Thou interposest, that my sudden hand,
Prevented, spares to tell thee yet by deeds
What it intends, till first I know of thee
What thing thou art, thus double-formed, and why,
In this infernal vale first met, thou callest

Me father, and that phantasm callest my son.
I know thee not, nor ever saw till now
Sight more detestable than him and thee.”

To whom thus the portress of hell-gate replied:
"Hast thou forgot me, then, and do I seem
Now in thine eye so foul? once deemed so fair
In heaven, when at the assembly, and in sight
Of all the seraphim with thee combined
In bold conspiracy against heaven's king,
All on a sudden miserable pain

Surprised thee, dim thine eyes, and dizzy swum
In darkness, while thy head flames thick and fast
Threw forth, till on the left side opening wide,
Likest to thee in shape and countenance bright,
Then shining heavenly fair, a goddess armed,

:

Out of thy head I sprung. Amazement seized
All the host of heaven; back they recoiled, afraid
At first, and called me Sin, and for a sign
Portentous held me; but, familiar grown,
I pleased, and with attractive graces won

740

745

750

755

760

The most averse, thee chiefly; who, full oft

Thyself in me thy perfect image viewing,

764

Becamest enamored . . . Meanwhile war arose,

And fields were fought in heaven; wherein remained

(For what could else?) to our almighty foe

Clear victory; to our part, loss and rout

770

Megæra a pest; also Virgil, the harpies. Æn., III. 215.-739. Spares, forbears. -741. Double-formed. How?-745. Than. Seel. 299.-748. The universal experience; fair at the time, foul afterwards. 752. On a sudden, etc. As Minerva (wisdom) sprang into life from the brain of Jove, so Sin from the head of Satan. See Class. Dict. - 755. Left side. Why left?-768. Fields, battles.

Through all the empyrean.

Down they fell,

Driven headlong from the pitch of heaven, down
Into this deep; and in the general fall

I also at which time this powerful key
Into my hand was given, with charge to keep
These gates forever shut, which none can pass
Without my opening. Pensive here I sat.
Distorted, all my nether shape thus grew
Transformed; but he my inbred enemy
Forth issued, brandishing his fatal dart,
Made to destroy. I fled, and cried out Death!
Hell trembled at the hideous name, and sighed
From all her caves, and back resounded Death! ..
These yelling monsters, that with ceaseless cry
Surround me, as thou sawest, hourly conceived
And hourly born with sorrow infinite

775

785

795

To me,

with conscious terrors vex me round,
That rest or intermission none I find.
Before mine eyes in opposition sits

801

Grim Death, my son and foe, who sets them on,
And me, his parent, would full soon devour
For want of other prey, but that he knows
His end with mine involved, and knows that I
Should prove a bitter morsel, and his bane,
Whenever that shall be: so Fate pronounced.
But thou, O father! I forewarn thee, shun
His deadly arrow; neither vainly hope
To be invulnerable in those bright arms,
Though tempered heavenly; for that mortal dint,
Save he who reigns above, none can resist.”

805

810

So in Shakes. 771. Empyréan (Gr. èv, in, πûp, fire; čμπupos, in fire), the highest portion of space supposed to be pervaded by the pure element or essence of fire. See note on I. 117.-772. Pitch (Old Fr. pic, high place; akin to peak; or fr. old pike), height.-787. Made. He? or dart?-801. Conscious. Meaning?-803. Opposition, front?-808. Bane. Because my death must end him?813. Dint ('Dint, dent, dunt, all imitative of the sound of a blow.'. Wedgwood), stroke, blow. -814. Save he. So Shakes., "All the conspira

She finished, and the subtle fiend his lore

Soon learned, now milder, and thus answered smooth:
"Dear daughter! – since thou claimst me for thy sire, .
I come no enemy, but to set free

815

From out this dark and dismal house of pain
Both him and thee, and all the heavenly host
Of spirits that, in our just pretences armed,
Fell with us from on high. From them I go
This uncouth errand sole, and one for all

825

Myself expose, with lonely steps to tread

The unfounded deep, and through the void immense

To search with wandering quest a place foretold

830

Should be, and, by concurring signs, ere now
Created vast and round; a place of bliss

In the purlieus of heaven; and, therein placed
A race of upstart creatures, to supply
Perhaps our vacant room, though more removed,
Lest heaven, surcharged with potent multitude,
Might hap to move new broils. Be this, or aught
Than this more secret, now designed, I haste
To know; and, this once known, shall soon return,
And bring ye to the place where thou and Death
Shall dwell at ease, and up and down unseen
Wing silently the buxom air, imbalmed

With odors. There ye shall be fed and filled
Immeasurably; all things shall be your prey."

