_Hans Lorbass_. Master, I will not look longer upon this farce! Lay about thee, kindle flames, slay, torture, make a harvest of the people,--but laugh and feel thyself a man once more! _King_. A man? A husband! That is the word! That is my office. And my virtue. Wouldst thou soar? Then load a burden on thy back. Art thou hungry? Then toss away thy food. Dost thou hear thy heart clamor within thee after freedom? Seek a prison, and lay thee down therein. _Hans Lorbass_. Dost thou hate her so? _King_. Hate her? Her--from whose soul a mildness like honey drops on mine? Her, in whose golden beauty the loveliness about her pales to a shadow? If I knew a blot which she had hidden from me, a single grain of dust upon the mirror of her soul, a single pretext however bald or hollow, then I should have a weapon with which to pierce my shame, to free me from this need of speaking out my humility--oh, might I hate her, my God, it would be well for me! But at that glance of sorrowing goodness with which she smiles on all our faults, all trace of defiant courage dies in me, and I am weaponless because she is. _Hans Lorbass_. Then come, escape! _King_ [_smiling wearily_]. True, the door stands open. _Hans Lorbass_. And when we have once passed the border, thou canst learn to forget. _King_. Perhaps! It may be! But can I learn to hope again? I went forth a conqueror; joyous self-confidence was my companion on the way--my bright horizon stretched itself to the boundless heavens. And now? I wear a sickly crown, which did not fall to me as victor, but fell upon me as I fell myself; and this fall has so sweated it to me that neither help of hands nor curses, but only death itself can tear it from my head. _Hans Lorbass_. Well, at least thou hast it; thou hast a crown, thou art king. _King_. King am I? Wilt thou mock me? Dost thou think I am so besotted as not to know my state? Yea, I might be king, were not the youth already ripening to maturity for whom I guard his throne from harm until he occupies it! _Hans Lorbass_. But every man holds what he has and hopes to have, in security, in pawn, as it were, for his children. _King_. Yes, for his own, not for a stranger's. _Hans Lorbass_. Then get some of thy own. _King_. To beg their bread? Thou knowest that in this whole kingdom of which I am king, there is not a single crust of bread, not a rag, that I may call my own. It is all his. _Hans Lorbass_. What is in thy head?