第 16 页

From Father to his Son? strange point and new!

Doctrine which we would know whence learned: who

saw

When this creation was? rememberest thou

Thy making, while the Maker gave thee being?

We know no time when we were not as now;

Know none before us, self-begot, self-raised

By our own quickening power, when fatal course

Had circled his full orb, the birth mature

Of this our native Heaven, ethereal sons.

Our puissance is our own; our own right hand

Shall teach us highest deeds, by proof to try

Paradise Lost

159 of 374

Who is our equal: Then thou shalt behold

Whether by supplication we intend

Address, and to begirt the almighty throne

Beseeching or besieging. This report,

These tidings carry to the anointed King;

And fly, ere evil intercept thy flight.

He said; and, as the sound of waters deep,

Hoarse murmur echoed to his words applause

Through the infinite host; nor less for that

The flaming Seraph fearless, though alone

Encompassed round with foes, thus answered bold.

O alienate from God, O Spirit accursed,

Forsaken of all good! I see thy fall

Determined, and thy hapless crew involved

In this perfidious fraud, contagion spread

Both of thy crime and punishment: Henceforth

No more be troubled how to quit the yoke

Of God’s Messiah; those indulgent laws

Will not be now vouchsafed; other decrees

Against thee are gone forth without recall;

That golden scepter, which thou didst reject,

Is now an iron rod to bruise and break

Thy disobedience. Well thou didst advise;

Yet not for thy advice or threats I fly

These wicked tents devoted, lest the wrath

Impendent, raging into sudden flame,

Distinguish not: For soon expect to feel

His thunder on thy head, devouring fire.

Then who created thee lamenting learn,

Paradise Lost

160 of 374

When who can uncreate thee thou shalt know.

So spake the Seraph Abdiel, faithful found

Among the faithless, faithful only he;

Among innumerable false, unmoved,

Unshaken, unseduced, unterrified,

His loyalty he kept, his love, his zeal;

Nor number, nor example, with him wrought

To swerve from truth, or change his constant mind,

Though single. From amidst them forth he passed,

Long way through hostile scorn, which he sustained

Superiour, nor of violence feared aught;

And, with retorted scorn, his back he turned

On those proud towers to swift destruction doomed.

Paradise Lost

161 of 374

Book VI

All night the dreadless Angel, unpursued,

Through Heaven’s wide champain held his way; till Morn,

Waked by the circling Hours, with rosy hand

Unbarred the gates of light. There is a cave

Within the mount of God, fast by his throne,

Where light and darkness in perpetual round

Lodge and dislodge by turns, which makes through

Heaven

Grateful vicissitude, like day and night;

Light issues forth, and at the other door

Obsequious darkness enters, till her hour

To veil the Heaven, though darkness there might well

Seem twilight here: And now went forth the Morn

Such as in highest Heaven arrayed in gold

Empyreal; from before her vanished Night,

Shot through with orient beams; when all the plain

Covered with thick embattled squadrons bright,

Chariots, and flaming arms, and fiery steeds,

Reflecting blaze on blaze, first met his view:

War he perceived, war in procinct; and found

Already known what he for news had thought

To have reported: Gladly then he mixed

Among those friendly Powers, who him received

With joy and acclamations loud, that one,

That of so many myriads fallen, yet one

Returned not lost. On to the sacred hill

Paradise Lost

162 of 374

They led him high applauded, and present

Before the seat supreme; from whence a voice,

From midst a golden cloud, thus mild was heard.

Servant of God. Well done; well hast thou fought

The better fight, who single hast maintained

Against revolted multitudes the cause

Of truth, in word mightier than they in arms;

And for the testimony of truth hast borne

Universal reproach, far worse to bear

Than violence; for this was all thy care

To stand approved in sight of God, though worlds

Judged thee perverse: The easier conquest now

Remains thee, aided by this host of friends,

Back on thy foes more glorious to return,

Than scorned thou didst depart; and to subdue

By force, who reason for their law refuse,

Right reason for their law, and for their King

Messiah, who by right of merit reigns.

