Complete Works of Henrik Ibsen (91 page)

EINAR.
Stand, and what you took restore!

BRAND.
Is it she? You see her there.

EINAR.
[To AGNES.]
Choose between the sunny shore
And this savage den of care.

AGNES.
There I have no choice to make.

EINAR.
Agnes, Agnes, hear me yet!
The old saying you forget,
Light to lift and hard to bear.

AGNES.
Go with God, thou tempter fair;
I shall bear until I break.

EINAR.
For thy mother’s, sisters’ sake!

AGNES.
Bring my greetings to my Home;
I will write-if words should come.

EINAR.
Over ocean’s gleaming breast
White sails hurry from the strand; —
Like the sighs of dreaming brows,
Lofty, diamond-beaded prows
Speed them to their haven-rest
In a far-off vision’d land.

AGNES.
Sail to westward, sail to east; —
Think of me as one deceased.

EINAR.
As a sister come with me.

AGNES.
[Shaking her head.]
‘Twixt us rolls a boundless sea.

EINAR.
O, then homeward to thy mother!

AGNES.
[Softly.]
Not from Master, Friend, and Brother.

BRAND.
[Coming a step nearer.]
Youthful maiden, weigh it well.
In this mountain-prison pent,
Oversoar’d by crag and fell,
In this dim and yawning rent,
Life henceforward shall be gray
As an ebbing autumn-day.

AGNES.
Gloom appals no more; afar
Through the cloud-wrack gleams a star.

BRAND.
Know, that I am stern to crave,
All or Not hing I will have;
If that call you disobey,
You have flung your life away.
No abatement in distress,
And for sin no tenderness, —
If life’s service God refuse,
Life you ‘joyfully must lose.

EINAR.
Fly this wild insensate play!
Spurn the sullen Doomer’s sway;
Live the life you know you may!

BRAND.
At the crossway standst thou:-choose.
[Goes.]

EINAR.
Choose the stillness or the strife!
For the choice to g o or stay
Is a choice of calm or fray,
Is a choice of Night or Day,
Is a choice of Death or Life!

AGNES.
[Rises, and then says slowly:]
On through Death. On into Night. —
Dawn beyond glows rosy-bright.
[She follows, where BRAND has gone. EINAR gazes a moment in bewilderment after her, then bows his head, and goes back to the fjord.]

ACT THIRD
.

Three years later. A little garden by the Parsonage. A great preeipice above, a stone wall round. The fjord, narrow and pent in, appears in the background. The lwuse-door opens upon the garden. Afternoon.

BRAND is standing on the steps outside the house. AGNES is sitting on the step at his feet.

AGNES.
My clearest husband, still your eye
Over the fjord roves anxiously —

BRAND.
I wait a summons.

AGNES.
With brows bent!

BRAND.
My Mother’s summons. This three years
I’ve waited between hopes and fears
The summons that was never sent.
To-day ‘twas told me, past a doubt,
That her life’s span is almost out.

AGNES.
[Softly and tenderly.]
Brand, without summons you should go?

BRAND.
[Shakes his head.]
Till she of her offence repent
I have no comfort to bestow.

AGNES.
She is your mother!

BRAND.
It were sin
To worship idols in my kin.

AGNES.
Brand, you are stern!

BRAND.
To you?

AGNES.
Oh no!

BRAND.
I warn’d you that the way was steep.

AGNES.
[Smiling.]
It was not true; you did not keep
Your word.

BRAND.
Yes, here the ice-wind rives;
Your cheek has lost its youthful glow,
Your tender heart is touch’d with snow.
Our home is built where nothing thrives,
Amid a barren waste of stone.

AGNES.
It lies the safer, then! So prone
Beetles yon jutting mountain-wall,
That, when the leafy spring is near
The brimming avalanche vaults sheer
Over our heads, and we lie clear
As in the hollow of a fall.

BRAND.
The sun we never see at all.

AGNES.
Oh, yet he dances warm and bright
Atop you mountain that we face.’

BRAND.
For three weeks, true,-at summer’s height, —
But never struggles to its base!

AGNES.
[Looks fixedly at him, rises and says:]
Brand, there’s o n e thought at which you shrink.

BRAND.
No, y ou!

AGNES.
No, you!

BRAND.
Within you bear
A secret terror.

AGNES.
Which you share!

