Psyche

Part II.

ACT III.

SCENE I.——LOVE, ZEPHYR.

Zep. Yes! right gallantly have I acquitted myself of your errand; and from the summit of that rock I have softly borne this beauty through the air to this enchanted palace, where, with full freedom, you can decree her fate. Yet you astonish me by this mighty change in your appearance. That figure, that countenance, that costume, perfectly conceal your real being, and I defy the most cunning to see in you to-day the god of love.

Love. 'Tis because I do not wish to be known to Psyche. 'Tis my heart, my heart alone, I wish to unfold; nothing more than the sweet raptures of this keen passion, which her charms excite within it. To express its gentle pining, and to hide what may be from those eyes that impose on me their will, I have assumed this form which thou seest.

Zep. You are a master in everything; this is how I know it. Often the gods, when in love, have been seen assuming various disguises, seeking to alleviate the pleasing wound inflicted on all hearts by your fiery darts; but in good sense you outstrip them. Yours is the form necessary for succeeding with the lovely sex, for whom we sigh. Yes, the assistance derived from that form is powerful; and, apart from rank and wit, whoever finds the means of being so fashioned does not sigh in vain.

Love. I have decided, my dear Zephyr, to remain always thus; and the oldest of all loves cannot be blamed for this. It is time to issue from this long infancy, that wears out my patience. It is time, henceforth, that I should be grown up.

Zep. You are right. You cannot do better; and you are initiated into a mystery that demands no childish powers.

Love. This change will, no doubt, vex my mother.

Zep. I foresee some anger in that quarter, although disputes about age ought not to exist among immortals; yet, your mother Venus shares the spirit of beauties, who do not like grown-up children. But whereat I fancy her offended is the line of conduct you are pursuing; and 'tis a strange method of avenging her, to love the beauty she wished to see punished. This hatred to which she expects the power of a son generally feared by the gods to answer….

Love. Let us drop this discourse, Zephyr, and tell me whether thy eyes do not find Psyche the fairest woman in the world? Is there aught on the earth, aught in heaven, that could seize from her the glorious title of matchless beauty? But I see her, my dear Zephyr, wondering at the splendours of this spot.

Zep. You can show yourself, to put an end to her torture, and unfold to her her glorious destiny. Speak to one another all that sighs, lips, and glances can speak. As a discreet confident, I know my duty, and will not interrupt lovers' secrets.

SCENE II.——PSYCHE (alone).

Where am I? and in a spot I deemed deserted, what skilled hand has reared this palace, which art and nature deck with the rarest gifts that the eye could ever admire. Everything smiles, shines, sparkles in this garden, in these apartments, whose pompous furniture presents nothing that does not charm and flatter the beholder; and whithersoever my fears lead me, I see under my feet naught but gold or flowers. Can heaven have formed this world of wonders for the abode of a serpent? And when, by this sight, it amuses and stays the unequalled rigour of my jealous fate, does it wish to show that it repents of it? No, no; this is the darkest, the keenest shaft of its hatred, so fertile in its cruelties. This hatred, by a renewed and unparalleled sternness, lays before my gaze the choice it has made of all that is fairest in the world, only that I may leave it with deeper regret.

How foolish is my hope if it fancies it can thus alleviate my pain. Every moment that my death is delayed becomes a new misfortune for me; the more it stays its coming, the oftener I die.

Leave me no longer to pine; come, take thy victim, monster, whose mission it is to slay me. Wouldst thou have me seek thee? and must I rouse thy fury to devour me? If heaven wills my death, if my life be a crime, dare at length to seize whatever little remains of it; I am tired of murmuring against a lawful penalty; I am weary of sighs; come, that I may end the death I am dying.

SCENE III.——LOVE, PSYCHE, ZEPHYR.

Love. Behold this serpent, this pitiless monster, whom a wonderful oracle has prepared for you, and who perhaps does not inspire such dread as you had imagined.

Psy. You, my Lord! you are that monster who, so spoke the oracle, threatens my sad life? you, who seem rather a god, deigning miraculously to come yourself to my rescue?

Love. What need of help in the midst of an empire where all that breathes only awaits your look to do its bidding, where I am the only monster you have to fear?

Psy. But small is the fear that a monster like you inspires, and if it has any venom, a soul has little reason to venture on the least complaint against a pleasing poison, the cure of which all the heart would dread! Scarce do I behold you than already my calmed fears suffer the image of death to vanish; and I feel I know not what unknown fire flow through my frozen veins: Esteem I have felt, and kindness, friendship, gratitude; compassion's innocent sorrows have made me know its power, but I have not yet felt what I now feel. I know not what it is, but I know that it fills me with delight, and causes me no alarm. The longer I gaze on you, the more I feel the spell. Nothing that I have ever felt had the same effect; and I would tell you, my Lord, that I love you, did I know what love is. Turn them not away, those eyes that poison me, those eyes so tender, so piercing, yet so loving, that look as if they shared the confusion they cause me. Alas! the more dangerous they prove, the more fondly I cling to them. What decree of heaven is it which I cannot understand, that forces me to tell you more than I should? I, whose modesty ought at least to wait that you explain the confusion that, I see, is within you. You sigh, my Lord, as I sigh; your senses, like mine, seem amazed. 'Tis my duty to be silent concerning this, yours to speak it, yet it is I who tell this to you.

