Paradise Lost (Modern Library Classics) (34 page)

Part of my soul I seek thee, and thee claim
⁴⁸⁷

My other half
⁴⁸⁷
.’ With that thy gentle hand

Seized mine, I yielded, and from that time see

How beauty is excelled by manly grace

And wisdom, which alone is truly fair.”

   So spake our general mother, and with eyes

Of conjugal attraction unreproved
⁴⁹³
,

And meek surrender, half embracing leaned

On our first father, half her swelling breast

Naked met his under the flowing gold

Of her loose tresses hid: he in delight

Both of her beauty and submissive charms

Smiled
⁴⁹⁹
with superior love, as Jupiter

On Juno smiles, when he impregns
⁵⁰⁰
the clouds

That shed May flowers; and pressed her matron lip

With kisses pure: aside the Devil turned

For envy, yet with jealous leer malign

Eyed them askance, and to himself thus plained.

   “Sight hateful, sight tormenting! Thus these two
⁵⁰⁵

Imparadised in one another’s arms

The happier Eden, shall enjoy their fill

Of bliss on bliss, while I to Hell am thrust
⁵⁰⁸
,

Where neither joy nor love, but fierce desire,

Among our other torments not the least,

Still
⁵¹¹
unfulfilled with pain of longing pines;

Yet let me not forget what I have gained

From their own mouths; all is not theirs it seems:

One fatal Tree there stands of Knowledge called,

Forbidden them to taste: knowledge
⁵¹⁵
forbidden?

Suspicious, reasonless. Why should their Lord

Envy them that? Can it be sin to know,

Can it be death? And do they only stand

By ignorance, is that their happy state,

The proof of their obedience and their faith?

O fair foundation laid whereon to build

Their ruin! Hence I will excite their minds

With more desire to know, and to reject

Envious commands, invented with design

To keep them low whom knowledge might exalt

Equal with gods; aspiring to be such,

They taste and die: what likelier can ensue?

But first with narrow search I must walk round

This garden, and no corner leave unspied;

A chance but chance
⁵³⁰
may lead where I may meet

Some wand’ring spirit of Heav’n, by fountain side,

Or in thick shade retired, from him to draw

What further would be learned. Live while ye may,

Yet happy pair; enjoy, till I return,

Short pleasures, for long woes are to succeed.”

   So saying, his proud step he scornful turned,

But with sly circumspection, and began

Through wood, through waste, o’er hill, o’er dale his roam.

Meanwhile in utmost longitude
⁵³⁹
, where heav’n

With earth and ocean meets, the setting sun

Slowly descended, and with right aspect
⁵⁴¹

Against the eastern gate of Paradise

Leveled his evening rays: it was a rock

Of alabaster, piled up to the clouds,

Conspicuous far, winding with one ascent

Accessible from earth, one entrance high;

The rest was craggy cliff, that overhung

Still
⁵⁴⁸
as it rose, impossible to climb.

Betwixt these rocky pillars Gabriel
⁵⁴⁹
sat

Chief of th’ angelic guards, awaiting night;

About him exercised heroic games

Th’ unarmèd youth of Heav’n, but nigh at hand

Celestial armory, shields, helms, and spears,

Hung high with diamond flaming, and with gold.

Thither came Uriel, gliding through the even
⁵⁵⁵

On a sunbeam, swift as a shooting star

In autumn thwarts
⁵⁵⁷
the night, when vapors fired

Impress
⁵⁵⁸
the air, and shows the mariner

From what point of his compass to beware

Impetuous winds: he thus began in haste.

