Whose waves of torrent fire inflame with rage.
Far off from these, a slow and silent stream,
Lethe, the river of oblivion, rolls
Her wat'ry labyrinth? whereof who drinks,
Forthwith his former state and being forgets;
Forgets both joy and grief, pleasure 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 else, deep snow and ice :
A gulf profound! as that Serbonian bog
Betwixt Damiata, and mount Casius old,
Where armies whole have sunk: the parching air Burns frore, and cold performs the 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 infice
Their soft ethereal warmth, and there to pine
Immoveable, infixed, and frozen round,
Periods of time; thence hurried back to fire.
They ferry over this Lethean sound
Both to and fro, their sorrow to augment,
And wish, and struggle as they pass to reach
The tempting stream, with one small drop to lose
In sweet forgetfulness all pain and woe,
All in one moment, and so near the brink:
But fate withstands, and to oppose th' attempt C10
Medusa, with Gorgonian terror, guards
The ford, and of itself 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' advent'rous bands, 615
With shudd'ring horror pale, and eyes aghast,
View'd first their lamentable lot, and found
No rest through many a dark and dreary vale
They pass'd, and many a region dolorous;
O'er many a frozen, many a fiery Alp;
Rocks, caves, lakes, fens, bogs, dens, and shades of
A universe of death! which God by curse
Created evil; for evil only good,
Where all life dies, death lives, and nature breed's
Perverse, all monstrous, all prodigious things,
Abominable, unutterable; and worse
Than fables yet have feign'd, or fear conceiv'd,
Gorgons, and Hydras, and Chimeras dire.
Meanwhile the adversary of God and man,
Satan, with thoughts inflam'd of highest design, 630
Puts on swift wings, and towards the gates of hell
Explores his solitary flight: sometimes
He scours the right-hand coast, sometimes the left:
Now shaves with level wing the deep; then soars
Up to the fiery concave tow'ring high.
As when far off at sea a fleet descry'd,
Hangs in the clouds, by equinoctial winds
Close sailing from Bengala, or the isles
Of Ternate, and Tidore, whence merchants bring
Their spicy drugs: they on the trading flood
Through the wide Ethiopian to the Cape
Ply, stemming nightly toward the Pole: so seem'd Far off the flying fiend. At last appear
Hell bounds, high-reaching to the horrid roof;
And thrice threefold the gates: three folds were
brass,
Three iron, three of adamantine rock;
Impenetrable, impal'd with circling fire,
Yet unconsum'd. Before the gates there sat
On either side a formidable shape;
The one seem'd woman to the waist, and fair: 650 But ended foul in many a scaly fold,
Voluminous and vast! a serpent arm'd
With mortal sting; about her middle round
A cry of hell-hounds never ceasing bark'd
With wide Cerberian mouths full loud, and rung 655
A hideous peal: yet, when they list, would creep,
If ought disturb'd their noise, into her womb,
And kennel there; yet there still bark'd, and howl'd
Within, unseen. Far less abhorr'd than these
Vex'd Scylla, bathing in the sea that parts
Calabria from the hoarse Trinacrian shore;
Nor uglier follow the night-hag, when call'd
In secret, riding through the air she comes,
Lur'd with the smell of infant-blood, to dance
With Lapland witches, while the lab'ring moon 665
Eclipses at their charms. The other shape
(If shape it might be call'd, that shape had none
Distinguishable in member, joint, or limb;
Or substance might be call'd that shadow seem'd, For each seem'd either :) black it stood as night, 670 Fierce as ten furies, terrible as hell,
And shook a dreadful dart: what seem'd his head,
The likeness of a kingly crown had on.
Satan was now at hand, and from his seat
The monster moving, onward came as fast
With horrid strides: hell trembled as he strode.
Th' undaunted fiend what this might be admir'd;
Admir'd, not fear'd; God and his Son except,
Created thing nought valued he, nor shunn'd;
And with disdainful look thus first began:
"Whence, and what art thou! execrable shape! That dar'st, though grin and terrible, advance Thy miscreated front athwart my way
To yonder gates? through them I mean to pass,
That be assur'd, without leave or ask of thee.
Retire, or taste thy folly, and learn by proof,
Hell-born! not to contend with spirits of heaven."
To whom the goblin full of wrath reply'd:
"Art thou that traitor-angel, art thou he,
Who first broke peace in heaven, and faith, till ther
Unbroken; and in proud rebellious arms
Drew after him the third part of heaven's sons,
Conjured against the Highest; for which both thou
And they, outcast from God, are here condem'd
To waste eternal days in wo and pain?
