With long and tedious havoc fabl❜d Knights
In Battels feign'd; the better fortitude
Of Patience and Heroic Martyrdom
Unfung; or to defcribe Races and Games,
Of tilting Furniture, emblazon'd Shields,
Impreffes quaint, Caparisons and Steeds;
Bafes and tinfel Trappings, gorgious Knights
At Jouft and Torneament; then marshal'd Feaft
Serv'd up in Hall with Sewers, and Seneshals;
The skill of Artifice or Office mean,
Not that which juftly gives Hebic name
To Perfon or to Poem. Me of these
Not skill'd nor ftudious, higher Argument
Remains, fufficient of it felf to raise
That name, unless an age too late, or cold
Climate, or Years damp my intended wing
Depreft, and much they may, if all be mine,
Not Hers who brings it nightly to my Ear.
The Sun was funk, and after him the Star
Of Hesperus, whofe Office is to bring
Twilight upon the Earth, fhort Arbiter
'Twixt Day and Night, and now from end to end
Night's Hemisphere had veil'd the Horizon round:
When Satan who late filed before the threats
Of Gabriel out of Eden, now improv❜d
In meditated fraud and malice, bent
On man's deftruction, maugre what might hap
Of heavier on himself, fearless return'd.
Ey Night he fled, and at Midnight return'd
From compaffing the Earth, cautious of day,
Since Uriel Regent of the Sun defcry'd.
His entrance, and forewarn'd the Cherubim,
That kept their watch; thence full of anguish driv'n;
The space of feven continu'd Nights he rode
With darkness, thrice the Equinoctial Line
He circi'd, four times crofs'd the Car of Night 65
From Pole to Pole, traverfing each Colure;
On the eighth return'd, and on the Coast averse
From entrance or Cherubic Watch, by stealth
Found unfufpected way. There was a place,
Now not, tho' Sin, not Time, first wrought the change,
Where Tigris at the foot of Paradife
Into a Gulf shot under ground, till part
Rofe up a Fountain by the Tree of Life;
In with the River funk, and with it rofe
Satan involv'd in rifing Mist, then fought
Where to lye hid; Sea he had fearcht and Land
From Eden over Pontus, and the Poole
Maotis, up beyond the River Ob;
Downward as far Antartic; and in length.
Weft from Orontes to the Ocean barr'd
At Darien, thence to the Land where flows
Ganges and Indus: thus the Orb he roam'd.
With narrow fearch; and with infpection deep
Confider'd every Creature, which of all
Moft opportune might serve his Wiles, and found The Serpent futtlest Beast of all the Field.
Him after long debate, irrefolute
Of thoughts revolv'd, his final sentence chofe
Fit Veffel, fittest Imp of fraud, in whom
To enter, and his dark suggestions hide
From sharpest fight: for in the wily Snake,
Whatever fleights none would fufpicious mark,
As from his wit and native futtlety
Proceeding, which in other Beafts obferv'd
Doubt might beget of Diabolic pow'r
Active within beyond the fenfe of brute.
Thus he refolv'd, but first from inward grief.
His burfting paffion into plaints thus pour'd:
O Earth, how like to Heav'n, if not preferr'd
More juftly, Seat worthier of Gods, as built
With fecond thoughts, reforming what was old!
For what God after better worfe would build?.
Terreftrial Heav'n, danc'd round by other Heav'ns
That fhine, yet bear their bright officious Lamps,
Light above Light, for thee alone, as feems,
In thee concentring all their precious beams
Of facred influence: As God in Heav'n
Is Center, yet extends to all, so thou
Centring receiv'ft from all thofe Orbs; in thee, Not in themselves, all their known virtue appears Productive in Herb, Plant, and nobler birth
Of Creatures animate with gradual life
Of Growth, Sense, Reason, ali fumm'd up in Man. With what delight could I have walkt thee round, If I could joy in aught, fweet interchange
Of Hill, and Valley, Rivers, Woods and Plains, Now Land, now Sea,and Shores with Forrest crown'd, Rocks, Dens, and Caves; but I in none of thefe Find place or refuge; and the more I fee
Pleasures about me, fo much more I feel
Torment within me, as from the hateful fiege
Of contraries; all good to me becomes
Bane, and in Heav'n much worfe would be my state. But neither here feek I, no nor in Heav'n
To dwell, unless by mastring Heav'ns Supream; r2s
Nor hope to be my felf lefs miserable
By what I feek, but others to make such
As I, though thereby worfe to me redound:
For only in destroying I find ease
To my relentless thoughts; and him deftroy'd, 130
Or won to what may work his utter lofs,
For whom all this was made, all this will foon
Follow, as to him linkt in weal or woe,
In woe then; that deftruction wide may range :
To me shall be the glory fole among
The infernal Powers, in one day to have marr'd
What he Almighty ftyl'd, fix Nights and Days
Continu'd making, and who knows how long
Before had been contriving, though perhaps
Not longer than fince I in one Night freed 140
From fervitude inglorious well nigh half
Th'Angelic Name, and thinner left the throng
Of his adorers: he to be aveng'd,
And to repaire his numbers thus impair'd,
Whether fuch virtue fpent of old now failed
More Angels to Create, if they at least
· Are his Created, or to fpite us more,
Determin'd to advance into our room
A Creature form'd of Earth, and him endow,
Exalted from fo base original,
With Heav'nly spoils, our spoils: What he decreed
He effected; Man he made, and for him built
Magnificent this World, and Earth his feat,
Him Lord pronounc'd, and, O indignity!
Subjected to his fervice Angel wings,
And flaming Minifters to watch and tend
Their earthy Charge: Of these the vigilance
I dread, and to elude, thus wrapt in mist
Of midnight vapor glide obfcure, and pry
In every Bush and Brake, where hap may find 160
The Serpent sleeping, in whose mazy foulds
To hide me, and the dark intent 1 bring.
O foul defcent! that I who erft contended
With Gods to fit the highest, am now constrain'd
Into a Beaft, and mixt with bestial flime,
This effence to incarnate and imbrute,
That to the heighth of Deity aspir'd;
But what will not Ambition and Revenge
Defcend to? who aspires must down as low
As high he foar'd, obnoxious first or last
To bafeft things. Revenge, at first though sweet,
Bitter e'er long back on it felf recoiles;
Let it; I reck not, fo it light well aim'd,
Since higher I fall fhort, on him who next
Frovokes my envy, this new Favourite
Of Heav'n, this Man of Clay, Son of despite,
Whom us the more to spite, his Maker rais'd
From duft: fpite then with fpite is best repaid,
So faying, through each Thicket Danck or Dry,
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