By ancient Tarfus held, or that fea-beaft
Leviathan, which God of all his works
Created hugest that swim th' ocean stream:
Him haply slumb'ring on the Norway foam
The pilot of fome small night-founder'd skiff
Deeming some island, oft, as feamen tell,
With fixed anchor in his scaly rind
Moors by his fide under the lee, while night
Invests the fea, and wished morn delays:

200

205

2:0

215

So ftretch'd out huge in length the arch-fiend lay
Chain'd on the burning lake: nor ever thence
Had ris'n, or heav'd his head, but that the will
And high permiffion of all-ruling Heav'n
Left him at large to his own dark designs;
That with reiterated crimes he might
Heap on himself damnation, while he fought
Evil to others; and enrag'd might fee
How all his malice serv'd but to bring forth
Infinite goodness, grace and mercy shown
On man by him seduc'd, but on himself
Treble confufion, wrath and vengeance pour'd. 220
Forthwith upright he rears from off the pool
His mighty stature; on each hand the flames
Driv'n'backward, flope their pointing spires, and roll'd
In billows, leave i' th' midst a horrid vale.
Then with expanded wings he Reers 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 burn'd
With folid, as the lake with liquid fire;
And fuch appear'd in hue, as when the force
Of fubterranean wind transports a hill
Torn from Pelorus, or the shatter'd fide
Of thund'ring Etna, whose combustible
And fuel'd intrails thence conceiving fire,

230

Sublim'd.

Sublim'd with mineral fury, aid the winds,
And leave a finged bottom all involv'd

235

With stench and smoke: fuch resting found the sole
Of unblest feet. Him'follow'd his next mate,
Both glorying to have 'fcap'd the Stygian flood
As gods, and by their own recover'd strength, 240
Not by the fuff'rance of fupernal pow'r.

245

Is this the region, this the foil, the clime, Said then the lost archangel, this the feat That we must change for heav'n, this mournful gloom For that celestial light? B' it so, fince he Who now as Sov'reign can dispose and bid What shall be right: farthest from him is best, Whom reas'n hath equall'd, force hath made fupreme Above his equals. Farewel, happy fields, Where joy for ever dwells! Hail horrors, hail 250 Infernal world! and thou profoundest hell. Receive thy new poffeffor; one who brings A mind not to be chang'd by place or time. The mind is its own place, and in itself Can make a heav'n of hell, a hell of heav'n. What matter where if I be still the fame, And what I should be, all but less than he Whom thunder hath made greater? Here at least We shall be free; th' Almighty hath not built

255

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 heav'n.
But wherefore let we then our faithful friends,
Th' associates and copartners of our loss,

265

Lie thus astonish'd on th' oblivious pool,

And call them not to share with us their part.

In this unhappy manfion, or once more
With rallied arms to try what may be yet

Regain'd Regain'd in heav'n, or what more lost in hell? 210

So Satan spake, and him Beëlzebub Thus answer'd. Leader of those armies bright, Which but th' Omnipotent none could have foil'd, If once they hear that voice, their liveliest pledge

Of hope in fears and dangers, heard so oft
In worst extremes, and on the perilous edge
Of battle when it rag'd, in all affaults
Their surest signal, they will foon refume
New courage and revive, though now they lie
Grov'ling and prostrate on yon lake of fire,
As we erewhile, astounded and amaz'd,
No wonder, fall'n fuch a pernicious height.

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280

285

290

He scarce had ceas'd when the fuperior fiend Was moving tow'ard the shore; his pond'rous shield, Ethereal temper, massy, large and round, Behind him cast; the broad circumference Hung on his shoulders like the moon, whose orb Through optic glass the Tufcan artist views At evening from the top of Fefolé, Or in Valdarno, to descry new lands, Rivers or mountains in her spotty globe. His spear, to equal which the tallest pine Hewn on Norwegian hills, to be the mast Of fome great admiral, were but a wand, He walk'd with to support uneasy steps Over the burning marle, (not like those steps On heaven's azure,) and the torrid clime Smote on him fore befides, vaulted with fire: Nathlefs he so endur'd, till on the beach Of that inflamed sea he stood, and call'd His legions, angel-forms, who lay intrane'd Thick as autumnal leaves that strow the brooks In Vallombrofa, where th' Etrurian shades High over-arch'd imbow'r; or scatter'd fedge

295

300 305

Afloat, when with fierce winds Orion arm'd
Hath vex'd the Red-Sea coast, where waves o'erthrew

Bufiris and his Memphian chivalry,

While with perfidious hatred they pursi'd

The fojourners of Goshen, who beheld

From the fafe shore their floating carcafes
And broken chariot wheels: So thick bestrown
Abject and lost lay these, cov'ring the flood,

310

Under amazement of their hideous change.
He call'd fo loud, that all the hollow deep
Of hell refounded. Princes, potentates,
Warriors, the flow'r of heav'n, once yours, now lost,

3'5

If fuch astonishment as this can seize

Eternal spirits; or have ye chos'n this place

After the toil of battle to repofe

Your wearied virtue, for the ease you find
To flumber here, as in the vales of heav'n?

320

Or in this abject posture have ye fworn
To' adore the conqueror? who now beholds
Cherub and seraph rolling in the flood

325

With scatter'd arms and ensigns, till anon.
His swift purfuers from heav'n-gates difcern
Th' advantage, and defcending tread us down
Thus drooping, or with linked thunder-bolts
Transfix us to the bottom of this gulf.
Awake, arife, or be for ever fall'n.

330

They heard, and were abafh'd, and up they sprung

Upon the wing; as when men wont to watch
On duty, fleeping found by whom they dread,
Roufe and bestir themselves ere well awake.
Nor did they not perceive the evil plight
In which they were, or the fierce pains not feel;
Yet to their gen'ral's voice they foon obey'd

Innumerable. As when the potent rod
Of Amram's fon, in Egypt's evil day,

335; 345

Wav'd round the coaft, up call'd a pitchy cloud 340
Of locuits, warpi, on the eastern wind,
That o'er the realm of impious Pharaoh hung
Like night, and darken'd all the land of Nile:
So numberless were those bad angels seen
Hovering on wing under the cope of hell,
'Twixt upper, nether, and furrounding fires;
Till, as a signal giv'n, th' uplifted spear
Of their great Sultan waving to direct
Their course, in even balance down they light
On the firm brimstone, and fill all the plain; 350
A multitude, like which the populous north
Pour'd never from her frozen loins, to pass
Rhene or the Danaw, when her barbarous fons
Came like a deluge on the fouth, and spread
Beneath Gibraltar to the Libian sands.

355

Forthwith from every squadron and each band
The heads and leaders thither haste where flood
Their great commander; god-like shapes and forms
Excelling human, princely dignities,

And pow'rs that erst in heaven fat on thrones; 360
Tho' of their names in heav'nly records now

Be no memorial, blotted out and raz'd

By their rebellion from the books of life.
Nor had they yet among the fons of Eve

364

Got them new names; till wand'ring o'er the earth, Through God's high fufferance for the tri'al of man,

By falfities and lies the greatest part

Of mankind they corrupted to forsake

God their Creator, and th' invisible

Glory of him that made them to transform
Oft to the image of a brute, adorn'd
With gay religions full of pomp and gold,

370

And devils to adore for deities:

Then were they known to men by various names,

And