Vondel's Lucifer (Act II, lines 1-34) - Joost van den Vondel

Ye speedy Spirits, stay our chariot now,
God's Morning-star in its full zenith stands;
Its height is reached; and lo! the moment comes
When Lucifer must set before this star,
This double star that rises from below
And seeks the way above, to tarnish Heaven
With earthly glow. No more should ye adorn
Proud Lucifer's apparel with glittering crowns,
Nor gild his forehead with the glorious dawn
Of morning-star, to which Archangels kneel.
Another splendour sweeps into the light
Of God, whose radiance drowns our vaunted glory.
As to the eyes of man, below, the sun,
By day, puts out the stars. The shades of night
Bedim the Angels and the suns of Heaven:
For man hath won the heart of the Most High,
Within his new-created Paradise.
He is the friend of Heaven. Our slavery
Even now begins. Go hence, rejoice and serve
And honour this new race like servile slaves.
For God was man created; we, for him.
Let then the Angels bend their necks beneath
His feet. Let each one now upon him wait
And bear him even unto the highest Thrones
On hands or wings: for our inheritance
Shall pass to him, the chosen son of God.
We, the first-born, shall suffer in this Realm.
The son, born on that day, the sixth, and made
In the image of the Father, shall attain
The crown. And rightly unto him was given
The mighty sceptre, which shall cause even us,
The ones first born, to tremble and to shake.
Here holds no contradiction now: ye heard
What Gabriel's trump spake at the golden port?

---

Joost van den Vondel (1587 – 1679) The Netherlands
Translated by Charles Leonard van Noppen
Act II, lines 1-34
Source: Project Gutenberg: J. van Vondel's Lucifer A tragedy 1654
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