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<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>Adam: A Sacred Drama. Act 2.</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">SCENE I. -- CHORUS OF ANGELS Singing.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Now let us garlands weave<br>Of all the fairest flowers, <br>Now at this early dawn,<br>For new-made man, and his companion dear;<br>Let all with festive joy,<br>And with melodious song,<br>Of the great Architect <br>Applaud this noblest work,<br>And speak the joyous sound,<br>Man is the wonder both of Earth and Heaven.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">FIRST Angel. </a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Your warbling now suspend,<br>You pure angelic progeny of God,<br>Behold the labour emulous of Heaven!<br>Behold the woody scene,<br>Decked with a thousand flowers of grace divine;<br>Here man resides, here ought he to enjoy<br>In his fair mate eternity of bliss.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">SECOND Angel.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">How exquisitely sweet<br>This rich display of flowers,<br>This airy wild of fragrance,<br>So lovely to the eye, <br>And to the sense so sweet.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">THIRD Angel.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">O the sublime Creator,<br>How marvellous his works, and more his power!<br>Such is the sacred flame<br>Of his celestial love,<br>Not able to confine it in himself,<br>He breathed, as fruitful sparks<br>From his creative breast,<br>The Angels, Heaven, Man, Woman, and the World.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">FOURTH Angel.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Yes, mighty Lord! yes, hallowed love divine!<br>Who, ever in thyself completely blest,<br>Unconscious of a want,<br>Who from thyself alone, and at thy will,<br>Bright with beignant flames,<br>Without the aid of matter or of form,<br>By efficacious power<br>Hast of mere nothing formed <br>The whole angelic host<br>With potency endowed,<br>And that momentous gift,<br>Either by sin to fall,<br>Or by volition stand.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">FIFTH Angel.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Hence, our Almighty Maker,<br>To render us more worthy of his Heaven,<br>And to confirm us in eternal grace,<br>Presented to our homage<br>The pure Incarnate Word; <br>That as a recompense for hallowed toil<br>So worthily achieved,<br>We might adore him humble;<br>For there's a written law<br>In the records of Heaven,<br>That not a work of God that breathes and lives,<br>And is endowed with reason,<br>Shall hold a seat in Heaven,<br>If it incline not first with holy zeal,<br>In tender adoration to the Word.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">SIXTH Angel.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Justly each Spirit in the realms above,<br>And all of mortal race,<br>And every foe to Heaven,<br>Should bow the knee in reverence of the Word;<br>Since this is he whom from eternity <br>God in the awful depth<br>Of his sublime and fruitful mind produced;<br>He is not accident, but substance true,<br>As rare as perfect, and as truly great<br>As his high Author holy and divine.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">SEVENTH Angel</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">This living Word, image express of God,<br>Is a resemblance of his mighty substance;<br>Whence he is called the Son, the Son of God,<br>Even as the Father, God;<br>The generated Word<br>By generation yields not unto time,<br>Since from eternity the eternal Father<br>Produced his Son, whence he rejoices there,<br>Great offspring of great Father there for ever!<br>For ever he is born,<br>There he is fed, and fostered<br>With plenitude of grace<br>Imparted by his Sire:<br>There was the Father ever, and the Son<br>Was ever at his side, or in the Father;<br>Nor younger is the Son<br>Than his Almighty Sire,<br>Nor elder is the Father <br>Than his eternal Son.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">EIGHTH Angel.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">O Son, O Sire, O God, O Man, O Word,<br>Let all with bended knee,<br>With humble adoration reverence you!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">NINTH Angel.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">O Lucifer, now doomed to endless pain,<br>Hadst thou been joined with us<br>In worship of the Word,<br>How hadst thou now been blessed in thy God!<br>But thou in pride alone, yes, thou alone<br>In thy great wisdom foolish,<br>Hast scorned the Paragon,<br>And wouldst not reverence the Incarnate God;<br>Whence by thy folly thou hast fallen as far<br>As thy proud soul expected to ascend.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">TENTH Angel.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Monster of fierceness, dwell<br>In thy obscure recess!<br>And for thy weighty crime <br>Incessant feel and infinite thy pain,<br>For infinite has been thy vast offence.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">ELEVENTH Angel.