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

Fluctuates disturbed, yet comely and in act Raised, as of some great matter to begin.

As when of old some orator renowned, In Athens or free Rome, where eloquence Flourished, since mute! to some great cause addressed, Stood in himself collected; while each part, Motion, each act, won audience ere the tongue; Sometimes in highth began, as no delay Of preface brooking, through his zeal of right: So standing, moving, or to highth up grown, The Tempter, all impassioned, thus began.

O sacred, wise, and wisdom-giving Plant, Mother of science! now I feel thy power Within me clear; not only to discern Things in their causes, but to trace the ways Of highest agents, deemed however wise.

Queen of this universe! do not believe Those rigid threats of death: ye shall not die: How should you? by the fruit? it gives you life To knowledge; by the threatener? look on me, Me, who have touched and tasted; yet both live, And life more perfect have attained than Fate Meant me, by venturing higher than my lot.

Shall that be shut to Man, which to the Beast Is open? or will God incense his ire For such a petty trespass? and not praise Rather your dauntless virtue, whom the pain Of death denounced, whatever thing death be, Deterred not from achieving what might lead To happier life, knowledge of good and evil; Of good, how just? of evil, if what is evil Be real, why not known, since easier shunned?

God therefore cannot hurt ye, and be just; Not just, not God; not feared then, nor obeyed: Your fear itself of death removes the fear.

Why then was this forbid? Why, but to awe; Why, but to keep ye low and ignorant, His worshippers? He knows that in the day Ye eat thereof, your eyes that seem so clear, Yet are but dim, shall perfectly be then Opened and cleared, and ye shall be as Gods, Knowing both good and evil, as they know.

That ye shall be as Gods, since I as Man, Internal Man, is but proportion meet; I, of brute, human; ye, of human, Gods.

So ye shall die perhaps, by putting off Human, to put on Gods; death to be wished, Though threatened, which no worse than this can bring.

And what are Gods, that Man may not become As they, participating Godlike food?

The Gods are first, and that advantage use On our belief, that all from them proceeds: I question it; for this fair earth I see, Warmed by the sun, producing every kind; Them, nothing: if they all things, who enclosed Knowledge of good and evil in this tree, That whoso eats thereof, forthwith attains Wisdom without their leave? and wherein lies The offence, that Man should thus attain to know?

What can your knowledge hurt him, or this tree Impart against his will, if all be his?

Or is it envy? and can envy dwell

In heavenly breasts? These, these, and many more Causes import your need of this fair fruit.

Goddess humane, reach then, and freely taste!

He ended; and his words, replete with guile, Into her heart too easy entrance won: Fixed on the fruit she gazed, which to behold Might tempt alone; and in her ears the sound Yet rung of his persuasive words, impregned With reason, to her seeming, and with truth: Mean while the hour of noon drew on, and waked An eager appetite, raised by the smell So savoury of that fruit, which with desire, Inclinable now grown to touch or taste, Solicited her longing eye; yet first Pausing a while, thus to herself she mused.

Great are thy virtues, doubtless, best of fruits, Though kept from man, and worthy to be admired; Whose taste, too long forborn, at first assay Gave elocution to the mute, and taught The tongue not made for speech to speak thy praise: Thy praise he also, who forbids thy use, Conceals not from us, naming thee the tree Of knowledge, knowledge both of good and evil; Forbids us then to taste! but his forbidding Commends thee more, while it infers the good By thee communicated, and our want:

For good unknown sure is not had; or, had And yet unknown, is as not had at all.

In plain then, what forbids he but to know, Forbids us good, forbids us to be wise?

Such prohibitions bind not. But, if death Bind us with after-bands, what profits then Our inward freedom? In the day we eat Of this fair fruit, our doom is, we shall die!

How dies the Serpent? he hath eaten and lives, And knows, and speaks, and reasons, and discerns, Irrational till then. For us alone

Was death invented? or to us denied

This intellectual food, for beasts reserved?

For beasts it seems: yet that one beast which first Hath tasted envies not, but brings with joy The good befallen him, author unsuspect, Friendly to man, far from deceit or guile.

What fear I then? rather, what know to fear Under this ignorance of good and evil, Of God or death, of law or penalty?

Here grows the cure of all, this fruit divine, Fair to the eye, inviting to the taste, Of virtue to make wise: What hinders then To reach, and feed at once both body and mind?

So saying, her rash hand in evil hour Forth reaching to the fruit, she plucked, she eat!

Earth felt the wound; and Nature from her seat, Sighing through all her works, gave signs of woe, That all was lost. Back to the thicket slunk The guilty Serpent; and well might;for Eve, Intent now wholly on her taste, nought else Regarded; such delight till then, as seemed, In fruit she never tasted, whether true Or fancied so, through expectation high Of knowledge; not was Godhead from her thought.

Greedily she ingorged without restraint, And knew not eating death: Satiate at length, And hightened as with wine, jocund and boon, Thus to herself she pleasingly began.