Love. Your heart, Psyche, has ever been too insensible, and you must not wonder if, to repair the insult, Love now pays himself with usury for that which your soul ought to have granted him. The time is come in which your lips must breathe those sighs so long restrained; and while it draws you from that fierce humour, an endless rapture, as sweet as it is unknown, must wound you as deeply as it ought to have wounded you during those golden days the course of which your unfeeling soul has profaned.

Psy. Not to love is, then, a great crime?

Love. Do you suffer a hard punishment for it?

Psy. The punishment is mild indeed.

Love. The penalty is suited to the offence; and Love, on this glorious day, avenges himself of lack of love by an excess of love.

Psy. Would I had been punished before! My life's happiness lies in it. I ought to blush at it, or to whisper it low, but this torture has too many charms. Suffer me to say, and to repeat it aloud; though I said it a hundred times, I would never blush for it. It is not I who speak; and the wonderful empire, the amiable violence of your presence, sway my voice as soon as I begin to speak. Vainly does my modesty take secret offence at it; vainly would my sex and decency bind me to other laws; it is your eyes that dictate my answer, and my lips, the slaves of their almighty power, no longer consult me on the self-respect I owe myself.

Love. Fair Psyche, believe what these eyes tell you. Let yours vie with each other in instructing me of all your emotions. Trust this sighing heart, which, so long as yours will answer, will tell you more by a sigh than a hundred looks can express. 'Tis the sweetest language, the most powerful, the truest of all!

Psy. The understanding of it was due to both our hearts to make them equally satisfied. I have sighed, you have understood me; you sigh, and I heard you. But release me from doubt, my Lord, and tell me, if by the same road Zephyr has led you hither after me; to tell me what I hear now. When I arrived here, were you expected? and when you speak to him, are you obeyed?

Love. The empire I exercise over this sweet climate is as sovereign as yours is over my heart. Love is favourable to me, and 'tis for his sake that Aeolus has placed Zephyr under my command. It was Love who, to reward my passion, dictated this oracle, by which your fair days that were threatened have been released from a throng of lovers; and which has freed me from the lasting obstacle of so many ardent sighs that were unworthy of being addressed to you. Ask not of me what this region be, nor the name of its ruler; you shall know it in time. My object is to win you; but I wish to do so by my services, my assiduous care, my constant vows, by a lover's sacrifice of all that I am, of all my power can effect. The splendour of my rank must not solicit you for me, neither must I make a merit of my power; and though sovereign lord of this blissful realm, I wish to owe you, Psyche, to nothing but my love.

Come with me, Princess, and admire its marvels; prepare your eyes and ears to the charms it will offer you. You shall gaze on woods and meads, contesting their beauties with gold and gems; you shall hear nothing but sweet concerts; a hundred beauties shall serve you here; without envy they shall worship you, and every moment with a humble and raptured soul shall solicit the honour of your commands.

Psy. My will waits upon yours; I can no longer have one of my own; but at any rate your oracle has severed me from two sisters, and the king, my father, whom my supposed death has all three reduced to bewail me. Suffer my sisters to be witnesses of my glory and your love for me, to dissipate the error which overwhelms their soul with mortal sorrow.

Lend them too, as you did me, Zephyr's wings, that they may facilitate their access to your empire, as they did mine. Let them see where I live, let them wonder at the success of my loss.

Love. You do not yield me all your soul, Psyche. This affectionate remembrance of a father and two sisters snatches from me part of that which I crave for my passion only. Have no eyes for anyone but for me, who have none but for you. Let love for me, and the desire of pleasing me, be your only thought, and when such cares dare divert you from it….

Psy. Can you be jealous of affection for kin?

Love. I am jealous, my Psyche, jealous of all nature. The sun's rays kiss you too often; your tresses are too sensible to the wooing of the breeze; no sooner does it caress them than I murmur. The very air which you breathe passes with too much pleasure between your lips; your robes cling too closely to your form. I know not what bewilders me, and I dread amidst your sighs some stray one.

But you would see your sisters. Be gone, Zephyr; Psyche commands, I cannot forbid.

SCENE IV.——LOVE, PSYCHE.

Love. When you shall show them this blissful seat, make them a thousand gifts from these treasures; lavish on them endearments, caresses; and, if possible, exhaust the tendernesses that blood demands, so that you may yield yourself entirely to love. I shall not importune you with my presence, but let not your meeting be too long, remembering that you rob me of whatever attention you pay them.

