| |
| OF MAN’S first disobedience, and the fruit | |
| 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, | 5 |
| Sing, Heavenly 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 heavens and earth | |
| Rose out of Chaos: or, if Sion hill | 10 |
| Delight thee more, and Siloa’s brook that flowed | |
| Fast by the oracle of God, I thence | |
| Invoke thy aid to my adventrous song, | |
| That with no middle flight intends to soar | |
| Above the Aonian mount, while it pursues | 15 |
| Things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme. | |
| And chiefly Thou, O Spirit, that dost prefer | |
| Before all temples the 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 highth of this great argument, | |
| I may assert Eternal Providence, | 25 |
| And justify the ways of God to men. | |
| Say first—for Heaven hides nothing from thy view, | |
| Nor the deep tract of Hell—say first what cause | |
| Moved our grand Parents, in that happy state, | |
| Favoured of Heaven so highly, to fall off | 30 |
| From their Creator, and transgress his will | |
| For one restraint, lords of the World besides. | |
| Who first seduced them to that foul revolt? | |
| The infernal Serpent; he it was whose guile, | |
| Stirred up with envy and revenge, deceived | 35 |
| The mother of mankind, what time his pride | |
| Had cast him out from Heaven, with all his host | |
| Of rebel Angels, by whose aid, aspiring | |
| To set himself in glory above his peers, | |
| He trusted to have equalled the Most High, | 40 |
| If he opposed, and, with ambitious aim | |
| Against the throne and monarchy of God, | |
| Raised impious war in Heaven and battle proud, | |
| With vain attempt. Him the Almighty Power | |
| Hurled headlong flaming from the ethereal sky, | 45 |
| With hideous ruin and combustion, down | |
| To bottomless perdition, there to dwell | |
| In adamantine chains and penal fire, | |
| Who durst defy the Omnipotent to arms. | |
| Nine times the space that measures day and night | 50 |
| To mortal men, he, with his horrid crew, | |
| Lay vanquished, rowling 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 | 55 |
| Torments him: round he throws his baleful eyes, | |
| That witnessed huge affliction and dismay, | |
| Mixed with obdurate pride and steadfast hate. | |
| At once, as far as Angel’s ken, he views | |
| The dismal situation waste and wild. | 60 |
| 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 | 65 |
| 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 | 70 |
| For those rebellious; here their prison ordained | |
| In utter darkness, and their portion set, | |
| As far removed from God and light of Heaven | |
| As from the centre thrice to the utmost pole. | |
| Oh how unlike the place from whence they fell! | 75 |
| There the companions of his fall, o’erwhelmed | |
| With floods and whirlwinds of tempestuous fire, | |
| He soon discerns; and, weltering by his side, | |
| One next himself in power, and next in crime, | |
| Long after known in Palestine, and named | 80 |
| Beëlzebub. To whom the Arch-Enemy, | |
| And thence in Heaven called Satan, with bold words | |
| Breaking the horrid silence, thus began:— | |
| “If thou beest he—but Oh how fallen! how changed | |
| From him!—who, in the happy realms of light, | 85 |
| Clothed 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, | |
| Joined with me once, now misery hath joined | 90 |
| In equal ruin; into what pit thou seest | |
| From what highth fallen: 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 | 95 |
| Can else inflict, do I repent, or change, | |
| Though changed in outward lustre, that fixed mind, | |
| And high disdain from sense of injured merit, | |
| That with the Mightiest raised me to contend, | |
| And to the fierce contention brought along | 100 |
| Innumerable force of Spirits armed, | |
| That durst dislike his reign, and, me preferring, | |
| His utmost power with adverse power opposed | |
| In dubious battle on the plains of Heaven, | |
| And shook his throne. What though the field be lost? | 105 |
| All is not lost—the unconquerable will, | |
| And study of revenge, immortal hate, | |
| And courage never to submit or yield: | |
| And what is else not to be overcome. | |
| That glory never shall his wrath or might | 110 |
| Extort from me. To bow and sue for grace | |
| With suppliant knee, and deify his power | |
| Who, from the terror of this arm, so late | |
| Doubted his empire—that were low indeed; | |
| That were an ignominy and shame beneath | 115 |
| 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 | 120 |
| To wage by force or guile eternal war, | |
| Irreconcilable to our grand Foe, | |
| Who now triumphs’, and in the excess of joy | |
| Sole reigning holds the tyranny of Heaven.” | |
