FAUSTUS, AT ALL TIMES, IN WHAT SHAPE AND FORM SOEVER HE PLEASE. I, JOHN FAUSTUS, OF WITTENBERG, DOCTOR, BY THESE PRESENTS, DO GIVE BOTH BODY AND SOUL TO LUCIFER PRINCE OF THE EAST, AND HIS MINISTER MEPHISTOPHILIS; AND FURTHERMORE GRANT UNTO THEM, THAT, FOUR-AND- TWENTY YEARS BEING EXPIRED, AND THESE ARTICLES ABOVE-WRITTEN BEING INVIOLATE, FULL POWER TO FETCH OR CARRY THE SAID JOHN FAUSTUS, BODY AND SOUL, FLESH AND 60 BLOOD, INTO THEIR HABITATION WHERESOEVER. BY ME, JOHN FAUSTUS. MEPHIST. Speak, Faustus, do you deliver this as your deed? FAUSTUS. Ay, take it, and the devil give thee good of it! MEPHIST. So, now, Faustus, ask me what thou wilt. FAUSTUS. First I will question with 61 thee about hell. Tell me, where is the 62 place that men call hell? MEPHIST. Under the heavens. FAUSTUS. Ay, so are all things else; but whereabouts? MEPHIST. Within the bowels of these elements, Where we are tortur'd and remain for ever: Hell hath no limits, nor is circumscrib'd In one self-place; but where we are is hell, And where hell is, there must we ever be: And, to be short, when all the world dissolves, And every creature shall be purified, All places shall be hell that are 63 not heaven. FAUSTUS. I think hell's a fable. 64 MEPHIST. Ay, think so still, till experience change thy mind. FAUSTUS. Why, dost thou think that Faustus shall be damn'd? MEPHIST. Ay, of necessity, for here's the scroll In which thou hast given thy soul to Lucifer. FAUSTUS. Ay, and body too; and what of that? Think'st thou that Faustus is so fond to imagine That, after this life, there is any pain? No, these are trifles and mere old wives' tales. MEPHIST. But I am an instance to prove the contrary, For I tell thee I am damn'd and now in hell. FAUSTUS. Nay, an this be hell, I'll willingly be damn'd: What! sleeping, eating, walking, and disputing! But, leaving this, let me have a wife, The fairest maid in Germany; For I am wanton and lascivious, And cannot live without a wife. MEPHIST. Well, Faustus, thou shalt have a wife. [MEPHISTOPHILIS fetches in a WOMAN-DEVIL.] FAUSTUS. What sight is this? MEPHIST. Now, Faustus, wilt thou have a wife? FAUSTUS. Here's a hot whore, indeed: no, I'll no wife. MEPHIST. Marriage is but a ceremonial toy, And, if thou lov'st me, think no more of it. I'll cull thee out the fairest courtezans, And bring them every morning to thy bed: She whom thine 65 eye shall like, thy 66 heart shall have, Were she as chaste as was 67 Penelope, As wise as Saba, or as beautiful As was bright