Psy. Your love grants me a favour, which 'twere not possible for me to abuse.

Love. Still, let us visit these gardens, this palace, where you will meet naught but what will pale before your dazzling charms. And you, little Cupids, you, young Zephyrs, whose souls are but soft sighs, vie with each other in showing what joy you feel at the appearance of my princess.

THIRD INTERLUDE.

Entry of ballet, composed of four Cupids and four Zephyrs, twice interrupted by a dialogue sung by a Cupid and a Zephyr.

Love, Psyche.

Part I.

A Zephyr.

They sing together.

A Zephyr (alone).

Both (together).

A Cupid (alone).

Both (together).

Part II.

A Zephyr (alone).

They sing together.

A Zephyr (alone).

Both (together).

A Cupid (alone).

Both (together).

ACT IV.

The scene changes to a splendid palace, in the interior of which is seen at the end of a long vestibule a lovely garden, in which are many trees laden with all kinds of fruit.

SCENE I.——AGLAURA, CIDIPPE.

Agl. I can bear it no longer, my sister. I have seen too many wonders; future times will scarcely conceive them; this sun, that sees all, and lays all before our gaze, never beheld the like. This dazzling palace and this stately equipage are a display hateful to me; shame as well as spite overwhelm me. How cruelly Fortune has treated us; see how her inconsiderate bounty blindly lavishes, exhausts, and unites her efforts to make all these treasures the lot of a younger sister!

Cid. I share all your feelings; your griefs are mine; in this delightful spot, all that displeases you wounds me; all which you consider a deadly insult oppresses me no less than yourself, and leaves bitterness within my breast and blushes on my brow.

Agl. No, my sister, no living queen, in her own realm speaks in such sovereign tones as Psyche in these abodes. Here we see her obeyed with scrupulous exactitude; and a yearning study of her will seeks it even in her eyes, a thousand beauties throng around her, and seem to say to our jealous looks, "Whatever your charms may be, she is still fairer, and we who serve her are fairer than you." She orders, it is done; none refuse, none rebel. Flora, clinging to her steps, lavishes her sweetest charms around her; Zephyr flies to execute her orders, and his mistress and he, too much a prey to her charms, forget their own love in their eagerness to serve her.

Cid. She has gods at her services, soon she will have altars; our sway extends over weak mortals only, whose continual caprice and impudence, rebelling secretly from us, oppose either murmurs or stratagem to our will.

Agl. It was but little indeed that at our court so many hearts contended for her, preferring her to us! It was not enough that she was there worshipped night and day by a crowd of lovers. When we were comforting ourselves with seeing her on the brink of the grave by the sudden order of the oracle, she thought fit to display before us the miracle of her new destiny, and has chosen our eyes to be witnesses of that which at the bottom of our hearts we least desire.

Cid. What above all fills my heart with despair is to see this lover, so perfect, so born to please, a captive under her sway. Were it in our power to choose from so many monarchs, should we find one who bears such a noble mien? To see your wishes fulfilled beyond expectation is oftentimes a bliss that engenders unhappiness; there is no splendid train, no proud palace, but opens some door to incurable ills. But to possess a lover of perfect merit, to see yourself dearly beloved by him, is a happiness so lofty, so exquisite, that its worth cannot be expressed.

Agl. No more of this, my sister; the thought of it would kill us; let us rather think of revenge; let us find means of breaking the spell that fosters this affection between her and him.

She comes; I have darts ready, such as she shall find difficult to parry.

SCENE II.——PSYCHE, AGLAURA, CIDIPPE.

Psy. I come to bid you farewell; my lover wishes your departure. He can no longer endure that you should deprive him of a particle of the joy he feels in being alone to contemplate me. The merest look, the slightest word, is a treasure for his love, and I rob him of it when I grant it to my sisters in favour of the ties of blood.

Agl. Jealousy is very keen, and these nice sentiments well deserve that he who shows such tenderness for you should be considered above the generality of lovers. I speak thus because I do not know him; nor do you know his name, or that of those to whom he owes the light. This alarms us. I hold him to be a mighty prince, whose power is extreme, far above kingly sway. His treasure which he has strewn beneath your feet would put Abundance herself to the blush. Your love for him is as keen as his for you; you are his delight, he is yours; your happiness, my sister, would be perfect if you but knew whom you love.

Psy. What care I! He loves me. The more he sees me, the more I please him. There are no pleasures which delight the soul, but anticipate my wishes. I do not understand the cause of your alarm when all here obeys my will.

Agl. What boots it that all bows to you here if this lover ever conceals what he is? If we are alarmed, it is for your interest alone. Vain it is that everything meets you with a smile, and brings delight; true love scorns reserve; and whoever persists in concealment is conscious that he is in some way open to reproach. Should this suitor prove fickle—for often change in love is pleasing, and between ourselves, I dare say that, however dazzling the flash of your charms, there are others as fair as you—if, I say, another beauty should bind him under new thralls, if in the state in which you are now, alone and defenceless at his mercy, he should go so far as to offer violence, on whom should the king wreak his vengeance for this change or this insolence?

