The Witch. [_laughing immoderately_] Ha! ha! now I perceive Old Nick is here! You are a rogue still, as you always were. Mephistopheles. [_aside to_ /Faust/] My friend, I give you here, your wit to whet, A little lesson in witch-etiquette. The Witch. Now say, good sirs, what would you have with me? Mephistopheles. A glass of your restoring liquor, That makes an old man's blood run quicker: And bring the best out from your bins; With years the juice in virtue wins. The Witch. Most willingly. Here I have got a phial Of which myself at times make trial: 'Tis now a pleasant mellow potion; You shall not meet with a denial. [_Softly._] Yet if this worthy man drinks it without precaution, His life can't stand an hour against its strong infection. Mephistopheles. Leave that to me; he's under my protection, Ripe for the draught; no harm will come to him. [_The_ /Witch/, _with strange gestures, draws a circle and places many curious things within it; meanwhile the glasses begin to tinkle, and the kettle to sound and make music. She brings a large book, puts the_ /Cat-Apes/ _into the circle, and makes them serve as a desk to lay the book on, and hold the torches. She motions to_ /Faust/ _to come near._ Faust. [_to_ /Mephistopheles/] Now say, what would she with this flummery? These antic gestures, this wild bedlam-stuff, This most insipid of all mummery, I know it well, I hate it well enough. Mephistopheles. Pshaw, nonsense! come, give up your sermonizing, And learn to understand what a good joke is! Like other quacks, she plays her hocus-pocus; It gives the juice a virtue most surprising! [_He obliges_ /Faust/ _to enter the circle._ The Witch. [_declaiming from the book with great emphasis_] Now be exact! Of one make ten, Then two subtract, And add three then, This makes thee rich. Four shalt thou bate, Of five and six, So says the Witch, Make seven and eight, And all is done. And nine is one, And ten is none; Here take and spell, if you are able, The Witches' multiplication table. Faust. This is a jargon worse than Babel; Say, is she fevered? is she mad? Mephistopheles. O never fear! the rest is quite as bad; I know the book, and oft have vexed my brains With bootless labor on its rhymes and rules; A downright contradiction still remains, Mysterious alike for wise men and for fools. My friend, the art is old and new; Ancient and modern schools agree With three and one, and one and three Plain to perplex, and false inweave with true. So they expound, discourse, dispute, debate; What man of sense would plague him with their prate? Men pin their faith to words, in sounds high sapience weening, Though words were surely made to have a meaning.