The Complete Poems (Penguin Classics)

  335 Plant of the field, which ere it was in the earth

  God made, and every herb, before it grew

  On the green stem; God saw that it was good:

  So ev’n and morn recorded the third day.

  Again th’ Almighty spake: Let there be lights

  340 High in th’ expanse of heaven to divide

  The day from night; and let them be for signs,

  For seasons, and for days, and circling years,

  And let them be for lights as I ordain

  Their office in the firmament of heav’n

  345 To give light on the earth; and it was so.

  And God made two great lights, great for their use

  To man, the greater to have rule by day,

  The less by night altern: and made the stars,

  And set them in the firmament of heav’n

  350 To illuminate the earth, and rule the day

  In their vicissitude, and rule the night,

  And light from darkness to divide. God saw,

  Surveying his great work, that it was good:

  For of celestial bodies first the sun

  355 A mighty sphere he framed, unlightsome first,

  Though of ethereal mould: then formed the moon

  Globose, and every magnitude of stars,

  And sowed with stars the heaven thick as a field:

  Of light by far the greater part he took,

  360 Transplanted from her cloudy shrine, and placed

  In the sun’s orb, made porous to receive

  And drink the liquid light, firm to retain

  Her gathered beams, great palace now of light.

  Hither as to their fountain other stars

  365 Repairing, in their golden urns draw light,

  And hence the morning planet gilds his horns;

  By tincture or reflection they augment

  Their small peculiar, though from human sight

  So far remote, with diminution seen.

  370 First in his east the glorious lamp was seen,

  Regent of day, and all th’ horizon round

  Invested with bright rays, jocund to run

  His longitude through heav’n’s high road: the grey

  Dawn, and the Pleiades before him danced

  375 Shedding sweet influence: less bright the moon,

  But opposite in levelled west was set

  His mirror, with full face borrowing her light

  From him, for other light she needed none

  In that aspéct, and still that distance keeps

  380 Till night, then in the east her turn she shines,

  Revolved on heaven’s great axle, and her reign

  With thousand lesser lights dividual holds,

  With thousand thousand stars, that then appeared

  Spangling the hemisphere: then first adorned

  385 With their bright luminaries that set and rose,

  Glad ev’ning and glad morn crowned the fourth day.

  And God said, Let the waters generate

  Reptile with spawn abundant, living soul:

  And let fowl fly above the earth, with wings

  390 Displayed on the op’n firmament of heav’n.

  And God created the great whales, and each

  Soul living, each that crept, which plenteously

  The waters generated by their kinds,

  And every bird of wing after his kind;

  395 And saw that it was good, and blessed them, saying,

  Be fruitful, multiply, and in the seas

  And lakes and running streams the waters fill;

  And let the fowl be multiplied on the earth.

  Forthwith the sounds and seas, each creek and bay

  400 With fry innumerable swarm, and shoals

  Of fish that with their fins and shining scales

  Glide under the green wave, in schools that oft

  Bank the mid sea: part single or with mate

  Graze the sea-weed their pasture, and through groves

  405 Of coral stray, or sporting with quick glance

  Show to the sun their waved coats dropped with gold,

  Or in their pearly shells at ease, attend

  Moist nutriment, or under rocks their food

  In jointed armour watch: on smooth the seal,

  410 And bended dolphins play: part huge of bulk

  Wallowing unwieldy, enormous in their gait

  Tempest the ocean: there Leviathan

  Hugest of living creatures, on the deep

  Stretched like a promontory sleeps or swims,

  415 And seems a moving land, and at his gills

  Draws in, and at his trunk spouts out a sea.

  Meanwhile the tepid caves, and fens and shores

  Their brood as numerous hatch, from the egg that soon

  Bursting with kindly rupture forth disclosed

  420 Their callow young, but feathered soon and fledge

  They summed their pens, and soaring th’ air sublime

  With clang despised the ground, under a cloud

  In prospect; there the eagle and the stork

  On cliffs and cedar tops their eyries build:

  425 Part loosely wing the region, part more wise

  In common, ranged in figure wedge their way,

  Intelligent of seasons, and set forth

  Their airy caravan high over seas

  Flying, and over lands with mutual wing

  430 Easing their flight; so steers the prudent crane

  Her annual voyage, borne on winds; the air

  Floats, as they pass, fanned with unnumbered plumes:

  From branch to branch the smaller birds with song

  Solaced the woods, and spread their painted wings

  435 Till ev’n, nor then the solemn nightingale

  Ceased warbling, but all night tuned her soft lays:

  Others on silver lakes and rivers bathed

  Their downy breast; the swan with archèd neck

  Between her white wings mantling proudly, rows

  440 Her state with oary feet: yet oft they quit

  The dank, and rising on stiff pennons, tow’r

  The mid aerial sky: others on ground

  Walked firm; the crested cock whose clarion sounds

  The silent hours, and th’ other whose gay train

  445 Adorns him, coloured with the florid hue

  Of rainbows and starry eyes. The waters thus

  With fish replenished, and the air with fowl,

  Ev’ning and morn solémnized the fifth day.

