by John Milton
Like change on Sea and Land, sideral blast,75
Vapour, and Mist, and Exhalation hot,
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Corrupt and Pestilent: Now from the North
Of Norumbega,76 and the Samoed shoar
Bursting thir brazen Dungeon, armd with ice
And snow and hail and stormie gust and flaw,77
Boreas78 and Cæcias and Argestes loud
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And Thrascias rend the Woods and Seas upturn;
With adverse blast up-turns them from the South
Notus and Afer black with thundrous Clouds
From Serraliona; thwart of these as fierce
Forth rush the Levant and the Ponent Winds
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Eurus and Zephir with thir lateral noise,
Sirocco, and Libecchio. Thus began
Outrage from liveless things; but Discord first
Daughter of Sin, among th’ irrational,
Death introduc’d through fierce antipathie:79
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Beast now with Beast gan war, and Fowl with Fowl,
And Fish with Fish; to graze the Herb all leaving,
Devourd each other; nor stood much in awe
Of Man, but fled him, or with count’nance grim
Glar’d on him passing: these were from without
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The growing miseries, which Adam saw
Alreadie in part, though hid in gloomiest shade,
To sorrow abandond, but worse felt within,
And in a troubl’d Sea of passion tost,
Thus to disburd’n sought with sad complaint.
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O miserable of happie! is this the end
Of this new glorious World, and mee so late
The Glory of that Glory, who now becom
Accurst of blessed, hide me from the face
Of God, whom to behold was then my highth
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Of happiness: yet well, if here would end
The miserie, I deserv’d it, and would bear
My own deservings; but this will not serve;
All that I eat or drink, or shall beget,
Is propagated curse. O voice once heard
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Delightfully, Encrease and multiply,
Now death to hear! for what can I encrease
Or multiplie, but curses on my head?
Who of all Ages to succeed, but feeling
The evil on him brought by me, will curse
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My Head, Ill fare our Ancestor impure,
For this we may thank Adam; but his thanks
Shall be the execration; so besides
Mine own that bide upon me, all from mee
Shall with a fierce reflux on mee redound,80
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On mee as on thir natural center light
Heavie, though in thir place. O fleeting joyes
Of Paradise, dear bought with lasting woes!
Did I request thee, Maker, from my Clay
To mould me Man, did I sollicite thee
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From darkness to promote me, or here place
In this delicious Garden? as my Will
Concurd not to my being, it were but right
And equal to reduce me to my dust,
Desirous to resigne, and render back
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All I receav’d, unable to perform
Thy terms too hard, by which I was to hold
The good I sought not. To the loss of that,
Sufficient penaltie, why hast thou added
The sense of endless woes? inexplicable
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Thy Justice seems; yet to say truth, too late,
I thus contest; then should have been refus’d
Those terms whatever, when they were propos’d:
Thou didst accept them; wilt thou enjoy the good,
Then cavil the conditions? and though God
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Made thee without thy leave, what if thy Son
Prove disobedient, and reprov’d, retort,
Wherefore didst thou beget me? I sought it not:
Wouldst thou admit for his contempt of thee
That proud excuse? yet him not thy election,
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But Natural necessity begot.
God made thee of choice his own, and of his own
To serve him, thy reward was of his grace,
Thy punishment then justly is at his Will.
Be it so, for I submit, his doom is fair,
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That dust I am, and shall to dust return:81
O welcom hour whenever! why delayes
His hand to execute what his Decree
Fix’d on this day? why do I overlive,
Why am I mockt with death, and length’n’d out
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To deathless pain? how gladly would I meet
Mortalitie my sentence, and be Earth
Insensible, how glad would lay me down
As in my Mothers lap? there I should rest
And sleep secure; his dreadful voice no more
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Would Thunder in my ears, no fear of worse
To mee and to my ofspring would torment me
With cruel expectation. Yet one doubt
Pursues me still, least all I cannot die,
Least that pure breath of Life, the Spirit of Man
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Which God inspir’d, cannot together perish
With this corporeal Clod; then in the Grave,
Or in some other dismal place, who knows
But I shall die a living Death? O thought
Horrid, if true! yet why? it was but breath
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Of Life that sinn’d; what dies but what had life
And sin? the Bodie properly hath neither.
All of me then shall die: let this appease
The doubt, since human reach no further knows.
