For never can true reconcilement grow, Where wounds of deadly hate have pierc'd so deep:
Which would but lead me to a worse relapse
And heavier fall: fo should I purchase dear Short intermiffion bought with double smart. This knows my Punisher: therefore as far From granting he, as I from begging peace: All hope excluded thus, behold in stead Of us outcast, exil'd, his new delight, Mankind created, and for him this world. So farewel hope, and with hope farewel fear, Farewel remorse: all good to me is lost; Evil be thou my good; by thee at least Divided empire with heaven's King I hơid, By thee, and more than half perhaps will reign; As man ere long, and this new world, shall know..
Thus while he spake, each passion dimm'd his face Thrice chang'd with pale ire, envy, and despair; 115 Which marr'd his borrow'd visage, and betray'd Him counterfeit, if any eye beheld.
For heav'nly minds from such distempers foul Are ever clear. Whereof he foon aware, Each perturbation smooth'd with outward calm, 120 Artificer of fraud; and was the first
That practis'd falfehood under faintly show; Deep malice to conceal, couch'd with revenge: Yet not enough had practis'd to deceive
Uriel once warn'd; whose eye purfu'd him down 125 The way he went, and on th' Affyrian mount Saw him disfigur'd, more than could befall Spirit of happy fort; his gestures fierce He mark'd, and mad demeanour, then alone,.
As he suppos'd, all unobserv'd, unseen. So on he fares, and to the border comes
Of Eden, where delicious Paradise,
Now nearer, crowns with her inclofure green a
As with a rural mound, the champaign head Of a steep wilderness, whofe hairy fides With thicket overgrown, grotesque and wild, Access deny'd; and over head up grew
Infuperable height of loftiest shade,
Cedar, and pine, and fir, and branching palm, A fylvan scene, and as the ranks afcend,
Shade above shade, a woody theatre
Of stateliest view. Yet higher than their tops The verd'rous wall of Paradise up sprung: Which to our general fire gave prospect large Into his nether empire neighb'ring round. And higher than that wall a circling row Of goodliest trees, loaden with fairest fruit, Blossoms and fruits at once of golden hue, Appear'd, with gay enamell'd colours mix'd: On which the fun more glad impress'd his beams 150 Than in fair evening cloud, or humid bow, When God hath shower'd the earth; so lovely seem'd That landscape: and of pure now purer air Meets his approach, and to the heart inspires Vernal delight and joy, able to drive AH fadness but despair: now gentle gales, Fanning their odoriferous wings, dispense Native perfumes, and whisper whence they stole Those balmy spoils. As when to them who fail Beyond the Cape of Hope, and now are past Mozambique, off at fea north-east winds blow Sabéan odours from the spicy shore
Of Araby the Bless'd; with such delay
Well pleas'd they lack their course, and many a league Cheer'd with the grateful smell old Ocean smiles: 165 So entertain'd these odorous sweets the fiend, Who came their bane; though with them better Than Afmodeus with the fishy fume
That drove him, though enamour'd, from the spoufe
Of Tobit's fon, and with a vengeance fent From Media post to Egypt, there fast bound.
Now to th' afcent of that steep savage hill Satan had journey'd on, pensive and flow; But further way found none, so thick intwin'd, As one continu'd brake, the undergrowth Of shrubs and tangling bushes had perplex'd All path of man or beast that pass'd that way. One gate there only was, and that look'd east On th' other fide: which when th' arch-felon faw,
Due entrance he disdain'd, and, in contempt, At one flight bound high overleap'd all bound Of hill or highest wall, and sheer within
Lights on his feet. As when a prowling wolf, Whom hunger drives to feek new haunt for prey, Watching where shepherds pen their flocks at eve 185
In hurdled cotes amid the field secure,
Leaps o'er the fence with ease into the fold:
Or as a thief, bent to unhoard the cash
Of fome rich burgher, whose substantial doors,
Cross-barr'd and bolted fast, fear no assault,
In at the window climbs, or o'er the tiles:
So clomb this first grand thief into God's fold;
So fince into his church lewd hirelings climb.
Thence up he flew, and on the tree of life,
The middle tree, and highest there that grew, 195
Sat like a cormorant; yet not true life
Thereby regain'd, but fat devifing death To them who liv'd; nor on the virtue thought
Of that life-giving plant, but only us'd,
For prospect, what well us'd had been the pledge 200
Of immortality. So little knows
Any, but God alone, to value right
The good before him, but perverts best things To worst abuse, or to their meanest use.
Beneath him with new wonder now he views, To all delight of human sense expos'd
In narrow room, nature's whole wealth, yea more, A heav'n on earth: for blissful Paradife
Of God the garden was, by him in th' east Of Eden planted; Eden stretch'd her line From Auran eastward to the royal towers Of great Seleucia, built by Grecian kings, Or where the fons of Eden long before Dwelt in Telaffar: in this pleasant foil His far more pleasant garden God ordain'd; Out of the fertile ground he caus'd to grow All trees of noblest kind for sight, smell, taste; And all amid them stood the tree of life,
High eminent, blooming ambrofial fruit Of vegetable gold: and next to life, Our death, the tree of knowledge, grew fast by; Knowledge of good bought dear by knowing ill. Southward through Eden went a river large, Nor chang'd his course, but through the shaggy hill Pass'd underneath ingulf'd; for God had thrown 225 That mountain as his garden-mould high rais'd Upon the rapid current, which, through veins Of porous earth with kindly thirst up drawn, Rose a fresh fountain, and with many a rill Water'd the garden; thence united fell Down the steep glade, and met the nether flood, Which from his darksome passage now appears; And now divided into four main streams, Runs diverse, wand'ring many a famous realm And country, whereof here needs no account; 235
But rather to tell how, if art could tell,
How from that faphir fount the crisped brooks, Rolling on orient pearl and sands of gold,
With mazy error under pendent shades
Ran nectar, visiting each plant, and fed Flowers, worthy' of Paradise, which not nice art In beds and curious knots, but nature boon Pour'd forth profuse on hill, and dale, and plain, Both where the morning-fun first warmly smote The open field, and where the unpierc'd shade 245 Imbrown'd the noontide-bow'rs. Thus was this place A happy rural feat of various view; Groves whose rich trees wept odorous gums and balm; Others whose fruit, burnish'd with golden rind, Hung amiable, Hesperian fables true, If true, here only', and of delicious taste: Betwixt them lawns, or level downs, and flocks
Grafing the tender herb, were interpos'd, Or palmy hillock; or the flow'ry lap Of fome irriguous valley spread her store, Flowers of all hue, and without thorn the rose: Another fide, umbrageous grots and caves Of cool recess, o'er which the mantling vine Lays forth her purple grape, and gently creeps Luxuriant; meanwhile murm'ring waters fall Down the flope hills, difpers'd, or in a lake, That to the fringed bank with myrtle crown'd Her crystal mirror holds, unite their streams. The birds their quire apply; airs, vernal airs, Breathing the smell of field and grove, attune The trembling leaves, while univerfal Pan, Knit with the Graces and the Hours in dance, Led on th' eternal spring. Not that fair field Of Enna, where Proférpine gathering flowers, Herself a fairer flow'r, by gloomy Dis Was gather'd, which cost Ceres all that pain To seek her through the world; nor that sweet grove
Of Daphne by Orontes, and th' inspir'd
Castalian spring, might with this Paradise
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