Their planaetry motions and aspects In fextile, fquare, and trine, and oppofite Of noxious efficacy, and when to join In fynod unbenign; and taught the fix'd Their influence malignant when to shower, Which of them rifing with the fun, or falling, Should prove tempestuous: to the winds they fet Their corners, when with blufter to confound Sea, air, and fhore; the thunder when to roll, With terror through the dark aeriel hall. Some fay, he bid his angels turn ascanse The poles of earth twice ten degrees and more From the fun's Axle, they with labour push'd Oblique the centric globe; fome fay the fun Was bid turn reins from th' equinoctial road Like diftant breath to Taurus with the feven Atlantic Sifters, and the Spartan Twins Up to the Tropic Crab; thence down amain By Leo, and the Virgin, and the Scales, As deep as Capricorn, to bring in change Of feafons to each clime; elfe had the spring Perpetual fmil'd on earth with verdant flowers, Equal in days and nights, except to those Beyond the polar circles; to them day Had unbenighted fhone, while the low fun, To recompenfe his distance, in their fight Had rounded ftill th' horizon, and not known Or east or weft, which had forbid the fnow From cold Eftotiland, and fouth as far Beneath Magellan. At that tafted fruit The fun, as from Thyeftean banquet, turn'd His courfe intended; else how had the world Inhabited, though finless, more than now, Avoided pinching cold and fcorching heat? These changes in the heav'n's, though flow, produc'd Like change on fea and land, fideral blast, Vapour, and mift, and exhalation hot,
Corrupt and peftilent: now from the north Of Norembega, and the Samoed shore,
Buriting their brazen dungeon, arm'd with ice,
And fnow, and hail, and stormy guft, and flaw, Boreas, and Cacias, and Argeftes loud,
And Thrafcias rend the woods, and feas upturn; 700 With adverse blast upturns them from the fouth Notus and Afer, black with thund'rous clouds, From Serraliona; thwart of these as fierce
Forth rush the Levant and the Ponent winds,
Eurus and Zephyr, with their lateral noise, Sirocco and Libecchio. Thus began
Outrage from lifeless things; but Discord first, Daughter of Sin, among the irrational,
Death introduc'd through fierce antipathy:
Beaft now with beast 'gan war, and fowl with fowl, And fish with fish; to graze the herb all leaving, Devour'd each other; nor ftood much in awe Of man, but fled him, or with count'nance grim Glar'd on him paffing. Thele were from without The growing miferies which Adam faw Already in part, though hid in gloomiest shade, To forrow abandon'd, but worse felt within, And in a troubled fea of paffion toft, Thus to difburden fought with fad complaint. Omiferable of happy! is this the end Of this new glorious world, and me fo late The glory of that glory, who now become Accurs'd of bleffed, hide me from the face Of God, whom to behold was then my height Of happiness! yet, well, if here would end
The mifery; I deferv'd it, and would bear My own defervings; but this will not serve; All that I eat or drink, or fhall beget, Is propagated curfe, O voice once heard Delightfully, Increase and multiply. Now death to hear! for what can I increase Or multiply, but curfes on my head?
Who of all ages to fucceed, but feeling
The evil on him brought by me, will curse My head? Il fare our ancestor impure,
For this we may thank Adam; but his thinks Shall be the execration; so befides
Mine own, that bide upon me, all from me Shall with a fierce reflux on me redound, On me as on their natural centre light
Heavy, though in their place. O fleeting joys Of Paradife, dear bought with lafting woes! Did I request thee, Maker, from my clay To mould me man, did I folicit thee
From darkness to promote me, or here place
In this delicious garden? As my will
Concurr'd not to my being, it were but right And equal to reduce me to my dust,
Defirous to reign and render back
All I receiv'd, unable to perform
Thy terms, too hard, by which I was to hold The good I fought not. To the lofs of that, Sufficient penalty, why halt thou added The fenfe of endless woes? Inexplicable Thy juftice feems; yet, to lay truth, too late I thus conteft; then fhould have been refus'd Thole terms whatever, when they were propos'd: Thou didit accept them: wilt thou enjoy the good, Then cavil the conditions? and though God
Made thee without thy leave, what it thy fon
Prove difobedient, and reprov'd, retort,
Wherefore didft thou beget me? I fought it not:
Wouldst thou admit for his contempt of thee
That proud excufe? yet him not thy election, But natural neceffity, begot.
