Act 3

SCENE 3.1:

JUPITER:Ye congregated powers of heaven, who shareThe glory and the strength of him ye serve,Rejoice! henceforth I am omnipotent.All else had been subdued to me; aloneThe soul of man, like unextinguished fire,Yet burns towards heaven with fierce reproach, and doubt,And lamentation, and reluctant prayer,Hurling up insurrection, which might makeOur antique empire insecure, though builtOn eldest faith, and hell's coeval, fear;And though my curses through the pendulous air,Like snow on herbless peaks, fall flake by flake,And cling to it; though under my wrath's nightIt climbs the crags of life, step after step,Which wound it, as ice wounds unsandalled feet,It yet remains supreme o'er misery,Aspiring, unrepressed, yet soon to fall:Even now have I begotten a strange wonder,That fatal child, the terror of the earth,Who waits but till the destined hour arrive,Bearing from Demogorgon's vacant throneThe dreadful might of ever-living limbsWhich clothed that awful spirit unbeheld,To redescend, and trample out the spark.Pour forth heaven's wine, Idaean Ganymede,And let it fill the Daedal cups like fire,And from the flower-inwoven soil divineYe all-triumphant harmonies arise,As dew from earth under the twilight stars:Drink! be the nectar circling through your veinsThe soul of joy, ye ever-living Gods,Till exultation burst in one wide voiceLike music from Elysian winds.And thouAscend beside me, veiled in the lightOf the desire which makes thee one with me,Thetis, bright image of eternity!When thou didst cry, 'Insufferable might!God! Spare me! I sustain not the quick flames,The penetrating presence; all my being,Like him whom the Numidian seps did thawInto a dew with poison, is dissolved,Sinking through its foundations:' even thenTwo mighty spirits, mingling, made a thirdMightier than either, which, unbodied now,Between us floats, felt, although unbeheld,Waiting the incarnation, which ascends,(Hear ye the thunder of the fiery wheelsGriding the winds?) from Demogorgon's throne.Victory! victory! Feel'st thou not, O world,The earthquake of his chariot thundering upOlympus?Awful shape, what art thou? Speak!

DEMOGORGON:Eternity. Demand no direr name.Descend, and follow me down the abyss.I am thy child, as thou wert Saturn's child;Mightier than thee: and we must dwell togetherHenceforth in darkness. Lift thy lightnings not.The tyranny of heaven none may retain,Or reassume, or hold, succeeding thee:Yet if thou wilt, as 'tis the destinyOf trodden worms to writhe till they are dead,Put forth thy might.

JUPITER:Detested prodigy!Even thus beneath the deep Titanian prisonsI trample thee! thou lingerest?Mercy! mercy!No pity, no release, no respite! Oh,That thou wouldst make mine enemy my judge,Even where he hangs, seared by my long revenge,On Caucasus! he would not doom me thus.Gentle, and just, and dreadless, is he notThe monarch of the world? What then art thou?No refuge! no appeal!Sink with me then,We two will sink on the wide waves of ruin,Even as a vulture and a snake outspentDrop, twisted in inextricable fight,Into a shoreless sea. Let hell unlockIts mounded oceans of tempestuous fire,And whelm on them into the bottomless voidThis desolated world, and thee, and me,The conqueror and the conquered, and the wreckOf that for which they combated.Ai, Ai!The elements obey me not. I sinkDizzily down, ever, for ever, down.And, like a cloud, mine enemy aboveDarkens my fall with victory! Ai, Ai!

SCENE 3.2:

OCEAN:He fell, thou sayest, beneath his conqueror's frown?

APOLLO:Ay, when the strife was ended which made dimThe orb I rule, and shook the solid stars,The terrors of his eye illumined heavenWith sanguine light, through the thick ragged skirtsOf the victorious darkness, as he fell:Like the last glare of day's red agony,Which, from a rent among the fiery clouds,Burns far along the tempest-wrinkled deep.

OCEAN:He sunk to the abyss? To the dark void?

APOLLO:An eagle so caught in some bursting cloudOn Caucasus, his thunder-baffled wingsEntangled in the whirlwind, and his eyesWhich gazed on the undazzling sun, now blindedBy the white lightning, while the ponderous hailBeats on his struggling form, which sinks at lengthProne, and the aereal ice clings over it.

OCEAN:Henceforth the fields of heaven-reflecting seaWhich are my realm, will heave, unstained with blood,Beneath the uplifting winds, like plains of cornSwayed by the summer air; my streams will flowRound many-peopled continents, and roundFortunate isles; and from their glassy thronesBlue Proteus and his humid nymphs shall markThe shadow of fair ships, as mortals seeThe floating bark of the light-laden moonWith that white star, its sightless pilot's crest,Borne down the rapid sunset's ebbing sea;Tracking their path no more by blood and groans,And desolation, and the mingled voiceOf slavery and command; but by the lightOf wave-reflected flowers, and floating odours,And music soft, and mild, free, gentle voices,And sweetest music, such as spirits love.

APOLLO:And I shall gaze not on the deeds which makeMy mind obscure with sorrow, as eclipseDarkens the sphere I guide; but list, I hearThe small, clear, silver lute of the young SpiritThat sits i' the morning star.

OCEAN:Thou must away;Thy steeds will pause at even, till when farewell:The loud deep calls me home even now to feed itWith azure calm out of the emerald urnsWhich stand for ever full beside my throne.Behold the Nereids under the green sea,Their wavering limbs borne on the wind-like stream,Their white arms lifted o'er their streaming hairWith garlands pied and starry sea-flower crowns,Hastening to grace their mighty sister's joy.It is the unpastured sea hungering for calm.Peace, monster; I come now. Farewell.