Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained

by John Milton

What in me is dark Illumine, what is low raise and support; That to the highth of this great Argument I may assert th’ Eternal Providence, And justifie the wayes of God to men.

Say first, for Heav’n hides nothing from thy view Nor the deep Tract of Hell, say first what cause Mov’d our Grand Parents in that happy State, Favour’d of Heav’n so highly, to fall off From their Creator, and transgress his Will For one restraint, Lords of the World besides?

But his doom Reserv’d him to more wrath; for now the thought Both of lost happiness and lasting pain Torments him;

The mind is its own place, and in it self Can make a Heav’n of Hell, a Hell of Heav’n. What matter where, if I be still the same, And what I should be, all but less then hee Whom Thunder hath made greater?

To reign is worth ambition though in Hell: Better to reign in Hell, then serve in Heav’n.

And in luxurious Cities, where the noyse Of riot ascends above thir loftiest Towrs,

All these and more came flocking; but with looks Down cast and damp, yet such wherein appear’d Obscure som glimps of joy, to have found thir chief Not in despair, to have found themselves not lost In loss it self; which on his count’nance cast

Let none admire That riches grow in Hell; that soyle may best Deserve the pretious bane.

Mee though just right, and the fixt Laws of Heav’n Did first create your Leader, next, free choice,

Who but felt of late When the fierce Foe hung on our brok’n Rear Insulting, and pursu’d us through the Deep, With what compulsion and laborious flight We sunk thus low?

Or if our substance be indeed Divine, And cannot cease to be, we are at worst On this side nothing;

who knows, Let this be good, whether our angry Foe Can give it, or will ever? how he can Is doubtful; that he never will is sure.

My voice disswades; for what can force or guile With him, or who deceive his mind, whose eye Views all things at one view?

This must be our task In Heav’n, this our delight; how wearisom Eternity so spent in worship paid To whom we hate.

Must we renounce, and changing stile be call’d Princes of Hell? for so the popular vote Inclines,

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,

Whence and what art thou, execrable shape,

Retire, or taste thy folly, and learn by proof,

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

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.

Hast thou forgot me then, and do I seem Now in thine eye so foul, once deemd so fair In Heav’n,

this once known, shall soon return, And bring ye to the place where Thou and Death Shall dwell at ease, and up and down unseen Wing silently the buxom Air, imbalm’d With odours;

Death ready stands to interpose his dart, Fearless to be o’rematcht by living might. But what ow I to his commands above Who hates me, and hath hither thrust me down Into this gloom of TARTARUS profound,

And time and place are lost; where eldest Night And CHAOS, Ancestors of Nature, hold Eternal ANARCHIE, amidst the noise Of endless warrs and by confusion stand.

Unless th’ Almighty Maker them ordain His dark materials to create more Worlds,

by which the Spirits perverse With easie intercourse pass to and fro To tempt or punish mortals, except whom God and good Angels guard by special grace.

If him by force he can destroy, or worse, By som false guile pervert; and shall pervert; For man will heark’n to his glozing lyes, And easily transgress the sole Command, Sole pledge of his obedience: So will fall Hee and his faithless Progenie: whose fault? Whose but his own? ingrate, he had of mee All he could have; I made him just and right, Sufficient to have stood, though free to fall.

O Father, gracious was that word which clos’d Thy sovran sentence, that Man should find grace; For which both Heav’n and Earth shall high extoll Thy praises, with th’ innumerable sound Of Hymns and sacred Songs, wherewith thy Throne Encompass’d shall resound thee ever blest.

Man shall not quite be lost, but sav’d who will, Yet not of will in him, but grace in me Freely voutsaft; once more I will renew His lapsed powers, though forfeit and enthrall’d By sin to foul exorbitant desires;

once more he shall stand On even ground against his mortal foe, By me upheld, that he may know how frail His fall’n condition is, and to me ow All his deliv’rance, and to none but me.

while offerd grace Invites; for I will cleer thir senses dark, What may suffice, and soft’n stonie hearts To pray, repent, and bring obedience due. To prayer, repentance, and obedience due, Though but endevord with sincere intent, Mine eare shall not be slow, mine eye not shut.

This my long sufferance and my day of grace They who neglect and scorn, shall never taste; But hard be hard’nd, blind be blinded more, That they may stumble on, and deeper fall;

now without redemption all mankind Must have bin lost, adjudg’d to Death and Hell By doom severe, had not the Son of God, In whom the fulness dwels of love divine, His dearest mediation thus renewd.

man shall find grace; And shall grace not find means, that finds her way, The speediest of thy winged messengers, To visit all thy creatures, and to all Comes unprevented, unimplor’d, unsought, Happie for man, so coming; he her aide Can never seek, once dead in sins and lost;

on me let Death wreck all his rage; Under his gloomie power I shall not long Lie vanquisht; thou hast givn me to possess Life in my self for ever, by thee I live,

I through the ample Air in Triumph high Shall lead Hell Captive maugre Hell, and show The powers of darkness bound.

Admiration seis’d All Heav’n, what this might mean, & whither tend Wondring;

well thou know’st how dear, To me are all my works, nor Man the least Though last created,

So Heav’nly love shal outdoo Hellish hate, Giving to death, and dying to redeeme, So dearly to redeem what Hellish hate So easily destroy’d, and still destroyes In those who, when they may, accept not grace.

Bad men and Angels, they arraignd shall sink Beneath thy Sentence; Hell, her numbers full, Thenceforth shall be for ever shut.

The World shall burn, and from her ashes spring New Heav’n and Earth, wherein the just shall dwell And after all thir tribulations long See golden days, fruitful of golden deeds, With Joy and Love triumphing, and fair Truth.

Impurpl’d with Celestial Roses smil’d.

Eternal King; thee Author of all being, Fountain of Light, thy self invisible Amidst the glorious brightness where thou sit’st

By thee created, and by thee threw down Th’ aspiring Dominations: thou that day Thy Fathers dreadful Thunder didst not spare, Nor stop thy flaming Chariot wheels, that shook Heav’ns everlasting Frame, while o’re the necks Thou drov’st of warring Angels disarraid.

Hail Son of God, Saviour of Men, thy Name Shall be the copious matter of my Song Henceforth, and never shall my Harp thy praise Forget, nor from thy Fathers praise disjoine.

So on this windie Sea of Land, the Fiend Walk’d up and down alone bent on his prey,

All th’ unaccomplisht works of Natures hand, Abortive, monstrous, or unkindly mixt, Dissolvd on earth, fleet hither, and in vain, Till final dissolution, wander here,

And now Saint PETER at Heav’ns Wicket seems To wait them with his Keys, and now at foot Of Heav’ns ascent they lift thir Feet, when loe A violent cross wind from either Coast Blows them transverse ten thousand Leagues awry Into the devious Air; then might ye see Cowles, Hoods and Habits with thir wearers tost And flutterd into Raggs, then Reliques, Beads, Indulgences, Dispenses, Pardons, Bulls, The sport of Winds: all these upwhirld aloft Fly o’re the backside of the World farr off Into a LIMBO large and broad, since calld The Paradise of Fools, to few unknown Long after, now unpeopl’d, and untrod;

The Stairs were then let down, whether to dare The Fiend by easie ascent, or aggravate His sad exclusion from the dores of Bliss.

A passage down to th’ Earth, a passage wide, Wider by farr then that of after-times