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Reside for ever in the deep abyss,<br>For well the world's eternal Master knows <br>Again to fill those high celestial seats,<br>That by your ruin you have vacant left;<br>Behold man fashioned from the earth, who lives,<br>Like plants that vegetate;<br>See in a moment's space<br>How the pure breath of life,<br>Breathed on his visage by the power divine,<br>Endows the wondrous creature with a soul,<br>A pure immortal soul, <br>That graced, and lovely with exalted powers,<br>Shines the great faithful image of its God.<br>Behold it has the gift to merit highly,<br>The option to deserve or heaven or hell,<br>In free will perfect, as the first of angels.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">TWELFTH Angel.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Yes, man alone was formed in just derision<br>Of all the infernal host,<br>As lord of this fair world and all that lives,<br>The ornament of all,<br>The miracle of nature,<br>The perfect heir of heaven,<br>Related to the angels,<br>Adopted son of God,<br>And semblance of the Holy Trinity;<br>What couldst thou hope for more, what more attain,<br>Creature miraculous, <br>In whom the eternal Lord<br>Has now vouchsafed in signalise his power?</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">THIRTEENTH Angel. </a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">How singular and worthy is his form,<br>Upright in stature, meek in dignity;<br>Well fashioned are his limbs, and his complexion<br>Well tempered, with a high majestic brow,<br>A brow turned upward to his native sky;<br>In language eloquent, in thought sublime,<br>For contemplation of his Maker formed.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">FOURTEENTH Angel. </a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Placed in a state of innocence is man;<br>Primeval justice is his blessed gift,<br>Hence are his senses to his reason subject,<br>His body to his mind,<br>Enjoying reason as his prime endowment.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">FIFTEENTH Angel.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Supernal love held him too highly dear,<br>To let him dwell alone;<br>And thence of lovely woman<br>(Fair faithful aid) bestowed on man the gift,<br>Adam, 'tis thine alone<br>To keep thy duty to thy Lord unstained;<br>In his command of the forbidden fruit,<br>Thy gift of freedom keep inviolate;<br>And though he fashioned thee without thy aid,<br>Think not without thy aid he means to save thee!<br>But since, descending from the heights of heaven,<br>We come as kind attendants upon man,<br>Now let us haste to Eden's flowery banks.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">ALL THE ANGELS SING.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Now take we happy flight<br>To Paradise, adorned with fairest flowers;<br>There let us almost worship<br>The mighty lord of this transcendent world,<br>And joyous let us sing<br>This flowery heaven, and Adam as its God.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">SCENE II.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Adam. O mighty Lord of mighty things sublime?<br>O my supreme Creator!<br>O bounteous in thy love<br>To me thy humble servant, such rare blessings<br>With liberal hand thou givest,<br>Where'er I turn my eyes,<br>I see myself revered.<br>Approach ye animals that range the field!<br>And ye now close your variegated wings,<br>Ye pleasing birds! in me you look on Adam,<br>On him ordained to name<br>All things that gracious God has made for man;<br>And praise, with justice praise<br>Him who created me, who made you all,<br>And in his bounteous love with me rejoice.<br>But what do I behold? blest that I am,<br>My dear, my sweet companion!<br>Who comes to hail me with a gift of flowers,<br>And with these sylvan honours crown my brow.<br>Go! stately lion, go! and thou with scales<br>Impenetrable armed<br>Rhinoceros, whose pride can strike to earth<br>The unconquered elephant!<br>Thou fiery courser bound along the fields,<br>And with thy neighing shake the echoing vale;<br>Thou camel, and all here, or beast, or bird,<br>Retire, in homage to approaching Eve!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. Oh what delight more dear,<br>Than that, which Adam in my sight enjoys,<br>Draws him far off from me? Ye tender flowers,<br>Where may I find on you<br>The traces of his step?</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Lurcone. See man and woman! hide thyself and watch!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Adam. No more fatigue my eyes,<br>Nor with thy animated glances dart<br>Such radiance lightning round:<br>Turn the clear Heaven of thy serener face<br>To him who loves its light;<br>See thy beloved Adam,<br>Behold him, my sweet love;<br>O thou, who art alone<br>Joy of the world, and dear delight of man!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Lurcone. Dread the approach of evil!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Guliar. Dread the deceit of hell!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. By sovereign content<br>I feel my tongue enchained;<br>But though my voice be mute,<br>My countenance may seem more eloquent,<br>Expressing, though in silence, all my joy.