BRAND.
You reel as from a dizzy brink!
Out with it! speak it out!

AGNES.
‘Tis true
I’ve trembled, whiles —
[Hesitates.]

BRAND.
Trembled! At what?

AGNES.
For Alf.

BRAND.
For Alf?

AGNES.
And so have you!

BRAND.
At times. But no, God takes him not!
God’s merciful! My child shall grow
To be a strong man yet, I know.
Where is he now?

AGNES.
He’s sleeping.

BRAND.
[Looks in through the door.]
See;
Of pain and grief he dreams not, he;
The little hand is plump and round —

AGNES.
Yet pale.

BRAND.
But that will pass.

AGNES.
How deep,
Restful and quickening is his sleep.

BRAND.
God bless thee; in thy sleep grow sound!
[Shuts the door.]
To all my labours you and he
Have brought light and tranquillity;
Each irksome task, each mournful care,
‘Twas easy, in your midst, to bear;
You near, I never felt dismay,
Grew braver by his baby-play.
A martyrdom I held my Call,
But something has transform’d it all, —
Success still follows my footfall.

AGNES.
Yes, Brand; but you deserve success.
Oh, you have battled, in storm and stress; —
Toild on through woe and weariness; —
But tears of blood you wept, apart —

BRAND.
And yet it seem’d so light a thing;
With you, love stole upon my heart
Like a glad sunny day in Spring.
In me Love never had been lit;
No parents’ hand had kindled it,
Rather they quench’d the fitful flashes
That gleam’d at moments in the ashes.
It was as though the tender Soul
That mute and darkling in me slept,
Had, closely garner’d, all been kept
To be my sweet Wife’s aureole.

AGNES.
Not mine alone: but whosoe’er
In our great Household has a share,
Each sorrowing son, each needy brother,
Each weeping child, each mourning mother,
Of quickening nurture have their part,
At the rich banquet of thy heart.

BRAND.
Only through you two. By your hand
That heavenly bridge of love was spann’d;
No single soul can all contain
Except it first have yearn’d for o n e .
I had to long and yearn in vain,
So my heart harden’d into stone.

AGNES.
And yet-your love is merciless;
You chasten whom you would caress.

BRAND.
You, Agnes?

AGNES.
Me? O nay, dear, nay!
On me a lightsome load you lay.
But many falter at the call
To offer Nothing or else all.

BRAND.
What the world calls by that name “Love,”
I know not and I reek not of.
God’s love I recognise alone,
Which melts not at the piteous plaint,
Which is not moved by dying groan,
And its caress i s chastisement.
What answer’d through the olive-trees
God, when the Son in anguish lay,
Praying, “O take this cup away!”
D i d He then take it? Nay, child, nay:
He made him drink it to the lees.

AGNES.
By such a measure meted, all
The souls of earth are forfeited.

BRAND.
None knows on whom the doom shall fall;
But God in flaming speech hath said:
“Be faithful through the hour of strife:
Haggling wins not the crown of life!”
Anguished repentance scales not heaven,
The martyr’s doom you must fulfil.
That you lack’d strength may be forgiven, —
But never that you wanted will.

AGNES.
Yes, it shall be as you have said;
O lift me to those heights you tread;
To your high heaven lead me forth,
My spirit is strong, my flesh is frail;
Oft, anguish-struck, I faint, I fail, —
My clogg’d foot drags upon the earth.

BRAND.
See, child; of all men God makes one
Demand: No coward compromise!
Whose work’s half done or falsely done,
Condemn’d with God his whole word lies.
We must give sanction to this teaching
By living it and not by preaching.

AGNES.
[Throws herself on his neck.]
Lead where you will; I follow you!

BRAND.
No precipice is too steep for t w o .
[Enter the DOCTOR; he has come down the road, and stops outside the garden fence.]

THE DOCTOR.
Ha! loving doves at their caresses
In these dark craggy wildernesses?

AGNES.
My dear old Doctor, here at last!
Come in, come in!
[Runs down and opens the garden gate.]

THE DOCTOR.
Ho, not so fast!
We’ve first to settle an old score. —
What! Tie yourself to this wild moor,
Where piercing winds of winter tear
Like ice, soul, body to the core

BRAND.
Not soul.

THE DOCTOR.
Not? Well, I must admit,
That seems about the truth of it.
Your hasty compact has an air
Of standing firm, unmoved, erect,
Though otherwise, one might expect,
By ancient usage, soon to fade
That which so suddenly was made.

