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810 Illimitable ocean, without bound, Without dimension; where length, breadth, and height,

But thou, O father! I forewarn thee, shun
His deadly arrow; neither vainly hope
To be invulnerable in those bright arms,
Though temper'd heavenly; for that mortal dint,
Save he who reigns above, none can resist!"

She finish'd, and the subtile fiend his lore 815 Soon learn'd, now milder, and thus answer'd sinooth:

"Dear daughter! since thou claim'st me for thy

sire,

And my fair son here show'st me (the dear pledge Of dalliance had with thee in heaven, and joys Then sweet, now sad to mention, thro' dire change Befallen us, unforeseen, unthought of!) know 821 1 come no enemy, but to set free

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Thus saying, from her side the fatal key, Sad instrument of all our woe! she took; And towards the gate rolling her bestial train, Forthwith the huge portcullis high up-drew; Which but herself, not all the Stygian powers 875 Could once have mov'd; then in the key-hole turns Th' intricate wards, and every bolt and bar Of massy iron, or solid rock, with ease Unfastens on a sudden open fly, With impetuous recoil, and jarring sound, Th' infernal doors, and on their hinges grate Harsh thunder, that the lowest bottom shook Of Erebus. She open'd, but to shut Excell'd her power; the gates wide open stood, That with extended wings a banner'd host, Under spread ensigns marching, might pass through With horse, and chariots, rank'd in loose array, So wide they stood! and like a furnace mouth, Cast forth redounding smoke, and ruddy flame. Before their eyes in sudden view appear The secrets of the hoary deep; a dark

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And time, and place are lost; where eldest Night
And Chaos, ancestors of Nature, hold
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Eternal anarchy, amidst the noise

Of endless wars, and by confusion stand:
For hot, cold, moist, and dry, four champions

fierce,

Strive here for mast'ry, and to battle bring
Their embryon atoms; they around the flag 900
Of each his faction, in their several clans,

Light arm'd, or heavy, sharp, smooth, swift, or slow,
Swarm populous, unnumber'd as the sands
Of Barca, or Cyrene's torrid soil,

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Levy'd to side with warring winds, and poise
Their lighter wings. To whom these most adhere,
He rules a moment: Chaos umpire sits,
And by decision more embroils the fray,
By which he reigns: next hiin high arbiter
Chance governs all. Into this wild abyss,
(The womb of nature, and perhaps her grave)
Of neither sea, nor shore, nor air, nor fire,
But all these in their pregnant causes mix'd
Confus'dly, and which thus must ever fight,
(Unless th' Almighty Maker them ordain
His dark materials to create more worlds)
Into this wild abyss the wary fiend
Stood on the brink of hell, and look'd awhile
Pond'ring his voyage; (for no narrow frith
He had to cross :) nor was his ear less peal'd
With noises loud, and ruinous, (to compare
Great things with small) than when Bellona storms,
With all her batt'ring engines bent to raze
Some capital city; or less than if this frame
Of heaven were falling, and these elements
In mutiny had from her axle torn
The steadfast earth. At last his sail-broad vans
He spreads for flight, and in the surging smoke
Uplifted spurns the ground: thence many a league,
As in a cloudy chair, ascending rides
Audacious; but that seat soon failing, meets
A vast vacuity: all unawares,
Flutt'ring his pennons vain, plumb down he drops
Ten thousand fathom deep; and to this hour
Down had been falling, had not by ill chance
The strong rebuff of some tumultuous cloud,
Instinct with fire and nitre, hurried him
As many miles aloft: that fury stay'd,
Quench'd in a boggy Syrtis, neither sea,
Nor good dry land, nigh founder'd on he fares, 940
Treading the crude consistence, half on foot,
Half flying; behooves him now both oar and sail.
As when a griffon, through the wilderness
With winged course o'er hill, or moory dale,
Pursues the Arimaspian, who by stealth
Had from his wakeful custody purloin'd
The guarded gold: so eagerly the fiend
O'er bog or steep, through strait, rough, dense or
With head, hands, wings, or feet, pursues his
way;

