"Othello" written by William Shakespeare play explores themes of jealousy, manipulation, betrayal

Doctor Faustus as a morality play and Christian Document".

The moral it was one of the early forms of drama. It developed out of the mystery and miracle plays and it flourished during the Middle Ages, attaining much popularity in the first half of the fifteenth century. The morality differed from the miracle play in that it was not concerned with presenting a biblical story with named characters, but was rather a play conveying a moral truth or lesson by means of personified abstractions. The morality at bottom dealt with some problem of good and evil.
   Doctor Faustus marks the culmination of the English morality tradition. As a morality, it vindicates humility, faith and obedience to the law of God. Indeed, an eminent critic has described this play as the most obvious Christian documents in all Elizabethan drama. Far from being iconoclastic, this play is wholly conventional in its Christian values and it enforces and illuminates the very basic tenets of Christianity. It preaches the basic Christian values and should therefore be regarded as a morality play.
    The basic beliefs of Christianity are inherent in every line of Doctor Faustus and the doctrine of domination pervades it. The devil and hell are omnipresent in this play and are terrifying realities. Faustus makes a bargain with the devil and for the sake of earthly leading, earthly power and earthly satisfaction goes down to horrible and everlasting prediction. The 'hero' is depicted as a wretched creature who for lower values gives up higher ones. Thus the drama is a morality play in which heaven struggles with hell for the soul of a renaissance "Everyman", who loses the battle on account of his psychological and moral weaknesses. It would be incorrect to treat Faustus as the noble victim of a tyrannical deity. On the contrary, God is exceedingly good in his gifts to the hero, until the latter becomes the victim of his own insatiable desires and even then God is willing to forgive if he repents. But Faustus intentionally refuses all aid and so goes down to domination. There is no ambiguity at all in the play on this main issue. Marlowe establishes the moral values of this play by various means. By the chorus, by Faustus's own recognition, by the good angel, by the old man, by the action itself and even by Mephistopheles. As an example of the pervasive Cristian view point, we also witness the deterioration and the coarsening of Faustus's character and his indulgence in cheap, sadistic fun.
   The prologue or first chorus, sets Faustus, his character and his doom before us in clear, emphatic terms. We are here told that Faustus, swollen with pride in his attainments, meets a sad end because he has preferred forbidden pursuits to the pursuit of salvation. Then, at the very beginning of Faustus's temptation, the good angel urges Faustus to lay aside the damned book of magic and to read  the scriptures. The good angel is the voice of God and the voice of Faustus's conscience. But Faustus listens to the evil angel, who is the emissary of lucifer and who encourages Faustus to continue his study of magic. The reward that he expects for practicing the forbidden black magic, is the world of "profit and delight, of power, of honor and omnipotence". But he will not only get knowledge and power, he also dwells longingly on the satisfaction of his material appetites. The spirits will bring him "gold", "orient pearl", "pleasent fruits", "princely delicates", and "silk". Faustus has intellectual pride to an odious degree, but he is also desirous of more vain glory. He recalls how he puzzled German priests by his clever expositions and he hopes to acquire the magic skill of Agrippa. Faustus is wholly egocentric. He speaks disparagingly of his opponents and relishes the inflated sense of his own abilities. Thus after Mephistopheles has left the stage in order to reappear in the shape of a friar, Faustus indulges in a delusion of self importance and says
                              How pliant is this Mephistopheles,
                              Full of obedience and humility!
                              Such is the force of magic and my spells: ( Act I, Scene III, Lines 29-31)
But Mephistopheles quickly disillusions him by saying that he has not appeared solely in response to Faustus's conjuring but that the Devils are always in search of those who can be won over to the side of lucifer. Faustus agree to worship belzebub "there is no chief but only belzebub". He says that he is not afraid of damnation and then goes on to ask questions about lucifer. Mephistopheles, in his answer anticipates Faustus's fall in lucifer's when he says that lucifer fell because of his "aspiring pride and insolence". But the foolhardy Faustus, through warned by the devil himself, reprimands Mephistopheles for cowardliness:
                   What, is great Mephistopheles so passionate
                   For being deprived of the joys of heaven?
                   Learn thou of Faustus's manly fortitude
                  And scorn those joys thou never shalt passess. (Act I, Scene III, Lines 102-103)
It would be wrong to regard the self-deluded, foolishly-boastful Faustus as a superman. We must not also forget what Faustus wants in return for selling his soul to the devil. He wants to live for twenty-four years "in all voluptuousness", to have Mephistophilis attend on him always, to bring him whatever he demands, and to tell him whatever he wants to know. Utter satisfaction of the will and utter satisfaction of the senses are what Faustus desires. And this man, who towards the end shudders and trembles with fear of his doom, now becomes eloquent at the prospect of what he hopes to get even though he is eventually to be damned:
Had I as many souls as there be stars,
I'd give them all for Mephistophilis.    (Act I, Scene III, Lines 102-103)
The next time we see Faustus, his emotional and intellectual instability is fully revealed. He wavers between God and the devil. At first he is conscience-stricken: "Now Faustus, must thou needs be damned, and canst thou not be saved." But in a moment he is once more the user of egocentric hyperbole:
The god thou servest is thine own appetite,
Wherein is fixed the love of Beelzebub
To him I will build an altar and a church
And offer lukewarm blood of new-born babes. (Act II, Scene I, Lines 11-14)
The struggle between Faustus's uncontrolled appetites and the powers of heaven continues. "The Good Angel and the Evil Angel re-appear, the former urging him to give up magic, and the latter encouraging him to "go forward in that famous art. Faustus has free will, free choice, and the ability to affirm or deny God. He cannot blame any one but himself for his act and its consequences. That is made clear by Faustus himself when, after his blood has congealed so that he cannot sign the document, he says that his soul is his own and that, therefore, he has every right to pledge it to the devil. After signing the document, Faustus says: "Conummatumest" (this is finished), which were the last words of Christ on earth according to the Gospel of St. John. Marlowe shows a great insight into the twisted mind of the magician by putting these blasphemous words in Faustus's mouth. Jesus died that Faustus's soul might live; Faustus flings away this priceless gift for certain material benefits and sensual pleasures. But the words are also true in a more literal sense: the good life, the possibility of reaching heaven, are indeed being finished for Faustus. Immediately afterwards, God's warning "Homo fuge" (man, fly) appears on Faustus's arm, and Faustus affirms the God whom he has just denied and gets into a turmoil of conflicting impulses:
Homo. fuge: whither should I fly?
If unto God, he'll throw me down to hell.
My senses are deceived; here's nothing writ:---
I see it plain; here in this place is writ
Homo, fuge: yet shall not Faustus fly.      (Act II, Scene I, Lines 77-80)
Thus Faustus consciously and deliberately sets his will against God's. But as he is in this state, Mephistophilis summons a few devils who offer crowns and rich garments to Faustus. In other words, Mephistophilis offers Faustus sensual satisfaction in order to distract his mind from spiritual concern (which might, of course, lead to repentance on his part). Whenever there is danger, from the devil's viewpoint that Faustus will turn to God's mercy, the powers of hell will deaden their victim's conscience by providing him with some satisfaction of the senses. But sometimes Faustus will ask for the opiate himself.
When Faustus says that he thinks hell to be a mere fable, Mephistophilis contradicts him by asserting that hell does exist. Faustus requests an opiate for his uncomfortable conscience by asking for a wife, "the fairest maid in Germany", and saying that he cannot live without a wife. Instead of giving him a proper wife, Mephistophilis promises to satisfy Faustus's appetite with beautiful courtesans.
In the scene (Act II, Scene ii) that follows, Faustus and Mephistophilis are again together. Faustus goes through another of his struggles between repentance and non-repentance. He blames Mephistophilis for his misery and says that "he will renounce this magic and repent". Thus Faustus does recognise that  repentance is still possible. And the Good Angel confirms Faustus's feeling by saying: Faustus, repent; yet God will pity thee". But continued exercise in sin is robbing Faustus of his will power. So he says: "My heart is hardened, I cannot repent." This, too, must be taken as an egocentric conclusion. He tells us that no sooner does he think of holy things, than all kinds of instruments of death are placed before him. And he says that he would have made use of these instruments—swords, knives, poison, guns, etc. —and killed himself if "sweet pleasure had not conqured deep despair". As has already been pointed out, sensuous pleasure is always Faustus's remedy for spiritual despair. Has he not made Homer and Amphion sing for him? And now the very thought of such pleasures drugs his conscience: "Why should I die then, or basely despair”?/T am resolved; Faustus shall never repent." In the latter part of the same scene (Act Il, Scene Il) Mephistophilis tells Faustus: "Think thou on hell, Faustus, for thou art damned". And Faustus once more characteristically blames Mephistophilis for his wretched condition; "'This thou hast damned distressed Faustus'soul". And so again Faustus is in spiritual distress. The Good Angel tells him that there is still time to repent. But the Evil Angel gives him the threat that, if he repents, devils will tear him to pieces. Faustus calls upon Christ to save his soul, whereupon Lucifer, Belzebub, and Mephistophilis appear. Lucifer reminds him of his promise, and the irresolute hedonist once more vows "never to name God, or to pray to him". Again the devil gets Faustus out of his melancholy by providing him with some satisfaction of the senses; this time it is the parade of the Seven Deadly Sins.
In Act IV, Scene IV, (the Horse-courser scene) Faustus is again shown in a state of spiritual distress, but still capable of rapid self-delusion: "What art thou, Faustus, but a man condemned to die?/ Despair doth drive distrust into my thoughts". But he consoles himself and falls asleep. In Act V, Scene I, we learn from Wagner that Faustus has made his will and "means to die shortly". But, says the puzzled servant, if death were near, Faustus would not eat, drink, and make merry with the students as he is doing. In other words, Faustus is still the incorrigible hedonist. The Scholars ask him to show them Helen of Troy. Mephistophilis brings in the peerless lady, and the Scholars are wonder struck by her beauty. The Scholars leave, and an Old Man enters. The Old Man begs Faustus, in moving words, to give up his wicked life. This means that Faustus is still capable of repentance, because otherwise there will be no point in the Old Man's exhortation. But Faustus now sees no hopes, and says: "Damned art thou, Faustus, damned; despair and die". Faustus completely misses the point of the Old Man's message, namely that no man's sins are too great for God to forgive. Faustus is about to kill himself with the dagger offered by Mephistophilis , but the Old Man stops him, saying that, if he avoids despair and seeks God’s mercy, he can yet look forward to divine grace. Faustus thanks the Old Man for his comforting words and asks to be left alone “to ponder on my sins”. But the Old Man, knowing how weak-minded Faustus is, leaves with a sorrowful heart “fearing the ruin of thy (Faustus’s) hopeless soul”. The Old Man is right in his fear because, after he leaves. Faustus undergoes an acute mental conflict which finds expression in the following words:
Accursed Faustus, where is mercy now?
I do repent: and yet I do despair:
Hell strives with grace for conquest in my breast:
What shall I do to shun the snares of death? (Act V, Scene I, Lines 63-66)
Hell strives against heaven, and despair strives against repentance. But as soon as Mephistophilis threatens to tear Faustus's flesh for disobedience to Lucifer, the weak-willed voluptuary quickly surrenders. Faustus now begs the devil’s pardon and offers to confirm with blood his former vow. Blaming the Old Man for his treason, he brutally begs Mephistophilis to torture the OId Man "with greatest torments that our hell affords."
Faustus now (in the same scene) asks Mephistophilis to bring Helen so that, by making love to her, he should be able to drive out from his mind any thoughts of revolt against Lucifer. In other words, he again seeks a drug (sensual pleasure) to deaden his spiritual instincts and the pangs of his conscience. For the sake of bodily pleasure, Faustus gives up the last possibility of redemption. And he aggravates his sin by making love to a succuba (the devil in female guise).
Nor should we ignore the exceedingly dramatic nature of Faustus's speech to the Scholars in Act V, Scene Ill: "But Faustus' offence can never be pardoned: the serpent that tempted Eve may be saved, but not Faustus......what wonders I have done, all Germany can witness, yea, all the world; for which Faustus hath lost both Germany and the world, yea, heaven itself." In this speech, too, Faustus remains the blatant egoist. In the midst of his self-reprocah, his basic vanity leaps forth: "What wonders have I done, all Germany can witness..... As he says later in the same scene, "for vain pleasures of twenty-four years hath Faustus lost eternal joy and felicity". Hei gave up higher values for lower. For small pleasures the voluptuary gave up greater pleasure. For those small pleasures, he must now endure all the horrible tortures of hell.
But there are also some silent protests against the official Christianity of the play. Theologically speaking. Helen of Troy is only a spirit who lures Faustus away from thoughts of repentance. Yet Faustus's passion for her glows with some of Marlowe's finest poetry. She is a symbol of the idea of beauty of ancient pagan Greece, which Marlowe loves so much. In the same way, all the meditations, the discontents, the high-soaring ambitions of Faustus in Act I are condemned by us as evil because they lead to Faustus's fall. Yet the poetry here too throbs with joy, and the ideas and emotions are the same as those which inspire Marlowe's other heroes, and were in all probability experienced by Marlowe himself.
However, it would be wrong to suppose that the highest poetry of the play is confined to passages of rebellion against Christianity. Surely there has seldom been a nobler expression of the sense of failure and the pain of everlasting damnation than Mephistophilis's lament in Act I, Scene Ill, Lines 78-84: "Why this is hell, nor am I out of it", etc. Equally eloquent are Mephistophilis's later words, in Act II, Scene I, Lines 122-24: "Hell hath no limits, nor is circumscribed in one self place", etc. In other words, while taking into account Marlowe's anti-Christian ideas, we should not fail to take into account the fact that thoughts of hell (meaning everlasting banishment from God) could cause much spiritual unrest to Marlowe.

