Paradise Lost - John Milton (classic reads .txt) 📗

hapless Eve, Of thy presumed return! event perverse!

Thou never from that hour in Paradise Foundst either sweet repast, or sound repose; Such ambush, hid among sweet flowers and shades, Waited with hellish rancour imminent To intercept thy way, or send thee back Despoiled of innocence, of faith, of bliss!

For now, and since first break of dawn, the Fiend, Mere serpent in appearance, forth was come; And on his quest, where likeliest he might find The only two of mankind, but in them The whole included race, his purposed prey.

In bower and field he sought, where any tuft Of grove or garden-plot more pleasant lay, Their tendance, or plantation for delight; By fountain or by shady rivulet

He sought them both, but wished his hap might find Eve separate; he wished, but not with hope Of what so seldom chanced; when to his wish, Beyond his hope, Eve separate he spies, Veiled in a cloud of fragrance, where she stood, Half spied, so thick the roses blushing round About her glowed, oft stooping to support Each flower of slender stalk, whose head, though gay Carnation, purple, azure, or specked with gold, Hung drooping unsustained; them she upstays Gently with myrtle band, mindless the while Herself, though fairest unsupported flower, From her best prop so far, and storm so nigh.

Nearer he drew, and many a walk traversed Of stateliest covert, cedar, pine, or palm; Then voluble and bold, now hid, now seen, Among thick-woven arborets, and flowers Imbordered on each bank, the hand of Eve: Spot more delicious than those gardens feigned Or of revived Adonis, or renowned

Alcinous, host of old Laertes’ son;

Or that, not mystick, where the sapient king Held dalliance with his fair Egyptian spouse.

Much he the place admired, the person more.

As one who long in populous city pent, Where houses thick and sewers annoy the air, Forth issuing on a summer’s morn, to breathe Among the pleasant villages and farms Adjoined, from each thing met conceives delight; The smell of grain, or tedded grass, or kine, Or dairy, each rural sight, each rural sound; If chance, with nymph-like step, fair virgin pass, What pleasing seemed, for her now pleases more; She most, and in her look sums all delight: Such pleasure took the Serpent to behold This flowery plat, the sweet recess of Eve Thus early, thus alone: Her heavenly form Angelick, but more soft, and feminine, Her graceful innocence, her every air Of gesture, or least action, overawed His malice, and with rapine sweet bereaved His fierceness of the fierce intent it brought: That space the Evil-one abstracted stood From his own evil, and for the time remained Stupidly good; of enmity disarmed,

Of guile, of hate, of envy, of revenge: But the hot Hell that always in him burns, Though in mid Heaven, soon ended his delight, And tortures him now more, the more he sees Of pleasure, not for him ordained: then soon Fierce hate he recollects, and all his thoughts Of mischief, gratulating, thus excites.

Thoughts, whither have ye led me! with what sweet Compulsion thus transported, to forget What hither brought us! hate, not love;nor hope Of Paradise for Hell, hope here to taste Of pleasure; but all pleasure to destroy, Save what is in destroying; other joy To me is lost. Then, let me not let pass Occasion which now smiles; behold alone The woman, opportune to all attempts, Her husband, for I view far round, not nigh, Whose higher intellectual more I shun, And strength, of courage haughty, and of limb Heroick built, though of terrestrial mould; Foe not informidable! exempt from wound, I not; so much hath Hell debased, and pain Enfeebled me, to what I was in Heaven.

She fair, divinely fair, fit love for Gods!

Not terrible, though terrour be in love And beauty, not approached by stronger hate, Hate stronger, under show of love well feigned; The way which to her ruin now I tend.

So spake the enemy of mankind, enclosed In serpent, inmate bad! and toward Eve Addressed his way: not with indented wave, Prone on the ground, as since; but on his rear, Circular base of rising folds, that towered Fold above fold, a surging maze! his head Crested aloft, and carbuncle his eyes; With burnished neck of verdant gold, erect Amidst his circling spires, that on the grass Floated redundant: pleasing was his shape And lovely; never since of serpent-kind Lovelier, not those that in Illyria changed, Hermione and Cadmus, or the god

In Epidaurus; nor to which transformed Ammonian Jove, or Capitoline, was seen; He with Olympias; this with her who bore Scipio, the highth of Rome. With tract oblique At first, as one who sought access, but feared To interrupt, side-long he works his way.

As when a ship, by skilful steersmen wrought Nigh river’s mouth or foreland, where the wind Veers oft, as oft so steers, and shifts her sail: So varied he, and of his tortuous train Curled many a wanton wreath in sight of Eve, To lure her eye; she, busied, heard the sound Of rusling leaves, but minded not, as used To such disport before her through the field, From every beast; more duteous at her call, Than at Circean call the herd disguised.

He, bolder now, uncalled before her stood, But as in gaze admiring: oft he bowed His turret crest, and sleek enamelled neck, Fawning; and licked the ground whereon she trod.

His gentle dumb expression turned at length The eye of Eve to mark his play; he, glad Of her attention gained, with serpent-tongue Organick, or impulse of vocal air,

His fraudulent temptation thus began.