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And swims, or sinks, or wades, or creeps, or flies.
At length a universal hubbub wild
Of stunning sounds, and voices all confus'd,
Borne through the hollow dark assaults his ear
With loudest vehemence: thither he plies,
Undaunted to meet there whatever power,
Or spirit, of the nethermost abyss,
Might in that noise reside, of whom to ask
Which way the nearest coast of darkness lies,
Bordering on light: when strait behold the throne
Of Chaos, and his dark pavilion spread
Wide on the wasteful deep: with him enthron'd
Sat sable-vested Night, eldest of things,
The consort of his reign: and by them stood
Orcus and Ades, and the dreaded name
Of Demogorgon: Rumour next, and Chance, 965
And Tumult, and Confusion all embroil'd,
And Discord with a thousand various mouths.
T'whom Satan turning boldly, thus: "Ye powers,
And spirits of this nethermost abyss,
Chaos, and ancient Night, I come no spy
With purpose to explore, or to disturb,
The secrets of your realm; but by constraint
Wand'ring this darksome desert, as my way
Lies through your spacious empire up to light,
Alone, and without guide, half lost, I seek
What readiest path leads where your gloomy bounds
Confine with heaven: or if some other place
From your dominion won, th' ethereal king.
Possesses lately, thither to arrive

I travel this profound; direct my course;

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Directed, no mean recompense it brings

Through Bosphorus, betwixt the justling rocks: To your behoof: if I that region lost,

Or when Ulysses on the larboard shunn'a All usurpation thence expelid, reduce

Charybdis, and by th other whirlpool steer'd. 1020 To her original darkness, and your sway,

So he with difficulty, and labour hard (Which is my present journey) and once more 985 Mov'd on; with difficulty and labour he: Erect the standard there of ancient Night;

But he once passid, soon after, when man fell, Yours be th' advantage all, mine the revenge!" Strange alteration! Sin, and Death, amain

Following his tract (such was the will of Heaven! Thus Satan; and him thus the anarch old, Pav'd after him a broad and beaten way

1026 With fault'ring speech, and visage incompos'd, Over the dark abyss, whose boiling gulf Answer'd: “I know thee stranger, who thou art, Tamely endur'd a bridge of wondrous length, That mighty leading angel, who of late

From hell continued, reaching th' utmost orb Made head against heaven's King, tho' overthrown. Of this frail world; by which the spirits perverse I saw, and heard; for such a num'rous host With easy intercourse pass to and fro, 1031 Fled not in silence through the frighted deep, To tempt or punish mortals, except whom With ruin upon ruin, rout on rout,

995 God and good angels guard by special grace. Confusion worse confounded; and heaven-gates Pour'd out by millions her victorious bands

But now at last the sacred influence Pursuing. I upon my frontiers here

Of light appears, and from the walls of heaven Keep residence; if all I can will serve,

Shoots far into the bosom of dim night 1036 That little which is left so to defend,

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A glimmering dawn: here Nature first begins Encroach'd on still through our intestine broils, Her farthest verge, and Chaos to retire, Weak'ning the sceptre of old Night: first hell, As from her outmost works a broken foe, Your dungeon, stretching far and wide beneath: With tumult less, and with less hostile din; 1040 Now lately heaven and earth, another world That Satan with less toil, and now with ease, Hung o'er my realm, link'd in a golden chain, 1005 Wafts on the calmer wave by dubious light; To that side heaven from whence your legions fell: And like a weather-beaten vessel holds If that way be your walk, you have not far;

Gladly the port, though shrouds and tackle torn: So much the nearer danger; go, and speed! Or in the emptier waste, resembling air, 1045 Havoc, and spoil, and ruin are my gain."

