With shame and horror I here lay down the bloody staff, under which you thought yourselves licensed to perpetrate your crimes and to defile the fair light of heaven with deeds of darkness. Depart to the right and to the left. We shall never more have aught in common.
THE ROBBERS. Ha! coward! where are thy lofty schemes? were they but soap-bubbles, which disperse at the breath of a woman?*
*[In lieu of this soliloquy and what follows, to the end, the
acting edition has:—
R. MOOR. Dare not to scrutinize the acts of Moor. That is my last command. Now, draw near—form a circle around me, and receive the last words of your dying captain. (He surveys them attentively for some time.) You have been devotedly faithful to me, faithful beyond example. Had virtue bound you together as firmly as vice, you would have been heroes, and your names recorded by mankind with admiration. Go and offer your services to the state. Dedicate your talents to the cause of a monarch who is waging war in vindication of the rights of man. With this blessing I disband you. Schweitzer and Kosinsky, do you stay. (The others disperse slowly, with signs of emotion.)]
SCENE VIII.
R. MOOR, SCRWETTZER, and KOSINSKY.
R. MOOR. Give me thy right hand, Kosinsky—Schweitzer thy left. (He takes their hands, and stands between, them; to KOSINSKY,) Young man, thou art still pure-amongst the guilty thou alone art guiltless! (To SCHWEITZER.) Deeply have I imbrued thy hand in blood. 'Tis I who have done this. With this cordial grasp I take back mine own. Schweitzer! thou art purified! (He raises their hands fervently to heaven.) Father in heaven! here I restore them to thee. They will be more devoted to thy service than those who never fell. Of that I feel assured. (SCHWEITZER and KOSINSKY fall on his neck with fervor.) Not now—not now, dear comrades. Spare my feelings in this trying hour. An earldom has this day fallen to my lot—a rich domain on which no malediction rests. Share it between you, my children; become good citizens; and if for ten human beings that I have destroyed you make but one happy, my soul may yet be saved. Go—no farewell! In another world we may meet again—or perhaps no more. Away! away! ere my fortitude desert me. [Exeunt both, with downcast countenances.]
SCENE IX.
And I, too, am a good citizen. Do I not fulfil the extremity of the law? Do I not honor the law? Do I not uphold and defend it? I remember speaking to a poor officer on my way hither, who was toiling as a day-laborer, and has eleven living children. A thousand ducats have been offered to whoever shall deliver up the great robber alive. That man shall be served. [Exit.]
CHARLES. Oh! fool that I was, to fancy that I could amend the world by misdeeds and maintain law by lawlessness! I called it vengeance and equity. I presumed, O Providence! upon whetting out the notches of thy sword and repairing thy partialities. But, oh, vain trifling! here I stand on the brink of a fearful life, and learn, with wailing and gnashing of teeth, that two men like myself could ruin the whole edifice of the moral world. Pardon—pardon the boy who thought to forestall Thee; to Thee alone belongeth vengeance; Thou needest not the hand of man! But it is not in my power to recall the past; that which is ruined remains ruined; what I have thrown down will never more rise up again. Yet one thing is left me whereby I may atone to the offended majesty of the law and restore the order which I have violated. A victim is required—a victim to declare before all mankind how inviolable that majesty is—that victim shall be myself. I will be the death-offering!