Hold him, Strato! Help! help for the prince! Prince, what raving anguish----
Forgive me, king! I have dealt you a more deadly blow than myself! I die, and soon will peaceful lands enjoy the fruit of my death. Your son, king, is a prisoner, and the son of my father is free!
Then it was your purpose, prince? But as our prisoner, you had no right over yourself!
Do not say that, Strato! Should a man be able to fetter another's liberty to die, the liberty which the gods have left in all vicissitudes of life?
Over? You lie, Strato! The war is not over, prince! Die! yes, die! But carry with you this tormenting thought! You believed, as a true ignorant boy, that fathers were all of one and the same mould,--all of the soft, effeminate nature of your father. They are not all like him! I am not so! What do I care about my son? And do you think that he cannot die as well for his father as you did for yours? Let him die! Let his death too spare me the disgraceful ransom! Strato, I am bereft now, I poor man! You have a son;--he shall be mine. For a son one must have! Happy Strato!
Your son too lives still, king! And will live! I hear it!
Does he live still? Then I must have him back. But you--die! I will have him back, let what will come of it. And in exchange for you! Or I will have such disgrace and dishonour shown to your body--I will have it----
The dead body!--If you will revenge yourself, king, awaken it again!
I pity you! Farewell, Strato! There, where all virtuous friends and all brave men are members of one blessed state--in Elysium we shall meet again! We also, king, shall meet again.
O then, ye gods, receive my triumphant soul; and thou, goddess of peace, thy offering!
He dies! Am I traitor, king, if I weep over your enemy? I cannot restrain myself. A wondrous youth!
Weep over him, weep! And I too! Come! I must have my son again. But do not oppose me, if I pay too high a ransom for him! In vain have we shed our streams of blood, in vain have we conquered lands. There he departs with our booty, the greater victor!--Come! Get me my son! And when I have him, I will no more be king. Do ye believe, ye men, that one does not grow weary of it? (_Exeunt_.)
'Emilia Galotti' was commenced in 1757, when Lessing was at Leipzig, but was thrown aside for some years, until in 1767, when at Hamburg, he again took it up, intending to have it represented on the Hamburg stage. But on the failure of the theatrical enterprise with which he was connected, he once more abandoned it until 1771, when he again turned his attention to it, and completed it in February of the following year. It was immediately represented on the Brunswick stage.