| So spake the apostate Angel, though in pain, | 125 |
| Vaunting aloud, but racked with deep despair; | |
| And him thus answered soon his bold Compeer;— | |
| “O Prince, O Chief of many thronèd Powers | |
| That led the embattled Seraphim to war | |
| Under thy conduct, and, in dreadful deeds | 130 |
| Fearless, endangered Heaven’s perpetual King, | |
| And put to proof his high supremacy, | |
| Whether upheld by strength, or chance, or fate! | |
| Too well I see and rue the dire event | |
| That, with sad overthrow and foul defeat, | 135 |
| Hath lost us Heaven, and all this mighty host | |
| In horrible destruction laid thus low, | |
| As far as Gods and Heavenly Essences | |
| Can perish: for the mind and spirit remains | |
| Invincible, and vigour soon returns, | 140 |
| Though all our glory extinct, and happy state | |
| Here swallowed up in endless misery. | |
| But what if He our Conqueror (whom I now | |
| Of force believe Almighty, since no less | |
| Than such could have o’erpowered such force as ours) | 145 |
| Have left us this our spirit and strength entire, | |
| Strongly to suffer and support our pains, | |
| That we may so suffice his vengeful ire, | |
| Or do him mightier service as his thralls | |
| By right of war, whate’er his business be, | 150 |
| Here in the heart of Hell to work in fire, | |
| Or do errands in the gloomy Deep? | |
| What can it then avail though yet we feel | |
| Strength undiminished, or eternal being | |
| To undergo eternal punishment?” | 155 |
| Whereto with speedy words the Arch-Fiend replied:— | |
| “Fallen Cherub, to be weak is miserable, | |
| Doing or suffering: but of this be sure— | |
| To do aught good never will be our task, | |
| But ever to do ill our sole delight, | 160 |
| As being the contrary to His high will | |
| Whom we resist. If then His providence | |
| Out of our evil seek to bring forth good, | |
| Our labour must be to pervert that end, | |
| And out of good still to find means of evil; | 165 |
| Which ofttimes may succeed so as perhaps | |
| Shall grieve him, if I fail not, and disturb | |
| His inmost counsels from their destined aim. | |
| But see! the angry Victor hath recalled | |
| His ministers of vengeance and pursuit | 170 |
| Back to the gates of Heaven: the sulphurous hail, | |
| Shot after us in storm, o’erblown hath laid | |
| The fiery surge that from the precipice | |
| Of Heaven received us falling; and the thunder, | |
| Winged with red lightning and impetuous rage, | 175 |
| Perhaps hath spent his shafts, and ceases now | |
| To bellow through the vast and boundless Deep. | |
| Let us not slip the occasion, whether scorn | |
| Or satiate fury yield it from our Foe. | |
| Seest thou yon dreary plain, forlorn and wild, | 180 |
| The seat of desolation, void of light, | |
| Save what the glimmering of these livid flames | |
| Casts pale and dreadful? Thither let us tend | |
| From off the tossing of these fiery waves; | |
| There rest, if any rest can harbour there; | 185 |
| And, re-assembling our afflicted powers, | |
| Consult how we may henceforth most offend | |
| Our Enemy, our own loss how repair, | |
| How overcome this dire calamity, | |
| What reinforcement we may gain from hope, | 190 |
| If not what resolution from despair.” | |
| Thus Satan, talking to his nearest Mate, | |
| With head uplift above the wave, and eyes | |
| That sparkling blazed; his other parts besides | |
| Prone on the flood, extended long and large, | 195 |
| Lay floating many a rood, in bulk as huge | |
| As whom the fables name of monstrous size, | |
| Titanian or Earth-born, that warred on Jove, | |
| Briareos or Typhon, whom the den | |
| By ancient Tarsus held, or that sea-beast | 200 |
| Leviathan, which God of all his works | |
| Created hugest that swim the ocean-stream. | |
| Him, haply slumbering on the Norway foam, | |
| The pilot of some small night-foundered skiff, | |
| Deeming some island, oft, as seamen tell, | 205 |
| With fixèd anchor in his scaly rind, | |
| Moors by his side under the lee, while night | |
| Invests the sea, and wishèd morn delays. | |
| So stretched out huge in length the Arch-Fiend lay, | |
| Chained on the burning lake; nor ever thence | 210 |
| Had risen, or heaved his head, but that the will | |
| And high permission of all-ruling Heaven | |
| Left him at large to his own dark designs, | |
| That with reiterated crimes he might | |
| Heap on himself damnation, while he sought | 215 |
| Evil to others, and enraged might see | |
| How all his malice served but to bring forth | |
| Infinite goodness, grace, and mercy, shewn | |
| On Man by him seduced, but on himself | |
| Treble confusion, wrath, and vengeance poured. | 220 |
| Forthwith upright he rears from off the pool | |
| His mighty stature; on each hand the flames | |
