Page:The Complete Poetical Works of John Milton.djvu/336

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��SAMSON AGONISTES

��The air, imprisoned also, close and damp, Unwholesome draught. But here I feel

amends

The breath of heaven fresh blowing, pure

and sweet, 10

With day-spring born; here leave me to

respire.

This day a solemn feast the people hold To Dagon, their sea-idol, and forbid Laborious works. Unwillingly this rest Their superstition yields me; hence, with

leave

Retiring from the popular noise, I seek This unfrequented place to find some

ease

Ease to the body some, none to the mind From restless thoughts, that, like a deadly

swarm

Of hornets armed, no sooner found alone 20 But rush upon me thronging, and pre- sent Times past, what once I was, and what am

now. Oh, wherefore was my birth from Heaven

foretold

Twice by an Angel, who at last, in sight Of both my parents, all in flames ascended From off the altar where an offering

burned,

As in a fiery column charioting His godlike presence, and from some great

act

Or benefit revealed to Abraham's race ? Why was my breeding ordered and pre- scribed 30 As of a person separate to God, Designed for great exploits, if I must

die Betrayed, captived, and both my eyes put

out,

Made of my enemies the scorn and gaze, To grind in brazen fetters under task With this heaven-gifted strength ? O glo- rious strength,

Put to the labour of a beast, debased Lower than bond-slave ! Promise was

that I

Should Israel from Philistian yoke de- liver !

Ask for this great Deliverer now, and find him 40

Eyeless in Gaza, at the mill with slaves, Himself in bonds under Philistian yoke. Yet stay; let me not rashly call in doubt Divine prediction. What if all foretold

��Had been fulfilled but through mine own

default ?

Whom have I to complain of but myself, Who this high gift of strength committed

to me, In what part lodged, how easily bereft

me,

Under the seal of silence could not keep, But weakly to a woman must reveal it, 50 O'ercome with importunity and tears ? O impotence of mind in body strong ! But what is strength without a double

share

Of wisdom ? Vast, unwieldy, burdensome, Proudly secure, yet liable to fall By weakest subtleties; not made to rule, But to subserve where wisdom bears com- mand. God, when he gave me strength, to shew

withal How slight the gift was, hung it in my

hair.

But peace ! I must not quarrel with the will 60

Of highest dispensation, which herein Haply had ends above my reach to know. Suffices that to me strength is my bane, And proves the source of all my mise- ries

So many, and so huge, that each apart Would ask a life to wail. But, chief of

all,

O loss of sight, of thee I moat complain ! Blind among enemies ! O worse than

chains,

Dungeon, or beggary, or decrepit age ! Light, the prime work of God, to me is ex- tinct, 7 o And all her various objects of delight Annulled, which might in part my grief

have eased.

Inferior to the vilest now become Of man or worm, the vilest here excel

me:

They creep, yet see; I, dark in light, ex- posed To daily fraud, contempt, abuse, and

wrong,

Within doors, or without, still as a fool, In power of others, never in my own Scarce half I seem to live, dead more than

half.

O dark, dark, dark, amid the blaze of noon, So

Irrecoverably dark, total eclipse

�� �