From cold Estotiland, and south as far
Beneath Magellan. At that tasted fruit
The sun, as from Thyestean banquet, turn'd
His course intended; else how had the world
Inhabited, though sinless, more than now,
Avoided pinching cold and scorching heat?
These changes in the heav'ns, tho' slow, produc'd
Like change on sea and land, sideral blast,
Vapour, and mist, and exhalation hot,
Corrupt and pestilent: now from the north
Of Norumbega, and the Samoed shore,
Bursting their brazen dungeon, arm'd with ice
And snow, and hail, and stormy gust and slaw,
Boreas, and Cæcias, and Argestes loud,
And Thrascias, rend the woods, and seas upturn;
With adverse blast upturns them from the south
Votus and After black with thund'rous clouds
From Serraliona; thwart of these as fierce
Forth rush the Levant and the Ponent winds,
Zurus and Zephyr, with their lateral noise,
irocco, and Libecchio. Thus began
Outrage from lifeless things: but discord first,
Daughter of Sin, among the irrational,
Death introduc'd, through fierce antipathy:
least now with beast 'gan war, and fowl with fowl,
and fish with fish; to graze the herb all leaving,
Devour'd each other; nor stood much in awe
of man, but fled him, or with count'nance grim
Har'd on him passing. These were from without
he growing miseries, which Adam saw
lready in part, though hid in gloomiest shade,
o sorrow abandon'd; but worse felt within,
nd in a troubled sea of passion tost,
hus to disburden sought with sad complaint:
O miserable of happy! is this the end
f this new glorious world, and me so late
he glory of that glory, who now become
ccurs'd of blessed? hide me from the face
God, whom to behold was then my height
Of happiness! yet well, if here would end
The misery; I deserv'd it, and would hear
My own deservings, but this will not serve;
All that I eat or drink, or shall beget,
Is propagated curse.
Delightfully, Increase and Multiply,
Now death to hear! for what can I increase
Or multiply, but curses on my head?
Who of all ages to succeed, but feeling
The evil on him brought by me, will curse
My head? Il fare our ancestor impure,
For this we may thank Adam: but his thanks
Shall be the execration: so besides
Mine own that bide upon me, all from me
Shall with a fierce reflux on me redound,
On me as on their natural center light
Heavy, though in their place. O fleeting joys
Of Paradise, dear bought with lasting woes!
Did I request thee, Maker, from my clay
To mould me Man? did I solicit thee
From darkness to promote me, or here place
In this delicious garden? As my
Concurr'd not to my being, it were but right
And equal to reduce me to my dust,
Desirous to resign and render back
All I receiv'd, unable to perform
Thy terms too hard, by which I was to hold
The good I sought not. To the loss of that,
Sufficient penalty, why hast thou added.
The sense of endless woes? Inexplicable
Thy justice seems, yet, to say truth, too late
I thus contest: then should have been refus'd
Those terms whatever, when they were propos'd:
Thou didst accept them; wilt thou enjoy the good
Then cavil the condition? And though God
Made thee without thy leave, what if thy son
Prove disobedient, and reprov'd, retort,
Wherefore didst thou beget me? I sought it not:
Wouldst thou admit for his contempt of thee
That proud excuse? yet him not thy election,
But natural necessity, begot.
God made thee of choice his own, and of his own
To serve him; thy reward was of his grace,
Thy punishment then justly is at his will,
Be it so, for I submit; his doom is fair,
That dust I am, and shall to dust return.
O welcome hour whenever! why delays
His hand to execute what his decree
Fix'd on this day? why do I overlive?
