Marlowe's "Doctor Faustus" and "Sin against the Holy Ghost"

Author(s): Gerard H. Cox, III

Reviewed work(s):
Source: Huntington Library Quarterly, Vol. 36, No. 2 (Feb., 1973), pp. 119-137
Published by: University of California Press
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 Marlowe'sDoctorFaustusand "Sinagainst
the Holy Ghost"
By GERARD H. Cox III

MARLOWE'S FAUSTUS polarizes his audience, and response to his fate

has largely reflected critical preconceptions. To those who believe Mar-
lowe was himself a skeptic, Faustus'aspiring will saves him; to those who
believe that Marlowe was an orthodox Christian, Faustus' perverse will
damns him. This failure of agreement has been aptly formulated by Max
Bluestone: "Just as there seem to be two plays dramatizing different
doctrines, there seem to be two Faustuses, the form of his critical for-
tunes, like his dramatic fortunes, 'good or bad.' "1
One solution to this polarity has been to emphasize the play's ambigu-
ity. To quote Bluestone's own position: "We are left with an equivocal
spectacle. And that may be all we know on earth and all we need to
know " (p. 82). But at the risk of seeming reductive, I dissent from the
notion that Doctor Faustus presents us with an equivocal spectacle.
Christian doctrine is the very stuff of Doctor Faustus, and Marlowe's
own attitude toward that doctrine is much less important than the dra-
matic use he makes of it. As spectators, we are called upon to respond to
a "tragicall Historie" (A text), a "Tragedie" (B text). What is impor-
tant, then, is not credence in Christian doctrine but its coherence within
this particular dramatic structure. The questions we must ask, therefore,
are: what principles order Doctor Faustus? is its dramatic structure as
ambiguous as some would have it? if not, how successfully does the form
of Faustus'fortunes evoke an emotional response appropriate to tragedy?
Like many of the incidents, the structure of Doctor Faustus follows
Marlowe's chief source, The Historie of the Damnable Life, and De-
served Death of Doctor John Faustus (1592). The three-part division
of the Damnable Life corresponds exactly to the sequence of tempta-
tions learned by every child in his catechism: the devil and all his works;
the pomps and vanities of the wicked world; the sinful lusts of the flesh.2
The beginning of the play focuses on Faustus' temptation and his giving
way to the devil; the middle illustrates in an appropriately comic mode
Faustus' indulgence in the pomps and vanities of the world; and the end
shows him absorbed by belly-cheer and the arms of Helen.

"'Libido Speculandi: Doctrine and Dramaturgy in Contemporary Interpretations of

Marlowe's Doctor Faustus," in Reinterpretations of Elizabethan Drama: Selected Papers
from the English Institute, ed. Norman Rabkin (New York, 1969), p. 41. An excellent sur-
vey, Bluestone's article also has a convenient appendix of some 8o studies of the play.
2See the First and Second Prayerbooks of Edward VI; Thomas Becon, A New Catechism;
the Elizabethan Prayerbooks of 1559 and 1604; Alexander Nowell, Catechismus (and Thomas
Norton's trans.); Luther's Small Catechism.

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?31973 by The Henry E. Huntington Library and Art Gallery.

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 HUNTINGTON LIBRARYQUJAR-TERLY
Underlying this three-part sequence of temptation is a secondary
sequence that is crucial to an understanding of the nature and magni-
tude of Faustus' fall. Critics have proposed a variety of reasons for it: he
presumes; he signs a pact with the devil; he is a prey to despair; he com-
mits the sin of demoniality;3 he refuses to repent. These explanations
have the peculiar merit of being collectively true but individually mis-
leading; all contribute something to our understanding of Faustus'down-
ward career, but none suffices as a definitive statement about his fall. For
Faustus falls not statically but progressively. Dame Helen Gardner
aptly describes the stages of this fall: "From a proud philosopher, mas-
ter of all human knowledge, to a trickster, to a slave of phantoms, to a
cowering wretch: that is a brief sketch of the progress of Dr. Faustus."4
This is an accurate sketch, but it, too, is incomplete. Faustus is guilty not
only of presumption and despair, sins which Dame Helen correctly iden-
tified as two of the sins against the Holy Ghost, but also of impenitence,
obstinacy, resistance to the known truth, and envy of a brother's spirit-
ual good. Faustus thus commits all six of the sins traditionally catego-
rized as sins against the Holy Ghost.
The concept of these sins was derived fromnMatthew xii.31-32:
"WhereforeI say unto you, everie sinne and blasphemie shal be forgiven
unto men: but the blasphemie against the holie Gost shal not be forgiven
unto men. And whosoever shal speake a worde against the Sone of man,
it shal be forgiven him: but whosoever shal speake against ye holie
Gost, it shal not be forgiven him, neither in this world nor in ye worlde to
come."5 Although Augustine admitted that no problem in the Bible was
more difficult than the meaning of sin against the Holy Ghost, the Scho-
lastic philosophers agreed that man sins against the Holy Ghost (whose
work is remission of sins) by deliberately choosing evil over good.
Aquinas says that such a choice results from the contemptuous rejection
of those things which should prevent a man from choosing evil: con-
sideration of God's judgment, consideration of the nature of sin, ac-
knowledgment of God's gifts to withdraw man from sin. The Scholastic
3This word is used by W. W. Greg in his article, "The Damnation of Faustus," MLR,
XLI (1946), 97-107. Greg notes that the definition of "demoniality" given in the OED is
rather misleading: the analogy of "demoniality" is not with "spirituality" but with "bes-
tiality"; see Lodovico Maria Sinistrari, Demoniality; or, Incubi and Succubi, the work
whose title furnishes one of the quotations given by the OED, as well as his better known
work, De Delictis et Poenis (Venice, 1700). Greg continues that according to Sinistrari
the first to use the term daemonialitas and to distinguish it from bestialitas was Johannes
Caramuelis in his Theologia Fundamentalis (Frankfort, 1651).
4"Milton's 'Satan' and the Theme of Damnation in Elizabethan Tragedy," Essays and
Studies, I (1948), rpt. in Elizabethan Drama: Modern Essays in Criticism, ed. Ralph J.
Kaufmann (New York, 1g61), p. 321.
5Here and elsewhere I quote from The Geneva Bible: A Facsimile of the I560 Edition
(Madison, 1969). Faustus himself quotes the Vulgate, but as few readers have even small
Latin, I have preferred to use the best known English trans. contemporary with the play.

