Sat on his throne, upheld by old repute,
Consent or custom; and his regal state
Put forth at full, but still his strength concealed, Which tempted our attempt, and wrought our fall. Henceforth his might we know, and know our own; So as not either to provoke, or dread
New war, provoked: our better part remains To work in close design, by fraud or guile, What force effected not: that he no less At length from us may find, who overcomes By force, hath overcome but half his foe. Space may produce new worlds; whereof so rife There went a fame in Heaven, that he ere long Intended to create, and therein plant
A generation, whom his choice regard Should favour equal to the sons of Heaven: Thither, if but to pry, shall be perhaps Our first eruption; thither or elsewhere: For this infernal pit shall never hold Celestial Spirits in bondage, nor the abyss Long under darkness cover. But these thoughts Full counsel must mature: peace is despaired; For who can think submission? War then, War, Open or understood, must be resolved.
He spake and to confirm his words, out-flew Millions of flaming swords, drawn from the thighs Of mighty Cherubim; the sudden blaze
Far round illumined Hell: highly they raged Against the Highest, and fierce with grasped arms Clashed on their sounding shields the din of war, Hurling defiance toward the vault of Heaven.
There stood a hill not far, whose grisly top Belched fire and rolling smoke; the rest entire Shone with a glossy scurf; undoubted sign That in his womb was hid metallic ore,
The work of sulphur. Thither winged with speed, A numerous brigad hastened: as when bands Of pioneers, with spade and pickax armed, Forerun the royal camp, to trench a field, Or cast a rampart. Mammon led them on; Mammon, the least erected Spirit that fell From Heaven; for e'en in Heaven his looks and thoughts Were always downward bent, admiring more The riches of Heaven's pavement, trodden gold, Than aught, divine or holy, else enjoyed In vision beatifick by him first
Men also, and by his suggestion taught,
Ransacked the center, and with impious hands Rifled the bowels of their mother Earth For treasures, better hid. Soon had his crew Opened into the hill a spacious wound, And digged out ribs of gold. Let none admire That riches grow in Hell; that soil may best Deserve the precious bane. And here let those Who boast in mortal things, and wondering tell Of Babel, and the works of Memphian kings, Learn how their greatest monuments of fame, And strength, and art, are easily out-done By Spirits reprobate, and in an hour What in an age they with incessant toil And hands innumerable scarce perform. Nigh on the plain, in many cells prepared,
That underneath had veins of liquid fire
Sluced from the lake, a second multitude
With wonderous art founded the massy ore,
Severing each kind, and scummed the bullion dross :
A third as soon had formed within the ground
A various mould, and from the boiling cells By strange conveyance filled each hollow nook; As in an organ, from one blast of wind,
To many a row of pipes the sound-board breathes. Anon, out of the earth, a fabrick huge Rose like an exhalation, with the sound Of dulcet symphonies and voices sweet, Built like a temple, where pilasters round Were set, and Dorick pillars overlaid With golden architrave; nor did there want Cornice or freeze, with bossy sculptures graven : The roof was fretted gold. Not Babylon, Nor great Alcairo, such magnificence Equalled in their glories, to enshrine Belus or Sérapis, their Gods; or seat Their kings, when Egypt with Assyria strove In wealth and luxury. The ascending pile Stood fixed her stately highth: and straight the doors,
Opening their brazen folds, discover, wide Within, her ample spaces, o'er the smooth And level pavement: from the arched roof, Pendant by subtle magick, many a row Of starry lamps and blazing cressets, fed With Napththa and Asphaltus, yielded light As from a sky. The hasty multitude
Admiring entered; and the work some praise,
And some the architect: his hand was known In Heaven by many a towered structure high, · Where sceptered Angels held their residence, And sat as princes; whom the supreme King Exalted to such power, and gave to rule, Each in his hierarchy, the orders bright. Nor was his name unheard, or unadored, In ancient Greece; and in Ausonian land Men called him Mulciber; and how he fell From Heaven, they fabled, thrown by angry Jove Sheer o'er the crystal battlements: from morn To noon he fell, from noon to dewy eve, A summer's day; and with the setting sun Dropt from the zenith like a falling star, On Lemnos the 'gean isle: thus they relate, Erring; for he with this rebellious rout
Fell long before; nor aught availed him now To have built in Heaven high towers; nor did he 'scape
By all his engines, but was headlong sent
With his industrious crew to build in Hell.
Mean while the winged heralds, by command
Of sovran power, with awful ceremony
And trumpets' sound, throughout the host proclaim A solemn council, forthwith to be held
At Pandemonium; the high capital
Of Satan and his peers: their summons called From every band and squared regiment
By place or choice the worthiest; they anon, With hundreds and with thousands, trooping came, Attended all access was thronged; the gates And porches wide, but chief the spacious hall
(Though like a covered field, where champions bold Wont ride in armed, and at the Soldan's chair Defied the best of Panim chivalry
To mortal combat, or career with lance,) Thick swarmed, both on the ground and in the air Brushed with the hiss of rusling wings. As bees In spring-time, when the sun with Taurus rides, Pour forth their populous youth about the hive In clusters they among fresh dews and flowers Fly to and fro, or on the smoothed plank, The suburb of their straw-built citadel,
New rubbed with balm, expatiate and confer Their state affairs. So thick the aery croud Swarmed and were straitened; till, the signal given, Behold a wonder! They but now who seemed In bigness to surpass Earth's giant sons, Now less than smallest dwarfs, in narrow room Throng numberless, like that Pygmean race Beyond the Indian mount; or faery elves, Whose midnight revels, by a forest side Or fountain, some belated peasant sees,
Or dreams he sees, while over-head the moon`
Sits arbitress, and nearer to the earth
Wheels her pale course; they, on their mirth and dance
Intent, with jocund musick charm his ear;
At once with joy and fear his heart rebounds.
Thus incorporeal Spirits to smallest forms
Reduced their shapes immense, and were at large, Though without number still, amidst the hall Of that infernal court. But far within,
And in their own dimensions, like themselves,
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