   “Gabriel, to thee
⁵⁶¹
thy course by lot hath giv’n

Charge and strict watch that to this happy place

No evil thing approach or enter in;

This day at highth of noon came to my sphere

A Spirit, zealous, as he seemed, to know

More of th’ Almighty’s works, and chiefly man

God’s latest Image: I described
⁵⁶⁷
his way

Bent all on speed, and marked his airy gait
⁵⁶⁸
;

But in the mount that lies from Eden north,

Where he first lighted, soon discerned his looks

Alien from Heav’n, with passions foul obscured:

Mine eye pursued him still, but under shade

Lost sight of him; one of the banished crew

I fear, hath ventured from the deep, to raise

New troubles; him thy care must be to find.”

   To whom the wingèd warrior thus returned:

“Uriel, no wonder if thy perfect sight,

Amid the sun’s bright circle where thou sitst,

See far and wide: in at this gate none pass

The vigilance
⁵⁸⁰
here placed, but such as come

Well known from Heav’n; and since meridian hour

No creature thence: if spirit of other sort,

So minded, have o’erleaped these earthy bounds

On purpose, hard thou knowst it to exclude

Spiritual substance with corporeal bar.

But if within the circuit of these walks,

In whatsoever shape he lurk, of whom

Thou tell’st, by morrow dawning I shall know.”

   So promised he, and Uriel to his charge

Returned on that bright beam, whose point now raised

Bore him slope downward
⁵⁹¹
to the sun now fall’n

Beneath th’ Azores; whether
⁵⁹²
the prime orb,

Incredible how swift, had thither rolled

Diurnal
⁵⁹⁴
, or this less voluble Earth

By shorter flight to th’ east, had left him there

Arraying with reflected purple and gold

The clouds that on his western throne attend:

Now came still evening on, and twilight gray

Had in her sober livery all things clad;

Silence accompanied, for beast and bird,

They to their grassy couch, these to their nests

Were slunk, all but the wakeful nightingale;

She all night long her amorous descant
⁶⁰³
sung;

Silence was pleased: now glowed the firmament

With living sapphires: Hesperus
⁶⁰⁵
that led

The starry
⁶⁰⁶
host, rode brightest, till the moon

Rising in clouded majesty, at length

Apparent
⁶⁰⁸
Queen unveiled her peerless light,

And o’er the dark her silver mantle threw.

   When Adam thus to Eve: “Fair consort, th’ hour

Of night, and all things now retired to rest

Mind us of like repose, since God hath set

Labor and rest, as day and night to men

Successive, and the timely dew of sleep

Now falling with soft slumbrous weight inclines

Our eyelids; other creatures all day long

Rove idle unemployed, and less need rest;

Man hath his daily work of body or mind

Appointed, which declares his dignity,

And the regard of Heav’n on all his ways;

While other animals unactive range,

And of their doings God takes no account.

To morrow ere fresh morning streak the east

With first approach of light, we must be ris’n,

And at our pleasant labor, to reform

Yon flow’ry arbors, yonder allies green,

Our walk at noon, with branches overgrown,

That mock our scant manuring
⁶²⁸
, and require

More hands than ours to lop their wanton growth:

Those blossoms also, and those dropping gums,

That lie bestrown unsightly and unsmooth,

Ask riddance, if we mean to tread with ease;

Meanwhile, as nature wills, night bids us rest.”

   To whom thus Eve with perfect beauty adorned.

“My author and disposer
⁶³⁵
, what thou bidd’st

Unargued I obey; so God ordains,

God is thy Law, thou mine: to know no more

Is woman’s happiest knowledge and her praise.

With thee conversing I forget all time,

All seasons
⁶⁴⁰
and their change, all please alike.

Sweet is the breath of morn, her rising sweet,

With charm
⁶⁴²
of earliest birds; pleasant the sun

When first on this delightful land he spreads

His orient beams, on herb, tree, fruit, and flow’r,

Glist’ring with dew; fragrant the fertile earth

After soft showers; and sweet the coming on

Of grateful evening mild, then silent night

With this her solemn bird
⁶⁴⁸
and this fair moon,

And these the gems of heav’n, her starry train:

But neither breath of morn when she ascends

With charm of earliest birds, nor rising sun

On this delightful land, nor herb, fruit, flow’r,

Glist’ring with dew, nor fragrance after showers,

Nor grateful evening mild, nor silent night

With this her solemn bird, nor walk by moon,

Or glittering starlight without thee is sweet.

