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5

Satan exalted sat, by merit raised

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 displayed:

10

"Powers and Dominions, Deities of Heaven!

For, since no deep within her gulf can hold
Immortal vigor, though oppressed and fallen,
I give not Heaven for lost. From this descent
Celestial Virtues rising will appear

15

More glorious and more dread than from no fall,

And trust themselves to fear no second fate.

Me, though just right, and the fixed laws of Heaven,

Did first create your leader, next, free choice,

20

With what besides, in council or in fight,
Hath been achieved of merit, yet this loss,
Thus far at least recovered, hath much more
Established 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 Thunderer's aim
Your bulwark, and condemns to greatest share
Of endless pain? Where there is then no good
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

25

30

9. Success, the outcome: not necessarily, as to-day, fortunate. 11. Powers and Dominions. For these angelic titles see Introd., p. 14. Give... for lost, not give up as lost, but consider as lost. 15. Virtues is another title. Celestial Virtues then means powers of heaven.

27. In this line, and 1. 32, Satan is not candid; i. 263 expresses his real mind.

Will covet more.

With this advantage then

t

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

35

Could have assured us; and, by what best way,
Whether of open war or covert guile,
We now debate; who can advise, may speak."

40

He ceased; and next him Moloch, sceptered king,
Stood up, the strongest and the fiercest spirit
That fought in Heaven, now fiercer by despair.
His trust was with the Eternal to be deemed
Equal in strength, and rather than be less
Cared not to be at all: with that care lost
Went all his fear; of God, or Hell, or worse
He recked not, and these words thereafter spake :
My sentence is for open war of wiles,
More unexpert, I boast not; them let those

66

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 lingering here,
Heaven's fugitives, and for their dwelling-place

45

50

55

35-40. The art with which Satan covers over the logical conclusions of his own remarks is worthy of a political speaker of the present day. He has already shown that in the war they would now undertake they must lose this advantage they now possess, in other words that the better they succeed the less sure are they to prosper.

43 and following. These speeches are extremely characteristic. If possible the student should study the more extended notes, pp. 94-97. That of Moloch is quite in keeping with what has been already said of him, i. 392-405. Compare 46-48 with i. 402.

46. With the Eternal. The Hebrew word Jehovah means "the eternal one." The Greek translators, however, used the word иúprоs, which means Lord, in which they were followed by the English translators. The French Bible has l'Eternel.

51, 52. Moloch is, as he says, merely a fierce warrior without skill in schemes or speech.

Accept this dark, opprobrious den of shame,
The prison of his tyranny who reigns

By our delay? No! let us rather choose,
Armed with Hell flames and fury, all at once

60

O'er Heaven's high towers 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

65

Infernal thunder, and for lightning see

Black fire and horror shot with equal rage

Among his angels, and his throne itself

Mixed 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 pursued us through the Deep,
With what compulsion, and laborious flight
We sunk thus low? The ascent is easy then;
The event is feared! Should we again provoke
Our stronger, some worse way his wrath may find
To our destruction, if there be in Hell.

70

75

80

65. Engine; the word was used in a very general way for any mechanical device.

67. Black fire, a bold conception, something like darkness visible, i. 64.

69. Tartarean.

the dead.

Tartarus was the classic name for the abode of

75. Proper motion, that which belongs to us, our own rightful

motion.

82. Event, outcome.

We still say "in any event."

83. Our stronger; our betters, our inferiors are more familiar examples of this use of a comparative adjective.

Fear to be worse destroyed. What can be worse

85

Than to dwell here, driven out from bliss, condemned

In this abhorrèd deep to utter woe;

Where pain of unextinguishable fire

Must exercise us, without hope of end,

The vassals of his anger, when the scourge

90

Inexorably, and the torturing hour,

Calls us to penance? More destroyed than thus,
We should be quite abolished, and expire.

What fear we then? what doubt we to incense
His utmost ire? which, to the highth enraged
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."

95

100

105

He ended frowning, and his look denounced Desperate revenge, and battle dangerous.

To less than gods. On the other side up rose
Belial, in act more graceful and humane;
A fairer person lost not heaven; he seemed
For dignity composed and high exploit.

110

But all was false and hollow; though his tongue
Dropt manna, and could make the worse appear
The better reason, to perplex and dash

89. Must exercise us, afflict us.

94. What doubt we to incense. The syntax is irregular. Milton may have had the preceding clause in mind.

97. Essential, of the character of essence, spiritual.

107. Desperate, hopeless.

109. Humane; not in the sense common to-day, but with the meaning, polished and scholarly.

Maturest counsels for his thoughts were low,
To vice industrious, but to nobler deeds
Timorous and slothful. Yet, he pleased the ear,
And with persuasive accent thus began :

115

"I should be much for open war, O Peers!
As not behind in hate, if what was urged
Main reason to persuade immediate war
Did not dissuade me most, and seem to cast
Ominous conjecture on the whole success;
When he who most excels in fact of arms,
In what he counsels and in what excels
Mistrustful, grounds his courage on despair
And utter dissolution, as the scope

Of all his aim, after some dire revenge.

First, what revenge? The towers of Heaven are filled
With armed watch, that render all access
Impregnable; oft on the bordering Deep
Encamp their legions, or, with obscure wing,
Scout far and wide into the realm of Night,
Scorning surprise. Or could we break our way
By force, and at our heels all Hell should rise
With blackest insurrection, to confound
Heaven's purest light, yet our great enemy,
All incorruptible, would on his throne
Sit unpolluted, and the ethereal mould,
Incapable of stain, would soon expel
Her mischief, and purge off the baser fire
Victorious. Thus repulsed, our final hope
Is flat despair: we must exasperate
The almighty victor to spend all his rage,

120

125.

130

135

140

119. Belial is throughout the polished rhetorician; his first effort is to turn to himself the minds already affected by the words of Moloch.

131. Impregnable.

nable, not the access.

In reality it is the towers that are impreg

135, 136. Belial is not so much in earnest on this theme as Moloch; these lines fall short of the vigor of 11. 60-70.

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