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The fiery serpent fled, and noxious worm,
The lion and fierce tiger glared aloof.
But now an aged man1 in rural weeds,

Following, as seemed, the quest of some stray ewe,
Or withered sticks to gather, which might serve
Against a winter's day when winds blow keen,
To warm him wet returned from field at eve,
He saw approach, who first with curious eye
Perused him, then with words thus uttered spake :

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Sir, what ill chance hath brought thee to this place, So far from path or road of men, who pass

In troop or caravan? for single none

Durst ever, who returned, and dropped not here
His carcass, pined with hunger and with drouth.
I ask the rather, and the more admire,

For that to me thou seem'st the man, whom late
Our new baptizing prophet at the ford

Of Jordan honoured so, and called thee Son

Of God; I saw and heard, for we sometimes

Who dwell this wild, constrained by want, come forth
To town or village nigh (nighest is far)

Where aught we hear, and curious are to hear,
What happens new; fame also finds us out."

To whom the Son of God: "Who brought me hither,

Will bring me hence; no other guide I seek."

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By miracle he may,” replied the swain,

"What other way I see not, for we here

Live on tough roots and stubs,2 to thirst inured
More than the camel,3 and to drink go far,
Men to much misery and hardship born:
But if thou be the Son of God, command

That out of these hard stones be made thee bread;

1 As the Scripture is entirely silent about what personage the tempter assumed, the poet was at liberty to indulge his own fancy; and nothing, I think, could be better conceived for his present purpose, or more likely to prevent suspicion of fraud. The poet might, perhaps, take the hint from a design of David Kirkboon's, where the devil is represented addressing himself to our Saviour, under the appearance of an old man.-Thyer.

2 Although this word is used both by Chaucer and Spenser to signify a stock or clump, still the sense seems to require " shrubs," as is proposed by Thyer.

3 On the endurance of thirst by the camel, see Plin. H. N. viii, 26. Taverner says that it will ordinarily live without drink eight or nine

days.

Is it not written

So shalt thou save thyself and us relieve
With food, whereof we wretched seldom taste."
He ended, and the Son of God replied :
Think'st thou such force in bread?
(For I discern thee other than thou seem'st)
Man lives not by bread only, but each word
Proceeding from the mouth of God, who fed
Our fathers here with manna? In the mount
Moses was forty days, nor ate nor drank;
And forty days Elijah without food

Wandered this barren waste; the same I now:
Why dost thou then suggest to me distrust,
Knowing who I am, as I know who thou art?"
Whom thus answered the arch-fiend now undisguised:
"'Tis true, I am that spirit unfortunate,

Who, leagued with millions more in rash revolt,
Kept not my happy station, but was driven
With them from bliss to the bottomless deep;
Yet to that hideous place not so confined
By rigour unconniving, but that oft
Leaving my dolorous prison I enjoy

Large liberty to round this globe of earth,

Or range in the air, nor from the Heaven of Heavens Hath he excluded my resort sometimes.

I came among the sons of God, when he

Gave up into my hands Uzzéan Job

To prove him, and illustrate his high worth;
And when to all his angels he proposed
To draw the proud king Ahab into fraud
That he might fall in Ramoth, they demurring,
I undertook that office, and the tongues
Of all his flattering prophets glibbed with lies
To his destruction, as I had in charge;
For what he bids I do. Though I have lost.
Much lustre of my native brightness, lost
To be beloved of God, I have not lost
To love, at least contemplate and admire
What I see excellent in good, or fair,
Or virtuous, I should so have lost all sense.
What can be then less in me than desire
To see thee and approach thee, whom I know
Declared the Son of God, to hear attent2
Thy wisdom, and behold thy Godlike deeds?
1 See 1 Kings, xxii. 19, sqq.
2 Attentively.

Men generally think me such a foe

To all mankind: why should I? they to me
Never did wrong or violence; by them

I lost not what I lost, rather by them

I gained what I have gained, and with them dwell
Copartner in these regions of the world,
If not disposer; lend them oft my aid,
Oft my advice by presages and signs,
And answers, oracles, portents, and dreams,
Whereby they may direct their future life.
Envy they say excites me thus to gain
Companions of my misery and woe.

At first it may be; but long since with woe
Nearer acquainted, now I feel by proof,
That fellowship in pain divides not smart,
Nor lightens aught each man's peculiar load.
Small consolation then, were men adjoined:
This wounds me most (what can it less?) that man,
Man fallen shall be restored; I never more."
To whom our Saviour sternly thus replied:
Deservedly thou griev'st, composed of lies
From the beginning, and in lies wilt end;

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Who boast'st release from Hell, and leave to come
Into the Heaven of Heavens. Thou com'st indeed,
As a poor miserable captive thrall

Comes to the place where he before had sat
Among the prime in splendour, now deposed,
Ejected, emptied, gazed, unpitied, shunned,
A spectacle of ruin or of scorn

To all the host of Heaven: the happy place
Imparts to thee no happiness, no joy,

Rather inflames thy torment, representing
Lost bliss to thee no more communicable,
So never more in Hell than when in Heaven.
But thou art serviceable to Heaven's King.
Wilt thou impute to obedience what thy fear
Extorts, or pleasure to do ill excites?

What but thy malice moved thee to misdeem
Of righteous Job, then cruelly to afflict him
With all inflictions? but his patience won.
The other service was thy chosen task,
To be a liar in four hundred mouths:
For lying is thy sustenance, thy food.
Yet thou pretend'st to truth; all oracles

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