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Adam. O my companion dear!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Lurcone. And soon perchance thy foe!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Adam. O thou my sweetest life!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Guliar. Perchance thy bitter death!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. Take, gentle Adam, from my hand these flowers;<br>With these, my gift, let me entwine thy locks.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Adam. Ye lilies, and ye shrubs of showy hue,<br>Jasmine as ivory pure,<br>Ye spotless graces of the shining field;<br>And thou most lovely rose<br>Of tint most delicate,<br>Fair consort of the morn,<br>Delighted to imbibe<br>The genial dew of Heaven,<br>Rich vegetation's vermil-tinctured gem,<br>April's enchanting herald,<br>Thou flower supremely blest,<br>And queen of all the flowers,<br>Thou form'st around my locks<br>A garland of such fragrance,<br>That up to Heaven itself<br>Thy balmy sweets ascend.<br>Let us in pure embraces<br>So twine ourselves, my love,<br>That we may seem united,<br>One well-compact, and intricate acanthus.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Lurcone. Soon shall the fetters of infernal toil<br>So spread around ye both,<br>The indissoluble bond,<br>No mortal effort shall have power to break!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. Now, that with flowers so lovely<br>We have adorned our tresses,<br>Here let us both with humble reverence kneel,<br>And praise our mighty Maker.<br>From this my thirsting heart<br>No longer can refrain.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Adam. At thy engaging words,<br>And thy pure heart's desire,<br>On these pure herbs and flowers,<br>I bend my willing knee in hallowed bliss.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Lurcone. Away! far off must I<br>From act so meekly just <br>Furious depart and leave the light of day.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Guliar. I must partake thy flight,<br>And follow thee, alas, surcharged with grief.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Adam. Now that these herbs and flowers to our bent knees<br>Such easy rest afford,<br>Let us with zealous ardour raise our eyes,<br>Contemplating with praise our mighty Maker!<br>First then, devout and favoured Eve, do thou<br>With sacred notes invite<br>To deeds so fair thy Adam.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. My Lord Omnipotent,<br>In his celestial essence<br>Is first, supreme, unlimited, alone,<br>Eternal, uncompounded,<br>He no beginning had, no end will have.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Adam. My sovereign Lord, so great<br>Is irresistible, terrific, just,<br>Gracious, benign, indulgent,<br>Divine, unspotted, holy, loving, good,<br>In justice most revered,<br>Ancient of days, in his sublimest court.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. He rests in highest Heaven,<br>Yet more exalted in his boundless self;<br>Thence his all-searching eye looks down on all;<br>Nought is from him concealed,<br>Since all exists in him:<br>Without him nothing could retain existence,<br>Nor is there aught that he<br>For his perfection needs,<br>Except himself alone.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Adam. He every place pervades,<br>But is confined in none:<br>In him the limits of all grandeur lie,<br>But he exists unlimited by space.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. Above the universe himself he raised,<br>Yet he behind it rests;<br>The whole he now encircles, now pervades,<br>Now dwells apart from all,<br>So great, the universe<br>To comprehend him fails.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Adam. If he to all inclines,<br>In his just balance all he justly weighs:<br>From him if all things flow,<br>All things in him acknowledge their support,<br>But he on nothing rests.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. To time my great director is not subject,<br>For time in him sees no vicissitude:<br>In awful and sublime eternity<br>One being stands for ever;<br>For ever stands one instant,<br>And hence this power assumes the name of God.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Adam. It is indeed a truth,<br>That my eternal mighty Lord is God;<br>This deity incomprehensible<br>That, ere the heaven was made,<br>Dwelt only in himself, and heaven in him.<br>Eve, let us joyous rise; in other scenes,<br>With admiration of celestial splendour <br>And of this lovely world,<br>With notes of hallowed bliss<br>Let us again make the glad air resound.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. Lead on, my faithful guide;<br>Quick is my willing foot to follow thee,<br>Since my fond soul believes<br>That I in praising heaven to heaven ascend,<br>So my pure bosom feels<br>Full of divine content.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Adam. To speak on every theme<br>Our mighty Maker made thee eloquent,<br>So that in praising heaven thou seemest there.<br>My fair associate! treasure of my life!<br>Upon the wings of this exalted praise<br>Devotion soars so high, that if her feet<br>Rest on the earth, her spirit reaches heaven.