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XVI.

But wisest Fate sayes no;

This must not yet be so;

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The Babe lies yet in smiling infancy, That on the bitter cross

Must redeem our loss,

So both himself and us to glorifie;

Yet first to those ychain'd in sleep

The wakefull trump of doom must thunder through the deep

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With such a horrid clang

As on Mount Sinai rang,

XVII.

While the red fire and smouldring clouds out brake;

The aged Earth, agast,

With terrour of that blast,

Shall from the surface to the center shake;

When at the worlds last session

The dreadfull Judge in middle air shall spread his throne.

XVIII.

And then at last our bliss

Full and perfect is,

But now begins; for, from this happy day,

Th' old Dragon under ground,

In straiter limits bound,

Not half so far casts his usurped sway;

And, wroth to see his kingdom fail,

Swindges the scaly horrour of his foulded tail.

XIX.

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The oracles are dumm;

No voice or hideous humm

Runs through the arched roof in words deceiving. Apollo from his shrine

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Can no more divine,

With hollow shreik the steep of Delphos leaving. No nightly trance, or breathed spell,

Inspires the pale-ey'd Priest from the prophetic cell.

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The lonely mountains o're

And the resounding shore

XX.

A voice of weeping heard and loud lament; From haunted spring and dale

Edg'd with poplar pale

The parting Genius is with sighing sent;

With flowre-in wov'n tresses torn

The nimphs in twilight shade of tangled thickets mourn.

In consecrated earth,

XXI.

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And on the holy hearth

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The Lars and Lemures moan with midnight plaint;

In urns and altars round,

A drear and dying sound

Affrights the Flamins at their service quaint;

And the chill marble seems to sweat,

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While each peculiar power forgoes his wonted seat.

XXII.

Peor and Baälim

Forsake their temples dim,

With that twise batter'd god of Palestine ; And mooned Ashtaroth,

Heav'ns queen and mother both,

Now sits not girt with tapers holy shine;

The Lybic Hammon shrinks his horn;

In vain the Tyrian maids their wounded Thamuz mourn;

And sullen Moloch, fled,

Hath left in shadows dred

XXIII.

His burning idol all of blackest hue; In vain with cymbals ring

They call the grisly King

In dismall dance about the furnace blue;
The brutish gods of Nile as fast,
Isis, and Orus, and the dog Anubis hast.

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XXIV.

Nor is Osiris seen

In Memphian grove or green

Trampling the unshowr'd grass with lowings loud, Nor can he be at rest

Within his sacred chest ;

Naught but profoundest hell can be his shroud; In vain with timbrel'd anthems dark

The sable-stoled sorcerers bear his worshipt ark.

He feels from Juda's land

The dredded Infant's hand;

XXV.

The rayes of Bethlehem blind his dusky eyn; Nor all the gods beside

Longer dare abide,

Not Typhon huge ending in snaky twine:

Our Babe, to show his Godhead true,

Can in his swadling bands controul the damned crew.

XXVI.

So, when the Sun in bed

Curtain'd with cloudy red

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Pillows his chin upon an orient wave,

The flocking shadows pale

Troop to th' infernal jail;

Each fetter'd ghost slips to his severall grave;

And the yellow-skirted Fayes

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Fly after the night-steeds, leaving their moon-lov'd maze.

XXVII.

But see the Virgin blest

Hath laid her Babe to rest;

Time is our tedious song should here have ending; Heav'ns youngest teemed star

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Hath fixt her polished car,

Her sleeping Lord with handmaid lamp attending; And all about the courtly stable

Bright-harnessed angels sit in order serviceable.

L'ALLEGRO.

HENCE, loathed Melancholy,

Of Cerberus and blackest Midnight born

In Stygian cave forlorn

'Mongst horrid shapes and shreiks and sights unholy; Find out som uncouth cell,

Wher brooding Darknes spreads his jealous wings,

And the night-raven sings;

There, under ebon shades and low-brow'd rocks,

As ragged as thy locks,

In dark Cimmerian desert ever dwell.

But com, thou Goddess fair and free,

In Heav'n ycleap'd Euphrosyne,
And by men heart-easing Mirth,
Whom lovely Venus at a birth
With two sisters Graces more

To ivy-crowned Bacchus bore;

Or whether (as som sager sing)

The frolick wind that breathes the spring,

Zephir with Aurora playing

As he met her once a Maying,

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And, if I give thee honour due,
Mirth, admit me of thy crue

To live with her, and live with thee,

In unreproved pleasures free:

To hear the lark begin his flight,
And singing startle the dull Night
From his watch-towre in the skies,
Till the dappled Dawn doth rise,
Then to com in spight of sorrow,
And at my window bid good morrow
Through the sweetbriar, or the vine,
Or the twisted eglantine,

While the cock with lively din
Scatters the rear of Darknes thin,

And to the stack, or the barn dore,

Stoutly struts his dames before;
Oft list'ning how the hounds and horn
Chearly rouse the slumbring Morn
From the side of som hoar hill,

Through the high wood echoing shrill;
Som time walking not unseen
By hedge-row elms, on hillocks green,
Right against the eastern gate,
Wher the great Sun begins his state,
Rob'd in flames and amber light,
The clouds in thousand liveries dight,
While the plowman neer at hand
Whistles ore the furrow'd land,
And the milkmaid singeth blithe,
And the mower whets his sithe,
And every shepherd tells his tale
Under the hawthorn in the dale.

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