God made thee of choice his own, and of his own
To ferve him; thy reward was of his grace,
Thy punishment then justly is at his will.
Be it fo, for I fubmit; his doom is fair,
That duft I am, and fhall to dust return:
O welcome hour whenever! Why delays His hand to execute what his decree Fix'd on this day? why do I overlive,
Why am I mock'd with death, and lengthen'd out To deathlefs pain? how gladly would I meet
Mortality, my fentence, and be earth
Infenfible, how glad would lay me down
As in my mother's lap! there I fhould reft And fleep fecure; his dreadful voice no more Would thunder in my ears, no fear of worfe To me and to my offspring would torment me With cruel expectation. Yet one doubt Purfues me ftill, left all I cannot die, Left that pure breath of life, the fpirit of man Which God infpir'd, cannot together perish With this corporeal clod; then in the grave Or in fome other difmal place, who knows But I fhall die a living death? O thought Horrid, if true! yet why? it was but breath Of life that finn'd; what dies but what had life And fin! the body properly hath neither.
All of me then fhall die: let this appeale
The doubt, fince human reach no further knows. For though the Lord of all be infinite,
Is his wrath alio? be it, man is not fo, But mortal doom'd. How can he exercife
Wrath without end on man whom death must end?
Can he make deathleis death? that were to make
Strange contradiction, which to God himself Impoffible is held, as argument
Of weakness, not of power. Will he draw out, For anger's fake, finite to infinite
In punish'd man, to fatisfy his rigor,
Satisfy'd never? that were to extend
His fentence beyond duft and Nature's law,
By which all caufes elfe, according still
To the reception of their matter, act,
Not to th' extent of their own fphere. But fay
That death be not one stroke, as I fuppos'd
Bereaving fenle, but endless mifery
From this day onward, which feel begun
Both in me, and without me, and fo last
To perpetuity? Ay me, that fear
Comes thund'ring back with dreadful revolution
On my defenceless head; both death and I Are found eternal, and incorporate both;
Nor I in my part fingle, in me all
Pofterity ftands curft: fair patrimony That I must leave ye, fons; O were I able To wafte it all myself, and leave ye none !
So difinherited, how would you blefs
Me now your curfe! Ah, why fhould all mankind
For one man's fault thus guiltless be condemn'd,
If guiltless? but from me what can proceed,
But all corrupt, both mind and will deprav'd, Not to do only, but to will the fame
With me? how can they then acquitted stand In fight of God? him after all difputes Forc'd I abfolve: all my evafions vain,
And reasonings, though through mazes, lead me ftill But to my own conviction: first and laft
On me, me only, as the fource and spring
Of all corruption, all the blame lights due;
So might the wrath. Fond wifh! couldst thou fupport That burden heavier than the earth to bear,
Than all the world much heavier, though divided
With that bad woman? thus what thou defir'ft,
And what thou fear'ft, alike destroys all hope Of refuge, and concludes thee miferable
Beyond all paft example and future,
To Satan only like both crime and doom.
O confcience, into what abyfs of fears
And horrors haft thou driven me: out of which
I find no way, from deep to deeper plung'd! Thus Adam to himself lamented loud
Through the ftill night; not now, as ere man fell, Wholesome and cool, and mild, but with black air Accompanied, with damps and dreadful gloom, Which to his evil confcience represented All things with double terror: on the ground Outstretch'd he lay, on the cold ground, and oft Curs'd his creation, Death as oft accus'd Of tardy execution, fince denounc'd
The day of his offence. Why comes not death, Said he, with one thrice acceptable stroke To end me? fhall Truth fail to keep her word, Justice divine not kasten to be just ?
« 上一頁繼續 » |