Doctor Faustus as an allegory

      It is possible to treat Dr. Faustus as an allegory. A large measure of the action of the play takes place not so much between characters as within a single character, namely Faustus himself. We can look upon the good angel, the evil angel, the old man and even Helen, Mephistopheles, Lucifer as part of Faustus. Yet obviously these characters are not merely parts of Faustus. The two angels are messengers of powers of independent of Faustus, while Helen though a phantom is not just a figment of Faustus's imagination. Hence, although an allegory, the play does not altogether exclude realism or we might say that this allegory employs realism as an instrument. Marlowe choose certain characters who are capable of serving a double purpose. These character are significant as symbols, by virtue of what they symbolize, but they are significant also as themselves, by virtue of what they are. And they are not significant now as the one thing, now as the other, by a sort of alternation. But continuously and simultaneously as both.
        The good angel, for example, represent the principle of goodness, independent of Faustus in that this principle is not affected by whether Faustus is loyal to it or not. Faustus can neither increase nor diminish its perfection, nor can create or destroy it.
At the same time the good angel symbolises a part of Faustus's nature. Only by loyalty to this part of his nature can Faustus attain his own perfection and therefore peace, if disloyal, he is tormented by regret for the perfection he has missed. And thus a synthesis is suggested by the allegory, that Faustus's life, though single and indivisible, is both his own and not his own. In much the same way, Helen is the lust of the eyes and of the flesh, both as these are objects in an external world, other than Faustus and as they are his own passions, leading him to seek happiness within those objects, inevitably they are part of his living. But there is a sense in which he and Helen must be distinct. While the good angel, at least as substantial as Faustus could ensure a lasting happiness, the angel at least as substantial as Faustus could ensure a lasting happiness, the happiness offered by Helen can only be momentary for she is hardly substantial- she is a shade.
        The allegorical interpretation should not be limited to space but extended also to time. In other words just as the spatial distinction between Faustus and the good angel is accepted as a device, so also should the temporal separation between Faustus's death and his singing of the bond. The one event follows the other after a period of 24 years. This period is significant as itself, but it is symbolical also the moment of singing, which is the moment of his plunging to spiritual death. He kills his soul, which does not need 24 years to weaken or to wither. But as death, whether spiritual or physical, does not annihilate a soul, the consequences of singing the bond are not confined to a moment. Without the intervention of grace, the consequences will stretch through eternity and can therefore be represented, if at all only under some figure of time. And this is the purpose of the 24 years. Which as has been said are significant as themselves, but are so only that a single moment may be the more adequately symbolised.
        A recognition of both these allegories is necessary to make it possible for the reader to understand and enjoy the play fully.
If the allegories are not recognised various absurdities may arise. If for example, the two angels are accepted merely in their symbolical sense, as parts of Faustus, the are nothing but ideals or aspirations opposing one another within his brain. To one or other he must attach himself and the two must argue for his allegiance. If on the other hand, the Angel are accepted as at the same time Angels that is as representatives of certain principles recognised in a universe outside Faustus, it cannot appear doubtful even for a moment which of them should be followed. For Faustus is submitted to tha universe as creature, though a free one and it is precisely to express this submission that he is symbolised by the Angel at all. The sole problem, given the angel as an objective evil and an objective good, is not which of them ought to be followed, but which of them will be followed in fact and what the consequences will be.
             The consequences are for their fuller comprehension spread over 24 years. Faustus is allowed to explore evil with all patience and all diligence. During the whole of this period each of the Angel continues in his double role, as part of Faustus, expressing his pre-occupations and as external agent, either encouraging those pre-occupations or seeking to end them. In both these roles, the evil Angel are inevitably more prominent in the earlier scenes. Evil is a new toy and Faustus cannot resist any invitations to evil that he may receive. Once Faustus has chosen evil, he has neither eyes nor ears except for the immediate advantages of having done so.
           The gifts of the devil, however neither satisfy nor last. Power and wealth, all that Faustus hitherto has obtained, are not in themselves either bad or good and so long as they are contemplated only, he need not be disturbed. But once the attempt is made to use them, disillusion begins. In his inexperience he thinks that, having sold himself to the devil, he will be allowed to retain some part of his integrity, to seize the opportunity, for example, of new found wealth to set up an orderly household. Therefore he asks for a wife and one is brought. But she proves to be an ugly devil. "A plague on her”, he cries, and must henceforth content himself with mistresses. His fleshly desires are thus satisfied, but the result is that his spiritual desires, as they are the more isolated, become the more insistent. The devil, having already supplied a book of spells, of planets, and of herbs, is summoned to discuss "divine astrology. The joy of learning, however, is no more permissible to Faustus than that of domestic bliss; for if pursued in due order and in the proper temper, it can lead to one thing only-the knowledge, the love, and ultimately the vision of God. And all these, along with goodness, he has renounced. When he asks: "Tell me who made the world", Mephistophilis refuses to answer. The whole economy of hell is disturbed; Lucifer appears with his companion-prince, Belzebub, and demands obedience. As a substitute for the vision of God, Lucifer shows him the Seven Deadly Sins, and at the end of the parade Faustus says: "O, this feeds my soul'. Then he goes on to express a desire to see hell and return:" might I see hell, and return again. How happy were I then ! "At this point he has fallen a victim to the vice of curiosity. The Seven Deadly Sins do not move him as they would move an ordinary man, and as a man should be moved. Faustus has begun to collect sensations without judgment and without order, not as an aid to right living but merely for their own sake. And the further descent from curiosity of the senses to that of the intellect is easy. No longer able to establish a contact with God, Faustus is now better qualified to tease Popes, oblige Duchesses, and entertain Emperors. The eternal, which Faustus neglects, cannot but avenge itself. By the choice of evil Faustus has forfeited not only spiritual but physical integrity, such as in the allegory is destroyed by the passage of time. The Old Man reminds him of this. He is seized with fury against an agent of good, and asks for him to be tormented. But in vain, for Mephistophilis is powerless against one who, unlike Faustus, has laid fast hold on the eternal. The Old Man will “fly unto his God", Faustus, on the contrary, has nowhere to fly but to what remains of his youth; the more fleeting as youth itself is a shadow. He begs Helen to make him immortal with a kiss, meaning thereby not that he himself (for to his misfortune, he is immortal already), but that what remains of youth, the present moment, shall not pass away. By the nature of things, this is Impossible. The twenty-four years draw to a close and before the allegory ends the last gift of the Evil Angel (namely, Helen) has already crumbled in his hands.
 
As the attractiveness of evil gradually declines, that of goodness grows. Accordingly the more prominent role which in the earlier scenes fell to the Evil Angel, is in the latter assumed by the Good Angel and his associates: the Old Man and Faustus’s own conscience. Speaking to the Scholars, Faustus laments: “What wonders have I done, all Germany can witness, yea, all the world; for which Faustus hath lost both Germany and the world, yea, heaven itself; and must remain in hell for ever!....for vain pleasure of twenty-four years hath Faustus lost eternal joy and felicity. " The Good Angel wins after all; for he or his allies speak last and, in an argument, he who speaks last wins.
 
It would be wrong to say that Faustus is brow-beaten by the devil and forbidden to repent. Faustus has identified himself with the devil as far as he possibly can; and he has done so, not by brow-beatings and threats so much as by his own free will. The devils have an affection to evil; they have so formed or de-formed themselves that they can desire only what brings them misery. Had they, for example, the opportunity to escape from hell, they would not utilize it, even though hell is a place only of suffering. A similar state of disorder exists in Faustus's soul. It is not only Lucifer who drags a reluctant Faustus from thoughts of heaven. Faustus also drags himself. For Lucifer, like the Good Angel, is here playing a double role: he is devil, but also he is part of Faustus's nature. Faustus is thus agent as well as victim in his own torment. We should not therefore question Faustus's moral freedom. It is not, for example, only Lucifer and Belzebub who forbid him to continue the study of "astrology"; it is his own evil will which has already determined not to embrace the truths to which astrology is leading.
 
The allegory in this play is, because of its complication, more than an allegory. One picture is not substituted for and therefore weakened by another: two pictures are retained, to give each other strength. Faustus suffers not merely as though he were struggling with an outside enemy, but he does have such an enemy; not merely as though he were torn within, but he is so torn. Against Lucifer he must struggle with the persistence called for against himself; and against himself he must struggle with the violence for which Lucifer calls. The whole of his strength seems to lie on both sides of the struggle and therefore he is indeed, as he says, torn as by devils. But he has an affection for the devils which tears equally. The temporal allegory is effective in a similar way. We must conceive of pain or sorrow persisting at its acutest only in the hope that one day it will cease; otherwise it must either blunt itself, or wear out its possessor. As he is alive, Faustus has hope and therefore pain of this intensity. But at the same time, he has no hope, for he is already dead. This is not to say that he unites contradictories in himself, as life and death, but that he must be conceived as continuing after death to suffer the utmost that he has even suffered in life.
 
It should be further noted that the allegories not only provide material and machinery for the body of the play, but shape it. The play begins with a monologue, for example, and ends with one. As Faustus alone can commit the act for which he is to be punished, he enters alone to commit it so that responsibility shall be clear. He alone can endure the punishment, and is therefore left alone to meet it. But between these two points the stage is crowded with figure who, if they cannot commit an act, may influence the act; or if not influence, may be influenced by it, in order more fully to exhibit its nature and its workings. Only towards the end the stage thins out, and Faustus is left alone with the Scholars. The Scholars are little more than conveniences, to allow him to soliloquize in public. Similarly with the  allegory of time. In the body of the play scene succeeds scene, not indeed in any order, but in one which is more of psychological than chronological significance. "They illustrate the possibly simultaneous aspects of a man's state of soul, rather than events in his history. But towards the end, references to time begin to multiply. In the final monologue a clock is on the stage, and Faustus's imagery. now seeking to halt time, now yielding to it in despair, only succeeds in making it fly the faster. The general effect of this is that he seems to be rushing upon his doom. And very much the same effect results from the opening monologue, in which he rushes on the act from which the doom proceeds. From the one, as the consequences of an act committed in it, the whole play issues; into the other, where the consequences are resumed, the whole play is absorbed. There is, however, more; according to one sensei of the temporal allegory both points are the same, for the consequence follow immediately upon the act. And thus the play is not only symmetrical; it has the. form of a closed circle: it ends where it begins; it leaves Faustus  where and as it found him.

Doctor Faustus has a beginning and an end but no "middle”

Doctor Faustus has often been criticized as regards its construction or structure. It is said that this play has a beginning and an end, but no "middle". In other words, between the beginning of this play and its end very little of real importance happens. Very early in the play the learned Doctor makes his decision to sell his soul to the devil. At the end, the devil comes to take away Faustus's soul. In the interval between these two events, there seems to be little for Faustus to do except to fill in the time. If the consequence of Faustus's bargain is inevitable, and if nothing can be done to alter it, then it does not much matter how the intervening time is spent. The author may in that case fill the intervening time with as much comedy and farce as the taste of the audience and its patience in sitting through the play will permit. If
Doctor Faustus is a play about knowledge, about the relation of a man's knowledge of the world to his knowledge of himself, or about knowledge of means and its relation to knowledge of ends. It is a play that reflects the interests of the Renaissance (and it even looks forward to the issues of the modern day). Faustus is dissatisfied and even bored with the study of ethics, divinity, and metaphysics.What has
captured his imagination is magic, the kind of knowledge that brings him power and that promises a world of profit, delight, and honour. Faustus's experiments with the knowledge that he acquires through magic bring him, again and again, up against knowledge of a more ultimate kind. For example, as soon as Faustus has signed the contract with the devil and has gained his new knowledge, his first question to Mephistophilis is concerned with the nature of the place to which he has finally to go. He asks Mephistophilis: "where is the place that men call hell? "Mephistophilis explodes any notion of a local hell, and defines hell as a state of mind. Faustus does not believe this information though it comes from the horse's very mouth. Thus he refuses to accept the first fruits of his new i knowledge. He had already come to the conclusion that stories of hell were merely "old wives' tales". Yet when Mephistophilis says that he is "an instance to prove the contrary" adding that "T am damned, and am now in hell", Faustus cannot comprehend this notion and says: "How ? now in hell ! Nay/An this be hell, I'll willingly be damned".

there is a "middle" in this play (and by a "middle" is meant that part of the play in which the character of Faustus becomes something quite different from the man whom we first meet) then that middle has to be sought in those scenes which reveal Faustus's personal self-examination and his inner conflict. A scrutiny of the play will show that the play does have a sufficient "middle". Faustus constantly re-affirms at deeper and deeper levels his original rash surrender of his soul to Lucifer. He suffers deeply while doing so, but his suffering is not meaningless. This suffering leads to knowledge "knowledge which Adam acquires in Milton's Paradise Lost). Early in the play, in reply to Faustus's remark: "I think hell's a fable", Mephistophilis says: "Think so still, till experience change thy mind" (Act II, Scene I, Lines 123-24). Perhaps the best way to describe the middle of the play is to say that the middle consists of the experiences that bring about a change in Faustus's mind so that in the end he knows what hell is and, finding himself truly damned, he feels genuinely terrified.

The new knowledge of Faustus proves unsatisfactory in other ways also. For instance, when Mephistophilis has given Faustus a book containing all the information about the stars and planets, plants and herbs, and so on, Faustus says: "When I behold the heavens, then I repent... Because thou hast deprived me of those joys." Mephistophilis manages to divert Faustus from ideas of repentance, but soon Faustus is once more making inquiries about the stars and planets; and again Faustus asks a more ultimate question: "Tell me who made the world."
 Thus technical questions about how Nature works have a tendency to raise the larger questions of the Creator and the purpose of the Creation. Faustus cannot be content with the mere workings of the machinery of the universe; he must push on to ask about ultimate purposes. Knowledge of means cannot be isolated from knowledge of ends. And Faustus's newly a acquired knowledge cannot give him answers different from those he already knew before signing the contract with devil. Indeed, his plight is that he cannot find anything to do really worthy of the supernatural powers that he has acquired. He evidently does not want to wall all Germany with brass, or make the swift Rhine circle the fair city of Wittenberg* (Act I, Scene I, Lines 86-87). Nor does he chase the Prince of Parma from Germany.** (Act I, Scene I, Line 91) Instead, he plays tricks on the Pope, or stages magical shows for the Emperor. When he summons, at the Emperor's request, Alexander the Great and his paramour (Thais), Faustus is careful to explain that the Emperor will not be seeing "the true substantial bodies of those two deceased princes which long since are consumed to dust." The illusion is certainly life-like, but even so Alexander and his paramour are no more than apparitions. This magical world lacks substance.