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">SCENE III. -- The Serpent, Satan, Spirits.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. To arms, to battle, O ye sons of power!<br>Ye warring spirits of the infernal field!<br>A new and wondrous war<br>Awaits you now, within the lists of earth;<br>Most strange indeed the mode<br>Of warring there, if triumph, war's great end,<br>Proves its beginning now.<br>Behold the sun himself turn pale with terror,<br>Behold the day obscured!<br>Behold each rapid bird directs his flight<br>Where thickest foliage spreads,<br>But shelter seeks in vain;<br>The leaves of every bough,<br>As with a palsy struck,<br>Affright him more, and urge his wings to flight.<br>I would not as a warrior take the field <br>Against the demi-goddess girt with angels,<br>Since she has now been used <br>To gaze on spirits tender and benign,<br>Not such as I, of semblance rough and fierce,<br>For battles born to subjugate the sky.<br>In human form I would not <br>Defy her to a great imprtant conflict,<br>The world she knows contains one only man.<br>Nor would I of the tiger<br>Or the imperious lion<br>Or other animal assume the shape;<br>For well she knows they could not reason with her,<br>Who are of reason void.<br>To make her knowledge vain,<br>That I exist to the eternal Maker,<br>A source of endless fear,<br>Wrapt in the painted serpent's scaly folds,<br>Part of myself I hide, giving the rest<br>A human semblance and a damsel's face.<br>Great things I tell thee, and behold I see<br>My adversary prompt to parley with me.<br>Of novelty to hear<br>How eager woman is!<br>Now, now I loose my tongue,<br>And shall entangle her in many a snare.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Satan. But what discordant sound<br>Rises from hell, where all was lately concord?<br>Why do hoarse trumpets bellow through the deep?</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">SCENE IV. -- Volan, the Serpent, Spirits, Satan.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Volan. Great Lord, ordained to found infernal realms,<br>And look with scorn upon the pomp of heaven,<br>Behold thy Volan fly <br>To pay his homage at thy scaly feet!<br>The chieftains of Avernus,<br>The prime infernal powers<br>To rise in rivalship <br>Of heaven in all, as in that lofty seat,<br>The Word to us revealed,<br>The source of such great strife,<br>They wish, that on the Earth<br>A goddess should prepare a throne for man,<br>And lead him to contemn<br>His own Almighty Maker:<br>Yet more the inhabitants of fire now wish<br>That having conquered Man,<br>And with such triumph gay,<br>To the great realms of deep and endless flames<br>Ye both with exultation may descend:<br>Then shall I see around<br>Hell dart its rays, and hold the sun in scorn<br>But if this man resist,<br>Then losing every hope<br>Of farther victory,<br>They wish that on the throne<br>Of triumph he may as a victor sit,<br>Who teaches it to move,<br>And thou perform the office<br>With an afflicted partner,<br>With him, who labours to conduct the car;<br>That clothed in horrid pomp<br>The region of Avernus,<br>May speak itself the seat of endless pain,<br>And at the sound of inauspicious trumpets<br>The heavens may shake, the universe re-echo. </a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">SCENE V. -- Vain Glory drawn by a Giant, Volan, the Serpent, Satan, and Spirits.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Vain Glory. King of Avernus, at this harp's glad sound<br>I weave a starry garland for thy locks,<br>For well I see thy lovely scales portend<br>Honour to me, ruin and shame to man.<br>I am Vain Glory, and I sit on high,<br>Exulting Victress of the Mighty Giant:<br>He has his front in heaven, on earth his feet,<br>A faithful image of man's mighty worth:<br>But shake not thou with fear! strong as he is <br>So brittle is the crown of glass he wears<br>That at my breath, which drives him fiercely on,<br>Man loses power, and falls a prey to Death.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. Angel, or Goddess, from thy lofty triumph<br>Descend with me at the desire of Hell!<br>Haste to a human conflict;<br>You all so light and quick,<br>That by your movement not a leaf is shaken<br>In all these woods around,<br>Your mighty triumphs now together hide;<br>Now that in silence we may pass unseen,<br>Quick let us enter neighbouring Paradise.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Vain Glory. Wherefore delay? Point out the path we go;<br>Since prompt to follow thee,<br>Full as I am of haughtiness and pride,<br>With expeditious foot<br>I will advance <br>Among these herbs and flowers,<br>And let infernal laurels<br>Circle thy towering crest and circle mine!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. What tribes of beauteous flowers,<br>And plants how new and vivid!<br>How desolate shall I<br>Soon make these verdant scenes of plant and flower!<br>Behold! how with my foot<br>I now as much depress them,<br>As they shoot forth with pride to rear their heads:<br>Behold! their humid life<br>I wither with my step of blasting fire.