Of thunder heard remote. Tow'rds him they bend With awful rev'rence prone; and as a god Extol him equal to the Highest in heav'n;
Nor fail'd they to express how much they prais'd, That for the general safety he despis'd
His own: for neither do the spirits damn'd Lose all their virtue; lest bad men should boast Their specious deeds on earth, which glory excites, Or close ambition varnish'd o'er with zeal. Thus they their doubtful consultations dark Ended, rejoicing in their matchless chief: As when from mountain-tops the dusky clouds Ascending, while the north-wind sleeps, o'erspread Heav'n's cheerful face, the louring element Scowls o'er the darken'd landskip snow, or shower; If chance the radient sun with farewel sweet Extends his evening beam, the fields revive, The birds their notes renew, and bleating herds Attest their joy, that hill and valley rings. O shame to men! devil with devil damn'd Firm concord holds, men only disagree Of creatures rational, though under hope Of heav'nly grace: and God proclaiming peace Yet live in hatred, enmity, and strife Among themselves, and levy cruel wars, Wasting the earth, each other to destroy: As if (which might induce us to accord) Man had not hellish foes enow besides, That day and night for his destruction wait. The Stygian council thus dissolv'd; and forth In order came the grand infernal peers: 'Midst came their mighty paramount, and seem'd Alone th' antagonist of heav'n, nor less Than hell's dread emperor with pomp supreme, And God-like imitated state: him round
A globe of fiery Seraphim inclos'd
With bright imblazonry, and horrent arms. Then of their session ended they bid cry With trumpets regal sound the great result;
end Tow'rds the four winds four speedy Cherubim Put to their mouths the sounding alchemy, By herald's voice explain'd; the hollow abyss Heard far and wide, and all the host of hell With deaf'ning shout return'd them loud acclaim. Thence more at ease their minds, and somewhat rais'd
By false presumptuous hope, the ranged powers Disband, and wand'ring each his several way Pursues, as inclination or sad choice
Leads him perplex'd, where he may likeliest find Truce to his restless thoughts, and entertain The irksome hours, till his great chief return. Part on the plain, or in the air sublime, Upon the wing, or in swift race contend, As at th' Olympian games or Pythian fields; Part curb their fiery steeds, or shun the goal With rapid wheels, or fronted brigades form, As when, to warn proud cities, war appears Wag'd in the troubled sky, and armies rush To battle in the clouds, before each van Prick forth the airy knights and couch their Till thickest legions close; with feats of arms From either end of heav'n the welkin burns. Others, with vast Typhean rage more fell, Rend up both rocks and hills, and ride the air In whirlwind; hell scarce holds the wild uproar, As when Alcides, from (Echalia crown'd
With conquest, felt th' invenom'd robe, and tore Through pain up by the roots Thessalian pines; And Lichas from the top of Œta threw Into th' Euboic sea. Others more mild, Retreated in a silent valley, sing
With notes angelical to many a harp Their own heroic deeds and hapless fall By doom of battle; and complain that fate Free virtue should enthral to force or chance. Their songs were partial; but th' harmony (What could it less when spirits immortal sing?)
