To search with wandering quest a place foretold 830 Should be, and, by concurring signs, ere now Created, vast and round, a place of bliss
In the purlieus of heaven, and therein plac'd A race of upstart creatures, to supply
Perhaps our vacant room, though more remov'd, 835 Lest heav'n surcharg'd with potent multitude Might hap to move new broils. Be this, or aught Than this more secret, now design'd, I haste To know, and, this once known, shall soon return, And bring ye to the place where thou and Death 840 Shall dwell at ease, and up and down unseen Wing silently the buxom air, imbalm'd
With odours; there ye shall be fed and fill'd Immeasurably, all things shall be your prey.
He ceas'd, for both seem'd highly pleas'd, and Death
Grinn'd horrible a gastly smile, to hear His famine should be fill'd, and blest his maw Destin'd to that good hour: no less rejoic'd His mother bad, and thus bespake her sire: The key of this infernal pit by due
And by command of heaven's all-powerful King, I keep, by him forbidden to unlock
These adamantine gates; against all force Death ready stands to interpose his dart,
842 buxom air] Spenser, F. Q. i. xi. 37.
'And therewith scourge the buxom air so sore.' Newton. 846 Grinn'd horrible] Imitated, Mr. Carey thinks, from Dante, Inf. v.;
'Stavvi Minos orribilmente e ringhia.'
Fearless to be o'ermatch'd by living might. But what owe I to his commands above, Who hates me, and hath hither thrust me down Into this gloom of Tartarus profound,
To sit in hateful office, here confin'd, Inhabitant of heaven and heavenly-born, Here, in perpetual agony and pain,
With terrors and with clamours compass'd round Of mine own brood, that on my bowels feed? Thou art my father, thou my author, thou My being gav'st me; whom should I obey But thee? whom follow? thou wilt bring me soon To that new world of light and bliss, among The Gods who live at ease, where I shall reign At thy right hand voluptuous, as beseems Thy daughter and thy darling, without end. Thus saying, from her side the fatal key, Sad instrument of all our woe, she took; And, towards the gate rolling her bestial train, Forthwith the huge portcullis high up drew, Which but herself not all the Stygian powers Could once have mov'd; then in the keyhole turns Th' intricate wards, and every bolt and bar Of massy iron or solid rock with ease Unfastens on a sudden open fly With impetuous recoil and jarring sound
868 live at ease] From Homer, Oɛol getα ¿woνtes. 6 open fly] Don Bellianis, part ii. chap. 19. brazen folding doors, grating harsh thunder on their Swift.
Open flew the turning hinges.'
Th' infernal doors, and on their hinge's grate Harsh thunder, that the lowest bottom shook Of Erebus. She open'd, but to shut
Excell'd her power; the gates wide open stood, That with extended wings a banner'd host Under spread ensigns marching might pass through With horse and chariots rank'd in loose array; So wide they stood, and like a furnace mouth Cast forth redounding smoke and ruddy flame. Before their eyes in sudden view appear The secrets of the hoary deep, a dark Illimitable ocean, without bound,
Without dimension, where length, breadth,and highth, And time and place are lost; where eldest Night And Chaos, ancestors of Nature, hold
Eternal anarchy amidst the noise
Of endless wars, and by confusion stand:
For Hot, Cold, Moist, and Dry, four champions fierce, Strive here for mastery, and to battle bring Their embryon atoms; they around the flag Of each his faction, in their several clans, Light-arm'd or heavy, sharp, smooth, swift, or slow, Swarm populous, unnumber'd as the sands Of Barca or Cyrene's torrid soil,
Levy'd to side with warring winds, and poise
889 Smoke] See Dante Il. Purg. c. xxiv.
'E giammai non si videro in fornace Vetri, o metalli sì lucenti erossi, Com' io vidi un, che dicea—
808 For hot] Ovid. Met. i. 19. Newton.
Their lighter wings. To whom these most adhere, He rules a moment; Chaos umpire sits,
And by decision more imbroils the fray
next him high arbiter
Into this wild abyss,
By which he reigns: Chance governs all. The womb of nature and perhaps her grave, Of neither sea, nor shore, nor air, nor fire, But all these in their pregnant causes mix'd Confusedly, and which thus must ever fight, Unless th' almighty Maker them ordain His dark materials to create more worlds: Into this wild abyss the wary fiend
Stood on the brink of hell, and look'd a while, Pondering his voyage; for no narrow frith
He had to cross. Nor was his ear less peal'd 920 With noises loud and ruinous, (to compare
Great things with small,) than when Bellona storms, With all her battering engines bent to rasc
Some capital city; or less than if this frame Of heaven were falling, and these elements In mutiny had from her axle torn
The stedfast earth. At last his sail-broad vans
He spreads for flight, and in the surging smoke Uplifted spurns the ground; thence many a league As in a cloudy chair ascending rides
Audacious; but, that seat soon failing, meets
927 sail-broad] See Maximi Tyrii Diss. vol. i. p. 214, ed. Reiske. Teiváσαi ràs лT8Qúyaç dσne loria. And Lucret. vi. 743. 'Pennarum vela remittunt.' Or consult Wakefield's note. See Milton's Prose Works, i. 148: ed. Symmons.
A vast vacuity: all unawares
Flutt'ring his pennons vain plumb down he drops. Ten thousand fathom deep, and to this hour Down had been falling, had not by ill chance The strong rebuff of some tumultuous cloud Instinct with fire and nitre hurried him As many miles aloft: that fury stay'd, Quench'd in a boggy Syrtis, neither sea,
Nor good dry land: nigh founder'd on he fares, 940 Treading the crude consistence, half on foot, Half flying; behoves him now both oar and sail. As when a gryfon through the wilderness With winged course o'er hill or moory dale Pursues the Arimaspian, who by stealth Had from his wakeful custody purloin'd The guarded gold: so eagerly the fiend
O'er bog or steep, through strait, rough, dense, or
936 rebuff] Compare Statii Theb. vii. 35.
'Atque illum Arctoæ labentem cardine portæ Tempestas æterna plagæ, prætentaque cœlo Agmina nimborum, primique Aquilonis hiatus In diversa ferunt.'
942 oar] Beaumont's Psyche, c. xvi. st. 224. 'Spreading their wings like oars.'
Marino's Sl. of the Inn. p. 49.
'With wings like feather'd oars.'
And Dante, Il. Purg. c. ii.
'Si che remo non vuol, ne altro velo.' C. xii. 4.
945 Arimaspian] Eschyli Prometheus, ver. 810. See Pomp. Mela;
lib. ii. c. 1. Solini Polyh. xv. 22. Aulularia, act iv. sc. 8. i. p. 142. Bulwer's Artif. Changeling, p. 102.
Prisciani Pervig. ver. 700. Plauti Plin. N. Hist. lib. iv. c. 26. See
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