Don Carlos

FERIA                 'Tis himself.

SCENE IX

The KING. The preceding.

All are alarmed at his appearance, fall back, and let him pass through them. He appears to be in a waking dream, like a sleep-walker. His dress and figure indicate the disorder caused by his late fainting. With slow steps he walks past the GRANDEES and looks at each with a fixed eye, but without recognizing any of them. At last he stands still, wrapped in thought, his eyes fixed on the ground, till the emotions of his mind gradually express themselves in words.

KING   Restore me back the dead! Yes, I must have him.DOMINGO (whispering to ALVA)   Speak to him, duke.KING              He died despising me!   Have him again I must, and make him think   More nobly of me.ALVA (approaching with fear)            Sire!KING (looking round the circle)                Who speaks to me!   Have you forgotten who I am? Why not   Upon your knees, before your king, ye creatures!   Am I not still your king? I must command   Submission from you. Do you all then slight me   Because one man despised me?ALVA                  Gracious king!   No more of him: a new and mightier foe   Arises in the bosom of your realm.FERIA   Prince Carlos —KING            Had a friend who died for him;   For him! With me he might have shared an empire.   How he looked down upon me! From the throne   Kings look not down so proudly. It was plain   How vain his conquest made him. His keen sorrow   Confessed how great his loss. Man weeps not so   For aught that's perishable. Oh, that he might   But live again! I'd give my Indies for it!   Omnipotence! thou bring'st no comfort to me:   Thou canst not stretch thine arm into the grave   To rectify one little act, committed   With hasty rashness, 'gainst the life of man.   The dead return no more. Who dare affirm   That I am happy? In the tomb he dwells,   Who scorned to flatter me. What care I now   For all who live? One spirit, one free being,   And one alone, arose in all this age!   He died despising me!ALVA               Our lives are useless!   Spaniards, let's die at once! E'en in the grave   This man still robs us of our monarch's heart.KING (sits down, and leans his head on his arm)   Oh! had he died for me! I loved him, too,   And much. Dear to me was he as a son.   In his young mind there brightly rose for me   A new and beauteous morning. Who can say   What I had destined for him? He to me   Was a first love. All Europe may condemn me,   Europe may overwhelm me with its curse,   But I deserved his thanks.DOMINGO                 What spell is this?KING   And, say, for whom did he desert me thus?   A boy, – my son? Oh, no, believe it not!   A Posa would not perish for a boy;   The scanty flame of friendship could not fill   A Posa's heart. It beat for human kind.   His passion was the world, and the whole course   Of future generations yet unborn.   To do them service he secured a throne —   And lost it. Such high treason 'gainst mankind   Could Posa e'er forgive himself? Oh, no;   I know his feelings better. Not that he   Carlos preferred to Philip, but the youth —   The tender pupil, – to the aged monarch.   The father's evening sunbeam could not ripen   His novel projects. He reserved for this   The young son's orient rays. Oh, 'tis undoubted,   They wait for my decease.ALVA                 And of your thoughts,   Read in these letters strongest confirmation.KING   'Tis possible he may miscalculate.   I'm still myself. Thanks, Nature, for thy gifts;   I feel within my frame the strength of youth;   I'll turn their schemes to mockery. His virtue   Shall be an empty dream – his death, a fool's.   His fall shall crush his friend and age together.   We'll test it now – how they can do without me.   The world is still for one short evening mine,   And this same evening will I so employ,   That no reformer yet to cone shall reap   Another harvest, in the waste I'll leave,   For ten long generations after me.   He would have offered me a sacrifice   To his new deity – humanity!   So on humanity I'll take revenge.   And with his puppet I'll at once commence.

[To the DUKE ALVA.

   What you have now to tell me of the prince,   Repeat. What tidings do these letters bring?ALVA   These letters, sire, contain the last bequest   Of Posa to Prince Carlos.KING (reads the papers, watched by all present. He then lays them aside and walks in silence up and down the room)                 Summon straight   The cardinal inquisitor; and begHe will bestow an hour upon the king,   This very night!TAXIS            Just on the stroke of two   The horses must be ready and prepared,   At the Carthusian monastery.ALVA                  Spies   Despatched by me, moreover, have observed   Equipments at the convent for a journey,   On which the prince's arms were recognized.FERIA   And it is rumored that large sums are raised   In the queen's name, among the Moorish agents,   Destined for Brussels.KING               Where is Carlos?ALVA   With Posa's body.KING             And there are lights as yet   Within the queen's apartments?ALVA                   Everything   Is silent there. She has dismissed her maids   Far earlier than as yet has been her custom.   The Duchess of Arcos, who was last with her,   Left her in soundest sleep.