Wonder not, sovran Mistress, if perhaps Thou canst, who art sole wonder! much less arm Thy looks, the Heaven of mildness, with disdain, Displeased that I approach thee thus, and gaze Insatiate; I thus single;nor have feared Thy awful brow, more awful thus retired.

Fairest resemblance of thy Maker fair, Thee all things living gaze on, all things thine By gift, and thy celestial beauty adore With ravishment beheld! there best beheld, Where universally admired; but here

In this enclosure wild, these beasts among, Beholders rude, and shallow to discern Half what in thee is fair, one man except, Who sees thee? and what is one? who should be seen A Goddess among Gods, adored and served By Angels numberless, thy daily train.

So glozed the Tempter, and his proem tuned: Into the heart of Eve his words made way, Though at the voice much marvelling; at length, Not unamazed, she thus in answer spake.

What may this mean? language of man pronounced By tongue of brute, and human sense expressed?

The first, at least, of these I thought denied To beasts; whom God, on their creation-day, Created mute to all articulate sound: The latter I demur; for in their looks Much reason, and in their actions, oft appears.

Thee, Serpent, subtlest beast of all the field I knew, but not with human voice endued; Redouble then this miracle, and say, How camest thou speakable of mute, and how To me so friendly grown above the rest Of brutal kind, that daily are in sight?

Say, for such wonder claims attention due.

To whom the guileful Tempter thus replied.

Empress of this fair world, resplendent Eve!

Easy to me it is to tell thee all

What thou commandest; and right thou shouldst be obeyed: I was at first as other beasts that graze The trodden herb, of abject thoughts and low, As was my food; nor aught but food discerned Or sex, and apprehended nothing high: Till, on a day roving the field, I chanced A goodly tree far distant to behold

Loaden with fruit of fairest colours mixed, Ruddy and gold: I nearer drew to gaze; When from the boughs a savoury odour blown, Grateful to appetite, more pleased my sense Than smell of sweetest fennel, or the teats Of ewe or goat dropping with milk at even, Unsucked of lamb or kid, that tend their play.

To satisfy the sharp desire I had

Of tasting those fair apples, I resolved Not to defer; hunger and thirst at once, Powerful persuaders, quickened at the scent Of that alluring fruit, urged me so keen.

About the mossy trunk I wound me soon; For, high from ground, the branches would require Thy utmost reach or Adam’s: Round the tree All other beasts that saw, with like desire Longing and envying stood, but could not reach.

Amid the tree now got, where plenty hung Tempting so nigh, to pluck and eat my fill I spared not; for, such pleasure till that hour, At feed or fountain, never had I found.

Sated at length, ere long I might perceive Strange alteration in me, to degree

Of reason in my inward powers; and speech Wanted not long; though to this shape retained.

Thenceforth to speculations high or deep I turned my thoughts, and with capacious mind Considered all things visible in Heaven, Or Earth, or Middle; all things fair and good: But all that fair and good in thy divine Semblance, and in thy beauty’s heavenly ray, United I beheld; no fair to thine

Equivalent or second! which compelled Me thus, though importune perhaps, to come And gaze, and worship thee of right declared Sovran of creatures, universal Dame!

So talked the spirited sly Snake; and Eve, Yet more amazed, unwary thus replied.

Serpent, thy overpraising leaves in doubt The virtue of that fruit, in thee first proved: But say, where grows the tree? from hence how far?

For many are the trees of God that grow In Paradise, and various, yet unknown To us; in such abundance lies our choice, As leaves a greater store of fruit untouched, Still hanging incorruptible, till men Grow up to their provision, and more hands Help to disburden Nature of her birth.

To whom the wily Adder, blithe and glad.

Empress, the way is ready, and not long; Beyond a row of myrtles, on a flat,

Fast by a fountain, one small thicket past Of blowing myrrh and balm: if thou accept My conduct, I can bring thee thither soon Lead then, said Eve. He, leading, swiftly rolled In tangles, and made intricate seem straight, To mischief swift. Hope elevates, and joy Brightens his crest; as when a wandering fire, Compact of unctuous vapour, which the night Condenses, and the cold environs round, Kindled through agitation to a flame, Which oft, they say, some evil Spirit attends, Hovering and blazing with delusive light, Misleads the amazed night-wanderer from his way To bogs and mires, and oft through pond or pool; There swallowed up and lost, from succour far.

So glistered the dire Snake, and into fraud Led Eve, our credulous mother, to the tree Of prohibition, root of all our woe; Which when she saw, thus to her guide she spake.

Serpent, we might have spared our coming hither, Fruitless to me, though fruit be here to excess, The credit of whose virtue rest with thee; Wonderous indeed, if cause of such effects.

But of this tree we may not taste nor touch; God so commanded, and left that command Sole daughter of his voice; the rest, we live Law to ourselves; our reason is our law.

To whom the Tempter guilefully replied.

Indeed! hath God then said that of the fruit Of all these garden-trees ye shall not eat, Yet Lords declared of all in earth or air$?

To whom thus Eve, yet sinless. Of the fruit Of each tree in the garden we may eat; But of the fruit of this fair tree amidst The garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat Thereof, nor shall ye touch it, lest ye die.

She scarce had said, though brief, when now more bold The Tempter, but with show of zeal and love To Man, and indignation at his wrong, New part puts on; and, as to passion moved,