| Driven backward slope their pointing spires, and, rowled | |
| In billows, leave i’ the midst a horrid vale. | |
| Then with expanded wings he steers his flight | 225 |
| Aloft, incumbent on the dusky air, | |
| That felt unusual weight; till on dry land | |
| He lights—if it were land that ever burned | |
| With solid, as the lake with liquid fire, | |
| And such appeared in hue as when the force | 230 |
| Of subterranean wind transports a hill | |
| Torn from Pelorus, or the shattered side | |
| Of thundering Ætna, whose combustible | |
| And fuelled entrails, thence conceiving fire, | |
| Sublimed with mineral fury, aid the winds, | 235 |
| And leave a singèd bottom all involved | |
| With stench and smoke. Such resting found the sole | |
| Of unblest feet. Him followed his next Mate; | |
| Both glorying to have scaped the Stygian flood | |
| As gods, and by their own recovered strength, | 240 |
| Not by the sufferance of supernal power. | |
| “Is this the region, this the soil, the clime,” | |
| Said then the lost Archangel, “this the seat | |
| That we must change for Heaven?—this mournful gloom | |
| For that celestial light? Be it so, since He | 245 |
| Who now is sovran can dispose and bid | |
| What shall be right: fardest from Him is best, | |
| Whom reason hath equalled, force hath made supreme | |
| Above his equals. Farewell, happy fields, | |
| Where joy forever dwells! Hail, horrors! hail, | 250 |
| Infernal World! and thou, profoundest Hell, | |
| Receive thy new possessor—one who brings | |
| A mind not to be changed by place or time. | |
| The mind is its own place, and in itself | |
| Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven. | 255 |
| What matter where, if I be still the same, | |
| And what I should be, all but less than he | |
| Whom thunder hath made greater? Here at least | |
| We shall be free; the Almighty hath not built | |
| Here for his envy, will not drive us hence: | 260 |
| Here we may reign secure; and, in my choice, | |
| To reign is worth ambition, though in Hell: | |
| Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven. | |
| But wherefore let we then our faithful friends, | |
| The associates and co-partners of our loss, | 265 |
| Lie thus astonished on the oblivious pool, | |
| And call them not to share with us their part | |
| In this unhappy mansion, or once more | |
| With rallied arms to try what may be yet | |
| Regained in Heaven, or what more lost in Hell?” | 270 |
| So Satan spake; and him Beëlzebub | |
| Thus answered:—“Leader of those armies bright | |
| Which, but the Omnipotent, none could have foiled! | |
| If once they hear that voice, their liveliest pledge | |
| Of hope in fears and dangers—heard so oft | 275 |
| In worst extremes, and on the perilous edge | |
| Of battle, when it raged, in all assaults | |
| Their surest signal—they will soon resume | |
| New courage and revive, though now they lie | |
| Grovelling and prostrate on yon lake of fire, | 280 |
| As we erewhile, astounded and amazed; | |
| No wonder, fallen such a pernicious highth!” | |
| He scarce had ceased when the superior Fiend | |
| Was moving toward the shore; his ponderous shield, | |
| Ethereal temper, massy, large, and round, | 285 |
| Behind him cast. The broad circumference | |
| Hung on his shoulders like the moon, whose orb | |
| Through optic glass the Tuscan artist views | |
| At evening, from the top of Fesolè, | |
| Or in Valdarno, to descry new lands, | 290 |
| Rivers, or mountains, in her spotty globe. | |
| His spear—to equal which the tallest pine | |
| Hewn on Norwegian hills, to be the mast | |
| Of some great Ammiral, were but a wand— | |
| He walked with, to support uneasy steps | 295 |
| Over the burning marle, not like those steps | |
| On Heaven’s azure; and the torrid clime | |
| Smote on him sore besides, vaulted with fire. | |
| Nathless he so endured, till on the beach | |
| Of that inflamèd sea he stood, and called | 300 |
| His legions—Angel Forms, who lay entranced | |
| Thick as autumnal leaves that strow the brooks | |
| In Vallombrosa, where the Etrurian shades | |
| High over-arched imbower; or scattered sedge | |
| Afloat, when with fierce winds Orion armed | 305 |
| Hath vexed the Red-Sea coast, whose waves o’erthrew | |
| Busiris and his Memphian chivalry, | |
| While with perfidious hatred they pursued | |
| The sojourners of Goshen, who beheld | |
| From the safe shore their floating carcases | 310 |
| And broken chariot-wheels. So thick bestrown, | |
| Abject and lost, lay these, covering the flood, | |
| Under amazement of their hideous change. | |
| He called so loud that all the hollow deep | |
| Of Hell resounded:—“Princes, Potentates, | 315 |
| Warriors, the Flower of Heaven—once yours; now lost, | |