[An officer of the Body Guard enters, takes the DUKE OF FERIA aside, and whispers to him. The latter, struck with surprise, turns to DUKE ALVA. The others crowd round him, and a murmuring noise arises.

FERIA, TAXIS, and DOMINGO (at the same time)                  'Tis wonderful!KING   What is the matter!FERIA              News scarce credible!DOMINGO   Two soldiers, who have just returned from duty,   Report – but – oh, the tale's ridiculous!KING   What do they say?ALVA             They say, in the left wing   Of the queen's palace, that the emperor's ghost   Appeared before them, and with solemn gait   Passed on. This rumor is confirmed by all   The sentinels, who through the whole pavilion   Their watches keep. And they, moreover, add,   The phantom in the queen's apartment vanished.KING   And in what shape appeared it?OFFICER                   In the robes,   The same attire he in Saint Justi wore   For the last time, apparelled as a monk.KING   A monk! And did the sentries know his person   Whilst he was yet alive? They could not else   Determine that it was the emperor.OFFICER   The sceptre which he bore was evidence   It was the emperor.DOMINGO              And the story goes   He often has been seen in this same dress.KING   Did no one speak to him?OFFICER                No person dared.   The sentries prayed, and let him pass in silence.KING   The phantom vanished in the queen's apartments!OFFICER   In the queen's antechamber.

[General silence.

KING (turns quickly round)                  What say you?ALVA   Sire! we are silent.KING (after some thought, to the OFFICER)              Let my guards be ready   And under arms, and order all approach   To that wing of the palace to be stopped.   I fain would have a word with this same ghost.

[Exit OFFICER. Enter a PAGE.

PAGE   The cardinal inquisitor.KING (to all present)                Retire!

[The CARDINAL INQUISITOR, an old man of ninety, and blind, enters, supported on a staff, and led by two Dominicans. The GRANDEES fall on their knees as he passes, and touch the hem of his garment. He gives them his blessing, and they depart.

SCENE X

The KING and the GRAND INQUISITOR. A long silence.

