Act the Third: Scene XV
DEMON [aside]. Just heavens,If my nature, in conjunction,Once possessed both grace and science,When 'mongst angels I was numbered,Grace alone is what I've lost,Science no. Then why unjustly,If 'tis so, deprive my scienceOf its proper power and function?
CYPRIAN. Lucifer, wise master mine.
CLARIN. Pray don't call him: for he'll come hereIn another corse, I warrant.
DEMON. Speak, what would you?
CYPRIAN. The annulling,The redemption of those pledges,At whose very thought I shudder.
CLARIN. As I don't redeem my pledges,I'll slip off here through the bushes.
Words in this poem
- cyprian a.
- Belonging to Cyprus.
- corse n.
- A living body or its bulk. [OF. cors, F. corps. See Corpse.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Act the Third: Scene XV is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Wonder-Working Magician, Project Gutenberg ebook #6372, the Denis Florence MacCarthy translation; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Pedro Calderón de la Barca, Act the Third: Scene XV, in The Wonder-Working Magician (1873), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #6372, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/calderon-magico-prodigioso/act-the-third-scene-xv.html, id L26646.
Form and metre
Act the Third: Scene XV is 17 lines in 6 stanzas. The metre is trochaic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 86%).
See other poems in trochaic tetrameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 -AB---BA heavens · conjunctionA · scienceB · numbered · lost · unjustly · scienceB · functionA
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against trochaic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| DEMON [aside]. Just heavens, | 7 | /˘˘/·/˘ |
| If my nature, in conjunction, | 8 | ··/˘·˘/˘ |
| Once possessed both grace and science, | 8 | ·˘/···/˘ |
| When 'mongst angels I was numbered, | 8 | ··/˘··/˘ |
| Grace alone is what I've lost, | 7 | ·˘/···· |
| Science no. Then why unjustly, | 8 | /˘···˘/˘ |
| If 'tis so, deprive my science | 8 | ···˘/·/˘ |
| Of its proper power and function? | 9 | ··/˘/˘·/˘ |
| CYPRIAN. Lucifer, wise master mine. | 8 | /˘/˘·/˘· |
| CLARIN. Pray don't call him: for he'll come here | 10 | ·········· |
| In another corse, I warrant. | 8 | ·˘/˘··/˘ |
| DEMON. Speak, what would you? | 6 | /˘···· |
| CYPRIAN. The annulling, | 7 | /˘˘·/˘˘ |
| The redemption of those pledges, | 8 | ·˘/˘··/˘ |
| At whose very thought I shudder. | 8 | ··/˘··/˘ |
| CLARIN. As I don't redeem my pledges, | 10 | ·····˘/·/˘ |
| I'll slip off here through the bushes. | 8 | ······/˘ |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.