Known partly, and soon found of whom they spake I am this chiefly, that my way must lie Through many a hard assay, even to the death, Ere I the promised kingdom can attain, Or work redemption for mankind, whose sins' Full weight must be transferred upon my head. Yet, neither thus disheartened or dismayed, The time prefixed I waited; when behold The Baptist (of whose birth I oft had heard, Not knew by sight) now come, who was to come Before Messiah, and his way prepare!
I, as all others, to his baptism came,
Which I believed was from above; but he
Straight knew me, and with loudest voice proclaimed Me him (for it was shown him so from Heaven)— Me him whose harbinger he was; and first
Refused on me his baptism to confer,
As much his greater, and was hardly won. But, as I rose out of the laving stream, Heaven opened her eternal doors, from whence The Spirit descended on me like a dove; And last, the sum of all, my Father's voice, Audibly heard from Heaven, pronounced me his, Me his beloved Son, in whom alone
He was well pleased: by which I knew the time Now full, that I no more should live obscure, But openly begin, as best becomes
The authority which I derived from Heaven. And now by some strong motion I am led Into this wilderness; to what intent
I learn not yet. Perhaps I need not know; For what concerns my knowledge God reveals." So spake our Morning Star, then in his rise, And, looking round, on every side beheld A pathless desert, dusk with horrid shades. The way he came, not having marked return, Was difficult, by human steps untrod; And he still on was led, but with such thoughts Accompanied of things past and to come
Lodged in his breast as well might recommend Such solitude before choicest society.
Full forty days he passed-whether on hill Sometimes, anon in shady vale, each night Under the covert of some ancient oak Or cedar to defend him from the dew, Or harboured in one cave, is not revealed; Nor tasted human food, nor hunger felt,
Till those days ended; hungered then at last Among wild beasts. They at his sight grew mild, 310 Nor sleeping him nor waking harmed; his walk The fiery serpent fled and noxious worm; The lion and fierce tiger glared aloof. But now an aged man in rural weeds,
Following, as seemed, the quest of some stray ewe, Or withered sticks to gather, which might serve Against a winter's day, when winds blow keen, To warm him wet returned from field at eve, He saw approach; who first with curious eye Perused him, then with words thus uttered spake :- 320
Sir, what ill chance hath brought thee to this place,
So far from path or road of men, who pass
In troop or caravan? for single none
Durst ever, who returned, and dropt not here
His carcass, pined with hunger and with droughth.
I ask the rather, and the more admire,
For that to me thou seem'st the man whom late
Our new baptizing Prophet at the ford
Of Jordan honoured so, and called thee Son
Of God. I saw and heard, for we sometimes
Who dwell this wild, constrained by want, come forth
To town or village nigh (nighest is far),
Where aught we hear, and curious are to hear, What happens new; fame also finds us out."
To whom the Son of God:-"Who brought me hither
Will bring me hence; no other guide I seck."
By miracle he may,” replied the swain ;
'What other way I see not; for we here
Live on tough roots and stubs, to thirst inured More than the camel, and to drink go far- Men to much misery and hardship born.
But, if thou be the Son of God, command
That out of these hard stones be made thee bread; So shalt thou save thyself, and us relieve
With food, whereof we wretched seldom taste." He ended, and the Son of God replied :- "Think'st thou such force in bread? (For I discern thee other than thou seem'st), Man lives not by bread only, but each word Proceeding from the mouth of God, who fed Our fathers here with manna? In the Mount Moses was forty days, nor eat nor drank; And forty days Eliah without food Wandered this barren waste; the same I now. Why dost thou, then, suggest to me distrust, Knowing who I am, as I know who thou art?”
Whom thus answered the Arch-Fiend, now undisguised :
"'Tis true, I am that Spirit unfortunate
Who, leagued with millions more in rash revolt,
Kept not my happy station, but was driven
With them from bliss to the bottomless Deep- Yet to that hideous place not so confined By rigour unconniving but that oft,
Leaving my dolorous prison, I enjoy
Large liberty to round this globe of Earth,
Or range in the Air; nor from the Heaven of Heavens Hath he excluded my resort sometimes.
I came, among the Sons of God, when he Gave up into my hands Uzzean Job,
To prove him, and illustrate his high worth; And, when to all his Angels he proposed To draw the proud king Ahab into fraud, That he might fall in Ramoth, they demurring, I undertook that office, and the tongues Of all his flattering prophets glibbed with lies To his destruction, as I had in charge:
For what he bids I do. Though I have lost Much lustre of my native brightness, lost To be beloved of God, I have not lost To love, at least contemplate and admire, What I see excellent in good, or fair,
Or virtuous; I should so have lost all sense. What can be then less in me than desire
To see thee and approach thee, whom I know Declared the Son of God, to hear attent Thy wisdom, and behold thy godlike deeds? Men generally think me much a foe
To all mankind. Why should I? they to me Never did wrong or violence. By them
I lost not what I lost; rather by them
I gained what I have gained, and with them dwell Copartner in these regions of the World, If not disposer-lend them oft my aid, Oft my advice by presages and signs, And answers, oracles, portents, and dreams, Whereby they may direct their future life. Envy, they say, excites me, thus to gain Companions of my misery and woe!
At first it may be; but, long since with woe Nearer acquainted, now I feel by proof That fellowship in pain divides not smart, Nor lightens aught each man's peculiar load ; Small consolation, then, were Man adjoined. This wounds me most (what can it less?) that Man, Man fallen, shall be restored, I never more." To whom our Saviour sternly thus replied: "Deservedly thou griev'st, composed of lies From the beginning, and in lies wilt end, Who boast'st release from Hell, and leave to come Into the Heaven of Heavens. Thou com'st, indeed, As a poor miserable captive thrall
Comes to the place where he before had sat Among the prime in splendour, now deposed, Ejected, emptied, gazed, unpitied, shunned, A spectacle of ruin, or of scorn,
To all the host of Heaven. The happy place Imparts to thee no happiness, no joy- Rather inflames thy torment, representing Lost bliss, to thee no more communicable; So never more in Hell than when in Heaven. But thou art serviceable to Heaven's King! Wilt thou impute to obedience what thy fear Extorts, or pleasure to do ill excites? What but thy malice moved thee to misdeem Of righteous Job, then cruelly to afflict him With all inflictions? but his patience won. The other service was thy chosen task, To be a liar in four hundred mouths; For lying is thy sustenance, thy food. Yet thou pretend'st to truth! all oracles
By thee are given, and what confessed more true Among the nations? That hath been thy craft, By mixing somewhat true to vent more lies. But what have been thy answers? what but dark, Ambiguous, and with double sense deluding, Which they who asked have seldom understood, And, not well understood, as good not known? Who ever, by consulting at thy shrine, Returned the wiser, or the more instruct To fly or follow what concerned 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 Among them to declare his providence,
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 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 retrenched;
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