Weighs his spread wings, at leisure

to behold

Far off th' empyreal heaven, extended wide He ceas'd, and Satan staid not to reply, 1010 In circuit, undetermin'd square or round: But glad that now his sea should find a shore, With opal towers and battlements adorn'd With fresh alacrity, and force renew'd,

Of living sapphire, (once his native seat!) 1050 Springs upward, like a pyramid of fire,

And fast by, hanging in a golden chain, Into the wild expanse ; rough the shock This pendant world, in bignes as a star Of fighting elements, on all sides round 1015 Of smallest magnitude, close by the moon. Environ'd, wins his way: harder beset,

Thither full fraught with mischievous revenge, And more endanger'd, than when Argo pass'd Accurs'd, and in a cursed hour, he hies. 1055

END OF BOOK SECOND.

PARADISE LOST. .

BOOK III.

THE ARGUMENT.

God sitting on his throne sees Satan flying towards this world, then newly created; shows him to the Son

who sat at his right hand; foretells the success of Satan in perverting mankind: clears his own justice and wisdom from all imputation, having created man free, and able enough to have withstood his tempter ; yet declares his purpose of grace towards him, in regard he fell not of his own malice, as did Satan, but by him seduced. The Son of God renders praises to his Father for the manifestation of his gracious purpose towards Man; but God again declares, that grace cannot be extended towards Man without the satisfaction of divine justice ; Man hath offended the majesty of God by aspiring to Godhead, and therefore, with his progeny devoted to death must die, unless some one can be found sufficient to answer for his offence, and undergo his punishment. The Son of God freely offers himself a ransom for Man: the Father accepts him, ordains his incarnation, pronounces his exaltation above all names in heaven and earth; commands all the angels to adore him; they obey, and hymning to their harps in full choir, celebrate the

Father and the Son. Meanwhile Satan alights upon the bare convex of this world's outermost orb; where wandering he first finds a place, since called the Limbo of Vanity; what persons and things fly up thither; thence comes to the gate of heaven, described ascending by stairs, and the waters above that it: his Uriel the regent of that orb; but first changes himself into the shape of a meaner angel; and pretending, a zealous desire to behold the new creation and Man whom God had placed there, inguires of him the place of his habitation, and is directed ; alights first on mount Niphates.

HAIL holy Light, offspring of heaven first-born! Or flocks, or herds, or human face divine :
Or of th' eternal co-eternal beam!

But cloud instead, and ever-during dark 45 May I express thee unblam'd? since God is light, Surrounds me! from the cheerful ways of men And never but in unapproached light

Cut

off; and for the book of knowledge fair, Dwelt from eternity;

dwelt then in thee, 5 Presented with a universal blank Bright effluence of bright essence increate!

Of nature's works, to me expung'd and raz'd, Or nearest thou rather

pure ethereal stream, And wisdom at one entrance quite shut out! 50 Whose fountain who shall tell? Before the sun, So much the rather thou, celestial Light! Before the heavens thou wert, and at the voice Shine inward, and the mind through all her powers Of God, as with a mantle, didst invest

10 Irradiate; there plant eyes; all mist from thence The rising world of waters dark and deep,

Purge and disperse; that I may see and tell Won from the void and formless infinite.

Of things invisible to mortal sight.

55 Thee I revisit now with bolder wing, Escap'd the Stygian pool, though long detain'd Now had th' Almighty Father from above, In that obscure sojourn; while in my flight 15 (From the pure enpyrean where he sits Through utter and through middle darkness borne, High thron'd above

all height) bent down his eye, With other notes than to th' Orphean lyre,

His own works and their works at once to view : I sung of Chaos, and eternal Night;

About him all the sanctities of heaven

60 Taught by the heavenly Muse to venture down Stood thick as stars, and from his sight receiv'd The dark descent, and up to reascend,

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Beatitude past utterance: on his right
Though hard, and rare! Thee I revisit safe, The radiant image of his glory sat,
And feel thy sovereign vital lamp: but thou His only Son. On earth he first beheld
Revisit'st not these eyes, that roll vain

Our two first parents (yet the only two.