But wherefore all night long shine these, for whom

This glorious sight, when sleep hath shut all eyes?”

   To whom our general ancestor replied.

“Daughter of God and man, accomplished Eve,

These
⁶⁶¹
have their course to finish, round the Earth,

By morrow evening, and from land to land

In order, though to nations yet unborn,

Minist’ring light prepared, they set and rise;

Lest
⁶⁶⁵
total darkness should by night regain

Her old possession, and extinguish life

In nature
⁶⁶⁷
and all things, which these soft fires

Not only enlighten, but with kindly heat

Of various influence foment and warm,

Temper or nourish, or in part shed down

Their stellar virtue on all kinds that grow

On earth, made hereby apter to receive

Perfection from the sun’s more potent ray.

These then, though unbeheld in deep of night,

Shine not in vain, nor think, though men were none,

That heav’n would want spectators, God want praise;

Millions of spiritual creatures walk the earth

Unseen, both when we wake, and when we sleep:

All these with ceaseless praise his works behold

Both day and night: how often from the steep

Of echoing hill or thicket have we heard

Celestial voices to the midnight air,

Sole, or responsive each to other’s note

Singing their great Creator: oft in bands

While they keep watch, or nightly rounding
⁶⁸⁵
walk

With Heav’nly touch of instrumental sounds

In full harmonic number joined, their songs

Divide the night
⁶⁸⁸
, and lift our thoughts to Heaven.”

   Thus talking hand in hand alone they passed

On to their blissful bower
⁶⁹⁰
; it was a place

Chos’n by the sov’reign planter, when he framed

All things to man’s delightful use; the roof

Of thickest covert was inwoven shade

Laurel and myrtle
⁶⁹⁴
, and what higher grew

Of firm and fragrant leaf; on either side

Acanthus, and each odorous bushy shrub

Fenced up the verdant wall; each beauteous flow’r,

Iris all hues, roses, and jessamine

Reared high their flourished heads between, and wrought

Mosaic; underfoot the violet,

Crocus, and hyacinth
⁷⁰¹
with rich inlay

Broidered the ground, more colored than with stone

Of costliest emblem
⁷⁰³
: other creature here

Beast, bird, insect, or worm durst enter none;

Such was their awe of man. In shady
⁷⁰⁵
bower

More sacred and sequestered, though but feigned,

Pan or Silvanus never slept, nor nymph,
⁷⁰⁷

Nor Faunus
⁷⁰⁷
haunted. Here in close
⁷⁰⁸
recess

With flowers
⁷⁰⁹
, garlands, and sweet-smelling herbs

Espousèd Eve decked first her nuptial bed,

And Heav’nly choirs the hymenaean
⁷¹¹
sung,

What day the genial
⁷¹²
angel to our sire

Brought her in naked beauty more adorned,

More lovely than Pandora
⁷¹⁴
, whom the Gods

Endowed with all their gifts, and O too like

In sad event, when to the unwiser son

Of Japhet
⁷¹⁷
brought by Hermes, she ensnared

Mankind with her fair looks, to be avenged

On him who had stole Jove’s authentic
⁷¹⁹
fire.

   Thus at their shady lodge arrived, both stood

Both turned, and under open sky adored

The God that made both sky, air, Earth and heav’n

Which they beheld, the moon’s resplendent globe

And starry pole
⁷²⁴
: “Thou also mad’st the night,

Maker omnipotent, and thou the day,

Which we in our appointed work employed

Have finished happy in our mutual help

And mutual love, the crown of all our bliss

Ordained by thee, and this delicious place

For us too large, where thy abundance wants

Partakers, and uncropped falls to the ground.

But thou hast promised from us two a race