12
Sin and her shadow Death, and misery,
13
Death’s harbinger4675 —sad task, yet argument4676
14
Not less but more heroic than the wrath
15
Of stern4677 Achilles on his foe4678 pursued
16
Thrice fugitive 4679 about Troy wall, or rage
17
Of Turnus 4680 for Lavinia4681 disespoused,4682
18
Or Neptune’s ire, 4683 or Juno’s,4684 that so long
19
Perplexed4685 the Greek,4686 and Cytherea’s son.4687
20
If answerable4688 style I can obtain
21
Of 4689 my celestial patroness,4690 who deigns4691
22
Her nightly visitation unimplored,
23
And dictates to me slumb’ring, or inspires
24
Easy4692 my unpremeditated 4693 verse,
25
Since first this subject for heroic song
26
Pleased me, long choosing, and beginning late, 4694
27
Not sedulous4695 by nature to indite4696
28
Wars, hitherto the only argument4697
29
Heroic deemed,4698 chief mastery 4699 to dissect 4700
30
With long and tedious havoc4701 fabled knights
31
In battles feigned 4702 —the better fortitude
32
Of patience and heroic martyrdom
33
Unsung—or to describe races and games,
34
Or tilting4703 furniture, 4704 emblazoned 4705 shields,
35
Impresses4706 quaint,4707 caparisons4708 and steeds,
36
Bases4709 and tinsel 4710 trappings, gorgeous4711 knights
37
At joust and tournament, then marshalled 4712 feast
38
Served up in hall with sewers4713 and senechals,4714
39
The skill of artifice4715 or office4716 mean,4717
40
Not that which justly gives heroic name
41
To person or to poem. Me, of these
42
Nor skilled nor studious, higher argument
43
Remains, sufficient of itself to raise4718
44
That name, 4719 unless an age too late, or cold
45
Climate, or years, damp my intended wing4720
46
Depressed.4721 And much they may, if all be mine,
47
Not hers, who brings it nightly to my ear.
48
The sun was sunk, and after him the star
49
Of Hesperus,4722 whose office4723 is to bring
50
Twilight upon the earth, short arbiter 4724
51
’Twixt day and night. And now from end to end
52
Night’s hemisphere had veiled th’ horizon round,
53
When Satan, who late4725 fled before the threats
54
Of Gabriel out of Eden, now improved4726
55
In meditated fraud and malice, bent
56
On man’s destruction, maugre4727 what might hap4728
57
Of heavier on himself, fearless returned.
58
By night he fled, and at midnight returned
59
From compassing4729 the earth, cautious of day,
60
Since Uriel, regent of the sun, descried 4730
61
His entrance, and forewarned the Cherubim
62
That kept their watch. Thence full of anguish driv’n,
63
The space of seven continued nights he rode4731
64
With darkness. Thrice the equinoctial4732 line
65
He circled, four times crossed the car4733 of night
66
From pole to pole, traversing each colure. 4734
67
On the eighth returned and, on the coast averse4735
68
From entrance or Cherubic watch, by stealth
69
Found unsuspected 4736 way. 4737
There was a place,
70
Now not, though Sin, not time, first wrought the change,
71
Where Tigris,4738 at the foot of Paradise,
72
Into a gulf 4739 shot 4740 under ground, till part
73
Rose up a fountain by the Tree of Life.
74
In with the river sunk, and with it rose
75
Satan, involved4741 in rising mist, then sought
76
Where to lie hid. Sea he had searched, and land,
77
From Eden over Pontus4742 and the pool
78
Maeotis,4743 up beyond the river Ob,4744
79
Downward as far Antarctic, and in length
80
West from Orontes4745 to the ocean barred
81
At Darien,4746 thence to the land where flows
82
Ganges and Indus. Thus the orb4747 he roamed
83
With narrow4748 search, and with inspection deep
84
Considered every creature, which of all
85
Most opportune might serve his wiles, and found
86
The serpent, subtlest beast of all the field.
87
Him after long debate, irresolute
88
Of thoughts revolved, his final sentence4749 chose
89
Fit vessel, fittest imp4750 of fraud, in whom
90
To enter, and his dark suggestions hide
91
From sharpest sight, for in the wily snake,
92
Whatever sleights,4751 none would suspicious mark,4752
93
As from his wit and native subtlety
94
Proceeding, which in other beasts observed
95
Doubt might beget 4753 of diabolic power
96
Active within, beyond the sense4754 of brute.
97
Thus he resolved, but first from inward grief
98
His bursting passion into plaints4755 thus poured:
99
“O earth, how like to Heav’n, if not preferred
100
More justly, seat worthier of gods, as built
101
With second thoughts, reforming4756 what was old!
102
For what god, after better, worse would build?
103
Terrestrial Heav’n, danced round by other Heav’ns
104
That shine, yet bear their bright officious4757 lamps,
105
Light above light, for thee4758 alone, as seems,
106
In thee concent’ring all their precious beams
107
Of sacred influence! As God in Heav’n
108
Is center, yet extends to all, so thou,
109
Cent’ring, receiv’st from all those orbs. In thee,
110
Not in themselves, all their known virtue4759 appears
111
Productive in herb, plant, and nobler birth
112
Of creatures animate with gradual 4760 life
113
Of growth, sense, reason, all summed up in man.
