Nathan the Wise; a dramatic poem in five acts

Scene.—The Place of Palms

The Templar walking and agitated

TEMPLAR

Here let the weary victim pant awhile.—
Yet would I not have time to ascertain
What passes in me; would not snuff beforehand
The coming storm.  ’Tis sure I fled in vain;
But more than fly I could not do, whatever
Comes of it.  Ah! to ward it off—the blow
Was given so suddenly.  Long, much, I strove
To keep aloof; but vainly.  Once to see her—
Her, whom I surely did not court the sight of,
To see her, and to form the resolution,
Never to lose sight of her here again,
Was one—The resolution?—Not ’tis will,
Fixt purpose, made (for I was passive in it)
Sealed, doomed.  To see her, and to feel myself
Bound to her, wove into her very being,
Was one—remains one.  Separate from her
To live is quite unthinkable—is death.
And wheresoever after death we be,
There too the thought were death.  And is this love?
Yet so in troth the templar loves—so—so—
The Christian loves the Jewess.  What of that?
Here in this holy land, and therefore holy
And dear to me, I have already doffed
Some prejudices.—Well—what says my vow?
As templar I am dead, was dead to that
From the same hour which made me prisoner
To Saladin.  But is the head he gave me
My old one?  No.  It knows no word of what
Was prated into yon, of what had bound it.
It is a better; for its patrial sky
Fitter than yon.  I feel—I’m conscious of it,
With this I now begin to think, as here
My father must have thought; if tales of him
Have not been told untruly.  Tales—why tales?
They’re credible—more credible than ever—
Now that I’m on the brink of stumbling, where
He fell.  He fell?  I’d rather fall with men,
Than stand with children.  His example pledges
His approbation, and whose approbation
Have I else need of?  Nathan’s?  Surely of his
Encouragement, applause, I’ve little need
To doubt—O what a Jew is he! yet easy
To pass for the mere Jew.  He’s coming—swiftly—
And looks delighted—who leaves Saladin
With other looks?  Hoa, Nathan!

Nathan and Templar

NATHAN

      Are you there?

TEMPLAR

Your visit to the sultan has been long.

NATHAN

Not very long; my going was indeed
Too much delayed.  Troth, Conrade, this man’s fame
Outstrips him not.  His fame is but his shadow.
But before all I have to tell you—

TEMPLAR

      What?

NATHAN

That he would speak with you, and that directly.
First to my house, where I would give some orders,
Then we’ll together to the sultan.

TEMPLAR

   Nathan,
I enter not thy doors again before—

NATHAN

Then you’ve been there this while—have spoken with her.
How do you like my Recha?

TEMPLAR

   Words cannot tell—
Gaze on her once again—I never will—
Never—no never: unless thou wilt promise
That I for ever, ever, may behold her.

NATHAN

How should I take this?

TEMPLAR (falling suddenly upon his neck)

Nathan—O my father!

NATHAN

Young man!

TEMPLAR (quitting him as suddenly)

   Not son?—I pray thee, Nathan—ha!

NATHAN

Thou dear young man!

TEMPLAR

      Not son?—I pray thee, Nathan,
Conjure thee by the strongest bonds of nature,
Prefer not those of later date, the weaker.—
Be it enough to thee to be a man!
Push me not from thee!

NATHAN

      Dearest, dearest friend!—

TEMPLAR

Not son?  Not son?  Not even—even if
Thy daughter’s gratitude had in her bosom
Prepared the way for love—not even if
Both wait thy nod alone to be but one?—
You do not speak?

NATHAN

   Young knight, you have surprised me.

TEMPLAR

Do I surprise thee—thus surprise thee, Nathan,
With thy own thought?  Canst thou not in my mouth
Know it again?  Do I surprise you?

NATHAN

      Ere
I know, which of the Stauffens was your father?

TEMPLAR

What say you, Nathan?—And in such a moment
Is curiosity your only feeling?