For though the Lord of all be infinite,
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Is his wrauth also? be it, man is not so,
But mortal doom’d. How can he exercise
Wrath without end on Man whom Death must end?
Can he make deathless Death? that were to make
Strange contradiction, which to God himself
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Impossible is held, as Argument
Of weakness, not of Power. Will he draw out,
For angers sake, finite to infinite
In punisht man, to satisfie his rigour
Satisfi’d never; that were to extend
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His Sentence beyond dust and Natures Law,
By which all Causes else according still
To the reception82 of thir matter act,
Not to th’ extent of thir own Sphear. But say
That Death be not one stroak, as I suppos’d,
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Bereaving sense, but endless miserie
From this day onward, which I feel begun
Both in me, and without me, and so last
To perpetuitie; Ay me, that fear
Comes thundring back with dreadful revolution
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On my defensless head; both Death and I
Am found Eternal, and incorporate both,
Nor I on my part single, in mee all
Posteritie stands curst: Fair Patrimonie
That I must leave ye, Sons; O were I able
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To waste it all my self, and leave ye none!
So disinherited how would ye bless
Me now your curse! Ah, why should all mankind
For one mans fault thus guiltless be condemn’d,
If guiltless? But from me what can proceed,
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But all corrupt, both Mind and Will deprav’d,
Not to do onely, but to will the same
With me? how can they then acquitted stand
In sight of God? Him after all Disputes
Forc’t I absolve: all my evasio
ns vain,
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And reasonings, though through Mazes, lead me still
But to my own conviction: first and last
On mee, mee onely, as the sourse and spring
Of all corruption, all the blame lights due;
So might the wrauth. Fond wish! couldst thou support
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That burden heavier then the Earth to bear,
Then all the World much heavier, though divided
With that bad Woman? Thus what thou desir’st
And what thou fearst, alike destroyes all hope
Of refuge, and concludes thee miserable
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Beyond all past example and future,
To Satan only like both crime and doom.
O Conscience, into what Abyss of fears
And horrors hast thou driv’n me; out of which
I find no way, from deep to deeper plung’d!
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Thus Adam to himself lamented loud
Through the still Night, not now, as ere man fell,
Wholsom and cool, and mild, but with black Air
Accompanied, with damps and dreadful gloom,
Which to his evil Conscience represented
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All things with double terror: On the ground
Outstretcht he lay, on the cold ground, and oft
Curs’d his Creation, Death as oft accus’d
Of tardie execution, since denounc’t
The day of his offence. Why comes not Death,
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Said hee, with one thrice acceptable stroke
To end me? Shall Truth fail to keep her word,
Justice Divine not hast’n to be just?
But Death comes not at call, Justice Divine
Mends not her slowest pace for prayers or cries.
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O Woods, O Fountains, Hillocks, Dales and Bowrs,
With other echo late I taught your Shades
To answer, and resound farr other Song.
Whom thus afflicted when sad Eve beheld,
Desolate where she sate, approaching nigh,
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Soft words to his fierce passion she assay’d:
But her with stern regard he thus repell’d.
Out of my sight, thou Serpent,83 that name best
Befits thee with him leagu’d, thy self as false
And hateful; nothing wants, but that thy shape,
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Like his, and colour Serpentine84 may shew
Thy inward fraud, to warn all Creatures from thee
Henceforth; least that too heav’nly form, pretended85
To hellish falshood, snare them. But for thee
I had persisted happie, had not thy pride
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And wandring vanitie, when lest was safe,
Rejected my forewarning, and disdain’d
Not to be trusted, longing to be seen
Though by the Devil himself, him overweening
To over-reach, but with the Serpent meeting
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Fool’d and beguil’d, by him thou, I by thee,
To trust thee from my side, imagin’d wise,
Constant, mature, proof against all assaults,
And understood not all was but a shew
Rather then solid vertu, all but a Rib
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Crooked by nature, bent, as now appears,
More to the part sinister86 from me drawn,
Well if thrown out, as supernumerarie
To my just number found. O why did God,
Creator wise, that peopl’d highest Heav’n
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With Spirits Masculine, create at last
This noveltie on Earth, this fair defect
Of Nature, and not fill the World at once
With Men as Angels without Feminine,
Or find some other way to generate
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Mankind? this mischief had not then befall’n,
And more that shall befall, innumerable
Disturbances on Earth through Femal snares,
And straight conjunction with this Sex: for either
He never shall find out fit Mate, but such
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As some misfortune brings him, or mistake,
Or whom he wishes most shall seldom gain
Through her perversness, but shall see her gaind
By a farr worse, or if she love, withheld
By Parents, or his happiest choice too late
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Shall meet, alreadie linkt and Wedlock-bound
To a fell Adversarie, his hate or shame:
Which infinite calamitie shall cause
To Human life, and houshold peace confound.
