Page:The Complete Poetical Works of John Milton.djvu/265

 BOOK TENTH

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��By Death at last (and miserable it is

To be to others cause of misery,

Our own begotten, and of our loins to

bring

Into this cursed world a woeful race, That, after wretched life, must be at last Food for so foul a Monster), iu thy power It lies, yet ere conception, to prevent The race unblest, to being yet unbegot. Childless thou art; childless remain. So

Death

Shall be deceived his glut, and with us two 990

Be forced to satisfy his ravenous maw. But, if thou judge it hard and difficult, Conversing, looking, loving, to abstain From love's due rites, nuptial imbraces

sweet,

And with desire to languish without hope Before the present object languishing With like desire which would be misery And torment less than none of what we

dread Then, both our selves and seed at once to

free

From what we fear for both, let us make short ; :

Let us seek Death, or, he not found, supply With our own hands his office on ourselves. Why stand we longer shivering under fears That shew no end but death, and have the

power,

Of many ways to die the shortest choosing, Destruction with destruction to destroy ? "

She ended here, or vehement despair Broke off the rest; so much of death her

thoughts Had entertained as dyed her cheeks with

pale.

But Adam, with such counsel nothing swayed, 1010

To better hopes his more attentive mind Labouring had raised, and thus to Eve re- plied: " Eve, thy contempt of life and pleasure

seems

To argue in thee something more sublime And excellent than what thy mind con- temns:

But self-destruction therefore sought re- futes

That excellence thought in thee, and implies Not thy contempt, but anguish and regret For loss of life and pleasure overloved. Or, if thou covet death, as utmost end 1020

��Of misery, so thinking to evade

The penalty pronounced, doubt not but

God Hath wiselier armed his vengeful ire than

so To be forestalled. Much more I fear lest

death So snatched will not exempt us from the

pain

We are by doom to pay; rather such acts Of contumacy will provoke the Highest To make death in us live. Then let us

seek

Some safer resolution which methinks I have in view, calling to mind with heed Part of our sentence, that thy seed shall

bruise 1031

The Serpent's head. Piteous amends ! un- less Be meant whom I conjecture, our grand

foe,

Satan, who in the Serpent hath contrived Against us this deceit. To crush his head Would be revenge indeed which will be

lost By death brought on ourselves, or childless

days

Resolved as thou proposest; so our foe Shall scape his punishment ordained, and

we 1039

Instead shall double ours upon our heads. No more be mentioned, then, of violence Against ourselves, and wilful barrenness That cuts us off from hope, and savours

only

Rancour and pride, impatience and despite, Reluctance against God and his just yoke Laid on our necks. Remember with what

mild And gracious temper he both heard and

judged,

Without wrauth or reviling. We expected Immediate dissolution, which we thought Was meant by death that day; when, lo !

to thee 1050

Pains only in child-bearing were foretold, And bringing forth, soon recompensed with

jy

Fruit of thy womb. On me the curse aslope Glanced on the ground. With labour I

must earn My bread; what harm ? Idleness had been

worse;

My labour will sustain me; and, lest cold Or heat should injure us, his timely care

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