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Mephistopheles, "the spirit that denies," appears before God and wins His permission to tempt Faust. The story then runs as follows-we can only outline it, without attempting to dwell upon the splendid conception of Faust's character: Dr. Heinrich Faust, an aged student of Wittenberg, has run the whole gamut of human life, and begins to despair of the ability of even knowledge to give pleasure or benefit. He wishes to move beyond all earthly power and to taste something of the knowledge which upholds the universe. By means of magic he calls up the Earth Spirit; but his weak human personality is repelled by the awe of the sight. In despair at his powerlessness he determines to poison himself; but just as the cup is raised to his lips, the joyful Easter bells ring forth and voices are heard singing "Christ is risen!" The memory of his childhood faith rushes upon the mind of Faust and he dashes down the cup. That same evening Mephistopheles appears in his study. Faust has been striving for knowledge as the only true happiness; he has found that knowledge is a mere phantom of joy. Therefore, he offers to sell his soul if he shall ever realize happiness :

When to the moment I shall say,
"Stay, thou art so lovely, stay!"
Then with thy fetters bind me round

Then perish I with cheerful glee.

So a compact is entered on and Faust receives the

gift of youth.

Thereafter Mephistopheles offers

him all manner of pleasure for his indulgence. Then the fair Margaret appears. She is the most beautiful of all Goethe's characters and is said to be a reminiscence of his early love, Frederika Brion. Pure and most lovable, she comes under the baleful influence of Mephistopheles. Through his suggestions, Faust wins her innocent love and ruins her. This draws after it a train of dreadful sorrow for the gentle Gretchen. Her mother dies; then her brother is slain by treachery, cursing her with his dying breath; lastly she kills her little child. She is arrested and condemned to death, and as she lies friendless and mad on the straw of her dungeon, Faust comes to try and save her. But in vain. Mephistopheles carries him off, pursued by Gretchen's pitiful cry, "Heinrich! Heinrich!"

So the First Part closes. But that last sad word gives a hint of the raison d'être of the Second Part: Margaret would not be happy if saved alone. A space of time intervenes between the First and Second Parts. Faust is discovered repentant and striving to quiet the anguish of his soul. Passing over the first three acts, in the fourth we come to a closer connection with the First Part. Here, and in the following act, Faust is engaged in draining and reclaiming from the sea a waste tract of land given him by an emperor whom he had served. Mephistopheles objects to this work for future generations, but Faust, now a blind old man, perseveres. At

last, joyful in the prospect of the good he is doing for mankind, he says:

"Anticipating all that future bliss,

I have it now. That moment's here. "Tis this!"

Dying, he has apparently forfeited his soul to the devil. But Mephistopheles has lost, because he has failed to draw Faust permanently away from the right, or to make cease his activity and his aspiration. The soul that continually aspires to the good shall be saved. So in vain the legions of evil spirits endeavor to capture the spirit of Faust. He is borne by angels to higher spheres, where Gretchen awaits his coming.

It has been said that this great poem presents a certain lack of unity. This is only natural when we remember the differing circumstances and moods under which it was written and the years during which it lay developing in the poet's mind. But in estimating its worth as a work of art we must not disregard the poet's intention. Fundamentally, Faust teaches the truth that salvation comes of sincere effort and aspiration as much as from actual achievement. The clue to the somewhat confusing mysticism of the piece and its fantasy is found in the fact that "it is at once a problem and a picture. Therein lies its fascination. The problem embraces all questions of vital importance; the picture represents all opinions, all sentiments, all classes, moving on the stage of life." In the problem lies the other

mode for the expression of the great truth which has been mentioned. The beauty and variety of the drama draw towards it a public appreciation the more universal because of that variety, and hence it wins a larger audience to whom the truth may be brought home. It is the truth which appealed so strongly to the English poet, Browning: "He that endures to the end shall be saved." The angels sing as they bear aloft the soul of Faust: "The man who strives and ever aspires him can we set free!"

We may cite two examples of Goethe's verse in Faust. The first from the dialogue between Faust and his servant Wagner:

Mark how, beneath the evening sunset's glow,
The green embosomed houses glitter!
The glow retreats, done is the day of toil,
It yonder hastes, new fields of life exploring;
Ah, that no wing can lift me from the soil,
Upon its track to follow, follow soaring!..

Yet, finally, the weary god is sinking;
The new-born impulse fires my mind-
I hasten on, his beams eternal drinking,

The Day before me and the Night behind,

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Above me Heaven unfurled, the floor of waves beneath meA glorious dream! though now the glories fade. . . .

Yet in each soul is born the pleasure

Of yearning onward, upward and away,

When o'er our heads, lost in the vaulted azure,

The lark sends down his flickering lay—

When over crags and piny highlands

The poising eagle slowly soars,

And over plains and lakes and islands

The crane sails by to other shores.

The second is the ballad sung by Gretchen:

There was a King in Thule,
Was faithful to the grave;
To whom his mistress, dying
A golden beaker gave.

More prized than all his treasure
That cup of gold remained;
His eyes with tears would glisten
When he the goblet drained.

When he was old and dying,
His wealth he reckoned up,
And gave all to his princes
-Except that golden cup!

And to his knights, all loyal,
As were the men of yore,
He gave a banquet royal

In his castle on the shore.

There stood the old King, drinking

One long, deep health-the last--
Then down among the billows

That sacred cup he cast;

And as the cup was sinking

He closed his eyes; no more
He drank the wine all rosy
In his castle by the shore!

Faust was Goethe's masterpiece. It was bound up with his literary life and was almost co-terminous with his career. But he did other work as well after Schiller's death. In 1817 he resigned the managership of Weimar theatre, owing to an un

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