Then was not guilty shame, dishonest shame
Of nature's works, honor dishonorable,
Sin-bred, how have ye troubled all mankind
With shows instead, mere shows of seeming pur
And banished from man's life his happiest life,
Simplicity and spotless innocence!
So passed they naked on, nor shunned the sight
Of God or angel, for they thought no ill :
So hand in hand they passed, the loveliest pair
That ever since in love's embraces met;
Adam the goodliest man of men since born
His sons, the fairest of her daughters Eve.
Under a tuft of shade, that on a green
Stood whispering soft, by a fresh fountain side
They sat them down; and after no more toil
Of their sweet gardening labor than sufficed
To recommend cool Zephyr, and made ease
More easy,
wholesome thirst and appetite
More grateful, to their supper fruits they fell,
Nectarine fruits, which the compliant boughs
Yielded them, sidelong as they sat recline
On the soft downy bank damasked with flowers.
The savory pulp they chew, and in the rind,
Still as they thirsted, scoop the brimming stream
Nor gentle purpose nor endearing smiles
Wanted, nor youthful dalliance, as beseems
Fair couple, linked in happy nuptial league,
Alone as they. About them frisking played
All beasts of the earth, since wild, and of all chas
In wood or wilderness, forest or den :
313-315. The punctuation is that of the earliest editions. period is needed after dishonorable, or after the first shame. 329. recommend, make welcome or acceptable. Zephyr, Zephyrus, is the personification of the west wind.
333. recline, reclined. 337. purpose, discourse. 339. Wanted, were wantin 341. wild, grown or be wild. of all chase, beasts chase; all beasts that are hu in various ways.
Sporting the lion ramped, and in his paw
Dandled the kid; bears, tigers, ounces, pards,
Gambolled before them; the unwieldy elephant,
To make them mirth, used all his might, and wreathed
His lithe proboscis; close the serpent sly
Insinuating wove with Gordian twine
His braided train, and of his fatal guile
Gave proof unheeded; others on the grass
Couched, and now filled with pasture gazing sat,
Or bedward ruminating; for the sun
Declined was hasting now with prone career
To the ocean isles, and in the ascending scale
Of heaven the stars that usher evening rose:
When Satan, still in gaze as first he stood,
Scarce thus at length failed speech recovered sad :
"O Hell! what do mine eyes with grief behold? Into our room of bliss thus high advanced Creatures of other mould, earth-born perhaps, Not spirits, yet to heavenly spirits bright Little inferior; whom my thoughts pursue With wonder, and could love, so lively shines In them divine resemblance, and such grace
The hand that formed them on their shape hath poured.
Ah, gentle pair! ye little think how nigh
Your change approaches, when all these delights
Will vanish and deliver ye to woe,
343. ramped, bounded; leaped.
344. pards, leopards, or pan-
thers.
348. Insinuating, winding
along. Gordian. At Gordium,
in Asia Minor, was a celebrated
knot, so intricate that an oracle
declared that he who should un-
tie it should rule the world.
Alexander of Macedon cut it with
his sword. - twine, twist.
350. unheeded by Adam and Eve.
351. Couched, lay.
352. bedward ruminating, chewing the cud before they slept. 353. prone, sloping downwards. 357. failed, lost for a time. 359. Into our room of bliss, to take our place in bliss.
362. Little inferior. hast made him a little lower than the angels." Psalm viii. 5.
More woe the more your taste is now of joy:
Happy, but for so happy ill secured
Long to continue, and this high seat your heav
Ill-fenced for heaven to keep out such a foe
As now is entered; yet no purposed foe
To you, whom I could pity thus forlorn,
Though I unpitied. League with you I seek,
And mutual amity, so strait, so close,
That I with you must dwell, or you with me
Henceforth my dwelling haply may not please
Like this fair Paradise, your sense; yet such
Accept your Maker's work; he gave it me,
Which I as freely give: Hell shall unfold,
To entertain you two, her widest gates,
And send forth all her kings; there will be roo
Not like these narrow limits, to receive
Your numerous offspring: if no better place,
Thank him who puts me loath to this revenge
On you who wrong me not, for him who wronge
And should I at your harmless innocence
Melt, as I do, yet public reason just,
Honor and empire with revenge enlarged
By conquering this new world, compels me now
To do what else, though damned, I should abhor
So spake the Fiend, and with necessity,
The tyrant's plea, excused his devilish deeds.
Then from his lofty stand on that high tree
Down he alights among the sportful herd
Of those four-footed kinds, himself now one,
Now other, as their shape served best his end
Nearer to view his prey, and unespied
To mark what of their state he more might learn
370. for, considering that you
371. continue, continue happy. 375. I myself remain unpitied.
381. Hell shall unfold. Isaiah xiv. 9.
386. puts, impels.-loat willing.
By word or action marked: about them round
A lion now he stalks with fiery glare;
Then as a tiger, who by chance hath spied
In some purlieu two gentle fawns at play,
Straight couches close, then rising changes oft
His couchant watch, as one who chose his ground,
Whence rushing he might surest seize them both
Griped in each paw: when Adam, first of men,
To first of women Eve thus moving speech,
Turned him all ear to hear new utterance flow :
"Sole partner and sole part of all these joys,
Dearer thyself than all, needs must the Power
That made us, and for us this ample world,
Be infinitely good, and of his good
As liberal and free as infinite;
That raised us from the dust and placed us here
In all this happiness, who at his hand
Have nothing merited, nor can perform
Aught whereof he hath need; he who requires
From us no other service than to keep
This one, this easy charge, of all the trees
In Paradise that bear delicious fruit
So various, not to taste that only Tree
Of Knowledge, planted by the Tree of Life;
So near grows death to life, whate'er death is,
Some dreadful thing no doubt; for well thou know'st
God hath pronounced it death to taste that tree,
The only sign of our obedience left
Among so many signs of power and rule
403. Then as, then couches close as, or like.
409. moving speech, speaking. 410. him, Satan. all ear. See Comus, line 560, "I was all
423. not to taste. "And the Lord God commanded the man,
saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it; for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." Genesis ii. 16, 17.
Conferred upon us, and dominion given
Over all other creatures that possess
Then let us not think har
One easy prohibition, who enjoy
Free leave so large to all things else, and choic Unlimited of manifold delights;
But let us ever praise him and extol
His bounty, following our delightful task,
To prune these growing plants and tend these flo Which were it toilsome yet with thee were swe
To whom thus Eve replied: "O thou for wh And from whom I was formed, flesh of thy flesh And without whom am to no end, my guide
And head, what thou hast said is just and right
For we to him indeed all praises owe,
And daily thanks; I chiefly, who enjoy
So far the happier lot, enjoying thee
Preeminent by so much odds, while thou
Like consort to thyself canst nowhere find./
That day I oft remember, when from sleep
I first awaked, and found myself reposed
Under a shade on flowers, much wondering whe
And what I was, whence thither brought, and
Not distant far from thence a murmuring sound
Of waters issued from a cave, and spread
Into a liquid plain, then stood unmoved,
Pure as the expanse of heaven: I thither went
With unexperienced thought, and laid me down
On the green bank, to look into the clear
Smooth lake, that to me seemed another sky.
430. dominion, of dominion.given. "Have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth." Genesis i. 28.
431. possess, occupy. 441. from whom I was See Genesis ii. 21-23.
443. head. "The head woman is the man." 1 Co
450. reposed, laid as for
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