FAUST

The cup again! The Holy One is faint.

OLDHAM

He speaks a miracle!...

THE HOLY ONE

And then I knew
That pilgrim as a saint, whose lips revealed
The glory of the Buddha. I beheld
My life one poisoned network of desire
And fleshly longing and pain-sowing hope--
The evil self seeking its happiness
And shaping horror. And I cast away
Myself, and cried: What am I but a dream,
A wave within the sea, a passing cloud
Upon the radiance of eternity?
All yearning will I slay, and slay therewith
The sorrow that succeeds it!...

So the lust
Of life passed from me; so the narrow I
Merged in the infinite, from hope set free--
Heritor of Nirvana's holy calm,
Wherein the voices of the heart's unrest
Are stifled, and the soul expands to clasp
Joy, nothingness, eternity and peace.

FAUST

Peace.... Peace.... Like bells from upland monasteries
You speak the word that summons us. But where
In peace is room for all once-towering hopes--
Nay, even for the wrecked and prostrate monoliths
That mark those fallen pylons?

THE HOLY ONE

Let the earth,
Ravenous of her young, these too devour,
And dust and nothingness engulf their shapes--
Vain burdens, bitter monuments.

FAUST

And where
Shall I find deeps wherein without a sound
I can extinguish my wild will that leaps
Flamelike to meet the stars?

THE HOLY ONE

In that deep sea
Hid in thy breast. Seek thou that tide of calm,
For it lies there awaiting.

FAUST

Can it be
That life's whole burden may be cast aside
And named as nothing, and its memory
Perish forever? In the summer nights,
Comes there no stealing ecstasy to stir
The old forgotten longings?

THE HOLY ONE

In the night
And in the day, one ecstasy abides
Ceaselessly with the heart that has put off
Desire--one ecstasy of final calm.
All other voices seem harsh clamorings.

OLDHAM

Ah, Holy One, lead me thy way of peace!
For I am weary of my heart's vain wars.
My life is as a desert, where desire
Corrodes me ceaselessly. Instruct my soul
To follow thee home to the gulfs of rest!
That, in renouncement of this bitter will,
It find at last deliverance it has sought.

THE HOLY ONE

My son, thou hast spoken; thou shalt come in time
To that abode. The Buddha's light shall guide