The verd'rous wall of Paradife up fprung:
Which to our general fire gave profpect large
Into his nether empire neighb'ring round.
And higher than that wall a circling row
Of goodliest trees loaden with fairest fruit,
Bloffoms and fruits at once of golden huc,
Appear'd, with gay enamel'd colors mix'd:
On which the fun more glad imprefs'd his beams 159
Than in fair evening cloud, or humid bow,
When God hath show'r'd the earth; fo lovely feem'd
That landskip And of pure now purer air
Meets his approach, and to the heart infpires
Vernal delight and joy, able to drive
All fadness but defpair: now gentle gales
Fanning their odoriferous wings dispense
Native perfumes, and whifper whence they ftole
Thofe balmy fpoils. As when to them who fail
Beyond the Cape of Hope, and now are past
Mozambic, off at fea north-eaft winds blow
Sabean odors from the spicy fhore
Of Araby the bleft; with such delay
Well pleas'd they lack their courfe, and many a league Chear'd with the grateful smell old Ocean fimiles: 165 So entertain'd thofe odorous fweets the Fiend
Who came their bane, though with them better pleas'd
Than Afmodeus with the fishy fume
That drove him, though enamour'd, from the spouse
Of Tobit's fon, and with a vengeance fent
From Media poft to Egypt, there fast bound.
Now to th' afcent of that steep favage hill
Satan had journey'd on, penfive and flow;
But further way found none, fo thick intwin'd,
As one continued 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 over leap'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 thepherds pen their flocks at eve 185
In hurdled cotes amid the field fecure,
Leaps o'er the fence with eafe into the fold:
Or as a thief bent to unhord the cash
Of fome rich burgher, whofe fubftantial doors,
Crofs-barr'd and bolted faft, fear no affault,
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,
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 profpect, 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: för blissful Paradife
Of God the garden was, by him in theast
Of Eden planted; Eden ftretch'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 fertil ground he caus'd to grow
All trees of noblest kind for sight, smell, taste ;
And all amid them ftood 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 courfe, but through the fhaggy hill
Pafs'd underneath ingulf'd, for God had thrown 225
That mountain as his garden mold high rais'd
Upon the rapid current, which through veins
Of porous earth with kindly thirst
up drawn,
Rofe 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 darkfome paffage now appears,
And now divided into four main streams,
Runs diverse, wand'ring many a famous realm
And country, whereof here needs no account;
But rather to tell how, if Art could tell,
How from that faphir fount the crifped brooks,
Rolling on orient pearl and sands of gold,
With mazy error under pendent flades
Ran nectar, visiting each plant, and fed
Flow'rs, worthy' of Paradife, 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
Inbrown'd the noontide bow'rs: Thus was this place
A happy rural feat of various view ;
Groves whofe rich trees wept odorous gums and balm, Others whose fruit burnish'd with golden rind
Hung amiable, Hefperian fables true,
If true, here only', and of delicious taste :
Betwixt them lawns, or level downs, and flocks
Grazing the tender herb, were interpos'd,
Or palmy hilloc; or the flow'ry lap
Of fome irriguous valley spread her store,
Flow'rs of all hue, and without thorn the rofe:
Another fide, umbrageous grots and caves
Of cool recefs, o'er which the mantling vine
Lays forth her purple grape, and gently creeps
Luxuriant; mean while 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 fpring. Not that fair field
Of Enna, where Proferpin gathering flowers,
Herfelf a fairer flow'r by gloomy Dis
Was gather'd, which coft Ceres all that pain
To feek her through the world; nor that sweet grove
Of Daphne by Orontes, and th' infpir'd
Caftalian spring, might with this Paradise
Of Eden strive; nor that Nyfeian ile
Girt with the river Triton, where old Cham,
Whom Gentiles Ammon call and Libyan Jove,
Hid Amalthea and her florid fon
Young Bacchus from his stepdame Rhea's eye;
Nor where Abaffin kings their iffue guard,
Mount Amara, though this by fome fuppos'd
True Paradise under the Ethiop line
By Nilus head, inclos'd with fhining rock,
A whole day's journey high, but wide remote
From this Affyrian garden, where the Fiend
Saw undelighted all delight, all kind
Of living creatures new to fight and strange.
Two of far nobler shape erect and tall,
Godlike erect, with native honor clad
In naked majefty feem'd lords of all,
And worthy feem'd; for in their looks divine,
The image of their glorious Maker shone,
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