Gladly the Port, though Shrouds and Tackle torn ; Or in the emptier wafte, resembling Air, Weighs his spread wings, at leasure to behold Farr off th' Empyreal Heav'n, extended wide In circuit, undetermind fquare or round, With Opal Towrs and Battlements adorn'd Of living Saphire, once his native Seat; And fast by hanging in a golden Chain This pendant world, in bigness as a Starr Of smallest Magnitude close by the Moon. Thither full fraught with mischievous revenge, Accurft, and in a curfed hour he hies.
The End of the Second Book.
AIL holy light, ofspring of Heav'n firstborn,
Or of th' Eternal Coeternal beam May I express thee unblam'd? fince God is light, And never but in unapproached light Dwelt from Eternitie, dwelt then in thee, Bright effluence of bright effence increate. Or hear'st thou rather pure Ethereal stream, Whose Fountain who fhall tell? before the Sun, Before the Heavens thou wert, and at the voice Of God, as with a Mantle didst invest
The rifing world of waters dark and deep, Won from the void and formless infinite. Thee I re-vifit now with bolder wing, Escap't the Stygian Pool, though long detain'd In that obfcure fojourn, while in my flight Through utter and through middle darkness borne With other notes then to th' Orphean Lyre I fung of Chaos and Eternal Night,
Taught by the heav'nly Muse to venture down The dark descent, and up to reafcend, Though hard and rare: thee I revifit fafe,
And feel thy fovran vital Lamp; but thou Revisit'st not these eyes, that rowle in vain To find thy piercing ray, and find no dawn; So thick a drop ferene hath quencht thir Orbs, Or dim fuffufion veild. Yet not the more Cease I to wander where the Muses haunt Cleer Spring, or shadie Grove, or Sunnie Hill, Smit with the love of facred fong; but chief Thee Sion and the flowrie Brooks beneath That wash thy hallowd feet, and warbling flow, Nightly I vifit: nor fomtimes forget Those other two equal'd with me in Fate, So were I equal'd with them in renown, Blind Thamyris and blind Mæonides, And Tirefias and Phineus Prophets old. Then feed on thoughts, that voluntarie move Harmonious numbers; as the wakeful Bird Sings darkling, and in fhadieft Covert hid Tunes her nocturnal Note. Thus with the Year Seasons return, but not to me returns
Day, or the sweet approach of Ev'n or Morn, Or fight of vernal bloom, or Summers Rose, Or flocks, or herds, or human face divine; But cloud in ftead, and ever-during dark Surrounds me, from the chearful waies of men Cut off, and for the Book of knowledg fair Prefented with a Universal blanc
Of Natures works to mee expung'd and ras'd, And wisdome at one entrance quite shut out. 50 So much the rather thou Celestial light Shine inward, and the mind through all her powers Irradiate, there plant eyes, all mist from thence
Purge and disperse, that I may see and tell Of things invisible to mortal fight.
Now had the Almighty Father from above, From the pure Empyrean where he fits
High Thron'd above all highth, bent down his eye, His own works and their works at once to view : About him all the Sanctities of Heaven
Stood thick as Starrs, and from his fight receiv'd Beatitude past utterance; on his right The radiant image of his Glory fat, His onely Son; On Earth he first beheld Our two first Parents, yet the onely two Of mankind, in the happie Garden plac't, Reaping immortal fruits of joy and love, Uninterrupted joy, unrivald love
In blissful folitude; he then furvey'd
Hell and the Gulf between, and Satan there Coasting the wall of Heav'n on this fide Night In the dun Air fublime, and ready now
To stoop with wearied wings, and willing feet On the bare outside of this World, that seem'd Firm land imbofom'd without Firmament, Uncertain which, in Ocean or in Air. Him God beholding from his profpect high, Wherein past, prefent, future he beholds, Thus to his onely Son foreseeing spake.
Onely begotten Son, feeft thou what rage Transports our adverfarie, whom no bounds Prescrib'd, no barrs of Hell, nor all the chains Heapt on him there, nor yet the main Abyss Wide interrupt can hold; fo bent he seems On desperat revenge, that shall redound
Upon his own rebellious head. And now Through all restraint broke loose he wings his Not farr off Heav'n, in the Precincts of light, Directly towards the new created World, And Man there plac't, with purpose to affay If him by force he can destroy, or worse, By fom false guile pervert; and shall pervert; For man will heark'n to his glozing lyes, And easily tranfgrefs the fole Command, Sole pledge of his obedience: So will fall Hee and his faithless Progenie: whose fault? Whose but his own? ingrate, he had of mee All he could have; I made him just and right, Sufficient to have stood, though free to fall. Such I created all th' Ethereal Powers And Spirits, both them who stood & them who faild; Freely they stood who ftood, and fell who fell. Not free, what proof could they have givn fincere Of true allegiance, conftant Faith or Love, Where onely what they needs must do, appeard, Not what they would? what praise could they re- What pleasure I from fuch obedience paid, [ceive? When Will and Reason (Reason also is choice) Useless and vain, of freedom both despoild, Made paffive both, had fervd neceffitie, Not mee. They therefore as to right belongd, So were created, nor can justly accuse Thir maker, or thir making, or thir Fate; As if Predeftination over-rul'd
Thir will, difpos'd by abfolute Decree
Or high foreknowledge; they themselves decreed Thir own revolt, not I: if I foreknew,
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