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430  HARRIETTE FANNING READ.

MEDEA'S LOVE.

(FROM MEDEA.)

MEDEA.
LOVE is my life! and should not I give all
The treasures which the gods have granted me,
To feed its sacred and mysterious flame?

IANTHE.
E'en if the flame should mount, with tyrant power,
And, 'mid her rites, consume the priestess?

MEDEA.
Ay,
To keep the flame undying I would yield
My life rather than live to see it wane,
Expire, and leave my heart to dark despair!
Gods, e'er I know the agony to live
Unloved of him who sways my every thought, 
O, snatch my life, and I will bless the stroke!

IANTHE.
Did I not know thy soul, I should exclaim,
A wife of yesterday might dream such dreams!

MEDEA.
A wife of yesterday!—Hath Love with Time
Such close alliance, that old age to both
Comes with the same alloy of clouds, and cares,
And chill indifference to mortal joys?
Ah, no! Time is but for the form we wear;
Love is the soul, which hath no bonds with Time.
For ever young, with wing untamed, he soars
On to the future, sorrow, care, and death
Made radiant by his smile.

IANTHE.
Such love as this
E'en Love himself knows not!

HARRIETTE FANNING READ.   431

MEDEA
So Jason read it in Medea's heart,
And feel it in his own, I care not, though
The god to Lethe's waves consign his shafts,
And leave the world to friendship's calmer reign.

(Enter Jason.)

JASON.
What, doth Medea ask for Friendship's reign?

MEDEA.
Not while Love's flame survives in Jason's breast.

JASON.
If that expire?

MEDEA.
Expire!  The gods forbid!

JASON.
Nay, start not at a jest!

MEDEA.
Will my lord jest
On such a theme? As well mightst thou lay bare
This heart, thine altar, tear it from its place,
And cast it quivering from thy grasp to earth,
As jest thus of a tie to me so dear,
So sacred, that to sever it would be
To loose each human feeling from my breast,
To make me desperate, outcast from my kind,
Hating myself, the world, and thee!

JASON.
Even so! [Aside.
Thou paint'st a Fury's not a woman's love!
But let not fancy torture thee; the world
Hath real ills enough.

MEDEA.
But not for me!
I dread,—I know no ill when thou art by.
Exile and want, disgrace, the hate of men,

Transcription Notes:
---------- Reopened for Editing 2023-06-29 18:36:58 ---------- Reopened for Editing 2023-06-29 22:43:15 ---------- Reopened for Editing 2023-06-29 22:25:18