835

840

tors, save only he," Jul. Cos. V. 5; 'Save thou,' sonnet 109; 'save I,' Twelfth Night, III. I. 172. Save (except that) he can, who, etc. — 815. Lore (A. S. lær, learning; læran, to teach), lesson. 825. Pretences, claims. So used in Shakes.—827. Uncouth, as in l. 407.— 829. Unfounded (Lat. sine fundo, without bottom; Fr. sans fond). Bottomless? or without foundation, treacherous? Deep. Hell? or Chaos? See note on 1. 405. — 833. Purlieus. Fr. pur, free; lieu, place; purlieu, a place free from trees (purus ab arboribus), the outskirts of a forest; or Fr. pour aller, for to walk; purlieu, land once part of a royal forest but separated from it by perambulation (pour-allée) granted by the crown. Placed, etc. A race that has been placed therein ? – 842. Buxom (A. S. beógan, bugan, to bow, to yield), yielding. Horace has cedentem aera, yielding air. Sat. II. 2, 13.-843. Fed. "Death shall feed on

He ceased; for both seemed highly pleased, and Death Grinned horrible a ghastly smile, to hear

His famine should be filled, and blessed his maw

846

Destined to that good hour. No less rejoiced

His mother bad, and thus bespake her sire:-
"The key of this infernal pit, by due,

850

And by command of heaven's all-powerful king,

Who hates me, and hath hither thrust me down

Thou art my father, thou my author; thou

My being gavest me: whom should I obey

865

But thee whom follow? Thou wilt bring me soon

To that new world of light and bliss, among

The gods who live at ease, where I shall reign

them." Ps. xlix. 14.846. Grinned. Ajax (Il. VII. 212), smiles with horrible countenance'; Minos (Dante's Inferno, V. 4) 'Standeth horribly and snarls'; Grantorto (Faerie Queene, V. XII. 16) is 'grinning griesly'; Sylvester's dead are 'grinning ghastly'; Statius's Tydeus (Thebais, viii. 582) is 'smiling dreadfully,' formidabile ridens; Cowley's devils (Davideis), 'with a dreadful smile deformedly grin'; and in Horace (Odes, III. XI. 21) Ixion and Tityos 'smiled with unwilling look.' Shakespeare has tried his pencil at the picture, and with what startling power!

"Within the hollow crown
That rounds the mortal temples of a king,
Keeps Death his court; and there the antic sits,
Scoffing his state, and grinning at his pomp!"

Richard II., III. II. 160-163.

847. Maw (Dutch maag, Ger. magen, stomach). Blessed, meaning he blessed his maw? or his maw should be blessed?-868. Gods who live at ease.

At thy right hand voluptuous, as beseems
Thy daughter and thy darling, without end."
Thus saying, from her side the fatal key,
Sad instrument of all our woe, she took ;

And, towards the gate rolling her bestial train,
Forthwith the huge portcullis high up-drew,
Which, but herself, not all the Stygian powers

870

875

Could once have moved; then in the keyhole turns

Of Erebus. She opened; but to shut

Excelled her power: the gates wide open stood,
That with extended wings a bannered host,

885

Homer has coì peła ¿wóvtes, theoi reia zoöntes, gods living at ease, II. VI. 138; Odys. V. 122, IV. 805. Tennyson in Lotos-eaters makes Ulysses' crew propose to live thus 'like gods.'-869-70. Right hand... daughter and darling. Just as the Messiah reigns at the Father's right hand, son and wellbeloved! -874. Portcullis (Fr. porte, Lat. porta, gate; coulisse, groove, grooved timber, or something that slides down; couler, to slide, slip), a harrowlike gate of timbers framed and iron-pointed, hung over the entrance to a castle, and capable of being let slide down instantly. -875. Which, but herself, etc. Allegory? Meaning? -876-7. Turns. Unless we interpret 'wards' to mean sliding bolts (a sense which Shakes. gives to 'ward,' Lucrece, 305), we may interpret 'turns,' 'passes round or by with the key '; just as we speak of 'turning a corner,' 'turning the enemy's flank,' etc. There is no need of supposing, with Keightley and the locksmiths, that Milton made a mistake here. 879-883. This is a famous passage. Observe closely the analogy which voice and movement bear to the things described. Contrast, VII. 205-7,

"Heaven opened wide

Her ever-during gates, harmonious sound,
On golden hinges moving."

Erebus, the realm of darkness, hell.—883-4.

excelled, etc.

Opened; but to shut

"Because none but God can put an end to the evils Keightley. Is this explanation valid? Wide, etc. "For wide is the gate." Matt. vii. 13.885. Wings. What?-889. Redound

caused by sin."