GRAND INQUISITOR   Say, do I stand before the king?KING                    You do.GRAND INQUISITOR   I never thought it would be so again!KING   I now renew the scenes of early youth,   When Philip sought his sage instructor's counsel.GRAND INQUISITOR   Your glorious sire, my pupil, Charles the Fifth,   Nor sought or needed counsel at my hands.KING   So much happier he! I, cardinal,   Am guilty of a murder, and no rest —GRAND INQUISITOR   What was the reason for this murder?KING                      'Twas   A fraud unparalleled —GRAND INQUISITOR               I know it all.KING   What do you know? Through whom, and since what time?GRAND INQUISITOR   For years – what you have only learned since sunset.KING (with astonishment)   You know this man then!GRAND INQUISITOR                All his life is noted   From its commencement to its sudden close,   In Santa Casa's holy registers.KING   Yet he enjoyed his liberty!GRAND INQUISITOR                  The chain   With which he struggled, but which held him bound,   Though long, was firm, nor easy to be severed.KING   He has already been beyond the kingdom.GRAND INQUISITOR   Where'er he travelled I was at his side.KING (walks backwards and forwards in displeasure)   You knew the hands, then, I had fallen into;   And yet delayed to warn me!GRAND INQUISITOR                  This rebuke   I pay you back. Why did you not consult us   Before you sought the arms of such a man?   You knew him: one sole glance unmasked him to you.   Why did you rob the office of its victim?   Are we thus trifled with! When majesty   Can stoop to such concealment, and in secret,   Behind our backs, league with our enemies,   What must our fate be then? If one be spared   What plea can justify the fate of thousands?KING   But he, no less, has fallen a sacrifice.GRAND INQUISITOR   No; he is murdered – basely, foully murdered.   The blood that should so gloriously have flowed   To honor us has stained the assassin's hand.   What claim had you to touch our sacred rights?   He but existed, by our hands to perish.   God gave him to this age's exigence,   To perish, as a terrible example,   And turn high-vaunting reason into shame.   Such was my long-laid plan – behold, destroyed   In one brief hour, the toil of many years.   We are defrauded, and your only gain   Is bloody hands.KING            Passion impelled me to it.   Forgive me.GRAND INQUISITOR          Passion! And does royal Philip   Thus answer me? Have I alone grown old?               [Shaking his head angrily.   Passion! Make conscience free within your realms,   If you're a slave yourself.KING                  In things like this   I'm but a novice. Bear in patience with me.GRAND INQUISITOR   No, I'm ill pleased with you – to see you thus   Tarnish the bygone glories of your reign.   Where is that Philip, whose unchanging soul,   Fixed as the polar star in heaven above,   Round its own axis still pursued its course?   Is all the memory of preceding years   Forever gone? And did the world become   New moulded when you stretched your hand to him?   Was poison no more poison? Did distinction   'Twixt good and evil, truth and falsehood, vanish?   What then is resolution? What is firmness?   What is the faith of man, if in one weak,   Unguarded hour, the rules of threescore years   Dissolve in air, like woman's fickle favor?KING   I looked into his eyes. Oh, pardon me   This weak relapse into mortality.   The world has one less access to your heart;   Your eyes are sunk in night.GRAND INQUISITOR                  What did this man   Want with you? What new thing could he adduce,   You did not know before? And are you versed   So ill with fanatics and innovators?   Does the reformer's vaunting language sound   So novel to your ears? If the firm edifice   Of your conviction totters to mere words,   Should you not shudder to subscribe the fate   Of many thousand poor, deluded souls   Who mount the flaming pile for nothing worse?KING   I sought a human being. These Domingos —GRAND INQUISITOR   How! human beings! What are they to you?   Cyphers to count withal – no more! Alas!   And must I now repeat the elements   Of kingly knowledge to my gray-haired pupil?   An earthly god must learn to bear the want   Of what may be denied him. When you whine   For sympathy is not the world your equal?   What rights should you possess above your equals?KING (throwing himself into a chair)   I'm a mere suffering mortal, that I feel;   And you demand from me, a wretched creature,   What the Creator only can perform.GRAND INQUISITOR   No, sire; I am not thus to be deceived.   I see you through. You would escape from us.   The church's heavy chains pressed hard upon you;   You would be free, and claim your independence.

[He pauses. The KING is silent.

   We are avenged. Be thankful to the church,   That checks you with the kindness of a mother.   The erring choice you were allowed to make   Has proved your punishment. You stand reproved!   Now you may turn to us again. And know   If I, this day, had not been summoned here,   By Heaven above! before to-morrow's sun,   You would yourself have stood at my tribunal!KING   Forbear this language, priest. Restrain thyself.   I'll not endure it from thee. In such tones   No tongue shall speak to me.GRAND INQUISITOR                  Then why, O king   Call up the ghost of Samuel? I've anointed   Two monarchs to the throne of Spain. I hoped   To leave behind a firm-established work.   I see the fruit of all my life is lost.   Don Philip's hands have shattered what I built.   But tell me, sire, wherefore have I been summoned?   What do I hear? I am not minded, king,   To seek such interviews again.KING                   But one   One service more – the last – and then in peace   Depart. Let all the past be now forgotten —   Let peace be made between us. We are friends.GRAND INQUISITOR   When Philip bends with due humility.KING (after a pause)   My son is meditating treason.GRAND INQUISITOR,                   Well!   And what do you resolve?KING                On all, or nothing.GRAND INQUISITOR   What mean you by this all?KING                 He must escape,   Or die.GRAND INQUISITOR        Well, sire! decide.KING                  And can you not   Establish some new creed to justify   The bloody murder of one's only son?GRAND INQUISITOR   To appease eternal justice God's own Son   Expired upon the cross.KING                And can you spread   This creed throughout all Europe?GRAND INQUISITOR                     Ay, as far   As the true cross is worshipped.KING                  But I sin —   Sin against nature. Canst thou, by thy power,   Silence her mighty voice.GRAND INQUISITOR              The voice of nature   Avails not over faith.KING               My right to judge   I place within your hands. Can I retrace   The step once taken?GRAND INQUISITOR              Give him to me!KING   My only son! For whom then have I labored?GRAND INQUISITOR   For the grave rather than for liberty!KING (rising up)   We are agreed. Come with me.GRAND INQUISITOR                   Monarch! WhitherKING   From his own father's hands to take the victim.

