Unargued I obey; so God ordains:
God is thy law, thou mine: to know no more Is woman's happiest knowledge, and her praise. With thee conversing I forget all time;
All seasons, and their change, all please alike. Sweet is the breath of morn, her rising sweet, With charm of earliest birds; pleasant the sun, When first on this delightful land he spreads His orient beams, on herb, tree, fruit, and flower, Glistering with dew; fragrant the fertile earth After soft showers; and sweet the coming on Of grateful evening mild; then silent night, With this her solemn bird, and this fair moon, And these the gems of heaven, her starry train: But neither breath of morn, when she ascends With charin of earliest birds; nor rising sun On this delightful land; nor herb, fruit, flower, Glistering with dew; nor fragrance after showers; Nor grateful evening mild; nor silent night, With this her solemn bird, nor walk by moon, Or glittering star-light, without thee, is sweet. But wherefore all night long shine these? for whom This glorious sight, when sleep hath shut all eyes?"
To whom our general ancestor replied: Daughter of God and man, accomplish'd Eve, These have their course to finish round the earth, By morrow evening, and from land to land In order, though to nations yet unborn, Ministering light prepar'd, they set and rise; Lest total darkness should by night regain Her old possession, and extinguish life In nature and all things; which these soft fires Not only' enlighten, but with kindly heat Of various influence foment and warm, Temper or nourish, or in part shed down Their stellar virtue on all kinds that grow On earth, made hereby apter to receive Perfection from the sun's more potent ray. These then, though unbeheld in deep of night, Shine not in vain; nor think, though men were none, That heaven would want spectators, God want praise: Millions of spiritual creatures walk the earth
Unseen, both when we wake, and when we sleep: All these with ceaseless praise his works behold Both day and night: how often from the steep Of echoing hill or thicket have we heard Celestial voices to the midnight air, Sole, or responsive each to others note, Singing their great Creator! oft in bands
While they keep watch, or nightly rounding walk, With heavenly touch of instrumental sounds, In full harmonic number join'd, their songs
Divide the night, and lift our thoughts to Heaven.”
Thus talking, hand in hand alone they pass'd On to their blissful bower: it was a place Chos'n by the sov'ran Planter, when he fram'd All things to man's delightful use; the roof Of thickest covert was inwoven shade Laurel and myrtle, and what higher grew Of firm and fragrant leaf; on either side Acanthus, and each odorous bushy shrub,
Fenc'd up the verdant wall; each beauteous flower, Iris all hues, roses, and jessamine,
Rear'd high their flourish'd heads between, and wrought Mosaic; under foot the violet,
Crocus, and hyacinth, with rich inlay
Broider'd the ground, more color'd than with stone Of costliest emblem: other creatures here,
Bird, beast, insect, or worm, durst enter none, Such was their awe of man. In shadier bower More sacred and sequester'd, though but feign'd, Pan or Sylvanus never slept, nor Nymph Nor Faunus haunted.
THE REBEL ANGELS DRIVEN OUT FROM HEAVEN BY
"So said, he, o'er his sceptre bowing, rose
From the right hand of glory where he sat ; And the third sacred morn began to shine,
Dawning through heaven: forth rush'd with whirlwind round The chariot of paternal Deity,
Flashing thick flames, wheel within wheel undrawn,
Itself instinct with spirit, but convoy'd
By four cherubic shapes; four faces cach
Had wondrous; as with stars their bodies all
And wings were set with eyes, with eyes the wheels Of beryl, and careering fires between;
Over their heads a crystal firinament,
Whereon a sapphire throne inlaid with pure Amber, and colours of the showery arch. He in celestial panoply all arm'd Of radiant Urim, work divinely wrought, Ascended; at his right hand Victory
Sat eagle wing'd; beside him hung his bow And quiver with three-bolted thunder stor'd, And from about him fierce effusion rol'd
Of smoke and bickering flame and sparkles dire:
Attended with ten thousand thousand saints He onward came, far off his coning shone; And twenty thousand (I their number heard) Chariots of God, half on each hand were seen: He on the wings of cherub rode sublime On the crystalline sky, in sapphire thron'd, Illustrious far and wide, but by his own First seen; them unexpected joy surpris'd, When the great ensign of Messiah blaz'd Aloft by angels borne, his sign in heaven; Under whose conduct Michael soon reduc'd His army, circumfus'd on either wing, Under their head embodied all in one. Before him power divine his way prepar'd: At his command th' uprooted hills retir'd Each to his place: they heard his voice, and went Obsequious; heaven his wonted face renew'd, And with fresh flowerets hill and valley smil'd.