Suspended hell, and took with ravishment
The thronging audience. In discourse more sweet, (For eloquence the soul, song charms the sense), Others apart sat on a hill retir'd,
In thoughts more elevate, and reason'd high Of providence, foreknowledge, will, and fate ; Fix'd fate, free will, foreknowledge absolute; And found no end in wand'ring mazes lost. Of good and evil much they argu'd then, Of happiness and final misery,
Passion, and apathy, and glory, and shame; Vain wisdom all, and false philosophy: Yet, with a pleasing sorcery, could charm Pain for a while, or anguish, and excite Fallacious hope, or arm th' obdured breast With stubborn patience, as with treple steel. Another part in squadrons and gross bands, On bold adventure to discover wide That dismal world, if any clime perhaps Might yield them easier habitation, bend Four ways their flying march, along the banks Of four infernal rivers, that disgorge Into the burning lake their baleful streams Abhorred Styx, the flood of deadly hate; Sad Acheron, of sorrow black and deep: Cocytus nam'd, of lamentation loud Heard on the rueful stream; fierce Phlegethon, Whose waves of torrent fire inflame with rage. Far off from these, a slow and silent stream,
Lethe, the river of oblivion, rolls
Her watery labyrinth; whereof who drinks Forthwith his former state and being forgets, Forgets both joy and grief, pleasure and pain. Beyond this flood a frozen continent
Lies dark and wild, beat with perpetual storms Of whirlwind and dire hail, which on firm land Thaws not, but gathers heap, and ruin seems Of ancient pile; all else deep snow and ice; A gulf profound, as that Serbonian bog
Betwixt Damiata and mount Casius old,
Where armies whole have sunk; the parching air Burns frore, and cold performs th' effect of fire. Thither, by harpy-footed furies hal'd,
At certain revolutions all the damn'd
Are brought; and feel by turns the bitter change Of fierce extremes, extremes by change more fierce; From beds of raging fire to starve in ice Their soft ethereal warmth, and there to pine Immoveable, infix'd, and frozen round, Periods of time; thence hurried back to fire, They ferry over this Lethean sound
Both to and fro, their sorrow to augment, And wish and struggle, as they pass, to reach The tempting stream, with one small drop to lose In sweet forgetfulness all pain and woe, All in one moment and so near the brink: But Fate withstands, and to oppose th' attempt Medusa with Gorgonian terror guards
The ford, and of itself the water flies
All taste of living weight, as once it fled The lip of Tantalus. Thus roving on
In confus'd march forlorn, th' advent'rous bands With shudd'ring horror pale, and eyes aghast, View'd first their lamentable lot, and found No rest: through many a dark and dreary vale They pass'd, and many a region dolorous,
O'er many a frozen, many a fiery Alp,
Rocks, caves, lakes, fens, bogs, dens, and shades of death,
An universe of death; which God by curse
Created evil, for evil only good,
Where all life dies, death lives, and nature breeds, Perverse, all monstrous, all prodigious things, Abominable, inutterable and worse
Than fables yet have feign'd, or fear conceiv'd, Gorgons, and hydras, and chimæras, dire. Meanwhile the adversary of God and man, Satan, with thoughts inflam'd of highest design,
Puts on swift wings, and tow'rds the gates of hell Explores his solitary flight: sometimes
He scours the right hand coast, sometimes the left; Now shaves with level wing the deep, then soars Up to the fiery concave tow'ring high,' As when far off at sea a fleet descry'd, Hangs in the clouds, by equinoctial winds Close sailing from Bangala, or the isles
Of Ternate and Tidore, whence merchants bring Their spicy drugs; they on the trading flood Through the wide Ethiopian to the Cape
Ply, stemming nightly tow'rds the pole; so seem'd Far off the flying fiend. At last appear
Hell-bounds, high reaching to the horrid roof; And thrice threefold the gates; three folds were brass, Three iron, three of adamantine rock Impenerable, impal'd with circling fire,
Yet unconsum'd. Before the gates there sat On either side a formidable shape:
The one seem'd woman to the waist, and fair; But ended foul in many a scaly fold Voluminous and vast; a serpent arm'd
With mortal sting: about her middle round A cry of hell-hounds never ceasing bark'd With wide Cerberean mouths full loud, and rung A hideous peal; yet, when they list, would creep, If ought disturb'd their noise, into her womb, And kennel there; yet there still bark'd and howl'd, Within unseen. Far less abhorr'd than these Vex'd Scylla, bathing in the sea that parts Calabria from the hoarse Trinacrian shore; Nor uglier follow the night-hag, when call'd In secret, riding through the air she comes, Lur'd with the smell of infant-blood, to dance With Lapland witches, while the lab'ring moon Eclipses at their charms. The other shape, If shape it might be call'd that shape had none Distinguishable in member, joint, or limb; Or substance might be call'd that shadow seem'd,
« ElőzőTovább » |