It may be that Marlowe is not answerable for some of the scenes that were inserted into the middle of the play. Yet to judge only from the scenes admitted to be Marlowe's and from the ending that Marlowe devised for the play, it is inconceivable that Faustus should ever have carried out the grandiose plans which he mentions in the beginning (Act l, Scene IV, Lines 104-09)-such matters as making a bridge through the moving air so that bands of men can pass over the ocean, or joining the hills that bind the African shore to those of Spain. Faustus's basic motivation ensures that the power he has gained will be used for what are finally frivolous purposes. (His basic motivation is his desire for self-aggrandisement).
If we assume that Faustus is doomed once he has signed the contract with the devil, then there is no further significant action that he can perform and the rest of the play will not have any dramatic quality. Whether the case of Faustus becomes hopeless early in the play (that is, immediately after the bond has been signed) is then a matter of real importance. On a purely legalistic basis of course, Faustus's case is certainly hopeless. He has signed a contract and must abide by it. This is the point that the devils insist on most firmly. Yet there are plenty of indications that Faustus was not the prisoner of one fatal act, namely his signing the contract. For instance, after Faustus has signed the bond, the Good Angel reappears and urges Faustus to repent. The Evil Angel, it is true, appears along with him to insist that repentance will be of no avail. But then the Evil Angel has appeared along with the Good in the earlier appearance also. This is not all. The devils, in spite of the contract, are evidently not at all sure of the soul of Faustus. They find it again and again necessary to argue with him to bully him, and to threaten him. Mephistophilis considers it very important to distract Faustus from his depressing thoughts. There is never any assumption in the play that the bond itself is quite sufficient to ensure Faustus's damnation. At least once, Lucifer himself has to be called to make sure that Faustus will not escape. When Faustus in a state of despair, is ready to commit suicide with the dagger offered to him by Mephistopholis (who feels happy to make sure in this way, of Faustus’s damnation), the Old Man persuades Faustus to desist from such a course.

the Old Man has faith that Faustus can still be saved and points to the presence of an angel waiting with a vial full of precious grace "ready to pour" it into Faustus's soul. Faustus, indeed, desists from committing suicide though he continuous to be in a state of despair and says: "Hell strives with grace for conquest in my breast", whereupon Mephistophilis calls him a traitor for being disobedient to Lucifer and threatens to tear his flesh piece-meal. The threat serves its purpose. A moment before, Faustus had addressed the old Man as "my sweet friend" . Now in a sudden reversal, he addresses the devil as " sweet Mephistophillis" and asks him to inflict on the old Man the "greatest torments that our hell affords." Faustus now thinks of hell a "our hell". This and his desire to see the Old Man suffer, surely mark a new stage in the moral deterioration of Faustus who has now become a member of the devil's party.
Furthermore he now seeks greater distractions and more powerful narcotics than he had required before. On a previous occasion, it was enough for Faustus to call up the vision of Helen. Now he needs to possess her. And if this final abandonment to sensual delight becomes the occasion for the most celebrated poetry in the play, that poetry thoroughly suggests the desperation of Faustus's plight. If the two opening lines of Faustus's famous speech here describe the transcendent power of a beauty that could command the allegiance of thousands, they also refer to the destructive fie that she set alight, and perhaps hint at the hell-fire that now burns for Faustus.

Faustus is the prisoner of his own conceptions and indeed preconceptions. He trapped in his own legalism. If the devils insist that  a promise is a promise and a bond is a bond that has to be honored, Faustus himself is convinced that this is true (even though the devils themselves are far from sure that the bond has effectively put Faustus's soul in their possession). Apparently, Faustus can believe in and understand a God of justice, but not a God of mercy. If Faustus's self-knowledge makes him say (in Act II, Scene II, Line 18): "My heart's so hardened, I cannot repent", his sense of legal obligation makes him say (Act V, Scene I, Lines 50-52): "Hell calls for right and with a roaring voice/Says, "Faustus come, thine hour is almost come/And Faustus now will come to do thee right". Even at this point the Old Man thinks that Faustus can still be saved. (An Angel has come with a "vial full of precious grace"). The devils themselves would seem to fear that Faustus even at the last moment might escape them: but Faustus himself is convinced that he cannot be saved and his despair effectively prevents any action which would allow him a way out. (Thus in one sense, this play is a study in despair. But the despair does not paralyse the imagination of Faustus. He knows constantly what is happening to him).
We may therefore ask whether the changes that occur in Faustus's soul between the singing of the the bond and his final damnation are sufficient to constitute a middle. The answer to this question would be "yes". 

The comic and farcical scene in Doctor Faustus

Before we discuss the appropriateness or otherwise of the comic and farcical scene in Doctor Faustus, a brief examination of these scenes is necessary. The first comic scene (Act I, Scene II) takes place between Wagner and two Scholars. Wagner here parodies the process of reasoning adopted by Scholars whose discussions he has often heard at his master’s house. While the Scholars have asked an innocent question as to the whereabouts of Faustus, Wagner tries to puzzle them by his answer. It is quite amusing to hear him refer to his master’s being corpus naturale  and he possibility of his having moved away from the place where he was

a little while ago. He refers to the dining-hall as the “place of execution”, and playing upon the word “execution” he expects to see the two Scholars “hanged at the next session” of the court. He then inform the Scholars that his master is at dinner with Valdes and Cornelius, “as this wine, if it could speak, would inform your worships”. There can be no doubt Wagner’s ready wit which has undoubtedly been sharpened by his having been in the service of a great scholar at whose house he must have been overhearing learned discussion of various subjects.
offer of a few coins, because he would not like to become Wagner’s slave. Wagner, however, summons two devils and frightens the clown into total submission, through only a moment ago the clown was boastfully threatening to kill one of the devils in order to make a reputation as a “kill-devil”.it is amusing to witness the clown’s fear at the appearance of the two devils, and his uttering a curse on them after they are gone. It is amusing also to hear him wishing to be changed into a flea in order that he may be able to tickle the pretty women. This scene, it must be admitted, offers good fun.   
to have any parents. Covetousness would like the house and all the people in it to be turned into gold. Wrath wounds himself with his daggers when there is nobody else to attack. Envy is “begotten of a chimney-sweeper and an oyster-wife”. Gluttony has bacon, herring, beef, claret and beer as his ancestors. The parade of the Seven Deadly Sins “feeds” Faustus’s soul and it would certainly evoke laughter from the audience.
Pope will now excommunicate him, Faustus contemptuously laughs away the ritual of excommunication. The next scenes (Act IV, Scene I and II) show us Robin and Ralph, the two ostlers. Robin is performing magic on the basis of what he has learnt from Faustus’s books, and he offers not only free spiced wine to his friend Ralph, but also the kitchen-maid in case Ralph is interested in making love to her. The two of them then befool an innkeeper whose silver wine-cup they have stolen. After they have been searched by the innkeeper, Robin summons Mephistophilis in order to teach the innkeeper a lesson. Mephistophilis feels annoyed with the two “slaves” who have brought him all the way from Constantinople, whereupon Robin offers him six-pence as compensation. Mephistophilis, in his irritation, changes Robin into an ape and Ralph into a dog.
towards him. Faustus removes the horns at the request of the Emperor, but warns the Knight to be more respectful to scholars in future.
The horse-courser’s pulling off Faustus’s leg and his having to pay another sum of forty dollars as compensation to “Doctor Faustus”. This is the least satisfactory of all the scenes, in so far as it is sheer foolery, buffoonery and house-play.
The fun here is the crudest and we revolt against this sort of thing.
  
It may be pointed out that, according to a general belief, most of these comic and farcical scene were written not by Marlowe himself, but by a collaborator. The collaborator has even been identified as Samuel Rowley. The responsibility for the dull coarseness of these scenes does not therefore rest upon Marlowe. They seem to have been written to order by a literary hack in order to satisfy the taste of the “groundlings”. Such scenes were very popular with Elizabethan audiences and were part of the regular stock-in-trade of the
theatrical companies. The sophisticated audiences of today will not find these scene entertaining, but the Elizabethan audiences derived much entertainment from comedy of this kind.
Even Shakespeare introduced some comic elements into his tragic plays. The reason for his doing so was not only to please the audiences of the time but also to relive the tension built up by the tragic scene. In order words, even from the dramatic point of view, comic elements do serve a useful psychological purpose in a tragic play. The tension in Doctor Faustus is built up by the acute and sometimes agonizing, metal conflict that the hero undergoes. To relieve that tension, a comic scene here and there would, fro the psychological point of view, be permissible. But in this play we have too many comic scenes which not only relieve the dramatic tension but have the effect of considerably diminishing and diluting the tragic effect. In other words, the abundance of the comic
scenes here weakens the dramatic quality. Apart from this, these comic scenes, as has already been indicated above, are not upto the mark. Here and there we do come across a good joke as, far instance, when Wagner tries to embarrass the scholars and as when Mephistophilis is offered six-pence as compensation for the long journey that he has undertaken in order to come in response to the summons of Robin and Ralph. The parade of the Seven Deadly Sins may also be justified as a survival of a feature that was common in the Morality type of play. But the rest of the fun, such as the harassment of the Pope and the practical jokes played on the horse-courser, is sheer clownage and unworthy of a great and somber play such as Doctor Faustus. 
“fair Wittenberg”, to chase away the Prince of Parma from his “land’, to make a bridge “through the moving air” and so on. But now Faustus revels in childish pranks such as snatching away dishes from the Pope’s hands and cheating a horse-courser  of money. These comic scenes (Act III, Scene I and Act IV, Scene I, II, IV), then, are useful in giving us an insight into the intellectual declines of Faustus. We get the feeling that, under the effect of unholy practices, an individual tends to lose his dignity and to find pleasure in crude forms of recreation of pastime.
the various comic scenes serve to fill the interval between Faustus’s attainment of magic powers and the damnation which overtakes him after a period of twenty-four years. However as has aptly been said, it was not necessary to fill interval with scene which might bore and irk the audience.

The next comic scene (Act I, Scene IV) pertains to Wagner and the clown. Wagner wishes to engage the clown his servant and referring to the poverty and the need of the clown, says that the clown is so hungry that “he would give his soul to the devil for a shoulder of mutton, through it were blood-raw”. The clown is not utterly stupid and so he refuses to accept such a proposition. If he must give his soul to the devil for the sake of food, he will insist on the mutton being “well roasted” and being served “with good sauce”. The clown, we gleefully tell ourselves, knows the value of his soul and would not part with it at a low price! Likewise, the clown declines Wagner’s
 

The next comic scene is th interrogation of the Seven Deadly Sins by Faustus (in Act II, Scene II). The various Sins do certainly amuse us by the manner in which they describe their respective characteristics. Pride “disdains”
 

The comic scene that follow are most unsatisfactory. There the comedy degenerates into farce. The humor there is crude and almost vulgar. We revolt against these scenes and can only console ourselves by the thought that Marlowe himself did not write them. Among these scenes, the first is Faustus’s harassment of the Pope (in Act III, Scene I), when, having been rendered invisible by Mephistophilis, he snatches the dishes and drinks from the Pope’s hands and eventually hits him on the ear. When told by Mephistophilis that the
 

In Act IV, Scene III, we have a touch of comedy when Faustus makes a pair of horns grow on the head of a Knight who has been insolent
 

Lastly, there is scene (Act IV, Scene IV) of Faustus’s dealings with a horse-courser. The humour here arises from

(a)    The manner in which a horse is sold of the Horse-courser for forty dollars

(b)   Faustus’s dismissal of the horse-courser with the words: “Away, you villain! What, dost think I am a horse-doctor?”

(c)    The hourse-courser’s account of how he rode upon the horse into a pond of water, how the horse just vanished and how he found himself sitting on a bundle of hay.

It is possible to argue that the comic scene in which Faustus himself figures were meant to emphasize the deterioration in the character of the hero. This Faustus is different from the Faustus of the earlier scenes. When Faustus was yet considering how he would use his magic powers, he spoke of grandiose schemes: he wanted to wall all Germany with brass, to make the Rhine “circle”
 

One other purpose served by these comic scenes may also be pointed out. Wagner and Robin, who make use of Faustus’s books of magic, burlesque Faustus’s own conjuring and his magical performances. The scenes pertaining to these two men are, therefore, a kind of an under-plot parodying the main plot which deals with the hero, Faustus. In  addition to all this, one may also argue that
 

It is also noteworthy that, in the Prologue to Tamburlaine, Marlowe had declared his rejection of buffoonery and clowning as being unfit for the kind of drama that he proposed to write. What he said in that Prologue merely confirms the general view that Marlowe could not have written these scenes himself.

The tragedy in Doctor Faustus

We first see Faustus at the peak of his worldly career. He is already master of all the existing knowledge and skills. He is a famous physician, honored by whole cities and held in reverence by his students. Why, then did he become restless? Why was he unwilling to remain "but Faustus, and a man"? (Act I, Scene I, Line 23). Why did he feel an urge to command "all things that move between the quiet poles"? (Act I, Scene I, Line 54). It is because a tragic hero feels the compulsion to realize himself fully in the face of all the odds, and that the test of his heroism is the degree of the risk he is willing to take. In this sense, the tragedy of Faustus is the tragedy of Adam. To Adam, paradise was not enough. He sought knowledge, and this was a forward step in the direction of self-realization. To the orthodox people, Adam's action is surely sinful, just as Faustus's action is wholly devilish in the eyes of the Chorus who opens and closes the play. Faustus's opening soliloquy also represents his action as sinful because, after he has dismissed all studies but necromancy (which he thinks to be the key to his self realization), the Good Angel tells him to put aside the damned book of magic, while the Evil Angel urges him to go forward in that famous art.
 
