Lucifer monologue (Act 1) — Vondel's Lucifer

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. 10 Another splendor 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 honor this new race like servile slaves. 20 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 30 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?