ceremonies? (Pause.)

Olof (irritated and humiliated). I weakened for a moment.

Lars. So you are human, after all? I thank you for it!

Olof. Are you mocking my weakness?

Lars. I am praising it.

Olof. And I am cursing it!--God in heaven, am I not right?

Lars. No, you are wrong.

[Enter Christine while Lars is still speaking.]

Christine. You are too much in the right!

Olof. Christine, what are you doing here?

Christine. It was so silent and lonesome at home.

Olof. I asked you not to come here.

Christine. I thought I might be of some use, but I see now--Another time
I shall stay at home.

Olof. You have been awake all night?

Christine. That is nothing! I will go now if you tell me to!

Olof. Go in there and rest a little while we talk. (Christine begins
absentmindedly to extinguish the candles.)

Olof. What are you doing, dear?

Christine. Why, it is full daylight.

(Lars gives Olof a significant glance.)

Olof. My mother is dead, Christine.

Christine (as she goes to Olof to let him kiss her on the forehead, the
look on her face is compassionate but cold). I am sorry for your loss.
[Exit Christine.]

(Pause. The brothers look for a moment in the direction where she
disappeared, then at each other.)

Lars. I beg you, Olof, as your friend and brother, don't go on as you
have been doing.

Olof. The old story! But he who has put his axe to the tree cannot draw
back until the tree is down. The King has betrayed our cause. Now I will
see what I can do for it.

Lars. The King is wise.

Olof. He is a miser, a traitor, and a protector of the nobility. First
he uses me to hunt his game, and then he wants to kick me out.

Lars. He sees farther than you do. If you were to go to three
million people, telling them: "Your faith is false; believe my words
instead"--do you think it possible that they would at once cast aside
their most intimate and most keenly experienced conviction, which until
then had been a support to them in sorrow as well as in joy? No, the
life of the soul would be in a bad condition, indeed, if all the old
things could be disposed of so quickly.

Olof. But it is not so. The whole people is full of doubt. Among the
priests there is hardly one who knows what to believe--if he cares to
believe anything at all. Everything is ready for the new, and it is only
you who are to blame--you weaklings whose consciences will not permit
you to sow doubt where nothing but a feeble