Psy. You fill me with dread. Kind heaven! can I be so unfortunate?

Cid. Who knows but that Hymen's knot….

Psy. Say no more, I could not bear it.

Agl. I have but one word more to say. This prince who loves you, sways the winds, gives us Zephyr's wings for a chariot, and every moment lavishes on you new pleasures, when he thus openly breaks the order of nature, may perhaps mingle some little imposture with so much love. Perhaps this palace is nothing more than an enchantment; these gilt ceilings, these mountains of wealth, with which he buys your affection, so soon as he shall be weary of your caresses, will vanish in a moment. You know as well as ourselves what power lies in spells.

Psy. In my turn, what cruel alarms I feel!

Agl. Our friendship seeks your good only.

Psy. Farewell, sisters, we must close our meeting; I love, and fear lest he should grow impatient; go, and to-morrow, if I may, you shall see me, either happier or crushed by the deepest anguish.

Agl. We go to apprise the king of the new glory, the excess of bliss which heaven showers upon you.

Cid. We go to relate to him the surprising and marvellous tale of so pleasing a change.

Psy. Trouble him not, sisters, with your suspicions, and when you describe to him this charming empire….

Agl. We both know what we must conceal and what speak, and need no lessons.

Zephyr carries off Psyche's sisters in a cloud, which descends to the earth, and in which he bears them rapidly away.

SCENE III.——LOVE, PSYCHE.

Love. You are alone at last. I can once more without your importunate sisters as witnesses declare to you what sway eyes so fair have won over me, and how extreme is the delight that a sincere ardour inspires when once it has locked two hearts together. I can unfold to you the loving eagerness of my enraptured soul, and swear that, enslaved to you alone, its rapture has no other aim than to behold this ardour followed by a similar ardour, to conceive no other wish but to bind my vows to your desires, and make all that pleases you my only delight. But wherefore does a cloud of sadness seem to dim the brightness of those beautiful eyes? Is there aught which you can want in these abodes? Scorn you the homage of the vows here paid to you?

Psy. No, my Lord!

Love. What is it then? And to what must I attribute my misfortune? You sigh less from love than from grief. The roses of your cheek are faded, a token of secret sorrow. Scarce are your sisters gone than you sigh of regret. Ah! my Psyche, when two hearts are swayed by an equal passion, can their sighs have a different object? and when their love is true, and the loved one nigh, is there room to sigh for relatives?

Psy. That is not the cause of my sorrow.

Love. Is it the absence of a rival, and a favoured rival too, that causes this neglect?

Psy. How ill you understand a heart wholly yours. I love you, my Lord; and my love is vexed at the undeserved suspicion which you have conceived. You but little know your own deserts, if you fear that you are not loved. I love you; and since I beheld the light of day, I have shown myself proud enough to scorn the vows of more than one king; and since I must disclose to you my whole heart, I have found none but you worthy of me. And yet I feel a certain sadness, which I would fain conceal from you; a gloomy grief is mingled with all my affection. Ask not the cause of it; perhaps, if you knew it, you would punish me for it, and if I still dare to aspire to anything, I am sure I should not obtain it.

Love. And do you not dread lest I should in my turn feel vexed at you for so ill understanding your own powers, or for pretending to be ignorant of the absolute sway you exercise over me? Ah! if you doubt it in the least, be undeceived. Speak.

Psy. I should have to bear with the shame of a refusal.

Love. I pray you to harbour kinder feelings in my behalf; the trial of it is easy. Speak; everything waits on your will. If you cannot trust my words without oaths, I swear by those beautiful eyes, those lords of my heart, those divine authors of my passion; and if it be not sufficient to swear by your beautiful eyes, I swear by the Styx, by which all the gods do swear.

Psy. After this assurance, my fears are somewhat allayed. My Lord, here I look on pomp and abundance, I adore you, and you worship me; my heart is enraptured, my senses charmed by it; but amidst this highest bliss, I have the misfortune of not knowing which it is whom I love. Dispel this darkness, and unfold to me who this perfect lover is.

Love. Psyche, what is that you say?

Psy. That this is the happiness for which I long, and that if you refuse it to me …

Love. I have sworn it, I am no longer master of it; but you do not know what you ask. Leave me my secret. If I discover myself, I lose you and you me. The only remedy is for you to retract your words.

Psy. Is this my sovereign sway over you?

Love. Your power is unbounded, and I am wholly yours. But if our wooing has charms for you, lay no obstacle in the way of its pleasing continuance. Do not force me to flight. This would be the least misfortune which can happen to us from that wish which has seduced you.

