ARGUMENT. God, sitting on his throne, sees Satan flying towards this world, then newly created; shews him to the Son who sat at his right hand; foretells the success of Satan in perverting mankind; clears his own justice and wisdom from all imputation, having created Man free, and able enough to have withstood his tempter; yet declares his purpose of Grace towards him, in regard he fell not of his own malice, as did Satan, but by him seduced. The Son of God renders praises to his Father for the manifestation of his gracious purpose towards Man; but God again declares, that Grace cannot be extended towards Man without the satisfaction of divine justice: Man hath offended the majesty of God by aspiring to Godhead, and therefore, with all his progeny devoted to death, must die, unless some one can be found sufficient to answer for his offence, and undergo his punishment. The Son of God freely offers himself a ransom for Man. The Father ac cepts him; ordains his incarnation; pronounces his exaltation above all names in Heaven and Earth; commands all the Angels to adore him: they obey, and, hymning to their harps in full quire, celebrate the Father and the Son. Meanwhile Satan alights upon the bare convex of this world's outermost orb; where, wandering, he first finds a place, since called 'The Limbo of Vauity;' what persons and things fly up thither; thence comes to the gate of Heaven, described ascending by stairs, and the waters above the firmament that flow about it. His passage thence to the orb of the sun: he finds there Uriel, the regent of that Orb, but first changes himself into the shape of a meaner Angel, and, pretending a zealous desire to behold the new creation, and Man whom God had placed here, enquires of him the place of his habitation, and is di rected; alights first on mount Niphates. PARADISE LOST. BOOK III. HAIL, holy Light, offspring of Heav'n first born! May I express thee' unblam'd? since God is light, The rising world of waters dark and deep, I sung of Chaos and eternal Night, Taught by the heav'nly Muse to venture down Cease I to wander, where the Muses haunt 10 15 20 25 Thee, Sion, and the flow'ry brooks beneath, 30 That wash thy hallow'd feet, and warbling flow, Unasti Nightly I visit: nor sometimes forget Those other two equall'd with me in fate, 35 40 45 Of nature's works, to me expung'd and ras'd, efface 50 Shine inward, and the mind through all her powers Of things invisible to mortal sight. 55 Now had th' almighty Father from above, From the pure empyréan where he sits High thron'd above all height, bent down his eye, His own works and their works at once to view. Go Stood thick as stars, and from his sight receiv'd Our two first parents, yet the only two 65 Reaping immortal fruits of joy and love, cuillant Uninterrupted joy, unrivall❜d love, 1 In blissful solitude; he then survey'd Hell and the gulf between, and Satan there In the dun air sublime, and ready now ondeur Only begotten Son, seest thou what rage Through all restraint broke lose, he wings his way 70 75 80 85 Directly towards the new created world, And Man there plac'd, with purpose to assay ეი If him by force he can destroy, or worse, à qui en And Spirits, both them who stood and them who fail'd; Not free, what proof could they have giv'n sincere 95 100 |