At length gave utterance to these words constrained: Of innocence, of faith, of purity, Our wonted ornaments now soiled and stained, Of foul concupiscence; whence evil store; Be sure then. How shall I behold the face Henceforth of God or Angel, erst with joy In solitude live savage, in some glade Hide me, where I may never see them more ! Some tree, whose broad smooth leaves, together sewed, Those middle parts; that this new-comer, Shame, So counseled he, and both together went 973 But such as, at this day, to Indians known, With feathered cincture; naked else, and wild Thus fenced, and, as they thought, their shame in part They sat them down to weep. Nor only tears Began to rise; high passions, anger, hate, Mistrust, suspicion, discord, and shook sore Speech intermitted thus to Eve renewed: Would thou hadst hearkened to my words and stayed I know not whence possessed thee; we had then Remained still happy; not as now, despoiled Of all our good; shamed, naked, miserable! Let none henceforth seek needless cause to approve Such proof, conclude they then begin to fail. To whom, soon moved with touch of blame, thus Eve: Of wandering, as thou callest it, which who knows No ground of enmity between us known, Why he should mean me ill, or seek to harm. Who might have lived, and 'joyed immortal bliss, Of thy transgressing? Not enough severe, I warned thee, I admonished thee, foretold The danger, and the lurking Enemy That lay in wait; beyond this had been force, And force upon free-will here hath no place. I also erred in overmuch admiring What seemed in thee so perfect, that I thought The fruitless hours, but neither self-condemning; BOOK X. MAN's transgression known, the guardian angels forsake Paradise, and return up to Heaven to approve their vigilance, and are approved; God declaring that the entrance of Satan could not be by them prevented. He sends His Son to judge the transgressors; who descends, and gives sentence accordingly; then, in pity, clothes them both, and re-ascends: Sin and Death, sitting till then at the gates of Hell, by wondrous sympathy feeling the success of Satan in this new world, and the sin by man there committed, resolve to sit no longer confined in Hell, but to follow Satan, their sire, up to the place of man. To make the way easier from Hell to this world to and fro, they pave a broad highway or bridge over Chaos, according to the track that Satan first made; then, preparing for earth, they meet him, proud of his success, returning to Hell; their mutual gratulation. Satan arrives at Pandemonium; in full assembly relates, with boasting, his success against man; instead of applause is entertained with a general hiss by all his audience, transformed, with himself also, suddenly into serpents, according to his doom given in Paradise; then, deluded with a show of the forbidden tree springing up before them, they greedily reaching to take of the fruit, chew dust and bitter ashes. The proceedings of Sin and Death: God foretells the final victory of His Son over them, and the renewing of all things; but, for the present, commands His angels to make several alterations in the heavens and elements. Adam, more and more perceiving his fallen condition, heavily bewails, rejects the condolemen of Eve; she persists, and at length appeases him: then, to evade the curse likely to fall on the offspring, proposes to Adam violent ways, which he approves not; but, conceiving better hope, puts her in mind of the late promise made them, that her seed should be revenged on the serpent; and exhorts her, with him, to seek peace of the offended Deity, by repentance and supplication. EANWHILE the heinous and despiteful act Of Satan done in Paradise; and how He, in the serpent, had perverted Eve, Was known in Heaven for what can 'scape the eye Omniscient? who, in all things wise and just, Of man, with strength entire, and free-will armed Whatever wiles of foe or seeming friend. For still they knew, and ought to have still remembered, The high injunction, not to taste that fruit, Whoever tempted; which they, not obeying, Incurred what could they less?- the penalty; And manifold in sin, deserved to fall. Up into Heaven from Paradise, in haste, |