Page:Poems of Emma Lazarus vol 1.djvu/357

340 Thy crime hath snapt in twain? — restore the wits Thy sin hath scattered ? No ! Thy punishment Is huge as thine offence. Death shall not help, Neither shall pious life wash out the stain. Living thou 'rt doomed, and dead, thou shalt be lost, Beyond salvation.

MABIA {springing to her feet).

Impious priest, thou liest ! God will have mercy — as my father would, Could he but see me in mine agony !

RIBERA.

Thou know'st me not. I am not what I was. My outward shape remains unchanged; these eyes. Now gloating on thine anguish, are the same That wept to see a shadow cross thy brow ; These ears, that drink the music of thy groans, Shrank from thy lightest sigh of melancholy. Thou think'st to find the father in me still ? Thy parricidal hands have murdered hun — Thou shalt not find a man. I am the spirit Of blind revenge — a brute, unswerving force. What deemest thou hath bound me unto life ? Ambition, pleasure, or the sense of fear ?