Marlowe sees the whole case not only as Good or Evil would see it but as it would be seen by a man of flesh and blood, the man who takes the risk and Is prepared to face the consequences. The meaning of the play is not only that Faustus's act was sinful and foolish. The meaning is in all that Faustus says, does, and becomes. The meaning is the total yield of the situation into which Faustus walks of his own free will, in accordance with the mysterious, tragic urge of his times. Faustus's first move after deciding upon necromancy as the field of his research is one of arrogant and impatient lust for power. Marlowe sets his hero's mind completely free to range forbidden realms (Act l, Scene I, Lines 51-61). Faustus's words here give a marvelous expression to the external elements of the Renaissance. "How am I glutted with conceit of this (Act I, Scene I, Line 76)!" cries Faustus, as he gloats over the power which he expects to acquire through magic. It is true that he speaks in a random manner here, and his desires grow fantastic and vainglorious. But his absurd egotism is mixed with intellectual and humanitarian impulses. He would resolve all ambiguities, read strange philosophy, rid his country of the foreign domination and fortify It with a wall of brass, clothe the schoolboys in silk. When Valdes warns him that he must be resolute, Faustus's courage is tested and he responds like a hero: "Valdes, as resolute am I in this /As thou to live:". He is prepared, at the end of Act I, Scene I, to take the ultimate risk: "This night I'll conjure, though I die therefore". Later, in Act I. Scene Ill, he rebukes the Devil's own messenger. Mephistophilis, whose heart faints as he anticipates Faustus's awful fate. Faustus here speaks of his own "manly fortitude", he scorns Mephistophilis’s warning; he rejects all hope or heavenly joys; and he offers his soul to Lucifer for twenty-four years of his heart's desires. With this decision come new energy, new power, new command. In Act Il, Scene Faustus ridicules such notions as hell and damnation. He is elated with the success of his first conjuring (in Act I, Scene IIl).
 
By the time of his second conjuring (Act Il, Scene I), even before the signing of the bond, he confesses doubts. "Something sounds in mine ears: Abjure this magic, turn to God again!", he says. And he asks himself why he is wavering. He feels like turning to God again, but thinks that God does not love him. In this dialogue with the Good and Evil Angels, immediately following, the tone in which he speaks of "contrition, prayer, repentance" is hesitant and uncertain. "Sweet Faustus...” pleads the Good Angel, and Faustus seems for a moment to yield, only to revert to his ungodly ways by the Evil Angel's reminder of the "honor" and the "wealth" which now lie within his power. But the doubts will not vanish, and Faustus lives out his twenty-four years as the first modern tragic man, part believer, part unbeliever, wavering between independence, and dependence upon God, now arrogant and confident, now anxious and worried, justified yet horribly unjustified.
 
Faustus is forced constantly to renew his choice between two alternatives. In contrasted moods, he sees greater heights, and he experiences greater terror. Soon the gentle voice that sounded in his ears, urging him to give up his magic and return to God, takes the shape of "fearful echoes" thundering in his ears: "Faustus, thou art damned" (Act II, Scene II, Lines 20-21). What he is learning is the truth of his own nature, that he is a creature as well as a creator, a man and not a god, a dependent and a responsible part of a greater whole. He learns that his soul is not a mere trifle which he can use as a commodity, and that contrition, prayer, repentance, hell, and damnation are not just "illusions" (as the Evil Angel told him).
 
Between the high-soaring scholar of the first scene and the agonized figure of the final scene, there is a notable difference. In the final scene.  Faustus enters with the Scholars, and for the first time in the play he has normal, compassionate discourse with his fellows. His role of demi-god is over; he is human once more, a friend and befriended. "Ah, gentlemen, hear me with patience, says he who had been only recently acting as if he were the lord of all creation. His friends now seem more “sweet” (he uses this word thrice for theme) than any “princely delicate”, or the “Signiory of Emden”. Although the thrill of his exploits still lingers (in his recollection of “the wonders he has done”), he is humble and repentant. He longs to weep and pray but finds himself prevented by the devils from doing so. He confesses to the Scholars the cause of all his misery. Knowing his doom is near, he refuses their help and asks them not to talk to him but save themselves and depart. They retire, leaving him to meet his fate alone.
 
Faustus reaches levels of perception never gained by less venturesome individuals. He must see things with his own eyes. He does not want so mush what power can bring: he never takes the Signiory of Emden, never builds a brass wall around Germany, never clothes the school-boys in silk. He wants what all men, good and bad, have wanted. He wants to conquer time, space, and ignorance. Above all, he wants knowledge: What is hell? Where is it? Who made the world? He wants to know everything about "the plants, the herbs, the trees that grow upon the earth". "He explores this world and also the regions above this world; he tries to understand the secrets of the heavens. He digs into the past, making blind Homer sing to him, and Amphion play the harp for him. What Marlowe dramatises is not only the terror of the black art as the old legend told about it, but the wonder of it, the wonder of the man who dared to use the black art and the wonder of the mysteries it reveals. But" the play also points to the peculiar dilemma of modern times. On the one hand is human limitation; on the other is the compulsion of the modern man to deny his limitations, and to press ever further into the mysteries of a universe which appears steadily to yield more and more of its secrets to his enquiring mind. 'To rest content with his limitations would mean that he refuses to make the fullest use of his own God-given powers; yet to explore the mysteries of the universe is somehow evil and may bring not only the present suffering but the horrors of eternity'". 
In his last despairing moments, Faustus asks why he was not born a creature lacking in a soul, or why his soul had to be immortal. Medieval theology held that man is because he believes. To this the answer of the Renaissance was that man is because he thinks and acts and discovers. Neither view, as Marlowe presents Faustus's dilemma, is wholly right or wholly wrong. In the world of tragedy, the hero can only take the road of experiment. He must follow his bent, take action, and live it through.

Doctor Faustus is a great work, it is also a flawed one"

Doctor Faustus is recognised as one of the masterpieces of English drama. There can, therefore, be no doubt as to the greatness of this work. Its stronger point, of course, is the characterisation of the tragic hero himself. The tragic hero is Doctor Faustus, a man of great learning and scholarship who barters away his soul to the devil for twenty-four years of omnipotence and pleasure. The character of Faustus has skilfully been delineated. The author successfully brings into focus both the high and the low sides of Faustus's character. According to Hazlitt, the character of Faustus in this play is a rude sketch, but a gigantic one. Hazlitt regards Faustus as a personification of the pride of will and eagerness of curiosity. Faustus is devoured by a tormenting desire to enlarge his knowledge to the utmost bounds, and to extend his power with his knowledge. To attain this purpose, Faustus defies all moral consequences and allies himself with the devil. It is to be noted, however, that Faustus gets very little in return for the damnation to which he has agreed. He never becomes a real boss of Mephistophilis who has sworn to serve him. After a brief pursuit of knowledge, he employs Mephistophilis for mere frivolous uses. He does gather some knowledge about heaven, and earth, and astronomy in general, but soon he devotes himself to mere trifles and childish pastimes. It is also to be noted that Faustus does not entirely give himself over to the devil because the desire to turn to God does not become totally defunct in him. Marlowe depicts a painful mental conflict which Faustus experiences throughout the period during which he practises magic. The portrayal of this conflict shows Marlowe's understanding of the psychology of a noble-minded individual who falls a victim to an irresistible temptation. The quality for which we admire and respect Faustus most is his scholarship and learning, his mastery over different branches of study such as logic, theology, and medicine. His decision to study necromancy and practise magic is merely an extension (though an impious extension) of that same tendency which in the earlier stages led him to master other fields of learning. In depicting Faustus, Marlowe has given us a portrait of a typical man of the Renaissance. Faustus is a martyr to everything that the Renaissance valued-power, curious knowledge, enterprise, wealth and beauty. The Evil Angel appeals to the ambitions and aspirations of a youthful mind that would make trial of the world. No wonder that Faustus cannot resist the Evil Angel's suggestion. Most of us would like Faustus for his love of life, his love of knowledge, his self-confidence, and his enthusiasm for beauty, and we would feel sorry for the fate that overtakes him. There is no doubt that Faustus is truly a tragic hero, in spite of the fact that some critics refuse to believe that there is anything heroic about him. Faustus's heroic quality consists in his desire for boundless knowledge, and unlimited power. That he attains boundless knowledge and unlimited power through impious means, that is, through his alliance with the devil, is true. But therein precisely lies the weakness or error or vice which causes his downfall. A tragic hero is a high-minded individual who meets a sad fate because of some weakness of character. By this test, Faustus is surely a tragic hero. He is intellectually a genius. His ultimate fate undoubtedly arouses the feelings of pity and horror in the audience. He experiences an acute mental conflict throughout his twenty-four years of power and pleasure. He is capable of tender human relationships. If he is a criminal, he is continually troubled by his criminal acts and by a desire for repentance. It would be wrong not to give him the status of a tragic hero. His extraordinary, almost superhuman learning and scholarship, and the sympathy which he wins, are enough to raise him to that position.

It is part of Marlowe's art to have presented the character of Faustus differently from the Faustus of the old legend. The old legend, as found in the German Faust-buch, was a commonplace tale of magic in which Faustus was depicted merely as an example of wickedness, as a cunning sorcerer who met a richly deserved end. There was no hint of sympathy for Faustus in the narrator's attitude. The appeal of the story, apart from its sensational elements and its farcical comedy, was that of a religious tract. But Marlowe has felt and conveyed the sense of tragedy in Faustus's aspirations and downfall. In the hands of Marlowe, Faustus acquires a spiritual greatness which, in the finest moments of the play, wins him our sympathy, and at his death arouses that pity and terror which great tragedy demands. 

Also, the play, as written by Marlowe, becomes one of the noblest expressions of the Renaissance genius and of Marlowe's own temperament. We see Faustus as a symbol of Marlowe's times when fresh wonders of the mind and of the world were being discovered and people's hopes of the attainable were full of ardour. "The mingled stuff of his dreams, his equal ecstasy in things of the senses and of the spirit, in riches and power, in the songs of blind Homer and in Helen's beauty, stamp him clearly as of the Elizabethan Renaissance."

The outstanding scenes of the play are also examples of Marlowe's power of transforming the original material. These scenes are the summoning of Mephistophilis, the signing of the contract, the vision of Helen, and the final death and damnation. In these scenes the original narrative is quickened into life. "The medley of desire and fear, the poignancy of regret, the ecstasy and the terror are depicted in these scenes with a sureness and strength which give them a place among the greatest emotional situations in Elizabethan tragedy. It is these scenes which especially justify Marlowe's claim to a rank next to Shakespeare."

Some of the passages in the play are famous for their poetic quality, and these passages also contribute to the greatness of the play. The most celebrated of these passages are Faustus' apostrophe to Helen and Faustus's final monologue. The apostrophe to Helen throbs with intense emotion and passion. It is enriched with classical legends and myths. It has an irresistible sensuous appeal. Faustus goes into raptures over the beauty of Helen and reveals an imagination whose powers are totally undiminished by the spiritual agony that he has been undergoing. In fact, the beauty of Helen lulls the mental conflict of Faustus and stimulates his mind and imagination to touch great heights of poetry. If this speech is great because of its appeal of our aesthetic sense, Faustus' final monologue is great because of its revelation of the spiritual terror of a sinner who would like to disown the devil and repent of his sins when it is too late and when no power can rescue him. It is said that, in the expression of sheer agony and horror, this speech is unsurpassed in English drama.

Marlowe has shown great skill in depicting the character of Mephistophilis also. The devil here is not represented as a grotesque and ridiculous figure. Marlowe, like Milton later on, sees Mephistophilis with something of the tragic splendour of a fallen angel. Marlowe thus departs from the customary manner of dealing with the evil spirits. This new and more understanding attitude is well brought out by the answer given by Mephistophilis to Faustus's question as to the whereabouts of hell: "Why. this is hell, nor am I out of it", etc. To a certain extent, Mephistophilis even wins our sympathy when he tells us that he is "tormented with ten thousand hells" because he has lost "the eternal joys of heaven".

There is certainly some weight in the opinion that Doctor Faustus is a great dramatic poem rather than a great play. While this view ignores the remarkable acting quality of the principal scenes, it is true that Doctor Faustus has more superb passages of dramatic poetry than any other of Marlowe's plays. The theme of this play lends itself to several passionate outbursts and lyrical raptures. Even apart from the address to Helen, there are occasions when Marlowe's imagination glows with similar brightness, and the feeling finds expression in rich and musical words. An example of this is the passage in which Faustus speaks of the high delights that his magic has brought him: "Have not I made blind Homer sing to me", etc. In his best passages, Marlowe is neither rhetorical nor obscure, but speaks with a bright and lucid simplicity. Many of his happiest lines in the play consist of words of everyday speech, and are often a sequence of monosyllables. Even in its less exalted passages, this play is almost entirely free from the rhetorical declamation and the word-fury which marked Tamburlaine. The description of the darkness which hide the grove wherein Faustus is about to conjure, is surely marked by extravagant phraseology but even this strained expression has some justification in the weird atmosphere which it is meant to suggest. Furthermore, this play shows most fully the extent of Marlowe's mastery of blank verse, the finest examples of which are Faustus' opening soliloquy and his final monologue.

To a certain extent the greatness of this play is due also to the fact that it has a morally elevating effect on us. Of course, we do not go to a play in order to seek moral instruction. A great work of art need not necessarily have any moral connotation. Art and morality are two altogether different concepts. But, if a work of art is otherwise great, and then at the same time it produces a morally uplifting effect on us, its value even as a work of art will be enhanced. Of course, we are not supposed to reduce Doctor Faustus to a moral formula and say that it teaches us to keep away from evil practices and to follow the path of righteousness. The play is meant primarily to appeal to our imagination and emotions; it stimulates, feeds, and satisfies our aesthetic sense; it reveals the workings of the human mind under certain selected circumstances; it gives us an insight into human nature and thus widens our mental horizon; it delights us by the grandeur of its verse; but it does at the same time morally exalt us. It puts us into a spiritual mood and strengthens our spiritual instincts.

But this play has its faults also. In the first place, its plot is not well knit. It does not have that unity of action which is so necessary in drama from the technical point of view. In other words, the play is weak as regards its construction. It is merely a string of scenes, and the only unity it has is that of a string of beads. The middle section of the play, especially, is discordant with its general tone. We have too much of frivolity and comedy in a play which is tragic in its essence. The abundance of comic scenes considerably dilutes the tragic effect. Secondly, the comedy in this play is of a low and crude variety. Much of the humour is farcical. While the scene in which Wagner talks light-heartedly to the Scholars, parodying the scholarly style of argument, is certainly amusing, and is also appropriate as relieving the tension of the preceding scene, Faustus's tricks at the courts of the Pope and the Emperor, and his dealings with the Horse-courser, are examples of mere buffoonery and horse play. These clownage scenes lower the tone of the play by their crudity. It does not matter to us whether Marlowe wrote these scenes or somebody else did. We are to judge the play as it is. The controversy regarding the authorship of these scenes is irrelevant to our purpose.

