第 23 页

To make her amiable: On she came,

Led by her heavenly Maker, though unseen,

And guided by his voice; nor uninformed

Of nuptial sanctity, and marriage rites:

Grace was in all her steps, Heaven in her eye,

In every gesture dignity and love.

I, overjoyed, could not forbear aloud.

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This turn hath made amends; thou hast fulfilled

Thy words, Creator bounteous and benign,

Giver of all things fair! but fairest this

Of all thy gifts! nor enviest. I now see

Bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh, myself

Before me: Woman is her name;of Man

Extracted: for this cause he shall forego

Father and mother, and to his wife adhere;

And they shall be one flesh, one heart, one soul.

She heard me thus; and though divinely brought,

Yet innocence, and virgin modesty,

Her virtue, and the conscience of her worth,

That would be wooed, and not unsought be won,

Not obvious, not obtrusive, but, retired,

The more desirable; or, to say all,

Nature herself, though pure of sinful thought,

Wrought in her so, that, seeing me, she turned:

I followed her; she what was honour knew,

And with obsequious majesty approved

My pleaded reason. To the nuptial bower

I led her blushing like the morn: All Heaven,

And happy constellations, on that hour

Shed their selectest influence; the Earth

Gave sign of gratulation, and each hill;

Joyous the birds; fresh gales and gentle airs

Whispered it to the woods, and from their wings

Flung rose, flung odours from the spicy shrub,

Disporting, till the amorous bird of night

Sung spousal, and bid haste the evening-star

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On his hill top, to light the bridal lamp.

Thus have I told thee all my state, and brought

My story to the sum of earthly bliss,

Which I enjoy; and must confess to find

In all things else delight indeed, but such

As, used or not, works in the mind no change,

Nor vehement desire; these delicacies

I mean of taste, sight, smell, herbs, fruits, and flowers,

Walks, and the melody of birds: but here

Far otherwise, transported I behold,

Transported touch; here passion first I felt,

Commotion strange! in all enjoyments else

Superiour and unmoved; here only weak

Against the charm of Beauty’s powerful glance.

Or Nature failed in me, and left some part

Not proof enough such object to sustain;

Or, from my side subducting, took perhaps

More than enough; at least on her bestowed

Too much of ornament, in outward show

Elaborate, of inward less exact.

For well I understand in the prime end

Of Nature her the inferiour, in the mind

And inward faculties, which most excel;

In outward also her resembling less

His image who made both, and less expressing

The character of that dominion given

O’er other creatures: Yet when I approach

Her loveliness, so absolute she seems

And in herself complete, so well to know

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Her own, that what she wills to do or say,

Seems wisest, virtuousest, discreetest, best:

All higher knowledge in her presence falls

Degraded; Wisdom in discourse with her

Loses discountenanced, and like Folly shows;

Authority and Reason on her wait,

As one intended first, not after made

Occasionally; and, to consummate all,

Greatness of mind and Nobleness their seat

Build in her loveliest, and create an awe

About her, as a guard angelick placed.

To whom the Angel with contracted brow.

Accuse not Nature, she hath done her part;

Do thou but thine; and be not diffident

Of Wisdom; she deserts thee not, if thou

Dismiss not her, when most thou needest her nigh,

By attributing overmuch to things

Less excellent, as thou thyself perceivest.

For, what admirest thou, what transports thee so,

An outside? fair, no doubt, and worthy well

Thy cherishing, thy honouring, and thy love;

Not thy subjection: Weigh with her thyself;

Then value: Oft-times nothing profits more

Than self-esteem, grounded on just and right

Well managed; of that skill the more thou knowest,

The more she will acknowledge thee her head,

And to realities yield all her shows:

Made so adorn for thy delight the more,

So awful, that with honour thou mayest love

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Thy mate, who sees when thou art seen least wise.

But if the sense of touch, whereby mankind

Is propagated, seem such dear delight

Beyond all other; think the same vouchsafed

To cattle and each beast; which would not be

To them made common and divulged, if aught

Therein enjoyed were worthy to subdue

The soul of man, or passion in him move.