He added not, and from her turn’d, but Eve
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Not so repulst, with Tears that ceas’d not flowing,
And tresses all disorderd, at his feet
Fell humble, and imbracing them, besaught
His peace, and thus proceeded in her plaint.
Forsake me not thus, Adam, witness Heav’n
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What love sincere, and reverence in my heart
I bear thee, and unweeting have offended,
Unhappilie deceav’d; thy suppliant
I beg, and clasp thy knees; bereave me not,
Whereon I live, thy gentle looks, thy aid,
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Thy counsel in this uttermost distress,
My onely strength and stay: forlorn of thee,
Whither shall I betake me, where subsist?
While yet we live, scarse one short hour perhaps,
Between us two let there be peace, both joyning,
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As joyn’d in injuries, one enmitie
Against a Foe by doom express assign’d us,
That cruel Serpent: On me exercise not
Thy hatred for this miserie befall’n,
On me already lost, mee then thy self
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More miserable; both have sin’d, but thou
Against God onely, I against God and thee,87
And to the place of judgment will return,
There with my cries importune Heav’n, that all
The sentence from thy head remov’d may light
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On me, sole cause to thee of all this woe,
Mee mee onely just object of his ire.
She ended weeping, and her lowlie plight,
Immoveable till peace obtain’d from fault
Acknowledg’d and deplor’d, in Adam wraught
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Commiseration; soon his heart relented
Towards her, his life so late and sole delight,
Now at his feet submissive in distress,
Creature so fair his reconcilement seeking,
His counsel whom she had displeas’d, his aid;
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As one disarm’d, his anger all he lost,
And thus with peaceful words uprais’d her soon.
Unwarie, and too desirous, as before,
So now of what thou knowst not, who desir’st
The punishment all on thy self; alas,
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Bear thine own first, ill able to sustain
His full wrauth whose thou feelst as yet lest part,
And my displeasure bearst so ill. If Prayers
Could alter high Decrees, I to that place
Would speed before thee, and be louder heard,
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That on my head all might be visited,
Thy frailtie and infirmer Sex forgiv’n,
To me committed and by me expos’d.
But rise, let us no more contend, nor blame
Each other, blam’d enough elsewhere, but strive
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In offices of Love, how we may light’n
Each others burden in our share of woe;
Since this days Death denounc’t, if ought I see,
Will pr
ove no sudden, but a slow-pac’t evill,
A long days dying to augment our pain,
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And to our Seed (O hapless Seed!) deriv’d.
To whom thus Eve, recovering heart, repli’d.
Adam, by sad experiment I know
How little weight my words with thee can find,
Found so erroneous, thence by just event
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Found so unfortunate; nevertheless,
Restor’d by thee, vile as I am, to place
Of new acceptance, hopeful to regain
Thy Love, the sole contentment of my heart,
Living or dying, from thee I will not hide
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What thoughts in my unquiet brest are ris’n,
Tending to som relief of our extremes,
Or end, though sharp and sad, yet tolerable,
As in our evils,88 and of easier choice.
If care of our descent perplex us most,
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Which must be born to certain woe, devourd
By Death at last, and miserable it is
To be to others cause of misery,
Our own begotten, and of our Loins to bring
Into this cursed World a woful Race,
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That after wretched Life must be at last
Food for so foul a Monster, in thy power
It lies, yet ere Conception to prevent
The Race unblest, to being yet unbegot.
Childless thou art, Childless remain: so Death
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Shall be deceav’d his glut, and with us two
Be forc’d to satisfie his Rav’nous Maw.
But if thou judge it hard and difficult,
Conversing, looking, loving, to abstain
From Loves due Rites, Nuptial imbraces sweet,
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And with desire to languish without hope,
Before the present object89 languishing
With like desire, which would be miserie
And torment less then none of what we dread,
Then both our selves and Seed at once to free
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From what we fear for both, let us make short,