by John Milton
Heroic built, though of terrestrial mould,
Foe not informidable, exempt from wound,
I not; so much hath Hell debas’d, and pain
Infeebl’d me, to what I was in Heav’n.
Shee fair, divinely fair, fit Love for Gods,
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Not terrible, though terrour be in Love
And beautie, not approacht by stronger hate,
Hate stronger, under shew of Love well feign’d,
The way which to her ruin now I tend.
So spake the Enemie of Mankind, enclos’d
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In Serpent, Inmate bad, and toward Eve
Address’d his way, not with indented wave,
Prone on the ground, as since, but on his rear,
Circular base of rising foulds, that tour’d38
Fould above fould a surging Maze, his Head
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Crested aloft, and Carbuncle his Eyes;
With burnisht Neck of verdant Gold, erect
Amidst his circling Spires,39 that on the grass
Floted redundant: pleasing was his shape,
And lovely, never since of Serpent kind
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Lovelier, not those that in Illyria chang’d40
Hermione and Cadmus, or the God41
In Epidaurus; nor to which transformd
Ammonian Jove, or Capitoline was seen,
Hee with Olympias, this with her who bore
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Scipio the highth of Rome.42 With tract oblique
At first, as one who sought access, but feard
To interrupt, side-long he works his way.
As when a Ship by skilful Stearsman wrought
Nigh Rivers mouth or Foreland, where the Wind
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Veres oft, as oft so steers, and shifts her Sail;
So varied hee, and of his tortuous Train
Curld many a wanton wreath in sight of Eve,
To lure her Eye; shee busied heard the sound
Of rusling Leaves, but minded not, as us’d
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To such disport before her through the Field,
From every Beast, more duteous at her call,
Then at Circean call the Herd disguis’d.43
Hee boulder now, uncall’d before her stood;
But as in gaze admiring: Oft he bowd
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His turret Crest, and sleek enamel’d Neck,
Fawning, and lick’d the ground whereon she trod.
His gentle dumb expression turnd at length
The Eye of Eve to mark his play; he glad
Of her attention gaind, with Serpent Tongue
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Organic, or impulse of vocal Air,44
His fraudulent temptation thus began.
Wonder not, sovran Mistress, if perhaps
Thou canst, who art sole Wonder, much less arm
Thy looks, the Heav’n of mildness, with disdain,
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Displeas’d that I approach thee thus, and gaze
Insatiate, I thus single, nor have feard
Thy awful brow, more awful thus retir’d.
Fairest resemblance of thy Maker fair,
Thee all things living gaze on, all things thine
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By gift, and thy Celestial Beautie adore
With ravishment beheld, there best beheld
Where universally admir’d; but here
In this enclosure wild, these Beasts among,
Beholders rude, and shallow to discern
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Half what in thee is fair, one man except,
Who sees thee? (and what is one?) who shouldst be seen
A Goddess among Gods, ador’d and serv’d
By Angels numberless, thy daily Train.
So gloz’d the Tempter, and his Proem tun’d;
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Into the Heart of Eve his words made way,
Though at the voice much marveling; at length
Not unamaz’d she thus in answer spake.
What may this mean? Language of Man pronounc’t
By Tongue of Brute, and human sense exprest?
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The first at lest of these I thought deni’d
To Beasts, whom God on thir Creation-Day
Created mute to all articulat sound;
The latter I demurr,45 for in thir looks
Much reason, and in thir actions oft appeers.
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Thee, Serpent, suttlest beast of all the field
I knew, but not with human voice endu’d;
Redouble then this miracle, and say,
How cam’st thou speakable of mute,46 and how
To me so friendly grown above the rest
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Of brutal kind,47 that daily are in sight?
Say, for such wonder claims attention due.
To whom the guileful Tempter thus reply’d.
Empress of this fair World, resplendent Eve,
Easie to mee it is to tell thee all
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What thou commandst, and right thou shouldst be obeyd:
I was at first as other Beasts that graze
The trodden Herb, of abject thoughts and low,
As was my food, nor aught but food discern’d
Or Sex, and apprehended nothing high:
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Till on a day roaving the field, I chanc’d
A goodly Tree farr distant to behold
Loaden with fruit of fairest colours mixt,
Ruddie and Gold: I nearer drew to gaze;
When from the boughs a savorie odour blown,
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Grateful to appetite, more pleas’d my sense
Then smell of sweetest Fenel, or the Teats
Of Ewe or Goat dropping with Milk at Eevn,
Unsuckt of Lamb or Kid, that tend thir play.
