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POETS

OF THE

SEVENTEENTH

ENTURY.

JOHN MILTON.

Born 1608. Died 1674.

SOLILOQUY OF SATAN.

S this the region, this the soil, the clime,

Said then the lost archangel, this the seat,

That we must change for heaven? this mournful
gloom

For that celestial light? Be it so, since he,

Who now is Sovran, can dispose and bid

What shall be right; farthest from him is best,

Whom reason hath equalled, force hath made supreme

Above his equals. Farewell, happy fields,

Where joy for ever dwells! Hail horrors, hail
Infernal world! and thou profoundest hell,
Receive thy new possessor, one who brings
A mind not to be changed by place or time.
The mind is its own place, and in itself
Can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven.
What matter where, if I be still the same,
And where I should be; all but less than he
Whom thunder hath made greater? Here at least
We shall be free; the Almighty hath not built
Here for his envy, will not drive us hence :
Here we may reign secure, and, in my choice,
To reign is worth ambition, though in hell,--
Better to reign in hell, than serve in heaven.

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But wherefore let we then our faithful friends,
The associates and co-partners of our loss,
Lie thus astonished on the oblivious pool,
And call them not to share with us their part
In this unhappy mansion; or once more,
With rallied arms to try what may be yet
Regained in heaven, or what more lost in hell?

Paradise Lost, Book I.

SATAN.

E scarce had ceased, when the superior fiend

HE

Was moving toward the shore: his ponderous shield,

Ethereal temper, massy, large, and round,

Behind him cast; the broad circumference

Hung on his shoulders like the moon, whose orb
Through optic glass the Tuscan artist views
At evening from the top of Fesolé,
Or in Valdarno, to descry new lands,
Rivers, or mountains, in her spotty globe.
His spear to equal which the tallest pine
Hewn on Norwegian hills, to be the mast
Of some huge ammiral, were but a wand-
He walked with, to support uneasy steps
Over the burning marle, not like those steps
On heaven's azure; and the torrid clime
Smote on him sore besides, vaulted with fire.
Nathless he so endured, till on the beach
Of that enflamed sea he stood, and called
His legions, angel forms, who lay entranced
Thick as autumnal leaves that strew the brooks
In Vallombrosa, where the Etrurian shades,
High over-arched, embower; or scattered sedge
Afloat, when with fierce winds Orion armed

Hath vext the Red-Sea coast, whose waves o'erthrew
Busiris and his Memphian chivalry,

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