<br>How I enjoy, as I advance through these<br>Fair bowers of rapid growth,<br>To poison with my breath the leaf and flower,<br>Embittering all these sweet and blooming fruits.<br>We are arrived, behold the lovely tree<br>Prohibited by heaven,<br>There mount, and be embowered<br>In the thick foliage of a wood so fair!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Vain Glory. See, I prepare to climb:<br>I am already high,<br>And in the leaves concealed.<br>Climb thou, great chief, and rapidly encircle,<br>And with thy scaly serpent train ascend<br>The tree; be quick, since now arising higher<br>I can discern where lonely Eve advances.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. Behold, enraged I twine around the trunk<br>With these my painted and empoisoned folds;<br>Behold, I breathe towards this woman, love,<br>Though hate is in my heart:<br>Behold me now; more beautiful than ever, <br>Though now of each pestiferous cruel monster<br>In poison and in rage, I am the model;<br>Now I behold her, now<br>In silence I conceal my gift of speech,<br>Among these leaves embowered.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">SCENE VI. -- Eve, Serpent, and Vain Glory.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. I ought, the servant of a Mighty Lord,<br>A servant low and humble,<br>With reverential knee bending to earth,<br>I ought to praise the boundless love of him,<br>Since he has made me queen<br>Of all the sun delights to view on earth.<br>But if to heaven I raise my eyes and heart,<br>Clearly can Eve not see <br>She was created for these great, eternal,<br>Celestial miracles?<br>So that in spirit or in mortal frame,<br>She ever must enjoy or earth or heaven.<br>Hence this fair flowering tree<br>Wreathing abroad its widely branching arms,<br>As if desirous to contend with heaven,<br>Seems willing in my locks<br>To spread a shining heaven of verdant leaves;<br>And if I pass among the herbs and flowers,<br>Those, I behold, that by my step are pressed,<br>Arise more beautiful; the very buds<br>Expand, to form festoons<br>To decorate the grassy scene around.<br>Other new flowers with freshest beauty fair,<br>That stand from me sequestered,<br>Formed into groups or scattered in the vale,<br>Seem with delight to view me, and to say<br>The neighbouring flowers rejoice<br>To give thy foot support,<br>But we, aspiring Eagles,<br>From far behold thy visage,<br>Mild portraiture of the Almighty form.<br>While other plants and flowers,<br>Wishing that I may form my seat among them,<br>Above their native growth<br>So seem to raise themselves, that of sweet flowers<br>A fragrant hedge they form;<br>And others in a thousand tender ties,<br>Form on the ground so intricate a snare,<br>That the incautious hand which aims to free<br>The captive foot, must be itself ensnared.<br>If food I wish, or draught,<br>Lo! various fruit, lo! honey, milk, and manna;<br>Behold, from many a fount and many a rill,<br>The crystal beauty of the cooling stream.<br>If melody, behold the tuneful birds,<br>Behold angelic bands!<br>If welcome day,<br>Or mild and wished-for night,<br>Behold the sun, behold the moon and stars!<br>If I a friend require,<br>Adam, sweet friend, replies;<br>And if my God in heaven, the Eternal Maker<br>Dwells not unmindful, but regards my speech,<br>If creatures subject to my will I wish,<br>Lo! at my side all subject to my will.<br>What more can I desire, what more obtain?<br>Now nothing more, my Sovereign,<br>Eve is with honour loaded.<br>But what's before me? do I wake or dream?<br>Among these boughs I see<br>A human visage fair; what! are there then<br>More than myself and Adam,<br>Who view the glorious sun?<br>O marvellous, though I am distant far,<br>I yet discern the truth; with arms, with hands,<br>A human breast it has,<br>The rest is serpent all:<br>Oh, how the sun, emblazing with his rays<br>These gorgeous scales with glowing colours bright,<br>O'erwhelms my dazzled eyes!<br>I would approach it.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. Now, then, at length you see<br>I have precisely ta'en the semblance fit,<br>To overcome this woman.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. The nearer I approach, more and more lovely<br>His semblance seems of emerald and sapphire,<br>Now ruby and now amethyst, and now<br>Of jasper, pearl, and flaming chrysolite<br>Each fold it waving forms around the trunk <br>Of this fair flowering tree!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. I will assail my foe.<br>Come to survey me better,<br>Thou dazzler of the eye,<br>Enchantress of the soul,<br>Soft idol of the heart,<br>Fair nymph, approach! Lo, I display myself,<br>Survey me all; now satisfy thine eyes;<br>View me attentive, paragon of beauty,<br>Thou noblest ornament of all the world,<br>Thou lovely pomp of nature,<br>Thou little paradise,<br>To whom all things do homage!<br>Where lonely from thy friend, thy Adam, far<br>Where art thou? now advancing where<br>The numerous bands of Angels<br>Become such fond admirers of thy beauty?<br>Happy I deem myself, supremely happy,<br>Since, 'tis my blessed lot,<br>With two fond eyes alone to gaze on that,<br>Which with unnumbered eyes, heaven scarce surveys.