To satisfie the sharp desire I had
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Of tasting those fair Apples, I resolv’d
Not to deferr; hunger and thirst at once,
Powerful perswaders, quick’n’d at the scent
Of that alluring fruit, urg’d me so keen.
About the mossie Trunk I wound me soon,
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For high from ground the branches would require
Thy utmost reach or Adams: Round the Tree
All other Beasts that saw, with like desire
Longing and envying stood, but could not reach.
Amid the Tree now got, where plenty hung
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Tempting so nigh, to pluck and eat my fill
I spar’d not, for such pleasure till that hour
At Feed or Fountain never had I found.
Sated at length, ere long I might perceave
Strange alteration in me, to degree
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Of Reason in my inward Powers, and Speech
Wanted not long, though to this shape retain’d.
Thenceforth to Speculations high or deep
I turnd my thoughts, and with capacious mind
Considerd all things visible in Heav’n,
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Or Earth, or Middle,48 all things fair and good;
But all that fair and good in thy Divine
Semblance, and in thy Beauties heav’nly Ray
United I beheld; no Fair to thine
Equivalent or second, which compel’d
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Mee thus, though importune perhaps, to come
And gaze, and worship thee of right declar’d
Sovran of Creatures, universal Dame.
So talk’d the spirited49 sly Snake; and Eve
Yet more amaz’d unwarie thus reply’d.
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Serpent, thy overpraising leaves in doubt
The vertue of that Fruit, in thee first prov’d:
But say, where grows the Tree, from hence how far?
For many are the Trees of God that grow
In Paradise, and variou
s, yet unknown
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To us, in such abundance lies our choice,
As leaves a greater store of Fruit untoucht,
Still hanging incorruptible, till men
Grow up to thir provision,50 and more hands
Help to disburden Nature of her Birth.
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To whom the wilie Adder, blithe and glad.
Empress, the way is readie, and not long,
Beyond a row of Myrtles, on a Flat,
Fast by a Fountain, one small Thicket past
Of blowing Myrrh and Balm; if thou accept
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My conduct, I can bring thee thither soon.
Lead then, said Eve. Hee leading swiftly rowld
In tangles, and made intricate seem strait,
To mischief swift. Hope elevates, and joy
Bright’ns his Crest, as when a wandring Fire,
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Compact of unctuous vapor, which the Night
Condenses, and the cold invirons round,
Kindl’d through agitation to a Flame,
Which oft, they say, some evil Spirit attends,
Hovering and blazing with delusive Light,
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Misleads th’ amaz’d Night-wanderer from his way
To Boggs and Mires, and oft through Pond or Pool,
There swallow’d up and lost, from succour farr.
So glister’d the dire Snake, and into fraud
Led Eve our credulous Mother, to the Tree
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Of prohibition, root of all our woe;
Which when she saw, thus to her guide she spake.
Serpent, we might have spar’d our coming hither,
Fruitless to mee, though Fruit be here to excess,
The credit51 of whose vertue rest with thee,
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Wondrous indeed, if cause of such effects.
But of this Tree we may not taste nor touch;
God so commanded, and left that Command
Sole Daughter52 of his voice; the rest, we live
Law to our selves, our Reason is our Law.
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To whom the Tempter guilefully repli’d.53
Indeed? hath God then said that of the Fruit
Of all these Garden Trees ye shall not eat,
Yet Lords declar’d of all in Earth or Air?
To whom thus Eve yet sinless. Of the Fruit
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Of each Tree in the Garden we may eat,
But of the Fruit of this fair Tree amidst
The Garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat
Thereof, nor shall ye touch it, least ye die.
She scarse had said, though brief, when now more bold
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The Tempter, but with shew of Zeal and Love
To Man, and indignation at his wrong,
New part puts on, and as to passion mov’d,
Fluctuats disturb’d, yet comely, and in act
Rais’d, as of som great matter to begin.
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As when of old som Orator renound
In Athens or free Rome, where Eloquence
Flourishd, since mute, to som great cause addrest,
Stood in himself collected, while each part,
Motion, each act won audience ere the tongue,
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Somtimes in highth began, as no delay
Of Preface brooking through his Zeal of Right.
So standing, moving, or to highth upgrown
The Tempter all impassiond thus began.
O Sacred, Wise, and Wisdom-giving Plant,
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Mother of Science,54 now I feel thy Power
Within me cleere, not onely to discern
Things in thir Causes,55 but to trace the wayes
Of highest Agents, deemd however wise.
