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, Irreconcileable to our grand foe,
Who now triumphs, and in th' excess of joy Sole reigning holds the tyranny of heav'n.
So spake th' 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 th' imbattell'd Seraphim to war Under thy conduct, and, in dreadful deeds Fearless, endanger'd heav'n'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 heav'n, 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 now
Of force believe almighty, since no less
Than such could have o'erpower'd such force as ours, Has 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 To undergo eternal punishment?
Whereto with speedy words th' Arch-fiend replied. Fall'n Cherub, to be weak is miserable,
Doing or suffering: but of this be sure, To do ought 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 destined aim. But see! the angry victor hath recall'd His ministers of vengeance and pursuit Back to the gates of heav'n: the sulphurous hail, Shot after us in storm, o'erblown hath laid The fiery surge, that from the precipice Of heav'n 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 th' 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 up-lift 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,1 Briareus, or Typhon, whom the den
By ancient Tarsus held, or that sea-beast 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 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 wishèd morn delays:2 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
1 The Titans were monstrous giants, said to have made war against the gods. Briareus had a hundred hands. Typhon was the same as Typhoeus, who was
imprisoned by Jupiter in a cave near Tarsus, in Cilicia.
2 The whale is evidently here intended.
In billows leave i' th' 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 thund'ring Etna, whose combustible And fuel'd entrails thence conceiving fire, Sublimed with mineral fury, aid the winds, And leave a singèd 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 heav'n, this mournful gloom For that celestial light? be it so, since he,
Who now is Sov'reign, can dispose and bid
What shall be right: farthest from him is best,
Whom reason hath
Above his equals.
equall'd, force hath made supreme Farewell happy fields,
Where joy for ever dwells: hail horrors; hail Infernal world; and thou profoundest hell Receive thy new possessor; one who brings A mind not to be changed 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.2 What matter where, if I be still the same, 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 Here for his envy, will not drive us hence:
1 Capo di Faro, in Sicily.
2 "There's nothing either good or bad, but Thinking makes it so."-SHAKESPEARE.
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, Lie thus astonish'd on th' oblivious pool, And call them not to share with us their part In this unhappy mansion; or once more With rallied arms to try what may be yet Regain'd in heav'n, or what more lost in hell? 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 raged, in all assaults Their surest signal, they will soon resume New courage and revive, though now they lie Grov❜ling and prostrate on yon lake of fire, As we erewhile, astounded and amazed, No wonder, fall'n such a pernicious highth.1
He scarce had ceased, when the superior fiend Was moving toward the shore; his ponderous 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 Tuscan artist2 views At ev'ning, from the top of Fesole 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 some great Ammiral, 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
2 Galileo. Milton became acquainted with the great astronomer when travel
ling in Italy. Optic-glass was the name given then and some time after to the telescope.
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