| If such astonishment as this can seize | |
| Eternal Spirits! Or have ye chosen this place | |
| After the toil of battle to repose | |
| Your wearied virtue, for the ease you find | 320 |
| To slumber here, as in the vales of Heaven? | |
| Or in this abject posture have ye sworn | |
| To adore the Conqueror, who now beholds | |
| Cherub and Seraph rowling in the flood | |
| With scattered arms and ensigns, till anon | 325 |
| His swift pursuers from Heaven-gates discern | |
| The advantage, and, descending tread us down | |
| Thus drooping, or with linkèd thunderbolts | |
| Transfix us to the bottom of this gulf?— | |
| Awake, arise, or be for ever fallen!” | 330 |
| They heard, and were abashed, and up they sprung | |
| Upon the wing, as when men wont to watch, | |
| On duty sleeping found by whom they dread, | |
| Rouse and bestir themselves ere well awake. | |
| Nor did they not perceive the evil plight | 335 |
| In which they were, or the fierce pains not feel; | |
| Yet to their General’s voice they soon obeyed | |
| Innumerable. As when the potent rod | |
| Of Amram’s son, in Egypt’s evil day, | |
| Waved round the coast, up-called a pitchy cloud | 340 |
| Of locusts, warping on the eastern wind, | |
| That o’er the realm of impious Pharaoh hung | |
| Like Night, and darkened all the land of Nile; | |
| So numberless were those bad Angels seen | |
| Hovering on wing under the cope of Hell, | 345 |
| ’Twixt upper, nether, and surrounding fires; | |
| Till, as a signal given, the uplifted spear | |
| Of their great Sultan waving to direct | |
| Their course, in even balance down they light | |
| On the firm brimstone, and fill the plain: | 350 |
| A multitude like which the populous North | |
| Poured never from her frozen loins to pass | |
| Rhene or the Danaw, when her barbarous sons | |
| Came like a deluge on the South, and spread | |
| Beneath Gibraltar to the Libyan sands. | 355 |
| Forthwith, from every squadron and each band, | |
| The heads and leaders thither haste where stood | |
| Their great Commander—godlike Shapes, and Forms | |
| Excelling human; princely Dignities; | |
| And powers that erst in Heaven sat on thrones, | 360 |
| Though of their names in Heavenly records now | |
| Be no memorial, blotted out and rased | |
| By their rebellion from the Books of Life. | |
| Nor had they yet among the sons of Eve | |
| Got them new names, till, wondering o’er the earth, | 365 |
| Through God’s high sufferance for the trial of man, | |
| By falsities and lies the greatest part | |
| Of mankind they corrupted to forsake | |
| God their Creator, and the invisible | |
| Glory of Him that made them to transform | 370 |
| Oft to the image of a brute, adorned | |
| With gay religions full of pomp and gold, | |
| And devils to adore for deities: | |
| Then were they known to men by various names, | |
| And various idols through the heathen world. | 375 |
| Say, Muse, their names then known, who first, who last, | |
| Roused from the slumber on that fiery couch, | |
| At their great Emperor’s call, as next in worth | |
| Came singly where he stood on the bare strand, | |
| While the promiscuous crowd stood yet aloof. | 380 |
| The chief were those who, from the pit of Hell | |
| Roaming to seek their prey on Earth, durst fix | |
| Their seats, long after, next the seat of God, | |
| Their altars by His altar, gods adored | |
| Among the nations round, and durst abide | 385 |
| Jehovah thundering out of Sion, throned | |
| Between the Cherubim; yea, often placed | |
| Within His sanctuary itself their shrines, | |
| Abominations; and with cursed things | |
| His holy rites and solemn feasts profaned, | 390 |
| And with their darkness durst affront His light. | |
| First, Moloch, horrid King, besmeared with blood | |
| Of human sacrifice, and parents’ tears; | |
| Though, for the noise of drums and timbrels loud, | |
| Their children’s cries unheard that passed through fire | 395 |
| To his grim idol. Him the Ammonite | |
| Worshiped in Rabba and her watery plain, | |
| In Argob and in Basan, to the stream | |
| Of utmost Arnon. Nor content with such | |
| Audacious neighbourhood, the wisest heart | 400 |
| Of Solomon he led by fraud to build | |
| His temple right against the temple of God | |
| On that opprobrious hill, and made his grove | |
| The pleasant valley of Hinnom, Tophet thence | |
| And black Gehenna called, the type of Hell. | 405 |
| Next Chemos, the obscene dread of Moab’s sons, | |
| From Aroar to Nebo and the wild | |
| Of southmost Abarim; in Hesebon | |
| And Horonaim, Seon’s realm, beyond | |
| The flowery dale of Sibma clad with vines, | 410 |
| And Elealè to the Asphaltick Pool: | |
| Peor his other name, when he enticed | |
| Israel in Sittim, on their march from Nile, | |
