Nowhere in all Kleist's writings has mysticism taken such strange possession of a perfectly pagan, not to say wanton, theme as in his _Amphitryon_, which is an adaptation of Molière's well-known comedy. The story, not a very easy one to treat, is as follows. During Amphitryon's absence, Jupiter assumes his form and visits his wife, Alcmene, who believes the god to be her husband. Amphitryon returns, and a whole series of comical confusions ensue between the real and the pretended husband, the real slave, Sosias, and Mercury as Sosias. At last the true state of affairs is explained, and Amphitryon has to console himself with the consideration that there is nothing dishonourable in such a relationship with Jupiter,--a moral theory which it must have been very much to the interest of Louis the Fourteenth to defend and propagate. "Mon nom, qu'incessamment toute la terre adore, étouffe ici le bruit, qui pouvait éclater; Un partage avec Jupiter N'a rien du tout qui déshonore." In genuine French fashion, Molière makes the collision between the husband and the lover the main point in his play; and when Alcmene upbraids Jupiter for the hard words he (i.e. Amphitryon) has used to her, the god takes refuge in the following fine distinction:-- "L'époux, Alcmène, a commis tout le mal; C'est l'époux qu'il vous faut regarder en coupable: L'amant n'a point de part à ce transport brutal, Et de vous offenser son cœur n'est point capable. Il a de vous, ce cœur, pour jamais y penser, Trop de respect et de tendresse; Et si de faire rien à vous pouvoir blesser Il avait eu la coupable faiblesse, De cent coups à vos yeux il voudrait le percer. Mais l'époux est sorti de ce respect soumis Ou pour vous on doit toujours être; A son dur procédé l'époux s'est fait connaître, Et par le droit d'hymen il s'est cru tout permis." Jupiter expresses himself, we see, with the polished gallantry of a courtier. At the close of the play the bystanders congratulate the wretched Amphitryon, and Sosias recites an epilogue, in which the whole matter is treated from the comical point of view, and the moral pointed that the less said about such affairs the better. Kleist naturally saw the subject in quite a different light. It is obvious that his Romantic mind was attracted first and foremost by the "Doppelgängerei;" then came the possibility of playing, faintly but clearly, on one of the most important mysteries of the Christian faith. Alcmene's husband is not the father of Hercules, yet the conception was no violation of her marriage vow; it was immaculate; the being to which she gives birth is not the child of a man, but of a god. Therefore, in the most important scene between Jupiter and Alcmene, the former is pantheistically exalted to the rank of the great world-spirit; he is not the wanton Olympian of the Greeks, he is as divine and spiritual as the "Absolute" of the _Naturphilosophie_. He says to Alcmene:--