voice, abuse him with her smiles, delude him with her crocodile tears, and sometimes cock her crown at him, and terrify him with the thunder of her Treble; making the effeminated Male Apple-eater tremble at the noise of that very Tongue, which at first commanded him to Sin. For it is yet a debate which the Learned have not decided, whether she persuaded and entreated him, or like a true she-tyrant, exercised her authority and oblig’d him to eat the forbidden fruit.
And therefore a certain author, whose name, for fear of the Sex’s resentment I conceal, brings her in, calling to Adam at a great distance, in an imperious haughty manner, beckoning to him with her hand, thus; Here, says she, you cowardly faint-hearted wretch, take this branch of heavenly fruit, eat and be a stupid fool no longer; eat and be wise; eat and be a God; and know, to your eternal shame, that your wife has been made an enlightn’d Goddess before you.
He tells you Adam hung back a little at first, and trembl’d, afraid to trespass: What ails the Sot, says the new Termagant? what are you afraid of? did God forbid you! yes, and why? that we might not be knowing and wise like himself! What reason can there be that we, who have capacious souls, able to receive knowledge, should have it withheld? take it, you Fool, and eat; don’t you see how I am exalted in soul by it, and am quite another Creature? Take it, I say, or, if you don’t, I’ll go and cut down the Tree, and you shall never eat any of it at all, and you shall be still a fool, and be governed by your wife for ever.
Thus, if this interpretation of the thing be just, she Scolded him into it; Rated him, and brought him to it by the terror of her voice; a thing that has retained a dreadful influence over him ever since; nor have the greatest of Adam’s Successors, how light soever some husbands make of it in this age, been ever able, since that, to conceal their terror, at the very Sound; nay, if we may believe history, it prevailed even among the Gods; not all the noise of Vulcan’s hammers could silence the clamours of that outrageous whore his Goddess; nay, even Jupiter himself led such a life with a termagant wife, that once, they say, Juno out-scolded the noise of all his Thunders, and was within an ace of brawling him out of Heaven. But to return to the Devil.
With these views he resolv’d, it seems, to attack the woman; and if you consider him as a Devil, and what he aim’d at, and consider the fair prospect he had of success, I must confess, I do not see who can blame him, or at least, how any thing less could be expected from him; But we shall meet with it again by and by.
1The meaning of the word Devil is Destroyer. See Pool upon Acts xiii. 10.
Chap. V.
Of the station Satan had in Heaven before he fell; the nature and original of his crime, and some of Mr. Milton’s mistakes about it.
Thus far I have gone upon general observation, in this great affair of Satan and his Empire in the World; I now come to my Title, and shall enter upon the historical part, as the main work before me.
Besides what has been said Poetically, relating to the fall and wandering condition of the Devil and his Host, which poetical part I offer only as an excursion, and desire it should be taken so; I shall give you what I think is deduc’d from good originals on the part of Satan’s story in a few words.
He was one of the created Angels, form’d by the same omnipotent hand and glorious power, who created the Heavens and the Earth, and all that is therein: This innumerable heavenly host, as we have reason to believe, contain’d Angels of higher and lower stations, of greater and of lesser degree, express’d in the Scripture by Thrones, Dominions, and Principalities: This, I think, we have as much reason to believe, as we have, that there are Stars in the Firmament (or starry Heavens) of greater and of lesser magnitude.
What particular station among the immortal Choir of Angels, this Arch-seraph, this Prince of Devils, call’d Satan, was plac’d in before his expulsion, that indeed, we cannot come at the knowledge of, at least, not with such an Authority as may be depended upon; but as from Scripture authority, he is plac’d at the head of all the Apostate armies, after he was fallen, we cannot think it in the least assuming to say, that he might be supposed to be one of the principal Agents in the Rebellion which happen’d in Heaven, and consequently that he might be one of the highest in dignity there, before that Rebellion.
The higher his station, the lower, and with the greater precipitation, was his overthrow; and therefore, those words, tho’ taken in another sense, may very well be apply’d to him: How art thou fallen, O Lucifer! Son of the Morning!
Having granted the dignity of his Person, and the high station in which he was placed among the heavenly Host; it would come then necessarily to inquire into the nature of his fall, and above all, a little into the reason of it; certain it is, he did fall, was guilty of Rebellion and Disobedience, the just effect of Pride; sins, which, in that holy place, might well be call’d wonderful.
But what to me is more wonderful, and which, I think, will be very ill accounted for, is, how came seeds of crime to rise in the Angelic Nature? created in a state of perfect, unspotted holiness? how was it first found in a place where no unclean thing can enter? how came ambition, pride, or envy to generate there? could there be offence where there was no crime? could untainted purity breed corruption? could that nature contaminate and infect, which was always Drinking in principles of perfection?
Happy ’tis to me, that writing the History, not solving the Difficulties of Satan’s Affairs, is my province in this Work; that I am to relate the Fact, not give reasons for it, or sign causes; if it was otherwise, I should break off at this difficulty, for I acknowledge I do not see thro’ it; neither do I think that the great Milton, after all his fine Images and lofty Excursions upon the Subject, has left it one jot clearer than he found it: Some are of opinion, and among them the great Dr. B——s, that crime broke in upon them at some interval, when they omitted but one moment fixing their eyes and thoughts on the glories of the divine face, to admire and adore, which is the full employment of Angels; but even this, tho’ it goes as high as imagination can carry us, does not reach it, nor, to me, make it one jot more comprehensible than it was before; all I can say to it here, is, that so it was, the fact was upon Record, and the rejected Troop are in being, whose circumstances confess the Guilt, and still groan under the Punishment.
If you will bear with a poetic excursion upon the subject, not to solve but to illustrate the difficulty; take it in a few lines, thus,
Thou sin of Witchcraft! firstborn child of Crime!
Produc’d before the bloom of Time;
Ambition’s maiden Sin, in Heaven conceiv’d,
And who could have believ’d
Defilement could in purity begin,
And bright eternal Day be soil’d with Sin?
Tell us, sly penetrating Crime,
How cam’st thou there, thou fault sublime?
How didst thou pass the Adamantine Gate;
And into Spirit thy self insinuate?
From what dark state? from what deep place?
From what strange uncreated race?
