Imatges de pàgina
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As mock'd they storm: great laughte: was in Heaven,
And looking down, to see the hubbub strange,
And hear the din: thus was the building left
Ridiculous, and the work Confusion named.
Whereto thus Adam, fatherly displeased:
O execrable son! so to aspire
Above his brethren; to himself assuming
Authority usurp'd, from God not given:
He gave us only over beast, fish, fowl,
Dominion absolute; that right we hold
By his donation; but man over men
He made not lord; such title to himself
Reserving, human left from human free.
But this usurper his encroachment proud
Stays not on Man; to God his tower intends
Siege and defiance: wretched man! what food
Will he convey up thither, to sustain
Himself and his rash army; where thin air
Above the clouds will pine his entrails gross,
And famish him of breath, if not of bread?

To whom thus Michaël: Justly thou abhorr'st
That son, who on the quiet state of men
Such trouble brought, affecting to subdue
Rational liberty; yet know withal,

Since thy original lapse, true liberty

Is lost, which always with right reason dwells
Twinn'd, and from her hath no dividual being:
Reason in man obscured or not obey'd,

Immediately inordinate desires

And upstart passions catch the government

From reason; and to servitude reduce

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Man, till then free. Therefore, since he permits 90
Within himself unworthy powers to reign
Over free reason, God, in judgment just,
Subjects him from without to violent lords;
Who oft as undeservedly enthral
His outward freedom: tyranny must be ;
Though to the tyrant thereby no excuse.

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Yet sometimes nations will decline so low
From virtue, which is reason, that no wrong,
But justice and some fatal curse annex'd,
Deprives them of their outward liberty;

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Their inward lost witness the irreverent son
Of him who built the ark; who, for the shame
Done to his father, heard this heavy curse,

Servant of servants, on his vicious race.

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Thus will this latter, as the former world,

Still tend from bad to worse; till God at last,
Wearied with their iniquities, withdraw
His presence from among them, and avert
His holy eyes; resolving from thenceforth
To leave them to their own polluted ways;
And one peculiar nation to select
From all the rest, of whom to be invoked,
A nation from one faithful man to spring:
Him on this side Euphrates yet residing,
Bred up in idol-worship: O, that men
(Canst thou believe?) should be so stupid grown,
While yet the patriarch lived who scaped the flood,
As to forsake the living God, and fall

To worship their own work in wood and stone

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For Gods! Yet him God the Most High vouchsafes
To call by vision, from his father's house,
His kindred, and false Gods, into a land
Which he will show him; and from him will raise
A mighty nation; and upon him shower
His benediction so that in his seed

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All nations shall be bless'd: he straight obeys;

Not knowing to what land, yet firm believes :
I see him, but thou canst not, with what faith

He leaves his Gods, his friends, and native soil,
Ur of Chaldea, passing now the ford
To Haran; after him a cumbrous train
Of herds and flocks, and numerous servitude;

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Not wandering poor, but trusting all his wealth
With God, who call'd him, in a land unknown.

Canaan he now attains; I see his tents
Pitch'd about Sechem, and the neighbouring plain
Of Moreh; there by promise he receives
Gift to his progeny of all that land,

From Hamath northward to the Desert south
(Things by their names I call, thou yet unnamed ;)
From Hermon east to the great western Sea;
Mount Hermon, yonder sea; each place behold
In prospect, as I point them; on the shore
Mount Carmel; here, the double-founted stream,
Jordan, true limit eastward; but his sons
Shall dwell to Senir, that long ridge of hills.
This ponder, that all nations of the earth
Shall in his seed be blessed by that seed

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Is meant thy great Deliverer, who shall bruise
The Serpent's head; whereof to thee anon
Plainlier shall be reveal'd. This patriarch bless'd,
Whom faithful Abraham due time shall call,
A son, and of his son a grandchild, leaves;
Like him in faith, in wisdom, and renown:

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The grandchild, with twelve sons increased, departs
From Canaan, to a land hereafter call'd
Egypt, divided by the river Nile ; `

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See where it flows, disgorging at seven mouths

Into the sea to sojourn in that land

He comes, invited by a younger son

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In time of dearth; a son, whose worthy deeds

Raise him to be the second in that realm

Of Pharaoh there he dies, and leaves his race
Growing into a nation, and now grown
Suspected to a sequent king, who seeks

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To stop their overgrowth, as inmate guests

Inhospitably, and kills their infant males:

Too numerous; whence of guests he makes them slaves

Till by two brethren (these two brethren call'd
Moses and Aaron) sent from God to claim
His people from enthralment, they return,
With glory and spoil, back to their promised land.

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But first, the lawless tyrant, who denies

To know their God, or message to regard,

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Must be compell'd by signs and judgments dire; 175
To blood ushed the rivers must be turn'd;
Frogs, lice, and flies must all his palace fill
With loathed intrusion, and fill all the land;
His cattle must of rot and murrain die ;
Botches and blains must all his flesh emboss,
And all his people; thunder mix'd with hail,
Hail mix'd with fire, must rend the Egyptian sky,
And wheel on the earth, devouring where it rolls;
What it devours not, herb, or fruit, or grain,
A darksome cloud of locusts swarming down
Must eat, and on the ground leave nothing green;
Darkness must overshadow all his bounds,
Palpable darkness, and blot out three days;
Last, with one midnight stroke, all the first-born
Of Egypt must lie dead. Thus with ten wounds 190
The river-dragon tamed at length submits

To let his sojourners depart, and oft

Humbles his stubborn heart; but still, as ice

More harden'd after thaw; till, in his rage

Pursuing whom he late dismiss'd, the sea

Swallows him with his host; but them lets pass,

As on dry land, between two crystal walls;

Awed by the rod of Moses so to stand

Divided, till his rescued gain their shore:

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Such wondrous power God to his saint will lend, 200 Though present in his Angel; who shall go

Before them in a cloud, and pillar of fire;

By day a cloud, by night a pillar of fire;

To guide them in their journey, and remove

Behind them, while the obdurate king pursues : 205
All night he will pursue; but his approach
Darkness defends between till morning watch;
Then through the fiery pillar, and the cloud,
God looking forth will trouble all his host,

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And craze their chariot-wheels: when by command

Moses once more his potent rod extends
Over the sea; the sea his rod obeys;

On their embattled ranks the waves return,
And overwhelm their war: the race elect

Safe towards Canaan from the shore advance

Through the wild Desert, not the readiest way;
Lest, entering on the Canaanite alarm'd,

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War terrify them inexpert, and fear

Return them back to Egypt, choosing rather

Inglorious life with servitude; for life

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To noble and ignoble is more sweet

Untrain'd in arms, where rashness leads not on.
This also shall they gain by their delay

In the wide wilderness; there they shall found

Their government, and their great senate choose 225
Through the twelve tribes, to rule by laws ordain'd;
God from the mount of Sinai, whose gray top
Shall tremble, he descending, will himself

In thunder, lightning, and loud trumpets' sound,
Ordain them laws; part, such as appertain

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To civil justice; part, religious rites
Of sacrifice; informing them, by types

And shadows, of that destined Seed to bruise
The Serpent, by what means he shall achieve
Mankind's deliverance. But the voice of God
To mortal ear is dreadful: they beseech
That Moses might report to them his will,

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And terror cease; he grants what they besought,
Instructed that to God is no access

Without Mediator, whose high office now

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Moses in figure bears; to introduce

One greater, of whose day he shall foretel,

And all the Prophets in their age the times

Of great Messiah shall sing. Thus, laws and rites
Establish'd, such delight hath God in men
Obedient to his will, that he vouchsafes
Among them to set up his tabernacle ;
The Holy One with mortal men to dwell:

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