Manfred

Thou false fiend, thou liest! My life is in its last hour—that I know, Nor would redeem a moment of that hour; I do not combat against Death, but thee And thy surrounding angels; my past power Was purchased by no compact with thy crew, But by superior science—penance, daring, And length of watching, strength of mind, and skill In knowledge of our Fathers—when the earth Saw men and spirits walking side by side, And gave ye no supremacy: I stand Upon my strength—I do defy—deny— Spurn back, and scorn ye!— What are my crimes to such as thee? Must crimes be punished but by other crimes, And greater criminals?—Back to thy hell! Thou hast no power upon me, that I feel; Thou never shalt possess me, that I know: What I have done is done; I bear within A torture which could nothing gain from thine: The Mind which is immortal makes itself Requital for its good or evil thoughts— Is its own origin of ill and end— And its own place and time: its innate sense, When stripped of this mortality, derives No colour from the fleeting things without, But is absorbed in sufferance or in joy, Born from the knowledge of its own desert. Thou didst not tempt me, and thou couldst not tempt me; I have not been thy dupe, nor am thy prey— But was my own destroyer, and will be My own hereafter.—Back, ye baffled fiends! The hand of Death is on me—but not yours! Credits: Reprinted from Lord Byron: Six Plays. Lord Byron. Los Angeles: Black Box Press, 2007.    

4 minutes