Go, Michael, of celestial armies prince,

And thou, in military prowess next,

Gabriel, lead forth to battle these my sons

Invincible; lead forth my armed Saints,

By thousands and by millions, ranged for fight,

Equal in number to that Godless crew

Rebellious: Them with fire and hostile arms

Fearless assault; and, to the brow of Heaven

Pursuing, drive them out from God and bliss,

Into their place of punishment, the gulf

Of Tartarus, which ready opens wide

Paradise Lost

163 of 374

His fiery Chaos to receive their fall.

So spake the Sovran Voice, and clouds began

To darken all the hill, and smoke to roll

In dusky wreaths, reluctant flames, the sign

Of wrath awaked; nor with less dread the loud

Ethereal trumpet from on high ‘gan blow:

At which command the Powers militant,

That stood for Heaven, in mighty quadrate joined

Of union irresistible, moved on

In silence their bright legions, to the sound

Of instrumental harmony, that breathed

Heroick ardour to adventurous deeds

Under their God-like leaders, in the cause

Of God and his Messiah. On they move

Indissolubly firm; nor obvious hill,

Nor straitening vale, nor wood, nor stream, divides

Their perfect ranks; for high above the ground

Their march was, and the passive air upbore

Their nimble tread; as when the total kind

Of birds, in orderly array on wing,

Came summoned over Eden to receive

Their names of thee; so over many a tract

Of Heaven they marched, and many a province wide,

Tenfold the length of this terrene: At last,

Far in the horizon to the north appeared

From skirt to skirt a fiery region, stretched

In battailous aspect, and nearer view

Bristled with upright beams innumerable

Of rigid spears, and helmets thronged, and shields

Paradise Lost

164 of 374

Various, with boastful argument portrayed,

The banded Powers of Satan hasting on

With furious expedition; for they weened

That self-same day, by fight or by surprise,

To win the mount of God, and on his throne

To set the Envier of his state, the proud

Aspirer; but their thoughts proved fond and vain

In the mid way: Though strange to us it seemed

At first, that Angel should with Angel war,

And in fierce hosting meet, who wont to meet

So oft in festivals of joy and love

Unanimous, as sons of one great Sire,

Hymning the Eternal Father: But the shout

Of battle now began, and rushing sound

Of onset ended soon each milder thought.

High in the midst, exalted as a God,

The Apostate in his sun-bright chariot sat,

Idol of majesty divine, enclosed

With flaming Cherubim, and golden shields;

Then lighted from his gorgeous throne, for now

‘twixt host and host but narrow space was left,

A dreadful interval, and front to front

Presented stood in terrible array

Of hideous length: Before the cloudy van,

On the rough edge of battle ere it joined,

Satan, with vast and haughty strides advanced,

Came towering, armed in adamant and gold;

Abdiel that sight endured not, where he stood

Among the mightiest, bent on highest deeds,

Paradise Lost

165 of 374

And thus his own undaunted heart explores.

O Heaven! that such resemblance of the Highest

Should yet remain, where faith and realty

Remain not: Wherefore should not strength and might

There fail where virtue fails, or weakest prove

Where boldest, though to fight unconquerable?

His puissance, trusting in the Almighty’s aid,

I mean to try, whose reason I have tried

Unsound and false; nor is it aught but just,

That he, who in debate of truth hath won,

Should win in arms, in both disputes alike

Victor; though brutish that contest and foul,

When reason hath to deal with force, yet so

Most reason is that reason overcome.

So pondering, and from his armed peers

Forth stepping opposite, half-way he met

His daring foe, at this prevention more

Incensed, and thus securely him defied.

Proud, art thou met? thy hope was to have reached

The highth of thy aspiring unopposed,

The throne of God unguarded, and his side

Abandoned, at the terrour of thy power

Or potent tongue: Fool!not to think how vain

Against the Omnipotent to rise in arms;

Who out of smallest things could, without end,

Have raised incessant armies to defeat

Thy folly; or with solitary hand

Reaching beyond all limit, at one blow,

Unaided, could have finished thee, and whelmed

Paradise Lost

166 of 374

Thy legions under darkness: But thou seest

All are not of thy train; there be, who faith

Prefer, and piety to God, though then

To thee not visible, when I alone

Seemed in thy world erroneous to dissent

From all: My sect thou seest;now learn too late

How few sometimes may know, when thousands err.

