In fire, destruction marks its way,
Yet Thee thy servants most adore,
Lord, in the peaceful beams of day.
ALL. . . . . . . . .Angelic powers thy sight inspires,
Though none thy secret mystery knows,
And rolling spheres and glorious fires,
Are glorious as at first they rose.
We are now introduced to Faust, and we find him first in his character of an University Professor, in an old Gothic chamber of an ancient tower, among musty parchments, strange apparatus, and antiquated furniture. It is late in the night, and he seems to have just thrown aside his books in despair and disappointment, to muse on the results of his application, on the arts and uses of his life, and he finds them—nothing. He discusses the value and substance of the sciences and studies among which he has so long been seeking repose of spirit and finding none, and he pronounces them vain and illusory, and exclaims bitterly against the deceit they have so long been wont to put on him, and through his means on others. He rhapsodizes his regret for the always inevitable and now irreparable waste of his life—of time and energies created and given him expressly to be wasted, and for that only, fitted and predestinated. He looks out at the window and speaks to the only face he sees, to the only companion he is wont to welcome.
Behold my sorrows end to-night!
Thou, whom so oft with pensive brow
To-night's high noon I've watch'd as now,
While hither thy consoling ray
O'er books and papers found its way.
Oh could I to the mountain's height
Float off, all buoyant in thy light,
Or flit with ghosts the abysses over,
O'er meadows in thy glimmering hover,
Or bathe, from wisdom's sorrows free;
In floods of dew all fresh from thee.
We—still in prison, fast and deep,
Accursed noisome donjon keep,
Where Heaven’s own light on weary walls,
Through painted windows dimly falls—
'Mid piles of books, which smoke and dust
And worms long since have made their prey,
And household stuffs, which moth and rust
Are hastening in their old decay—
