[_The Fool goes close to him._ Or else it's, 'Fool, be gone.' [_The Fool goes further off._ Or, 'Fool, stand there.' [_The Fool straightens himself up._ Or, 'Fool, go sit in the corner.' [_The Fool sits in the corner._ And all the while What were they all but fools before I came? What are they now, but mirrors that seem men, Because of my image? Fool, hold up your head. [_Fool does so._ What foolish stories they have told of the ghosts That fumbled with the clothes upon the bed, Or creaked and shuffled in the corridor, Or else, if they were pious bred, Of angels from the skies, That coming through the door, Or, it may be, standing there, Would solidly out stare The steadiest eyes with their unnatural eyes, Aye, on a man's own floor. [_An angel has come in. It should be played by a man if a man can be found with the right voice, and may wear a little golden domino and a halo made of metal. Or the whole face may be a beautiful mask, in which case the last sentence on page 136 should not be spoken._ Yet it is strange, the strangest thing I have known, That I should still be haunted by the notion That there's a crisis of the spirit wherein We get new sight, and that they know some trick To turn our thoughts for their own ends to frenzy. Why do you put your finger to your lip, And creep away? [_Fool goes out._ (_Wise Man sees Angel._) What are you? Who are you? I think I saw some like you in my dreams, When but a child. That thing about your head,-- That brightness in your hair--that flowery branch; But I have done with dreams, I have done with dreams. ANGEL I am the crafty one that you have called. WISE MAN How that I called? ANGEL I am the messenger. WISE MAN What message could you bring to one like me? ANGEL (_turning the hour-glass_) That you will die when the last grain of sand Has fallen through this glass. WISE MAN I have a wife. Children and pupils that I cannot leave: Why must I die, my time is far away? ANGEL You have to die because no soul has passed The heavenly threshold since you have opened school, But grass grows there, and rust upon the hinge; And they are lonely that must keep the watch. WISE MAN And whither shall I go when I am dead? ANGEL You have denied there is a purgatory, Therefore that gate is closed; you have denied There is a heaven, and so that gate is closed. WISE MAN Where then? For I have said there is no hell. ANGEL