Hung ore my Realm, link'd in a golden Chain

To that side Heav'n from whence your Legions fell:

If that way be your walk, you have not farr;

So much the neerer danger; goe and speed;

Havock and spoil and ruin are my gain.

He ceas'd; and SATAN staid not to reply,

But glad that now his Sea should find a shore,

With fresh alacritie and force renew'd

Springs upward like a Pyramid of fire

Into the wilde expanse, and through the shock

Of fighting Elements, on all sides round

Environ'd wins his way; harder beset

And more endanger'd, then when ARGO pass'd

Through BOSPORUS betwixt the justling Rocks:

Or when ULYSSES on the Larbord shunnd

CHARYBDIS, and by th' other whirlpool steard.

So he with difficulty and labour hard

Mov'd on, with difficulty and labour hee;

But hee once past, soon after when man fell,

Strange alteration! Sin and Death amain

Following his track, such was the will of Heav'n,

Pav'd after him a broad and beat'n way

Over the dark Abyss, whose boiling Gulf

Tamely endur'd a Bridge of wondrous length

From Hell continu'd reaching th' utmost Orbe

Of this frail World; by which the Spirits perverse

With easie intercourse pass to and fro

To tempt or punish mortals, except whom

God and good Angels guard by special grace.

But now at last the sacred influence

Of light appears, and from the walls of Heav'n

Shoots farr into the bosom of dim Night

A glimmering dawn; here Nature first begins

Her fardest verge, and CHAOS to retire

As from her outmost works a brok'n foe

With tumult less and with less hostile din,

That SATAN with less toil, and now with ease

Wafts on the calmer wave by dubious light

And like a weather-beaten Vessel holds

Gladly the Port, though Shrouds and Tackle torn;

Or in the emptier waste, resembling Air,

Weighs his spread wings, at leasure to behold

Farr off th' Empyreal Heav'n, extended wide

In circuit, undetermind square or round,

With Opal Towrs and Battlements adorn'd

Of living Saphire, once his native Seat;

And fast by hanging in a golden Chain

This pendant world, in bigness as a Starr

Of smallest Magnitude close by the Moon.

Thither full fraught with mischievous revenge,

Accurst, and in a cursed hour he hies.

HAil holy light, ofspring of Heav'n first-born,

Or of th' Eternal Coeternal beam

May I express thee unblam'd? since God is light,

And never but in unapproached light

Dwelt from Eternitie, dwelt then in thee,

Bright effluence of bright essence increate.

Or hear'st thou rather pure Ethereal stream,

Whose Fountain who shall tell? before the Sun,

Before the Heavens thou wert, and at the voice

Of God, as with a Mantle didst invest

The rising world of waters dark and deep,

Won from the void and formless infinite.

Thee I re-visit now with bolder wing,

Escap't the STYGIAN Pool, though long detain'd

In that obscure sojourn, while in my flight

Through utter and through middle darkness borne

With other notes then to th' ORPHEAN Lyre

I sung of CHAOS and ETERNAL NIGHT,

Taught by the heav'nly Muse to venture down

The dark descent, and up to reascend,

Though hard and rare: thee I revisit safe,

And feel thy sovran vital Lamp; but thou

Revisit'st not these eyes, that rowle in vain

To find thy piercing ray, and find no dawn;

So thick a drop serene hath quencht thir Orbs,

Or dim suffusion veild. Yet not the more

Cease I to wander where the Muses haunt

Cleer Spring, or shadie Grove, or Sunnie Hill,

Smit with the love of sacred song; but chief

Thee SION and the flowrie Brooks beneath

That wash thy hallowd feet, and warbling flow,

Nightly I visit: nor somtimes forget

Those other two equal'd with me in Fate,

So were I equal'd with them in renown,

Blind THAMYRIS and blind MAEONIDES,

And TIRESIAS and PHINEUS Prophets old.

Then feed on thoughts, that voluntarie move

Harmonious numbers; as the wakeful Bird

Sings darkling, and in shadiest Covert hid

Tunes her nocturnal Note. Thus with the Year

Seasons return, but not to me returns

Day, or the sweet approach of Ev'n or Morn,

Or sight of vernal bloom, or Summers Rose,

Or flocks, or herds, or human face divine;

But cloud in stead, and ever-during dark

Surrounds me, from the chearful waies of men

Cut off, and for the book of knowledg fair

Presented with a Universal blanc

Of Natures works to mee expung'd and ras'd,

And wisdome at one entrance quite shut out.

So much the rather thou Celestial light

Shine inward, and the mind through all her powers

Irradiate, there plant eyes, all mist from thence

Purge and disperse, that I may see and tell

Of things invisible to mortal sight.

Now had the Almighty Father from above,

From the pure Empyrean where he sits

High Thron'd above all highth, bent down his eye,

His own works and their works at once to view:

About him all the Sanctities of Heaven

Stood thick as Starrs, and from his sight receiv'd

Beatitude past utterance; on his right

The radiant image of his Glory sat,

His onely Son; On Earth he first beheld

Our two first Parents, yet the onely two

Of mankind, in the happie Garden plac't,

Reaping immortal fruits of joy and love,

Uninterrupted joy, unrivald love

In blissful solitude; he then survey'd

Hell and the Gulf between, and SATAN there

Coasting the wall of Heav'n on this side Night

In the dun Air sublime, and ready now

To stoop with wearied wings, and willing feet

On the bare outside of this World, that seem'd

Firm land imbosom'd without Firmament,

Uncertain which, in Ocean or in Air.

Him God beholding from his prospect high,

Wherein past, present, future he beholds,

Thus to his onely Son foreseeing spake.

Onely begotten Son, seest thou what rage

Transports our adversarie, whom no bounds

Prescrib'd, no barrs of Hell, nor all the chains

Heapt on him there, nor yet the main Abyss

Wide interrupt can hold; so bent he seems

On desperat revenge, that shall redound

Upon his own rebellious head. And now

Through all restraint broke loose he wings his way

Not farr off Heav'n, in the Precincts of light,

Directly towards the new created World,

And Man there plac't, with purpose to assay

If him by force he can destroy, or worse,

By som false guile pervert; and shall pervert;

For man will heark'n to his glozing lyes,

And easily transgress the sole Command,

Sole pledge of his obedience: So will fall

Hee and his faithless Progenie: whose fault?

Whose but his own? ingrate, he had of mee

All he could have; I made him just and right,

Sufficient to have stood, though free to fall.

Such I created all th' Ethereal Powers

And Spirits, both them who stood & them who faild;

Freely they stood who stood, and fell who fell.

Not free, what proof could they have givn sincere

Of true allegiance, constant Faith or Love,

Where onely what they needs must do, appeard,

Not what they would? what praise could they receive?

What pleasure I from such obedience paid,

When Will and Reason (Reason also is choice)

Useless and vain, of freedom both despoild,

Made passive both, had servd necessitie,

Not mee. They therefore as to right belongd,

So were created, nor can justly accuse

Thir maker, or thir making, or thir Fate;