Another weakness in the play is that, barring the character of Faustus and, to some extent, of Mephistophilis, the rest of the characters are shadowy and have no real existence. The Good and Evil Angels are mere personifications of Faustus' own good and evil instincts, even though they may also be regarded as symbolising the external forces of good and evil which operate in the universe. In either case, these Angels have no concrete existence. Valdes and Cornelius appear only for a short while in the opening scene and then disappear altogether. Wagner, the Clown, the Horse-courser have very little to do with the main plot of the drama. The Pope, the Emperor, and the Duke and Duchess of Vanholt are introduced merely as an excuse for Faustus to show his magic powers. The Old Man is also merely a symbol representing unflinching piety and righteousness. The Scholars do not have any individuality separately from one another. They are introduced merely to provide a kind of background against which the change that has come over, Faustus may be depicted. In fact, of all the minor characters (excepting Mephistophilis, who is, in any case not a minor character) the Seven Deadly Sins, despite their purely symbolical and fictitious character, have been endowed with the greatest concreteness. Each of these Seven Sins gives a vivid, though brief, portrayal of itself, and this portrayal fully corresponds to our own notions of each of them.

Discuss Doctor Faustus known as organic unity

Its construction is not one of the strong points of Doctor Faustus. In fact the greatness of this play is diminished by its construction being loose. The plot of the play is not well-knit or well-organised. To be precise, the play does not have a plot in the ordinary sense of the word. The object of the author seems to have been to reveal Faustus's mind to us at a few extraordinary and critical moments. The play is therefore a series of scenes, some splendid, some trivial, closely inter-connected in a time sequence and leading to the expected catastrophe. Our whole interest centres round the mind or the inner life of Faustus. Mephistophilis is the only other character who has any separate individual personality; the rest of the characters make very brief appearances and are meant only to throw some light on Faustus.

In the older versions of the legend of Faustus, the emphasis was on Faustus's various exploits and demonstrations of magical power. Marlowe presents these either through the Chorus or through a few comparatively brief scenes (which were perhaps not even written by himself). Marlowe's chief concern is the presentation of Faustus-Faustus's dreams of power, his initial resolve, the subsequent vacillations of his mind, his agonizing last moments, and his death. These form the main incidents of the drama, and give it whatever unity the drama has.

The play opens with a speech by the Chorus who gives us a brief exposition of the theme. Then Faustus is shown to us in his study. By the end of the first scene, his decision to practise magic is taken: "This night I'll conjure, though I die therefore". He has been encouraged in this resolve by Valdes and Cornelius but the resolve is essentially his own. The first scene is, indeed, masterly in its presentation of Faustus meditating upon the various branches of study, receiving the conflicting advice tendered by the Good and Evil Angels, speaking to himself about the glorious future that lies before him, and discussing his prospects with Valdes and Cornelius. The two Angels are Marlowe's own addition to the story. They are personifications of Faustus's own contrary impulses, good and bad, and symbolize his inner conflict.

Between the opening scene and the scene of the conjuration of Mephistophilis, there is a comic interlude (Act I, Scene II). There is another comic interlude between the conjuration of Mephistophilis (Act 1, Scene III) and the signing of the bond by Faustus (Act II, Scene I). The comedy in those intervening scenes is, of course, rather weak but it may be taken as an example of the practice, followed by certain play-wrights of the time, of placing a tensely emotional scene against a frivolous scene in which there is an element of parody. There is certainly point in the Clown's reply to Wagner (coming as it does immediately after Faustus has determined to make a bargain with Mephistophilis). Wagner has said that the Clown would "give his soul to the devil for a shoulder of mutton, though it were blood-raw". The Clown's reply is: "How ! my soul to the devil for a shoulder of mutton, though't were blood-raw ! not so, good friend; by'r lady, I had need have it well-roasted and good sauce to it, if I pay so dear."

The scene that follows (Act II, Scene I) depicts Faustus's inner conflict, the Good Angel and the Evil Angel urging him in opposite directions and the signing of the bond by Faustus. This scene is written with the same simple intensity as the opening scene. We are here much impressed by the quiet dignity of Mephistophilis. Mephistophilis here speaks like one who has not come overwillingly and with no desire to tempt. His replies to Faustus's eager questionings are at first rather casual but soon the tragic passion behind his restraint bursts forth when he describes the nature of hell:

Hell hath no limits, nor is circumscribed 
In one self place: for where we are is hell, 
And where hell is, there must we ever be: (Act II, Scene I, Lines 118-120)

The incident of the signing of the contract effectively shows Faustus's excitement, and his almost hysterical haste to put his new powers to the test by asking for a wife, "the fairest maid in Germany". Between this scene (Act II, Scene 1) and the one that follows (Act II, Scene II), an interval of time is supposed to have passed. Faustus has been enjoying the pleasures which his newly-acquired power has brought him. He has made blind Homer sing to him of the love of Paris and Oenon; and he has made Amphion produce ravishing music from his melodious harp. Compared with such delights, which were invented by Marlowe himself and which reflect Marlowe's own poetic temper, the later exploits of Faustus (at the court of the Pope, at the court of the Emperor, and at the court of the Duke and Duchess of Vanholt. not to speak of Faustus's dealings with the Horse-courser) are mostly crude and odious. Incidentally, the later exploits were borrowed directly from Faust-buch. In the same scene (Act II, Scene II), there is a fine moment when Faustus is stung by remorse and when, after the two Angels have spoken to him, he cries: "Ah, Christ, my Saviour/Seek to save distressed Faustus' soul". Lucifer himself appears, and compels Faustus to make a promise to think only of the devil and never to think of God or Christ. The parade of the Seven Deadly Sins which Lucifer offers as a "pastime" is another of Marlowe's additions to the story. The Seven Deadly Sins were frequently introduced in early English dramas, and they find a fitting place here. The grotesque self. descriptions of the Seven Deadly Sins are very vivid and forceful.

Then except for the two speeches by the Chorus at the opening of Act III and Act IV, there follow scenes of comedy which are generally regarded as one of the flaws of this play. In the first place, the comedy here is of the low, crude, farcical type. Secondly, the introduction of so much comedy in a tragic play is psychologically most inappropriate as it greatly dilutes and weakens the tragic effect. A brief comic scene to relieve the tension created by Faustus's inner conflict would perhaps have been quite in place, but several successive scenes of farcical humour were certainly uncalled-for. Even the scene at the court of the Duke of Vanholt, though not farcical, has nothing to recommend it.

If the intention of the author in introducing these scenes was to show the deterioration in the character of Faustus and Faustus's complete departure from his original grand designs (of walling all Germany with brass, driving the Prince of Parma from his land, etc.), it could have been done through the Chorus. If the intention was to fill the interval between the signing of the bond, and the ultimate damnation of Faustus with demonstrations of magic by Faustus, the device is very unfortunate. The unity of the play is certainly marred by the introduction of these clownage scenes for which no defence is possible. The scene in which Faustus cheats and dupes the Horse-courser is, perhaps, the worst from this point of view. The buffoonery of this scene is utterly unpardonable.

The last Act is, again, like Acts I and II, not only organic to the design of the play but also admirably written. In this Act, Faustus summons Helen of Troy to enable the Scholars to see with their own eyes "that peerless dame of Greece whom all the world admires for majesty". Immediately afterwards the Old Man appears and tries to awaken Faustus's conscience (which, incidentally, has never been asleep). Faustus feels miserable to hear the Old Man's words and realises that his damnation is imminent: "Damned art thou, Faustus, damned; despair and die". Faustus feels like committing suicide but the Old Man dissuades him from this desperate step. The Old Man goes, and Faustus laments the fate that awaits him: "Accursed Faustus, where is mercy now ?" "Hell strives with grace for conquest" in his breast. Mephistophilis appears and threatens to tear Faustus's flesh bit by bit for his disobedience to Lucifer, and Faustus begs Mephistophilis's pardon. Faustus now wants Helen as his paramour. Mephistophilis brings Helen, and Faustus goes into a rapture over her beauty. Faustus's apostrophe to Helen is one of the most celebrated passages in English drama.

When we next meet Faustus (Act V, Scene III), he is in the company of the Scholars. He is now on the verge of collapse, both physical and mental. He tells the Scholars that "for vain pleasure of twenty-four years hath Faustus lost eternal joy and felicity". The subdued talk of the Scholars as they bid farewell and go to pray is a masterly prologue to the overwhelming passion of Faustus's last hour. His final monologue is another famous speech which reveals in a most convincing manner the spiritual torture of a hopeless but repentant sinner who is about to be overtaken by death and damnation. The last four lines of this monologue are unsurpassed so far as their effect of horror is concerned:

My God, my God, look not so fierce on me! 
Adders and serpents, let me breathe a while!
Ugly hell, gape not! Come not. Lucifer!
I'll burn my books! Ah, Mephistophilis ! (Act V, Scene III, Lines 120-123) 

The devils take away Faustus. The Chorus enters and, with his simple solemn comment on Faustus's fate, the play comes to the kind of quiet ending which great tragedy demands.

Doctor Faustus has neither unity of time nor unity of place. Its action extends over a period of twenty-four years (not twenty-four hours), and its hero is not confined to one place but travels far and wide not only on the earth but through the air to the planets and the stars. Nor does the play have even the unity of action in so far as most of the scenes in Act III and IV are irrelevant and discordant. The play does, however, produce one dominant impression, and that is the tension and torture suffered by a man who, having resolved to ally himself with the Devil for the sake of power and pleasure, finds it impossible not only to retrace his steps but to repent of his sins except when it is too late.

Stages of Doctor Faustus's damnation

As soon as Faustus has decided that necromancy is the only study worth his while, he seeks the aid of Valdes and Cornelius, who, are already proficient in the art. The pair are ready enough to help Faustus, for they have been trying in the past to lead him into forbidden ways. He tells them that their exhortations have won him at last “to practice magic and concealed arts”. At the same time, he is anxious not to appear too pliant, and adds: “Yet not your words only, but mine own fantasy”. He makes it plain that he is no humble seeker after instruction, but one who has already earned fame and honor. The two friends are willing to accept him on his own terms. Valdes hints that common efforts deserve common rewards: 

Faustus, these books, thy wit and our experience,
Shall make all nations to canonize us (Act Scene I, Lines 117-118)

He paints a glowing picture of the possibilities before them, the only condition being that Faustus firm in his decision: "If learned Faustus will be resolute." However, it soon appeares that for all their reputation for proficiency in magic, the two friends of Faustus have not yet gone very far. They have certainly called spirits, but they have made no use of success. They have been careful not to sacrifice their salvation for the attainment of supernatural powers. They have never yielded to the temptation of the spirits and never put their powers to test. Even when they agree to guide Faustus in his exploration of magic, they leave us in no doubt of their intention to use Faustus as a tool rather than run into danger themselves. Speaking to his partner, Cornelius says:

Valdes, first let him know the words of art; 

And then, all other ceremonies learned, 

Faustus may try his cunning by himself. (Act I, Scene I, Lines 156-158)

These two men are not perfect magicians welcoming a promising beginner. but merely the devil's decoys luring Faustus along the road to destruction. They serve their purpose in giving a dramatic turn to the scene of his temptation, and except for a passing mention by the students, we hear no more of them.

Faustus goes to conjure alone, and alone he concludes his pact with the devil. As for the use to which he will put his newly-acquired powers, he speaks in a heroic vein about the world of profit and delight, of power, of honour, and omnipotence; all things that move between the quiet poles shall be at his command; his dominion will stretch as far as does the mind of man; he will become a demi-god; he will wall all Germany with brass, and chase the Prince of Parma from his land. Whatever baser elements there may be in his ambition, we should not fail to recognise its nobler elements, even though subsequently Faustus, instead of pursuing ends worthy of his professed ideals, abandons these and appears content to amuse the Emperor with conjuring tricks and play childish branks on the Pope.

Faustus soon lapses into luxury and buffoonery. The reason is that all that happens to Faustus, once the pact has been signed, is the devil's work. Who but a fool would imagine that any power but evil could be won by a bargain with evil, or that truth could be elicited from the father of lies? Marlowe knew the nature of the power his hero had acquired and the inevitable curse it carried with it. Of course, Faustus's deterioration is not an automatic result of his pact with the devil. In spite of his genuine desire to know truth, the seeds of decay existed in his character from the first; otherwise he would not have made his fatal bargain. Besides his passion for knowledge, he has a lust for riches and pleasure and power. He does express patriotic sentiments, but he has an almost vulgar desire to exercise authority over kings and rulers and even reveals his sensual nature by speaking of living "in all voluptuousness". It is not for nothing that Valdes spoke of the spirits who sometimes appear like women or maids possessing greater beauty than is to be seen "in the white breasts of the Queen of Love". Faustus is a man dazzled by the unlimited possibilities of magic, and he shows himself quite aware of his own weakness when he says: "The god thou servest is thine own appetite."

After Faustus has signed the bond with his blood, we can trace the stages of a gradual deterioration. Although he was sceptical regarding hell and heaven in his first interview with Mephistophilis (before he signed the bond), his scepticism now becomes bolder and more jeering. He now tells Mephistophilis that he thinks hell to be a "fable". He refuses to believe that "after this life there is any pain". To Mephistophilis's remark that he (Mephistophilis) is now in hell, Faustus's reply is that if this be hell ("sleeping, eating, walking, and disputing"), he will willingly be damned. Faustus's discussion with Mephistophilis on the subject of astronomy is curiously barren. "These slender trifles Wagner can decide", says Faustus impatiently. The quarrel that follows on Mephistophilis's refusal to say who made the world leads to the intervention of Lucifer and the "pastime" of the Seven Deadly Sins. It is a much shrunken Faustus who, after seeing the parade of the Seven Deadly Sins, exclaims: "O, this feeds my soul." He had felt equally delighted with the dance of the devils who offered him "crowns and rich apparel" just before his signing the bond. At that time he was told that he would be able to conjure up such spirits at will and even perform greater feats. Faustus had thereupon said: "Then there's enough for a thousand souls." We may perhaps infer that Mephistophilis's promise included sensual satisfaction. That inference would accord with Faustus's mood soon afterwards when he demands a wife, "the fairest maid in Germany", and when, instead of providing a suitable wife for him, Mephistophilis offered to bring him a mistress, any woman who attracted him, "be she as chaste as was Penelope......."

