Page:The Complete Poetical Works of John Milton.djvu/254

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��Were such as under government well

seemed

Unseemly to bear rule ; which was thy part And person, hadst thou known thyself

aright."

So having said, he thus to Eve in few: " Say, Woman, what is this which thou

hast done ? "

To whom sad Eve, with shame nigh over- whelmed, 159 Confessing soon, yet not before her Judge Bold or loquacious, thus abashed replied: " The Serpent me beguiled, and I did eat." Which when the Lord God heard, with- out delay

To judgment he proceeded on the accused Serpent, though brute, unable to transfer The guilt on him who made him instru- ment

Of mischief, and polluted from the end Of his creation justly then accursed, As vitiated in nature. More to know Concerned not Man (since he no further knew), 170

Nor altered his offence; yet God at last To Satan, first in sin, his doom applied, Though in mysterious terms, judged as

then best; And on the Serpent thus his curse let

fall: " Because thou hast done this, thou art

accursed

Above all cattle, each beast of the field ; Upon thy belly grovelling thou shalt go, And dust shalt eat all the days of thy life. Between thee and the Woman I will put Enmity, and between thine and her seed; Her seed shall bruise thy head, thou bruise his heel." 181

So spake this oracle then verified When Jesus, son of Mary, second Eve, Saw Satan fall like lightning down from

Heaven, Prince of the Air; then, rising from his

grave,

Spoiled Principalities and Powers, tri- umphed

In open shew, and, with ascension bright, Captivity led captive through the Air, The realm itself of Satan, long usurped, Whom He shall tread at last under our feet, 190

Even He who now foretold his fatal bruise, And to the Woman thus his sentence turned:

��" Thy sorrow I will greatly multiply By thy conception; children thou shalt

bring

In sorrow forth, and to thy husband's will Thine shall submit; he over thee shall

rule."

On Adam last thus judgment he pro- nounced: " Because thou hast hearkened to the voice

of thy wife,

And eaten of the Tree concerning which I charged thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat thereof, 200

Curs'd is the ground for thy sake; thou in

sorrow

Shalt eat thereof all the days of thy life ; Thorns also and thistles it shall bring thee

forth Unbid; and thou shalt eat the herb of the

field; In the sweat of thy face thou shalt eat

bread,

Till thou return unto the ground; for thou Out of the ground wast taken: know thy

birth,

For dust thou art, and shalt to dust re- turn."

So judged he Man, both Judge and Sa- viour sent,

And the instant stroke of death, denounced

that day, 210

Removed far off; then, pitying how they

stood

Before him naked to the air, that now Must suffer change, disdained not to begin Thenceforth the form of servant to assume. As when he washed his servants' feet, so

now,

As Father of his family, he clad Their nakedness with skins of beasts, or

slain,

Or, as the snake, with youthful coat repaid ; And thought not much to clothe his ene- mies.

Nor he their outward only with the skins Of beasts, but inward nakedness, much more 221

Opprobrious,with his robe of righteousness Arraying, covered from his Father's sight. To him with swift ascent he up returned, Into his blissful bosom reassumed In glory as of old; to him, appeased, All, though all-knowing, what had passed

with Man Recounted, mixing intercession sweet.

�� �