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A political realist and high-ranking Catholic official who hides his true motives under a mask of piety, the Chancellor-Archbishop tells the Emperor that evils afflict his realm. He is also the only counselor who openly challenges Mephistopheles’s proposal that the Emperor resuscitate his state by digging for hidden gold. He does this not to protect the empire, however, but to consolidate his own power by maintaining the integration of Church and State. Later, the Chancellor-Archbishop squeezes lands, taxes, and tithes from the Emperor in exchange for hushing up the fact that his victory over rebels came only because of an alliance with the devil himself.
The Chancellor-Archbishop Quotes in Faust
The Faust quotes below are all either spoken by The Chancellor-Archbishop or refer to The Chancellor-Archbishop. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Part 2: Act 1: The Throne Room Quotes
Nature and intellect are not words said to Christians.
Because such language is so dangerous
the atheist is executed at the stake.
Nature is sin, and Intellect the devil;
hermaphroditic Doubt their child
which they foster together.
Related Characters:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
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The Chancellor-Archbishop Character Timeline in Faust
The timeline below shows where the character The Chancellor-Archbishop appears in Faust. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Part 2: Act 1: An Imperial Palace: The Throne Room
...precedes the solemn Christian observance of Lent in spring), the empire is in dire straits. The Chancellor announces that evils haunt the realm: fever, theft, injustice, civil turmoil, flattery, and corruption. A...
(full context)
...gold buried by desperate people in times past, like those fleeing Rome during its collapse. The Chancellor (also the Archbishop of Mainz, a city in the Holy Roman Empire) accuses Mephistopheles of...
(full context)
Part 2: Act 1: An Imperial Palace: A Garden
The Chancellor explains: Faust and Mephistopheles came up with the idea of having paper money printed on...
(full context)
Part 2: Act 4: The Anti-Emperor’s Tent
...high titles to the princes—Arch-Marshal, Arch-Cupbearer, and the like—and he grants them, along with the Chancellor-Archbishop (who enters during these proceedings), fine estates and authority subordinate only to his own. The...
(full context)
The Chancellor-Archbishop remains. He is gravely concerned that the Emperor conspired with Satan to achieve his magical...
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Finally, the Chancellor-Archbishop reminds the Emperor that he granted Faust the Empire’s coasts to rule as a feudal...
(full context)
