O fhame to men! Devil with Devil damn'd
Firm concord holds, men only disagree
Of creatures rational, though under hope
Of heav'nly grace: and God proclaiming peace,
Yet live in hatred, enmity, and strife
Among themselves, and levy cruel wars,
Wafting the earth, each other to destroy:
As if (which might induce us to accord)
Man had not hellish foes enow besides,
That day and night for his destruction wait.
The Stygian council thus diffolv'd; and forth
In order came the grand infernal peers:
Midst came their mighty paramount, and feem'd
Alone th'antagonist of Heav'n, nor less
Than Hell's dread emperor with pomp fupreme, 510
And God-like imitated ftate; him round
A globe of fiery Seraphim inclos'd
With bright imblazonry, and horrent arms.
Then of their feffion ended they bid cry
With trumpets regal found the great refult;
Tow'ards the four winds four fpeedy Cherubim
Put to their mouths the founding alchemy
By heralds voice explain'd; the hollow' abyss
Heard far and wide, and all the host of Hell
With deafning fhout return'd them loud acclame. 520
Thence more at ease their minds, and fomewhat rais'd.
By falfe prefumptuous hope, the ranged Powers
Difband, and wand'ring, each his several way
Purfues, as inclination or fad choice
Leads him perplex'd, where he may likelieft find 525
Truce to his reftlefs thoughts, and entertain
The irksome hours, till his great chief return.
Part on the plain, or in the air fublime,
Upon the wing, or in fwift race contend,
As at th' Olympian games or Pythian fields ;
Part curb their fiery steeds, or shun the goal
With rapid wheels, or fronted brigads form.
As when to warn proud cities war appears
Wag'd in the troubled fky, and armies ruth
To battle in the clouds, before each van
Prick forth the aery knights, and couch their fpears
Till thickest legions close; with feats of arms
From either end of Heav'n the welkin burns.
Others with vaft Typhoean rage more fell
Rend up both rocks and hills and ride the air
In whirlwind; Hell fcarce holds the wild uproar.
As when Alcides, from Oechalia crown'd
With conqueft, felt the envenom'd robe, and tore
Through pain up by the roots Theffalian pines,
And Lichas from the top of Qeta threw
Into th' Euboic fea. Others more mild,
Retreated in a filent valley, fing
With notes angelical to many a harp
Their own heroic deeds and hapless fall
By doom of battle; and complain that fate
Free virtue fhould enthrall to force or chance.
Their fong was partial, but the harmony
(What could it less when Spi'rits immortal fing?) Sufpended Hell,, and took with ravishment
The thronging audience. In difcourfe more fweet 555 (For eloquence the foul, fong charms the sense,) Others apart fat on a hill retir'd,
In thoughts more elevate, and reason'd high
Of providence, foreknowledge, will, and fate,
Fix'd fate, free will, foreknowledge abfolute,
And found no end, in wand'ring mazes loft.
Of good and evil much they argued then,
Of happiness and final mifery,
Paffion and apathy, and glory' and fame,
Vain wifdom all, and false philofophy:
Yet with a pleasing forcery could charm
Pain for a while or anguifh, and excite
Fallacious hope, or arm th' obdured breast
With stubborn patience as with triple steel.
Another part in squadrons and grofs bands,
On bold adventure to discover wide
That dismal world, if any clime perhaps
Might yield them easier habitation, bend
Four ways their flying march, along the banks
Of four infernal rivers, that difgorge.
Into the burning lake their baleful Яreams;
Abhorred Styx, the flood of deadly hate ;
Sad Acheron of forrow, black and deep;
Cocytus, nam'd of lamentation loud
Heard on the rueful ftream; fierce Phlegethon, 580
Whose waves of torrent fire inflame with rage.
Far off from thefe a flow and filent stream,
Lethe the river of oblivion rolls
Her wat❜ry labyrinth, whereof who drinks,
Forthwith his former ftate and be'ing forgets, 585
Forgets both joy and grief, pleafure and pain.
