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Hath told thee? Hast thou eaten of the tree, Whereof I gave thee charge thou shouldst not eat?"

To whom thus Adam sore beset replied

"O heav'n! in evil strait this day I stand
Before my Judge; either to undergo
Myself the total crime, or to accuse
My other self, the partner of my life;

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Whose failing, while her faith to me remains,
I should conceal, and not expose to blame

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By my complaint: but strict necessity
Subdues me, and calamitous constraint;
Lest on my head both sin and punishment,
However insupportable, be all

Devolv'd; though should I hold my peace, yet thou Wouldst easily detect what I conceal.

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This woman, whom thou mad'st to be my help,

And gav'st me as thy perfect gift, so good,

So fit, so acceptable, so divine,

That from her hand I could suspect no ill,

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And what she did, (whatever in itself,)

Her doing seem'd to justify the deed;

She gave me of the tree, and I did eat."

To whom the Sov'reign Presence thus replied:

"Was she thy God, that her thou didst obey

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Before his voice? or was she made thy guide,
Superior, or but equal, that to her

Thou didst resign thy manhood, and the place
Wherein God set thee above her made of thee,
And for thee, whose perfection far excell'd
Hers in all real dignity? Adorn'd

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She was indeed, and lovely, to attract

Thy love, not thy subjection: and her gifts

Were such, as, under government, well seem'd;
Unseemly to bear rule; which was thy part
And person, hadst thou known thyself aright.
So having said, he thus to Eve in few:

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66 Say, woman, what is this which thou hast done?"

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To whom sad Eve, with shame nigh overwhelm'd, Confessing soon, yet not before her Judge Bold or loquacious, thus abash'd replied: "The serpent me beguil'd, and I did eat." Which when the Lord God heard, without delay To judgment he proceeded on th' accus'd Serpent, though brute; unable to transfer The guilt on him who made him instrument Of mischief, and polluted from the end Of his creation: justly then accurs'd As vitiated in nature: more to know

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Concern'd not man, (since he no farther knew,) 170
Nor alter'd his offence; yet God at last
To Satan first in sin his doom applied,

Though in mysterious terms, judg'd as then best:
And on the serpent thus his curse let fall:

"Because thou hast done this, thou art accurs'd Above all cattle, each beast of the field; Upon thy belly grov'ling thou shalt go, And dust shalt eat all the days of thy life. Between thee and the woman I will put

Enmity, and between thine and her seed;

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Her seed shall bruise thy head, thou bruise his

heel."

So spake this oracle, then verified

When Jesus, son of Mary, second Eve,

Saw Satan fall, like lightning, down from heav'n,

Prince of the air; then, rising from his grave,
Spoil'd Principalities and Pow'rs, triumph'd
In open show, and with ascension bright,
Captivity led captive through the air,
The realm itself of Satan, long usurp'd,
Whom he shall tread at last under our feet;
Even he, who now foretold his fatal bruise:
And to the woman thus his sentence turn'd:
Thy sorrow I will greatly multiply

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By thy conception; children thou shalt bring

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In sorrow forth; and to thy husband's will
Thine shall submit; he over thee shall rule."

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On Adam last thus judgment he pronounc'd: "Because thou hast hearken'd to the voice of thy wife, And eaten of the tree concerning which

I charg'd thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat thereof:
Curs'd is the ground for thy sake; thou in sorrow 201
Shall eat thereof, all the days of thy life;
Thorns also and thistles it shall bring thee forth
Unbid; and thou shalt eat of the herb of the field;
In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread,
Till thou return unto the ground: for thou
Out of the ground wast taken; know thy birth,
For dust thou art, and shalt to dust return."-

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Sin and Death become aware in some wonderful manner of Satan's success, and prepare a road from hell to the earth, Satan returns to hell, and convenes a council to listen to the narrative of his triumph, but God punishes his pride by transforming him and his accomplices into serpents.

BOOK XI.

THE ARGUMENT.

God accepts the prayers of our first parents, but declares that they must no longer abide in Paradise; sends Michael with a band of cherubim to dispossess them; but first to reveal to Adam future things; Michael's coming down.

"O SONS, like one of us man is become
To know both good and evil, since his taste
Of that defended fruit; but let him boast
His knowledge of good lost, and evil got;
Happier, had it suffic'd him to have known
Good by itself, and evil not at all.
He sorrows now, repents, and prays contrite,
My motions in him; longer than they move,
His heart I know how variable and vain,
Self-left. Lest, therefore, his now bolder hand
Reach also to the tree of life, and eat,
And live for ever,-dream at least to live
For ever, to remove him I decree,

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And send him from the garden forth to till

The ground whence he was taken, fitter soil.
Michael, this my behest have thou in charge;
Take to thee from among the cherubim

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Thy choice of flaming warriors, lest the Fiend,

Or in behalf of man, or to invade

Vacant possession, some new trouble raise:

Haste thee, and from the Paradise of God

Without remorse drive out the sinful pair;
From hallow'd ground th' unholy; and denounce
To them, and to their progeny, from thence
Perpetual banishment. Yet, lest they faint
At the sad sentence rigorously urg'd,
(For I behold them soften'd, and with tears
Bewailing their excess,) all terror hide.

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If patiently thy bidding they obey,
Dismiss them not disconsolate; reveal
To Adam what shall come in future days,
As I shall thee enlighten; intermix
My cov'nant in the woman's seed renew'd;
So send them forth, though sorrowing, yet in peace:
And on the east side of the garden place,
Where entrance up from Eden easiest climbs,
Cherubic watch; and of a sword the flame
Wide-waving; all approach far off to fright,
And guard all passage to the tree of life;
Lest Paradise a receptacle prove

To spirits foul, and all my trees their prey;

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With whose stol'n fruit man once more to delude."
He ceas'd; and th' archangelic power prepar'd 126
For swift descent; with him the cohort bright
Of watchful cherubim; four faces each
Had, like a double Janus; all their shape
Spangled with eyes more numerous than those 130
Of Argus, and more wakeful than to drowse,
Charm'd with Arcadian pipe, the pastoral reed
Of Hermes, or his opiate rod.

In the remainder of the book, Michael, according to God's instructions, takes Adam up to a high hill, and shows him in vision the history of his descendants till the time of the Flood. In the twelfth book, Michael narrates to Adam the history of man from the flood to the end of the world, dwelling specially on the incarnation, life, and death of Jesus Christ, the descendant of the woman who undid the work of the devil. After descending from the mount, the angel proceeds to fulfil his commission by expelling our first parents from Eden: their expulsion is thus described.

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