What higher in her society thou findest

Attractive, human, rational, love still;

In loving thou dost well, in passion not,

Wherein true love consists not: Love refines

The thoughts, and heart enlarges; hath his seat

In reason, and is judicious; is the scale

By which to heavenly love thou mayest ascend,

Not sunk in carnal pleasure; for which cause,

Among the beasts no mate for thee was found.

To whom thus, half abashed, Adam replied.

Neither her outside formed so fair, nor aught

In procreation common to all kinds,

(Though higher of the genial bed by far,

And with mysterious reverence I deem,)

So much delights me, as those graceful acts,

Those thousand decencies, that daily flow

From all her words and actions mixed with love

And sweet compliance, which declare unfeigned

Union of mind, or in us both one soul;

Harmony to behold in wedded pair

More grateful than harmonious sound to the ear.

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Yet these subject not; I to thee disclose

What inward thence I feel, not therefore foiled,

Who meet with various objects, from the sense

Variously representing; yet, still free,

Approve the best, and follow what I approve.

To love, thou blamest me not; for Love, thou sayest,

Leads up to Heaven, is both the way and guide;

Bear with me then, if lawful what I ask:

Love not the heavenly Spirits, and how their love

Express they? by looks only? or do they mix

Irradiance, virtual or immediate touch?

To whom the Angel, with a smile that glowed

Celestial rosy red, Love’s proper hue,

Answered. Let it suffice thee that thou knowest

Us happy, and without love no happiness.

Whatever pure thou in the body enjoyest,

(And pure thou wert created) we enjoy

In eminence; and obstacle find none

Of membrane, joint, or limb, exclusive bars;

Easier than air with air, if Spirits embrace,

Total they mix, union of pure with pure

Desiring, nor restrained conveyance need,

As flesh to mix with flesh, or soul with soul.

But I can now no more; the parting sun

Beyond the Earth’s green Cape and verdant Isles

Hesperian sets, my signal to depart.

Be strong, live happy, and love! But, first of all,

Him, whom to love is to obey, and keep

His great command; take heed lest passion sway

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Thy judgement to do aught, which else free will

Would not admit: thine, and of all thy sons,

The weal or woe in thee is placed; beware!

I in thy persevering shall rejoice,

And all the Blest: Stand fast;to stand or fall

Free in thine own arbitrement it lies.

Perfect within, no outward aid require;

And all temptation to transgress repel.

So saying, he arose; whom Adam thus

Followed with benediction. Since to part,

Go, heavenly guest, ethereal Messenger,

Sent from whose sovran goodness I adore!

Gentle to me and affable hath been

Thy condescension, and shall be honoured ever

With grateful memory: Thou to mankind

Be good and friendly still, and oft return!

So parted they; the Angel up to Heaven

From the thick shade, and Adam to his bower.

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Book IX

No more of talk where God or Angel guest

With Man, as with his friend, familiar us’d,

To sit indulgent, and with him partake

Rural repast; permitting him the while

Venial discourse unblam’d. I now must change

Those notes to tragick; foul distrust, and breach

Disloyal on the part of Man, revolt,

And disobedience: on the part of Heaven

Now alienated, distance and distaste,

Anger and just rebuke, and judgement given,

That brought into this world a world of woe,

Sin and her shadow Death, and Misery

Death’s harbinger: Sad talk!yet argument

Not less but more heroick than the wrath

Of stern Achilles on his foe pursued

Thrice fugitive about Troy wall; or rage

Of Turnus for Lavinia disespous’d;

Or Neptune’s ire, or Juno’s, that so long

Perplexed the Greek, and Cytherea’s son:

If answerable style I can obtain

Of my celestial patroness, who deigns

Her nightly visitation unimplor’d,

And dictates to me slumbering; or inspires

Easy my unpremeditated verse:

Since first this subject for heroick song

Pleas’d me long choosing, and beginning late;

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Not sedulous by nature to indite