<br>Trust me if all the loveliness of heaven<br>Would wrap itself within a human veil,<br>Nought but thy beauteous bosom<br>Could form a mansion worthy such a guest.<br>How well I see, full well<br>That she above with thy light agile feet,<br>Imprints her step in heaven, and there she smiles<br>With thy enchanting lip,<br>To scatter joy around those blessed spheres;<br>Yes, with thy lips above,<br>She breathes, she speaks, she pauses,<br>And with thine eyes communicates a lustre<br>To all that's fair in heaven or fair on earth.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. And who art thou, so eager<br>To lavish praise on me?<br>Yet never did mine eyes see form like thine.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. Can I be silent now?<br>Too much, too much, I pant <br>To please the lovely model of all grace.<br>Know when the world was fashioned out of nought<br>And this most fruitful garden, <br>I was ordained to dwell a gardener here,<br>By him who cultivates<br>The fair celestials fields:<br>Here joyful I ascend,<br>To watch that no voracious bird may seize<br>On such delicious fruit;<br>Here it is my delight,<br>Though all be marvellously fair around,<br>Lily to blend with lily, rose with rose,<br>And now the fragrant hedge<br>To form, and now between the groups of flowers,<br>And o'er the tender herb<br>To guide the current of the crystal stream.<br>Oh, what sweet scenes to captivate the eye<br>Of such a lovely virgin,<br>Will I disclose around;<br>Thou, if thou canst return<br>To this alluring spot,<br>And ever with fresh myrtle and new flowers,<br>More beauteous thou shalt find it;<br>This wondrous faculty I boast infused <br>By thy supernal Maker,<br>To guard in plant and flower their life and fragrance.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. Since I have found thee courteous<br>No less than wise, reveal to me thy name;<br>Speak it to me, unless<br>I seek to know too much.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. Wisdom, I name myself,<br>Sometimes I Life am called,<br>For this my double nature, since I am<br>One part a serpent and the other human.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. Strange things this day I hear; but tell me why <br>Thou serpent art combined with human form?</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. I will inform thee; when the sovereign God<br>On nothing resting, yet gave force to all.<br>To balance all things in an even scale<br>The sage of heaven desired,<br>And not from opposite extremities<br>To pass without a medium justly founded:<br>Hence 'tween the brute and man<br>It pleased him to create this serpent kind;<br>And even this participates in reason,<br>And with a human face has human speech.<br>But what can fail to honour with submission,<br>The demi-god of earth?<br>Oh! if proportioned to thy charms, or equal<br>To the desert of man,<br>You had high knowledge, doubt not but in all<br>Ye would be reckoned as immortal gods;<br>Since the prime power of lofty science is <br>One of the first and greatest<br>Of attributes divine: Oh, could this be,<br>Descending from the base<br>Of this engaging plant,<br>How as a goddess should I here adore thee!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. What, dost thou think so little then the sum<br>Of knowledge given to man? does he not know<br>Of every living herb and flower and plant,<br>Of minerals and of unnumbered gems,<br>Of fish, of fowl, and every animal,<br>In water or n earth, of fire, of air,<br>Of this fair starry heaven,<br>And of the moon and sun,<br>The virtues most concealed?</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. Ah, this is nothing; since it only serves<br>To make the common things of nature known;<br>And I, although I am<br>Greatly inferior in my rank to man,<br>Yet, one by one, even I can number these,<br>More worthy it would be<br>To know both good and ill;<br>This, this is the supreme<br>Intelligence, and mysteries most high,<br>That on the earth would make you like to God.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. That which hath power sufficient to import<br>This knowledge so sublime of good and ill,<br>(But mixt with mortal anguish,)<br>Is this forbidden tree, on which thou sittest.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. And tell me why a law<br>So bitter rises from a fruit so sweet?<br>Where then, where is the sense<br>That you so lately boasted as sublime?<br>Observe, if it be just,<br>That man so brave, so lovely, man that rules<br>The world with skilful hand, man that so much<br>Pleased his creating God, when power almighty <br>Fashioned the wonders both of earth and heaven,<br>That man at last a little fruit should crush,<br>And all be formed for nothing, or at best<br>But for a moment's space?<br>No, no, far from thee, far be such a doubt!<br>Let colour to thy cheek, and to thy lip<br>The banished rose return!<br>Say, -- but I know -- thy heart<br>Within thee speaks the language that I speak!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. The Lord commanded me I should not taste<br>This fruit; and to obey him is my joy.