[Leads him away.

SCENE XI

Queen's Apartment.

CARLOS. The QUEEN. Afterwards the KING and attendants. CARLOS in monk's attire, a mask over his face, which he is just taking off; under his arm a naked sword. It is quite dark. He approaches a door, which is in the act of opening. The QUEEN comes out in her night-dress with a lighted candle. CARLOS falls on one knee before her.

CARLOS   Elizabeth!QUEEN (regarding him with silent sorrow)         Do we thus meet again?CARLOS   'Tis thus we meet again!

[A silence.

QUEEN (endeavoring to collect herself)            Carlos, arise!   We must not now unnerve each other thus.   The mighty dead will not be honored now   By fruitless tears. Tears are for petty sorrows!   He gave himself for thee! With his dear life   He purchased thine. And shall this precious blood   Flow for a mere delusion of the brain?   Oh, Carlos, I have pledged myself for thee.   On that assurance did he flee from hence   More satisfied. Oh, do not falsify   My word.CARLOS (with animation)        To him I'll raise a monument   Nobler than ever honored proudest monarch,   And o'er his dust a paradise shall bloom!QUEEN   Thus did I hope to find thee! This was still   The mighty purpose of his death. On me   Devolves the last fulfilment of his plans,   And I will now fulfil my solemn oath.   Yet one more legacy your dying friend   Bequeathed to me. I pledged my word to him,   And wherefore should I now conceal it from you?   To me did he resign his Carlos – I   Defy suspicion, and no longer tremble   Before mankind, but will for once assume   The courage of a friend; My heart shall speak.   He called our passion – virtue! I believe him,   And will my heart no longer —CARLOS                   Hold, O queen!   Long was I sunk in a delusive dream.   I loved, but now I am at last awake   Forgotten be the past. Here are your letters, —   Destroy my own. Fear nothing from my passion,   It is extinct. A brighter flame now burns,   And purifies my being. All my love   Lies buried in the grave. No mortal wish   Finds place within this bosom.

[After a pause, taking her hand.

                   I have come   To bid farewell to you, and I have learned   There is a higher, greater good, my mother,   Than to call thee mine own. One rapid night   Has winged the tardy progress of my years,   And prematurely ripened me to manhood.   I have no further business in the world,   But to remember him. My harvest now   Is ended.

[He approaches the QUEEN, who conceals her face.

         Mother! will you not reply!QUEEN   Carlos! regard not these my tears. I cannot   Restrain then. But believe me I admire you.CARLOS   Thou wert the only partner of our league   And by this name thou shalt remain to me   The most beloved object in this world.   No other woman can my friendship share,   More than she yesterday could win my love.   But sacred shall the royal widow be,   Should Providence conduct me to the throne.

[The KING, accompanied by the GRAND INQUISITOR, appears in the background without being observed.

   I hasten to leave Spain, and never more   Shall I behold my father in this world.   No more I love him. Nature is extinct   Within this breast. Be you again his wife —   His son's forever lost to him! Return   Back to your course of duty – I must speed   To liberate a people long oppressed   From a fell tyrant's hand. Madrid shall hail   Carlos as king, or ne'er behold him more.   And now a long and last farewell —

[He kisses her.

QUEEN                     Oh, Carlos!   How you exalt me! but I dare not soar   To such a height of greatness: – yet I may   Contemplate now your noble mind with wonder.CARLOS   Am I not firm, Elizabeth? I hold thee   Thus in my arms and tremble not. The fear   Of instant death had, yesterday, not torn me   From this dear spot.

[He leaves her.

              All that is over now,   And I defy my mortal destinies.   I've held thee in these arms and wavered not.   Hark! Heard you nothing!

[A clock strikes.

QUEEN                 Nothing but the bell   That tolls the moment of our separation.CARLOS   Good night, then, mother! And you shall, from Ghent,   Receive a letter, which will first proclaim   Our secret enterprise aloud. I go   To dare King Philip to an open contest.   Henceforth there shall be naught concealed between us!   You need not shun the aspect of the world.   Be this my last deceit.

[About to take up the mask – the KING stands between them.

KING                It is thy last.

[The QUEEN falls senseless.

CARLOS (hastens to her and supports her in his arms)   Is the queen dead? Great heavens!KING (coolly and quietly to the GRAND INQUISITOR)                     Lord Cardinal!   I've done my part. Go now, and do your own.[Exit