482
Long had foretold, a fabric 5409 wonderful
483
Of absolute5410 perfection, therein man
484
Placed in a Paradise, by our exile
485
Made happy. Him by fraud I have seduced 5411
486
From his Creator and, the more to increase
487
Your wonder, with an apple. 5412 He, 5413 thereat
488
Offended (worth your laughter!) hath given up
489
Both His belovèd man and all his world
490
To Sin and Death a prey, and so to us,
491
Without our hazard, labor, or alarm,5414
492
To range5415 in, and to dwell, and over man
493
To rule, as over all He should have ruled.
494
“True is, me also He hath judged, or rather
495
Me not, but the brute serpent in whose shape
496
Man I deceived. That which to me belongs
497
Is enmity, which He will put between
498
Me and mankind. I am to bruise5416 his heel.
499
His seed (when is not set5417 ) shall bruise my head.
500
A world who would not purchase with a bruise,
501
Or much more grievous pain?
“Ye have th’ acc
502
Of my performance. What remains, ye Gods,
503
But up, and enter now into full bliss?
504
So having said, a while he stood, expecting
505
Their universal shout and high applause
506
To fill his ear—when, contrary, he hears
507
On all sides, from innumerable tongues,
508
A dismal universal hiss, the sound
509
Of public scorn. He wondered, but not long
510
Had leisure, wond’ring at himself now more.
511
His visage drawn he felt to sharp and spare;
512
His arms clung to his ribs, his legs entwining
513
Each other, till supplanted 5418 down he fell,
514
A monstrous serpent on his belly prone,
515
Reluctant,5419 but in vain. A greater power
516
Now ruled him, punished in the shape he sinned,
517
According to his doom.5420 He would have spoke,
518
But hiss for hiss returned with forkèd tongue
519
To forkèd tongue, for now were all transformed
520
Alike, to serpents all, as accessories
521
To his bold 5421 riot.5422 Dreadful was the din
522
Of hissing through the hall, thick swarming now
523
With complicated 5423 monsters head and tail,
524
Scorpion, and asp, and amphisbaena5424 dire,
525
Cerastes hornèd, hydrus,5425 and elops5426 drear, 5427
526
And dipsas5428 (not so thick swarmed once the soil
527
Bedropped with blood of Gorgon,5429 or the isle
528
Ophiusa),5430 but still greatest he the midst,
529
Now dragon grown, larger than whom5431 the sun
530
Engendered in the Pythian5432 vale on slime, 5433
531
Huge python, and his 5434 power no less he seemed
532
Above the rest still to retain. They all
533
Him followed, issuing forth to th’ open field,
534
Where all yet left of that revolted rout,5435
535
Heav’n-fall’n, in station5436 stood or just5437 array,
536
Sublime5438 with expectation when to see
537
In triumph issuing forth their glorious chief.
538
They saw, but other sight instead! a crowd
539
Of ugly serpents. Horror on them fell,
540
And horrid sympathy, for what they saw
541
They felt themselves now changing. Down their arms,
542
Down fell both spear and shield, down they as fast,
543
And the dire hiss renewed, and the dire form
544
Catched by contagion,5439 like5440 in punishment
545
As in their crime. Thus was th’ applause they meant
546
Turned to exploding hiss, triumph to shame
547
Cast on themselves from their own mouths.
There stood
548
A grove hard by, sprung up with5441 this their change
549
(His will who reigns above, to aggravate5442
550
Their penance), laden with fair fruit, like that
551
Which grew in Paradise, the bait of Eve
552
Used by the Tempter. On that prospect 5443 strange5444
553
Their earnest eyes they fixed, imagining
554
For one forbidden tree a multitude
555
Now ris’n, to work them further woe or shame.
556
Yet parched with scalding thirst and hunger fierce,
557
Though to delude them sent, could not abstain,
558
But on they rolled in heaps, and up the trees
559
Climbing, sat thicker than the snaky locks
560
That curled Megaera.5445 Greedily they plucked
561
The fruitage fair to sight, like that which grew
562
Near that bituminous 5446 lake 5447 where Sodom flamed—
563
This more delusive, not the touch, but taste
564
Deceived. They fondly5448 thinking to allay
565
Their appetite with gust,5449 instead of fruit
566
Chewed bitter ashes, which th’ offended taste
567
With spattering noise rejected. Oft they assayed,
568
Hunger and thirst constraining, drugged 5450 as oft,
569
With hatefullest disrelish5451 writhed their jaws,
570
With soot and cinders filled. So oft they fell
571
Into the same illusion, not as man
572
Whom they triumphed 5452 once5453 lapsed. Thus were they plagued
573
And worn with famine, 5454 long and ceaseless hiss,
574
Till their lost shape, permitted, they resumed,
575
Yearly enjoined, some say, to undergo
576
This annual humbling certain5455 numbered days,
577
To dash5456 their pride and joy for man seduced.
578
However, some tradition5457 they dispersed 5458
579
Among the heathen, of their purchase5459 got,
580
And fabled how the serpent, whom they called
581
Ophion,5460 with Eurynome5461 (the wide-
582
Encroaching Eve, 5462 perhaps), had first the rule
583
Of high Olympus, thence by Satu
rn driv’n
584
And Ops,5463 ere yet Dictaean Jove5464 was born.