Queen of this Universe, doe not believe
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Those rigid threats of Death; ye shall not Die:
How should ye? by the Fruit? it gives56 you Life
To Knowledge; by the Threatner? look on mee,
Mee who have touch’d and tasted, yet both live,
And life more perfet have attaind then Fate
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Meant mee, by ventring higher then my Lot.
Shall that be shut to Man, which to the Beast
Is open? or will God incense his ire
For such a petty Trespass, and not praise
Rather your dauntless vertue, whom the pain
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Of Death denounc’t,57 whatever thing Death be,
Deterrd not from atchieving what might lead
To happier life, knowledge of Good and Evil;
Of good, how just? of evil, if what is evil
Be real, why not known, since easier shunnd?
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God therefore cannot hurt ye, and be just;
Not just, not God; not feard then, nor obeyd:
Your fear it self of Death removes the fear.
Why then was this forbid? Why but to awe,
Why but to keep ye low and ignorant,
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His worshippers; he knows that in the day
Ye Eat thereof, your Eyes that seem so cleer,
Yet are but dim, shall perfetly be then
Op’n’d and cleerd, and ye shall be as Gods,
Knowing both Good and Evil as they know.
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That ye should be as Gods, since I as Man,
Internal Man, is but proportion meet,
I of brute human, yee of human Gods.
So ye shall die perhaps, by putting off
Human, to put on Gods, death to be wisht,
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Though threat’n’d, which no worse then this can bring.
And what are Gods that Man may not become
As they, participating God-like food?
The Gods are first, and that advantage use
On our belief, that all from them proceeds;
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I question it, for this fair Earth I see,
Warm’d by the Sun, producing every kind,
Them nothing: If they all things, who enclos’d
Knowledge of Good and Evil in this Tree,
That whoso eats thereof, forthwith attains
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Wisdom without their leave? and wherein lies
Th’ offence, that Man should thus attain to know?
What can your knowledge hurt him, or this Tree
Impart against his will if all be his?
Or is it envie, and can envie dwell
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In heav’nly brests? these, these and many more
Causes import your need of this fair Fruit.
Goddess humane,58 reach then, and freely taste.
He ended, and his words replete with guile
Into her heart too easie entrance won:
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Fixt on the Fruit she gaz’d, which to behold
Might tempt alone, and in her ears the sound
Yet rung of his perswasive words, impregn’d
With Reason, to her seeming, and with Truth;
Mean while the hour of Noon59 drew on, and wak’d
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An eager appetite, rais’d by the smell
So savorie of that Fruit, which with desire,
Inclinable now grown to touch or taste,
Sollicited her longing eye; yet first
Pausing a while, thus to her self she mus’d.
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Great are thy Vertues, doubtless, best of Fruits,
Though kept from Man, and worthy to be admir’d,
Whose taste, too long forborn, at first assay
Gave elocution to the mute, and taught
The Tongue not made for Speech to speak thy praise:
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Thy praise hee also who forbids thy use,
Conceals not from us, naming thee the Tree
Of Knowledge, knowledge both of good and evil;
Forbids us then to taste, but his forbidding
Commends thee more, while it inferrs the good
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By thee communicated, and our want:
For good unknown, sure is not had, or had
And yet unknown, is as not had at all.
In plain then, what forbids he but to know,
Forbids us good, forbids us to be wise?
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Such prohibitions bind not. But if Death
Bind us with after-bands, what profits then
Our inward freedom? In the day we eat
Of this fair Fruit, our doom is, we shall die.
How dies the Serpent? hee hath eat’n and lives,
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And knows, and speaks, and reasons, and discerns,
Irrational till then. For us alone
Was death invented? or to us deni’d
This intellectual food, for beasts reserv’d?
For Beasts it seems: yet that one Beast which first
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Hath tasted, envies not, but brings with joy
The good befall’n him, Author unsuspect,60
Friendly to man, farr from deceit or guile.
What fear I then, rather what know to fear
Under this ignorance of Good and Evil,
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Of God or Death, of Law or Penaltie?
Here grows the Cure of all, this Fruit Divine,
Fair to the Eye, inviting to the Taste,
Of vertue to make wise: what hinders then
To reach, and feed at once both Bodie and Mind?
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So saying, her rash hand in evil hour
Forth reaching to the Fruit, she pluck’d, she eat:61
Earth felt the wound, and Nature from her seat
Sighing through all her Works gave signs of woe,
That all was lost. Back to the Thicket slunk
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The guiltie Serpent, and well might, for Eve
Intent now wholly on her taste, naught else
Regarded, such delight till then, as seemd,
In Fruit she never tasted, whether true
Or fansied so, through expectation high