Nor what the potent victor in his rage
Can else inflict, do I repent or change,
Though changed in outward lustre, that fix'd mind, And high disdain from sense of injured merit, That with the Mightiest raised me to contend, And to the fierce contention brought along Innumerable force of Spirits arm'd,
That durst dislike his reign, and, me preferring, His utmost power with adverse power opposed In dubious battle on the plains of Heaven, And shook his throne. What though the field be lost? All is not lost; the unconquerable will,
And study of revenge, immortal hate, And courage never to submit or yield, And what is else not to be overcome; That glory never shall his wrath or might Extort from me. To bow and sue for grace With suppliant knee, and deify his power, Who from the terror of this arm so late Doubted his empire; that were low indeed, That were an ignominy, and shame beneath This downfall; since, by fate, the strength of gods And this empyreal substance cannot fail; Since through experience of this great event In arms not worse, in foresight much advanced, We may with more successful hope resolve To wage, by force or guile, eternal war, Irreconcilable to our grand Foe,
Who now triumphs, and, in the excess of joy
Sole reigning, holds the tyranny of Heaven.
So spake the apostate Angel, though in pain, Vaunting aloud, but rack'd with deep despair: And him thus answer'd soon his bold compeer.
O Prince, O Chief of many throned Powers, That led the embattled Seraphim to war Under thy conduct, and, in dreadful deeds Fearless, endanger'd Heaven's perpetual King, And put to proof his high supremacy, Whether upheld by strength, or chance, or fate; Too well I see and rue the dire event, That with sad overthrow, and foul defeat, Hath lost us Heaven, and all this mighty host In horrible destruction laid thus low, As far as gods and heavenly essences Can perish: for the mind and spirit remains Invincible, and vigour soon returns,
Though all our glory extinct, and happy state Here swallow'd up in endless misery. But what if he our Conqueror (whom I nów Of force believe Almighty, since no less
Than such could have o'erpower'd such force as ours)
Have left us this our spirit and strength entire
Strongly to suffer and support our pains, That we may so suffice his vengeful ire, Or do him mightier service as his thralls By right of war, whate'er his business be, 7 Here in the heart of Hell to work in fire, Or do his errands in the gloomy deep; What can it then avail, though yet we feel Strength undiminish'd, or eternal being,
To undergo eternal punishment?
Whereto with speedy words the Arch-Fiend replied.
Fallen Cherub! to be weak is miserable
Doing or suffering: but of this be sure, To do aught good never will be our task, But ever to do ill our sole delight, As being the contrary to his high will Whom we resist. If then his providence Out of our evil seek to bring forth good, Our labour must be to pervert that end, And out of good still to find means of evil; Which ofttimes may succeed, so as perhaps Shall grieve him, if I fail not, and disturb His inmost counsels from their destined aim. But see! the angry Victor hath recall'd
His ministers of vengeance and pursuit Back to the gates of Heaven: the sulphurous hail, Shot after us in storm, o'erblown, hath laid The fiery surge, that from the precipice
Of Heaven received us falling; and the thunder, Wing'd with red lightning and impetuous rage, Perhaps hath spent his shafts, and ceases now To bellow through the vast and boundless deep. Let us not slip the occasion, whether scorn, Or satiate fury, yield it from our Foe. Seest thou yon dreary plain, forlorn and wild, The seat of Desolation, void of light,
Save what the glimmering of these livid flames Casts pale and dreadful? Thither let us tend From off the tossing of these fiery waves;
There rest, if any rest can harbour there; And, reassembling our afflicted Powers, Consult how we may henceforth most offend Our Enemy; our own loss how repair; How overcome this dire calamity;
What reinforcement we may gain from hope; If not, what resolution from despair.
Thus Satan, talking to his nearest mate, With head uplift above the wave, and eyes That sparkling blazed; his other parts besides Prone on the flood, extended long and large, Lay floating many a rood; in bulk as huge As whom the fables name of monstrous size, Titanian, or Earth-born, that warr'd on Jove; Briareos or Typhon, whom the den
By ancient Tarsus held; or that seabeast Leviathan, which God of all his works Created hugest that swim the ocean stream: Him, haply, slumbering on the Norway foam The pilot of some small night-founder'd skiff Deeming some island, oft, as seamen tell, With fixed anchor in his scaly rind
Moors by his side under the lee, while night Invests the sea, and wished morn delays:
So stretch'd out huge in length the Arch-Fiend lay, Chain'd on the burning lake: nor ever thence Had risen, or heaved his head; but that the will
And high permission of all-ruling Heaven Left him at large to his own dark designs; That with reiterated crimes he might
Heap on himself damnation, while he sought Evil to others; and, enraged, might see How all his malice served but to bring forth Infinite goodness, grace, and mercy, shown On Man by him seduced; but on himself Treble confusion, wrath, and vengeance, pour'd. Forthwith upright he rears from off the pool His mighty stature; on each hand the flames, Driven backward, slope their pointing spires, and, roll'd In billows, leave i' the midst a horrid vale. Then with expanded wings he steers his flight 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 solid, as the lake with liquid, fire: And such appear'd in hue, as when the force Of subterranean wind transports a hill Torn from Pelorus, or the shatter'd side Of thundering Ætna, whose combustible And fuel'd entrails thence conceiving fire, Sublimed with mineral fury, aid the winds, And leave a singed bottom all involved
With stench and smoke: such resting found the sole Of unbless'd feet. Him follow'd his next mate: Both glorying to have scaped the Stygian flood As gods, and by their own recover'd strength, Not by the sufferance of supernal Power.
Is this the region, this the soil, the clime, Said then the lost Arch-Angel, this the seat That we must change for Heaven; this mournful gloom
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