Of all corruption, all the blame lights due; So might the wrauth, Fond wish! couldst thou support That burden heavier then the Earth to bear, Then all the world much heavier, though divided With that bad Woman? Thus what thou desir’st, And what thou fearst, alike destroyes all hope Of refuge, and concludes thee miserable Beyond all past example and future, To Satan onely like both crime and doom. O Conscience, into what Abyss of fears And horrors hast thou driv’n me; out of which I find no way, from deep to deeper plung’d!
Thus Adam to himself lamented loud Through the still Night, now now, as ere man fell, Wholsom and cool, and mild, but with black Air Accompanied, with damps and dreadful gloom, Which to his evil Conscience represented All things with double terror: On the ground Outstretcht he lay, on the cold ground, and oft Curs’d his Creation, Death as oft accus’d Of tardie execution, since denounc’t The day of his offence. Why comes not Death, Said hee, with one thrice acceptable stroke To end me? Shall Truth fail to keep her word, Justice Divine not hast’n to be just? But Death comes not at call, Justice Divine Mends not her slowest pace for prayers or cries. O Woods, O Fountains, Hillocks, Dales and Bowrs, VVith other echo farr I taught your Shades To answer, and resound farr other Song. VVhom thus afflicted when sad Eve beheld, Desolate where she sate, approaching nigh, Soft words to his fierce passion she assay’d: But her with stern regard he thus repell’d.
Out of my sight, thou Serpent, that name best
Befits thee with him leagu’d, thy self as false
And hateful; nothing wants, but that thy shape,
Like his, and colour Serpentine may shew
Thy inward fraud, to warn all Creatures from thee
Henceforth; least that too heav’nly form, pretended
To hellish falshood, snare them. But for thee
I had persisted happie, had not thy pride
And wandring vanitie, when lest was safe,
Rejected my forewarning, and disdain’d
Not to be trusted, longing to be seen
Though by the Devil himself, him overweening
To over-reach, but with the Serpent meeting
Fool’d and beguil’d, by him thou, I by thee,
To trust thee from my side, imagin’d wise,
Constant, mature, proof against all assaults,
And understood not all was but a shew
Rather then solid vertu, all but a Rib
Crooked by nature, bent, as now appears,
More to the part sinister from me drawn,
Well if thrown out, as supernumerarie
To my just number found. O why did God,
Creator wise, that peopl’d highest Heav’n
With Spirits Masculine, create at last
This noveltie on Earth, this fair defect
Of Nature, and not fill the World at once
With Men as Angels without Feminine,
Or find some other way to generate
Mankind? this mischief had not then befall’n,
And more that shall befall, innumerable
Disturbances on Earth through Femal snares,
And straight conjunction with this Sex: for either
He never shall find out fit Mate, but such
As some misfortune brings him, or mistake,
Or whom he wishes most shall seldom gain
Through her perverseness, but shall see her gaind
By a farr worse, or if she love, withheld
By Parents, or his happiest choice too late
Shall meet, alreadie linkt and Wedlock-bound
To a fell Adversarie, his hate or shame:
Which infinite calamitie shall cause
To humane life, and houshold peace confound.
He added not, and from her turn’d, but Eve Not so repulst, with Tears that ceas’d not flowing, And tresses all disorderd, at his feet Fell humble, and imbracing them, besaught His peace, and thus proceeded in her plaint.
Forsake me not thus, Adam, witness Heav’n What love sincere, and reverence in my heart I beare thee, and unweeting have offended, Unhappilie deceav’d; thy suppliant I beg, and clasp thy knees; bereave me not, Whereon I live, thy gentle looks, thy aid, Thy counsel in this uttermost distress, My onely strength and stay: forlorn of thee, Whither shall I betake me, where subsist? While yet we live, scarse one short hour perhaps, Between us two let there be peace, both joyning, As joyn’d in injuries, one enmitie Against a Foe by doom express assign’d us, That cruel Serpent: On me exercise not Thy hatred for this miserie befall’n, On me already lost, mee then thy self More miserable; both have sin’d, but thou Against God onely, I against God and thee, And to the place of judgement will return, There with my cries importune Heaven, that all The sentence from thy head remov’d may light On me, sole cause to thee of all this woe, Mee mee onely just object of his ire.
She ended weeping, and her lowlie plight,
Immoveable till peace obtain’d from fault
Acknowledg’d and deplor’d, in Adam wraught Commiseration; soon his heart relented Towards her, his life so late and sole delight, Now at his feet submissive in distress, Creature so faire his reconcilement seeking, His counsel whom she had displeas’d, his aide; As one disarm’d, his anger all he lost, And thus with peaceful words uprais’d her soon.
Unwarie, and too desirous, as before,
So now of what thou knowst not, who desir’st
The punishment all on thy self; alas,
Beare thine own first, ill able to sustaine
His full wrauth whose thou feelst as yet lest part,
And my displeasure bearst so ill. If Prayers
Could alter high Decrees, I to that place
Would speed before thee, and be louder heard,
That on my head all might be visited,
Thy frailtie and infirmer Sex forgiv’n,
To me committed and by me expos’d.
But rise, let us no more contend, nor blame
Each other, blam’d enough elsewhere, but strive
In offices of Love, how we may light’n
