Ye are young! New come to power And ye suppose Your towered citadel Calamity Can never enter! Ah, and have not Seen from those pinnacles a two-fold fall Of tyrants? And the third, who his brief "now"Of lordship arrogates, I shall see yet By lapse most swift' most ignominious, Sink to perdition. And dost thou suppose I crouch and cower in reverence and awe To Gods of yesterday? I fail of that So much, the total all of space and time Bulks in between. Take thyself hence and count Thy toiling steps back by the way thou camest, In nothing wiser for thy questionings.
HERMES
This is that former stubbornness of thine That brought thee hither to foul anchorage.
PROMETHEUS
Mistake me not; I would not, if I might, Change my misfortunes for thy vassalage.
HERMES
Oh! better be the vassal of this rock Than born the trusty messenger of Zeus PROMETHEUSI answer insolence, as it deserves, With insolence. How else should it be answered?
HERMES
Surely; and, being in trouble, it is plain You revel in your plight.
PROMETHEUS
Revel, forsooth!
I would my enemies might hold such revels And thou amongst the first.
HERMES
Dost thou blame me For thy misfortunes?
PROMETHEUS
I hate all the Gods, Because, having received good at my hands, They have rewarded me with evil.
Proves thee stark mad!
HERMES
This proves thee stark mad!
PROMETHEUS
Mad as you please, if hating Your enemies is madness HERMESWere all well With thee, thou'dst be insufferable!
PROMETHEUS
Alas!
HERMES
Alas, that Zeus knows not that word, Alas!
PROMETHEUS
But ageing Time teacheth all knowledge.
HERMES
Time Hath not yet taught thy rash, imperious will Over wild impulse to win mastery.
PROMETHEUS
Nay: had Time taught me that, I had not stooped To bandy words with such a slave as thou.
HERMES
This, then, is all thine answer: thou'lt not One syllable of what our Father asks.
PROMETHEUS
Oh, that I were a debtor to his kindness!
I would requite him to the uttermost!
HERMES
A cutting speech! You take me for a boy Whom you may taunt and tease.
PROMETHEUS
Why art thou not A boy-a very booby-to suppose Thou wilt get aught from me? There is no wrong However shameful, nor no shift of malice Whereby Zeus shall persuade me to unlock My lips until these shackles be cast loose.
Therefore let lightning leap with smoke and flame, And all that is be beat and tossed together, With whirl of feathery snowflakes and loud crack Of subterranean thunder; none of these Shall bend my will or force me to disclose By whom 'tis fated he shall fall from power.
HERMES
What good can come of this? Think yet again!
PROMETHEUS
I long ago have thought and long ago Determined.
HERMES
Patience! patience! thou rash fool Have so much patience as to school thy mind To a right judgment in thy present troubles.
PROMETHEUS
Lo, I am rockfast, and thy words are wave That weary me in vain. Let not the thought Enter thy mind, that I in awe of Zeus Shall change my nature for a girl's, or beg The Loathed beyond all loathing-with my hands Spread out in woman's fashion-to cast loose These bonds; from that I am utterly removed.
HERMES
I have talked much, yet further not my purpose;For thou art in no whit melted or moved By my prolonged entreaties: like a colt New to the harness thou dost back and Plunge.
Snap at thy bit and fight against the rein.
And yet thy confidence is in a straw;
For stubbornness, if one be in the wrong, Is in itself weaker than naught at all.
