Zemp.  There’s nothing, thou canst raise, can make me start; A living form can only shake my heart.

Ism. You twice ten hundred deities,
            To whom we daily sacrifice;
            You powers, that dwell with fate below,
            And see what men are doomed to do;
            Where elements in discord dwell;
            Thou god of sleep, arise and tell
            Great Zempoalla what strange fate
            Must on her dismal vision wait.

Zemp.  How slow these spirits are!  Call, make them rise, Or they shall fast from flame and sacrifice.

Ism.  Great empress,
Let not your rage offend what we adore,
And vainly threaten, when we must implore. 
Sit silently, and attend—­
While my powerful charms I end.

By the croaking of the toad, In their caves that make abode; Earthy Dun that pants for breath, With her swelled sides full of death; By the crested adders’ pride, That along the clifts do glide; By thy visage fierce and black; By the death’s-head on thy back; By the twisted serpents placed For a girdle round thy waist; By the hearts of gold that deck Thy breast, thy shoulders, and thy neck:  From thy sleepy mansion rise, And open thy unwilling eyes, While bubbling springs their music keep, That use to lull thee in thy sleep.

God of Dreams rises.

God.  Seek not to know what must not be revealed;
Joys only flow where fate is most concealed: 
Too busy man would find his sorrows more,
If future fortunes he should know before;
For, by that knowledge of his destiny,
He would not live at all, but always die. 
Enquire not, then, who shall from bonds be freed,
Who ’tis shall wear a crown, and who shall bleed: 
All must submit to their appointed doom;
Fate and misfortune will too quickly come: 
Let me no more with powerful charms be pressed;
I am forbid by fate to tell the rest.

[The god descends.

Zemp.  Stay, cozener, thou, that hat’st clear truth like light,
And usest words dark as thy own dull night. 
You tyrant gods, do you refuse to free
The soul, you gave, from its perplexity? 
Why should we in your mercies still believe,
When you can never pity, though we grieve? 
For you have bound yourselves by harsh decrees;
And those, not you, are now the deities. [Sits down sad.

Ism.  She droops under the weight of rage and care: 
You spirits, that inhabit in the air,
With all your powerful charms of music, try
To bring-her soul back to its harmony.

SONG SUNG BY AERIAL SPIRITS.

  Poor mortals, that are clogged with earth below,
    Sink under love and care,
    While we, that dwell in air,
   Such heavy passions never know. 
    Why then should mortals be
    Unwilling to be free
    From blood, that sullen cloud,
    Which shining souls does shroud? 
    Then they’ll shew bright,
    And like us light,
   When leaving bodies with their care,
    They slide to us and air.