Psy. My Lord, you now wish to test me; but I know how far I am to believe it. I pray you to let me know the measure of my glory, and no longer to conceal from me for what illustrious choice I have rejected the vows of so many kings.

Love. Do you will it so?

Psy. Suffer me to beseech you to it.

Love. If you knew what cruel misfortune you draw upon yourself by it….

Psy. My Lord, you fill me with despair.

Love. Think well on it; I can yet be silent.

Psy. Do you pledge yourself by oaths which you do not mean to keep.

Love. Be it so! I am a god, the most powerful of all gods, absolute master on this earth, and in the heavens; my power is supreme in the ocean and the air; in a word, I am Love himself. I have wounded myself with my own darts for love of you; and, alas! but for the violence which you impose on me, and which has turned my passion for you into wrath, you would have me now for your husband. Your wish is accomplished; you know whom you loved; you know the lover whom you charmed; see now what misfortune is upon us. Yourself you force me to abandon you, yourself you force me to deprive you of all the fruits of your victory. It may be that your beautiful eyes will see me no more; this palace, these grounds, once vanished with me, will cause your rising glory to fade away. You would not believe me, and the dispelling of this doubt has for fruit that Fate, at whose blows the very heavens tremble, mightier than my love, mightier than all the gods united, which is even now showing its hatred to you, and driving me hence.

Love flies away, and the gardens vanish.

SCENE IV.

The stage represents a desert and the wild banks of a river.

Psyche, the River God, reclining on a bank of reeds, and leaning on an urn.

Psy. Cruel destiny! aching pain! fatal curiosity! Speak, dread solitude, what hast thou done with all my felicity? I loved a god; was beloved by him; my happiness redoubled at every moment; and now behold me, alone, bewailing, in the midst of a desert, where, to increase my pain, when shame and despair are upon me, I feel my love increasing now that I have lost the lover. Its very remembrance charms and poisons my soul. Its delights tyrannise over a wretched heart, which my passion has condemned to the keenest pain. Kind heaven! When Love abandoned me, why did he leave me the fire he had breathed into me. O thou! the pure and inexhaustible source of all good, lord of men and gods, dear author of the pain I now endure, art thou for ever vanished from my sight? I! I banished thee! when love was deepest, when bliss supreme, an unworthy suspicion filled my heart with alarm. Ungrateful heart, the fire was but ill-kindled; for from the first moment of love we cannot have any wish other than that of him whom we cherish. Let me die, it is the only choice left me after the loss I have made. For whom, great gods, would I live, for whom entertain a single wish? Thou, river, whose wave washes these desert sands, bury my crime in thy waters; and end ills so miserable by allowing me to find a rest in thy bed.

The River God. Thy death would sully my stream, Psyche. Heaven forbids it. Perhaps after such heavy sorrows, another fate awaits thee. Rather flee Venus' implacable anger. I see her seeking thee in order to punish thee; the son's love has excited the mother's hatred. Flee! I will detain her.

Psy. I shall await her avenging wrath! What can it have that will not be too pleasant for me? Whoever seeks death dreads no gods or goddesses, but can defy all their darts.

SCENE V.——VENUS, PSYCHE, THE RIVER GOD.

Ven. Insolent Psyche, you dare then to await my arrival after you have deprived me on earth of my honours, after your seducing charms have received the incense which is due to mine alone? I have seen my shrines forsaken, I have seen all the world, enslaved by your charms, idolise you as the sovereign beauty, offer to you a homage until then unknown, and not stay to consider whether there was another Venus at all; notwithstanding this, I see you bold enough not to dread the punishment your crime justly deserves, and to meet my gaze as if my resentment were but little matter.

Psy. If I have been loved by a few mortals, is it a crime in me to have possessed charms by which they allowed their eyes to be captured while they were blind to you? I am but what heaven hath made me, I have only those attractions which it has been willing to lend me; if the vows that were paid to me pleased you but little, you had only to show yourself, to conceal no longer from men that perfect beauty which has but to show itself in order to bring them back to their duty.

Ven. You should have guarded better against these vows; this veneration, this incense ought to be declined, and in order to undeceive them more effectively, you should yourself have rendered this homage to me in their presence. You found pleasure in this error, from which on the contrary you should have shrunk with horror. Your haughty temper, proud of having rejected a thousand kings, has carried the extravagant ambition of its choice even to the skies.

Psy. Have I in my ambition aspired to heaven?

Ven. Your insolence is without an equal; do you not aspire to the gods when you reject all the kings of the world?

Psy. If Love had hardened my heart to all their passion, and had reserved me for himself alone, do I stand guilty? and must you to-day as a price for so dazzling a love crush me with everlasting sorrow?

Ven. Psyche, you should have known your position better, and the rank of this god.

Psy. And has he allowed me time and opportunity for doing so when from the first he became absolute master of my heart?

Ven. You have allowed your heart to be charmed by him, and you have loved him as soon as he said, "I love."

