MANFRED,

A DRAMATIC POEM.

"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,

"Than are dreamt of in your philosophy."

DRAMATIS PERSONE.

MANFRED.

CHAMOIS HUNTER.

ABBOT OF ST. MAURICE.

MANUEL.

HERMAN.

WITCH OF The Alps.

ARIMANES.

NEMESIS.

THE DESTINIES.

SPIRITS, &c.

The Scene of the Drama is amongst the Higher Alps-partly in the Castle of Manfred, and partly in the Mountains.

MANFRED.

10000

ACT I.

SCENE I.

MANFRED alone-Scene, a Gothic gallery---Time, Midnight.

MAN. THE lamp must be replenish'd but even then
It will not burn so long as I must watch:
My slumbers-if I slumber-are not sleep,
But a continuance of enduring thought,
Which then I can resist not in my heart
There is a vigil, and these eyes but close
To look within; and yet I live, and bear
The aspect and the form of breathing men.
But grief should be the instructor of the wise;
Sorrow is knowledge: they who know the most
Must mourn the deepest o'er the fatal truth,
The Tree of Knowledge is not that of Life.