_Lucifer._ Yet, Gabriel, By the lie in me which I keep myself, Thou'rt a false swearer. Were it otherwise, What dost thou here, vouchsafing tender thoughts To that earth-angel or earth-demon--which, Thou and I have not solved the problem yet Enough to argue,--that fallen Adam there,-- That red-clay and a breath,--who must, forsooth, Live in a new apocalypse of sense, With beauty and music waving in his trees And running in his rivers, to make glad His soul made perfect?--is it not for hope, A hope within thee deeper than thy truth, Of finally conducting him and his To fill the vacant thrones of me and mine, Which affront heaven with their vacuity? _Gabriel._ Angel, there are no vacant thrones in heaven To suit thy empty words. Glory and life Fulfil their own depletions; and if God Sighed you far from him, his next breath drew in A compensative splendour up the vast, Flushing the starry arteries. _Lucifer._ What a change! So, let the vacant thrones and gardens too Fill as may please you!--and be pitiful, As ye translate that word, to the dethroned And exiled, man or angel. The fact stands, That I, the rebel, the cast out and down, Am here and will not go; while there, along The light to which ye flash the desert out, Flies your adopted Adam, your red-clay In two kinds, both being flawed. Why, what is this? Whose work is this? Whose hand was in the work? Against whose hand? In this last strife, methinks, I am not a fallen angel! _Gabriel._ Dost thou know Aught of those exiles? _Lucifer._ Ay: I know they have fled Silent all day along the wilderness: I know they wear, for burden on their backs, The thought of a shut gate of Paradise, And faces of the marshalled cherubim Shining against, not for them; and I know They dare not look in one another's face,-- As if each were a cherub! _Gabriel._ Dost thou know Aught of their future? _Lucifer._ Only as much as this: That evil will increase and multiply Without a benediction. _Gabriel._ Nothing more? _Lucifer._ Why so the angels taunt! What should be more? _Gabriel._ God is more. _Lucifer._ Proving what? _Gabriel._ That he is God, And capable of saving. Lucifer, I charge thee by the solitude he kept Ere he created,--leave the earth to God! _Lucifer._ My foot is on the earth, firm as my sin. _Gabriel._ I charge thee by the memory of heaven Ere any sin was done,--leave earth to God! _Lucifer._ My sin is on the earth, to reign thereon.