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 THE
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 HUNTINGTON LIBRARY QUARTERLY
opinion held into the seventeenth century. Citing Augustine and Aguinas
in a sermon on Matthew xii.-31, Donne explains that the Schoolmen
rightly divide sin against the Holy Ghost into three corresponding
branches or "couples":
The firstcouple is, presumptionand desperation;for presumptiontakesaway
the feare of God, and desperation the love of God. And then, they name Im-
penitence, and hardnesse of heart; for Impenitence removes all sorrow for
sins past, and hardnesse of heart all tendernesse towards future tentations. And
lastly, they name The resisting of a truth acknowledged before, and the envy-
ing of other men, who have made better use of Gods grace then we have done;
for this resisting of a Truth, is a shutting up of our selves against it, and this
envying of others, is a sorrow, that that Truth should prevaile upon them.

Following Matthew xii.3 i, moreover, these six sins were held to be irre-
missible.6
Faustus commits all of these sins, some of them not once but repeat-
edly. Each time he becomes less able to repent because his habitual sin-
fulness binds him ever tighter to the consequences of his previous acts.
The result is a progressively renewed allegiance to sin. The shaping of
the play in terms of a conventional understanding of the nature and kinds
of sin against the Holy Ghost has thus two important consequences: it
makes Faustus'damnation unambiguous, and it helps to clarify the sense
in which Faustus' fall is tragic.
We first see Faustus engaged in a deliberative inquiry. His intention
to "levell at the end of every Art" indicates that, quite appropriately,
he is making a rational judgment rather than a willful choice.7 Pro-
ceeding with his inquiry, Faustus systematically excludes logic, medi-
cine, and law, concluding, "When all is done, Divinitie is best." Of
course, Faustus cannot rest here. He has limited his range of choices,
but he has yet to decide which art to choose.
Such a decision was traditionally viewed as the conclusion of a prac-
tical syllogism. What appears to be ironic is the means Faustus employs
to construct his syllogism. Faustus is apparently practicing the Sortes
Virgilianae: opening a text (here, of course, the Bible rather than Vir-
gil) and taking as a guide to decision or action the first verse the eyes
light on. (The same technique is used for comic effect in Rabelais's Gar-
6For Augustine's varied opinions, see De Serm. Dom. in Monte 1.22; De Corrept. et
Gratia 12.35; Epist. 185.1149. Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Pt. II of 2nd Pt., Q. 14, Art. 1-4.
Subsequent references to Aquinas are to the Summa. The Sermons of John Donne, ed.
George R. Potter and Evelyn M. Simpson (Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1953-62), V, 93-94.
7Except when the A text is indicated, I quote the B text of s6i6 from Marlowe's Doctor
Faustus 1604-I616: Parallel Texts, ed. W. W. Greg (Oxford, 1g5o). On the deliberation that
should precede choice, see Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, III, 2, 3 ( 1112a 15, 113a I 1);
Aquinas, II-I, Q. 14, Art. 1.

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 MARLOWE'S DOCTOR FA UST US
gantua and Pantagruel, Bk. III, Cu. x.) Obviously, the texts from Ro-
mans vi.23 and I John i.8-9 are too pertinent to result from random
selection; but whether they are providential or whether Mephostophilis
leads his eye, Faustus sees only the first half of each text and so con-
cludes that sin cannot be forgiven:
Why then belikewe mustsinne,
And so consequentlydie,
I, we must die, an everlastingdeath.
(11.71-73)

This conclusion completely ignores the chief article of Christian doc-

trine. The forgiveness of sins is the doctrine by which the Church tradi-
tionally has distinguished itself from false religions, by which glory is
given to God alone, and by which enduring comfort is offered to sinful
man. As Donne preached succinctly, "Whosoever acknowledges a God,
acknowledges a Remission of sins, and whosoever acknowledges a Re-
mission of sins, acknowledges a God."8 But by not acknowledging the
forgiveness of sins, Faustus is all but committed to not acknowledging a
God. Hence, the often remarked sense that the devil is more real to
Faustus than God. Faustus' mistaken consideration of the role of mercy
in God's judgment opens the door to his temptations by evil: he becomes
contemptuous-"What doctrine call you this? Che sera, sera: / What
will be, shall be"-and he abandons divinity to pursue magic.
This contemptuous rejection of divinity leads to the first of his sins
against the Holy Ghost. His lack of fear concerning God's justice en-
courages the unchecked aspirations summarized by the famous line,
"Here tire my braines to get a Deity." As Dame Helen observes, the
"sin of Faustus here is presumption, the aspiring above his order, or the
rebellion against the law of his creation" (p. 323). The Good Angel
warns Faustus against "Gods heavy wrath," but any such consideration
is removed by the.enticements of the Bad Angel: "Be thou on earth as
Jove is in the skye, / Lord and Commander of these elements."
Led on by the two unholy persons of Valdes and Cornelius, Faustus
soon commits his second sin against the Holy Ghost. First Valdes and
then Cornelius describe the rewards Faustus can gain if he remains
resolute. Their elaborate invocation of miracles, fame, and wealth so
cheers his soul that he hardens his will in sin, exclaiming, "This night
I'le conjure tho I die therefore." Far from following the advice of the
Good Angel to turn away from magic and repent, Faustus has become
confirmed in obstinacy.
When Faustus begins to conjure, he again reminds the audience of his
obstinacy: "Then feare not Faustus to be resolute / And try the utmost
8Sermons, IX, 258-259.

