Among the heathen of their purchase got,
And fabled how the serpent, whom they call'd
Ophion with Eurynome, the wide

Encroaching Eve perhaps, had first the rule
Of high Olympus, thence by Saturn driv'n
And Ops, ere yet Dictaan Jove was born.

Meanwhile in paradise the hellish pair
Too soon arrived, Sin there in power before,
Once actual, now in body, and to dwell
Habitual habitant; behind her Death

Close following pace for pace, not mounted yet
On his pale horse; to whom Sin thus began.

Second of Satan sprung, all conquering Death, What think'st thou of our empire now, though earn'd With travail difficult, not better far

Than still at hell's dark threshold to have sate watch,
Unnamed, undreaded, and thyself half starved?
Whom thus the sin-born monster answer'd soon.
To me, who with eternal famine pine,

Alike is hell, or paradise, or heaven,

There best, where most with ravin I may meet;
Which here, though plenteous, all too little seems1
To stuff this maw, this vast unhide-bound corps.

To whom th' incestuous mother thus replied.
Thou therefore on these herbs, and fruits, and flowers
Feed first; on each beast next, and fish, and fowl;
No homely morsels; and whatever thing
The scythe of Time mows down, devour unspared,
Till I in man residing through the race,
His thoughts, his looks, words, actions, all infect;
And season him thy last and sweetest prey.
This said, they both betook them several ways,
Both to destroy, or unimmortal make
All kinds, and for destruction to mature
Sooner or later; which th' Almighty seeing,
From his transcendent seat the saints among,
To those bright orders utter'd thus his voice.
See with what heat these dogs of hell advance

1 Prov. xxvii. 20.

To waste and havoc yonder world, which I
So fair and good created, and had still
Kept in that state, had not the folly of man
Let in these wasteful furies, who impute
Folly to me; so doth the prince of hell
And his adherents, that with so much ease
I suffer them to enter and possess

A place so heavenly, and conniving seem
To gratify my scornful enemies,

That laugh, as if, transported with some fit
Of passion, I to them had quitted all,

At random yielded up to their misrule;

And know not that I call'd and drew them thither

My hell-hounds, to lick up the draff and filth,
Which man's polluting sin with taint hath shed
On what was pure! till cramm'd and gorged, nigh burst
With suck'd and glutted offal, at one sling

Of thy victorious arm, well-pleasing Son,

Both Sin, and Death, and yawning Grave, at last
Through Chaos hurl'd, obstruct the mouth of hell
For ever, and seal up his ravenous jaws.'

Then heav'n and earth renew'd shall be made pure
To sanctity that shall receive no stain:
Till then the curse pronounced on both precedes.
He ended, and the heav'nly audience loud
Sung Hallelujah, as the sound of seas,

Through multitude that sung: Just are thy ways,
Righteous are thy decrees on all thy works;
Who can extenuate thee? Next, to the Son,
Destined restorer of mankind, by whom
New heav'n and earth shall to the ages rise,
Or down from heav'n descend. Such was their song
While the Creator calling forth by name
His mighty angels gave them several charge,
As sorted best with present things. The sun
Had first his precept so to move, so shine,
As might affect the earth with cold and heat
Scarce tolerable, and from the north to call

See Dante's Inferno, cant. xxiii.

Rev. xv. 3; xvi. 7.

Decrepit winter; from the south to bring
Solstitial summer's heat. To the blank moon'
Her office they prescribed, to th' other five
Their planetary motions and aspects

In Sextile, Square, and Trine, and Opposite,
Of noxious efficacy, and when to join

In synod unbenign, and taught the fix'd
Their influence malignant when to show'r,
Which of them rising with the sun, or falling,
Should prove tempestuous. To the winds they set
Their corners, when with bluster to confound
Sea, air, and shore; the thunder when to roll
With terror through the dark aëreal hall.
Some say, he bid his angels turn askance
The poles of earth twice ten degrees and more
From the sun's axle; they with labour push'd
Oblique the centric globe: some say, the sun
Was bid turn reins from th' equinoctial road
Like distant breadth to Taurus with the sev'n
Atlantic sisters," and the Spartan twins,*
Up to the Tropic Crab; thence down amain
By Leo, and the Virgin, and the Scales,
As deep as Capricorn, to bring in change
Of seasons to each clime; else had the spring
Perpetual smiled on earth with vernant flow'rs,
Equal in days and nights, except to those

