Leave them, and walk with dust? And, having fail'd to be one, would be nought Of dust, and feel for it, and with you. You know my thoughts? Lucifer. They are the thoughts of all And all that in them is. So I have heard Worthy of thought;-'t is your immortal part His seraphs sing; and so my father saith. Lucifer. They say--what they must sing and say, Which speaks within you. Cain. Cain. : I live, But live to die and, living, see nothing The earth, which is thine outward covering, is No more? No less! and why Lucifer. It may be thou shalt be as we. on pain Of being that which I am-and thou art— Cain. As he saith-which I know not, nor believe- Creating worlds, to make eternity Less burthensome to his immense existence Let him crowd orb on orb; he is alone Indefinite, indissoluble tyrant; (2) Could he but crush himself, 't were the best boon Are ye happy? And multiply himself in misery! Lucifer. We are mighty. Cain. Are ye happy? Spirits and men, at least we sympathise― By the unbounded sympathy of all Cain I am :-and thou, with all thy might, what | Create, and re-create▬▬(3) motion is vast and solemn. Those of Lord Byron's spirit are less dignified and more abrupt, but charged as intensely with fierce and bitter spleen. The one seems not unworthy to haunt the solitudes of Eden; the other appears to have no little knowledge of the world, and to be most at home in the busy walks of men." Campbell. (1) In this long dialogue, the tempter tells Cain (who is thus far supposed to be ignorant of the fact) that the soul is immortal, and that souls who dare use their immortality' are condemned by God to be wretched everlastingly. This sentiment, which Cain. Thou speak'st to me of things which long have swum In visions through my thought: I never could is the pervading moral (if we may call it so) of the play, is developed in the lines which follow." Heber. (2) The poet rises to the sublime in making Lucifer first in- "Create, and re-create-perhaps he 'll make Of serpents, and of fruits and trees: I see Tamed down; my mother has forgot the mind A watching shepherd-boy, who offers up The earth yield nothing to us without sweat; For such companionship, I would not now (1) In the MS. "Have stood before thee as I am; but chosen The serpent's charming symbol, as before."-E. (2) "The tree of life was doubtless a material tree, producing material fruit, proper as such for the nourishment of the body; but was it not also set apart to be partaken of as a symbol or sacrament of that celestial principle which nourishes the soul to immortality?" Bishop Horne. (3) "The Eclectic reviewer, we believe the late Robert Hall, says, "A more deadly sentiment, a more insidious falsehood, than is conveyed in these words, could not be injected into the youthful mind by the Author of Evil. Innocence is not the cause of curiosity, but has, in every stage of society, been its victim. Curiosity has ruined greater numbers than any other passion, and as, in its incipient actings, it is the most dangerous foe of innocence, so, when it becomes a passion, it is only fed by guilt. Innocence, indeed, is gone when desire has conceived the sin. Cain, in this drama, is made, like the Faust of Goethe, to be the victim of curiosity; and a fine moral might have been Poor clay! what should I tempt them for, or how? Cain. They say the serpent was a spirit. Lucifer. Who Saith that? It is not written so on high: But we, who see the truth, must speak it. Thy deduced from it." Dr. Johnson, on the contrary, says, “A generous and elevated mind is distinguished by nothing more certainly than by an eminent degree of curiosity. This passion is, perhaps regularly heightened in proportion as the powers of the mind are elevated and enlarged. Curiosity is the thirst of the soul; inflames and torments us, and makes us taste every thing with joy, however otherwise insipid, by which it may be quench'd."