O’re many a Frozen, many a Fierie Alpe,
Rocks, Caves, Lakes, Fens, Bogs, Dens, and shades of death,
A Universe of death, which God by curse
Created evil, for evil only good,
Where all life dies, death lives, and nature breeds,
Perverse, all monstrous, all prodigious things,
Abominable, inutterable, and worse
Then Fables yet have feign’d, or fear conceiv’d,
GORGONS and HYDRA’S, and CHIMERA’S dire.
Mean while the Adversary of God and Man,
SATAN with thoughts inflam’d of highest design,
Puts on swift wings, and toward the Gates of Hell
Explores his solitary flight; som times
He scours the right hand coast, som times the left,
Now shaves with level wing the Deep, then soares
Up to the fiery concave touring high.
As when farr off at Sea a Fleet descri’d
Hangs in the Clouds, by AEQUINOCTIAL Winds
Close sailing from BENGALA, or the Iles
Of TERNATE and TIDORE, whence Merchants bring
Thir spicie Drugs: they on the trading Flood
Through the wide ETHIOPIAN to the Cape
Ply stemming nightly toward the Pole. So seem’d
Farr off the flying Fiend: at last appeer
Hell bounds high reaching to the horrid Roof,
And thrice threefold the Gates; three folds were Brass
Three Iron, three of Adamantine Rock,
Impenitrable, impal’d with circling fire,
Yet unconsum’d. Before the Gates there sat
On either side a formidable shape;
The one seem’d Woman to the waste, and fair,
But ended foul in many a scaly fould
Voluminous and vast, a Serpent arm’d
With mortal sting: about her middle round
A cry of Hell Hounds never ceasing bark’d
With wide CERBEREAN mouths full loud, and rung
A hideous Peal: yet, when they list, would creep,
If aught disturb’d thir noyse, into her woomb,
And kennel there, yet there still bark’d and howl’d
Within unseen. Farr less abhorrd then these
Vex’d SCYLLA bathing in the Sea that parts
CALABRIA from the hoarce TRINACRIAN shore:
Nor uglier follow the Night-Hag, when call’d
In secret, riding through the Air she comes
Lur’d with the smell of infant blood, to dance
With LAPLAND Witches, while the labouring Moon
Eclipses at thir charms. The other shape,
If shape it might be call’d that shape had none
Distinguishable in member, joynt, or limb,
Or substance might be call’d that shadow seem’d,
For each seem’d either; black it stood as Night,
Fierce as ten Furies, terrible as Hell,
And shook a dreadful Dart; what seem’d his head
The likeness of a Kingly Crown had on.
SATAN was now at hand, and from his seat
The Monster moving onward came as fast,
With horrid strides, Hell trembled as he strode.
Th’ undaunted Fiend what this might be admir’d,
Admir’d, not fear’d; God and his Son except,
Created thing naught vallu’d he nor shun’d;
And with disdainful look thus first began.
Whence and what art thou, execrable shape,
That dar’st, though grim and terrible, advance
Thy miscreated Front athwart my way
To yonder Gates? through them I mean to pass,
That be assur’d, without leave askt of thee:
Retire, or taste thy folly, and learn by proof,
Hell-born, not to contend with Spirits of Heav’n.
To whom the Goblin full of wrauth reply’d,
Art thou that Traitor Angel, art thou hee,
Who first broke peace in Heav’n and Faith, till then
Unbrok’n, and in proud rebellious Arms
Drew after him the third part of Heav’ns Sons
Conjur’d against the highest, for which both Thou
And they outcast from God, are here condemn’d
To waste Eternal daies in woe and pain?
And reck’n’st thou thy self with Spirits of Heav’n,
Hell-doomd, and breath’st defiance here and scorn,
Where I reign King, and to enrage thee more,
Thy King and Lord? Back to thy punishment,
False fugitive, and to thy speed add wings,
Least with a whip of Scorpions I pursue
Thy lingring, or with one stroke of this Dart
Strange horror seise thee, and pangs unfelt before.
So spake the grieslie terrour, and in shape,
So speaking and so threatning, grew ten fold
More dreadful and deform: on th’ other side
Incenc’t with indignation SATAN stood
Unterrifi’d, and like a Comet burn’d,
That fires the length of OPHIUCUS huge
In th’ Artick Sky, and from his horrid hair
Shakes Pestilence and Warr. Each at the Head
Level’d his deadly aime; thir fatall hands
No second stroke intend, and such a frown
Each cast at th’ other, as when two black Clouds
With Heav’ns Artillery fraught, come rattling on
Over the CASPIAN, then stand front to front
Hov’ring a space, till Winds the signal blow
To joyn thir dark Encounter in mid air:
So frownd the mighty Combatants, that Hell
Grew darker at thir frown, so matcht they stood;
For never but once more was either like
To meet so great a foe: and now great deeds
Had been achiev’d, whereof all Hell had rung,
Had not the Snakie Sorceress that sat
Fast by Hell Gate, and kept the fatal Key,