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 HUNTINGTON LIBRARYQUARTERLY
Magicke can performe." His famous exchanges with Mephostophilis
give further evidence that his will is hardened in sin. He readily admits
to having abjured all godliness and to holding the principle that "There
is no chiefe but onely Beelzebub." Once allegiance is given to false gods
like Beelzebub, sinful man deprives himself of enduring comfort. Iron-
ically, Faustus does not perceive that the answers to his questions about
the fall of Lucifer apply equally well to him, so once again he is con-
temptuous:
What is greatMephostophilis so passionate
Forbeing deprivedof the Joyesof heaven?
Learnethou of Faustus manlyfortitude,
And scornethoseJoyesthou nevershalt possesse.
(11.308-311)
Because of his contempt, he offers to make the compact and still further
hardens his will in sin: "Had I as many soules, as there be Starres,/ I'de
give them all for Mephostophilis" (11.327-328).
Faustus' next scene leads him to despair, the third of his sins against
the Holy Ghost.9 As in the first scene, Faustus is engaged in delibera-
tion, but whereas then he was concerned with the choice of vocation,
now he is considering the possibility of mercy tempering God's judg-
ment: "Now Faustus, must thou needs be damn'd?I Canst thou not be
sav'd?"(11.390-391). These questions indicate the first motion of Faustus
toward repentance. As Richard Hooker explains: "The root and begin-
ning of penitency therefore is the consideration of our own sin, as a
cause which hath procured the wrath, and a subject which doth need the
mercy of God."'0 In this consideration of God's judgment Faustus
once again constructs a syllogism, concluding, "Despaire in GOD,and
trust in Belzebub." Yet even though he wants to be resolute, he wavers:
"O something soundeth in mine eare. I Abjure this Magicke, turne to
God againe." This portent dramatizes the orthodox belief that sinful
man is unable to repent until God gives him the first motions. The sound-
ings in Faustus' ear point to God's prevenient grace, and as such provide
grounds for hope of salvation. But, just as in the first scene presumption
removed the fear of God's justice, here despair removes the hope of
God's mercy:
To God?he loves thee not,
The god thou servestis thine owne appetite,
whereinis fixt the love of Belsabub.
(A text, 11.447-449)
9Dame Helen argues that despair is Faustus' final sin (P. 323).
10Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, Bk. VI, Gh. iii.3, in The Works of . . . Richard
Hooker, ed. John Keble, rev. R. W. Church and F. Paget, 7th ed. (Oxford, 1888), III, 9.
Subsequent references are to this ed. and will be included in the text.

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 MARLOWE'SDOC TOR FA USTUS
And as before, contempt confirms his choice of evil: his decision to
"build an Altar and a Church, / And offer luke-warme bloud, of new
borne babes" indicates by its parody of the Mass the degree to which he
despises God's saving grace.
In spite of Faustus' presumption, obstinacy, and despair, one effort
after another is made to induce his repentance and thus save his soul.
The Good Angel again entreats him to turn away from magic, urging
contrition, prayer, and repentance as the "meanes to bring thee unto
heaven" (1. 406). But distracted by the Bad Angel's reminders of honor
and wealth, Faustus once more casts his lot with evil:
When Mephostophilis shall stand by me,
What power can hurt me? Faustus thou art safe.
Cast no more doubts; Mepho: come
And bring glad tydings from great Lucifer.
(11.412-415)

Before he can receive his tidings of great joy, however, he has to sign
away his soul with his own blood. A second portent occurs: the blood
congeals. Faustus ponders its possible significance, but can find none.
He parodies the last words of Christ while he signs the deed, and a third
portent occurs: the words Homofuge appear on his arm. But as before,
Faustus remains resolute. Then, distracted by the dance of the devils
and presumably swayed by their symbolic gifts of "Crownes and rich
apparell," Faustus hands the "Deed of Gift" to Mephostophilis.
The giving of the deed to Mephostophilis is largely a symbolic act, an
expression of his firm commitment to evil more than an act quintes-
sentially evil in itself. It is the sequence of events leading to this dramatic
gesture that is important. These events consistently turn upon issues of
Faustus' own good, and Faustus consistently responds to questions of
what is best for him by some version of "Evil be thou my Good." The
process by which Faustus comes to sign away his soul thus points up how
his fall occurs through his own free will acting on deliberate, considered
choice.
We next see Faustus in his study, chopping logic with Mephostophilis.
Faustus' conclusion to their disputation on the place of man in creation
illustrates Robert Burton's observation that a man in the grip of the devil
"doth resist, and hath some good motions intermixed now and then.""1
This time Faustus' conclusion-"If Heaven was made for man, 'twas
made for me"-is sound, and he decides to act upon it: "I will renounce
this Magicke and repent" (11.579-580). This drama builds even more
as Faustus momentarily withstands the words of the Bad Angel and re-
I1The Anatomy of Melancholy (1621), Pt. 111, Sec. iv, Memb. 2, Subs. vi; Everyman
ed. (London, 1932),111I,048.