| To do him wanton rites, which cost them woe. | |
| Yet thence his lustful orgies he enlarged | 415 |
| Even to that hill of scandal, by the grove | |
| Of Moloch homicide, lust hard by hate, | |
| Till good Josiah drove them thence to Hell. | |
| With these came they who, from the bordering flood | |
| Of old Euphrates to the brook that parts | 420 |
| Egypt from Syrian ground, had general names | |
| Of Baalim and Ashtaroth—those male, | |
| These feminine. For Spirits, when they please, | |
| Can either sex assume, or both; so soft | |
| And uncompounded is their essence pure, | 425 |
| Not tied or manacled with joint or limb, | |
| Nor founded on the brittle strength of bones, | |
| Like cumbrous flesh; but, in what shape they choose, | |
| Dilated or condensed, bright or obscure, | |
| Can execute their aery purposes, | 430 |
| And works of love or enmity fulfil. | |
| For those the race of Israel oft forsook | |
| Their Living Strength, and unfrequented left | |
| His righteous altar, bowing lowly down | |
| To bestial gods; for which their heads, as low | 435 |
| Bowed down in battle, sunk before the spear | |
| Of despicable foes. With these in troop | |
| Came Astoreth, whom the Phoenicians called | |
| Astarte, queen of heaven, with cresent horns; | |
| To whose bright image nightly by the moon | 440 |
| Sidonian virgins paid their vows and songs; | |
| In Sion also not unsung, where stood | |
| Her temple on the offensive mountain, built | |
| By that uxorious king whose heart, though large, | |
| Beguiled by fair idolatresses, fell | 445 |
| To idols foul. Thammuz came next behind, | |
| Whose annual wound in Lebanon allured | |
| The Syrian damsels to lament his fate | |
| In amorous ditties all a summer’s day, | |
| While smooth Adonis from his native rock | 450 |
| Ran purple to the sea, supposed with blood | |
| Of Thammuz yearly wounded: the love-tale | |
| Infected Sion’s daughters with like heat, | |
| Whose wanton passions in the sacred porch | |
| Ezekiel saw, when, by the vision led, | 455 |
| His eye surveyed the dark idolatries | |
| Of alienated Judah. Next came one | |
| Who mourned in earnest, when the captive Ark | |
| Maimed his brute image, head and hands lopt off, | |
| In his own temple, on the grunsel-edge, | 460 |
| Where he fell flat and shamed his worshipers: | |
| Dagon his name, sea-monster, upward man | |
| And downward fish; yet had his temple high | |
| Reared in Azotus, dreaded through the coast | |
| Of Palestine, in Gath and Ascalon, | 465 |
| And Accaron and Gaza’s frontier bounds. | |
| Him followed Rimmon, whose delightful seat | |
| Was fair Damascus, on the fertile banks | |
| Of Abbana and Pharphar, lucid streams. | |
| He also against the house of God was bold: | 470 |
| A leper once he lost, and gained a king— | |
| Ahaz, his sottish conqueror, whom he drew | |
| God’s altar to disparage and displace | |
| For one of Syrian mode, whereon to burn | |
| His odious offerings, and adore the gods | 475 |
| Whom he had vanquished. After these appeared | |
| A crew who, under names of old renown— | |
| Osiris, Isis, Orus, and their train— | |
| With monstrous shapes and sorceries abused | |
| Fanatic Egypt and her priests to seek | 480 |
| Their wandering gods disguised in brutish forms | |
| Rather than human. Nor did Israel scape | |
| The infection, when their borrowed gold composed | |
| The calf in Oreb; and the rebel king | |
| Doubled that sin in Bethel and in Dan, | 485 |
| Likening his Maker to the grazèd ox— | |
| Jehovah, who, in one night, when he passed | |
| From Egypt marching, equalled with one stroke | |
| Both her first-born and all her bleating gods. | |
| Belial came last; than whom a Spirit more lewd | 490 |
| Fell not from Heaven, or more gross to love, | |
| Vice for itself. To him no temple stood | |
| Or altar smoked; yet who more oft than he | |
| In temples and at altars, when the priest | |
| Turns atheist, as did Eli’s sons, who filled | 495 |
| With lust and violence the house of God? | |
| In courts and palaces he also reigns, | |
| And in luxurious cities, where the noise | |
| Of riot ascends above their loftiest towers, | |
| And injury and outrage; and, when night | 500 |
| Darkens the streets, then wander forth the sons | |
| Of Belial, flown with insolence and wine. | |
| Witness the streets of Sodom, and that night | |
| In Gibeah, when the hospitable door | |
| Exposed a matron, to avoid worse rape. | 505 |
| These were the prime in order and in might: | |
| The rest were long to tell; though far renowned | |
| The Ionian gods—of Javan’s issue held | |
| Gods, yet confessed later than Heaven and Earth, | |
| Their boasted parents;—Titan, Heaven’s first-born, | 510 |
| With his enormous brood, and birthright seized | |