585
Meanwhile in Paradise the hellish pair
586
Too soon arrived, Sin there in power before,
587
Once5465 actual,5466 now in body, and to dwell
588
Habitual habitant; behind her Death,
589
Close following pace for pace, not mounted yet
590
On his pale horse. 5467 To whom Sin thus began:
591
“Second of Satan sprung, all-conquering Death!
592
What think’st thou of our empire now, though earned
593
With travel difficult, not better far
594
Than still at Hell’s dark threshold to have sat watch,
595
Unnamed, undreaded, and thyself half starved?
596
Whom thus the Sin-born monster answered soon:5468
597
“To me, who with eternal famine pine, 5469
598
Alike is Hell, or Paradise, or Heaven—
599
There best, where most with ravine5470 I may meet,
600
Which here, though plenteous, all too little seems
601
To stuff this maw, this vast unhide-bound 5471 corpse.” 5472
602
To whom th’ incestuous mother thus replied:
603
“Thou therefore on these herbs, and fruits, and flow’rs
604
Feed first. On each beast next, and fish, and fowl—
605
No homely 5473 morsels! And whatever thing
606
The scythe of Time mows down, devour unspared,5474
607
Till I, in man residing through the race,
608
His thoughts, his looks, words, actions, all infect,
609
And season him thy last and sweetest prey.
610
This said, they both betook them several 5475 ways,
611
Both to destroy, or unimmortal make
612
All kinds, and for destruction to mature5476
613
Sooner or later. Which th’Almighty seeing,
614
From His transcendent seat the Saints among,
615
To those bright orders uttered thus His voice:
616
“See with what heat these dogs of Hell advance
617
To waste5477 and havoc5478 yonder world, which I
618
So fair and good created, and had still
619
Kept in that state, had not the folly of man
620
Let in these wasteful Furies, who impute5479
621
Folly to me! So doth the Prince of Hell
622
And his adherents, that with so much ease
623
I suffer 5480 them to enter and possess
624
A place so Heav’nly, and conniving5481 seem
625
To gratify 5482 my scornful enemies,
626
That laugh, as if transported 5483 with some fit
627
Of passion, I to them had quitted5484 all,
628
At random5485 yielded up to their misrule,
629
And know not that I called, and drew them thither,
630
My Hell-hounds, to lick up the draff 5486 and filth
631
Which man’s polluting sin with taint hath shed
632
On what was pure, till 5487 crammed 5488 and gorged,5489 night5490 burst
633
With sucked 5491 and glutted 5492 offal,5493 at one sling5494
634
Of thy victorious arm, well-pleasing Son,
635
Both Sin and Death, and yawning5495 grave at last
636
Through Chaos hurled, obstruct 5496 the mouth of Hell
637
Forever, and seal up his ravenous jaws.
638
Then Heav’n and earth renewed shall be made pure
639
To sanctity5497 that shall receive no stain:
640
Till then, the curse pronounced on both precedes.”5498
641
He ended, and the Heav’nly audience loud
642
Sung Hallelujah, as5499 the sound of seas,
643
Through multitude that sung:
“Just are Thy way
644
Righteous are Thy decrees on all Thy works.
645
Who can extenuate5500 Thee?” Next,5501 to the Son,
646
Destined Restorer of mankind, by whom
647
New Heav’n and earth shall to the ages rise,
648
Or down from Heav’n descend.
Such was their song,
649
While the Creator, calling forth by name
650
His mighty Angels, gave them several charge5502
651
As sorted 5503 best with present things. The sun
652
Had first his precept 5504 so to move, so shine,
653
As might affect the earth with cold and heat
654
Scarce tolerable, and from the north to call
655
Decrepit 5505 winter, from the south to bring
656
Solstitial 5506 summer’s heat. To the blanc5507 moon
657
Her office they prescribed; to th’ other five5508
658
Their planetary motions, and aspects,5509
659
In sextile, 5510 square, 5511 and trine, 5512 and opposite, 5513
660
Of noxious5514 efficacy, and when to join
661
In synod5515 unbenign, and taught the fixed 5516
662
Their influence malignant when to shower,
663
Which of them rising with the sun, or falling,
664
Should prove tempestuous.5517 To the winds they set
665
Their corners,5518 when with bluster5519 to confound 5520
666
Sea, air, and shore; the thunder when to roll
667
With terror through the dark aereal hall.
668
Some say He bid his Angels turn askance5521
669
The poles of earth, twice ten degrees and more
670
From the sun’s axle. They with labor pushed
671
Oblique5522 the centric globe. 5523 Some say the sun5524
672
Was bid turn reins from th’ equinoctial 5525 road
673
Like5526 distant breadth to Taurus5527 with the Sev’n
674
Atlantic Sisters,5528 and the Spartan Twins,5529
675
Up to the Tropic Crab,5530 thence down amain5531
676
By Leo, 5532 and the Virgin,5533 and the Scales,5534
677
As deep as Capricorn, to bring in change
678
Of seasons to each clime. Else 5535 had the Spring
679
Perpetual smiled on earth with vernant 5536 flowers,
680
Equal in days and nights, except to those
681
Beyond the polar circles: to them day
682
Had unbenighted 5537 shone, while the low sun,
683
To recompense5538 his distan
ce, in their sight
684
Had rounded still the horizon, and not known
685
Or east or west, which had forbid the snow
686
From cold Estotiland,5539 and south as far
The Annotated Milton: Complete English Poems Page 53