NATHAN

For see, once I myself well knew a Stauffen,
Whose name was Conrade.

TEMPLAR

      Well, and if my father
Was bearer of that name?

NATHAN

   Indeed?

TEMPLAR

      My name
Is from my father’s, Conrade.

NATHAN

      Then thy father
Was not my Conrade.  He was, like thyself,
A templar, never wedded.

TEMPLAR

   For all that—

NATHAN

How?

TEMPLAR

   For all that he may have been my father.

NATHAN

You joke.

TEMPLAR

   And you are captious.  Boots it then
To be true-born?  Does bastard wound thine ear?
The race is not to be despised: but hold,
Spare me my pedigree; I’ll spare thee thine.
Not that I doubt thy genealogic tree.
O, God forbid!  You may attest it all
As far as Abraham back; and backwarder
I know it to my heart—I’ll swear to it also.

NATHAN

Knight, you grow bitter.  Do I merit this?
Have I refused you ought?  I’ve but forborne
To close with you at the first word—no more.

TEMPLAR

Indeed—no more?  O then forgive—

NATHAN

      ’Tis well.
Do but come with me.

TEMPLAR

   Whither?  To thy house?
No? there not—there not: ’tis a burning soil.
Here I await thee, go.  Am I again
To see her, I shall see her times enough:
If not I have already gazed too much.

NATHAN

I’ll try to be soon back.

[Goes.

TEMPLAR

   Too much indeed—
Strange that the human brain, so infinite
Of comprehension, yet at times will fill
Quite full, and all at once, of a mere trifle—
No matter what it teems with.  Patience!  Patience!
The soul soon calms again, th’ upboiling stuff
Makes itself room and brings back light and order.
Is this then the first time I love?  Or was
What by that name I knew before, not love—
And this, this love alone that now I feel?

Daya and Templar

DAYA

Sir knight, sir knight.

TEMPLAR

   Who calls? ha, Daya, you?

DAYA

I managed to slip by him.  No, come here
(He’ll see us where you stand) behind this tree.

TEMPLAR

Why so mysterious?  What’s the matter, Daya?

DAYA

Yes, ’tis a secret that has brought me to you
A twofold secret.  One I only know,
The other only you.  Let’s interchange,
Intrust yours first to me, then I’ll tell mine.

TEMPLAR

With pleasure when I’m able to discover
What you call me.  But that yours will explain.
Begin—

DAYA

That is not fair, yours first, sir knight;
For be assured my secret serves you not
Unless I have yours first.  If I sift it out
You’ll not have trusted me, and then my secret
Is still my own, and yours lost all for nothing.
But, knight, how can you men so fondly fancy
You ever hide such secrets from us women.

TEMPLAR

Secrets we often are unconscious of.

DAYA

May be—So then I must at last be friendly,
And break it to you.  Tell me now, whence came it
That all at once you started up abruptly
And in the twinkling of an eye were fled?
That you left us without one civil speech!
That you return no more with Nathan to us—
Has Recha then made such a slight impression,
Or made so deep a one?  I penetrate you.
Think you that on a limed twig the poor bird
Can flutter cheerfully, or hop at ease
With its wing pinioned?  Come, come, in one word
Acknowledge to me plainly that you love her,
Love her to madness, and I’ll tell you what.

TEMPLAR

To madness, oh, you’re very penetrating.

DAYA

Grant me the love, and I’ll give up the madness.

TEMPLAR

Because that must be understood of course—
A templar love a Jewess—

DAYA

      Seems absurd,
But often there’s more fitness in a thing
Than we at once discern; nor were this time
The first, when through an unexpected path
The Saviour drew his children on to him
Across the tangled maze of human life.

TEMPLAR

So solemn that—(and yet if in the stead
Of Saviour, I were to say Providence,
It would sound true) you make me curious, Daya,
Which I’m unwont to be.