Psy. How could I refuse to love the god who inspires all with love, and who was pleading his own cause? He is your son; you well know his power, his merit.

Ven. Yes; he is my son; but a son who excites my wrath; a son who ill returns to me what he knows is due; a son who knows that I am forsaken, and who, the more to flatter his own unworthy affection, since you return his love, wounds no one, forces no one to come to my shrine and address his supplications to me. You have made a rebel of him; but the whole world shall behold my dire revenge on you, and I shall teach you whether it is meet for a mortal maiden to suffer a god to sigh at her feet. Follow me; you shall find by your own experience to what degree of mad self-reliance this ambition was leading you. Come, and arm yourself with as much patience as you possess presumption.

FOURTH INTERLUDE.

The scenes represent the infernal regions; a sea of fire is discovered, whose waves are rolling unceasingly. This terrible sea is enclosed by burning ruins; and, standing in the midst of the raging billows, through a frightful opening, appears Pluto's palace. Eight Furies issue from it, and form the entry of the ballet, in which they show their delight at having kindled such dire wrath in the heart of the sweetest of divinities. A Goblin adds perilous jumps to their dances, and meanwhile Psyche, who, in obedience to Venus, has come to the infernal regions, is seen crossing again in Charon's bark, holding the box given to her by Proserpina for Venus.

ACT V.

SCENE I.——PSYCHE (alone)

Alas! Ye awful waves of hell, ye gloomy palaces where Megaera and her sisters hold their court, far ever foes to the sun's light, amongst your Ixions and your Tantaluses, in the midst of so many incessant tortures, in these hideous recesses, what pain, what toil so great as those to which Venus condemns my love? Yet my troubles satisfy not her wrath; and since I am subject to her laws, since I see myself a prey to her resentment, in these cruel moments I must have had more than one soul, more than one life, to fulfil her commands. Yet all this I could bear with joy if, in the midst of her hatred, my eyes could behold, were it for one moment only, my darling, my beloved lover! His name I dare not utter; my lips, whose guilt it was to exact too much, are now unworthy of him; and in this deadly anguish, the keenest pain my ever-returning death subjects me to is that I may not see him. If his anger lasted still, no anguish could equal mine; but if he felt any pity for a soul that worships him, however great the sufferings to which I am condemned, I should feel them not. Yea, thou mighty destiny, if he would but stay his wrath, all my sorrows would be at an end. Ah! a mere look from the son suffices to make me insensible to the mother's fury. I will doubt it no longer; he shares my grief, he sees what I endure, and weeps with me; my sufferings are his too; it is a self-imposed law of love; in spite of Venus, in spite of my crime, he it is who sustains and revives me in the midst of the dangers I have to encounter. He harbours still the tender feelings urged by his passion, and hastens to restore me to new life as soon as I perish. But what would with me those two shades I see advancing towards me through the doubtful light of these dark recesses?

SCENE II.——PSYCHE, CLEOMENES, AGENOR.

Psy. Cleomenes, Agenor, is it not you whom I see? Who has deprived you of life?

Cle. The meetest grief that could have caused a noble despair. That funeral pomp where you awaited the fiercest rigour and highest injustice of a fate most dark.

Age. On that same rock where heaven in its wrath was promising to you, instead of a husband, a dragon who would forthwith devour you, we held ourselves ready to repulse his fury, or die with you. You know it well, Princess; and when you disappeared from our gaze through the air, both, equally carried away by our love and grief, cast ourselves headlong from that rock, in order to follow your beauty, or rather to feel that love-born joy of offering in your behalf a first prey to the monster.

Cle. We were fortunately deceived as to the meaning of your oracle; but here we have recognised its miracle, and learned that the serpent, ready to devour you, was the god who is the source of all love, and who, in spite of his divinity, adoring you himself, could not bear that mortals such as we are should presume to love you.

Age. We now enjoy a pleasant death, as a reward for having followed you. What would have been life to us if we could not have been yours? Here we behold your charms once more; which neither of us would ever have seen again in the world above. Happy shall we be if we see the merest tear honour the misfortunes of which you have been the cause.

Psy. How can I have more tears to shed when my own misfortunes have been carried to the highest pitch? Let us mingle our sighs, since we have so fatal a destiny; we cannot exhaust sighs; but yours, Princes, are uttered in behalf of an ungrateful being. You would not survive my misfortune; but under whatever blow I fall, I cannot die for you.

Cle. Have we deserved aught else, we whose great passion has not ceased to weary you with the tale of our woes?

Psy. Princes, you might have won my whole soul but for your being rivals; those incomparable qualities which attended the vows of both rendered you too deserving of love to allow me to reject either.

Age. You have been able, without injustice or cruelty, to refuse a heart reserved for a god. But behold Venus! Fate bids us return, and forces us to say "Farewell."

Psy. Is not leisure allowed you to tell me what your abode is here?