Wars, hitherto the only argument

Heroick deem’d chief mastery to dissect

With long and tedious havock fabled knights

In battles feign’d; the better fortitude

Of patience and heroick martyrdom

Unsung; or to describe races and games,

Or tilting furniture, imblazon’d shields,

Impresses quaint, caparisons and steeds,

Bases and tinsel trappings, gorgeous knights

At joust and tournament; then marshall’d feast

Serv’d up in hall with sewers and seneshals;

The skill of artifice or office mean,

Not that which justly gives heroick name

To person, or to poem. Me, of these

Nor skill’d nor studious, higher argument

Remains; sufficient of itself to raise

That name, unless an age too late, or cold

Climate, or years, damp my intended wing

Depress’d; and much they may, if all be mine,

Not hers, who brings it nightly to my ear.

The sun was sunk, and after him the star

Of Hesperus, whose office is to bring

Twilight upon the earth, short arbiter

‘twixt day and night, and now from end to end

Night’s hemisphere had veil’d the horizon round:

When satan, who late fled before the threats

Of Gabriel out of Eden, now improv’d

In meditated fraud and malice, bent

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On Man’s destruction, maugre what might hap

Of heavier on himself, fearless returned

From compassing the earth; cautious of day,

Since Uriel, regent of the sun, descried

His entrance, and foreworned the Cherubim

That kept their watch; thence full of anguish driven,

The space of seven continued nights he rode

With darkness; thrice the equinoctial line

He circled; four times crossed the car of night

From pole to pole, traversing each colure;

On the eighth returned; and, on the coast averse

From entrance or Cherubick watch, by stealth

Found unsuspected way. There was a place,

Now not, though sin, not time, first wrought the change,

Where Tigris, at the foot of Paradise,

Into a gulf shot under ground, till part

Rose up a fountain by the tree of life:

In with the river sunk, and with it rose

Satan, involved in rising mist; then sought

Where to lie hid; sea he had searched, and land,

From Eden over Pontus and the pool

Maeotis, up beyond the river Ob;

Downward as far antarctick; and in length,

West from Orontes to the ocean barred

At Darien ; thence to the land where flows

Ganges and Indus: Thus the orb he roamed

With narrow search; and with inspection deep

Considered every creature, which of all

Most opportune might serve his wiles; and found

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The Serpent subtlest beast of all the field.

Him after long debate, irresolute

Of thoughts revolved, his final sentence chose

Fit vessel, fittest imp of fraud, in whom

To enter, and his dark suggestions hide

From sharpest sight: for, in the wily snake

Whatever sleights, none would suspicious mark,

As from his wit and native subtlety

Proceeding; which, in other beasts observed,

Doubt might beget of diabolick power

Active within, beyond the sense of brute.

Thus he resolved, but first from inward grief

His bursting passion into plaints thus poured.

More justly, seat worthier of Gods, as built

With second thoughts, reforming what was old!

O Earth, how like to Heaven, if not preferred

For what God, after better, worse would build?

Terrestrial Heaven, danced round by other Heavens

That shine, yet bear their bright officious lamps,

Light above light, for thee alone, as seems,

In thee concentring all their precious beams

Of sacred influence! As God in Heaven

Is center, yet extends to all; so thou,

Centring, receivest from all those orbs: in thee,

Not in themselves, all their known virtue appears

Productive in herb, plant, and nobler birth

Of creatures animate with gradual life

Of growth, sense, reason, all summed up in Man.

With what delight could I have walked thee round,

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If I could joy in aught, sweet interchange

Of hill, and valley, rivers, woods, and plains,

Now land, now sea and shores with forest crowned,

Rocks, dens, and caves! But I in none of these

Find place or refuge; and the more I see

Pleasures about me, so much more I feel

Torment within me, as from the hateful siege

Of contraries: all good to me becomes

Bane, and in Heaven much worse would be my state.

But neither here seek I, no nor in Heaven

To dwell, unless by mastering Heaven’s Supreme;

Nor hope to be myself less miserable

By what I seek, but others to make such

As I, though thereby worse to me redound:

For only in destroying I find ease

To my relentless thoughts; and, him destroyed,

Or won to what may work his utter loss,

For whom all this was made, all this will soon

Follow, as to him linked in weal or woe;