PARADISE LOST.

BOOK I.

THE ARGUMENI.

This First Book proposes, first, in brief, the whole subject, Man's disobedience, and the loss thereupon of Paradise, wherein he was placed: then touches the prime cause of his fall, the Serpent, or rather Satan in the serpent; who revolting from God, and drawing to his side many legions of Angels, was, by the command of God, driven out of Heaven, with all his crew, into the great deep. Which action passed over, the poem hastens into the midst of things, presenting Satan with his Angels now fallen into Hell, described here, not in the centre (for Heaven and Earth may be supposed as yet not made, certainly not yet accursed) but in a place of utter darkness, fitliest called Chaos: here Satan with his Angels lying on the burning lake, thunderstruck and astonished, after a certain space recovers, as from confusion, calls up him who next in order and dignity lay by him; they confer of their miserable fall. Satan awakens all his legions, who lay till then in the same manner confounded: they rise, their numbers, array of battle, their chief leaders named, according to the idols known afterward in Canaan and the countries adjoining. To these Satan directs his speech, comforts them with hope yet of regaining Heaven, but tells them lastly of a new world and new kind of creature to be created, according to an ancient prophecy or report in Heaven; for that Angels were long before this visible creation, was the opinion of many ancient Fathers. To find out the truth of this prophecy, and what to dete wine thereon, he refers to a full council. What his associates thence attempt. Pandemonium, the palace of Satan, rises, suddenly built out of the deep: the infernal peers there sit in council.

man's first disobedience, and the fi alt

Of that forbidden tree, whose mortal taste
Brought death into the world, and all our woe,
With loss of Eden, till one greater man
Restore us, and regain the blissful seat,

1. The fitness and exquisite beauty of this introduction to poem cannot be too much admired. The classical taste and religious feelings of the author are both evidenced in it; the former by the simplicity with which the subject is stated and the invocation of the muse, and the latter by his addressing the Holy Spirit as the source of inspiration and light. Great admiration has been expressed by the different commentators on the skilful construction of the verse in these introductory lines, the pauses of which are so varied as to give a most musical effect to the whole passage. 4. It has been supposed that Milton intimated in this expression bis idea of writing Paradise Regained, but it appears to have been suggested merely by the subject of his present contemp'ation.

Sing Heav'nly Muse, that on the secret top

Of Oreb, or of Sinai, didst inspire

That Shepherd, who first taught the chosen seed

In the beginning, how the heav'ns and earth
Rose out of Chaos. Or if Sion hill

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Delight thee more, and Siloa's brook that flow'd
Fast by the oracle of God; I thence
Invoke thy aid to my advent'rous song,
That with no middle flight intends to soar
Above th' Aonian mount, while it pursues
Things unattempted yet, in prose or rhyme.
And chiefly Thou, O Sp'rit, that dost prefer
Before all temples th' upright heart and pure,
Instruct me, for Thou know'st: Thou from the first
Wast present, and with mighty wings outspread 20
Dove-like sat'st brooding on the vast abyss,

And mad'st it pregnant. What in me is dark
Illumine, what is low raise and support;
That to the height of this great argument

I may assert eternal Providence,

And justify the ways of God to Men.

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Say first, for Heav'n hides nothing from thy view, Nor the deep tract of Hell; say first what cause Moved our grand parents, in that happy state, Favour'd of Heav'n so highly, to fall off From their Creator, and trangress his will For one restraint, lords of the world besides? Who first seduced them to that foul revolt? Th' infernal Serpent: he it was whose guile, Stirr'd up with envy and revenge, deceived The mother of mankind, what time his pride Had cast him out from Heav'n, with all his host Of rebel Angels; by whose aid aspiring

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6. Bentley proposed the changing of this epithet into sacred, but his opinion has been successfully confuted, it having been shewn that the former word is peculiarly applicable to Oreb or Sirai, which had been so awfully obscured at the giving of the law. 8. Moses; who, we are told, Exod. iii. 1. kept the flock of Jethro his father-in-law.

11. Siloa was a fountain flowing near the temple of Jerusalem. 15. Th' Aonian mount; the classical seat of the Muses. 16. It has been supposed that Milton took the idea of writing a poem on the loss of Paradise, from an Italian tragedy called II Paradiso Perso,' but little weight can be placed on this opinion when it is considered that both his genius and the most favourite of his studies led him continually to religious contemplation.

To set himself in glory 'bove his peers,
He trusted to have equall'd the Most High,
If he opposed; and with ambitious aim
Against the throne and monarchy of God,

Raised impious war in Heav'n, and battle proud
With vain attempt. Him the Almighty Power
Hurl'd headlong flaming from th' ethereal sky, 45
With hideous ruin and combustion, down
To bottomless perdition; there to dwell
In adamantine chains and penal fire,
Who durst defy th' Omnipotent to arms.

