Read The Annotated Milton: Complete English Poems Online
Authors: John Milton,Burton Raffel
Tags: #Fiction, #General, #Literary Collections, #Poetry, #Classics, #English; Irish; Scottish; Welsh, #English poetry
442 | | |
443 | | The other’s |
444 | | Whereat he inly raged and, as they talked, |
445 | | Smote him |
446 | | That beat out life. He fell, and deadly pale |
447 | | Groaned out his soul with gushing blood effused. |
448 | | Much at that sight was Adam in his heart |
449 | | Dismayed, and thus in haste to th’ Angel cried: |
450 | | |
451
To that meek man, who well had sacrificed.
452
Is piety thus and pure devotion paid?”
453
T’ whom Michael thus, he also moved, replied:
454
“These two are brethren, Adam, and to come
455
Out of thy loins. Th’ unjust the just hath slain,
456
For envy that his brother’s offering found
457
From Heav’n acceptance. But the bloody fact
5988
458
Will be avenged, and th’ other’s faith, approved,
5989
459
Lose no reward, though here thou see him die,
460
Rolling in dust and gore.”
5990
To which our sire:
461
“Alas! both for the deed, and for the cause!
462
But have I now seen Death? Is this the way
463
I must return to native
5991
dust? O sight
464
Of terror, foul and ugly to behold,
465
Horrid to think, how horrible to feel!”
466
To whom thus Michael:
5992
“Death thou hast seen
467
In his first shape on man, but many shapes
5993
468
Of Death, and many are the ways that lead
469
To his grim cave, all dismal, yet to sense
470
More terrible at th’ entrance, than within.
471
Some, as thou saw’st, by violent stroke shall die,
472
By fire, flood, famine, by intemperance more
473
In meats and drinks, which on the earth shall bring
474
Diseases dire, of which a monstrous crew
475
Before thee shall appear, that thou may’st know
476
What misery th’ inabstinence
5994
of Eve
477
Shall bring on men.”
Immediately a place
478
Before his eyes appeared, sad, noisome,
5995
dark,
479
A lazar
5996
-house it seemed, wherein were laid
480
Numbers of all diseased, all maladies
481
482
Of heart-sick agony, all feverous kinds,
483
Convulsions, epilepsies, fierce catarrhs,
5999
484
Intestine stone and ulcer, colic
6000
pangs,
485
Daemoniac frenzy, moping melancholy,
486
487
488
Dropsies,
6006
and asthmas, and joint-racking rheums.
489
Dire was the tossing, deep the groans. Despair
490
Tended the sick, busiest from couch to couch,
491
And over them triumphant Death his dart
492
Shook, but delayed to strike, though oft invoked
493
With vows, as their chief good and final hope.
494
Sight so deform
6007
what heart of rock could long
495
Dry-eyed behold? Adam could not, but wept,
496
Though not of woman born. Compassion quelled
6008
497
His best of man, and gave him up to tears
498
A space, till firmer thoughts restrained excess
499
And, scarce recovering words, his plaint renewed:
500
“O miserable mankind, to what fall
501
Degraded, to what wretched state reserved!
502
Better end here unborn. Why is life giv’n
503
To be thus wrested
6009
from us? Rather, why
504
Obtruded
6010
on us thus? Who, if we knew
505
What we receive, would either not accept
506
Life offered, or soon beg to lay it down,
507
Glad to be so dismissed in peace. Can thus
508
The image of God in man, created once
509
So goodly
6011
and erect, though faulty since,
510
To such unsightly sufferings be debased
511
Under inhuman pains? Why should not man,
512
Retaining still divine similitude
6012
513
In part, from such deformities be free
514
And, for his Maker’s image sake, exempt?”
515
“Their Maker’s image,” answered Michael, “then
516
Forsook them, when themselves they vilified
6013
517
To serve ungoverned appetite, and took
518
His image whom they served, a brutish
6014
vice,
519
Inductive
6015
mainly to the sin of Eve.
520
Therefore so abject is their punishment,
521
Disfiguring not God’s likeness, but their own,
522
Or if His likeness, by themselves defaced,
523
While they pervert pure Nature’s healthful rules
524
To loathsome sickness—worthily, since they
525
God’s image did not reverence in themselves.”
526
“I yield it just,” said Adam, “and submit.
527
But is there yet no other way, besides
528
These painful passages,
6016
how we may come
529
To Death, and mix with our connatural
6017
dust?”
530
“There is,” said Michael, “if thou well observe