162
Whom we resist. If then His providence
163
Out of our evil seek to bring forth good
164
Our labor must be to pervert that end
165
And out of good still 1472 to find means of evil
166
Which oft-times may succeed so as, perhaps
167
Shall grieve Him, if I fail not, and disturb1473
168
His inmost counsels1474 from their destined 1475 aim
169
“But see! the angry victor hath recalled
170
His ministers of vengeance and pursuit
171
Back to the gates of Heav’n. The sulphurous hail
172
Shot after us in storm1476 o’erblown, hath laid 1477
173
The fiery surge1478 that from the precipice
174
Of Heav’n received us falling, and the thunder
175
Winged with red lightning and impetuous rage
176
Perhaps hath spent his shafts, and ceases now
177
To bellow through the vast and boundless deep
178
Let us not slip 1479 th’ occasion, whether scorn
179
Or satiate1480 fury yield it from our foe
180
“Seest thou yon dreary plain, forlorn and wild
181
The seat of desolation, void of light
182
Save what the glimmering of these livid 1481 flames
183
Casts pale and dreadful? Thither let us tend 1482
184
From off the tossing of these fiery waves
185
There rest, if any rest can harbor 1483 there
186
And, re-assembling our afflicted 1484 Powers
187
Consult how we may henceforth most offend 1485
188
Our enemy, our own loss how repair
189
How overcome this dire calamity
190
What reinforcement we may gain from hope
191
If not, what resolution from despair
192
Thus Satan, talking to his nearest mate, 1486
193
With head uplift above the wave, and eyes
194
That sparkling blazed, his other parts besides
195
Prone on the flood,1487 extended long and large
196
Lay floating many a rood,1488 in bulk as huge
197
As whom the fables name of monstrous size
198
Titanian1489 or earth-born,1490 that warred on Jove
199
Briareos or Typhon, whom the den
200
By ancient Tarsus1491 held,1492 or that sea-beast
201
Leviathan,1493 which God of all His works
202
Created hugest that swim th’ ocean-stream
203
Him, haply1494 slumbering on the Norway foam,1495
204
The pilot of some small night-foundered 1496 skiff
205
Deeming1497 some island, oft, as seamen tell
206
With fixed anchor in his scaly rind,1498
207
Moors by his side under the lee, 1499 while night
208
Invests1500 the sea, and wishèd morn delays
209
So stretched out huge in length the arch-fiend lay
210
Chained on the burning lake, nor ever thence
211
Had risen or heaved 1501 his head, but that the will
212
And high permission of all-ruling Heav’n
213
Left him at large to his own dark designs
214
215
Heap on himself damnation, while he sought
216
Evil to others, and enraged might see
217
How all his malice served but to bring forth
218
Infinite goodness, grace, and mercy, shown
219
On man by him seduced, but on himself
220
Treble confusion,1502 wrath, and vengeance poured
221
Forthwith1503 upright he rears from off the pool
222
His mighty stature. On each hand the flames
223
Driv’n backward slope their pointing spires and, rolled
224
In billows, leave in th’ midst a horrid vale
225
Then with expanded 1504 wings he steers his flight
226
Aloft, incumbent1505 on the dusky air
227
That felt unusual weight, till on dry land
228
He lights1506 —if it were land that ever burned
229
With solid, as the lake with liquid fire
230
And such1507 appeared in hue1508 as when the force
231
Of subterranean wind transports a hill
232
Torn from Pelorus,1509 or the shattered side
233
Of thundering Etna, whose combustible
234
And fuellèd entrails thence conceiving fire
235
Sublimed 1510 with mineral fury, aid the winds
236
And leave a singèd bottom1511 all involved 1512
237
With stench and smoke. Such resting found the sole
238
Of unblest feet. Him followed his next mate
239
Both glorying to have scaped the Stygian1513 flood 1514
240
As1515 gods, and by their own recovered strength
241
Not by the sufferance1516 of supernal1517 power
242
“Is this the region, this the soil, the clime
243
Said then the lost Archangel, “this the seat1518
244
That we must change for Heav’n?—this mournful gloom
245
For that celestial light? Be it so, since He
246
Who now is sov’reign can dispose1519 and bid1520
247
What shall be right. Farthest from Him is best
248
Whom reason hath equalled, force hath made supreme
249
Above His equals. Farewell, happy fields
250
Where joy forever dwells! Hail, horrors! hail
251
Infernal world! and thou, profoundest1521 Hell
252
Receive thy new possessor—one who brings
253
A mind not to be changed by place or time
254
The mind is its own place, and in itself
255
Can make a Heav’n of Hell, a Hell of Heav’n.
256
What matter where, if I be still the same
257
And what I should be, all but 1522 less than He
258
Whom thunder hath made greater? Here at least
259
We shall be free. Th’Almighty hath not built
260
Here for His envy, will not drive us hence
261
Here we may reign secure and, in my choice
262
To reign is worth ambition, though in Hell
263
Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heav’n!