1 Some editions printed blanc moon, i.e., white.

2 Terms inade use of by the astrologers, and signifying the positions or aspects of the five (then known) planets. Sextile means a planet situated at a distance of two signs (the sixth of twelve) from another planet. Square, separated by four signs. Trine, separated by three signs. Opposite was considered a position of noxious efficacy. The period in which Milton lived explains the fact of his countenancing these superstitions, as they were universally believed. After the great Fire of Loudon, the House of Commons called the astrologer Lilly before them, to examine him as to his foreknowledge of that calamity, and gravely received

his explanation of how he obtained his foresight from the art he practised. He had foretold the fire in a hieroglyphic resembling ose formerly published in Old Moore's Almanack, which might be interpreted in any manner the reader pleased. "Did you foresee the year?" asked one of the Committee. "I did not," replied Lilly, "nor was desirous; of that I made no scrutiny." The as trologer then told them, very wisely, that the fire was not of man, but of God. It was believed to have been caused by incendiaries.

3 The Pleiades, daughters of Atlas. This constellation is in the neck of Taurus.

⚫ Castor and Pollux, the Gemini.

Beyond the polar circles; to them day
Had unbenighted shone, while the low sun
To recompense his distance in their sight
Had rounded still th' horizon, and not known
Or east or west, which had forbid the snow
From cold Estotiland,' and south as far
Beneath Magellan. At that tasted fruit
The sun, as from Thyestean banquet,3 turn'd
His course intended; else how had the world
Inhabited, though sinless, more than now
Avoided pinching cold and scorching heat?
These changes in the heav'ns, though slow, produced
Like change on sea and land, sideral blast,
Vapour, and mist, and exhalation hot,
Corrupt and pestilent. Now from the north
Of Norumbega' and the Samoed shore,
Bursting their brazen dungeon, arm.'d with ice,
And snow, and hail, and stormy gust, and flaw,
Boreas, and Cacias, and Argestes loud,

5

And Thrascias rend the woods, and seas upturn;
With adverse blast upturns them from the south
Notus, and Afer black with thund'rous clouds
From Serraliona, thwart of these as fierce
Forth rush the Levant and the Ponent winds,
Eurus and Zephyr with their lateral noise
Sirocco and Libecchio. Thus began

Outrage from lifeless things; but Discord first,
Daughter of Sin, among th' irrational

Death introduced through fierce antipathy:
Beast now with beast gan war, and fowl with fowl,

A tract of land north of America, near the Arctic Ocean and Hudson's Bay.-HUME.

Extreme south of South America.

3 Atreus, to avenge an injury, invited his brother Thyestes to a banquet, and served up for his food the flesh of his murdered children. This horrid revenge was visited on the family of Atreus for generations.

4 A province of the northern Armenia. Samoieda, in the north-east of Muscovy, upon the Frozen Sea.-HUME.

Names of the winds. Boreas the north; Cæcias, north-west; Argestes, north-east. Thrascias, from Threce. Notus, the south wind. Afer, from Africa-From RICHARDSON.

• The Lion Mountains, south-west of Africa, famous for storms.

7 Levant and Ponent are Italian names for the east and west winds, called by the Greeks Eurus and Zephyr. Sirocco and Libecchio are the south-east and south-west winds.

And fish with fish; to graze the herb all leaving Devour'd each other; nor stood much in awe Of man, but fled him, or with count'nance grim Glared on him passing. These were from without The growing miseries, which Adam saw Already in part, though hid in gloomiest shade, To sorrow abandon'd, but worse felt within, And, in a troubled sea of passion tost, Thus to disburden sought with sad complaint. O miserable of happy! is this the end Of this new glorious world, and me so late The glory of that glory, who now become Accursed of blessed? Hide me from the face Of Gop, whom to behold was then my highth Of happiness: yet well, if here would end The misery, I deserved it, and would bear My own deservings; but this will not serve; All that I eat, or drink, or shall beget, Is propagated curse. O voice once heard Delightfully, Encrease and multiply, Now death to hear! for what can I encrease Or multiply, but curses on my head? Who of all ages to succeed, but feeling The evil on him brought by me, will curse My head? Ill fare our ancestor impure, For this we may thank Adam; but his thanks Shall be the execration; so besides Mine own that bide upon me, all from me Shall with a fierce reflux on me redound, On me, as on their natural centre, light, Heavy, though in their place. O fleeting joys Of paradise, dear bought with lasting woes! Did I request thee, Maker, from my clay, To mould me man? Did I solicit thee From darkness to promote me, or here place In this delicious garden? As my will Concurr'd not to my being, it were but right And equal to reduce me to my dust, Desirous to resign, and render back All I received, unable to perform