Cle. Among groves ever green, where we breathe naught but love; no sooner do we die of love than through love we revive; we sigh for love under the sweet laws of his blest empire; and everlasting night dares not expel from it the day which Love himself brings on our phantoms, which he inspires, and of which he forms a court even in Hades.

Age. Your envious sisters, who descended here below after us lost themselves in the hope of losing you. Both, each in turn, as a reward for the plot which cost them their life, suffer, now the rock at Ixion's side, now the vulture at Tityus'! Love, by means of the Zephyrs, has executed on them swift justice for their envenomed and jealous malice. Those winged ministers of his just wrath, under pretence of restoring them again to you, cast them both to the bottom of a precipice, where the hideous spectacle of their mangled bodies displays but the first and least torture for that stratagem the cunning of which was the cause of the ills you now endure.

Psy. How I pity them!

Cle. You alone are to be pitied; but we tarry too long conversing with you. Farewell! May we live in your remembrance; may you, and that soon, have nothing further to dread. Soon may Love exalt you to heaven, place you beside the other gods, and, kindling again a flame that cannot be extinguished, release for ever your beauteous eyes from the task of increasing daylight in these realms!

SCENE III.——PSYCHE (alone).

Hapless lovers! their passion still continues; though dead, both love me—me, whose harshness so ill received their vows. 'Tis not thus thou actest—thou, who alone hast seized my heart; lover whom I still prize a thousand times more than my life, and who breakest such charming ties. Shun me no longer, and leave me to hope that one day thou shalt cast a glance on me, that by my sufferings, I shall please thee, and again win thy plighted faith. But my woes have disfigured me too much to allow to entertain such hopes. Eyes dejected, sad, despairing, pining, and with cheeks faded, what have I that can speak in my favour if some miracle impossible to foresee does not restore to me the beauty which once captivated thee? This treasure of divine beauty, which Proserpina has entrusted to me for Venus, contains charms which I can make mine own, and their lustre must be extreme, since beauty herself, Venus, requires them to adorn herself. Would it be a great crime to snatch a few? To captivate a god, who has been my lover, to recover his affection, and put an end to my torture, can anything that I may do be unlawful? Let me open it. What vapours cloud my brain? and what do I behold issuing from this open casket? Love, unless thy compassion forbids my death, I must needs descend to the tomb, never to live again.

Psyche swoons, and Love flies towards her.

SCENE IV.

Love. Thy danger, Psyche, dispels my wrath; nay, the violence of my passion has never abated; and though thou hast excited my highest displeasure, yet my anger was harboured only against my mother's wrath. I have seen all thy toils, I have followed all thy misfortunes, and throughout my sighs have answered thy tears. Look on me, I am still the same. What, again and again, I repeat that I love thee, and yet thou wilt not say that thou lovest me! Can it be that thy beauteous eyes are for ever closed, that they are for ever bereft of daylight? O Death! need'st thou have taken so cruel a dart, and, regardless of my eternal being, endangered my own life! How oft, ungrateful deity, have I swelled thy dark empire by the contempt or the cruelty of a fierce and proud fair one? How many faithful lovers, since I must confess it, have I, through irresistible raptures, sacrificed to thee? Go, I shall wound no more souls, I shall pierce no more hearts, but with darts dipped in the divine liquors that foster heaven's immortal passions. I shall hurl them no more but to make as many lovers as there are gods. As for thee, thou inexorable mother, who forcest her to bereave me of what I held dearest in this world, dread, in thy turn, the effects of my wrath. Thou wouldst sway my feelings, thou who art often swayed by my will; thou who wearest a heart as sensitive as that of mortals; thou enviest to mine the raptures of thine own! But in this same heart I shall plunge such darts as shall be followed by jealous sorrow. I shall crush thee by abasing ravishments, and ever choose as objects for thy dearest longings Adonises and Anchises who will nurse nothing but hatred towards thee.

SCENE V.——VENUS, LOVE, PSYCHE (still senseless).

Ven. The threat is full of respect, and the anger of a rebellious son presumptuous….

Love. I am no longer a child; my childhood has been but too long, and my wrath is as just as it is impetuous.

Ven. Its impetuosity should be subdued, and thou oughtest to remember that to me thou owest thy birth.

Love. And thou mightest well not forget that thou possessest a heart and beauty that hold their power from me; that my bow is the only support of this power, that without my shafts it is nothing, and that if the stoutest hearts have suffered themselves to be drawn in thy triumphant train, thou hast never enslaved any one whose chains it was not my pleasure to forge. Mention no more those rights of birth that fetter my desires; and if thou dost not wish to lose a thousand sighs, pay thy tribute to gratitude when thou seest me; thou whose glory and delights are the offsprings of my power.

