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That with the Mightiest rais'd 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 oppos'd
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 reyenge, 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 advanc’d,
We may with more successful hope resolve
To wage, by force or guile, eternal war;
Irreconcileable 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 imbattled 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 remain
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 Conquerour (whom I now
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,
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
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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 oft-times may succeed, so as perhaps
Shall grieve him, if I fail not, and disturb
His inmost counsels from their destin'd aim.
But see! the angry Victor hath recallid
!
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 receiv'd 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
183-212. Casts pale and dreadful? thither fet 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 blaz’d; 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; Briarëos, or Typhon, whom the den By ancient Tarsus held; or that sea-beast Leviathan, which God of all his works Created hughest that swim the occan stream : Him haply slumb'ring on the Norway foam, The pilot of some small night-founder'd skift, Deeming some island, oft, as scamen 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
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Had risen, or heav'd 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, enrag'd might see
How all his malice sery'd but to bring forth
Infinite goodness, grace, and mercy, shown
On man, by him seduc'd; 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 rollid
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 foree
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,
Sublim’d with mineral fury, aid the winds,
And leave a singed bottom all involv'd
With stench and smoke: such resting found the sole
Of unblest feet. Him follow'd his next mate :
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