"So spake the Son, and into terror chang'd His count'nance too severe to be beheld. And full of wrath bent on his enemies.
At once the Four spread out their starry wings With dreadful shade contiguous, and the orbs Of his fierce chariot roll'd, as with the sound Of torrent floods, or of a numerous host. He on his impious foes right onward drove, Gloomy as night; under his burning wheels The steadfast empyrean shook throughout, All but the throne itself of God. Full soor Among them he arriv'd, in his right hand Grasping ten thousand thunders, which he sent Before him, such as in their souls infix'd Plagues; they, astonish'd, all resistance lost, All courage; down their idle weapons dropt; O'er shields and helms, and helmed heads he rode Of thrones and mighty Seraphim prostate, That wish'd the mountains now might be again Thrown on them as a shelter from his ire. Not less on either side tempestuous fell His arrows, from the four-fold visag'd Four Distinct with eyes, and from the living wheels Distinct alike with multitude of eyes; One spirit in them rul'd, and every eye Glar'd lightning, and shot forth pernicious fire Among the accurs'd, that wither'd all their strength, And of their wonted vigor left them drain'd, Exhausted, spritless, afflicted, fall'n.
et half his strength he put not forth, but check'd His thunder in inid volley; for he meant
Not to destroy, but root them out of Heaven; The overthrown he rais'd, and as a herd Of goats or timorous flock together throng'd Drove them before him thunderstruck, pursued With terrors and with furies to the bounds And crystal wall of Heav'n, which, opening wide, Roll'd inward, and a spacious gap disclos'd Into the wasteful deep; the monstrous sight Struck them with horror backward, but far worse Urged them behind; headlong themselves they threw Down from the verge Heav'n; eternal wrath Burnt after them to the bottomless pit.
SATAN ASSEMBLES HIS INFERNAL LEGIONS AFTER THEIR FALL FROM HEAVEN.
HE scarce had ceas'd, when the superior Fiend Was moving to'ward 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 Tuscan artist views At evening 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 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 sore besides, vaulted with fire: Nathless he so endur'd, till on the beach Of that inflamed sea he stood, and call'd His legions, angel forms, who lay intranc'd Thick as autumnal leaves that strow the brooks In Vallombrosa, where th' Etrurian shades High over-arch'd imbow'r; or scatter'd sedge Afloat when with fierce winds Orion arm'd Hath vex'd the Red-sea coast, whose waves o'erthrew Busiris and his Memphian chivalry,
While with perfidious hatred they pursu'd
The sojourners of Goshen, who beheld, From the safe shore, their floating carcasses
And broken chariot wheels; so thick bestrown Abject and lost lay these, cov'ring the flood, Under amazement of their hideous change. He call'd so loud, that all the hollow deep Of hell resounded. "Princes, Potentates,
Warriors, the flow'r of Heaven! once yours, now lost,
If such astonishment as this can seize
Eternal Spirits; or have ye chos'n this place After the toil of battle to repose
Your wearied virtue, for the ease you find To slumber here, as in the vales of Heaven? Or in this abject posture have ye sworn To' adore the Conqueror, who now beholds Cherub and Seraph rolling in the flood With scatter'd arms and ensigns, till anon His swift pursuers from Heaven-gates discern The' advantage, and, descending, tread us down Thus drooping; or with linked thunderbolts Transfix us to the bottom of this gulf? Awake, arise, or be forever fall'n!
They heard, and were abash'd, and up they sprung Upon the wing; as when men wont to watch On duty, sleeping found by whom they dread, Rouse 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 general's voice they soon obey'd, Innumerable. As when the potent rod Of Amram's son in Egypt's evil day,
Wav'd round the coast, up call'd a pitchy cloud Of locusts, warping 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 surrounding fires; Till, as a signal given, the' 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; A multitude, like which the populous north Pour'd never from her frozen loins to pass Rhene or the Danaw, when her barbarous sons Came like a deluge on the south, and spread Beneath Gibraltar to the Lybian sands.
Forthwith from every squadron and each band The heads and leaders thither haste, where stood Their great commander; godlike shapes and form Excelling human; princely dignities;
And powers that erst in Heaven sat on thrones; Though of their names in heavenly records now Be no memorial; blotted out and ras'd By their rebellion from the book of life.
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