114
With what delight could I have walked thee round
( If I could joy in aught), sweet interchange4761
116
Of hill, and valley, rivers, woods, and plains,
117
Now land, now sea and shores with forest crowned,
118
Rocks, dens, and caves! But I in none of these
119
Find place or refuge, and the more I see
120
Pleasures about me, so much more I feel
121
Torment within me, as from the hateful siege
122
Of contraries.4762 All good to me becomes
123
Bane4763 —and in Heav’n much worse would be my state,
124
“But neither here seek I, no, nor in Heav’n
125
To dwell, unless by mast’ring Heav’n’s Supreme, 4764
126
Nor hope to be myself less miserable
127
By what I seek, but others to make such
128
As I, though thereby worse to me redound.4765
129
For only in destroying I find ease
130
To my relentless thoughts and, him4766 destroyed,
131
Or won to what may work his utter loss,
132
For whom all this was made, all this will soon
133
Follow, as to him linked in weal 4767 or woe.
134
In woe then. That destruction wide may range:4768
135
To me shall be the glory sole among
136
Th’ infernal Powers, in one day to have marred 4769
137
What He, Almighty styled, six nights and days
138
Continued making—and who knows how long
139
Before had been contriving? Though perhaps
140
Not longer than since I, in one night, freed
141
From servitude inglorious well nigh half
142
Th’Angelic name, and thinner left the throng
143
Of His adorers. He, to be avenged,
144
And to repair His numbers thus impaired,
145
Whether such virtue spent of old now failed
146
More Angels to create (if they at least
147
Are His created) or, to spite us more,
148
Determined to advance into our room4770
149
A creature formed of earth, and him endow,
150
Exalted from so base original,4771
151
With Heav’nly spoils—our spoils. What He decreed,
152
He effected. Man He made, and for him built
153
Magnificent this world, and earth his seat,
154
Him lord pronounced and, O indignity!
155
Subjected to his service angel-wings,
156
And flaming ministers4772 to watch and tend
157
Their earthly charge. Of these the vigilance
158
I dread and, to elude, thus wrapped in mist
159
Of midnight vapor glide obscure, 4773 and pry4774
160
In every bush and brake, 4775 where hap4776 may find
161
The serpent sleeping, in whose mazy folds4777
162
To hide me, and the dark intent I bring.
163
“O foul descent! that I, who erst contended
164
With gods to sit the highest, am now constrained 4778
165
Into a beast and, mixed with bestial slime,
166
This essence to incarnate4779 and imbrute4780
167
That4781 to the height of Deity aspired!
168
But what will not ambition and revenge
169
Descend to? Who4782 aspires, must down4783 as low
170
As high he soared, obnoxious,4784 first or last,
171
To basest things. Revenge, at first though sweet,
172
Bitter ere long, back on itself recoils.
173
Let it. I reck4785 not, so it light4786 well aimed,
174
Since higher I fall short, on him who next
175
Provokes my envy, this new favorite
176
Of Heav’n, this man of clay, son of despite4787
177
Whom us the more to spite his Maker raised
178
From dust. Spite then with spite is best repaid.
179
So saying, through each thicket dank or dry,
180
Like a black mist low-creeping, he held 4788 on
181
His midnight-search, where soonest he might find
182
The serpent. Him fast-sleeping soon he found
183
In labyrinth of many a round 4789 self-rolled,
184
His head the midst, well stored with subtle wiles,
185
Not yet in horrid 4790 shade or dismal den,4791
186
Nor nocent4792 yet, but on the grassy herb,
187
Fearless unfeared he slept. In at his mouth
188
The Devil entered and his4793 brutal sense,
189
In heart or head, possessing, soon inspired
190
With act intelligential, but his sleep
191
Disturbed not, waiting close4794 the approach of morn.
192
Now when as sacred light began to dawn
193
In Eden on the humid flow’rs, that breathed
194
Their morning incense, 4795 when all things that breathe
195
From th’ earth’s great altar send up silent praise
196
To the Creator, and His nostrils fill
197
With grateful 4796 smell, forth came the human pair
198
And joined their vocal worship to the choir
199
Of creatures wanting4797 voice. That done, partake4798
200
The season prime for sweetest scents and airs,
201
Then commune4799 how that day they best may ply4800
202
Their growing work, for much their work out-grew
203
The hands’ dispatch4801 of two gard’ning so wide. 4802
204
And Eve first to her husband thus began:
205
“Adam, well may we labor still4803 to dress4804
206
This garden, still to tend plant, herb, and flow’r,
207
Our pleasant task enjoined,4805 but till more hands
208
Aid us the work under our labor grows
209
Luxurious4806 by restraint. What we by day
210
Lop overgrown, or prune, or prop, or bind,
211
One night or two with wanton4807 growth derides,4808
212
Tending4809 to wild. Thou therefore now advise, 4810
213
Or hear what to my mind first thoughts present.
214
Let us divide our labors—thou where choice
215
Leads thee, or where most needs, whether to wind
216
The woodbine round this arbor, or direct
217
The clasping
ivy where to climb, while I,
218
In yonder spring4811 of roses intermixed
219
With myrtle, find what to redress4812 till noon.
220
For while so near each other thus all day
221
Our task we choose, what wonder if so near
The Annotated Milton: Complete English Poems Page 45
