First, kneeling, let the dedication be Accepted, lofty Lady! Let me kiss The gracious hand that lifts me to thy side. Confirm me as co-regent of thy realm, Whose borders are unknown, and win for thee Guard, slave and worshipper, and all in one![217] The old man in the throes of a passion so great that he was wholly absorbed by it did not dare to address the beloved woman except in the most humble terms. Helena made no declaration of love, but was complacent to him, and when Faust suggested: “Now let our throne become a bower unblighted,” Helena agreed to follow him to a secluded and green bower. There they remained alone for some time, cared for by an old servant. The result of this union was not a child like that to which Marguerite gave birth and afterwards killed. It was a strange and peculiar being; a boy who immediately after his birth began to leap about and to alarm his parents by the activity of his movements. Although Goethe preserved an obstinate silence when he was asked to explain many of the scenes in the second Part, he had no hesitation in explaining the significance of this astonishing child. “The child was not a human being but an allegory, in which was personified poetry, which is not bound to any time, to any place, or to any person” (Eckermann, December 20, 1829). Struck by the tragic fate of Byron, Goethe made the son of Faust and Helena a symbol of the English poet. Literary critics, setting out from the categorical explanation of Goethe himself, have declared that the union of Faust and Helena was meant to denote the alliance of romanticism and classicism, a marriage from which was born modern poetry, personified in its highest representative, Byron. This, however, cannot be the idea of Goethe, who himself was far from an enthusiast about classicism and romanticism. “What,” he said, “is all this noise about the classic and the romantic? The essential thing is that a piece of work should be wholly good and serious; then it will also be classic” (Eckermann, October 17, 1828). It is much more probable that Goethe intended poetry to spring from the relations between the old Faust and his adorable companion, relations of a kind to be included in so-called platonic love. Such love inspires the creation of perfect work even in an old poet, when he is stimulated by a beautiful woman. When Faust and Helena emerged from the grotto with their son, Helena said:— _Helena_: Love, in human wise to bless us, In a noble pair must be; But divinely to possess us, It must form a precious Three. _Faust_: All we seek has therefore found us; I am thine and thou art mine! So we stand as love hath bound us; Other fortune we resign.[218] After the death of her son, Helena abandoned Faust, leaving him her garments:—