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. If 'tis forbidden thee<br>To taste a fruit so fair,<br>Heaven does not choose that man should be a God,<br>But thou with courtesy, to my kind voice<br>Lend an attentive ear: say, if your Maker<br>Required such strict obedience, that you might <br>Depend but on his word to move and guard you;<br>Was there not power sufficient in the laws<br>Sublime of hope, of faith, and charity<br>Why then, fair creature, why, without occasion<br>Thus should he multiply his laws for man,<br>For ever outraging with such a yoke<br>Your precious liberty, and of great lords<br>Making you slaves, nay, in one point inferior<br>Even to the savage beasts, <br>Whom he would not reduce to any law?<br>Who does not know that loading you so much<br>With precepts, he has lessened the great blessing<br>Of joyous being, that your God first gave you?<br>Perchance he dreaded that ye soon might grow<br>His equals both, in knowledge, and be Gods?<br>No, for though like to God you might become<br>By such experiment, the difference still<br>Between you must be great, since this your knowledge,<br>And acquisition of divinity,<br>Could be but imitation, and effect<br>Of the first cause divine that dwells above.<br>And can it then be true, <br>That such a vital hand<br>Can do a deadly deed?<br>Oh, hadst thou tasted this, how wouldst thou gain<br>Advantage of the Lord, how then with him<br>Would thy conversing tongue,<br>Accuse the latent mysteries of heaven!<br>For other flowers and other plants, and fields,<br>And elements, and spheres,<br>Far different suns, and different moons, and stars<br>There are above, from those thou viewest here<br>Buried below these; all to thee are near,<br>Observe how near! but at the very distance<br>This apple is from thee. Extend thy hand,<br>Boldly extend it, -- ah! why dost thou pause?</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. What should I do? Who counsels me, O God?<br>Hope bids me live, and fear at once destroys me.<br>But say, how art thou able <br>To know such glorious things exist above,<br>And that on earth, one thus may equal God,<br>By feeding on this apple,<br>If thou in heaven wert never,<br>And ne'er permitted of the fruit to taste?</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. Ah! is there ought I can deny to her<br>Whose happiness I wish? Now listen to me.<br>When of this garden I was made the keeper,<br>By him who fashioned thee,<br>All he has said to thee, to me he said;<br>And opening to me heaven's eternal bosom,<br>With all his infinite celestial pomp, <br>He satiated my eyes, and then thus spake:<br>Thy paradise thou hast enjoyed, O Serpent,<br>No more thou shalt behold it; now retain<br>Memory of heaven on earth,<br>Which thou mayst do by feeding on such fruit.<br>A heavenly seat alone is fit for man,<br>For that's the seat of beauty;<br>Since thou art partly man, and partly brute,<br>'Tis just thou dwell on earth;<br>The world was made for various beasts to dwell in,<br>He added, nor canst thou esteem it hard,<br>Serpent and man, to dwell on earth for ever,<br>Since thou already in thy human portion<br>Most fully hast enjoyed thy bliss above.<br>Thus I eternal live,<br>Forming my banquet of this savoury fruit,<br>And Paradise is open to my eyes,<br>By the intelligence, through me transfused<br>From this delicious viand.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. Alas! what should I do? to whom apply?<br>My heart, what is thy counsel?</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. 'Tis true, thy sovereign has imposed upon thee,<br>Under the pain of death,<br>To taste not of this fruit;<br>And to secure from thee<br>A dainty so delightful,<br>The watchful guard he made me<br>Of this forbidden tree;<br>So that if I consent, both man and thou,<br>His beautiful companion,<br>May rise to equal God in happiness.<br>'Tis but too true that to participate<br>In food and beverage with savage beasts,<br>Gives us in this similitude to them; <br>It is not just you both,<br>Works of a mighty Maker,<br>Great offspring of a great God,<br>Should in a base condition,<br>Among these groves and woods,<br>Lead a life equal to the lowest beast.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. Ah! why art thou so eager<br>That I should taste of this forbidden food?</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. Wouldst thou that I should tell?</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. 'Tis all my wish.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. Now lend thine ear, now arch<br>With silent wonder, both thy beauteous brows!<br>For two proud joys of mine,<br>Not for thy good alone, I wish to make thee<br>This liberal overture, and swear to keep<br>Silence while thou shalt seize the fruit denied.<br>First to avenge that high unworthy wrong<br>Done me by God, in fashioning my shape;<br>For I was deemed the refuse of his heaven,<br>For these my scaly parts,<br>That ever like a snake I trail behind;<br>And then, because he should to me alone<br>Have given this world, and o'er the numerous beasts<br>Have made me lord, not wholly of their kind;<br>But this my empire mighty and supreme,<br>O'er all these living things,<br>While man is doomed<br>To breathe on vital air,<br>Must seem but low and servile vassalage;<br>Since man, and only man<br>Was chosen high and mighty lord of all <br>This wondrous scene, and he thus raised to grandeur<br>Was newly formed of nought.