Who long have ‘paved hell with their good intentions.’ | |
XXXVIII | |
Michael began: ‘What wouldst thou with this man, | |
Now dead, and brought before the Lord? What ill | |
Hath he wrought since his mortal race began, | |
300 | That thou canst claim him? Speak! and do thy will, |
If it be just: if in this earthly span | |
He hath been greatly failing to fulfil | |
His duties as a king and mortal, say, | |
And he is thine; if not, let him have way.’ | |
XXXIX | |
305 | ‘Michael!’ replied the Prince of Air, ‘even here, |
Before the Gate of him thou servest, must | |
I claim my subject: and will make appear | |
That as he was my worshipper in dust, | |
So shall he be in spirit, although dear | |
310 | To thee and thine, because nor wine nor lust |
Were of his weaknesses; yet on the throne | |
He reign’d o’er millions to serve me alone. | |
XL | |
‘Look to | |
Once, more | |
315 | In this poor planet’s conquest; nor, alas! |
Need he thou servest envy me my lot: | |
With all the myriads of bright worlds which pass | |
In worship round him, he may have forgot | |
Yon weak creation of such paltry things: | |
320 | I think few worth damnation save their kings, – |
XLI | |
‘And these but as a kind of quit-rent, to | |
Assert my right as lord; and even had | |
I such an inclination, ’twere (as you | |
Well know) superfluous: they are grown so bad, | |
325 | That hell has nothing better left to do |
Than leave them to themselves: so much more mad | |
And evil by their own internal curse, | |
Heaven cannot make them better, nor I worse. | |
XLII | |
‘Look to the earth, I said, and say again: | |
330 | When this old, blind, mad, helpless, weak, poor worm |
Began in youth’s first bloom and flush to reign, | |
The world and he both wore a different form, | |
And much of earth and all the watery plain | |
Of ocean call’d him king: through many a storm | |
335 | His isles had floated on the abyss of time; |
For the rough virtues chose them for their clime. | |
XLIII | |
‘He came to his sceptre young; he leaves it old: | |
Look to the state in which he found his realm, | |
And left it; and his annals too behold, | |
340 | How to a minion first he gave the helm; |
How grew upon his heart a thirst for gold, | |
The beggar’s vice, which can but overwhelm | |
The meanest hearts; and for the rest, but glance | |
Thine eye along America and France. | |
XLIV | |
345 | ‘ ’Tis true, he was a tool from first to last |
(I have the workmen safe); but as a tool | |
So let him be consumed. From out the past | |
Of ages, since mankind have known the rule | |
Of monarchs — from the bloody rolls amass’d | |
350 | Of sin and slaughter – from the Cæsars’ school, |
Take the worst pupil; and produce a reign | |
More drench’d with gore, more cumber’d with the slain. | |
XLV | |
‘He ever warr’d with freedom and the free: | |
Nations as men, home subjects, foreign foes, | |
355 | So that they utter’d the word “Liberty!” |
Found George the Third their first opponent. Whose | |
History was ever stain’d as his will be | |
With national and individual woes? | |
I grant his household abstinence; I grant | |
360 | His neutral virtues, which most monarchs want; |
XLVI | |
‘I know he was a constant consort; own | |
He was a decent sire, and middling lord. | |
All this is much, and most upon a throne; | |
As temperance, if at Apicius’ board, | |
365 | Is more than at an anchorite’s supper shown. |
I grant him all the kindest can accord; | |
And this was well for him, but not for those | |
Millions who found him what oppression chose. | |
XLVII | |
‘The New World shook him off; the Old yet groans | |
370 | Beneath what he and his prepared, if not |
Completed: he leaves heirs on many thrones | |
To all his vices, without what begot | |
Compassion for him – his tame virtues; drones | |
Who sleep, or despots who have now forgot | |
375 | A lesson which shall be re-taught them, wake |
Upon the thrones of earth; but let them quake! | |
XLVIII | |
‘Five millions of the primitive, who hold | |
The faith which makes ye great on earth, implored | |
A | |
380 | Freedom to worship – not alone your Lord, |
Michael, but you, and you, Saint Peter! Cold | |
Must be your souls, if you have not abhorr’d | |
The foe to catholic participation | |
In all the license of a Christian nation. | |
XLIX | |
385 | ‘True! he allow’d them to pray God; but as |
A consequence of prayer, refused the law | |
Which would have placed them upon the same base | |
With those who did not hold the saints in awe.’ | |
But here Saint Peter started from his place, | |
390 | And cried, ‘You may the prisoner withdraw: |
Ere heaven shall ope her portals to this Guelph, | |
While I am guard, may I be damn’d myself! | |
L | |
‘Sooner will I with Cerberus exchange | |
My office (and | |
395 | Than see this royal Bedlam bigot range |
The azure fields of heaven, of that be sure!’ | |
‘Saint!’ replied Satan, ‘you do well to avenge | |
The wrongs he made your satellites endure | |
And if to this exchange you should be given, | |
400 | I’ll try to coax |
LI | |
Here Michael interposed: ‘Good saint! and devil! | |
Pray, not so fast; you both outrun discretion. | |
Saint Peter! you were wont to be more civil: | |
Satan! excuse this warmth of his expression, | |
405 | And condescension to the vulgar’s level: |
Even saints sometimes forget themselves in session. | |
Have you got more to say?’ – ‘No. ‘ – ’If you please, | |
I’ll trouble you to call your witnesses.’ | |
LII | |
Then Satan turn’d and waved his swarthy hand, | |
410 | Which stirr’d with its electric qualities |
Clouds farther off than we can understand, | |
Although we find him sometimes in our skies; | |
Infernal thunder shook both sea and land | |
In all the planets, and hell’s batteries | |
415 | Let off the artillery, which Milton mentions |
As one of Satan’s most sublime inventions. | |
LIII | |
This was a signal unto such damn’d souls | |
As have the privilege of their damnation | |
Extended far beyond the mere controls | |
420 | Of worlds past, present, or to come; no station |
Is theirs particularly in the rolls | |
Of hell assign’d; but where their inclination | |
Or business carries them in search of game, | |
They may range freely – being damn’d the same. | |
LIV | |
425 | They are proud of this — as very well they may, |
It being a sort of knighthood, or gilt key | |
Stuck in their loins; or like to an ‘entré’ | |
Up the back stairs, or such free-masonry. | |
I borrow my comparisons from clay, | |
430 | Being clay myself. Let not those spirits be |
Offended with such base low likenesses; | |
We know their posts are nobler far than these. | |
LV | |
When the great signal ran from heaven to hell — | |
About ten million times the distance reckon’d | |
435 | From our sun to its earth, as we can tell |
How much time it takes up, even to a second, | |
For every ray that travels to dispel | |
The fogs of London, through which, dimly beacon’d, | |
The weathercocks are gilt some thrice a year, | |
440 | If that the |
LVI |