Showers on her kings Barbaric pearl and gold, Satan exalted sat, by merit rais'd
To that bad eminence; and, from despair Thus high uplifted beyond hope, aspires Beyond thus high, insatiate to pursue Vain war with heaven, and by success untaught His proud imaginations thus display'd.
Powers and Dominions, Deities of heaven, For since no deep within her gulf can hold Immortal vigor, though oppress'd and fall'n, I give not heaven for lost: from this descent Celestial virtues rising will appear
More glorious and more dread, than from no fall, And trust themselves to fear no second fate. Me though just right and the fix'd laws of heaven Did first create your leader, next free choice, With what besides, in council or in fight, Hath been achiev'd of merit; yet this loss, Thus far at least recover'd, hath much more Establish'd in a safe unenvied throne, Yielded with full consent. The happier state In heaven, which follows dignity, might draw Envy from each inferior; but who here Will envy whom the highest place exposes Foremost to stand against the Thund'rer's aim Your bulwark, and condemns to greatest share
4 Barbaric] Lucret. lib. ii. 500. Barbaricæ vestes.' Euripid. Iph. Aul. 73. de Paride:
χρυσῷ τε λάμπρος, βαρβάρῳ χλιδήματι. and Virg. Æn. ii. 504.
Of endless pain? Where there is then no good 30 For which to strive, no strife can grow up there From faction; for none sure will claim in hell Precedence, none, whose portion is so small Of present pain, that with ambitious mind Will covet more. With this advantage then To union, and firm faith, and firm accord, More than can be in heaven, we now return To claim our just inheritance of old, Surer to prosper than prosperity
Could have assur'd us; and by what best Whether of open war or covert guile, We now debate; who can advise, may speak. He ceas'd; and next him Moloch, scepter'd king, Stood up, the strongest and the fiercest spirit That fought in heaven, now fiercer by despair: 45 His trust was with th' Eternal to be deem'd Equal in strength, and rather than be less Car'd not to be at all; with that care lost
88 our just inheritance] See Crashaw's Steps to the Temple, p. 64. (1646.)
'And for the never fading fields of light,
My fair inheritance, he confines me here: '
and Beaumont's Psyche, c. i. st. 24.
'Was't not enough against the righteous law
Of primogeniture to throw us down,
From that bright home which all the world does know
Was by confest inheritance our own.'
40 best way] Compare Spenser's F. Queen, vii. vi. 21. and ii. xi. 7. Todd.
Went all his fear of God, or hell, or worse, He reck'd not; and these words thereafter spake: My sentence is for open war: of wiles, More unexpert, I boast not them let those Contrive who need, or when they need, not now: For while they sit contriving, shall the rest, Millions that stand in arms and longing wait The signal to ascend, sit ling'ring here Heaven's fugitives, and for their dwelling-place Accept this dark opprobrious den of shame, The prison of his tyranny who reigns By our delay? no, let us rather choose, Arm'd with hell flames and fury, all at once O'er heaven's high tow'rs to force resistless way, Turning our tortures into horrid arms Against the torturer; when to meet the noise Of his almighty engine he shall hear Infernal thunder, and for lightning see Black fire and horror shot with equal rage Among his angels; and his throne itself
54 sit contriving] See Milton's Prose Works, vol. ii. 380, iii. 24. 'But to sit contriving.'
67 Black fire] See Eschyli Prometheus, ver. 930.
Ὃς δὴ κεραυνοῦ κρέισσον ἐυρήσει φλόγα Βροντῆς θ' ὑπερβάλλοντα καρτερὸν κτύπον.
and see Statii Theb. iv. 133. 'furiarum lampade nigra.' Silv. i. iv. 64. fulminis atri.' Lucan Ph. ii. 301. 'ignes atros.'
'I talk of flames, and yet I call hell dark;
Flames I confess they are, but black.'
See M. Stevenson's Poems (1654), p. 113, (A Guesse at Hell.)
Mixt with Tartarean sulphur and strange fire, His own invented torments. But perhaps The way seems difficult and steep to scale With upright wing against a higher foe. Let such bethink them, if the sleepy drench Of that forgetful lake benumb not still, That in our proper motion we ascend Up to our native seat: descent and fall To us is adverse. Who but felt of late, When the fierce foe hung on our broken rear Insulting, and pursu'd us through the deep, With what compulsion and laborious flight We sunk thus low? th' ascent is easy then; Th' event is fear'd; should we again provoke Our stronger, some worse way his wrath may find To our destruction, if there be in hell
Fear to be worse destroy'd: What can be worse 85 Than to dwell here, driven out from bliss, condemn'd In this abhorred deep to utter woe; Where pain of unextinguishable fire Must exercise us without hope of end, The vassals of his anger, when the scourge Inexorable, and the torturing hour
Call us to penance? more destroy'd than thus
69 strange fire] See Nonni Dionysiaca, lib. xliv. ver. 153. Εἰ δέ κε πειρήσαιτο καὶ ἡμετέροιο κεραυνοῦ,
γνωσέται, οἷον ἔχω χθόνιος σέλας· οὐρανίου γὰρ Θερμοτέρους σπινθῆρας ἐμοῦ λαχέν ἀντίτυπον πῦρ. 89 exercise] Vex, trouble: v. Virg. Georg. iv. 453. 'Non te nullius exercent numinis iræ.' Newton.
We should be quite abolish'd and expire.
What fear we then? what doubt we to incense His utmost ire? which, to the highth enrag'd, 95 Will either quite consume us, and reduce To nothing this essential; happier far, Than miserable to have eternal being. Or, if our substance be indeed divine, And cannot cease to be, we are at worst On this side nothing; and by proof we feel Our power sufficient to disturb his heaven, And with perpetual inroads to alarm, Though inaccessible, his fatal throne: Which, if not victory, is yet revenge.
He ended frowning, and his look denounc'd Desperate revenge and battel dangerous To less than gods. On th' other side up rose Belial, in act more graceful and humane; A fairer person lost not heaven; he seem'd For dignity compos'd and high exploit: But all was false and hollow; though his tongue Dropp'd manna, and could make the worse appear The better reason, to perplex and dash
Maturest counsels; for his thoughts were low; 115 To vice industrious, but to nobler deeds
118 worse] Val. Flacc. Arg. lib. iii. ver. 645.
-' Rursum instimulat, ducitque faventes Magnanimus Calydone satus; potioribus ille Deteriora fovens, semperque inversa tueri Durus.'
114 better] Tòv óyov Tòv ŸTTW KρeíTTW TOLETV. Bentley.
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