The ringing echoes of Gabriel's clarion trumpet have scarcely died away, when, throughout the clear hyaline, millions of angelic choristers burst into that sublime hymn of praise--that "anthem sung to harps of gold "--the grandest ever penned:
Triumphant songs and glad hosannahs now float down those "arching voids of empyrean stair." "All that pleaseth God is well" is the devout conclusion of this splendid outburst of celestial praise. Harmony re-echoes harmony; and with this glorious ode of jubilation the act comes to an end.
In the second act, the protagonist first comes on the scene, like a god,
"With thunder shod, Crowned with the stars, and with the morning stoled."
He has until now been artfully kept in the background. Drawn by fire-winged cherubim, he sweeps into view, and voices, in no uncertain tone, his dissatisfaction with the divine decree.
Gabriel, the angel of revelation, is with admirable art now placed over against the Stadtholder. Lucifer would argue--would know the exact nature of Heaven's last decree. Gabriel, however, merely replies to his eager questioning with a dignified affirmation of God's command, and departs, leaving the divine injunction behind.
Belzebub, with untiring malignity, now prods the wounded pride of the fiery Stadtholder, and Lucifer again and again blazes into the most intense and bitter defiance. Listen to this speech, seething with the soul of rebellion:
"Now swear I by my crown upon this chance To venture all, to raise my seat amid The firmament, the spheres, the splendor of The stars above. The Heaven of Heavens shall then My palace be; the rainbow be my throne; The starry vast, my court; while down beneath, The Earth shall be my foot-stool and support; I shall, then swiftly drawn through air and light, High-seated on a chariot of cloud, With lightning-stroke and thunder grind to dust Whate'er above, around, below doth us Oppose, were it God's Marshal grand himself; Yea, e'er we yield, these empyrean vaults, Proud in their towering masonry, shall burst, With all their airy arches, and dissolve Before our eyes; this huge and joint-racked earth Like a misshapen monster lifeless lie; This wondrous universe to chaos fall, And to its primal desolation change. Who dares, who dares defy great Lucifer?"