DAYA

      This is the place
For miracles

TEMPLAR

   For wonders—well and good—
Can it be otherwise, where the whole world
Presses as toward a centre.  My dear Daya,
Consider what you asked of me as owned;
That I do love her—that I can’t imagine
How I should live without her—that

DAYA

   Indeed!
Then, knight, swear to me you will call her yours,
Make both her present and eternal welfare.

TEMPLAR

And how, how can I, can I swear to do
What is not in my power?

DAYA

      ’Tis in your power,
A single word will put it in your power.

TEMPLAR

So that her father shall not be against it.

DAYA

Her father—father? he shall be compelled.

TEMPLAR

As yet he is not fallen among thieves—
Compelled?

DAYA

   Aye to be willing that you should.

TEMPLAR

Compelled and willing—what if I inform thee
That I have tried to touch this string already,
It vibrates not responsive.

DAYA

      He refused thee?

TEMPLAR

He answered in a tone of such discordance
That I was hurt.

DAYA

   What do you say?  How, you
Betrayed the shadow of a wish for Recha,
And he did not spring up for joy, drew back,
Drew coldly back, made difficulties?

TEMPLAR

      Almost.

DAYA

Well then I’ll not deliberate a moment.

TEMPLAR

And yet you are deliberating still.

DAYA

That man was always else so good, so kind,
I am so deeply in his debt.  Why, why
Would he not listen to you?  God’s my witness
That my heart bleeds to come about him thus.

TEMPLAR

I pray you, Daya, once for all, to end
This dire uncertainty.  But if you doubt
Whether what ’tis your purpose to reveal
Be right or wrong, be praiseworthy or shameful,
Speak not—I will forget that you have had
Something to hide.

DAYA

   That spurs me on still more.
Then learn that Recha is no Jewess, that
She is a Christian.

TEMPLAR

   I congratulate you,
’Twas a hard labour, but ’tis out at last;
The pangs of the delivery won’t hurt you.
Go on with undiminished zeal, and people
Heaven, when no longer fit to people earth.

DAYA

How, knight, does my intelligence deserve
Such bitter scorn?  That Recha is a Christian
On you a Christian templar, and her lover,
Confers no joy.

TEMPLAR

   Particularly as
She is a Christian of your making, Daya.

DAYA

O, so you understand it—well and good—
I wish to find out him that might convert her.
It is her fate long since to have been that
Which she is spoiled for being.

TEMPLAR

      Do explain—
Or go.

DAYA

   She is a Christian child—of Christian
Parents was born and is baptised.

TEMPLAR (hastily)

      And Nathan—

DAYA

Is not her father.

TEMPLAR

   Nathan not her father—
And are you sure of what you say?

DAYA

      I am,
It is a truth has cost me tears of blood.
No, he is not her father.

TEMPLAR

   And has only
Brought her up as his daughter, educated
The Christian child a Jewess.

DAYA

      Certainly.

TEMPLAR

And she is unacquainted with her birth?
Has never learnt from him that she was born
A Christian, and no Jewess?

DAYA

   Never yet.

TEMPLAR

And he not only let the child grow up
In this mistaken notion, but still leaves
The woman in it.

DAYA

   Aye, alas!

TEMPLAR

      How, Nathan,
The wise good Nathan thus allow himself
To stifle nature’s voice?  Thus to misguide
Upon himself th’ effusions of a heart
Which to itself abandoned would have formed
Another bias, Daya—yes, indeed
You have intrusted an important secret
That may have consequences—it confounds me,
I cannot tell what I’ve to do at present,
Therefore go, give me time, he may come by
And may surprise us.

DAYA

   I should drop for fright.

TEMPLAR

I am not able now to talk, farewell;
And if you chance to meet him, only say
That we shall find each other at the sultan’s.

DAYA

Let him not see you’ve any grudge against him.
That should be kept to give the proper impulse
To things at last, and may remove your scruples
Respecting Recha.  But then, if you take her
Back with you into Europe, let not me
Be left behind.

TEMPLAR

   That we’ll soon settle, go.