Page:The collected works of Henrik Ibsen (Volume 4).djvu/187

 Nature has given to the light of day.
 * One feels so secure, and so much more courageous,-
 * one would gladly, at need, take a bull by the horns.-
 * What a stillness all round! Ah, the joys of Nature,-
 * strange enough I should never have prized them before.
 * Why go and imprison oneself in a city,
 * for no end but just to be bored by the mob.-
 * just look how the lizards are whisking about,
 * snapping, and thinking of nothing at all.
 * What innocence ev'n in the life of the beasts!
 * Each fulfils the Creator's behest unimpeachably,
 * preserving its own special stamp undefaced;
 * is itself, is itself, both in sport and in strife,
 * itself, as it was at his primal: Be!
 * [Puts on his eye-glasses.]
 * A toad. In the middle of a sandstone block.
 * Petrifaction all round him. His head alone peering.
 * There he's sitting and gazing as though through a window
 * at the world, and is-to himself enough.-
 * [Reflectively.]
 * Enough? To himself-? Where is it that's written?
 * I've read it, in youth, in some so-called classic.
 * In the family prayer-book? Or Solomon's Proverbs?
 * Alas, I notice that, year by year,
 * my memory for dates and for places is fading.
 * [Seats himself in the shade.]
 * Here's a cool spot to rest and to stretch out one's feet.
 * Why,