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If chance the radiant Sun with farewel sweet
Extend his ev'ning beam, the fields revive,
The birds their notes renew, and bleating herds
Atteft their joy, that hill and valley rings.
O shame to men! Devil with Devil damn'd

495

Firm concord holds; men only difagree
Of creatures rational, though under hope
Of heav'nly grace, and God proclaiming peace,
Yet live in hatred, enmity and strife

500

Among themselves, and levy cruel wars,
Wafting the earth, each other to destroy:
As if (which might induce us to accord)
Man had not hellish foes enow befides,
That day and night for his destruction wait.

505

The STYGIAN council thus dissolv'd, and forth

In order came the grand infernal Peers:
'Midst came their mighty Paramount, and seem'd
Alone th' antagonist of Heav'n, nor less
Than Hell's dread Emperor, with pomp fupreme, 510
And God-like imitated state: him round
A globe of fiery Seraphim inclos'd
With bright imblazonry, and horrent arms.
Then of their session ended they bid cry
With trumpets regal found the great refult :
Tow'rds the four winds four speedy Cherubim
Put to their mouths the founding alchymy,
By heralds voice explain'd: the hollow Abyss
Heard far and wide, and all the host of Hell
With deafning thout return'd them loud acclaim. 520

515

Thence more at ease their minds, and somewhat rais'd By false presumptuous hope, the ranged Pow'rs Disband, and wand'ring, each his feveral way Perfues, as inclination or fad choice Leads him perplext, where he may likelieft find 525 Truce to his restiess thoughts, and entertain

The irksome hours, till his great chief return.

Part

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Part on the plain, or in the air fublime
Upon the wing, or in swift race contend,
As at th' OLYMPIAN games or PYTHIAN fields:
Part curb their fiery steeds, or shun the goal
With rapid wheels, or fronted brigads form.
As when, to warn proud cities, war appears
Wag'd in the troubl'd sky, and armies rush
To battel in the clouds, before each van

53

535

Prick forth the aery Knights, and couch their spears
Till thickest legions close; with feats of arms
From either end of heav'n the welkin burns.
Others, with vast TYPHAAN rage, more fell
Rend up both rocks and hills, and ride the air 540
In whirlwind: Hell scarce holds the wild uproar.
As when ALCIDES from OECHALIA crown'd
With conquest, felt th' invenom'd robe, and tore
Through pain up by the roots THESSALIAN pines,
And LICHAS from the top of OETA threw 545
Into the EUBOIC Sea. Others more mild,

Retreated in a filent valley, fing

With notes angelical to many a harp
Their own heroic deeds and hapless fall
By doom of battel: and complain that Fate
Free virtue should inthrall to force or chance.

550

Their fong was partial, but the harmony (What could it less when spirits immortal fing?) Suspended Hell, and took with ravishment The thronging audience. In discourse more sweet 555 (For eloquence the foul, fong charms the fenfe)

Others apart fat on a hill retir'd,

In thoughts more elevate, and reason'd high,
Of providence, foreknowledge, will and fate,
Fixt fate, free will, foreknowledge absolute; 560
And found no end, in wandring mazes loft.
Of good and evil much they argu'd then,
Of happiness and final mifery,

Paffion and apathy, and glory and shame,
Vain wisdom all, and false philofophy:

565

570

Yet with a pleasing forcery could charm
Pain for a while, or anguish; and excite
Fallacious hope, or arm th' obdurate breaft
With ftubborn patience, as with triple steel.
Another part, in squadrons and gross bands,
On bold adventure to discover wide
That dismal world, if any clime perhaps
Might yield them eafier habitation, bend
Four ways their flying march, along the banks
Of four infernal rivers, that disgorge
Into the burning lake their baleful ftreams:
Abhorred STYX, the flood of deadly hate;
Sad ACHERON, of forrow black and deep;
COCYTUS, nam'd of lamentation loud
Heard on the rueful stream; fierce PHLEGETON, 580
Whose waves of torrent fire inflame with rage.
Far off from these a flow and filent stream,
LETHE the river of oblivion, rolls

575

Her watry labyrinth; whereof who drinks,
Forthwith his former state and being forgets,
Forgets both joy and grief, pleasure and pain

585

Beyond this flood a frozen continent

Lies dark and wild, beat with perpetual storms
Of whirlwind and dire hail; which on firm land
Thaws not, but gathers heap, and ruin feems
Of ancient pile; all else deep snow and ice;
A gulf profound, as that SERBONIAN bog
Betwixt DAMIATA and mount CASIUS old,
Where armies whole have funk: the parching air
Burns frore, and cold performs th' effect of fire. 595

590

Thither by harpy-footed Furies hal'd
At certain revolutions, all the damn'd
Are brought; and feel by turns the bitter change
Of fierce extremes, extremes by change more fierce!
From beds of raging fire to starve in ice
Their foft ethereal warmth, and there to pine

600,

Inmoveable, infixt, and frozen round,

Periods of time; thence hurried back to fire.

They

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