The Saint's Tragedy

Monks.  A vanitatibus sæculi
Domine libera nos.

[Sophia descends from the Dais, leading Elizabeth.  Ladies follow.]

Sophia [to the Fool].  Silence, you screech-owl.—
Come strew flowers, fair ladies,
And lead into her bower our fairest bride,
The cynosure of love and beauty here,
Who shrines heaven’s graces in earth’s richest casket.

Eliz.  I come, [aside] Here, Guta, take those monks a fee—
Tell them I thank them—bid them pray for me.
I am half mazed with trembling joy within,
And noisy wassail round.  ’Tis well, for else
The spectre of my duties and my dangers
Would whelm my heart with terror.  Ah! poor self!
Thou took’st this for the term and bourne of troubles—
And now ’tis here, thou findest it the gate
Of new sin-cursed infinities of labour,
Where thou must do, or die!

[aloud] Lead on.  I’ll follow.  [Exeunt.]

Fool.  There, now.  No fee for the fool; and yet my prescription was as good as those old Jeremies’.  But in law, physic, and divinity, folks had sooner be poisoned in Latin, than saved in the mother-tongue.

ACT II

SCENE I.  A.D. 1221-27

Elizabeth’s Bower.  Night.  Lewis sleeping in an Alcove.

Elizabeth lying on the Floor in the Foreground.

Eliz.  No streak yet in the blank and eyeless east—
More weary hours to ache, and smart, and shiver
On these bare boards, within a step of bliss.
Why peevish?  ’Tis mine own will keeps me here—
And yet I hate myself for that same will:
Fightings within and out!  How easy ’twere, now,
Just to be like the rest, and let life run—
To use up to the rind what joys God sends us,
Not thus forestall His rod: What! and so lose
The strength which comes by suffering?  Well, if grief
Be gain, mine’s double—fleeing thus the snare
Of yon luxurious and unnerving down,
And widowed from mine Eden.  And why widowed?
Because they tell me, love is of the flesh,
And that’s our house-bred foe, the adder in our bosoms,
Which warmed to life, will sting us.  They must know—
I do confess mine ignorance, O Lord!
Mine earnest will these painful limbs may prove.
. . . . .
And yet I swore to love him.—So I do
No more than I have sworn.  Am I to blame
If God makes wedlock that, which if it be not,
It were a shame for modest lips to speak it,
And silly doves are better mates than we?
And yet our love is Jesus’ due,—and all things
Which share with Him divided empery
Are snares and idols—‘To love, to cherish, and to obey!’
. . . . .
O deadly riddle!  Rent and twofold life!
O cruel troth!  To keep thee or to break thee
Alike seems sin!  O thou beloved tempter,

[Turning toward the bed.]

Who first didst teach me love, why on thyself
From God divert thy lesson?  Wilt provoke Him?
What if mine heavenly Spouse in jealous ire
Should smite mine earthly spouse?  Have I two husbands?
The words are horror—yet they are orthodox!

[Rises and goes to the window.]

How many many brows of happy lovers
The fragrant lips of night even now are kissing!
Some wandering hand in hand through arched lanes;
Some listening for loved voices at the lattice;
Some steeped in dainty dreams of untried bliss;
Some nestling soft and deep in well-known arms,
Whose touch makes sleep rich life.  The very birds
Within their nests are wooing!  So much love!
All seek their mates, or finding, rest in peace;
The earth seems one vast bride-bed.  Doth God tempt us?
Is’t all a veil to blind our eyes from him?
A fire-fly at the candle.  ’Tis love leads him;
Love’s light, and light is love: O Eden!  Eden!
Eve was a virgin there, they say; God knows.
Must all this be as it had never been?
Is it all a fleeting type of higher love?
Why, if the lesson’s pure, is not the teacher
Pure also?  Is it my shame to feel no shame?
Am I more clean, the more I scent uncleanness?
Shall base emotions picture Christ’s embrace?
Rest, rest, torn heart!  Yet where? in earth or heaven?
Still, from out the bright abysses, gleams our Lady’s silver footstool,
Still the light-world sleeps beyond her, though the night-clouds fleet below.
Oh that I were walking, far above, upon that dappled pavement,