MOSER. Then, for the first time, will the sword of eternity pass through your soul;--and then, for the first time, too late, the thought of God will wake up a terrible monitor, whose name is Judge. Mark this, Moor; a thousand lives hang upon your beck; and of those thousand every nine hundred and ninety-nine have been rendered miserable by you. You wanted but the Roman empire to be a Nero, the kingdom of Peru to be a Pizarro. Now do you really think that the Almighty will suffer a worm like you to play the tyrant in His world and to reverse all his ordinances? Do you think the nine hundred and ninety-nine were created only to be destroyed, only to serve as puppets in your diabolical game? Think it not! He will call you to account for every minute of which you have robbed them, every joy that you have poisoned, every perfection that you have intercepted. Then, if you can answer Him--then, Moor, I will admit that you have won. FRANCIS. No more, not another word! Am I to be at the mercy of thy drivelling fancies? MOSER. Beware! The different destinies of mankind are balanced with terrible nicety. The scale of life which sinks here will rise there, and that which rises here will sink there. What was here temporary affliction will there be eternal triumph; and what here was temporary triumph will there be eternal despair. FRANCIS (rushing savagely upon him.) May the thunder of heaven strike thee dumb, thou lying spirit! I will tear thy venomed tongue out of thy mouth! MOSER. Do you so soon feel the weight of truth? Before I have brought forward one single word of evidence? Let me first proceed to the proofs-- FRANCIS. Silence! To hell with thee and thy proofs! The soul is annihilated, I tell thee, and I will not be gainsaid! MOSER. That is what the spirits of the bottomless pit are hourly moaning for; but heaven denies the boon. Do you hope to escape from the Avenger's arm even in the solitary waste of nothingness? If you climb up into heaven, he is there! if you make your bed in hell, behold he is there also! If you say to the night, "Hide me!" and to the darkness, "Cover me!" even the night shall be light about you, and darkness blaze upon your damned soul like a noonday sun. FRANCIS. But I do not wish to be immortal--let them be so that like; I have no desire to hinder them. I will force him to annihilate me; I will so provoke his fury that he may utterly destroy me. Tell me which are the greatest sins--which excite him to the most terrible wrath? MOSER. I know but two. But men do not commit these, nor do men even dream of them. FRANCIS. What are they? MOSER (very significantly). Parricide is the name of the one; fratricide of the other. Why do you turn so suddenly pale? FRANCIS. What, old man? Art thou in league with heaven or with hell? Who told thee that? MOSER. Woe to him that hath them both upon his soul! It were better for that man that he had never been born! But be at peace; you have no longer either a father or a brother!