Faust's Pact and the Hole in the Ceiling

By legend Faust, the famous necromancer, lived here. He came from Germany, the son of poor parents; but an uncle recognised his gifts, took him in and sent him to study. The talented boy learned well and became a doctor of wisdom. Yet all human art and knowledge did not suffice him, and he wished to penetrate secrets that mortals are not meant to know. When he had squandered the fortune inherited from his uncle with frivolous companions, he took an evil road instead of honest work: he procured books of sorcery, and when he thought he knew enough he called up an evil spirit one night at a crossroads. With a tremendous din Satan appeared to him out of the darkness on a fiery chariot and asked in a sepulchral voice: “Why do you call me, and what do you want of me?” “I wish to be happy and rich, that is why I called you,” answered Faust. “Very well,” the spirit replied, “tomorrow at midnight I shall come to you and we shall make a proper compact together.” The spirit vanished, and Faust went back to the town in high spirits, already looking forward to the good life. The next night the devil did indeed fly into his lodging through the closed door and spoke at once: “Sit and write what I tell you.” And he handed Faust a raven's quill. And the blinded Faust wrote: “I renounce God and his faith, I shall neither pray nor go to church. But after four and twenty years my body and my soul belong to Lucifer.” He hesitated a moment longer, but wrote it out to the end. Then the spirit bade him sign, pricked his left hand with its claw, and as the blood sprang out Faust signed with his own blood and so sealed the pact. Lucifer looked the paper over and said: “For all that time my servant Mephistopheles will serve you faithfully and carry out your every command.” And taking the compact with him, he vanished as he had come. In the morning the promised servant appeared at Faust's and at his order brought him at once the finest food and as much wine as his throat desired. From that day he lived in bliss, and the strange tricks he played would fill a whole chronicle. And because there was a famous university in Prague, Faust came here too; he liked the place and lived in the house that bears his name to this day — until the black one carried him off through a hole in the ceiling. The spirit of the sorcerer who had fallen by his own fault into the devil's power had no rest from then on and raged in that house every night. For many years nobody would live there, and the opening in the ceiling still gaped threateningly, though people tried several times to wall it up. Only when a church building was put up next door in 1730 did the nightly haunting in Faust's house cease.