Page:Paradise lost by Milton, John.djvu/210

204 Against unequal arms to fight in pain, Against unpained, impassive; from which evil Ruin must needs ensue. For what avails Valor or strength, though matchless, quelled with pain Which all subdues, and makes remiss the hands Of mightiest? Sense of pleasure we may well Spare out of life perhaps, and not repine, But live content, which is the calmest life; But pain is perfect misery, the worst Of evils, and excessive overturns All patience. He who therefore can invent With what more forcible we may offend Our yet unwounded enemies, or arm Ourselves with like defence, to me deserves No less than for deliverance what we owe.'
 * "Whereto with look composed Satan replied:

'Not uninvented that, which thou aright Believest so main to our success, I bring.— Which of us who beholds the bright surface Of this ethereous mould whereon we stand, This continent of spacious Heaven, adorned With plant, fruit, flower ambrosial, gems and gold; Whose eye so superficially surveys These things as not to mind from whence they grow, Deep underground, materials dark and crude