With gentle penetration, though unseen, 585 Through his glazed optic tube yet never saw. 500 595 600 In various shapes old Proteus from the sea, 605 610 615 620 603. Hermes, or Mercury; Proteus was a sea-god, celebrated as is well known for the variety of shapes he had the power of taking; the ancients meant to express, under the name of this fabulous being, the first principle of things. The stone alluded to is that by which philosophers hoped to turn all things into gold. The same whom John saw also in the Sun. Of beaming sunny rays a golden tiar 625 Circled his head, nor less his locks behind Illustrious on his shoulders fledge with wings Lay waving round. On some great charge employ'd He seem'd, or fix'd in cogitation deep. Glad was the Spirit impure, as now in hope 630 To find who might direct his wand'ring flight To Paradise, the happy seat of Man, His journey's end, and our beginning woe. 635 And now a stripling Cherub he appears, Under a coronet his flowing hair 640 In curls on either cheek play'd; wings he wore His habit fit for speed succinct, and held Before his decent steps a silver wand. He drew not nigh unheard: the Angel bright, 645 Ere he drew nigh, his radiant visage turn'd, Admonish'd by his ear, and straight was known Th' Arch-Angel Uriel, one of the seven Who in God's presence, nearest to his throne, Stand ready at command, and are his eyes 650 Bear his swift errands over moist and dry, O'er sea and land: him Satan thus accosts: Uriel, for thou of those sev'n Spirits that stand In sight of God's high throne, gloriously bright, 655 The first art wont his great authentic will Where all his sons thy embassy attend; And here art likeliest, by Supreme decree, Like honour to obtain, and as his eye €30 To visit oft this new creation round; 623. See Rev. xix. 17. 627. Instead of fledged for softness. 644. Decent, used in the Latin sense, graceful and beautiful. 650. Zech. iv. 10. Tobit xii. 15. Rev. i. 4. v. 6. viii. 2. Unspeakable desire to see, and know 665 His fixed seat, or fixed seat hath none, But all these shining orbs his choice to dwell; 670 On whom the great Creator hath bestow'd 675 The Universal Maker we may praise, Who justly hath driv'n out his rebel foes To deepest Hell; and to repair that loss Created this new happy race of Men To serve him better: wise are all his ways. 680 So spake the false Dissembler unperceived; Hypocrisy, the only evil that walks Invisible, except to God alone, For neither Man nor Angel can discern By his permissive will, thro' Heav'n and Earth: 685 Resigns her charge, while Goodness thinks no ill In his uprightness answer thus return'd: Fair Angel, thy desire, which tends to know The works of God, thereby to glorify 690 695 The great Work-Master, leads to no excess But what created mind can comprehend 705 That brought them forth, but hid their causes deep? I saw when at his word the formless mass, This world's material mould, came to a heap: Confusion heard his voice, and wild Uproar 710 Stood ruled, stood vast Infinitude confined; Light shone, and Order from Disorder sprung: Flew upward, spirited with various forms, Look downward on that globe, whose hither side 725 730 Timely' interposes, and her monthly round 730. Triform, so called from her increase and decrease towards east and west, and her fulness. 742. Niphates, a mountain on the borders of Armenia, near which Paradise is supposed to have been situated. BOOK IV THE ARGUMENT. Satan now in prospect of Eden, and nigh the place where ...e must now attempt the bold enterprise which he undertook alone against God and Man, falls into many doubts with himself, and many passions, fear, envy, and despair; but at length confirms himself in evil, journeys on to Paradise, whose outward prospect and situation is described, overleaps the bounds, sits in the shape of a cormorant on the Tree of Life, as highest in the garden, to look about him. The garden described: Satan's first sight of Adam and Eve; his wonder at their excellent form and happy state, but with resolution to work their fall; overhears their discourse, thence gathers that the Tree of Knowledge was forbidden them to eat of, under penalty of Death; and thereon intends to found his temptation, by seducing them to transgress; then leaves them a while, to know further of their state by some other means. Meanwhile Uriel, descending on a sun-beam, warns Gabriel, who had in charge the gate of Paradise, that some evii Spirit had escaped the deep, and passed at noon by his sphere in the shape of a good Angel down to Paradise, discovered after by his furious gestures in the Mount. Gabriel promises to find him ere morning. Night coming on, Adam and Eve discourse of going to their rest: their bower described; their evening worship. Gabriel drawing forth his bands of night-watch to walk the round of Paradise, appoints two strong Angels to Adam's bower, lest the evil Spirit should be there doing some harm to Adam or Eve sleeping; there they find him at the ear of Eve, tempting her in a dream, and bring him, though unwilling, to Gabriel, by whom questioned, he scornfully answers, prepares resistance, but hindered by a sign from Heaven, flies out of Paradise. O FOR that warning voice, which he who saw Woe to th' inhabitants on earth!' that now, While time was, our first parents had been warn'd The coming of their secret foe, and 'scaped, Haply so 'scaped his mortal snare: for now Satan, now first inflamed with rage, came down, 5 The tempter ere th' accuser of mankind, 10 1. There is great propriety in the opening of the present book. The grand subject of the relation which St. John gave of the Apocalypse or Revelation he received, is the overthrow of Satan, whose first attempts upon Man's purity and happiness form the ground-work of this part t of the poem. |