LITMIR.BIZ

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in a chariot drawn by fiery steeds.

      The stairs were then let down, whether to dare

      The Fiend by easy ascent, or aggravate

      His sad exclusion from the doors of bliss:

      Direct against which opened from beneath,

      Just o’er the blissful seat of Paradise,

      A passage down to the Earth, a passage wide,

      Wider by far than that of after-times

      Over mount Sion, and, though that were large,

      Over the Promised Land to God so dear;

      By which, to visit oft those happy tribes,

      On high behests his angels to and fro

      Passed frequent, and his eye with choice regard

      From Paneas, the fount of Jordan’s flood,

      To Beersaba, where the Holy Land

      Borders on Egypt and the Arabian shore;

      So wide the opening seemed, where bounds were set

      To darkness, such as bound the ocean wave.

      Satan from hence, now on the lower stair,

      That scaled by steps of gold to Heaven-gate,

      Looks down with wonder at the sudden view

      Of all this world at once. As when a scout,

      Through dark and desert ways with peril gone

      All night; at last by break of cheerful dawn

      Obtains the brow of some high-climbing hill,

      Which to his eye discovers unaware

      The goodly prospect of some foreign land

      First seen, or some renowned metropolis

      With glistering spires and pinnacles adorned,

      Which now the rising sun gilds with his beams:

      Such wonder seized, though after Heaven seen,

      The Spirit malign, but much more envy seized,

      At sight of all this world beheld so fair.

      Round he surveys (and well might, where he stood

      So high above the circling canopy

      Of night’s extended shade,) from eastern point

      Of Libra to the fleecy star that bears

      Andromeda far off Atlantic seas

      Beyond the horizon; then from pole to pole

      He views in breadth, and without longer pause

      Down right into the world’s first region throws

      His flight precipitant, and winds with ease

      Through the pure marble air his oblique way

      Amongst innumerable stars, that shone

      Stars distant, but nigh hand seemed other worlds;

      Or other worlds they seemed, or happy isles,

      Like those Hesperian gardens famed of old,

      Fortunate fields, and groves, and flowery vales,

      Thrice happy isles; but who dwelt happy there

      He staid not to inquire: Above them all

      The golden sun, in splendour likest Heaven,

      Allured his eye; thither his course he bends

      Through the calm firmament, (but up or down,

      By center, or eccentric, hard to tell,

      Or longitude,) where the great luminary

      Aloof the vulgar constellations thick,

      That from his lordly eye keep distance due,

      Dispenses light from far; they, as they move

      Their starry dance in numbers that compute

      Days, months, and years, towards his all-cheering lamp

      Turn swift their various motions, or are turned

      By his magnetic beam, that gently warms

      The universe, and to each inward part

      With gentle penetration, though unseen,

      Shoots invisible virtue even to the deep;

      So wonderously was set his station bright.

      There lands the Fiend, a spot like which perhaps

      Astronomer in the sun’s lucent orb

      Through his glazed optic tube yet never saw.

      The place he found beyond expression bright,

      Compared with aught on earth, metal or stone;

      Not all parts like, but all alike informed

      With radiant light, as glowing iron with fire;

      If metal, part seemed gold, part silver clear;

      If stone, carbuncle most or chrysolite,

      Ruby or topaz, to the twelve that shone

      In Aaron’s breast-plate, and a stone besides

      Imagined rather oft than elsewhere seen,

      That stone, or like to that which here below

      Philosophers in vain so long have sought,

      In vain, though by their powerful art they bind

      Volatile Hermes, and call up unbound

      In various shapes old Proteus from the sea,

      Drained through a limbeck to his native form.

      What wonder then if fields and regions here

      Breathe forth Elixir pure, and rivers run

      Potable gold, when with one virtuous touch

      The arch-chemic sun, so far from us remote,

      Produces, with terrestrial humour mixed,

      Here in the dark so many precious things

      Of colour glorious, and effect so rare?

      Here matter new to gaze the Devil met

      Undazzled; far and wide his eye commands;

      For sight no obstacle found here, nor shade,

      But all sun-shine, as when his beams at noon

      Culminate from the equator, as they now

      Shot upward still direct, whence no way round

      Shadow from body opaque can fall; and the air,

      Nowhere so clear, sharpened his visual ray

      To objects distant far, whereby he soon

      Saw within ken a glorious Angel stand,

      The same whom John saw also in the sun:

      His back was turned, but not his brightness hid;

      Of beaming sunny rays a golden tiar

      Circled his head, nor less his locks behind

      Illustrious on his shoulders fledge with wings

      Lay waving round; on some great charge employed

      He seemed, or fixed in cogitation deep.

      Glad was the Spirit impure, as now in hope

      To find who might direct his wandering flight

      To Paradise, the happy seat of Man,

      His

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