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 HUNTINGTON LIBRARY QUARTERLY
peats his conviction: "Yea, God will pitty me if I repent." But whatever
hope we may entertain is lost when Faustus replies to the Bad Angel's
"I, but Faustus never shall repent" with his despairing acknowledgment,
"My heart is hardned, I cannot repent."
As his speech continues, it becomes clear that Faustus is going beyond
despair to impenitence, the settled purpose of not repenting:
Scarce can I name salvation, faith, or heaven.
Swords, poyson, halters, and invenomb'd steele,
Are laid before me to dispatch my selfe:
And long e're this, I should have done the deed,
Had not sweete pleasure conquer'd deepe despaire.

Why should I die then, or basely despaire?

I am resolv'd, Faustus shall not repent.
(11.590-594, 6oo-6oi)

Even though despair may have removed any hope of God's mercy,
Aquinas explains, man can still extricate himself from sin by consider-
ing the disorder and shamefulness of his actions. Faustus comes to pre-
cisely the opposite conclusion. He reveals that the pleasures for which
he sold his soul are valuable to him only as distractions, as pastimes, to
make him forget his deep despair. Yet he then declares that these pleas-
ures are sweet, that they possess him with joy and therefore concludes,
"Why should I die then, or basely despaire?" This is circular reason-
ing, and it has the effect of removing him even further from repentance:
"I am resolv'd, Faustus shall not repent." Not simply despairing, Faus-
tus is now impenitent.
As he continues disputing with Mephostophilis, however, another
good motion comes about when he feels contempt not for God but for
his informer:

These slender questions Wagner can decide:

Hath Mephostophilis no greater skill?

These are fresh mens questions.

(11.618-619, 625)

By asking a seemingly more difficult question-"who made the world"

-Faustus returns to the consideration of repentance. His question about
the Creation is of a different order of knowledge from the previous
ones: they dealt with "divine Astrology" and would be unknown by the
greater portion of the audience; this deals with faith-the answer he
seeks is given in the first article of the Apostles' Creed-and should have
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 MARLOWE'SDOCTOR FAUSTUS
been known by everyone in the audience. Once he is conscious of God
the Creator, Faustus reacts against Mephostophilis and questions, not
whether he should repent, but whether it is too late to repent. Moved by
the promise of the Good Angel, "Repent and they [the devils] shall
never raise thy skin," Faustus starts to repent: "O Christ my Saviour,
my Saviour, / Helpe to save distressed Faustus soule." This is a good be-
ginning, but contrary to what we might assume, only to begin is in effect
not to repent. As Donne warned his congregation, "He that makes half-
repentances, makes none."12 When Lucifer, Beelzebub, and Mepho-
stophilis enter, Faustus first abandons his repentance and then proceeds
to an even more grievous sin of impenitence. Afraid that these terrible
beings have come to fetch his soul, Faustus forgets the Good Angel's
promise and is soon bullied into submission. What follows is a parody of
penance. Down on his knees, Faustus repents his repentance: "Nor will
Faustus henceforth [call on Christ]: pardon him for this, / And Faus-
tus vowes never to looke to heaven" (11.665-666). The significance of
this backsliding is apparent in Hooker's quotation of Tertullian on peni-
tence: " 'He which by repentance for sins' (saith Tertullian, speaking of
fickle-minded men) 'had a purpose to satisfy the Lord, will now by
repentance make Satan satistaction; and be so much more hateful to
God, as he is unto God's enemy more acceptable'" (VI.v.i). Lucifer's
response is obviously one of smug satisfaction: "So shalt thou show thy
selfe an obedient servant, / And we will highly gratify thee for it."
Just as Faustus'falling into despair constituted a breach with the good,
so his recanting his repentance constitutes a breach with repentance. In
a speech found only in A, Faustus determines to be an active foe of God,
vowing
Never to name God, or to pray to him,
To burne his Scriptures, slay his Ministers,
And make my spirites pull his churches downe.13

These actions are precisely those we would expect to be hateful to God

and acceptable to Satan. The following pageant of the Seven Deadly
Sins also relates to his impenitence. Because he will have to guard against
falling into the life of grace, these sins provide Faustus with examples of
how he can pass his remaining time in the world. As the good is to be
feared, so sin is to be enjoyed. Faustus exclaims about the show, "O how
this sight doth delight my soule," and Lucifer not only tells him that in

12Sermons, IX, 267. For a perceptive discussion of Faustus' "incomplete repentances,"

see Douglas Cole, Suffering and Evil in the Plays of Christopher Marlowe (Princeton,
1962), pp. 209-225.
13Greg believes the editor's fear of profanity led him to cancel these lines in B (Notes:
A 726-728).

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 HUNTINGTON LIBRARYQUARTERLY
Hell is all manner of delight, but promises that he will give him a guided
tour, coming for him (in what is surely an ironic foreshadowing) at
midnight.
In the comic episodes that dramatize his yielding to the temptations
of worldly pomps and vanities, Faustus' activities remain perversely
inverted from what they should be. For example, Burton advises that
someone affected by religious melancholy should "by all honest recrea-
tions refresh and recreate his distressed soul" (III.iv.2.vi). But Faustus'
recreations do not refresh his soul, they only distract it. Far from lessen-
ing his despairing allegiance to Lucifer, they confirm it. What Pascal
noted under the topic of Wretchedness is virtually a summary of Mar-
lowe's treatment of Faustus:
The only thing that consolesus for our miseriesis diversion.And yet it is the
greatestof our miseries.For it is that above all which preventsus thinking
about ourselvesand leads us imperceptiblyto destruction.But for that we
should be bored,and boredomwould drive us to seek some moresolid means
of escape, but diversion passesour time and brings us imperceptiblyto our
death.14

