A rich landscape outside Paradise. A little rough hut. ADAM is driving stakes into the ground to make a fence. EVE is making an arbour. LUCIFER.

ADAM
This place is mine. Instead of the great world
This plot shall be my home, my own domain.
I guard it from the prowling beasts of prey
And have it yield me fruit in harvest time.

EVE
I build a shady arbour, like the first
In that fair garden, for I would bring back
The lost delight of Eden.

LUCIFER
      Ah, great things
Ye speak of. Family, possession, these
Shall be twin levers that shall move the world,
All weal and woe shall from these twain be born,
Twin forces, these shall grow unceasingly
Till nations rise, and trade and commerce come,
Twain parents of all great and noble things,
Twain parents who their offspring shall devour.

ADAM
Thou speakest riddles. Thou didst promise me
Knowledge, and I renounced the happiness
Of trust instinctive, that I might be great.
What have I gained?

LUCIFER
      Dost thou not feel it, then?

ADAM
I feel that as God cast me off from Him,
And thrust me out with empty hands to roam
The waste, I left God, too. I have, myself
Become my own god, and what I attain,
Is mine, and fitly. This, my strength and pride.

LUCIFER aside
Vain puppet, that would mock at Heaven now;
Wilt thou so bold be when the lightning glares?

EVE
And I am proud in this one thought alone
That I shall be the mother of the world.

LUCIFER aside
A glorious ideal of woman’s heart
The curse of sinners to perpetuate.

ADAM
What owe I God? Existence, nought beside.
Life, to be worth the burden ’tis to live,
Must be the recompense of weary toil.
The pleasure that a draught of water gives
I must earn thirsty in the heat of noon.
The honey of a kiss is bought with that
Which follows on the kiss - despondency.
And if the bonds of thankfulness are loosed
And fallen from me, if I freedom have
To build my destiny, or cast it down,
Stretching with groping fingers towards my goal,
There was no need, it may be, of thy help,
For this I could have done by mine own strength.
Thou hast not freed me from the heavy chains
Which bind my straining body to the earth.
I feel a bond, no stronger than a hair,
How it be named, I know not, that prevents
My longing soul from soaring proud and free.
See, if I leapt, my body would fall back,
If what the distance hides I strove to seek,
My eyes and ears their service would deny,
And if imagination raises me
To higher spheres, then hunger drags me down
An abject creature to the earth again.

LUCIFER
Stronger than I the bond that fetters thee.

ADAM
Ah, then thou art a spirit weak indeed:
This spider’s web unseen, this thing of nought
Which ten score thousand creatures would not mark,
For though they struggle, taken in its net,
They yet believe they are at liberty,
This thing which only some few chosen souls perceive
Defies thee, and thou can’st not vanquish it.

LUCIFER
And this alone hath strength to challenge me,
For ’tis a spirit, like to me. Because
It works in silence, hidden, dost thou think
It is not strong? Believe it not; that which
A world doth shatter and a world create,
Is hidden in a darkness absolute.
For who should view it would grow faint with fear.
The work of man doth sparkle and resound,
Enduring but an hour, and then is gone.

ADAM
Grant me to gaze upon this hidden force,
A moment’s glance, thou know’st my heart is bold,
Which thus can sway me. For I am myself
A unity complete and separate.

LUCIFER
‘I am.’ Vain words. Thou wert and thou shalt be.
All life is an eternal rise and fall,
Yet gaze around and see with spirit eyes.
As ADAM speaks the following lines everything becomes visible.

ADAM
What stream is this that wells up ceaselessly,
Swift flowing ever upward to the height,
Then parts in twain, and with deep thunder falls
Upon the twin poles of the earth?

LUCIFER
      ’Tis heat,
Which life brings to the land of snow and ice.

ADAM
And these two flaming streams that roar and flow
So near, I fear lest I be swept away,
And yet I feel their quickening glow and force,
What are they? Lo, their glory makes me swoon.

LUCIFER
What thou dost see is Magnetism named.

ADAM
The earth beneath me quakes. That which before
I held as formless and immovable,
Is seething matter, irresistibly
Striving for ordered shape, and life. Lo, here
It cools to crystal, there it doth become
A tender bud. Ah, in this tumult wild,
What shall become of that self locked in me,
In which I trusted, foolish that I was,
As in a solid and enduring tool,
To serve me in my longing and intent?
Poor pampered child that sorrow and delight
Alike dost bring me, wilt thou only sink
To be a little dust, while what of thee
Remains yet, water, and thin, formless air
Which, but a while since, glowed with joy of life,
With mine own being, cloudward mounts on high
In aery vapour? Lo, my every word,
My every thought consumes a part of me.
I burn! And it may be, the baleful fire
A hidden spirit fans, that he may warm
Himself beside my ashes. Hence, dire vision, hence,
Lest I go mad. Ah, frightful ’tis to stand
In battle midst a hundred elements,
Tortured by desolation and despair.
Why did I cast away that providence
Which instinct felt, yet knew the value not
That providence, which wisdom seeks, in vain!