264
“But wherefore let we then our
faithful friends
265
Th’ associates and co-partners of our loss
266
Lie thus astonished 1523 on th’ oblivious1524 pool
267
And call them not to share with us their part
268
In this unhappy mansion,1525 or once more
269
With rallied arms to try what may be yet
270
Regained in Heav’n, or what more lost in Hell
271
So Satan spoke; and him Beelzebub
272
Thus answered: “Leader of those armies bright
273
Which, but th’ Omnipotent, none could have foiled!1526
274
If once they hear that voice, their liveliest pledge1527
275
Of hope in fears and dangers—heard so oft
276
In worst extremes, and on the perilous edge
277
Of battle, when it raged, in all assaults
278
Their surest signal—they will soon resume
279
New courage and revive, though now they lie
280
Grovelling and prostrate on yon lake of fire
281
As we erewhile, astounded 1528 and amazed.1529
282
No wonder, fall’n such a pernicious1530 height
283
He scarce had ceased when the superior fiend
284
Was moving toward the shore, his ponderous shield
285
Ethereal 1531 temper, 1532 massy, large, and round
286
Behind him cast. The broad circumference
287
Hung on his shoulders like the moon, whose orb
288
Through optic glass the Tuscan1533 artist1534 views
289
At evening, from the top of Fesolé
290
Or in Valdarno, to descry1535 new lands
291
Rivers, or mountains in her spotty1536 globe
292
His spear—to equal which the tallest pine
293
Hewn on Norwegian hills to be the mast
294
Of some great ammiral,1537 were but a wand—1538
295
He walked with, to support uneasy1539 steps
296
Over the burning marl,1540 not like those steps
297
On Heaven’s azure. And the torrid clime
298
Smote1541 on him sore besides, vaulted 1542 with fire
299
Nathless1543 he so endured, till on the beach
300
Of that inflamèd 1544 sea he stood, and called
301
His legions, Angel forms, who lay entranced 1545
302
Thick as autumnal leaves that strew the brooks
303
In Vallombrosa,1546 where th’ Etrurian1547 shades
304
High over-arched, embow’r1548 —or scattered sedge1549
305
Afloat, when with fierce winds Orion armed 1550
306
Hath vexed 1551 the Red-Sea coast, whose waves o’erthrew
307
Busiris1552 and his Memphian1553 chivalry, 1554
308
While with perfidious1555 hatred they pursued
309
The sojourners1556 of Goshen,1557 who beheld
310
From the safe shore their floating carcases
311
And broken chariot-wheels. So thick bestrewn
312
Abject 1558 and lost, lay these, covering the flood
313
Under amazement 1559 of their hideous1560 change
314
He called so loud that all the hollow deep
315
Of Hell resounded: “Princes, Potentates,1561
316
Warriors, the Flow’r of Heav’n—once yours, now lost
317
If such astonishment1562 as this can seize
318
Eternal Spirits! Or have ye chosen this place
319
After the toil of battle to repose
320
Your wearied virtue, 1563 for the ease you find
321
To slumber here, as in the vales of Heav’n?
322
Or in this abject posture have ye sworn
323
To adore the conqueror, who now beholds
324
Cherub and Seraph rolling in the flood
325
With scattered arms and ensigns,1564 till anon1565
326
His swift pursuers from Heav’n-gates discern
327
Th’ advantage, and descending, tread us down
328
Thus drooping, or with linkèd thunderbolts
329
Transfix1566 us to the bottom of this gulf? 1567
330
Awake, arise, or be for ever fall’n!”
331
They heard, and were abashed, and up they sprung
332
Upon the wing, 1568 as when men wont 1569 to watch
333
On duty, sleeping found by whom they dread
334
Rouse and bestir themselves ere well awake
335
Nor did they not perceive the evil plight
336
In which they were, or the fierce pains not feel
337
Yet to their general’s voice they soon obeyed
338
Innumerable. As when the potent rod
339
Of Amram’s son,1570 in Egypt’s evil day
340
Waved round the coast, up-called a pitchy1571 cloud
341
Of locusts, warping1572 on the eastern wind
342
That o’er the realm of impious Pharaoh hung
343
Like night, and darkened all the land of Nile
344
So numberless were those bad Angels seen
345
Hovering on wing under the cope1573 of Hell
346
’Twixt upper, nether, and surrounding fires
347
Till, as a signal giv’n, th’ uplifted spear
348
Of their great sultan waving to direct
349
Their course, in even balance down they light1574
350
On the firm1575 brimstone, 1576 and fill all the plain
351
A multitude like which the populous North1577
352
Poured never from her frozen loins to pass
353
Rhine or the Danau,1578 when her barbarous sons
354
Came like a deluge on the South and spread
355
Beneath1579 Gibraltar to the Libyan sands
356
Forthwith,1580 from every squadron and each band
357
The heads and leaders thither haste, where stood
358
Their great commander—godlike shapes, and forms
359
Excelling 1581 human; princely Dignities
360
And Powers that erst 1582 in Heav’n sat on thrones
361
Though of their names in Heav’nly records now
362
Be no memorial, blotted out and razed
363
By their rebellion, from the Books of Life. 1583
364
Nor had they yet among the sons of Eve
365
Got them new names, till wand’ring o’er the earth
366
(Through God’s high sufferance
)1584 for the trial 1585 of man
367
By falsities and lies the greatest part
368
Of mankind they corrupted to forsake
369
God their Creator, and th’ invisible
370