The Dramatic Works of G. E. Lessing Part 78

NATHAN THE WISE.

A DRAMATIC POEM IN FIVE ACTS.

(_Translated by R. Dillon Boylan_.)

The well-known Goetze Controversy is to be thanked for the appearance of this, the longest, and in many respects the most important of Lessing's dramatic works. It was written in 1778-9, in reply to some of the theological censures of the Hamburg pastor. In 1783, it was first acted at Berlin, but it met with little success there or elsewhere, until in 1801, when it was introduced on the Weimar stage, by Schiller and Goethe.

DRAMATIS PERSONae

 

Sultan Saladin.

Sittah, _his Sister_.

Nathan, _a rich Jew of Jerusalem_.

Recha, _his adopted Daughter_.

Daja, _a Christian woman living in the Jew's house as_ Recha's _companion_.

_A young_ Knight Templar.

A Dervise.

_The_ Patriarch of Jerusalem.

A Friar.

_An_ Emir _and several of_ Saladin's Mamelukes.

_The scene is in Jerusalem_.

NATHAN THE WISE.

"Introite, nam et heic Dii sunt."

_Apud_ Gellium.

ACT I.

Scene I.--_A Hall in Nathan's House_.

Nathan, _returning from a journey_; Daja, _meeting him_.

DAJA.

'Tis he! 'Tis Nathan! endless thanks to Heaven That you at last are happily returned.

NATHAN.

Yes, Daja! thanks to Heaven! But why at _last_?

Was it my purpose--was it in my power To come back sooner? Babylon from here, As I was forced to take my devious way, Is a long journey of two hundred leagues; And gathering in one's debts is not--at best, A task that expedites a traveller's steps.

DAJA.

O Nathan! what a dire calamity Had, in your absence, nigh befallen us!

Your house----

NATHAN.

Took fire. I have already heard.

G.o.d grant I may have learnt the whole that chanced!

DAJA.

Chance saved it, or it had been burnt to ashes.

NATHAN.

Then, Daja! we had built another house, And a far better----

DAJA.

True--ay, true! but Recha Was on the point of peris.h.i.+ng amid The flames----

NATHAN.

Of peris.h.i.+ng? Who saidst thou? Recha?

I had not heard of that. I should not then Have needed any house. What! on the point Of peris.h.i.+ng? Nay, nay; perchance she's dead-- Is burnt alive. Speak, speak the dreadful truth.

Kill me, but do not agonize me thus.

Tell me at once she's dead.

DAJA.

And if she were Could you expect to hear it from these lips?

NATHAN.

Why then alarm me? Recha! O my Recha!

DAJA.

Your Recha? Yours?

NATHAN.

And can it ever be That I shall cease to call this child my own?