EVE
My heart is troubled likewise, for if thou
Shalt fight in battle with fierce beasts of prey,
And I our garden tend in weariness,
I lift my eyes, and in the whole wide world
No kinsman is there in the earth or heaven,
No friend to strengthen and protect. Not thus
Once was it in more happy days of peace.

LUCIFER scornfully
If then so puny are your souls, forsooth,
That ye should shrink without a hand to guide,
If ye must needs be subject and obey,
Behold, I give to you a demigod
Who shall more kindly than the Ancient be.
The spirit of this earth; I know him well,
A fair and modest youth from Heaven’s choir.
      Come, spirit, come straightway,
      Know, thou can’st not forbear:
      The everlasting Nay
      Calleth, none else would dare.
Flames burst from the earth; a heavy dun cloud appears girt with a rainbow and sounding with thunder.

LUCIFER recoiling
Who art thou, shape of fear? Not thee I called.
The genius of the earth is calm and mild.

THE VOICE OF THE SPIRIT OF THE EARTH
He whom in Heaven’s choir thou heldest weak
Is in his own sphere strong and infinite.
Lo! I am here, since I must needs obey
The spirit’s word, yet know, one thing it is
To summon, but another to command.
Thou wilt fall back, if mine own form I take
And these two worms here perish, crushed and slain.

LUCIFER
How shall man in thy haughty presence stand,
If he would pay thee homage as a god?

THE VOICE OF THE SPIRIT OF THE EARTH
In water, in the clouds and in the trees,
In all things I am immanent, where’re
He gaze with strong intent and trusting heart.
He vanishes. The springs and groves are peopled with fleeting nymphs.

EVE
Ah, look on these fair faces greeting us
In smiling comradeship. No more is there
Lonely despair in desert wilderness.
For happiness is come to us in them.
They give us courage in the time of grief
And wholesome counsel in perplexity.

LUCIFER
And nowhere better can ye counsel ask,
Who, what ye ask, already have resolved,
Than from these kindly fleeting presences
that speak in answer as ye ask of them,
And smiling gaze on him whose heart is pure,
Yet shrink appalled from the despairing soul.
These wait upon you in a hundred shapes
And ever changing in a hundred ways;
The hale form of the wise philosopher,
And the ideal of hearts forever young.

ADAM
What profiteth the glitter of these shapes
That like a mirage fade as I draw near
And add one riddle more to vex my brain?
Beguile my heart no further, Lucifer.
Let me know all as thou did’st promise me.

LUCIFER
aside
One day thy knowledge shall prove bitterness,
And thou shalt yearn for ignorance again.
aloud
Have patience, yet. Thou knowest, thou must earn
Through weary fight a moment’s ecstasy.
Thou must through many schools pass, many times
Cherish false hope ere all things thou shalt know.

ADAM
For thee of patience easy ’tis to speak
For thee before doth stretch eternity.
I have not eaten of the Tree of Life,
Time hastens and my days pass fleeting by.

LUCIFER
All that hath life, hath equal part in life;
The hoary tree, the moth that lives a day,
Feel, love, rejoice, and perish, when each one
Its life hath led, its purpose hath fulfilled.
Not time progresseth; it is we who change;
A century the same is as a day.
Fear not, thou shalt accomplish thy desire,
But think not that man’s essence is enclosed
In this mean body formed of dust and clay.
Look on the anthill or the swarm of bees,
A thousand workers hasten to and fro,
Blindly perform their task, then pass away,
Yet the whole mass endures, a unity,
And, with a common spirit, lives and works,
Brings to accomplishment a conscious plan,
Until the end come and the whole doth cease.
’Tis true thy earthly body shall decay,
But thou shalt live on in a hundred forms,
And nothing need begin once more anew.
If thou sin, in thy son thou shalt atone,
In him thy body’s weakness shalt prolong;
What thou hast felt and learned and come to know
Shall be thy portion for a million years.

ADAM
To age belongeth it to view the past:
Not thus the longing of my flaming heart,
For on my future I would gaze to know
What I must suffer and wherefore I fight.

EVE
And if then life shall be so oft renewed
I would know if my beauty shall endure.

LUCIFER
So be it. I will lay a spell on you.
Ye shall look on the future to its end,
Viewed in the flitting phantoms of a dream.
But when ye see how foolish the intent,
How grievous is the conflict to be fought,
Lest ye be overwhelmed in grey despair,
And leave the battle, smitten to the heart,
I give to you one little shining ray,
To comfort you, that all things which ye saw
Were but illusion. Lo, this ray is hope.
LUCIFER leads ADAM and EVE into the hut. They fall asleep.