And thy request think now fulfill'd, that ask'd
How first this world and face of things began,
And what before thy memory was done
From the beginning: that posterity,

Inform'd by thee, might know: if else thou seek'st
Aught not surpassing human measure, say."

PARADISE LOST.

BOOK VIII.

THE ARGUMENT.

Adam inquires concerning celestial motions; is doubtfully answered, and exhorted to search rather things more worthy of knowledge; Adam assents; and, still desirous to detain Raphael, relates to him what he remembered since his own creation; his placing in Paradise; his talk with God concerning solitude and fit society; his first meeting and nuptials with Eve; his discourse with the angel thereupon, who, after admonitions repeated, departs.

HE angel ended, and in Adam's ear

So charming left his voice, that he awhile

Thought him still speaking, still stood fix'd to hear; Then, as new-waked, thus gratefully replied:

"What thanks sufficient, or what recompense

Equal, have I to render thee, divine

Historian, who thus largely hast allay'd
The thirst I had of knowledge, and vouchsafed
This friendly condescension, to relate

Things else by me unsearchable; now heard
With wonder, but delight, and, as is due,
With glory attributed to the high
Creator? Something yet of doubt remains,
Which only thy solution can resolve.
When I behold this goodly frame, this world,
Of heaven and earth consisting, and compute
Their magnitudes; this earth, a spot, a grain,
An atom, with the firmament compared
And all her number'd stars, that seem to roll
Spaces incomprehensible (for such

Their distance argues, and their swift return
Diurnal), merely to officiate light

Round this opacous earth, this punctual spot,
One day and night; in all their vast survey
Useless besides; reasoning, I oft admire,
How Nature, wise and frugal, could commit
Such disproportions, with superfluous hand
So many nobler bodies to create,

Greater, so manifold, to this one use,

For aught appears, and on their orbs impose
Such restless revolution, day by day

Repeated; while the sedentary earth,

That better might with far less compass move,
Served by more noble than herself, attains
Her end without least motion, and receives,
As tribute, such a sumless journey brought
Of incorporeal speed, her warmth and light;
Speed, to describe whose swiftness number fails."
So spake our sire, and by his countenance seem'd
Entering on studious thoughts abstruse; which Eve