Chapter 1
(excerpt)
I,
WHO erewhile the happy Garden sung
By one man's disobedience lost, now
sing
Recovered Paradise to all mankind,
By one man's firm obedience fully
tried
Through all temptation, and the Tempter foiled
In all his wiles,
defeated and repulsed,
And Eden raised in the waste Wilderness.
Thou
Spirit, who led'st this glorious Eremite
Into the desert, his victorious
field
Against the spiritual foe, and brought'st him thence
By proof the
undoubted Son of God, inspire,
As thou art wont, my prompted song, else
mute,
And bear through highth or depth of Nature's bounds,
With prosperous
wing full summed, to tell of deeds
Above heroic, though in secret
done,
And unrecorded left through many an age:
Worthy to have not remained
so long unsung.
Now had the great Proclaimer, with a voice
More awful
than the sound of trumpet, cried
Repentance, and Heaven's kingdom nigh at
hand
To all baptized. To his great baptism flocked
With awe the regions
round, and with them came
From Nazareth the son of Joseph deemed
To the
flood
Unmarked, unknown. But him the Baptist soon
Descried, divinely
warned, and witness bore
As to his worthier, and would have resigned
To
him his heavenly office. Nor was long
His witness unconfirmed: on him
baptized
Heaven opened, and in likeness of a Dove
The Spirit descended,
while the Father's voice
From Heaven pronounced him his beloved Son.
That
heard the Adversary, who, roving still
About the world, at that assembly
famed
Would not be last, and, with the voice divine
Nigh thunder-struck,
the exalted man to whom
Such high attest was given a while surveyed
With
wonder; then, with envy fraught and rage,
Flies to his place, nor rests, but
in mid air
To council summons all his mighty Peers,
Within thick clouds
and dark tenfold involved,
A gloomy consistory; and them amidst,
With
looks aghast and sad, he thus bespake:--
"O ancient Powers of Air and
this wide World
(For much more willingly I mention Air,
This our old
conquest, than remember Hell,
Our hated habitation), well ye know
How many
ages, as the years of men,
This Universe we have possessed, and ruled
In
manner at our will the affairs of Earth,
Since Adam and his facile consort
Eve
Lost Paradise, deceived by me, though since
With dread attending when
that fatal wound
Shall be inflicted by the seed of Eve
Upon my head. Long
the decrees of Heaven
Delay, for longest time to Him is short;
And now,
too soon for us, the circling hours
This dreaded time have compassed, wherein
we
Must bide the stroke of that long-threatened wound
(At least, if so we
can, and by the head
Broken be not intended all our power
To be infringed,
our freedom and our being
In this fair empire won of Earth and Air)--
For
this ill news I bring: The Woman's Seed,
Destined to this, is late of woman
born.
His birth to our just fear gave no small cause;
But his growth now
to youth's full flower, displaying
All virtue, grace and wisdom to
achieve
Things highest, greatest, multiplies my fear.
Before him a great
Prophet, to proclaim
His coming, is sent harbinger, who all
Invites, and
in the consecrated stream
Pretends to wash off sin, and fit them
so
Purified to receive him pure, or rather
To do him honour as their King.
All come,
And he himself among them was baptized--
Not thence to be more
pure, but to receive
The testimony of Heaven, that who he is
Thenceforth
the nations may not doubt. I saw
The Prophet do him reverence; on him,
rising
Out of the water, Heaven above the clouds
Unfold her crystal doors;
thence on his head
A perfet Dove descend (whate'er it meant);
And out of
Heaven the sovraign voice I heard,
'This is my Son beloved,--in him am
pleased.'
His mother, than, is mortal, but his Sire
He who obtains the
monarchy of Heaven;
And what will He not do to advance his Son?
His
first-begot we know, and sore have felt,
When his fierce thunder drove us to
the Deep;
Who this is we must learn, for Man he seems
In all his
lineaments, though in his face
The glimpses of his Father's glory
shine.
Ye see our danger on the utmost edge
Of hazard, which admits no
long debate,
But must with something sudden be opposed
(Not force, but
well-couched fraud, well-woven snares),
Ere in the head of nations he
appear,
Their king, their leader, and supreme on Earth.
I, when no other
durst, sole undertook
The dismal expedition to find out
And ruin Adam, and
the exploit performed
Successfully: a calmer voyage now
Will waft me; and
the way found prosperous once
Induces best to hope of like success."
