Of whirlwind and dire hail, which on firm land Thaws not, but gathers heap, and ruin seems Of ancient pile; or else deep snow and ice, A gulf profound, as that Serbonian bog Betwixt Damiata and mount Casius old,
Where armies whole have sunk: The parching air Burns frore, and cold performs the effect of fire. Thither by harpy-footed furies haled,
At certain revolutions, all the damned
Are brought; and feel by turns the bitter change
Of fierce extremes, extremes by change more fierce, From beds of raging fire, to starve in ice
Their soft ethereal warmth, and there to pine
Immoveable, infixed, and frozen round,
Periods of time, thence hurried back to fire. They ferry over this Lethean sound
Both to and fro, their sorrow to augment, And wish and struggle, as they pass, to reach The tempting stream, with one small drop to lose In sweet forgetfulness all pain and woe,
All in one moment, and so near the brink; But Fate withstands, and to oppose the attempt Medusa with Gorgonian terrour guards
The ford, and of itself the water flies All taste of living wight, as once it fled The lip of Tantalus. Thus roving on
In confused march forlorn, the adventurous bands With shuddering horrour pale, and eyes aghast, Viewed first their lamentable lot, and found
No rest Through many a dark and dreary vale They passed, and many a region dolorous,
O'er many a frozen, many a fiery Alp,
Rocks, caves, lakes, fens, bogs, dens, and shades of death,
A universe of death; which God by curse
Created evil, for evil only good,
Where all life dies, death lives, and nature breeds, Perverse, all monstrous, all prodigious things, Abominable, inutterable, and worse
Than fables yet have feigned, or fear conceived, Gorgons, and Hydras, and Chimeras dire.
Mean while, the Adversary of God and Man, Satan, with thoughts inflamed of highest design, Puts on swift wings, and towards the gates of Hell Explores his solitary flight: sometimes
He scours the right hand coast, sometimes the left; Now shaves with level wing the deep, then soars
Up to the fiery concave towering high.
As when far off at sea a fleet descried
Hangs in the clouds, by equinoctial winds Close sailing from Bengala, or the isles
Of Ternate and Tidore, whence merchants bring Their spicy drugs; they, on the trading flood,
Through the wide Ethiopian to the Cape,
Ply stemming nightly toward the pole: So seemed Far off the flying Fiend. At last appear
Hell bounds, high reaching to the horrid roof,
And thrice three-fold the gates; three folds were brass, Three iron, three of adamantine rock Impenetrable, impaled with circling fire,
Yet unconsumed. Before the gates there sat On either side a formidable shape;
The one seemed woman to the waist, and fair;
But ended foul in many a scaly fold
Voluminous and vast: a serpent armed
With mortal sting: About her middle round of Hell-hounds never ceasing barked
cry With wide Cerberean mouths full loud, and rung
A hideous peal; yet, when they list, would creep,
If aught disturbed their noise, into her womb,
And kennel there; yet there still barked and howled, 658 Within unseen. Far less abhorred than these Vexed Scylla, bathing in the sea that parts Calabria from the hoarse Trinacrian shore: Nor uglier follow the night-hag, when, called In secret, riding through the air she comes, Lured with the smell of infant blood, to dance With Lapland witches, while the labouring moon Eclipses at their charms. The other shape,
If shape it might be called that shape had none Distinguishable in member, joint, or limb;
Or substance might be called that shadow seemed, For each seemed either; black it stood as Night, Fierce as ten Furies, terrible as Hell,
And shook a dreadful dart; what seemed his head The likeness of a kingly crown had on.
Satan was now at hand, and from his seat
The monster moving onward came as fast
With horrid strides; Hell trembled as he strode. The undaunted Fiend what this might be admired, Admired, not feared; God and his Son except, Created thing nought valued he, nor shunned; And with disdainful look thus first began.
Whence and what art thou, execrable shape! That dar'st, though grim and terrible, advance Thy miscreated front athwart my way To yonder gates? through them I mean to pass, That be assured, without leave asked of thee: Retire, or taste thy folly; and learn by proof, Hell-born! not to contend with Spirits of Heaven. To whom the Goblin full of wrath replied. Art thou that Traitor-Angel, art thou He, Who first broke peace in Heaven, and faith, till then Unbroken; and in proud rebellious arms
Drew after him the third part of Heaven's sons
Conjured against the Highest; for which both thou And they, outcast from God, are here condemned To waste eternal days in woe and pain?
And reckon'st thou thyself with Spirits of Heaven, Hell-doomed! and breath'st defiance here and scorn, Where I reign king, and, to enrage thee more, Thy king and lord? Back to thy punishment, False fugitive! and to thy speed add wings, Lest with a whip of scorpions I pursue
Thy lingering, or with one stroke of this dart Strange horrour seize thee, and pangs unfelt before.
So spake the grisly Terrour, and in shape,
So speaking and so threatening, grew ten-fold More dreadful and deform. On the other side, Incensed with indignation, Satan stood Unterrified, and like a comet burned, That fires the length of Ophiuchus huge In the arctick sky, and from his horrid hair Shakes pestilence and war. Each at the head Levelled his deadly aim; their fatal hands No second stroke intend; and such a frown Each cast at the other, as when two black clouds, With Heaven's artillery fraught, come rattling on Over the Caspian, then stand front to front, Hovering a space, till winds the signal blow
To join their dark encounter in mid air:
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