-E. (4) “Cain is described as imagining, that once eating of the tree of life would have conferred immortality: Would,' he exclaims, they had snatched both the fruits, or neither!' There is not the slightest ground for such a supposition: the tree of life was among the trees of which Adam 'might eat freely,' and of which he had most probably frequently eaten. This privilege was denied as a consequence of sin; as known vice is made an objection to being admitted to the sacraments, or as concealed vice renders them ineffectual, if not destructive, to the communicant." Harness. Which are so beautiful: shall they, too, die? Lucifer. Perhaps but long outlive both thine and thee. [dieCain. I'm glad of that: I would not have them They are so lovely. What is death? I fear, I feel, it is a dreadful thing; but what, I cannot compass: 't is denounced against us, Lucifer. To be resolved into the earth. Be it proved. He has not yet I cannot answer. Which name thou wilt: he makes but to destroy. I watch'd for what I thought his coming, (1) for Up to the lights above us, in the azure, (1) "It may appear a very prosaic, but it is certainly a very obvious, criticism on these passages, that the young family of mankind had, long ere this, been quite familiar with the death of animals—some of whom Abel was in the habit of offering up as sacrifices; so that it is not quite conceivable that they should be so much at a loss to conjecture what Death was." Jeffrey. -E. As I know not death, That were no evil: would I ne'er had been Aught else but dust! Not to snatch first that fruit:—but ere he pluck'd And yet I fear it-fear I know not what! Cain. [see Wilt thou teach me all? Lucifer. Ay, upon one condition. Thou dost fall down and worship me-thy Lord. No. meditated mischief is couched under the plausible reasonings put into the mouths of Cain and Lucifer. This may or may not be a just conclusion: we have no right to say that Lord Byron adopts the apologies of Cain, or the dialectics of the Devil: all that can be fairly said on this subject is-that it has been a part of the poet's plan to throw as much ingenuity into the arguments, both of Cain and his Mentor, as it was competent to his Lordship to urnish; and that he has left these arguments-without refutation or answer to produce their unrestricted influence on the (2) Most of Lord Byron's spleen against My Grandmother's Review, the British, may be traced to its critique on Cain, -e. g "We have heard it remarked, that a great deal of pre-reader."-E. And if he did betray you, 't was with truth; To offer up, Saidst thou not To till the earth-for I had promised―― Lucifer. Cain. To cull some first-fruits. Lucifer. Cain. With Abel, on an altar. Lucifer. Thou ne'er hadst bent to him who made thee? Enter ADAH. Adah. Adah. But all we know of it has gather'd And dread, and toil, and sweat, and heaviness; Lucifer. More than thy mother, and thy sire? It one day will be in your children. No, not yet; What! Must not my daughter love her brother Enoch? Aduh. Oh, my God! Shall they not love and bring forth things that love My brother, I have come for thee; Born of the same sole womb, in the same hour It is our hour of rest and joy-and we Cain. See'st thou not? Has pluck'd a fruit more fatal to thine offspring And happy intercourse with happy spirits: Beats quick; he awes me, and yet draws me near, Nearer and nearer :—Cain—Cain-save me from him! Cain. What dreads my Adah? This is no ill spirit. Adah. He is not God-nor God's: I have beheld The cherubs and the seraphs; he looks not Like them. Cain. But there are spirits loftier still— Lucifer. And still loftier than the archangels. Consists in slavery-no. Adah. If the blessedness I have heard it said, The seraphs love most-cherubim know most- What must he be you cannot love when known?(4) In the MS. Oh, Cain! choose love. "What can he be who places love in ignorance?"-E. Cain. Did they love us when they snatch'd from the tree That which hath driven us all from Paradise? Adah. We were not born then-and if we had been, Should we not love them and our children, Cain? In the same hour! They pluck'd the tree of science By ages! and I must be sire of such things! Hath not fulfill'd its promise ;-if they sinn'd, Cain. Be thou happy, then, aloneI will have nought to do with happiness, Which humbles me and mine. Nor would be happy: but with those around us Alone, thou say'st, be happy? And thou couldst not Alone! Oh, my God! Who could be happy and alone, or good? To me my solitude seems sin; unless When I think how soon I shall see my brother, His brother, and our children, and our parents. Lucifer. Yet thy God is alone; and is he happy, Lonely, and good? (2) This "placid hour" of Cain is, we fear, from a source which it will do Lord B. no credit to name,-the romance of Faublus. -E |