So far Faustus has not left Wittenberg, and the emphasis has been on the hollowness of his bargain in respect of any intellectual progress or enlightenment. The actual degradation of his character has not yet received much emphasis. As yet only his childish pleasure in the devil-dance (Act III, Scene I, Lines 82-83) and the pageant of the Seven Deadly Sins (Act II, Scene II, Lines 112-172) hints at the vulgar trivialities to which he will world (Act III-the speech of the Chorus). But his flights on the back of a dragon to find the secrets of astronomy and "to prove cosmography" only land him at last in the Pope's private chamber to "take some part of holy Peter's feast" and to view the royal courts of kings, and this only brings out very pointedly the progressive silliness and meaninglessness of Faustus's career.

There is something strange and peculiar, not only in Faustus's situation, but in his nature. Once he has signed the bond, he has of his own free will renounced salvation. But he has brought upon himself another change also. In this connection, we should not neglect the first clause of his agreement. with the devil: "that Faustus may be a spirit in form and substance". This clause has generally been taken to mean merely that Faustus will be free of the bonds of flesh, so that he may be invisible at will, able to change his shape, ride on dragons, and so on. But in this play the word "spirit" has been used in a special sense. Here this word means "devil". When, for instance, Faustus sees the dance of the devils (Act II, Scene I, Lines 82-83), he asks: "But may I raise up spirits when I please?" Later he promises to make his "spirits" pull down the churches of God (Act II, Scene II, Line 101). At one point, speaking to Mephistophilis, he says: "Ay, go, accursed spirit, to ugly hell" (Act II, Scene II. Line 78). Mephistophilis speaks of the devils as "unhappy spirits that fell with Lucifer" (Act I, Scene III, Line 71). When Faustus asks what is Lucifer, Mephistophilis replies: "Arch-regent and commander of all spirits" (Act I, Scene III, Line 64) which Faustus at once interprets as "prince of devils". In short, the word "spirit" in this play is persistently used to mean "devil". This throws a new light on the question, debated throughout the play, whether Faustus can be saved by repentance. Faustus, of course, is for ever repenting (and then each time apologising to Mephistophilis for this repentance because of his fear of bodily torture and death). The Good and Bad Angels, who symbolise the two sides of his nature, are for ever disputing the point:

Faustus. Contrition, prayer, repentance-what of them? Good Angel. Oh, they are means to bring thee unto heaven.
Evil Angel. Rather illusions, fruits of lunacy........ (Act II, Scene I, Lines 16-18)
Again:
Good Angel. Never too late, if Faustus will repent. 
Evil Angel. If thou repent, devils will tear thee in pieces.
Good Angel. Repent, and they shall never raze thy skin. (Act II, Scene II, Lines 82-84)

These two passages are particularly significant in this respect. When Faustus calls on Christ to save his distressed soul, Lucifer replies with admirable logic that Christ, being just, will not interfere because Faustus's soul has been pledged to the devil. Thus the possibility of Faustus' salvation is left nicely balanced in doubt. It is only when, back among his students at Wittenberg, he faces the final reckoning that Faustus regains some degree of  heroic dignity. But even so the years have wrought a change. His faithful Wagner is puzzled:

And yet, methinks, if that death were near, 
He would not banquet, and carouse, and swill 
Amongst the students, as even now he doth. (Act V, Scene I, Lines 3-5)

This is a very different Faustus from the fearless teacher his students used to know, whose least absence from the class-room used to cause anxiety. 

One good, or at least amiable, quality, apart from a genuine tenderness towards his students, Faustus shows throughout: a love of beauty in Nature and in art:

Have not I made blind Homer sing to me
Of Alexander's love and Oenon's death? 
And hath not he, that built the walls of Thebes 
With ravishing sound of his melodious harp, 
Made music-? (Act II, Scene II, Lines 26-30)

The climax of his career is his union with the immortal beauty of Helen. This sensitive appreciation of beauty could be something that has survived uncorrupted from his days of innocence. But there appears no hint of it in the austere student of the early scenes. It would seem to be some strange flowering of moral decay. After all, the builder of Thebes played on his melodious harp and "made music with my Mephistophilis" (Act II, Scene II, Line 30). And who is Helen? Here we come to the central theme of the damnation of Faustus. When the Emperor asks him to summon Alexander and his paramour, Faustus explains the nature of the figures that will appear. He says that the true substantial bodies of Alexander and his paramour will not appear but such as will resemble Alexander and his paramour in that manner that they both lived in, "in their most flourishing estate". The same holds good for Helen, because Faustus warns the students to be silent, "for danger is in words", when he is about to summon Helen. The circumstances in which Helen is summoned for the second time should also be noted. Urged by the Old Man, Faustus has tried for the last time to revolt against the devil. But he has been threatened into submission, and has renewed the blood- bond. He has sunk so low as to ask for revenge upon the Old Man who had tried to save his soul. And it is in the first place as a safeguard against once again trying to desert the devil that he seeks possession of Helen. He wants Helen so that her sweet embraces "may extinguish clean / Those thoughts that do dissuade me from my vow,/ And keep mine oath I made to Lucifer!" Revenge upon the Old Man and the desire to make love to Helen are both sought as guarantees against salvation. Helen then is a "spirit", and in this play a spirit means a "devil". In making her his paramour Faustus commits the sin of demoniality, that is, bodily or sexual intercourse with a demon. The implication of Faustus's action is made plain in the comments of the Old Man after the Helen episode:

Accursed Faustus, miserable man,
That from thy soul excludest the grace of heaven. (Act V, Scene II, Lines 1-2) 

Thus with Faustus's union with Helen the nice balance between possible salvation and imminent damnation is upset, and the Old Man recognises the inevitable in his above-quoted speech. Faustus, in his talk with the Scholars in Act V, Scene II, shows a terrible clarity of vision: "a surfeit of deadly sin, that hath damned both body and soul. Faustus' offence can never be pardoned: the serpent that tempted Eve may be saved, but not Faustus." In the final scene Faustus is still haunted by the idea of a salvation beyond his reach:

See, see, where Christ's blood streams in the firmament! 
One drop would save my soul, half a drop: Ah, my Christ! (Act V, Scene III, Lines 79-80)

This play presents the fall and slow moral disintegration of an ardent, but erring, spirit. It depicts not only Faustus's spiritual sin of bartering his soul to the powers of evil, but also the physical counterpart of that sin, the physical counterpart being demoniality (though this sin is disguised in the immortal verse of the apostrophe to the spirit of Helen).

Discuss Faustus as a man of Renaissance

"Rebel and pioneer though he was, Marlowe was yet a product of his own age. The introduction of the Good and Bad Angels, of the minor devils, and of the Seven Deadly Sins in Faustus links him with the drama of the later middle Ages. Faustus's inexhaustible thirst for knowledge, his worship of beauty, his passion for the classics, his capitalism, his interest in sorcery and magic, his admiration for Machiavelli and for super-human ambition and will in the pursuit of ideals of beauty or power, or whatever they may be, prove the author to be a man of Renaissance."

Faustus appears as a man of the Ranaissance in the very opening scene when, rejecting the tradition subjects of study, he turns to magic and considers the varied uses to which he can put his magic skill after he has acquired it. He contemplated the "world of profit and delight, of power, of honor, of omnipotence" which he hopes to enjoy as a magician. In dwelling upon the advantages which will occur to him by the exercise of his magic power, he shows his ardent curiosity, his desire for wealth and luxury, his nationalism, and his longing for power. These were precisely the qualities of the Renaissance, which was the age of discovery. A number allusions in the first scene of Act I maintain our sense of the enlarged outlook extended horizons of that great period of English history. Faustus desires gold from the East Indies, pearls from the depths of the sea,  pleasant fruits and princely delicacies from America. His friend valdes refers to the Indians in the Spanish colonies, to Lapland giants, to the argosies of Venice, and to the annual plate-fleet which supplied gold and silver to the Spanish treasury from the new world. There was much in this scene to inflame the hearts of English audiences who must have heartily approved of Faustus's intention to chase away the Prince of Parma from the Netherlands. After all, only the defeat of the Spanish Armada had prevented Parma from invading England in the 1588. Englishman knew also about "the fiery keel at Antwerp's bridge." the Italian inventor of which had been in the service of England in 1588. Thus Faustus's dream of power included much that had a strong appeal for the English people including Marlowe himself.

Faustus certainly embodies the new enquiring and aspiring spirit of the age of he Renaissance. Marlowe expresses in this play both his fervent sympathy with that new spirit and ultimately his awed and pitiful recognition of the danger into which he could lead those who were dominated by it . The danger is clearly seen in Faustus's last soliloquy in which Faustus offers to burn his books. No doubt these books are chiefly the books of magic, but we are surely reminded of his exclamation to the scholars earlier in this scene: "O, would I had never seen writtenberg, never read book! "Thus we get the impression that Faustus attributed his downfall, partly at least, to his learning.

"Doctor Faustus, although without specific Italian sources, owes audacity of thought and temper to Renaissance Italy, and treats with a comparable reach of mind questions that troubled Italian thinkers. To get some impressions of Renaissance quality of Doctor Faustus, it this enough to read three Italian walks (readily available in translation) - Petrarch's On His Own Ignorance, Lorenzo Valla's Dialogue on Free Will, and Pico della Mirandola's Oration on the Dignity of Man. Petrach reconciles a Renaissance delight in life and learning with the Augustian recognization of the limitation of man, and a devotion to eloquence with a devotion to dogma. Valla's elegant argument illuminate his theme but leave its paradoxes as teasing as it finds them, adding a stringent warning against pursuing moral questions too for. Pico vindicates the magus who weds earth to heaven, and lower things to the endowments and power of higher things.

But the Italian who most often anticipates the dynamic and mysterious qualities of Marlowe's intellectual vision of Marsilio Ficino. Ficino shares Marlowe's awareness of the sanctity and torment of desire -  "by the natural instinct every soul strives in a continuous effort both to know our truths by the intellect and to enjoy all things by the will." Through its striving the soul reaches out towards harmony with the cosmic order and by the exercise of four furores (music, poetry, religious rites, prophecy and love) man  can enjoy the most beneficent influences from the stars and planets. Whether we treat Faicino's astrological theory of power of words (vis verborum) as fantasy, as naive science or as valid allegory, we must recognize it as an attempt to explain why  eloquence seems often to refresh out more being even before we are fully alive to its meaning. Marlowe exercises the poetic furore without
giving an astrological account of it. But his rhetoric often commands imagery of cosmic space, and the verse of Tamburlaine is indebted to Renaissance cosmography. Marlowe's distinction was to make the verbal magic efficacious in English - to put audiences under a spell. His eloquence often endows sweetness with power, and power with sweetness, in a way that disarms conventional moral judgments. The problem arises in the Doctor  Faustus, for the play does not leave us free to assume uncritically that poetic eloquence is one thing and moral truth quit another. It may be claimed that what we value most at the end is not the piety of good but the rhetoric of demand." 

Doctor Faustus is not only the first major elizabethan tragedy, but turn first to explore the tragic possibilities of the direct clash between the Renaissance compulsions and the Hebraic (Jewish) - Christian tradition. Tamburlaine symbolises the outward trust of the Renaissance, (and Marlowe conceived of this play as  a tragedy because of its picture of suffering and destruction, and it’s spectacle of death overthinking in the end even the mightiest of wordly conquerors). But in the Doctor Faustus Marlowe turned the focus inward. Here he depicted the human soul as the tragic battlefield and wrote the first "Christian tragedy".

The play has typical morality-play ending. It close with a speech by the Chorus warning “forward wits” against such fiendish practices as Faustus followed. But, if the play has a pious conclusion, the truth of the play goes far beyond the final piety of the speech of the Chorus. No figure of the medieval morality-plays talks so much or takes us so deep into his own being as Faustus does. No figure of the old morality-plays does so much and so boldly, as Faustus. Faustus in thought and action, brooding, philosophizing, disputing, conjuring, defying God, risking his body and soul, does not suggest merely the lay figure of the morality-plays, he suggests Adam (the knowledge-seeker), and he suggest Prometheus (the defiant hero of Greek tradition). In other words, Faustus put into an old legend a new meaning. He inserted into the old medieval or Christian moral education the new and ambiguous dynamic of the Renaissance. He treated the legend of Faustus in such a manner as to give it a fascination and a dignity never realized in previous treatments of the story. He made Faustus the first modern man. The story of this 24 years action, compressed by Marlowe in a few vivid scenes, represents a soul torn between the desire to stretch to its utmost limit its new mastery and freedom on the one hand and on the other hand, the claims of the old teachings a defiance of which meant guilt and a growing sense of alienation from society.

The legend of Faustus was believed to be a terrible and ennobling example, and a warning to all Christians to avoid the pitfalls of science, pleasure and ambition which had led to Faustus’s damnation. But it has to be noted that all that the Renaissance valued is represented in what the devil has to offer and one I left wondering whether it is the religious life or the worldly life that is more attractive. All that the Good Angel in ths play has to offer is “warning”. For instance, the Good Angel warns Faustus against reading the book of magic because it will bring God’s “heavy wrath” upon his head and asks him to think of heaven. To this Evil Angel replies: “No, Faustus, think of honor and of wealth”. At another point in the play the Evil Angel urges Faustus to go forward in the famous art of magic and to become a lord and commander of the earth. There can be no doubt that the devil here represent the natural ideal of the Renaissance by appealing to the vague but healthy ambitions of a young soul which wishes to launch itself upon the wide world. No wonder that Faustus, a child of the Renaissance, cannot resist the devil’s suggestion. We like him for his love of life, for his trust in Nature, for his enthusiasm for beauty. He speaks for us all when, looking at Helen, he cries:

Was this he face that launched a thousand ships

And burnt the topless tower of Ilium?

                                                                                (Act V, Scene II, Lines 91-92)

In a word Marlowe’s Faustus is a martyr to everything that the Renaissance valued-power, curious knowledge, enterprise, wealth, and beauty. The play shows Marlowe’s own passion for these Renaissance values.