Why am I mock'd with death, and lengthen'd out
To deathless pain? how gladly would I meet
Mortality my sentence, and be earth
Insensible? how glad would lay me down,
As in my mother's lap? there I should rest
And sleep secure; his dreadful voice no more
Would thunder in my ears, no fear of worse
To me and to my offspring would torment me
With cruel expectation. Yet one doubt
Pursues me still, lest all I cannot die;
Lest that pure breath of life, the spirit of man,
Which God inspir'd, cannot together perish
With this corporeal clod; then in the grave,
Or in some other dismal place, who knows
But I shall die a living death; O thought
Horrid, if true! yet why? it was but breath
Of life that sinn'd: what dies but what had iife
And sin? the body properly hath neither.
All of me then shall die: let this appease
The doubt, since human reach no further knows.
For though the Lord of all be infinite,
Is his wrath also be it, man is not so,
But mortal doom'd. How can he exercise
Wrath without end on Man whom death must end? Can he make deathless death? that were to make Strange contradiction, which to God himself. Impossible is held, as argument
Of weakness not of pow'r. Will he draw out,
For anger's sake, finite to infinite
In punish'd man, to satisfy his rigour,
Satisfy'd never? that were to extend
His sentence beyond dust, and nature's law,
By which all causes else according still
To the reception of their matter act,
Not to th' extent of their own sphere. But say
That death be not one stroke, as I suppos'd,
Bereaving sense, but endless misery
From this day onward, which I feel begun
Both in me, and without me, and so last
To perpetuity: Ay me, that fear
Comes thund'ring back with dreadful revolution
On my defenceless head; both Death and I
Am found eternal, and incorporate both;
Not I on my part single, in me all
Posterity stands curs'd: fair matrimony
'That I must leave ye, sons: O were 1 able
To waste it all myself, and leave ye none!
So disinherited, how would ye bless
Me now your curse! Ah, why should all mankind,
For one man's fault thus guiltless be condemn'd
If guiltless? But from me what can proceed,
But all corrupt, both mind and will deprav'd,
Not to do only, but to will the same
With me? how can they then acquitted stand
In sight of God? Him after all disputes
Forc'd I absolve: all my evasions vain,
And reasonings, though through mazes, lead me still
But to my own conviction: first and last
On me, me only, as the source and spring
Of all corruption, all the blame lights due;
So might the wrath. Fond wish! couldst thou support
That burden heavier than the earth to bear,
Than all the world much heavier, though divided
With that bad woman? Thus what thou desir'st,
And what thou fear`st, alike destroys all hope
Of refuge, and concludes thee miserable
Beyond all past example and future,
To Satan only like both crime and doom.
O conscience, into what abyss of fears
And horrors hast thou driv'n me; out of which
I find no way, from deep to deeper plung'd!
Thus Adam to himself lamented loud
Through the still night; not now as ere man fell,
Wholesome, and cool, and mild, but with black air
Accompanied, with damps and dreadful gloom
Which to his evil conscience represented
All things with double terror; on the ground
Outstretch'd he lay, on the cold ground, and oft
Curs'd his creation, death as oft accus'd
Of tardy execution, since denounc'd
The day of his offence. Why comes not death,
Said he, with one thrice acceptable stroke
To end me? shall Truth fail to keep her word,
Justice divine not hasten to be just?
But Death comes not at call, Justice divine
Mends not her slowest pace for pray'rs or cries.
O woods, O fountains, hillocks, dales, and bow'rs,
With other echo late I taught your shades
To answer, and resound far other song.
Whom thus afflicted, when sad Eve beheld,
Desolate where she sat, approaching nigh,
Soft words to his fierce passion she assay'd;
But her with stern regard he thus repell'd:
Out of my sight, thou serpent; that name best
Befits thee with him leagu’d, thyself as false
And hateful; nothing wants, but that thy shape,
Like his, and colour serpentine, may show
Thy inward fraud, to warn all creatures from thee
Henceforth; lest that too heav'nly form pretended,
To hellish falsehood snare them. But for thee
I had persisted happy, had not thy pride
And wand'ring vanity, when least was safe
Rejected my forewarning, and disdain'd
Not to be trusted; longing to be seen,
Though by the devil himself, him overweening
To over-reach: but with the serpent meeting.
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