O sovran, virtuous, precious of all trees In Paradise! of operation blest

To sapience, hitherto obscured, infamed.

And thy fair fruit let hang, as to no end Created; but henceforth my early care, Not without song, each morning, and due praise, Shall tend thee, and the fertile burden ease Of thy full branches offered free to all; Till, dieted by thee, I grow mature

In knowledge, as the Gods, who all things know; Though others envy what they cannot give: For, had the gift been theirs, it had not here Thus grown. Experience, next, to thee I owe, Best guide; not following thee, I had remained In ignorance; thou openest wisdom’s way, And givest access, though secret she retire.

And I perhaps am secret: Heaven is high, High, and remote to see from thence distinct Each thing on Earth; and other care perhaps May have diverted from continual watch Our great Forbidder, safe with all his spies About him. But to Adam in what sort Shall I appear? shall I to him make known As yet my change, and give him to partake Full happiness with me, or rather not, But keeps the odds of knowledge in my power Without copartner? so to add what wants In female sex, the more to draw his love, And render me more equal; and perhaps, A thing not undesirable, sometime

Superiour; for, inferiour, who is free This may be well: But what if God have seen, And death ensue? then I shall be no more!

And Adam, wedded to another Eve,

Shall live with her enjoying, I extinct; A death to think! Confirmed then I resolve, Adam shall share with me in bliss or woe: So dear I love him, that with him all deaths I could endure, without him live no life.

So saying, from the tree her step she turned; But first low reverence done, as to the Power That dwelt within, whose presence had infused Into the plant sciential sap, derived From nectar, drink of Gods. Adam the while, Waiting desirous her return, had wove Of choicest flowers a garland, to adorn Her tresses, and her rural labours crown; As reapers oft are wont their harvest-queen.

Great joy he promised to his thoughts, and new Solace in her return, so long delayed: Yet oft his heart, divine of something ill, Misgave him; he the faltering measure felt; And forth to meet her went, the way she took That morn when first they parted: by the tree Of knowledge he must pass; there he her met, Scarce from the tree returning; in her hand A bough of fairest fruit, that downy smiled, New gathered, and ambrosial smell diffused.

To him she hasted; in her face excuse Came prologue, and apology too prompt; Which, with bland words at will, she thus addressed.

Hast thou not wondered, Adam, at my stay?

Thee I have missed, and thought it long, deprived Thy presence; agony of love till now Not felt, nor shall be twice; for never more Mean I to try, what rash untried I sought, The pain of absence from thy sight. But strange Hath been the cause, and wonderful to hear: This tree is not, as we are told, a tree Of danger tasted, nor to evil unknown Opening the way, but of divine effect To open eyes, and make them Gods who taste; And hath been tasted such: The serpent wise, Or not restrained as we, or not obeying, Hath eaten of the fruit; and is become, Not dead, as we are threatened, but thenceforth Endued with human voice and human sense, Reasoning to admiration; and with me Persuasively hath so prevailed, that I Have also tasted, and have also found The effects to correspond; opener mine eyes, Dim erst, dilated spirits, ampler heart, And growing up to Godhead; which for thee Chiefly I sought, without thee can despise.

For bliss, as thou hast part, to me is bliss; Tedious, unshared with thee, and odious soon.

Thou therefore also taste, that equal lot May join us, equal joy, as equal love; Lest, thou not tasting, different degree Disjoin us, and I then too late renounce Deity for thee, when Fate will not permit.

Thus Eve with countenance blithe her story told; But in her cheek distemper flushing glowed.

On the other side Adam, soon as he heard The fatal trespass done by Eve, amazed, Astonied stood and blank, while horrour chill Ran through his veins, and all his joints relaxed; From his slack hand the garland wreathed for Eve Down dropt, and all the faded roses shed: Speechless he stood and pale, till thus at length First to himself he inward silence broke.

O fairest of Creation, last and best Of all God’s works, Creature in whom excelled Whatever can to sight or thought be formed, Holy, divine, good, amiable, or sweet!

How art thou lost! how on a sudden lost, Defaced, deflowered, and now to death devote!

Rather, how hast thou yielded to transgress The strict forbiddance, how to violate The sacred fruit forbidden! Some cursed fraud Of enemy hath beguiled thee, yet unknown, And me with thee hath ruined; for with thee Certain my resolution is to die:

How can I live without thee! how forego Thy sweet converse, and love so dearly joined, To live again in these wild woods forlorn!

Should God create another Eve, and I Another rib afford, yet loss of thee Would never from my heart: no, no!I feel The link of Nature draw me: flesh of flesh, Bone of my bone thou art, and from thy state Mine never shall be parted, bliss or woe.

So having said, as one from sad dismay Recomforted, and after thoughts disturbed Submitting to what seemed remediless, Thus in calm mood his words to Eve he turned.

Bold deed thou hast presumed, adventurous Eve, And peril great provoked, who thus hast dared, Had it been only coveting to eye

That sacred fruit,