Conflict is the essence of drama Doctor Faustus 

Conflict in drama is of two kinds: outer and inner. Outer conflict occurs between the hero and his outer circumstances which may be unfavourable or hostile to him. These circumstances include, of course, certain individuals who try to thwart his aspirations or endeavours or with whom he may come into clash on account of their opposed aims and objects. Inner conflict means the conflict in the hero's own mind. This inner conflict takes place because the hero finds himself pulled in opposite directions or torn between two possible alternatives one of which he must choose. In a tragedy the hero meets his downfall, because in spite of a strong will-power and determined efforts, he proves unequal to the forces (outer and inner) opposing him.

In Doctor Faustus, there is practically no outer conflict, because Faustus does not come into clash with any hostile individuals or any hostile circumstances. But Faustus experiences an inner conflict which occurs at various stages in the course of his career. There is no point in the course of the play where we can stop and say that Faustus's mind is no longer divided and that he is pursuing a particular line of action without any mental disturbance. Faustus is throughout dogged by uncertainty, doubt, apprehension, and fear which in the later stages become painful and agonising.

When we meet Faustus first, he is debating the merits and demerits of various branches of study. He promptly dismisses logic, medicine, law, and divinity, and decides in favour of magic which seems to offer him "a world of profit and delight". He feels quite elated to think of the power that magic will bring him. "A sound magician is a mighty god", he says, and decides to "tire his brains to gain a deity". There is no conflict here, and it seems that Faustus has meditated upon this subject even before the play begins. We get the feeling that he is already predisposed towards magic, and that he has now merely rationalised his preference.

The very next moment, however, the Good Angel and the Evil Angel appear. These two Angels represent two contrary impulses in Faustus. The Good Angel, symbolising Faustus's conscience, tries to dissuade him from the practice of magic, but the Evil Angel, symbolising the evil instinct that exists in every human being, urges him to "go forward in that famous art" Here is inner conflict, then. The Good Angel and the Evil Angel should not be regarded as forces outside Faustus, but contrary natural tendencies in him, with the evil impulse proving more powerful. But this conflict is very brief and, with the exit of the two Angels, we again find Faustus feeling exultant over his dreams, of what the spirits will do for him (Act I, Scene I. Lines 76- 95).

In the course of the same scene (Act I, Scene I), when Valdes expresses some doubt about Faustus's resolution to pursue the study of magie, Faustus speaks of his determination: "Valdes, as resolute am I in this as thou to live." Now he does not seem to suffer from any uncertainty at all. On the contrary. at the end of his last speech in this scene, he says: "This night I'll conjure, though I die therefore,"

When Faustus goes into a grove at night in order to conjure, he feels just a momentary hesitation but quickly recovers his composure, and says, "Then fear not, Faustus, but be resolute. And try the uttermost magic can perform." He feels so happy with the success of his conjuring that even Mephistophilis's account of hell and of his torture after his banishment from heaven does not dampen Faustus's enthusiasm. On the contrary, he says, in a soliloquy, that, even if he had as many souls as there are stars, he would give them all for Mephistophilis.

At the beginning of Act II, Scene 1, we again find Faustus in the throes of a conflict. He realises that he is damned and cannot be saved. That being so. he feels that it is no use thinking of God or heaven. He is overtaken by "despair" and finds that he must put his faith in Belzebub. An inner voice calls upon him to turn to God, and he does feel like turning to God. But soon he changes his mind and says that the God he must serve is his own "appetite", "wherein is fixed the love of Belzebub." He proposes to build an altar and a church to Belzebub and to offer him the lukewarm blood of new- born babes. As soon as he takes this decision, however, the mental conflict recurs. The Good Angel and the Evil Angel appear and externalise his internal struggle with his conscience. "Contrition, prayer, repentance" which, according to the Good Angel, are the means of entry into heaven, are denounced by the Evil Angel as "illusions" and "fruits of lunacy". The Good Angel asks him to think of heaven and heavenly things, while the Evil Angel urges him to think of honour and of wealth. At the mention of wealth, Faustus makes up his mind. Once again he feels elated to think that the Signiory of Emden shall be his. He comforts himself by saying that, with Mephistophilis by his side, God will not be able to hurt him. He tells himself that he is safe, and that he should have no more doubts.

When Faustus proceeds to write the bond, his blood congeals and he can write no more. This is another warning to him from his own soul. But he asks himself if he does not have full authority over his own soul: "Is not thy soul thy own ?" When Mephistophilis has brought a chafer of coals to dissolve the blood, Faustus resumes his writing of the bond, but yet another warning comes in the words: "Homo, fuge". This, too, is his inner voice urging him not to go headlong to his damnation. But whither should he fly ? "If unto God, He'll throw me down to hell." And he concludes that there is no need for him to fly. The bond is accordingly signed, and Faustus begins to interrogate Mephistophilis regarding hell. Faustus's conflict is, for the time being, over and he goes so far as to say that if hell is what Mephistophilis has described it to be, he would willingly be damned. 

At the opening of Act II. Scene II, we find Faustus regretting his loss of the joys of heaven. Speaking to Mephistophilis, he says: 

When I behold the heavens, then I repent,
And curse thee, wicked Mephistophilis,
Because thou hast deprived me of those joys. (Act II, Scene II, Lines 1-3)

Mephistophilis tries to divert his thoughts from heaven, but the Good Angel and the Evil Angel appear, once again externalising the inner struggle that has started in him. The Good Angel urges Faustus to repent in order to seek God's mercy, but the Evil Angel dissuades him from such a course of action The Angels depart, and Faustus expresses his disturbed state of mind. His heart is so hardened that he cannot repent; and yet his thoughts often turn to salvation, faith, and heaven. He would have killed himself by now in this state of mind if "sweet pleasure had not conquered deep despair" He recalls how, by his magic power, he made blind Homer sing to him and Amphion play on his melodious harp. And once again he concludes that he need neither kill himself nor fall into a state of despair:

Why should I die, then, or basely despair? 
I am resolved; Faustus shall never repent. (Act II, Scene II, Lines 31-32) 

He questions Mephistophilis regarding astronomy and, when he goes on to ask who made the world, he gets a disappointing and annoying reply. Mephistophilis leaves, but Faustus's mood has again changed to one of despair. He feels that it is too late for him to repent, the Good Angel and the Evil Angel appear once again, the former urging him to repent, and the latter threatening him with dire consequences if he repents. Faustus appeals to Christ to save his soul: "Ah, Christ, my Saviour/Seek to save distressed Faustus' soul !"

This is a moment of crisis in Faustus's career. He would like to retrace his steps and repent of his surrender to the devil. But Lucifer, Belzebub, and Mephistophilis appear and demand the fulfilment of the conditions to which Faustus had agreed by signing a bond with his blood. Finding no way out of the situation, Faustus begs the forgiveness of the devils and vows never to mention God or pray to Him or to look to heaven. The devils thereupon show him the Seven Deadly Sins in order to entertain him and, at the end of the parade, Faustus says that this sight "feeds his soul". Lucifer assures him that "in hell is all manner of delight." This scene (Act II, Scene II) ends with Faustus's reconciliation with the devil and with a confirmation of his commitment to remain loyal to him. Then follow several scenes (some of them coarsely comic) which show Faustus exploiting his magic powers and making a display of these powers in various ways.

In Act V, Scene I, an Old Man appears and tries to awaken Faustus's conscience to the heinous sin which he has committed by his contract with the devil. There is still time for Faustus to seek God's mercy. Christ's blood alone can wash away Faustus's guilt. This exhortation by the Old Man may also be regarded as an embodiment of the inner voice of Faustus who has apparently been quite happy in the exercise of his magic powers but whose conscience is not absolutely dead. On hearing the Old Man's exhortation. Faustus immediately becomes aware of his predicament and says to himself.

Where art thou, Faustus ? Wretch, what hast thou done?
Damned art thou, Faustus, damned; despair and die! (Act V, Scene I, Lines 48-49)

Faustus's inner conflict here re-appears in an even more acute and agonising form. He feels that hell is calling him "with a, roaring voice". Mephistophilis offers him a dagger so that, in his state of despair, he may kill himself and go to hell. But the Old Man stops Faustus from committing suicide and tells him that he might yet receive the grace of God. The Old Man's words bring some comfort to Faustus's distressed soul. But, as Faustus proceeds to fight against his despair in order to be able to repent, Mephistophilis threatens to tear his flesh into pieces for disobeying Lucifer Faustus, unable to offer any resistance, begs the devil's forgiveness and expresses his readiness to sign the bond again with his blood. He then sees a vision of Helen, which puts him in a mood of rapturous joy.

But this joy is short-lived. In Act V, Scene II, we find the Old Man scolding Faustus for having excluded himself from the grace of heaven. In the following scene, we find Faustus telling his woeful story to the Scholars and deeply regretting his compact with the devil. He tells them that there is only this one night between him and his damnation. Then, of course, comes Faustus's last soliloquy in which his mental agony at his fast-approaching fate is so pathetically expressed:

Ah, Faustus.
Now hast thou but one bare hour to live, 
And then thou must be damned perpetually! (Act V, Scene III, Lines 66-68)

He would like time to stand still so that the hour of midnight (when Mephistophilis will take away his soul), should not come. He sees a vision of Christ's blood in the sky. One drop, nay half a drop, of that blood can save him. But Lucifer would not let him call on Christ. Faustus would like mountains and hills to descend upon him in order to hide him "from the heavy wrath of God". He would like to take shelter in the depths of the earth. He would like to mingle with the clouds. His agony becomes unbearable when he thinks that there is to be no end to his life in hell. He deplores the fact that he has an immortal soul. He wishes that he were a beast. He curses the parents who begot him. He would like his body to turn into air. He would like his soul to be changed into little water-drops which may mingle with the waves of the ocean, never to be found. But all these means of escape are vain. The devils enter, looking at him fiercely. He offers to burn his books if he could keep away Lucifer. Then comes that heart-rending cry of horror from him: "Ah, Mephistophilis"! The tormented soul of Faustus is taken by the fiends to hell to endure everlasting torment.

Doctor Faustus's character as revealed in Marlowe's play 

Marlowe is primarily interested in a study of the mind of Faustus. Faustus's career is presented so as to show us Faustus's mental development. For instance, the first speech of Faustus is meant to suggest, in a telescoped fashion, a long period of mental debate, not to represent a single occasion. The tempo is quickened beyond that of ordinary life, just as movements are speeded up sometimes in the cinema.

The Prologue, with its subtle and perhaps intentional mixture of the past and present tenses, prepares the spectators for the summary presented in the soliloquy of Faustus, which follows. Faustus, turning from one book to the next, represents his own mental history in this soliloquy, as the Prologue has given the history of the outward events of his life. (The Good and Evil Angels may also be regarded as personifications of Faustus's own contrary impulses). 

Faustus's character is not one of fixed determination, as is so often asserted. He constantly wavers, and his purpose keeps changing. Sometimes he sounds immovable:

This night I'll conjure, though I die therefore. (Act I, Scene I, Line 164)
Had I as many souls as there be stars, 
I'd give them all for Mephistophilis. (Act I, Scene III, Lines 102-103) 

Yet he has continually to screw up his courage. Before he begins the conjuring, he says half apprehensively: "Then fear not, Faustus, be resolute." His soliloquy at the opening of Act II is full of the twists and doublings of his mind. He thinks of his damnation and feels that it is no use thinking of God or heaven. He tries to strengthen his trust in Belzebub. He urges himself not to go backward, and to be resolute. But something sounds in his ears: "Abjure this magic, turn to God again." He almost decides to turn to God again, but stops and says that God does not love him. This is a regular mental debate showing his wavering mind. After this inner debate, the two Angels again appear, and they too are personifications representing two opposite points of view.

In this soliloquy (at the opening of Act II), Faustus for the first time tells himself to "despair". The idea of despair in the theological sense (that is, a conviction of damnation) runs through the play. It is the means by which the devils, from the very beginning, secure Faustus's soul, making him incapable of repentance, even though he exerts all his will-power to repent. The word "distressed" is also used in the play as an alternative description of this mental state. At other times, however, Faustus's determination and resolve are astonishing. He can urge Mephistophilis himself to learn "manly fortitude" from him and "to scorn the joys of heaven". His intoxication with his power to command the devil occasionally blinds him to everything else, and when Mephistophilis tells him truthfully of hell, he simply refuses to face it, saying that "hell is a fable".

Faustus's mind, as revealed in the first two Acts of the play, is seen swaying constantly between repentance and damnation, wavering remorse and fixed pride. In Act II, scene II, there is a third repentance: the two Angels again appear symbolising the conflict, but their speeches are shorter and sharper, and the passage ends with the triumph of the Evil Angel: "Faustus never shall repent." Immediately Faustus falls into despair: "My heart is so hardened I cannot repent." And he begins another cross-examination of Mephistophilis, for this is the means by which he calms the agitation of his mind. In the middle of this scene, there is the fourth and last conflict. This time Faustus goes further than before and calls upon Christ to save his soul. His appeal to Christ brings the three chief devils. There is extraordinary irony in this situation (namely, Faustus's appeal to Christ leading to the appearance of the three chief devils-Lucifer, Belzebub and Mephistophilis). This kind of irony of situation is paralleled by the use of quotations with an ironic significance. Faustus, as he signs the bond, says: "Consummatum est", the final words of Christ in St. John's Gospel. It immediately reminds us of the masterly adaptation of Ovid in the final soliloquy (O lente, lente currite, noctis equi.")*

In Act IV, Scene IV, there is a passage which recalls Faustus's earlier repentances and despairs. Faustus realises that he is but a man condemned to die and that his "fatal time doth draw to final end". He is in a state of despair, but he is able to console himself with the thought that Christ did show mercy to a thief at the last moment. In Act V, Scene I, Faustus repents but then immediately falls into a state of despair. He is ready to commit suicide: "Damned art thou, Faustus, damned; despair and die." But he is comforted by the Old Man. However, as soon as the Old Man leaves, Faustus's uncertainty returns, and he says: "Accursed Faustus, where is mercy now? I do repent; and yet I do despair." Mephistophilis forces him to sign another bond; and Faustus tries to forget his distress by making love to Helen.

