But I can now no more; the parting sun
Beyond the Earth's green Cape and verdant Isles Hesperian sets, my signal to depart.
Be strong, live happy, and love! But, first of all, Him, whom to love is to obey, and keep His great command: take heed lest passion sway Thy judgment to do aught, which else free will Would not admit: thine, and of all thy sons, The weal or woe in thee is plac'd; beware! I in thy persevering shall rejoice,
And all the Blest: Stand fast; to stand or fall Free in thine own arbitrement it lies. Perfect within, no outward aid require ; And all temptation to transgress repel.
So saying, he arose; whom Adam thus Follow'd with benediction. Since to part, Go, heavenly guest, ethereal Messenger, Sent from whose sovran goodness I adore! Gentle to me and affable hath been Thy condescension, and shall be honour'd ever With grateful memory: Thou to mankind Be good and friendly still, and oft return! So parted they; the Angel up to Heaven From the thick shade, and Adam to his bower.
No more of talk where God or Angel guest With Man, as with his friend, familiar us'd To sit indulgent, and with him partake Rural repast; permitting him the while
Venial discourse unblam'd. I now must change Those notes to tragick; foul distrust, and breach Disloyal on the part of Man, revolt
And disobedience: on the part of Heaven Now alienated, distance and distaste,
Anger and just rebuke, and judgment given, That brought into this world a world of woe, Sin and her shadow Death, and Misery Death's harbinger: Sad task, yet argument Not less but more heroick than the wrath Of stern Achilles on his foe pursued Thrice fugitive about Troy wall; or rage Of Turnus for Lavinia disespous'd; Or Neptune's ire, or Juno's, that so long Perplex'd the Greek, and Cytherea's son; If answerable style I can obtain
Of my celestial patroness, who deigns Her nightly visitation unimplor'd,
And dictates to me slumbering; or inspires Easy my unpremeditated verse:
Since first this subject for heroick song
Pleas'd me long choosing, and beginning late;
Not sedulous by nature to indite
Wars, hitherto the only argument
Heroick deem'd; chief mastery to dissect With long and tedious havock fabled knights In battles feign'd; the better fortitude Of patience and heroick martyrdom Unsung; or to describe races and games, Or tilting furniture, imblazon'd shields, Impresses quaint, caparisons and steeds, Bases and tinsel trappings, gorgeous knights At joust and tournament; then marshall'd feast Serv'd up in hall with sewers and seneshals; The skill of artifice or office mean,
Not that which justly gives heroick name To person, or to poem. Me, of these Nor skill'd nor studious, higher argument Remains; sufficient of itself to raise That name, unless an age too late, or cold Climate, or years, damp my intended wing Depress'd; and much they may, if all be mine Not hers, who brings it nightly to my ear,
The sun was sunk, and after him the star
Of Hesperus, whose office is to bring
Twilight upon the earth, short arbiter
'Twixt day and night, and now from end to end Night's hemisphere had veil'd the horizon round: When Satan, who late fled before the threats Of Gabriel out of Eden, now improv'd
In meditated fraud and malice, bent
On Man's destruction, maugre what might hap Of heavier on himself, fearless return'd. By night he fled, and at midnight return'd From compassing the earth; cautious of day, Since Uriel, regent of the sun, descried
His entrance, and forewarned the Cherubim That kept their watch; thence full of anguish driven, The space of seven continued nights ne rode With darkness; thrice the equinoctial line He circled; four times cross'd the car of night From pole to pole traversing each colure; On the eighth return'd; and on the coast averse From entrance or Cherubick watch, by stealth Found unsuspected way. There was a place,
Now not, though sin, not time, first wrought the change, Where Tigris, at the foot of Paradise,
Into a gulf shot under ground, till part
Rose up a fountain by the tree of life:
In with the river sunk, and with it rose
Satan, involv'd in rising mist; then sought
Where to lie hid; sea he had search'd, and land,
From Eden over Pontus and the pool
Mæotis, up beyond the river Ob;
Downward as far antarctick; and in length, West from Orontes to the ocean barr'd
At Darien; thence to the land where flows Ganges and Indus: Thus the orb he roam'd With narrow search; and with inspection deep Consider'd every creature, which of all
Most opportune might serve his wiles; and found The Serpent subtlest beast of all the field. Him after long debate, irresolute
Of thoughts revolv'd, his final sentence chose Fit vessel, fittest imp of fraud, in whom To enter, and his dark suggestions hide From sharpest sight: for, in the wily snake Whatever sleights, none would suspicious mark, As from his wit and native subtlety Proceeding; which, in other beasts observ'd, Doubt might beget of diabolick power Active within, beyond the sense of brute. Thus he resolv'd, but first from inward grief His bursting passion into plaints thus pour'd.
O Earth, how like to Heaven, if not preferr'd More justly, seat worthier of gods, as built With second thoughts, reforming what was old! For what god, after better. worse would build? Terrestrial Heaven, danc'd round by other Heavens That shine, yet bear their bright officious lamps, Light above light, for thee alone, as seems, In thee concentring all their precious beams Of sacred influence! As God in Heaven
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