| By younger Saturn: he from mightier Jove, | |
| His own and Rhea’s son, like measure found; | |
| So Jove unsurping reigned. These, first in Crete | |
| And Ida known, thence on the snowy top | 515 |
| Of cold Olympus ruled the middle air, | |
| Their highest heaven; or on the Delphian cliff, | |
| Or in Dodona, and through all the bounds | |
| Of Doric land; or who with Saturn old | |
| Fled over Adria to the Hesperian fields, | 520 |
| And o’er the Celtic roamed the utmost Isles. | |
| All these and more came flocking; but with looks | |
| Downcast and damp; yet such wherein appeared | |
| Obscure some glimpse of joy to have found their Chief | |
| Not in despair, to have found themselves not lost | 525 |
| In loss itself; which on his countenance cast | |
| Like doubtful hue. But he, his wonted pride | |
| Soon recollecting, with high words, that bore | |
| Semblance of worth, nor substance, gently raised | |
| Their fainting courage, and dispelled their fears: | 530 |
| Then straight commands that, at the war-like sound | |
| Of trumpets loud and clarions, be upreared | |
| His mighty standard. That proud honour claimed | |
| Azazel as his right, a Cherub tall: | |
| Who forthwith from the glittering staff unfurled | 535 |
| The imperial ensign; which, full high advanced, | |
| Shon like a meteor streaming to the wind, | |
| With gems and golden lustre rich imblazed, | |
| Seraphic arms and trophies; all the while | |
| Sonorous metal blowing martial sounds: | 540 |
| At which the universal host up-sent | |
| A shout that tore Hell’s concave, and beyond | |
| Frighted the reign of Chaos and old Night. | |
| All in a moment through the gloom were seen | |
| Ten thousand banners rise into the air, | 545 |
| With orient colours waving: with them rose | |
| A forest huge of spears; and thronging helms | |
| Appeared, and serried shields in thick array | |
| Of depth immeasurable. Anon they move | |
| In perfect phalanx to the Dorian mood | 550 |
| Of flutes and soft recorders—such as raised | |
| To highth of noblest temper heroes old | |
| Arming to battle, and instead of rage | |
| Deliberate valour breathed, firm, and unmoved | |
| With dread of death to flight or foul retreat; | 555 |
| Nor wanting power to mitigate and swage | |
| With solemn touches troubled thoughts, and chase | |
| Anguish and doubt and fear and sorrow and pain | |
| From mortal or immortal minds. Thus they, | |
| Breathing united force with fixed thought, | 560 |
| Moved on in silence to soft pipes that charmed | |
| Their painful steps o’er the burnt soil. And now | |
| Advanced in view they stand—a horrid front | |
| Of dreadful length and dazzling arms, in guise | |
| Of warriors old, with ordered spear and shield, | 565 |
| Awaiting what command their mighty Chief | |
| Had to impose. He through the armed files | |
| Darts his experienced eye, and soon traverse | |
| The whole battalion views—their order due, | |
| Their visages and stature as of Gods; | 570 |
| Their number last he sums. And now his heart | |
| Distends with pride, and, hardening in his strength, | |
| Glories: for never, since created Man, | |
| Met such imbodied force as, named with these, | |
| Could merit more than that small infantry | 575 |
| Warred on by cranes—though all the giant brood | |
| Of Phlegra with the heroic race were joined | |
| That fought at Thebes and Ilium, on each side | |
| Mixed with auxiliar gods; and what resounds | |
| In fable or romance of Uther’s son, | 580 |
| Begirt with British and Armoric knights; | |
| And all who since, baptized or infidel, | |
| Jousted in Aspramont, or Montalban, | |
| Damasco, or Marocco, or Trebisond, | |
| Or whom Biserta sent from Afric shore | 585 |
| When Charlemain with all his peerage fell | |
| By Fontarabbia. Thus far these beyond | |
| Compare of mortal prowess, yet observed | |
| Their dread Commander. He, above the rest | |
| In shape and gesture proudly eminent, | 590 |
| Stood like a tower. His form had yet not lost | |
| All her original brightness, nor appeared | |
| Less than Archangel ruined, and the excess | |
| Of glory obscured: as when the sun new-risen | |
| Looks through the horizontal misty air | 595 |
| Shorn of his beams, or, from behind the moon, | |
| In dim eclipse, disastrous twilight sheds | |
| On half the nations, and with fear of change | |
| Perplexes monarchs. Darkened so, yet shon | |
| Above them all the Archangel: but his face | 600 |
| Deep scars of thunder had intrenched, and care | |
| Sat on his faded cheek, but under brows | |
| Of dauntless courage, and considerate pride | |
| Waiting revenge. Cruel his eye, but cast | |
| Signs of remorse and passion, to behold | 605 |
| The fellows of his crime, the followers rather | |
| (Far other once beheld in bliss), condemned | |
