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And not well understood, as good not known?
Whoever by consulting at thy shrine

Return'd the wiser, or the more instruct
To fly or follow what concern'd him most,
And run not sooner to his fatal snare?
For God hath justly given the nations up
To thy delusions; justly since they fell
Idolatrous: but when his purpose is

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Among them to declare his providence

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To thee not known, whence hast thou then thy truth,

But from him or his Angels president

In every province; who themselves disdaining

To approach thy temples, give thee in command

What to the smallest tittle thou shalt say

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To thy adorers: thou with trembling fear,
Or like a fawning parasite, obey'st;
Then to thyself ascrib'st the truth foretold.
But this thy glory shall be soon retrench'd;
No more shalt thou by oracling abuse

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The Gentiles; henceforth oracles are ceased,
And thou no more with pomp and sacrifice
Shalt be inquired at Delphos or elsewhere,
At least in vain, for they shall find thee mute.
God hath now sent his Living Oracle

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Into the world to teach his final will,

And sends his Spirit of Truth henceforth to dwell
In pious hearts, an inward oracle

To all truth requisite for men to know.

So spake our Saviour, but the subtle Fiend, Though inly stung with anger and disdain Dissembled, and this answer smooth return'd: Sharply thou hast insisted on rebuke,

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And urged me hard with doings, which not will
But misery hath wrested from me: where

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Easily canst thou find one miserable,

And not enforced oft-times to part from truth;
If it may stand him more in stead to lie,

Say and unsay, feign, flatter, or abjure?
But thou art placed above me, thou art Lord,
From thee I can, and must, submiss endure
Check or reproof, and glad to 'scape so quit.

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Hard are the ways of Truth, and rough to walk,

Smooth on the tongue discoursed, pleasing to th' ear
And tuneable as sylvan pipe or song;

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What wonder then if I delight to hear

Her dictates from thy mouth? most men admire
Virtue, who follow not her lore; permit me
To hear thee when I come (since no man comes),
And talk at least, though I despair to attain.
Thy Father, who is holy, wise and
pure,
Suffers the hypocrite, or atheous priest,
To tread his sacred courts, and minister
About his altar, handling holy things,
Praying or vowing, and vouchsafed his voice
To Balaam reprobate, a prophet yet
Inspired; disdain not such access to me.

To whom our Saviour with unalter'd brow:
Thy coming hither, though I know thy scope,
I bid not or forbid; do as thou find'st

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490

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Permission from above; thou canst not more.

He added not; and Satan bowing low

His grey dissimulation, disappear'd
Into thin air diffused: for now began

Night with her sullen wings to double shade

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The desert; fowls in their clay nests were couch'd;

And now wild beasts came forth the woods to roam.

BOOK II.

THE ARGUMENT.

The disciples of Jesus, uneasy at his long absence, reason amongst themselves concerning it. Mary also gives vent to her maternal anxiety; in the expression of which she recapitulates many circumstances respecting the birth and early life of her Son. Satan again meets his infernal council, reports the bad success of his first temptation of our blessed Lord, and calls upon them for council and assistance. Belial proposes the tempting of Jesus with women. Satan rebukes Belial for his dissoluteness, charging on him all the profligacy of that kind ascribed by the poets to the heathen gods, and rejects his proposal as in no respect likely to succeed. Satan then suggests other modes of temptation, particularly proposing to avail himself of the circumstance of our Lord's hungering; and, taking a band of chosen spirits with him, returns to resume his enterprise. Jesus hungers in the desert. Night comes on; the manner in which our Saviour passes the night is described. Morning advances. Satan again appears to Jesus, and, after expressing wonder that he should be so entirely neglected in the wilderness, where others had been miraculously fed, tempts him with a sumptuous banquet of the most luxurious kind. This he rejects, and the banquet vanishes. Satan, finding our Lord not to be assailed on the ground of appetite, tempts him again by offering him riches, as the means of acquiring power: this Jesus also rejects, producing many instances of great actions performed by persons under virtuous poverty, and specifying the danger of riches, and the cares and pains inseparable from power and greatness.

MEAN while the new-baptized, who yet remain'd

At Jordan with the Baptist, and had seen

Him whom they heard so late expressly call'd

Jesus Messiah, Son of God declared,

And on that high authority had believed,

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And with him talk'd, and with him lodged, I mean
Andrew and Simon, famous after known,

With others, though in Holy Writ not named,
Now missing him their joy so lately found,
So lately found, and so abruptly gone,
Began to doubt, and doubted many days,

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And as the days increased, increased their doubt:
Sometimes they thought he might be only shown,
And for a time caught up to God, as once
Moses was in the mount, and missing long;
And the great Thisbite, who on fiery wheels
Rode up to Heav'n, yet once again to come.
Therefore, as those young prophets then with care
Sought lost Elijah, so in each place these
Ni gh to Bethabara; in Jericho

The city of Palms, Ænom, and Salem old,
Machærus, and each town or city wall'd
On this side the broad lake Genezaret,
Or in Peræa; but return'd in vain.
Then on the bank of Jordan, by a creek,

Where winds with reeds and osiers whisp'ring play,
Plain fishermen, no greater men them call,
Close in a cottage low together got,
Their unexpected loss and plaints outbreath'd.
Alas, from what high hope to what relapse
Unlook'd-for are we fallen! our eyes beheld
Messiah certainly now come, so long

Expected of our fathers; we have heard

His words, his wisdom, full of grace and truth;

Now, now,

for sure, deliverance is at hand,

The kingdom shall to Israel be restored;

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Thus we rejoiced, but soon our joy is turn'd
Into perplexity and new amaze:

For whither is he gone, what accident

Hath wrapt him from us? will he now retire

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After appearance, and again prolong

Our expectation? God of Israel,

Send thy Messiah forth the time is come;

Behold the kings of th' earth how they oppress
Thy chosen, to what height their power unjust
They have exalted, and behind them cast,
All fear of thee; arise and vindicate

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Thy glory, free thy people from their yoke.

But let us wait; thus far he hath perform'd,
Sent his Anointed, and to us reveal'd him,
By his great Prophet, pointed at and shown
In public, and with him we have conversed;
Let us be glad of this, and all our fears
Lay on his Providence; he will not fail,
Nor will withdraw him now, nor will recall,

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Mock us with his blest sight, then snatch him hence

Soon shall we see our Hope, our Joy, return.
Thus they out of their plaints new hopes resume,

To find whom at the first they found unsought:

But to his mother Mary, when she saw

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Others return'd from baptism, not her son,
Nor left at Jordan tidings of him none,

Within her breast though calm, her breast though pure,
Motherly cares and fears got head, and raised

Some troubled thoughts, which she in sighs thus clad:
O what avails me now that honour high

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To have conceived of God, or that salute,

Hail, highly favour'd, among women blest!
While I to sorrows am no less advanced,

And fears as eminent, above the lot
Of other women, by the birth I bore,

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In such a season born when scarce a shed

Could be obtain'd to shelter him or me

From the bleak air; a stable was our warmth,

A manger his: yet soon enforced to fly

Thence into Egypt, till the murd❜rous king

Were dead, who sought his life, and missing fill'd
With infant blood the streets of Bethlehem;

From Egypt home return'd in Nazareth
Hath been our dwelling many years, his life
Private, unactive, calm, contemplative,
Little suspicious to any king; but now
Full grown to man, acknowledged, as I hear,
By John the Baptist, and in public shown,
Son own'd from Heaven by his Father's voice;

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