Whom the grand foe, with scornful eye askance,

Thus answered. Ill for thee, but in wished hour

Of my revenge, first sought for, thou returnest

From flight, seditious Angel! to receive

Thy merited reward, the first assay

Of this right hand provoked, since first that tongue,

Inspired with contradiction, durst oppose

A third part of the Gods, in synod met

Their deities to assert; who, while they feel

Vigour divine within them, can allow

Omnipotence to none. But well thou comest

Before thy fellows, ambitious to win

From me some plume, that thy success may show

Destruction to the rest: This pause between,

(Unanswered lest thou boast) to let thee know,

At first I thought that Liberty and Heaven

To heavenly souls had been all one; but now

I see that most through sloth had rather serve,

Ministring Spirits, trained up in feast and song!

Such hast thou armed, the minstrelsy of Heaven,

Servility with freedom to contend,

As both their deeds compared this day shall prove.

Paradise Lost

167 of 374

To whom in brief thus Abdiel stern replied.

Apostate! still thou errest, nor end wilt find

Of erring, from the path of truth remote:

Unjustly thou depravest it with the name

Of servitude, to serve whom God ordains,

Or Nature: God and Nature bid the same,

When he who rules is worthiest, and excels

Them whom he governs. This is servitude,

To serve the unwise, or him who hath rebelled

Against his worthier, as thine now serve thee,

Thyself not free, but to thyself enthralled;

Yet lewdly darest our ministring upbraid.

Reign thou in Hell, thy kingdom; let me serve

In Heaven God ever blest, and his divine

Behests obey, worthiest to be obeyed;

Yet chains in Hell, not realms, expect: Mean while

From me returned, as erst thou saidst, from flight,

This greeting on thy impious crest receive.

So saying, a noble stroke he lifted high,

Which hung not, but so swift with tempest fell

On the proud crest of Satan, that no sight,

Nor motion of swift thought, less could his shield,

Such ruin intercept: Ten paces huge

He back recoiled; the tenth on bended knee

His massy spear upstaid; as if on earth

Winds under ground, or waters forcing way,

Sidelong had pushed a mountain from his seat,

Half sunk with all his pines. Amazement seised

The rebel Thrones, but greater rage, to see

Paradise Lost

168 of 374

Thus foiled their mightiest; ours joy filled, and shout,

Presage of victory, and fierce desire

Of battle: Whereat Michael bid sound

The Arch-Angel trumpet; through the vast of Heaven

It sounded, and the faithful armies rung

Hosanna to the Highest: Nor stood at gaze

The adverse legions, nor less hideous joined

The horrid shock. Now storming fury rose,

And clamour such as heard in Heaven till now

Was never; arms on armour clashing brayed

Horrible discord, and the madding wheels

Of brazen chariots raged; dire was the noise

Of conflict; over head the dismal hiss

Of fiery darts in flaming vollies flew,

And flying vaulted either host with fire.

So under fiery cope together rushed

Both battles main, with ruinous assault

And inextinguishable rage. All Heaven

Resounded; and had Earth been then, all Earth

Had to her center shook. What wonder? when

Millions of fierce encountering Angels fought

On either side, the least of whom could wield

These elements, and arm him with the force

Of all their regions: How much more of power

Army against army numberless to raise

Dreadful combustion warring, and disturb,

Though not destroy, their happy native seat;

Had not the Eternal King Omnipotent,

From his strong hold of Heaven, high over-ruled

Paradise Lost

169 of 374

And limited their might; though numbered such

As each divided legion might have seemed

A numerous host; in strength each armed hand

A legion; led in fight, yet leader seemed

Each warriour single as in chief, expert

When to advance, or stand, or turn the sway

Of battle, open when, and when to close

The ridges of grim war: No thought of flight,

None of retreat, no unbecoming deed

That argued fear; each on himself relied,

As only in his arm the moment lay

Of victory: Deeds of eternal fame

Were done, but infinite; for wide was spread

That war and various; sometimes on firm ground

A standing fight, then, soaring on main wing,

Tormented all the air; all air seemed then

Conflicting fire. Long time in even scale