A

DRAMATIC POEM.

"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, "Than are dreamt of in your philosophy."

BY LORD BYRON.

A NEW EDITION.

LONDON:

JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE-STREET.

1819.

LONDON:

PRINTED BY THOMAS DAVISON, WHITEFRIARS.

DRAMATIS PERSONÆ.

MANFRED.

CHAMOIS HUNTER.

ABBOT OF ST. MAURICE.

MANUEL.

HERMAN.

WITCH OF The Alps.

ARIMANES.

NEMESIS.

THE DESTINIES.

SPIRITS, &c.

The Scene of the Drama is amongst the Higher Alps-partly in the Castle of Manfred, and partly in the Mountains.

MANFRED.

ACT I.

SCENE I

MANFRED alone-Scene, a Gothic gallery-Time,

Midnight.

MAN. THE lamp must be replenish'd, but even then
It will not burn so long as I must watch:
My slumbers if I slumber—are not sleep,
But a continuance of enduring thought,
Which then I can resist not: in my heart
There is a vigil, and these eyes but close
To look within; and yet I live, and bear
The aspect and the form of breathing men.
But grief should be the instructor of the wise;.
Sorrow is knowledge: they who know the most
Must mourn the deepest o'er the fatal truth,
The Tree of Knowledge is not that of Life.