65 To find thy piercing ray, and find no dawn; Of mankind) in the happy garden plac'd, So thick a drop serene hath quench'd their orbs, 25 Reaping immortal fruits of joy and love; Or dim suffusion veil'd! Yet not the more

Uninterrupted joy, unrivalid love, Cease I to wander, where the Muses haunt

In blissful solitude. He then survey'd Clear spring, or shady grove, or sunny hill,

Hell, and the gulf hetween, and Satan there 70 Smit with

the love of sacred song: but chief Coasting the wall of heaven on this side night, Thee, Sion, and the flowery brooks beneath, 30 In the dun air sublime; and ready now That wash thy hallow'd feet, and warbling flow, To stoop with wearied wings, and willing feet, Nightly I visit: nor sometimes forget

On the bare outside of this world, that seem'd Those other two equall'd with me in fate,

Firm land imbosom'd without firmament; 75 (So were I equall'd with them in renown!)

Uncertain which, in ocean, or in air. Blind Thamyris, and blind Mæonides:

35 Him God beholding from his prospect high, And Tiresias and Phineus, prophets old.

Wherein past, present, future he beholds,
Then feed on thoughts, that voluntary move Thus to his only Son foreseeing spake:
Harmonious numbers; as the wakeful bird
Sings darkling, and in shadiest covert hid

“Only begotten Son! seest thou what rage 80 Tunes her nocturnal note. Thus with the year 40 Transports our adversary, whom

no bounds Seasons return; but not to me returns

Prescrib'd, no

bars of hell, nor all the chains Day, or the sweet approach of even or morn, Heap'd on him there, nor yet the main abyss Or sight of vernal bloom, or summer's rose, Wide-interrupt, can hold. So bent he seems

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On desperate revenge, that shall redound
Upon his own rebellious head. And now
Through all restraint broke loose, he wings his
Not far off heaven, in the precincts of light, [way
Directly towards the new-created world,
And man there plac'd; with purpose to assay
If him by force he can destroy, or worse,
By some false guile pervert: and shall pervert;
For man will hearken to his glozing lies,
And easily transgress the sole command,
Sole pledge of his obedience: so will fall,
He, and his faithless progeny. Whose fault?
Whose but his own? Ingrate! he had of me
All he could have: I made him just and nght;
Sufficient to have stood, though free to fall.
Such I created all th' ethereal powers,
And spirits, both them who stood, and them who
fail'd:

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Freely they stood who stood, and fell who fell.
Not free, what proof could they have given sincere
Of true allegiance, constant faith, or love, 104
Where only what they needs must do, appear'd;
Not, what they would? What praise could they
receive ?

What pleasure I from such obedience paid,
When will and reason (reason also is choice):
Useless and vain, of freedom both despoil'd,
Made passive both, had serv'd necessity,

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Not me? They therefore, as to right belong'd,
So were created, nor can justly' accuse
Their Maker, or their making, or their fate;
As if predestination overrul'd

Their will, dispos'a by absolute decree,

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Or high foreknowledge. They themselves decreed
Their own revolt, not I: if I foreknew,
Foreknowledge had no influence on their fault,
Which had no less prov'd certain unforeknown.
So without least impulse, or shadow of fate,
Or ought by me immutably foreseen,
They trespass; authors to themselves in all,
Both what they judge, and what they choose; for so
I form'd them free, and free they must remain,
Till they inthral themselves; I else must change
Their nature, and revoke the high decree
Unchangeable, eternal, which ordain'd
Their freedom; they themselves ordain'd their fall.
The first sort by their own suggestion fell,
Self-tempted, self-deprav'd: man falls, deceiv'd, 130
By th' other first: man therefore shall find grace,
The other none. In mercy' and justice both,
Through heaven and earth, so shall my glory' excel:
But mercy, first and last, shall brightest shine."