| For ever now to have their lot in pain— | |
| Millions of Spirits for his fault amerced | |
| Of Heaven, and from eternal splendours flung | 610 |
| For his revolt—yet faithful how they stood, | |
| Their glory withered; as, when heaven’s fire | |
| Hath scathed the forest oaks or mountain pines, | |
| With singèd top their stately growth, though bare, | |
| Stands on the blasted heath. He now prepared | 615 |
| To speak; whereat their doubled ranks they bend | |
| From wing to wing, and half enclose him round | |
| With all his peers: Attention held them mute. | |
| Thrice he assayed, and thrice, in spite of scorn, | |
| Tears, such as Angels weep, burst forth: at last | 620 |
| Words interwove with sighs found out their way:— | |
| “O myriads of immortal Spirits! O Powers | |
| Matchless, but with the Almighty!—and that strife | |
| Was not inglorious, though the event was dire, | |
| As this place testifies, and this dire change, | 625 |
| Hateful to utter. But what power of mind, | |
| Foreseeing or presaging, from the depth | |
| Of knowledge past or present, could have feared | |
| How such united force of gods, how such | |
| As stood like these, could ever know repulse? | 630 |
| For who can yet believe, though after loss, | |
| That all these puissant legions, whose exile | |
| Hath emptied Heaven, shall fail to reascend, | |
| Self-raised, and re-possess their native seat? | |
| For me, be witness all the host of Heaven, | 635 |
| If counsels different, or danger shunned | |
| By me, have lost our hopes. But he who reigns | |
| Monarch in Heaven till then as one secure | |
| Sat on his throne, upheld by old repute, | |
| Consent or custom, and his regal state | 640 |
| Put forth at full, but still his strength concealed— | |
| Which tempted our attempt, and wrought our fall. | |
| Henceforth his might we know, and know our own, | |
| So as not either to provoke, or dread | |
| New war provoked: our better part remains | 645 |
| To work in close design, by fraud or guile, | |
| What force effected not; that he no less | |
| At length from us may find, Who overcomes | |
| By force hath overcome but half his foe. | |
| Space may produce new Worlds; whereof so rife | 650 |
| There went a fame in Heaven that He ere long | |
| Intended to create, and therein plant | |
| A generation whom his choice regard | |
| Should favour equal to the Sons of Heaven. | |
| Thither, if but to pry, shall be perhaps | 655 |
| Our first eruption—thither, or elsewhere; | |
| For this infernal pit shall never hold | |
| Cælestial Spirits in bondage, nor the Abyss | |
| Long under darkness cover. But these thoughts | |
| Full counsel must mature. Peace is despaired; | 660 |
| For who can think submission? War, then, war | |
| Open or understood, must be resolved.” | |
| He spake; and, to confirm his words, out-flew | |
| Millions of flaming swords, drawn from the thighs | |
| Of mighty Cherubim; the sudden blaze | 665 |
| Far around illumined Hell. Highly they raged | |
| Again the Highest and fierce with graspèd arms | |
| Clashed on their sounding shields the din of war, | |
| Hurling defiance toward the vault of Heaven. | |
| There stood a hill not far, whose griesly top | 670 |
| Belched fire and rowling smoke; the rest entire | |
| Shown with a glossy scurf—undoubted sign | |
| That in his womb was hid metallic ore, | |
| The work of sulphur. Thither, winged with speed, | |
| A numerous brigad hastened: as when bands | 675 |
| Of pioners, with spade and pickaxe armed, | |
| Forerun the royal camp, to trench a field, | |
| Or cast a rampart. Mammon led them on— | |
| Mammon, the least erected Spirit that fell | |
| From Heaven; for even in Heaven his looks and thoughts | 680 |
| Were always downward bent, admiring more | |
| The riches of Heaven’s pavement, trodden gold, | |
| Than aught divine or holy else enjoyed | |
| In vision beatific. By him first | |
| Men also, and by suggestion taught | 685 |
| Ransacked the Centre, and with impious hands | |
| Rifled the bowels of their mother Earth | |
| For treasures better hid. Soon had his crew | |
| Opened into the hill a spacious wound, | |
| And digged out ribs of gold. Let none admire | 690 |
| That riches grow in Hell: that soil may best | |
| Deserve the pretious bane. And here let those | |
| Who boast in mortal things, and wondering tell | |
| Of Babel and the works of Memphian kings, | |
| Learn how their greatest monuments of fame, | 695 |
| And strength, and art, are easily outdone | |
| By Spirits reprobate, and in an hour | |
| What in an age they, with incessant toil | |
| And hands innumerable, scarce perform. | |
| Nigh on the plain, in many cells prepared, | 700 |
| That underneath had veins of liquid fire | |
| Sluiced from the lake, a second multitude | |