And reckon'st thou thyself with spirits of heaven,
Hell-doom'd! and breath'st defiance here and scorn,
Where I reign king, and to enrage thee more,
Thy king, and lord? Back to thy punishment,
False fugitive! and to thy speed add wings;
Lest with a whip of scorpions I pursue
Thy ling'ring; or with one stroke of this dart
Strange horror seize thee, and pangs unfelt before."
So spake the grisly terror, and in shape
(So speaking, and so threat'ning) grew tenfold 705
More dreadful and deform. On th' other side,
Incens'd with indignation, Satan stood
Unterrify'd; and like a comet burn'd,
That fires the length of Ophiucus huge
In th' arctic sky, and from his horrid hair
Shakes pestilence and war. Each at the head
Levell'd his deadly aim; their fatal hands
No second stroke intend: and such a frown
Each cast at th' other, as when two black clouds
With heaven's artil'ry fraught, come rattling on 715
Over the Caspian; then stand front to front,
Hov'ring a space, till winds the signal blow
To join their dark encounter in mid-air:
So frown'd the mighty combatants, that hell
Grew darker at their frown: so match'd they stood: For never but once more was either like
To meet so great a foe. And now great deeds
Had been achiev'd, whereof all hell had rung,
Had not the snaky sorceress that sat
Fast by hell-gate, and kept the fatal key,
Risen, and with hideous outcry rush'd between.
"O father! what intends thy hand," she cry'd, "Against thy only son? What fury, O son, Possesses thee to bend that mortal dart Against thy father's head? and knowest for whom ; For him who sits above, and laughs the while At thee, ordain'd his drudge, to execute Whate'er his wrath, which he calls justice, bids; His wrath, which one day will destroy ye both!"
She spake, and at her words the hellish pest 725 Forbore: then these to her Satan return'd:
"So strange thy outcry, and thy words so strange Thou interposest, that my sudden hand Prevented, spares to tell thee yet by deeds What it intends; till first I know of thee,
What thing thou art, thus double-form'd; and why
In this infernal vale first met, thou call'st
Me father, and that phantom call'st my son:
I know thee not, nor ever saw till now
Sight more detestable than him and thee."
T'whom thus the portress of hell-gate reply'd;
"Hast thou forgot me then, and do I seem
Now in thine eye so foul? once deem'd so fair
In heaven! when at th' assembly, and in sight
Of all the seraphim, with thee combin'd
In bold conspiracy against heaven's King,
All on a sudden miserable pain
Surpris'd thee, dim thine eyes, and dizzy swam
In darkness; while thy head flames thick and fast
Threw forth; till on the left side op'ning wide, 755
Likest to thee in shape, and count'nance bright,
Then shining heavenly fair, a goddess arm'd,
Out of thy head I sprung: amazement seiz'd
All th' host of heaven; back they recoil'd, afraid
At first, and call'd me Sin; and for a sign
Portenteous held me: but familiar grown,
I pleas'd, and with attractive graces won
The most averse, thee chiefly, who full oft
(Thyself in me thy perfect image viewing)
Becam'st enamour'd, and such joy thou took'st 765
With me in secret, that my womb conceiv'd
A growing burden. Meanwhile war arose,
And fields were fought in heaven; wherein remain'd
(For what could else?) to our almighty foe
Clear victory; to our part loss, and rout,
Through all the empyrean: down they fell,
Driven headlong from the pitch of heaven, down
Into this deep; and in the general fall
I also: at which time this powerful key
Into my hand was given, with charge to keep
These gates for ever shut, which none can pass
4. hout my opening. Pensive here I sat
Alone, but long I sat not, till my womb
Pregnant by thee, and now excessive grown,
Prodigious motion felt, and rueful throes!
At last this odious off-pring whom thou seest,
Thine own begotten, breaking violent way
Tore through my entrails; that with fear and pain
Distorted, all my nether shape thus grew
Transform'd. But he, my inbred enemy
Forth-issu'd, brandishing his fatal dart
Made to destroy: I fled, and cry'd out, Death!
Hell trembled at the hideous name, and sigh'd
From all her caves, and back resounded, Death!
I fled, but he pursu'd (though more, it seems,
Inflam'd with lust than rage) and, swifter far
Me overtook, his mother, all dismay'd:
And in embraces forcible, and foul,
Engendering with me, of that rape begot
These yelling monsters; that with ceaseless cry 795
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