  The sixth, and of Creation last arose

  450 With ev’ning harps and matin, when God said,

  Let the earth bring forth soul living in her kind,

  Cattle and creeping things, and beast of the earth,

  Each in their kind. The earth obeyed, and straight

  Op’ning her fertile womb teemed at a birth

  455 Innumerous living creatures, perfect forms,

  Limbed and full-grown: out of the ground uprose

  As from his lair the wild beast where he wons

  In forest wild, in thicket, brake, or den;

  Among the trees in pairs they rose, they walked:

  460 The cattle in the fields and meadows green:

  Those rare and solitary, these in flocks

  Pasturing at once, and in broad herds upsprung.

  The grassy clods now calved, now half appeared

  The tawny lion, pawing to get free

  465 His hinder parts, then springs as broke from bonds,

  And rampant shakes his brinded mane; the ounce,

  The libbard and the tiger, as the mole

  Rising, the crumbled earth above them threw

  In hillocks; the swift stag from under ground

  470 Bore up his branching head: scarce from his mould

  Behemoth biggest born of earth upheaved

  His vastness: fleeced the flocks and bleating rose,

  As plants: ambiguous between s
ea and land

  The river horse and scaly crocodile.

  475 At once came forth whatever creeps the ground,

  Insect or worm; those waved their limber fans

  For wings, and smallest lineaments exact

  In all the liveries decked of summer’s pride

  With spots of gold and purple, azure and green:

  480 These as a line their long dimension drew,

  Streaking the ground with sinuous trace; not all

  Minims of nature; some of serpent kind

  Wondrous in length and corpulence involved

  Their snaky folds, and added wings. First crept

  485 The parsimonious emmet, provident

  Of future, in small room large heart enclosed,

  Pattern of just equality perhaps

  Hereafter, joined in her popular tribes

  Of commonalty: swarming next appeared

  490 The female bee that feeds her husband drone

  Deliciously, and builds her waxen cells

  With honey stored: the rest are numberless,

  And thou their natures know’st, and gav’st them names,

  Needless to thee repeated; nor unknown

  495 The serpent subtlest beast of all the field,

  Of huge extent sometimes, with brazen eyes

  And hairy mane terrific, though to thee

  Not noxious, but obedient at thy call.

  Now heav’n in all her glory shone, and rolled

  500 Her motions, as the great First Mover’s hand

  First wheeled their course; earth in her rich attire

  Consummate lovely smiled; air, water, earth,

  By fowl, fish, beast, was flown, was swum, was walked

  Frequent; and of the sixth day yet remained;

  505 There wanted yet the master work, the end

  Of all yet done; a creature who not prone

  And brute as other creatures, but endued

  With sanctity of reason, might erect

  His stature, and upright with front serene

  510 Govern the rest, self-knowing, and from thence

  Magnanimous to correspond with Heav’n,

  But grateful to acknowledge whence his good

  Descends, thither with heart and voice and eyes

  Directed in devotion, to adore

  515 And worship God supreme, who made him chief

  Of all his works: therefore the Omnipotent

  Eternal Father (for where is not he

  Present) thus to his Son audibly spake.

  Let us make now man in our image, man

  520 In our similitude, and let them rule

  Over the fish and fowl of sea and air,

  Beast of the field, and over all the earth,

  And every creeping thing that creeps the ground.

  This said, he formed thee, Adam, thee O man

  525 Dust of the ground, and in thy nostrils breathed

  The breath of life; in his own image he

  Created thee, in the image of God

  Express, and thou becam’st a living soul..

  Male he created thee, but thy consórt

  530 Female for race; then blessed mankind, and said,

  Be fruitful, multiply, and fill the earth,

  Subdue it, and throughout dominion hold

  Over fish of the sea, and fowl of the air,

  And every living thing that moves on the earth.

  535 Wherever thus created, for no place

  Is yet distinct by name, thence, as thou know’st

  He brought thee into this delicious grove,

  This garden, planted with the trees of God,

  Delectable both to behold and taste;

  540 And freely all their pleasant fruit for food

  Gave thee, all sorts are here that all th’ earth yields,

  Variety without end; but of the Tree

  Which tasted works Knowledge of Good and Evil,

  Thou may’st not; in the day thou eat’st, thou diest;

  545 Death is the penalty imposed, beware,

  And govern well thy appetite, lest Sin

  Surprise thee, and her black attendant Death.