<br>But when the fairest of all Eden's fruits<br>Is snatched and tasted, when you rise to Gods,<br>'Tis just that both ascending from this world,<br>Should reach the higher spheres<br>So that on earth to make me<br>Of every creature lord,<br>Of human error I my virtue make:<br>Know, that command is grateful even to God,<br>Grateful to man, and grateful to the serpent.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. I yield obedience, ah! what is't I do?</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. Rather what do you not? Ah, boldly taste,<br>Make me a god on earth, thyself in heaven.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. Alas, how I perceive<br>A chilling tremour wander through my bones,<br>That turns my heart to ice!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. It is thy mortal part that now begins <br>To languish, as o'ercome by the divine,<br>Which o'er its lowly partner<br>In excellence ascends.<br>Behold the pleasant plant,<br>More lovely and more rich <br>Than if it raised to heaven branches of gold,<br>And bore the beauteous emerald as leaves,<br>With roots of coral and a trunk of silver.<br>Behold this jewelled fruit,<br>That gives enjoyment of a state divine!<br>How fair it is, and how<br>It takes new colours from the solar rays,<br>Bright as the splendid train<br>Of the gay peacock, when he whirls it round<br>Full in the sun, and lights his thousand eyes!<br>Behold how it invites!<br>'Tis all delicious, it is sweetness all;<br>Its charms are not deceitful, <br>Thine eye can view them well.<br>Now take it! Now I watch<br>In any angel spy thee! Dost thou pause?<br>Up! for once more I am thy guide; at last<br>The victory is thine!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. At length behold me the exalted mistress<br>Of this most lovely fruit!<br>But why, alas, does my cold brow distil<br>These drops that overwhelm me?</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. Lovely Virgin,<br>Will not our reason tell us<br>Supreme felicity is bought with pain?<br>Who from my brow will wipe<br>These drops of keener pain?<br>Who dissipate the dread that loads my heart?</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. Tell me what wouldst thou? tell me who afflicts thee?</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. The terror of thy Lord; and hence I pray thee?<br>That when thou hast enjoyed<br>That sweet forbidden fruit,<br>When both of you become eternal gods,<br>That you would guard me from the wrath of heaven;<br>Since well indeed may he,<br>Whom we call God, kindle his wrath against me<br>Having to you imparted <br>Taste of this fruit against his high command.<br>But tell him, my desire<br>To make me lord of this inferior world,<br>Like man a god in heaven,<br>Rendered me mute while Eve attained the apple.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. The gift I owe thee, Serpent, well deserves<br>That I should ne'er forget thee.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. Now in these verdant leaves I hide myself<br>Till thou with sounds of joy <br>Shalt call and re-assure me. </a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Eve. Now then conceal thyself, I promise thee<br>To be thy shield against the wrath of God.<br>O what delicious odour! 'tis so sweet<br>That I can well believe<br>That all the lovely flowers<br>From this derive their fragrance.<br>These dewy leaves to my conception seem<br>Moistened with manna, rather than with dew.<br>Ah, it was surely right<br>That fruit so exquisite<br>Should flourish to impart new life to man,<br>Not waste its sweets upon the wind and sun.<br>Nothing for any ill<br>To man could spring from God's creative hand:<br>Since he for man assuredly has felt <br>Such warmth of love unbounded, I will taste it.<br>How sweet it is! how far <br>Surpassing all the fruits of every kind,<br>Assembled in this soil!<br>But where is Adam now? Oh, Adam! Adam!<br>He answers not; then thou with speed depart<br>To find him; but among these flowers and leaves<br>Conceal this lovely apple, lest the angels,<br>Descrying it, forbid.<br>Adam to taste its sweets,<br>And so from man be made a mighty God.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Serpent. Extinguish in the waves thy rays, O sun!<br>No more distribute life!<br>Thus Lucifer ordains, and thus the apple! <br>Man, man is now subdued!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=537527" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Vain Glory. O joyous day! O day<br>To Hell of triumph, and of shame to Heaven!<br>Eve has enjoyed the apple,<br>And now contrives that man may taste it too.<br>Now see by direst fate<br>Life is exchanged for death!<br>Now I exulting sing,<br>And hence depart with pride,<br>Since man's high boast is crushed,<br>And his bright day now turned to hideous night!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br/></a><a href="https://poems.citatepedia.com/">poem</a> by <strong><a rel="author" href="https://authors.citatepedia.com/by.php?a=William+Cowper">William Cowper</a></strong></div>

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