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Elect above the rest: so is my will:

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The rest shall hear me call, and oft be warn'd 185
Their sinful state, and to appease betimes
Th' incensed Deity, while offer'd grace
Invites: for I will clear their senses dark,
What may suffice, and soften stony hearts
To pray, repent, and bring obedience due.
To prayer, repentance, and obedience due,
Though but endeavour'd with sincere intent,
Mine ear shall not be slow, mine eye not shut;
And I will place within them as a guide
My umpire Conscience; whom if they will hear,
Light after light well us'd they shall attain,
And to the end persisting, safe arrive.
This my long sufferance, and my day of grace,
They who neglect and scorn shall never taste;
But hard be harden'd, blind be blinded more, 200
That they may stumble on, and deeper fall;
And none but such from mercy I exclude.
But yet all is not done: Man disobeying,
Disloyal breaks his fealty, and sins
Against the high supremacy of heaven,
Affecting Godhead, and so losing all,
To expiate his treason hath nought left,
But to destruction, sacred and devote,
He with his whole posterity must die;
Die he or justice must; unless for him
Some other able, and as willing, pay
The rigid satisfaction, death for death.
Say, heavenly powers, where shall we find such
Which of ye will be mortal to redeem [love?
Man's mortal crime, and just, th' unjust to save?
Dwells in all heaven charity so dear?"

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He ask'd, but all the heavenly choir stood mute, And silence was in heaven: on man's behalf Patron, or intercessor none appear'd; Much less that durst upon his own head draw 220 The deadly forfeiture, and ransom set. And now, without redemption, all mankind Must have been lost, adjudg'd to death and hell By doom severe, had not the Son of God, In whom the fulness dwells of love divine, His dearest mediation thus renew'd:

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"Father, thy word is pass'd; man shall find grace: And shall grace not find means, that finds her way, The speediest of thy winged messengers,

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To visit all thy creatures, and to all
Comes unprevented, unimplor'd, unsought?
Happy for man, so coming! he her aid
Can never seek, once dead in sins and lost;
Atonement for himself, or offering meet,
(Indebted, and undone!) hath none to bring. 235
Behold me then! me for him, life for life

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I offer; on me let thine anger fall; Account me man: I for his sake will leave Thy bosom, and this glory next to thee

Freely put off, and for him lastly die

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Well pleas'd: on me let death wreak all his rage:
Under his gloomy power I shall not long
Lie vanquish'd; thou hast given me to possess
Life in myself for ever; by thee I live,

"O Father! gracious was that word which clos'd
Thy sovereign sentence, that man should find grace;
For which both heaven and earth shall high extol
Thy praises, with th' innumerable sound
Of hymns and sacred songs, wherewith thy throne
Encompass'd shall resound thee ever bless'd.
For should man finally be lost, should man
Thy creature late so lov'd, thy youngest son,
Fall circumvented thus by fraud, though join'd
With his own folly? That be from thee far,
That far be from thee, Father, who art judge
Of all things made, and judgest only right.
Or shall the adversary thus obtain
His end, and frustrate thine? shall he fulfil
His malice, and thy goodness bring to nought;
Or proud return, though to his heavier doom,
Yet, with revenge accomplish'd, and to hell
Draw after him the whole race of mankind,
By him corrupted? Or wilt thou thyself
Abolish thy creation, and unmake,
For him, what for thy glory thou hast made?
So should thy goodness and thy greatness, both '165
Be question'd, and blasphem'd without defence."

To whom the great Creator thus replied:
"O Son, in whom my soul hath chief delight,
Son of my bosom, Son who art alone
My word, my wisdom, and effectual might!
All hast thou spoken as my thoughts are, all

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Though now to death I yield, and am his due 245
All that of me can die; yet that debt paid,
Thou wilt not leave me in the loathsome grave
His prey, nor suffer my unspotted soul
For ever with corruption there to dwell;
But I shall rise victorious, and subdue
My vanquisher, spoil'd of his vaunted spoil;
Death his death's wound shall then receive, and
Inglorious, of his mortal sting disarm'd. [stoop
I through the ample air in triumph high
Shall lead hell captive, maugre hell! and show 255
The powers of darkness bound. Thou at the sight
Pleas'd, out of heaven shalt look down and smile;
While by thee rais'd I ruin all my foes,
Death last, and with his carcass glut the grave:
Then, with the multitude of my redeem'd,
Shall enter heaven, long absent, and return,