Nine times the space that measures day and night 50
To mortal men, he with his horrid crew
Lay vanquish'd, rolling in the fiery gulf,
Confounded though immortal: But his doom
Reserved him to more wrath; for now the thought
Both of lost happiness and lasting pain
Torments him; round he throws his baleful eyes,
That witness'd huge affliction and dismay,
Mix'd with obdurate pride and steadfast hate:

The dismal situation waste and wild:

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At once, as far as angels' ken, he views

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A dungeon horrible on all sides round,

As one great furnace flamed; yet from those flames
No light; but rather darkness visible
Served only to discover sights of woe,

Regions of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace

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And rest can never dwell: hope never comes,
That comes to all: but torture without end
Still urges, and a fiery deluge, fed
With ever-burning sulphur unconsumed:
Such place eternal justice had prepared
For those rebellious; here their pris'n ordain'd

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In utter darkness, and their portion set
As far removed from God and light of heaven,
As from the centre thrice to th' utmost pole.

44. This whole description of the fall of the angels and of the infernal abyss is conceived in the noblest style of poetry; the flaming, rushing fall of the apostate angels, and the dark but fiery prison which received them, are perhaps the most sublime pictures which the human imagination ever produced.

74. It is a curious observation, that Homer places Hell as far beneath the earth as Heaven is above it; Virgil makes it twice as distant, and Milton here thrice as far.

O how unlike the place from whence they fell!
There the companions of his fall, o'erwhelm'd
With floods and whirlwinds of tempestuous fire,
He soon discerns, and welt'ring by his side
One next himself in power, and next in crime,
Long after known in Palestine, and named
Beelzebub. To whom th' Arch-Enemy,

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And thence in Heav'n call'd Satan, with bold words Breaking the horrid silence thus began:

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If thou beest he; but O how fallen! how changed From him who, in the happy realms of light Cloth'd with transcendent brightness didst outshine Myriads though bright! If he whom mutual league, United thoughts and counsels, equal hope And hazard in the glorious enterprise,

Join'd with me once, now misery hath join'd
In equal ruin: into what pit thou seest

From what height fall'n, so much the stronger proved He with his thunder: and till then who knew

The force of those dire arms? yet not for those
Nor what the potent victor in his rage
Can else inflict, do I repent or change,
Though changed in outward lustre, that fix'd mind
And high disdain from sense of injured merit,
That with the Mightiest raised me to contend,
And to the fierce contention brought along
Innumerable force of Spirits arm'd,

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That durst dislike his reign, and me preferring,

His utmost pow'r with adverse pow'r opposed

In dubious battle on the plains of Heav'n,

And shook his throne. What though the field be lost?

81. Beelzebub, or the Lord of Flies, was worshipped at Ekron, 2 Kings, i. 2. see also Matt. xii. 24.

82. Satan in Hebrew means an enemy.

84. The first speech of Satan is very noble, and the abrupt manner of its coinmencement is powerfully striking. Imitations have been pointed out in this passage, of Isaiah xiv. Virgil, Æn. ii. 274. and Homer, Odyss. vi. 110. Others have also been remarked of schylus, Tasso, &c. but they seem to me to have been coincidences rather than imitations.

Extort from me. To bow and sue for grace
With suppliant knee, and deify his pow'r,
Who from the terror of this arm so late
Doubted his empire; that were low indeed!
That were an ignominy and shame beneath
This downfall; since by fate the strength of Gods
And this empyreal substance cannot fail,
Since through experience of this great event

In arms not worse, in foresight much advanced,
We may with more successful hope resolve
To wage by force or guile eternal war,
Irreconcileable to our grand foe,
Who now triumphs, and in th' excess of joy
Sole reigning holds the tyranny of heav'n.

So spake th' apostate Angel, though in pain,
Vaunting aloud, but rack'd with deep despair:
And him thus answer'd soon his bold compeer.

O Prince, O Chief of many throned powers!
That led th' embattled Seraphim to war
Under thy conduct, and in dreadful deeds
Fearless, endanger'd heav'n's perpetual King,
And put to proof his high supremacy,

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Whether upheld by strength, or chance, or fate;
Too well I see and rue the dire event,
That with sad overthrow and foul defeat

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Hath lost us heav'n, and all this mighty host

In horrible destruction laid thus low,
As far as Gods and heav'nly essences
Can perish for the mind and spirit remains
Invincible, and vigour soon returns,

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Though all our glory extinct, and happy state
Here swallow'd up in endless misery.
But what if he our conqu'ror (whom I now
Of force believe almighty, since no less

Than such could have o'erpower'd such force as ours) Have left us this our spirit and strength entire 146 Strongly to suffer and support our pains,

That we may so suffice his vengeful ire,

116. Satan expresses by the word fate, his high and proud belief in the original and underived existence as well as immortality of the angels. Here is an admirable attention to the minutest circumstances which might develope the character of the fallen spirit evident throughout the speech, and the reader's attention cannot be too strongly directed to its examination.