VIII. IN THE GARDEN. EPIMETHEUS. THE storm is past, but it hath left behind it Are strewn with shattered boughs; the birds are silent; The flowers, downtrodden by the wind, lie dead; As if some dreadful deed had been committed PANDORA, coming from the house. O Epimetheus, I no longer dare To lift mine eyes to thine, nor hear thy voice, EPIMETHEUS. What hast thou done? PANDORA. Forgive me not, but kill me. EPIMETHEUS. What hast thou done? PANDORA. I pray for death, not pardon. EPIMETHEUS. What hast thou done? PANDORA. I dare not speak of it. EPIMETHEUS. Thy pallor and thy silence terrify me ! PANDORA. I have brought wrath and ruin on thy house! EPIMETHEUS. Then all is lost! I am indeed undone. PANDORA. I pray for punishment, and not for pardon. EPIMETHEUS. Mine is the fault, not thine. On me shall fall The vengeance of the Gods, for I betrayed Their secret when, in evil hour, I said It was a secret; when, in evil hour, I left thee here alone to this temptation. PANDORA. Why didst thou return? Eternal absence would have been to me The greatest punishment. To be left alone. EPIMETHEUS. On thee and me. I do not love thee less for what is done, And cannot be undone. Thy very weakness My love will have a sense of pity in it, PANDORA. Pity me not; pity is degradation. Love me and kill me. EPIMETHEUS. Beautiful Pandora! Thou art a Goddess still! PANDORA. I am a woman; And the insurgent demon in my nature, EPIMETHEUS. Youth, hope, and love: To build a new life on a ruined life, To make the future fairer than the past, Upon the ground I saw a fallen nest Auspicious omen! PANDORA. EPIMETHEUS. May the Eumenides Put out their torches and behold us not, PANDORA. Me let them punish. Only through punishment of our evil deeds, CHORUS OF THE EUMENIDES. Never shall souls like these Escape the Eumenides, The daughters dark of Acheron and Night! Our scourges in the air Send forth prophetic sounds before they smite. Never by lapse of time. The soul defaced by crime Into its former self returns again; For every guilty deed Holds in itself the seed Of retribution and undying pain. Never shall be the loss |