Faustus' pastimes console him with worldly mirth and thus serve to con-
ceal his despair from himself, but their very diversion makes him lose
himself all the more irrevocably. From the point of view of the audience,
the comic scenes show Faustus being perceptibly diverted from his true
end, God, and so brought to an everlasting death.
The soliloquy Faustus gives after his haggling with the horse trader
represents still another means of passing the time. Faustus does recog-
nize his condition:
What art thou Faustusbut a man condemn'dto die?
Thy fatall time drawesto a finall end;
Despairedoth drivedistrustinto my thoughts.
(11.1546-48)

But by ignoring this perception of his approaching end, Faustus remains

impenitent:
Confoundthese passionswith a quiet sleepe:
Tush Christdid call the Theefe upon the Crosse,
Then rest thee Faustus quiet in conceit.
14Pensees, No. 171, trans. A. J. Krailsheimer, Penguin ed. (London, 1966), p. 148.
The thematic relevance of his diversion has been well established by Robert Ornstein,
"The Comic Synthesis in Doctor Faustus," ELH, XXII (1955), 165-172; Roland M. Frye,
"Marlowe's Doctor Faustus: The Repudiation of Humanity," SAQ LV (1956), 322-328;
John H. Crabtree, Jr., "The Comedy of Marlowe's Dr. Faustus," Furman Studies, IX
(1961), 1-9; Warren D. Smith, "The Nature of Evil in Doctor Faustus," MLR, LX (1965),
17 1-175.

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 MARLOWE'S DOCTOR FAUSTUS
To postpone repentance was foolish, for it assumed that when the mo-
ment of death came near one would still retain all his faculties intact and
be sufficiently undistracted to examine himself spiritually. Further-
more, as writers in the ars moriendi tradition never tired of warning, a
late or deathbed repentance was by its very nature suspect-it might
not be efficacious for salvation.
Yet this speech presents Faustus as more than foolish. In one sense,
he possesses knowledge all other men lack: he knows his "fatal time";
he knows the very hour and minute he will die. Like the other knowledge
he has gained, this certainty leads not to liberation but to limitation; it
is less a blessing than a misfortune. Far from meditating on that grim
reminder, memento mori, Faustus escapes the present moment by losing
himself in pastimes and distractions. Sleep, that death in little, will in-
deed confound his passions, but to seek refuge in oblivion is to place the
soul in peril. Relevant here is a passage from a sermon by Bishop Lati-
mer incorporating the text: "Unusquisque enim tempus certum habet
praedefinitum a Domino; For every man hath a certain time appointed
him of God, and God hideth that same time from us."15 Latimer's
explanation of this text is precisely applicable to Faustus: "He hath not
manifested to us the time, because he would have us at all times ready:
else if I knew the time, I would presume upon it, and so should be
worse." By reassuring himself that Christ called the thief upon the cross,
Faustus can rationalize postponing his repentance and can thus rest
"quiet in conceit." But of course there were two thieves, and only one of
them was saved. Knowing his fatal time, Faustus does presume and so
is the worse.
The moral of these comic scenes is unknowingly voiced by the Duke
when he comments that Faustus' "Artfull sport, drives all sad thoughts
away" (1. 1773); but it does so in the same manner that Faustus con-
founds his passions with a quiet sleep: it distracts him from thinking
about his own condition and so leads him perceptibly to his own destruc-
tion.
Having shown Faustus yielding successively to the temptations of the
devil and the world, the play now turns to the temptations of the flesh.
As Wagner tells us, Faustus is filling his remaining days with belly-cheer,
and he will soon seek oblivion in the arms of Helen. With the entrance
of the Old Man, the two remaining sins against the Holy Ghost, resist-
ance to known or divine truth and envy of a brother's spiritual good, are
given dramatic importance. The Old Man represents the two gifts from
God that can withdraw man from sin: acknowledgment of truth, and the
assistance of inward grace. Even though Faustus has spent his twenty-
15"The Sixth Sermon on the Lord's Prayer." Sermons by Hugh Latimer, ed. George
Elwes Corrie, Parker Society (Cambridge, Eng., 1844), pp. 415-416. For similar Renaissance
texts, see Cole, p. 218.

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four years in sin, he still is offered these gifts by the Old Man. In his ef-
fort to save Faustus' soul, the Old Man first points out the consequences
of practicing magic-it will charm his soul to Hell and totally bereave
him of salvation-and then pleads that Faustus not continue impenitent:
Though thou hast now offended like a man,
Doe not persever in it like a Divell;
Yet, yet, thou hast an amiable soule,
If sin by custome grow not into nature:
Then Faustus, will repentance come too late,
Then thou art banisht from the sight of heaven;
No mortall can expresse the paines of hell.
(11.1816-22)

These truthful words are motivated by love and pity and not, as Faustus'
soon will be, by wrath and envy; yet their effect on Faustus leads not to
acknowledgment but to resistance of truth. His reaction is not hope but
rather despair of God's mercy:
Where art thou Faustus? wretch, what hast thou done?
Hell claimes his right, & with a roaring voice,
Saies Faustus come, thine houre is almost come,
And Faustus now will come to do thee right.

This is precisely the opposite of being withdrawn from sin. The dagger
he accepts from Mephostophilis of course symbolizes his intention to
commit suicide, the ultimate act of despair. But, much as Una prevents
the Red Cross Knight from killing himself in the Cave of Despair, so the
Old Man checks Faustus: "O stay good Faustus, stay thy desperate steps."
His next lines are far more emphatic than Una's, however, for while she
argues that the knight has a share in heavenly mercies, the Old Man wit-
nesses to an extraordinary circumstance:
I see an Angell hover ore thy head,
And with a vyoll full of pretious grace,
Offers to poure the same into thy soule,
Then call for mercy, and avoyd despaire.
(11. 1835-38)

This could be the Good Angel, but the drama is increased if it is taken
to be not a guardian angel but a special emissary from God. These angels
were believed to come to men only on rare occasions: to inspire prophets,
to deliver warnings, or to act on behalf of the good in an emergency.16
16Robert Hunter West, The Invisible World: A Study of Pneumatology in Elizabethan
Drama (Athens, Ga., 1939), p. 29.