Ven. How hast thou defended this glory of which thou speakest? How hast thou restored it to me? And when thou hast seen my shrines deserted, my temples violated, the honours due to me rivalled by those of another, if thou hast shared my shame, how hast thou punished Psyche, who hath stolen them from me? I bade thee throw a spell over her, that she might love the basest of mortals, who would not condescend to answer her passion but by continual repulse and cruellest contempt; and thyself thou hast loved her! Thou hast seduced immortal deities against me; for the Zephyrs have concealed her from me; for thee, Apollo himself, by an oracle cleverly turned, had snatched her from my power so well that, but for the curiosity which by a blind distrust restored her to my vengeance, she escaped for ever my angry passion. See to what thy love has reduced her, thine own Psyche! See! her soul is even now departing; and if thine is still smitten, receive now her last breath. Threaten and brave me if thou wilt, but she must die. So much insolence suits thee well; and I must needs bow to all it pleases thee to say, I, who can do nothing without thy darts.

Love. Thy power is but too great, relentless goddess! Fate abandons her to thy wrath; but be less inexorable to the prayers and tears of a son who beseeches thee on his knees. It must be a pleasant sight enough for thee to see on one side Psyche expiring, on the other a son who, in a suppliant voice, wishes to hold his heart's happiness from thee only. Give me back my Psyche, restore to her all her charms, surrender her to my tears, to my love, to my grief; for she is my eyes' delight, my heart's happiness.

Ven. However deep thy love for Psyche, do not expect me to put an end to her misfortunes. If Fate abandons her to me, I abandon her to her fate. Importune me no more, and let her in the midst of her calamities triumph or perish without Venus.

Love. Alas! if I am too importunate, I would not be so if I could but die!

Ven. This grief is not common that drives an immortal to long for death.

Love. Thou mayest judge of the intensity of my passion by its very excess; wilt thou not be merciful?

Ven. I must confess thy love touches my heart; it disarms, it abates my sternness; thy Psyche shall see the light again.

Love. How powerfully I shall cause thy sway to be felt everywhere!

Ven. Ay! thou shalt behold her decked in her first beauty; but I will have the entire deference of thy grateful vows. I will that a true respect allow my love to select for thee another spouse.

Love. And I will have no such grace; I assume all my former boldness; I will have Psyche; I will have her plighted faith; I will that she live again, and that she live for me; and I reckon as naught that thy wearied hatred give way to favour another maiden. Jupiter, who even now appears, shall judge betwixt us, and decide between my insubordination and thy wrath.

The lightning flashes, the thunder rolls, and Jupiter appears in the air borne aloft by his eagle.

SCENE VI.——JUPITER, VENUS, LOVE, PSYCHE (senseless).

Love. O thou to whom alone all is possible, father of gods, lord of mortals, soften the rigour of an inexorable mother, who without me would have no shrines. I have wept, I have supplicated; I sigh, I threaten. Sighs and threats are alike vain. She will not perceive that on my displeasure hangs the happy or sad condition of the whole world, and that if Psyche dies, if Psyche be not mine, I am no longer "Love". Yes! I shall break my bow, shatter my arrows; I shall even extinguish my sacred flame, and leave all nature to pine to death; or if I deign to wound a few more hearts with these golden shafts that arrest my sway, I shall wound you all above in behalf of mortals, while I shall hurl against them blunted darts only that inspire hatred, and produce thankless and cruel rebels. What tyrannical law is this that would bind me to keep my shafts ever ready to serve you, and would have me make conquest upon conquest for you, while you forbid me to make one for myself?

Jup. (to Venus). My daughter, show thyself less severe towards him; his Psyche's destiny is even now in thy hands. Fate, at thy slightest word, is ready to follow up thy wrath. Speak, and let a mother's tenderness prevail upon thy designs. All dread this wrath which awes even me. Will thou leave the world to become the prey of hatred, disorder, and confusion, and change a god of union, of delights, of joy, into one of bitterness and division? Consider the lofty rank we hold, and say whether passion ought to sway our feelings. The word revenge is pleasing to mortals; the more is it meet that we should resort to forgiveness.

Ven. I forgive this rebel son. Yet would you have me submit to the reproach that a contemptible mortal, the object of my wrath, proud Psyche, because she displays some charms, has defiled my alliance and my son's couch?

Jup. Well, then, I make her immortal, so that all shall be equal.

Ven. I feel no longer hatred or contempt for her, but admit her to the honour of this conjugal tie. Psyche! recover your life, never more to lose it. Jupiter has contrived your restoration, and I abandon that lofty humour which opposed itself to your wishes.

Psy. (recovering from her fainting condition). It is you then, mighty goddess, who restores the life to this innocent being?

Ven. Jupiter extends his pardon to you, and my wrath lasts no longer. Live! Venus commands it. Love allows it.

Psy. (to Love). At last I see you again, dear object of my passion!

Love. (to Psyche). You are mine at last, my soul's own delight!

Jup. Come, lovers, come; and conclude in heaven so great, so lofty a union. Come, fair Psyche, to change thy destiny, and take thy place among the gods.