She bare expos'd to sight, all lovely dress'd
In beauty's livery, and quaint devise:
Thus she bewitches many a boy unblest,

Who drenched in hell, dreams all of paradise:
Her breasts his spheres, her arms his circling sky,
Her pleasu e, heaven, her love eternity:

For her he longs to live, with her he longs to die.

Close by her sat Despair, sad ghastly spright,
With staring looks, unmoved, fast nailed to Sin;
Her body all of earth, her soul of fright,

About her thousand deaths, but more within: Pale, pined cheeks, black hair, torn, rudely dight; Short breath, long nails, dull eyes, sharp pointed chin: Light, life, heaven, earth, herself, and all she fled. Fain would she die but could not; yet half dead, A breathing corse she seem'd, wrapt up in living lead. In th' entrance Sickness, and faint Languor dwelt, Who with sad groans toll out their passing knell '; Late fear, fright, horror, that already felt

The torturer's claws, preventing death and hell Within loud Grief, and roaring Pangs that swelt In sulphur flames, did weep, and howl, and yell. And thousand souls in endless dolour lie,

Who burn, fry, hiss, and never cease to cry,"Oh that I ne'er had liv'd! oh that I once could die?"

And now the Infernal Powers through th' ayer driving, For speed their leathern pinions broad display; Now at eternal Death's wide gate arriving,

Sin gives them passage; still they cut their way, Till to the bottom of hell's palace driving

They enter Dis' deep conclave: there they stay,

Waiting the rest, and now they all are met,
A full foul senate, now they all are set,

The horrid courts, big swol'n with th' hideous counsel

sweat,

The mid'st but lowest,-in hell's heraldry

The deepest is the highest room,-in state

Sat lordly Lucifer: his fiery eye,

Much swoln with pride, but more with rage and hate,

As censor muster'd all his company;

Who round about with awful silence sate.

This do, this let rebellious spirits gain,

Change God for Satan, heaven's for hell's sov'reign:
O let him serve in hell, who scorns in heaven to reign!

Ah wretch! who with ambitious cares opprest,
Long'st still for future, feel'st no present good:
Despising to be better, would'st be best;

Good never; who wilt serve thy lusting mood,
Yet all command: not he, who raised his crest

But pulled it down, hath high and firmly stood. Fool serve thy towering lust, grow still, still crave, Rule, reign, this comfort from thy greatness have, Now at thy top thou art a great commanding slave.

Thus fell that prince of darkness, once a bright

And shining star; he wilful turned away
His borrowed globe from that eternal light:
Himself he sought, so lost himself; his ray
Vanished to smoke, his morning sunk in night,
And never more shall see the springing day:

To be in heaven the second he disdains:

So now the first in hell, in flames he reigns,

Crown'd once with joy and light; crown'd now with fire and pains.

As where the warlike Dane the sceptre sways,
They crown usurpers with a wreath of lead;
And with hot steel while loud the traitor brays,
They melt, and drop it down unto his head.
Crown'd he would live, and crown'd he ends his days:
All so in heaven's court this traitor sped.

Who now, when he had overlooked his train,
Rising upon his throne with bitter strain,

Thus 'gan to whet their rage, and chide their frustrate pain.

The speech of Satan, which occupies eighteen stanzas, is too long for insertion. He begins with lamenting the universal peace in which the world reposed, and the extention of divine truth by the propagation of the Gospel.

Spring-tides of light divine the air surround,

t

And bring down heav'n to earth; deaf ignorance Vext with the day, her head in hell hath drown'd, Fond superstition, frighted with the glance Of sudden beams, in vain hath crost her round, Truth and religion every where advance Their conquering standards: Error's lost and fled: Earth burns in love to heaven; heaven yields her bed To earth; and common grown, smiles to be ravished.

That little swimming Isle above the rest,

Spite of our spite, and all our plots, remains, And grows in happiness; but late our nest,

Where we, and Rome, and blood, and all our trains

Monks, nuns, dead and live idols, safe did rest:

Now there,-next the oath of God,-that Wrestler

reigns

spear

Who fills the land and world with peace, his
Is but a pen, with which he down doth bear
Blind ignorance, false gods, and superstitious fear.

But me, oh! never let me, Spirits, forget
That glorious day, when I your standard bore
And scorning in the second place to sit,

With you assaulted heaven, his yoke forswore ;
My dauntless heart yet longs to bleed, and sweat
In such a fray; the more I burn, the more
I hate should he yet offer grace
and ease,

If subject, we our arms and spite surcease,
Such offer should I hate, and scorn so base a peace.

Where are those spirits? Where that haughty rage
That durst with me invade eternal light?

What? Are our hearts fallen too? Droop we with age?

Can we yet fall from hell and hellish spite?

Can smart our wrath, can grief our hate assuage?
Dare we with heaven, and not with earth to fight?
Your arms, allies, yourselves are strong as ever,
Your foes, their weapons, numbers weaker never,
For shame tread down this earth; what wants but your
endeavour?

And now you states of hell give your advice,
And to these ruins lend your helping hand.—
This said, and ceased,-straight humming murmurs rise:
Some chafe, some fret, some sad and thoughtful stand,

Some chat, and some new stratagems devise,
And every one heaven's stronger power ban'd,
And tear for madness their uncombed snakes,
And every one his fiery weapon shakes,

And every one expects who first the answer makes.

So when the falling sun hangs o'er the main,
Ready to drop into the western wave,
By yellow Chame, where all the Muses reign,
And with their towers his reedy head embrave;
The warlike gnats their fluttering armies train,

All have sharp spears, and all shrill trumpets have : Their files they double, loud their cornets sound, Now march at length, their troops now gather round: The banks, the broken noise, and turrets fair rebound.

The 2nd Canto commences, as usual with this poet, in a strain of solemn reflection. At the fourth stanza, the following striking metaphor introduces the respondent to the infernal leader :

As when the angry winds with seas conspire,
The white-plum'd hills marching in set array,
Invade the earth, and seem with rage on fire;
While waves with thundering drums whet on the fray,
And blasts with whistling fifes new rage inspire:
Yet soon as breathless airs their spight allay,

A silent calm ensues: the hilly main

Sinks in itself; and drums unbraced, refrain
Their thund'ring noise, while seas sleep on the even plain.

All so the raging storm of cursed fiends,

Blown up with sharp reproof and bitter spight, First rose in loud uproar, then falling, ends

And ebbs in silence: when a wily spright