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Usually such an angel would remain invisible, so its manifestation to the
Old Man (besides being necessary if he is to say the lines) demonstrates
his spirituality. That the angel is ready to pour grace into his soul em-
phasizes that Faustus still can repent, for he has the assistance of inward
grace to call for mercy.
Dramatically, it is a masterful stroke to show Faustus poised in the
balance. He has only two choices: to repent, or to persevere; but his in-
decision-"I do repent, and yet I doe despaire"-both heightens the
suspense and suggests that sin by custom has nearly grown into nature.
His internal conflict is resolved by his fear of Mephostophilis. Under
the familiar physical threat of being torn to pieces, Faustus gives over his
spiritual struggle. As he did before, Faustus repents his repentance:
I do repent I ere offendedhim [Lucifer],
SweetMephasto: intreatthy Lord
To pardonmy unjustpresumption,
And with my bloud againe I will confirme
The formervow I madeto Lucifer.
(11.1850-54)

This time his blood does not congeal, signifying that sin by custom has
now grown into nature. Because such customary acts make him even
more hateful unto God, the response of Mephostophilis is heavily ironic:
"Do it then Faustus, with unfained heart, / Lest greater dangers do
attend thy drift."
Parallel to Faustus' impenitence, a sin against God, is his desire to
torment the Old Man. His urging Mephostophilis to torture "that base
and aged man" is motivated by envy of a brother's spiritual good. Meph-
ostophilis' admission that he cannot touch the Old Man'ssoul once again
places the grounds for Faustus' backsliding in a highly ironic light:
His faith is great,I cannottouch his soule;
But what I mayafflicthis body with,
I will attempt,which is but little worth.
(11.1860-62)

Mephostophilis' begrudging response seems almost a paraphraseof Mat-

thew x.28: "And feare ye not them which kil the bodie, but are not able
to kil the soule: but rather feare him, which is able to destroye bothe
soule and bodie in hel." Typically, Faustus misses the point. He now is
concerned only with escaping from any motions toward repentance;
Helen's "sweet embraces"will "extinguish cleare" his thoughts of good
arising from the assistance of inward grace and so will enable him to
keep his vow to Lucifer.
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For all intents and purposes, Faustus has shut himself off from salva-
tion. The kiss of Helen's that sucks forth his soul is the outward and visi-
ble sign of an inward and devilish degeneration: Faustus has lost his soul
to Lucifer. We need not accept Greg'sargument that Faustus is damned
because he has intercourse with a succubus to recognize that his embrace
of Helen is the dramatic manifestation of his downfall.17 The reentry
of the Old Man (in the A text only) underlines the theological conse-
quences of Faustus' devotion to Helen. In contrast to accepting the grace
of the Holy Ghost, Faustus has deliberately rejected it:
AccursedFaustus, miserableman,
That fromthy soule excludstthe graceof heaven,
And fliest the throneof his tribunallseate.
(A. 11.1377-79)

Truly resolute, the Old Man provides an example of holy dying: his
faith is proven and not found wanting. Particularly interesting in this
regard are his lines on laughter:
Ambitiousfiends,see how the heavenssmiles
At your repulse,and laughsyour state to scorne,
Hencehel, for hence I flie unto my God.
(A, 11.1384-86)

The laughter provoked by Faustus' trial of his art was worldly mirth;
now we are reminded of the higher order of spiritual mirth. The first is
allied with the devil; the other with God. One of the more rigorous me-
dieval notions was that a prolonged contemplation of the day of doom
should still all laughter.18Those that persisted in levity would receive
their due reward hereafter. As Mephostophilis taunts Faustus, "Fooles
that will laugh on earth, most weepe in hell" (1. 1994). But alongside
this severe sobriety existed the more genial attitude that laughter could
have spiritual value. In The Rule and Exercises of Holy Living, for
example, Jeremy Taylor quotes approvingly a saying from a medieval life
of St. Anthony: "'There is one way of overcoming our ghostly enemies;
spiritual mirth, and a perpetual bearing of God in our minds': this ef-
fectively resists the devil, and suffers us to receive no hurt from him."19
The Old Man's faith, or the perpetual bearing of God in his mind, and
his spiritual mirth do enable him to fly unto his God despite the ambi-

17"The Damnation of Faustus," MLR, XLI (1946), 97-107.

18V.A. Kolve, The Play Called Corpus Christi (Stanford, 1966), pp. 125-126.
19Holy Living (1650), 1.3, in The Whole Works of... Jeremy Taylor, ed. Reginald
Heber, rev. Charles Page Eden (London, i86 1), III, 28.

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 MARLOWE'SDOCTOR FA USTUS
tion of the fiends to possess his soul. Not only is the earlier promise of
the Good Angel vindicated-"Repent and they shall never raise thy
skin"-but the contrast to Faustus' approaching end could not be more
pointed.
After this Christian comedy follows Faustus' tragedy. In a state of re-
'ligious melancholy, Faustus suffers the sudden pangs and convulsions
that often afflict even the most forsaken of God; yet, as Hooker warns,
this anguish can not substitute for contrition because it does not involve
the deliberate aversion of the will from sin (VI.iii.5). When the second
Scholar pleads with him to call on God, Faustus' inability to repent
illustrates the Augustinian belief that the downfall of sin against the Holy
Ghost is so great that the sinner cannot submit to the humiliation of ask-
ing forgiveness, even though his consciousness of guilt forces him to pro-
claim his sin:20
On God, whom Faustus hath abjur'd?on God, whom Faustus
hath blasphem'd? 0 my God, I would weepe, but the Divell
drawes in my teares. Gush forth bloud in stead of teares,
yea life and soule: oh hee stayes my tongue: I would
lift up my hands, but see they hold 'em, they hold 'em.
(11.1950-54)