| With wondrous art founded the massy ore, | |
| Severing each kind, and scummed the bullion-dross. | |
| A third as soon had formed within the ground | 705 |
| A various mould, and from the boiling cells | |
| By strange conveyance filled each hollow nook; | |
| As in an organ, from one blast of wind, | |
| To many a row of pipes the sound-board breathes. | |
| Anon out of the earth a fabric huge | 710 |
| Rose like an exhalation, with the sound | |
| Of dulcet symphonies and voices sweet— | |
| Built like a temple, where pilasters round | |
| Were set, and Doric pillars overlaid | |
| With golden architrave; nor did there want | 715 |
| Cornice or frieze, with bossy sculptures graven: | |
| The roof was fretted gold. Not Babilon | |
| Nor great Alcairo such magnificence | |
| Equalled in all their glories, to inshrine | |
| Belus or Serapis their gods, or seat | 720 |
| Their kings, when Ægypt with Assyria strove | |
| In wealth and luxury. The ascending pile | |
| Stood fixed her stately highth; and straight the doors | |
| Opening their brazen folds, discover, wide | |
| Within, her ample spaces o’er the smooth | 725 |
| And level pavement: from the arched roof, | |
| Pendent by subtle magic, many a row | |
| Of starry lamps and blazing cressets, fed | |
| With naphtha and asphaltus, yielded light | |
| As from a sky. The hasty multitude | 730 |
| Admiring entered; and the work some praise, | |
| And some the Architect. His hand was known | |
| In Heaven by many a towered structure high, | |
| Where sceptred Angels held their residence, | |
| And sat as Princes, whom the supreme King | 735 |
| Exalted to such power, and gave to rule, | |
| Each in his hierarchy, the Orders bright. | |
| Nor was his name unheard or unadored | |
| In ancient Greece; and in Ausonian land | |
| Men called him Mulciber; and how he fell | 740 |
| From Heaven they fabled, thrown by angry Jove | |
| Sheer o’er the crystal battlements: from morn | |
| To noon he fell, from noon to dewy eve, | |
| A summer’s day, and with the setting sun | |
| Dropt from the zenith, like a falling star, | 745 |
| On Lemnos, the Ægæan isle. Thus they relate, | |
| Erring; for he with this rebellious rout | |
| Fell long before; nor aught availed him now | |
| To have built in Heaven high towers; nor did he scape | |
| By all his engines, but was headlong sent, | 750 |
| With his industrious crew, to build in Hell. | |
| Meanwhile the wingèd Haralds, by command | |
| Of sovran power, with awful ceremony | |
| And trumpet’s sound, throughout the host proclaim | |
| A solemn council forthwith to be held | 755 |
| At Pandæmonium, the high capital | |
| Of Satan and his peers. Their summons called | |
| From every band and squarèd regiment | |
| By place or choice the worthiest: they anon | |
| With hundreds and with thousands trooping came | 760 |
| Attended. All access was thronged; the gates | |
| And porches wide, but chief the spacious hall | |
| (Though like a covered field, where champions bold | |
| Wont ride in armed, and at the Soldan’s chair | |
| Defied the best of Panim chivalry | 765 |
| To mortal combat, or career with lance), | |
| Thick swarmed, both on the ground and in the air, | |
| Brushed with the hiss of rustling wings. As bees | |
| In spring-time, when the Sun with Taurus rides, | |
| Pour forth their populous youth about the hive | 770 |
| In clusters; they among fresh dews and flowers | |
| Fly to and fro, or on the smoothèd plank, | |
| The suburb of their straw-built citadel, | |
| New rubbed with balm, expatiate, and confer | |
| Their state-affairs: so thick the aerie crowd | 775 |
| Swarmed and were straitened; till, the signal given, | |
| Behold a wonder! They but now who seemed | |
| In bigness to surpass Earth’s giant sons, | |
| Now less than smallest dwarfs, in narrow room | |
| Throng numberless—like that pygmean race | 780 |
| Beyond the Indian mount; or faery elves, | |
| Whose midnight revels, by a forest-side | |
| Or fountain, some belated peasant sees, | |
| Or dreams he sees, while overhead the Moon | |
| Sits arbitress, and nearer to the Earth | 785 |
| Wheels her pale course: they, on their mirth and dance | |
| Intent, with jocond music charm his ear; | |
| At once with joy and fear his heart rebounds. | |
| Thus incorporeal Spirits to smallest forms | |
| Reduced their shapes immense, and were at large, | 790 |
| Though without number still, amidst the hall | |
| Of that infernal court. But far within, | |
| And in their own dimensions like themselves, | |
| The great Seraphic Lords and Cherubim | |
| In close recess and secret conclave sat, | 795 |
| A thousand demi-gods on golden seats, | |
| Frequent and full. After short silence then, | |
| And summons read, the great consult began. | |
| |
