HUSBANDMAN. Whose heart were not for very anger rent? But whence springs this difference rare ? One grieves to quit me, one had grieved to stay. RICH MAN. Because that I was rich and mighty there. BEGGAR. Because I had the beggar's part to play. WORLD. Let go these toys. BEGGAR. Lo! what good cause was mine, Leaving the world to mourn not, nor repine! Enter the INFANT. WORLD. To you a part at first the Author gave: INFANT. My life you re-demanded in a grave; Enter DISCRETION. WORLD. You, what did you for your adornment crave, DISCRETION. I asked for a strict vow, obedience, WORLD. Well, leave them in my hands, that none may say They have delivered anything from me. DISCRETION. I will not; prayers and good works do not stay And with me I must carry them away, WORLD. Thee of thy good deeds I can not deprive : KING. Who would not now no realms have called his own! BEAUTY. Who would not now have ne'er been Beauty's queen! RICH MAN. Who would not fain have no such riches known! BEGGAR. Who would not willingly more griefs have seen! HUSBANDMAN. Who would not more of toil have undergone! WORLD. It is too late- for after death in vain But now that I have marred the beauteous brow, That I have equalled sceptre and rude spade, KING. But why dost thou so rudely us dismiss, WORLD. The cause is this: What time a man doth anything expect, With mouth above; reverse its mouth, and lo! Let me take the opportunity which these last words. suggest of adding something here, which will not be altogether out of its place. There is no surer mark of genius than the recognition of the mystery which so often lies in the common and the familiar. Only genius pierces or lifts the veil which custom and use have for most men so effectually thrown over these, that the most wonderful and most pregnant with meaning has come to have no meaning at all, if only its lesson has been constantly repeated; according to that proverb, "What is ever seen is never seen.' Only genius detects in the humblest very often a significant symbolism of the highest, and finds the ever new in that which is the oldest of all. Calderon will endure excellently well to be tried by this test of genius. The mystery of the common, the symbolic character of many of our most ordinary actions and customs, is precious to him; and he constantly seeks to interpret it to others, and not to suffer it to pass by them unobserved. The ever-recurring mystery of sleep and waking as the daily rehearsal of death and resurrection; the dews and sunshine of earth, corresponding to the tears and laughter of those that are its dwellers,† or, as here, the likeness of the tomb to *Thus in Belshazzar's Feast: Descanso del sueño hace El hombre, ay Dios! sin que advierta Cada dia muere, nace. Que vivo cadaver yáce Cada dia, pues rendida La vida á una breve homicida, † Al tiempo que ya la salva |