All that Faustus can do now is realize his own predicament. In one
sense, of course, his realization is explicitly didactic, but insofar as his
awarenessgrows quite literally out of a race against time, it is highly dra-
matic. Faustus now sees that the knowledge he sought proved in the at-
tainment to be only cunning; that for the "vaine pleasure of foure and
twenty yeares hath Faustus lost eternall joy and felicitie" (11. 1960-
6i). Yet in contrast to the earlier scene (11. 1546-51) in which he
postponed repenting because there was still time, time has now run out
and he is the worse: "I writ them a bill with mine owne bloud, the date
is expired: this is the time, and he will fetch mee." He weeps because he
has lost eternal happiness, but we might remember that this grief is en-
tirely self-centered; he has not progressed to the point where he feels
grief at having offended God's love.
Because Hell is a condition as well as a location-"Hell hath no lim-
its, nor is circumscrib'd,/ In one selfe place: but where we are is hell"
(11.513-514)-Marlowe is able to represent Faustus suffering the tor-
tures of Hell while he is still alive. After the throne, a symbol of Heaven,
descends to music, Faustus is shown the "bright shining Saints"in order
20Augustine, De Serm. Dom. in Monte 1.22. Abject though he is, Faustus is not hum-
ble; rather, he is guilty of that insidious form of pride which believes that one's sins are
too great even for God to forgive: "But Faustus offence can nere be pardoned, / The
serpent that tempted Eve may be saved, / But not Faustus" (11.1937-39).

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to teach him that he has lost their state of "celestiall happinesse, / Plea-
sures unspeakeable, blisse without end." According to Aquinas, such a
vision torments the damned before judgment day both because they will
envy the saints' happiness, and because they have forfeited that glory
(Supplement to III, Q. 98. Art. 9). As Mephostophilis told Faustus ear-
lier:
Think'st thou that I that saw the face of God,
And tasted the eternall joyes of heaven,
Am not tormented with ten thousand hels,
In being depriv'd of everlasting blisse?
(11.302-305)

Faustus' fury at the Old Man is now more explicable. Envy of others'
spiritual good has become a state of being for Faustus, whose sin is iron-
ically punished by sin even as he commits it. The discovery of Hell
further emphasizes Faustus' privation, and the suffering of the damned
he beholds fills him with horror: "0, I have seene enough to torture me."
But, as the Bad Angel gleefully tells him, his torment has only begun and
will soon extend to his other senses as well.
His experiences have changed his mind, as Mephostophilis said they
would, but the striking of the clock underlines that time has nearly run
out. Increasingly frantic, Faustus wants time to stop so he can repent,
yet his very distraction at its passing precludes even a deathbed repent-
ance. For the last time, he calls out of the depths of despair, but, as
before, his will is bound by habitual sin:
O I'le leape up to heaven:who puls me downe?
One dropof bloud will saveme; oh my Christ,
Rend not my heart,for namingof my Christ.
Yetwill I call on him: 0 spareme Lucifer.
(11. 2048-5 1)

At last we see the awful effects of Faustus' reiterated impenitence. Be-

cause he has habitually placed his hope in Lucifer, Faustus has made
himself hateful to God. What follows dramatizes John iii.36: "He that
beleveth in the Sonne, hathe everlasting life, &che that obeieth not the
Sonne, shal not se life, but the wrath of God abideth on him." Now that
the time of mercy is past and the time of justice begins, the blood sym-
bolizing Christ's sacrifice disappears and the "threatning Arme" and
"tangryBrow" of God's wrath appear. The contempt for God's judgment
he felt in the beginning of the play is now transmuted and expanded to
the appropriate emotion of fear:
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Mountaines and Hils, come, come, and fall on me,
And hide me from the heavy wrath of heaven.
No? Then will I headlong run into the earth:
Gape earth; 0 no, it will not harbour me.

As he futilely tries to escape from himself, Faustus gives emotional force

to the Scholastic thesis that the damned would prefer not to exist.21
Rather than suffer, rather than "live still to be plagu'd in hell," Faustus,
like the damned, would willingly forfeit his eternal soul. His outcry,
"Curst be the parents that ingendred me," is also consistent with the
interpretation that he is already suffering the torments of the damned,
for such texts as Matthew Xxvi.24, "wo be to that man, by whome the
Sonne of man is betrayed: it had bene good for that man, if he had never
bene borne" and Jeremiah xx. 14, "Cursed be the day wherein I was
borne," were glossed as confirming that it is better not to be than to en-
dure the privations of the damned. Faustus does momentarily confront
his situation and realize that he damned himself by yielding to the temp-
tations of Lucifer, but so frantic is he as his time runs out that he loses
all dignity and reverts to his desire for annihilation. Thunder sounds, the
devils enter, and after his poignant offer to burn his books, Faustus is
dragged screaming into Hellmouth.
Only after Faustus has died is the audience in a position to assess his
"hellish fall." Although most authorities followed Matthew xii.31-32
in arguing that sin against the Holy Spirit was irremissible, the question
remained open whether any given individual might be forgiven if he
repented. Bishop Latimer, for example, emphasizes that no conclusion
could be drawn until the individual had died unrepentant:
I cannot deny but that there is a sin against the Holy Ghost, which is irremis-
sible: but we cannot judge of it aforehand, we cannot tell which man hath com-
mitted that sin or not, as long as he is alive; but when he is gone, then I can
judge whether he sinned against the Holy Ghost or not.... Therefore, as I said
before, he that is blasphemous, and obstinately wicked, and abideth in his
wickedness still to the very end, he sinneth against the Holy Ghost; as St.
Augustine, and all other godly writers do affirm.22

Faustus is unquestionably "blasphemous, and obstinately wicked," so

his only hope for salvation lies in a late or deathbed repentance. Toward
this the Old Man attempts to move him, but Faustus knowingly and
willingly "abideth in his wickedness still to the very end." Because he

21See Aquinas, Supp. to Pt. III, Q. 98, Art. 3.