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Father! to see thy face, wherein no cloud

With solemn adoration down they cast 35 Of anger shall remain; but peace assurd

Their crowns, inwove with amaranth and gold; And reconcilement: wrath shall be no more

Immortal amaranth! a flower which onoe Thenceforth, but in thy presence joy entire." 265 In Paradise, fast by the tree of life,

Began to bloom; but soon for man's offence His words here ended, but his meek aspect To heaven remov'd, where first it grew, there Silent yet spake, and breath'd immortal love And flowers aloft, shading the fount of life; (grows, To mortal men, above which only shone

And where the river of bliss thro' midst of heaven Filial obedience: as a sacrifice,

Rolls o'er Elysian flowers her amber stream: Glad to be offer'd, he atten.is the will

270 With these, that never fade, the spirits elect 360 Of his great Father. Admiration seiz'd [tend, Bind their resplendent locks, inwreath'd with All heaven, what this might mean, and whither

beams; Wond'ring; but soon th' Almighty thus replied: Now in loose garlands thick thrown off, the bright

Pavement, that

like a sea of jasper shone, “O thou, in heaven and earth the only peace Impurpled with celestial roses smil'd. Found out for mankind under wrath! O thou, 275 Then crown'd again, their golden harps they took, My sole complacence! well thou know'st how dear Harps ever tun'd, that, glittering by their side, 366 To me are all my works, nor man the least,

Like quivers hung, and with preamble sweet Though last created; that for him I spare

of charming symphony they introduce Thee from my bosom and right hand, to save, Their sacred song, and waken raptures high; By losing thee a while, the whole racé lost. 280 No voice exempt; no voice but well could join 370 Thou, therefore, whom thou only canst redeem, Melodious part, such concord is in heaven. Their nature also to thy nature join, And be thyself man among men on earth,

“ Thee, Father," first they sung, "omnipotent, Made flesh, when time shall be, of virgin seed, Immutable, inmortal, infinite, By wondrous birth: be thou, in Adam's room, 285 Eternal King; thee, Author of all being, The head of all mankind, though Adam's son. Fountain of light, thyself invisible

375 As in him perish all men, so in thee,

Amidst the glorious brightness where thou sitt'st As from a second root, shall be restor'd

Thron'd inaccessible, but when thou shad'st As many as are restor'd, without thee none.

The full blaze of thy beams, and through a cloud, His crime makes guilty all his sons; thy merit 290 Drawn round about thee like a radiant shrine, Imputed shall absolve them who renounce

Dark with excessive bright, thy skirts appear, 380 Their own both righteous and unrighteous deeds, Yet dazzle heaven, that brightest seraphim And live in thee transplanted, and from the Approach not, but with both wings veil their eyes." Receive new life. So man, as is most just,

“ Thee," next they sang, “ of all creation first, Shall satisfy for man, be judg'd, and die, 1295 | Begotten Son, divine similitude ! And dying rise, and rising with him raise

In whose conspicuous count'nance, without cloud His

brethren, ransom'd with his own dear life. Made visible, th' almighty Father shines, 386 So heavenly love shall outdo hellish hate,

Whom else no creature can behold : on thee
Giving to death, and dying to redeem,

Impress'd, th' effulgence of his glory' abides,
So dearly to redeem what hellish hate 300 Transfus'd on thee his ample Spirit rests.
So easily destroy'd, and still destroys,

He heaven of heavens, and all the powers therein, In those who, when they may, accept not grace. By thee created, and by thee threw down 391 Nor shalt thou, by descending to assume

Th' aspiring dominations: thou that day Man's nature, lessen or degrade thine own.