AGNES.
A sunbeam’s kiss, a bell’s note, may
Awaken for a summer’s day.

THE DOCTOR.
A patient waits for me. Farewell.

BRAND.
My mother?

THE DOCTOR.
Yes. You also go?

BRAND.
Not now.

THE DOCTOR.
Have been, I daresay?

BRAND.
No.

THE DOCTOR.
Priest, you are hard. Through mist and snow
I’ve trudged across the desolate fell,
Well knowing that she is of those
Who pay like paupers.

BRAND.
May God bless
Your skill and your unweariedness!
Ease, if you can, her bitter throes.

THE DOCTOR.
Bless my goodwill! I tarried not
A moment when I heard her state.

BRAND.
You she has summon’d: I’m forgot, —
And sick at heart, I wait, I wait.

THE DOCTOR.
Come without summons!

BRAND.
Till she calls,
I have no place within those walls.

THE DOCTOR.
[To AGNES.]
You hapless blossom, laid within
The pitiless grasp of such a lord!

BRAND.
I am not pitiless.

AGNES.
He had pour’d
His blood, to wash her soul from sin!

BRAND.
Unask’d, upon myself I took
The clearance of her debit-book.

THE DOCTOR.
Clear off your own!

BRAND.
O n e man may get
Hundreds acquitted, in God’s eyes.

THE DOCTOR.
Ay; not a Beggar, though, who lies
Himself o’er head and ears in debt.

BRAND.
Beggar or rich,-with all my soul
I will ;-and that one thing’s the whole!

THE DOCTOR.
Yes, in your ledger, truly, Will
Has enough entries and to spare:
But, priest, your L o v e-account is still
A virgin-chapter, blank and bare.
[Goes.]

BRAND.
[Follows him awhile with his eyes.]
Never did word so sorely prove
The smirch of lies, as this word Love:
With devilish craft, where will is frail,
Men lay Love over, as a veil,
And cunningly conceal thereby
That all their life is coquetry.
Whose path’s the steep and perilous slope,
Let h i m but love ,-and he may shirk it;
If he prefer Sin’s easy circuit,
Let him but love ,-he still may hope;
If God he seeks, but fears the fray,
Let him but love ,-’tis straight his prey;
If with wide-open eyes he err,
Let him but love ,-there’s safety there!

AGNES.
Yes, it is false: yet still I fall
Questioning: Is it, after all?
[Goes.]

BRAND.
O n e point’s omitted: First the Will
Law’s thirst for righteousness must still.
You must first will! Not only things
Attainable, in more or less,
Nor only where the action brings
Some hardship and some weariness;
No, you must will with flashing eyes
Your way through all earth’s agonies.
It is not martyrdom to toss
In anguish on the deadly cross:
But to have will’d to perish so,
To will it through each bodily throe,
To will it with still-tortured mind,
This, only this, redeems mankind.

AGNES.
[Clinging closely to him.]
If at the terrible call I cower,
Speak, strong-soul’d husband, in that hour!

BRAND.
If Will has conquer’d in that strife,
Then comes at length the hour of Love;
Then it descends like a white dove,
Bearing the olive-leaf of life:
But in this nerveless, slothful state,
The true, the sovereign Love is-Hate!
[In horror.]
Hate! Hate! O Titan’s toil, to will
That one brief easy syllable!
[Goes hurriedly into the house.]

AGNES.
[Looking through the open door.]
He kneels beside his little son,
And heaves as if with bursts of tears;
He clutches close the bed, like one
That knows no refuge from his fears. —
O what a wealth of tender ruth
Lies hidden in this breast of steel!
Alf he dares love: the baby-heel
Has not yet felt Earth’s serpent-tooth.
[Cries out in terror.]
Ha! he leaps up with ashy brow!
Wringing his hands! what sees he now!

BRAND.
[Coining out.]
A summons came?

AGNES.
No summons, no!

BRAND.
[Looking back into the house.]
His parch’d skin burns in fever-glow;
His temples throb, his pulses race — !
Oh fear not, Agnes!

AGNES.
God of grace — !

BRAND.
Nay, have no fear
[Calls out over the road.]
The summons, see!

A MAN.
[Through the garden-gate.]
You must come n o w, priest!