Page:The collected works of Henrik Ibsen (Volume 4).djvu/210

 an onlooker only, in safety ensconced,-
 * see thinkers perish and martyrs bleed,
 * see empires founded and vanish away,-
 * see world-epochs grow from their trifling seeds;
 * in short, I will skim off the cream of history.-
 * I must try to get hold of a volume of Becker,
 * and travel as far as I can by chronology.-
 * It's true-my grounding's by no means thorough,
 * and history's wheels within wheels are deceptive;-
 * but pooh; the wilder the starting-point,
 * the result will oft be the more original.-
 * How exalting it is, now, to choose a goal,
 * and drive straight for it, like flint and steel!
 * [With quiet emotion.]
 * To break off all round one, on every side,
 * the bonds that bind one to home and friends,-
 * to blow into atoms one's hoarded wealth,-
 * to bid one's love and its joys good-night,-
 * all simply to find the arcana of truth,-
 * [Wiping a tear from his eye.]
 * that is the test of the true man of science!-
 * I feel myself happy beyond all measure.
 * Now I have fathomed my destiny's riddle.
 * Now 'tis but persevering through thick and thin!
 * It's excusable, sure, if I hold up my head,
 * and feel my worth, as the man, Peer Gynt,
 * also called Human-life's Emperor.-
 * I will own the sum-total of bygone days;
 * I'll nevermore tread in the paths of the living.
 * The present is not worth so much as a shoe-sole;
 * all faithless and marrowless the doings of men;
 * their soul has no wings and their deeds no weight;
 * [Shrugs his shoulders.]
 * and women,-ah, they are a worthless crew!
 * [Goes off.]

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