In the first part of Act V, Scene III, we see Faustus's humanity. His poignant feelings are shown through the repetition of phrases: "What wonders I have done, all Germany can witness, yea, all the world: for which Faustus hath lost both Germany and the world: yea, heaven itself, heaven the seat of God, throne of the blessed, the kingdom of joy; and must remain in hell for ever-hell, ah, hell, for ever!" This repetition indicates Faustus's helplessness; he can only say the same thing again and again, the repetition also shows his fixation upon the single problem which at last he cannot evade. He already sounds broken; the devil's power over him is now of the physical kind also. He would like to weep but the devil dries up his tears. He would like to raise his hands, in prayer to God, but the devil holds his hands.

The greatness of the final speech of Faustus depends not only on its poetic power, but the subtle way in which it gathers up and focuses all the feelings of the earlier scenes. For example, the line about Christ's blood "streaming in the firmament" suggests the scene where Faustus's own blood congealed when he was about to sign the bond and he cried, in his haste to sell his soul: "Why streams it not?" Faustus's former moods reappear, intensified by the pressure of his feeling. He frantically denies the situation; he tries to conjure in a more daring manner than ever by calling upon the ever-moving spheres of heaven to stand still, by asking the sun to rise again in order to make perpetual day: "Fair Nature's eye, rise, rise again." The quick repetition comes because he is trying to cram as many words into his little hour as possible and also, by repeating the same word, to give himself the illusion that time is not passing at all. He ends with desperate commands to body and soul, to God and the devils, as though by the exercise of his will he could reverse the course of events:

Ugly hell, gape not! Come not, Lucifer! 
I'll burn my book !-Ah, Mephistophilis.. (Act V, Scene III, Lines 122-123)

The last two words are, of course, a shriek, a scream of terror. 

Marlowe portray the character of Doctor Faustus

The first thing that strikes us about Faustus is his extra-ordinary learning and scholarship. The Chorus, in his very first speech, tells us of this aspect of Faustus's character. According to the Chorus, Faustus made a rapid progress in the study of divinity and, by "gracing scholarism", was soon "graced with a doctor's degree". From Faustus's first soliloquy we learn that, before he decided to practise magic, he had already attained mastery over various other branches of study. He had acquired great proficiency in logic; his medical skill had won him great renown; he had made a name as a theologian; and so on. From his talk with Valdes and Cornelius, we learn that, "with concise syllogisms", he had baffled the priests of the German church, and made the young and promising scholars of Wittenberg flock to him in order to listen to his disquisitions. It is this learning which makes Cornelius say that Faustus knows all the principles required by magic and that soon Faustus would be visited by more people anxious to hear his prophecies than used to visit the ancient "Delphian oracle". And it is this quality of Faustus which makes Valdes say that, although Faustus may have to learn the rudiments from Valdes, soon he will become "perfecter" than the teacher. Intellectually equipped as Faustus is, he soon becomes a great magician whose wonderful performances astonish all Germany. Speaking to the Scholars towards the end of the play, Faustus recalls the wonders that he has done and that the whole world has witnessed.

Faustus is endowed with a rare imaginative faculty. Indeed, his imaginative reach is amazing, though it is something that we would naturally expect from a man whose intellectual calibre, as we have seen above, is extraordinary. Having rejected the various branches of study, Faustus visualises the wonders that he will be able to work with the power of magic:

O, what a world of profit and delight 
Of power, of honour, of omnipotence, 
Is promised to the studious artizan ! (Act I, Scene I, Lines 51-53) 

He goes on to speak of the unlimited authority he will wield. He will be greater than emperors and kings, and his dominion will "stretch as far as doth the mind of man". He will become a "mighty god". He sees bright visions of spirits bringing him gold from India, pearls from the ocean, pleasant fruits from distant corners of the world. He hopes to wall all Germany with brass, make the Rhine circle the city of Wittenberg, chase the Prince of Parma from his land, and so on. He thinks that he will be able to make a bridge through the moving air in order to cross the ocean with an army of soldiers; he thinks of joining the hills that bind the African shore; he imagines that no ruler will be able to rule except by his permission. Not only does Faustus possess an exceptional imaginative power which enables him to see bright dreams of his future as a magician, but he is a born poet. His poetic faculty is, indeed, remarkable. Almost every major speech of Faustus is instinct with the poetry that is an innate gift with him. Even the manner in which he gives expression to his conflicts and despairs is worthy of a poet. Three outstanding examples of his poetic power may especially be pointed out. At one point (Act II, Scene II), Faustus recalls how he has made blind Homer sing to him of the love of Paris and Oenon, and how he has made Amphion produce ravishing music from his melodious harp. It is the soul of a poet that speaks in these lines. Then there is the final soliloquy in which Faustus calls upon the heavenly spheres to stop moving so that time may cease and midnight never come, in which he sees the vision of Christ's blood flowing in the firmament, in which he gives us a wonderful picture of his being drawn up by the stars, like a foggy mist, into the depths of the clouds above, and so on. But more wonderful than these two passages is his apostrophe to Helen. This speech is deservedly famous. It is a highly imaginative and passionate speech enriched with several mythological allusions and made radiant with the brightness of a thousand stars. This speech has a manifold appeal and we linger over it, trying to extract the maximum pleasure from it.

Faustus's sin is pride, presumption, and self-conceit. The Chorus refers to him as becoming "swollen with cunning, of a self-conceit," and compares him to Icarus who flew into the sky with wings made of wax which melted with the heat of the sun and led to Icarus's dropping to the earth and meeting his death because of his presumption in challenging the gods who then "conspired his overthrow". Faustus's pride is the pride of knowledge with which he proceeds to study necromancy. The Chorus puts it thus:

Nothing so sweet as magic is to him 
Which he prefers before his chiefest bliss:

In his very first soliloquy, Faustus speaks of a "world of profit, and delight, of honour, of omnipotence" which he hopes to attain. He dreams of ruling all things "that move between the quiet poles" and thinks that his power will "stretch as far as doth the mind of man". "A sound magician is a mighty god", he says, and decides to exert his brains in order "to gain a deity". He quickly responds to the suggestion of the Evil Angel that he should be on earth "as Jove in the sky", and attain the position of a "lord and commander" of this world. Faustus sees extravagant visions of the power that he will wield, and is encouraged in his hopes by Valdes and Cornelius. He becomes so proud that the word "damnation", he says, "terrifies not him" and he refuses to believe that there is any pain waiting for human beings after death. He scolds Mephistophilis for feeling unhappy at having lost the joys of heaven and asks him to learn from him "manly fortitude". He expects Mephistophilis to do whatever he shall command, "be it to make the moon drop from her sphere./Or the ocean to overwhelm the world." Closely allied to the sin of pride is Faustus's "curiosity" which makes him probe the secrets of the universe. He not only wants Mephistophilis to tell him what hell is like but he would like visit to hell in order that he can see it with his own eyes: "O, might I see hell, and return again." He demands from the devil a book which can teach him all about spells and incantations, characters and planets of the heavens, the plants and trees that grow on the earth. With the power of magic, he ascends to the top of the Olympus mountain, sees the Tropic, the Zones, and the heights of Primum Mobile, and studies cosmography, not to speak of his visits to various places on the earth. This excessive curiosity is also regarded as part of Faustus's sin. But that is not all. He is also guilty of sensuality. While laying down his conditions for signing a contract with the devil, he demands that he should be allowed to live for twenty-four years "in all voluptuousness". Soon after the bond has been signed, he demands a wife, "the fairest maid in Germany" because, as he says, he cannot live without a wife. Subsequently, he asks for Helen whose sweet embraces, he says, will drive out from his mind all thoughts of rebellion against Lucifer. When Helen is brought to him, he goes into raptures over her beauty and says that none but she shall be his paramour. Faustus knows very well that the woman to whom he is making love is not the real Helen, but a succuba, a devil in the guise of Helen. This means that, in making love to her, he commits the sin of demoniality. Finally, Faustus is guilty of the sin of despair. "Despair" in this context means allegiance to the devil and loss of faith in God. At several points in the course of the play, Faustus speaks of his despair. For instance, after the Old Man, has spoken to him of his sinful life, Faustus, addressing himself, says: "Damned art thou, Faustus, damned; despair and die!"

Although it is in a mood of exhilaration and elation that Faustus decides to take to the study of necromancy and to practise magic, he has no peace once he has taken that decision. Throughout the twenty-four years during which he practises magic, he experiences a mental conflict between his godly and ungodly impulses. A feeling of regret at having alienated God keeps haunting him during this period. The Good and the Evil Angels, who appear to him on several occasions, are merely the personifications of his own good and evil impulses. The words they speak to him are symbolic of the mental debate that goes on in his own mind between his desire to enjoy the fruits of the power he has gained through magic and an urge not to renounce his trust in God. But this is not the only symptom of his mental conflict. Several times he gives an outward expression to the tussle that goes on in his mind. At the beginning of Act II, Scene I, we find him speaking of the tug-of- war that is going on in his mind:

What boots it, then, to think of God or heaven? 
Away with such vain fancies and despair;
Despair in God, and trust in Belzebub: 
Now go not backward; no, Faustus, be resolute: 
Why waverest thou ? O, something sounds in mine ears, 
"Abjure this magic, turn to God again!"
Ay, and Faustus will turn to God again, 
To God? He loves thee not....... (Act II, Scene I, Lines 3-10)

This is a characteristic speech showing how Faustus, while continuing to practise magic, yet experiences the pangs and pricks of his conscience. The congealing of his blood when he is about to sign the bond shows the same thing. Immediately after completing the draft of the bond, he sees the words, "man, fly", inscribed on his arm. This too is indicative of the spiritual conflict of Faustus, and this conflict goes on.

After attaining the power of magic, Faustus does certainly pursue his intellectual ideal of acquiring knowledge which is beyond the reach of  human beings. The Chorus in his speech at the beginning of Act III, tells us of Faustus's investigations into the secrets of this universe. But we feel puzzled when we find this great scholar stooping to play all kinds of silly tricks and foolish practical jokes. The manner in which Faustus harasses the Pope by snatching away eatables and drinks from the Pope's hands and the manner in which he befools and cheats the Horse-courser, far from doing him any credit, lower and degrade him in our eyes. This great scholar, who had planned to wall all Germany with brass and to drive away the Prince of Parma from his land, is now frittering away his energies by playing crude tricks and by giving magic performances to entertain the Emperor (by summoning Alexander and Thais) and the Duke and Duchess of Vanholt (by procuring grapes for the Duchess). Perhaps the scene of the Pope's harassment and the Horse-courser scene were not written by Marlowe himself. Perhaps it was Marlowe's intention to show, with the help of such scenes, the rapid deterioration that takes place in the character of Faustus after his becoming a disciple of the devil. The Faustus who plays tricks on the Pope, the Knight, and the Horse-courser is different from the Faustus of the opening scenes. The Faustus of the opening scenes commanded our respect, his decision to practise magic notwithstanding. This Faustus appears to be no more than a juggler.

In Act V, Scene III, however, Faustus rehabilitates himself in our esteem. Here we see a chastened Faustus. He is in a mood of deep despair. All his native tenderness, and humanity re-emerge. He becomes humble, too. What can be more poignant than the words in which he describes his state of distress when speaking to the Scholars: "Faustus's offence can never be pardoned: the serpent that tempted Eve may be saved, but not Faustus. Ah, gentlemen, hear me with patience, and tremble not at my speeches!........Sweet friends, what shall become of Faustus, being in hell for ever?" What words expressive of despair could be more touching than the following: "Ah, my God, I would weep! but the devil draws in my tears. O, he stays my tongue! I would lift up my hands; but see, they hold them, they hold them!....... For vain pleasure of twenty-four years hath Faustus lost eternal joy and felicity".

The final monologue of Faustus not only emphasises Faustus's imaginative and poetic faculties, but is unsurpassed as an expression of spiritual horror. Faustus here realises that time will not stop and that the devil will come at the fixed hour:

The stars move still, time runs, the clock will strike, 
The devil will come, and Faustus must be damned. (Act V, Scene III, Lines 76-77)

Then he sees a vision of Christ's blood in the sky but, when he appeals to Christ for pity, Lucifer, who has a proprietary claim to Faustus's soul, inflicts physical torture on him, and Faustus cries out: "Ah, rend not my heart for naming of my Christ !" Faustus wishes that he did not have a soul or that his soul were not immortal. He would like his body to turn into air and his soul to little water-drops which may mingle with the ocean and never be found again. The acme or climax of horror is reached in the last four lines of this monologue. Seeing the devils who have come to take away his soul, Faustus says:

My God, my God, look not so fierce on me! 
Adders and serpents, let me breathe a while!
Ugly hell, gape not! Come not, Lucifer; 
I'll burn my books! Ah, Mephistophilis ! (Act V, Scene III, Lines 120-123)

The last two words are, of course, a scream of terror.

Christopher Marlowe | The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus | Important Questions With Answers

1. What do you think is the cause of the tragedy in Doctor Faustus?
2. Discuss Doctor Faustus as a Morality play. Or Elaborate the view that Doctor Faustus is a thoroughly "Christian" Document.
3. Discuss Doctor Faustus as an allegory. Or Bring out the symbolic meaning of Doctor Faustus.
4. Do you agree with the view that Doctor Faustus has a beginning and an end but no "middle" ?  Or Discuss the structure or construction or design of the play, Doctor Faustus. 
5. Write a note on the Renaissance character of the play, Doctor Faustus. Or Discuss Faustus as a man of Renaissance.
6. Write a note on Faustus's character as revealed in Marlowe's play. Or Show that Marlowe in this play is concerned with recording the mental history of Faustus. "
7. Trace the various stages of Faustus's damnation. Or "This play presents the fall and slow moral disintegration of an ardent, but erring spirit." Discuss. 
8. Discuss the appropriateness or otherwise of the comic and farcical scenes in Doctor Faustus. Write a note on the comic and farcical scenes in Doctor Faustus. Do you think the introduction of these scenes in the play to be justified? Give reasons for your answer. 
9. Conflict is the essence of drama. Illustrate this dictum with reference to Doctor Faustus. Or Trace the mental conflict of Faustus from the beginning till his last hour on this earth.
10. How does Marlowe portray the character of Faustus? Or What estimate of the character of Faustus have you formed?
11. Discuss Doctor Faustus as regards its construction. Do you think that it possesses what is known as organic unity?
12. "If Doctor Faustus is a great work, it is also a flawed one". Discuss