  Here finished he, and all that he had made

  Viewed, and behold all was entirely good;

  550 So ev’n and morn accomplished the sixth day:

  Yet not till the Creator from his work

  Desisting, though unwearied, up returned

  Up to the Heav’n of Heav’ns his high abode,

  Thence to behold this new created world

  555 Th’ addition of his empire, how it showed

  In prospect from his throne, how good, how fair,

  Answering his great Idea. Up he rode

  Followed with acclamation and the sound

  Symphonious of ten thousand harps that tuned

  560 Angelic harmonies: the earth, the air

  Resounded, (thou remember’st, for thou heard’st)

  The heav’ns and all the constellations rung,

  The planets in their stations list’ning stood,

  While the bright pomp ascended jubilant.

  565 Open, ye everlasting gates, they sung,

  Open, ye Heav’ns, your living doors; let in

  The great Creator from his work returned

  Magnificent, his six days’ work, a world;

  Open, and henceforth oft; for God will deign

  570 To visit oft the dwellings of just men

  Delighted, and with frequent intercourse

  Thither will send his wingèd messengers

  On errands of supernal grace. So sung

  The glorious train ascending: he through Heav’n,

  575 That opened wide her blazing portals, led

  To God’s eternal house direct the way,

  A broad and ample road, whose dust is gold

  And pavement stars, as stars to thee appear,

  Seen in the Galaxy, that Milky Way

  580 Which nightly as a circling zone thou seest

  Powdered with stars. And now on earth the seventh

  Ev’ning arose in Eden, for the sun

  Was set, and twilight from the east came on,

  Forerunning night; when at the holy Mount

  585 Of Heav’n’s high-seated top, th’ imperial throne

  Of Godhead, fixed for ever firm and sure,

  The Filial Power arrived, and sat him down

  With his great Father (for he also went

  Invisible, yet stayed: such privilege

  590 Hath Omnipresence) and the work ordained,

  Author and end of all things, and from work

  Now resting, blessed and hallowed the seventh day,

  As resting on that day from all his work,

  But not in silence holy kept; the harp

  595 Had work and rested not, the solemn pipe,

  And dulcimer, all organs of sweet stop,

  All sounds on fret by string or golden wire

  Tempered soft tunings, intermixed with voice

  Choral or unison: of incense clouds

  600 Fuming from golden censers hid the Mount.

  Creation and the six days’ acts they sung,

  Great are thy works, Jehovah, infinite

  Thy power; what thought can measure thee or tongue

  Relate thee; greater now in thy return

  605 Than from the Giant angels; thee that day

  Thy thunders magnified; but to create

  Is greater than created to destroy.

  Who can impair thee, mighty King, or bound

  Thy empire? easily the proud attempt

  610 Of Spirits apostate and their counsels vain

  Thou hast repelled, while impiously they thought

  Thee to diminish, and from thee withdraw

  The number of thy worshippers. Who seeks

  To lessen thee, against his purpose serves

  615 To manifest the more thy might: his evil

  Thou usest, and from thence creat’st more g
ood.

  Witness this new-made world, another Heav’n

  From Heaven gate not far, founded in view

  On the clear hyaline, the glassy sea;

  620 Of amplitude almost immense, with stars

  Numerous, and every star perhaps a world

  Of destined habitation; but thou know’st

  Their seasons: among these the seat of men,

  Earth with her nether Ocean circumfused,

  625 Their pleasant dwelling place. Thrice happy men,

  And sons of men, whom God hath thus advanced,

  Created in his image, there to dwell

  And worship him, and in reward to rule

  Over his works, on earth, in sea, or air,

  630 And multiply a race of worshippers

  Holy and just: thrice happy if they know

  Their happiness, and persevere upright.

  So sung they, and the Empyrean rung,

  With hallelujahs: thus was Sabbath kept.

  635 And thy request think now fulfilled, that asked

  How first this world and face of things began,

  And what before thy memory was done

  From the beginning, that posterity

  Informed by thee might know; if else thou seek’st

  640 Aught, not surpassing human measure, say.

  BOOK VIII

  The Argument

  Adam inquires concerning celestial motions, is doubtfully

  answered, and exhorted to search rather things more worthy

  of knowledge: Adam assents, and still desirous to detain

  Raphael, relates to him what he remembered since his own

  5 creation, his placing in Paradise, his talk with God concerning

  solitude and fit society, his first meeting and nuptials with Eve,

  his discourse with the angel thereupon; who after admonitions

  repeated departs.

  The angel ended, and in Adam’s ear

  So charming left his voice, that he a while

  Thought him still speaking, still stood fixed to hear;

  Then as new waked thus gratefully replied.

  5 What thanks sufficient, or what recompense

  Equal have I to render thee, divine

  Historian, who thus largely hast allayed

  The thirst I had of knowledge, and vouchsafed

  This friendly condescension to relate

  10 Things else by me unsearchable, now heard

  With wonder, but delight, and, as is due,

  With glory áttribúted to the high

  Creator; something yet of doubt remains,

  Which only thy solution can resolve.

  15 When I behold this goodly frame, this world

  Of heav’n and earth consisting, and compute

  Their magnitudes, this earth a spot, a grain,

  An atom, with the firmament compared

  And all her numbered stars, that seem to roll