ACT IV.
SCENE I. An apartment in a royal castle. Ethwald is discovered sitting in deep meditation by the side of a couch, with a lamp burning by him on a high stand; the rest of the stage entirely dark.
Ethw. Why am I haunted with these thoughts? What boots it
That from their weak and priest-beridden king
The soldiers turn distasteful, and on me
In mutter'd wishes call? What boots all this?
Occasion fairly smiles, but I am shackled.
Elsewhere I needs must turn my climbing thoughts—
But where? The youthful see around them spread
A boundless field of undetermin'd things,
Towering in tempting greatness;
But, to the closer scan of men matured,
These fade away, and in the actual state
Of times and circumstances each perceives
A path which doth to his advancement lead,
And only one; as to the dazzled eye
Of the night rev'ller, o'er his emptied bowl,
The multiplied and many whirling lights
Do shrink at last into one single torch,
Shedding a steady ray. I see my path;
But what is that to me? my steps are chain'd.