Thy Father's dreadful thunder didst not spare, Because thou hast, though thron'd in highest bliss Nor stop thy flaming chariot-wheels, that shook Equal to God, and equally enjoying

306 Heaven's everlasting frame, while o'er the necks Godlike fruition, quitted all to save

Thou drov'st of warring angels disarray'd. 396 A world from utter loss, and hast been found Back from pursuit thy powers with loud acclaim By merit more than birthright Son of God,

Thee only' extollid, Son of thy Father's might, Found worthiest to be so by being good,

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To execute fierce vengeance on his foes. Far more than great or high; because in thee Not so on man: him thro' their malice fallen, 400 Love hath abounded more than glory' abounds; Father of mercy' and grace! thou didst not doom Therefore thy humiliation shall exalt

So strictly, but much more to pity' incline : With thee thy manhood also to this throne:

No sooner did thy dear and only Son Here shalt thou sit incarnate, here shalt reign 315 Perceive thee purpos'd not to doom frail man Both God and Man, Son both of God and Man, So strictly, but much more to pity' incline, 405 Anointed Universal King; all power

He, to appease thy wrath, and end the strife I give thee; reign for ever, and assume

Of mercy and justice in thy face discern'd, Thy merits: under thee, as head supreme,

319 Regardless of the bliss wherein he sat Thrones, princedoms, powers, dominions, Í reduce; Second to thee, offer'd himself to die All knees to thee shall bow, of them that bide For man's offence. O unexampled love! 410 In heaven, or earth, or under earth in hell.

Love no where to be found less than divine ! When thou, attended gloriously from heaven, Hail, Son of God, Saviour of men ! Thy name Shalt in the sky appear, and from thee send Shall be the copious inatter my song The summoning archangels to proclaim 325 Henceforth, and never shall my harp thy praise Thy dread tribunal: forth with from all winds Forget, nor from thy Father's praise disjoin." 415 The living, and forth with the cited dead Of all past ages, to the general doom

Thus they in heaven, above the starry sphere, Shall hasten, such a peal shall rouse their sleep: Their happy hours in joy and hymning spent. Then, all thy saints assembled, thou shalt judge 330 Meanwhile upon the firm opacous globe Bad men and angels; they arraign'd shali sink Of this round world, whose first convex divides Beneath thy sentence; hell (her numbers full). The luminous inferior orbs, enclos'd

420 Thenceforth shall be for ever shut. Meanwhile From Chaos, and th' inroad of darkness old, The world shall burn, and from her ashes spring Satan alighted walks. A globe far off New heaven and earth, wherein the just shall dwell; It seem'd, now seems a boundless continent, And, after all their tribulations long,

336 Dark, waste, and wild, under the frown of night See golden days, fruitful of golden deeds,

Starless expos'd, and ever-threat'ning storms 425 With joy and love triumphing, and fair truth: Of Chaos blust'ring round, inclement sky: Then thou thy regal sceptre shalt lay by,

Save on that side which from the wall of heaven, For regal sceptre then no more shall need; 340 Though distant far, some small reflection gains God shall be all in all, But all ye gods,

Of glimmering air, less vex'd with tempest loud : Adore him, who to compass all this dies;

Here walk'd the fiend at large in spacious field. Adore the Son, and honour him as me!"

As when a vulture, on Imaus bred,

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Whose snowy ridge the roving Tartar bounds, No sooner had th' Almighty ceas'd, but all Dislodging from a region scarce of prey, The multitude of angels, with a shout

345 To gorge the flesh of lambs, or yeanling kids, Loud as from numbers without number, sweet, On hills where flocks are fed, flies tow'rds the springs As from bless'd voices uttering joy, heaven rung Of Ganges, or Hydaspes, Indian streams; 456 With jubilee, and loud hosannas fillid

But in his way lights on the barren plains Th' eternal regions. Lowly reverent

Of Sericana, where Chineses drive Towards either throne they bow, and to the ground With sails and wind their cany waggons light:

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