Beyond this flood a frozen continent
Lies dark and wild, beat with perpetual storms
Of whirlwind and dire hail, which on firm land
Thaws not, but gathers heap, and ruin seems
Of ancient pile: all elfe deep fnow and ice,
A gulf profound as that Serbonian bog
Betwixt Damiata and mount Cafius old,
Where armies whole have funk: the parching air Burns frore, and cold performs th' effect of fire. 595 Thither by harpy-footed furies hal'd
At certain revolutions all the damn'd
Are brought, and feel by turns the bitter change Of fierce extremes, extremes by change more fierce, From beds of raging fire to starve in ice
Their foft ethereal warmth, and there to pine
Immoveable, infix'd, and frozen round,
Periods of time, thence hurried back to fire.
They ferry over this Lethean found
Both to and fro, their forrow to augment,
And wifh and ftruggle, as they pafs, to reach
The tempting ftream, with one small drop to lófe
In fweet forgetfulness all pain and woe,
All in one moment, and fo near the brink;
But fate withstands, and to oppofe th' attempt 610
Medufa with Gorgonian terror guards
The ford, and of itfelf the water flies
All taste of living wight, as once it fled
The lip of Tantalus. Thus roving on
In confus'd march forlorn, th' adventrous bands 615
With fhudd'ring horror pale, and eyes aghaft,
View'd first their lamentable lot, and found
No reft through many a dark and dreary vale
They pafs'd, and many a region dolorous,
O'er many a frozen, many a fiery Alp,
Rocks, caves, lakes, fens, bogs,dens, and fhades of death,
A univerfe of death, which God by curfe
Created ev'il, for evil only good,
Where all life dies, death lives, and nature breeds,
Perverse, all monftrous, all prodigious things, 6251
Abominable, inutterable, and worse
Than fables yet have feign'd, or fear conceiv'd,
Gorgon's, and Hydra's, and Chimera's dire.
Mean while the Adverfary' of God and Man, Satan with thoughts enflam'd of hig'heft defign, 630 Puts on swift wings, and tow'ards the gates of Hell Explores his folitary flight; fometimes
He fcours the right hand coaft, fometimes the left,
Now fhaves with level wing the deep, then foars
Up to the fiery concave tow'ring high.
E
As when far off at fea a fleet defcry'd
Hangs in the clouds, by equinoctial winds
Clofe failing from Bengala, or the ifles
Of Ternate and Tidore, whence merchants bring Their fpicy drugs: they on the trading flood Through the wide Ethiopian to the Cape
Ply femming nightly tow'ard the pole. So feem'd Far off the flying Fiend: at last appear
Hell bounds high reaching to the horrid roof,
And thrice three-fold the gates; three folds were brafs, Three iron, three of adamantine rock,
Impenetrable, impal'd with circling fire,
Yet unconfum'd. Before the gates there fat
On either fide a formidable fhape;
The oné féem'd woman to the waift, and fair, 650 But ended foul in many a fcaly fold
Voluminous and vaft, a ferpent arm'd
With mortal fting: about her middle round
A cry of Hell hounds never ceafing bark'd
With wide Cerberean mouths full loud, and rung
A hideous peal; yet, when they lift, would creep,
If ought disturb'd their noife, into her womb,
And kennel there, yet there still bärk'd and howl'd,
Within unfeen. Far lefs abhorr'd than these
Vex'd Scylla bathing in the fea that parts
Calabria from the hoarse Trinaërian shore:
Nor uglier follow the night-hag, when call'd
In fecret, riding through the air fhe comes,
Lur'd with the smell of infant blood, to dance
With Lapland witches, while the lab'ring moon
Eclipfes at their charms. The other shape,
If fhape it might be call'd, that shape had none
Distinguishable in member, joint, or limb,
Or fubftance might be call'd that shadow seem'd,
For each feem'd either; black it steed as night,
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