22"On the Parable of a King That Married His Son," Sermons, pp. 462-463. See also
Aquinas, II-II, Q. 14, A. 3.

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never repents, his sins against the Holy Spirit are irremissible, and hence
we are justified in accepting the dramatic fact of Faustus'damnation.
Doctor Faustus is a tragedy in which drama grows out of doctrine,
and in accord with Renaissance theories of tragedy, the emotions of fear,
woe, and wonder accompany the hero's fall. Faustus' end is indeed fear-
ful: we do not need to be told that the macrocosmof nature was disturbed
in order to grasp the magnitude of his peril because we, unlike the rather
choric scholars, have realized his danger from the beginning. His fear
of the catastrophe in turn creates ours, and it is one of the most impres-
sive representations of fear in Elizabethan tragedy. His death is also woe-
ful. As the second scholar remarks, Faustus' end is "such/ As every
Christian heart laments to thinke on." His hellish fall is lamentable
because it is placed within a catholic, Christian framework: Faustus is
damned not because some are mysteriously elected and some equally
mysteriously damned, but because he willfully persisted in a sinful con-
dition until the end of his life. As he failed to understand the nature
and consequences of God's love-"I, we must die, an everlasting death"
-he deserves our pity, but his perverse obstinacy soon qualifies this
pity: "Nay, and this be hell, I'le willingly be damn'd." Each of his sins
against the Holy Spirit should alienate the audience, and the dramatic
nadir of his sinful progress occurs when he begs Mephostophilis to tor-
ture the Old Man. We may sympathize when a character harms himself,
but we react differently when he injures others.23That Faustus should
wish harm to one who only wished him good is cause for wonder at his
degeneration. The fall of the "Scholler, once admired / For wondrous
knowledge" is accompanied by almost no insight; the magician who
sought to be lord and commander of the elements finally seeks to lose
his being in the earth, air, or sea. His end is piteous and unpitied.24
Faustus' tragedy is one of free will gone wrong, and consequently
nearly every one of his decisions moves him further from repentance
and also makes the need for repentance that much more crucial. Con-
tributing to this dual perspective of ours is the feeling, at first gradual

23Doing harm to innocents is a conventional means of causing an audience to withdraw

its sympathy from the leading character: we recoil from the Herod who orders his knights
to slaughter the Innocents, from the Macbeth who orders his men to slaughter the wife
and child of Macduff. These men, like Faustus, feel no remorse, and so we wish them to
get what they deserve. With poetic justice, Faustus receives measure for measure-what
he called for in the case of the Old Man is what he himself suffers.
24By way of J. V. Cunningham's illuminating discussion of wonder in Woe or Wonder,
rpt. in Tradition and Poetic Structure (Denver, 196o), pp. 188-231, I noticed that Queen
Margaret's speech about Richard III invokes attitudes similar to those in Faustus: "But
at hand, at hand,/Ensues his piteous and unpitied end./Earth gapes, hell burns, fiends
roar, saints pray, / To have him suddenly convey'd from hence" (IV.iv.73-76).

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but then growing ever more insistent, that "this could be otherwise."25
Grace is made available again and again to Faustus, but each time he
spurns it. That even at the end of his twenty-four years an angel with a
vial of grace is hovering over this hollow man is cause for wonder at
God's mercy; that Faustus rejects God's grace is cause for wonder at his
"fiendfull fortune." Wonder, rather than sympathy, dominates the end
of the play. From the fully Christian view, Doctor Faustus is a tragedy
of needless loss.
More than a few critics, however, have argued that Faustus' fall em-
bodies an unresolved conflict between doctrinal orthodoxy and the real
thrust of the play. But it is doubtful that such a distinction between the
play's theological conception and its dramatic realization can be made
except by ignoring the full implications of its theological conception.
Faustus' character and his behavior are presented in theological terms;
the play shows us the spectacle of a sinful man gradually transformed
into a hardened sinner, and in working out Faustus' sins in terms of a
progressive committing of the six sins against the Holy Ghost, Marlowe
makes it clear that Faustus is a grievous sinner. Any one of the sins
against the Holy Ghost was held sufficient for damnation, and Faustus
commits not one but all six, and most of them not once but repeatedly.
Because of the magnitude of Faustus' sin, unremitted as it is by repent-
ance, the play can end with the unequivocal spectacle of Faustus suffer-
ing the tortures of the damned, the brilliantly dramatic outcome of his
theologically perverse actions. Far from there being a conflict between
doctrine and dramatic thrust in Doctor Faustus, doctrine underpins and
directs dramatic thrust. Only the failure to define accurately the doctrine
informing the dramatic action has made the two seem at odds.

25An extreme example of suspense gained by postponing repentance is Nathaniel

Woodes's The Conflict of Conscience, rpt. in Vol. VI of Robert Dodsley's A Select Col-
lection of Old English Plays, rev. W. C. Hazlett (London, 1874). Given the circum-
stances as he goes offstage for the last time, Philologus can either despair and hang him-
self or repent and live, and the suspense is only resolved by the entrance of Nuntius with
his joyful news. For an excellent study in relation to Faustus, see Lily B. Campbell,
"Doctor Faustus: A Case of Conscience," PMLA, LXVII (1952), 219-239.

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