WALLENSTEIN (in soliloquy). Is it possible? | |
| Is ’t so? I can no longer what I would! | |
| No longer draw back at my liking! I | |
| Must do the deed, because I thought of it, | |
| And fed this heart here with a dream! Because | 5 |
| I did not scowl temptation from my presence, | |
| Dallied with thought of possible fulfilment, | |
| Commenced no movement, left all time uncertain, | |
| And only kept the road, the access open! | |
| By the great God of Heaven! It was not | 10 |
| My serious meaning, it was ne’er resolve. | |
| I but amused myself with thinking of it. | |
| The free-will tempted me, the power to do | |
| Or not to do it.—Was it criminal | |
| To make the fancy minister to hope, | 15 |
| To fill the air with pretty toys of air, | |
| And clutch fantastic sceptres moving t’ward me? | |
| Was not the will kept free? Beheld I not | |
| The road of duty clear beside me—but | |
| One little step and once more I was in it! | 20 |
| Where am I? Whither have I been transported? | |
| No road, no track behind one, but a wall, | |
| Impenetrable, insurmountable, | |
| Rises obedient to the spells I muttered | |
| And meant not—my own doings tower behind me. | 25 |
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