; I see the background of the past--'tis
nothingness! My weary body, heavy head, and tired feet, sink, seeking
rest. My eyes turn towards a glowing horizon, boundless, immense,
seeming to grow increasingly in height and depth. I shall devour it, as I
have devoured all else.
When, O God! shall I sleep in my turn? When wilt Thou cease creating?
When may I, digging my own grave, stretch myself out within my tomb,
and, swinging thus upon the world, list the last breath, the death-gasp,
of expiring nature?
When that time comes, away my darts and shroud I'll hurl. Then shall I
free my horse, and he shall graze upon the grass that grows upon the
Pyramids, sleep in the palaces of emperors, drink the last drop of water
from the sea, and snuff the odour of the last slow drop of blood! By day,
by night, through the countless ages, he shall roam through fields

eternal as the fancy takes him; shall leap with one great bound from
Atlas to the Himalayas; shall course, in his insolent pride, from heaven
to earth; disport himself by caracoling in the dust of crumbled empires;
shall speed across the beds of dried-up oceans; shall bound o'er ruins of
enormous cities; inhale the void with swelling chest, and roll and
stretch at ease.
Then haply, faithful one, weary as I, thou finally shalt seek some
precipice from which to cast thyself; shalt halt, panting before the
mysterious ocean of infinity; and then, with foaming mouth, dilated
nostrils, and extended neck turned towards the horizon, thou shalt, as I,
pray for eternal sleep; for repose for thy fiery feet; for a bed of green
leaves, whereon reclining thou canst close thy burning eyes forever.
There, waiting motionless upon the brink, thou shalt desire a power
stronger than thyself to kill thee at a single blow--shalt pray for union
with the dying storm, the faded flower, the shrunken corpse. Thou shalt
seek sleep, because eternal life is torture, and the tomb is peace.
Why are we here? What hurricane has hurled us into this abyss? What
tempest soon shall bear us away towards the forgotten planets whence
we came?
Till then, my glorious steed, thou shalt run thy course; thou mayst
please thine ear with the crunching of the heads crushed under thy feet.
Thy course is long, but courage! Long time hast thou carried me: but
longer time still must elapse, and yet we shall not age.
Stars may be quenched, the mountains crumble, the earth finally wear
away its diamond axis; but we two, we alone are immortal, for the
impalpable lives forever!
But to-day them canst lie at my feet, and polish thy teeth against the
moss-grown tombs, for Satan has abandoned me, and a power unknown
compels me to obey his will. Lo! the dead seek to rise from their
graves.
* * * * *

Satan, I love thee! Thou alone canst comprehend my joys and my
deliriums. But, more fortunate than I, thou wilt some day, when earth
shall be no more, recline and sleep within the realms of space.
But I, who have lived so long, have worked so ceaselessly, with only
virtuous loves and solemn thoughts,--I must endure immortality. Man
has his tomb, and glory its oblivion; the day dies into night but I--!
And I am doomed to lasting solitude upon my way, strewn with the
bones of men and marked by ruins. Angels have fellow-angels; demons
their companions of darkness; but I hear only sounds of a clanking
scythe, my whistling arrows, and my speeding horse. Always the echo
of the surging billows that sweep over and engulf mankind!
SATAN.
Dost thou complain,--thou, the most fortunate creature under heaven?
The only, splendid, great, unchangeable, eternal one--like God, who is
the only Being that equals thee! Dost thou repine, who some day in thy
turn shalt disappear forever, after thou hast crushed the universe
beneath thy horse's feet?
When God's work of creating has ceased; when the heavens have
disappeared and the stars are quenched; when spirits rise from their
retreats and wander in the depths with sighs and groans; then, what
unpicturable delight for