VII-1. Descend from Heav'n Urania, by that name / If rightly thou art call'd, whose Voice divine / Following, above th' Olympian Hill I soare, / Above the flight of Pegasean wing.

VII-5. The meaning, not the Name I call: for thou / Nor of the Muses nine, nor on the top / Of old Olympus dwell'st, but Heav'nlie borne,

VII-8. Before the Hills appeerd, or Fountain flow'd, / Thou with Eternal Wisdom didst converse, / Wisdom thy Sister, and with her didst play / In presence of th' Almightie Father, pleas'd

VII-12. With thy Celestial Song. Up led by thee / Into the Heav'n of Heav'ns I have presum'd, / An Earthlie Guest, and drawn Empyreal Aire,

VII-15. Thy tempring; with like safetie guided down / Return me to my Native Element: / Least from this flying Steed unrein'd, (as once / Bellerophon, though from a lower Clime) / Dismounted, on th' Aleian Field I fall / Erroneous there to wander and forlorne.

VII-21. Half yet remaines unsung, but narrower bound / Within the visible Diurnal Spheare;

VII-23. Standing on Earth, not rapt above the Pole, / More safe I Sing with mortal voice, unchang'd / To hoarce or mute, though fall'n on evil dayes, / On evil dayes though fall'n, and evil tongues;

VII-27. In darkness, and with dangers compast round,

VII-28. And solitude; yet not alone, while thou / Visit'st my slumbers Nightly, or when Morn / Purples the East: still govern thou my Song,

VII-31. Urania, and fit audience find, though few.

VII-32. But drive farr off the barbarous dissonance

VII-33. Of Bacchus and his Revellers, the Race / Of that wilde Rout that tore the Thracian Bard / In Rhodope, where Woods and Rocks had Eares / To rapture, till the savage clamor dround / Both Harp and Voice; nor could the Muse defend

VII-38. Her Son. So fail not thou, who thee implores: / For thou art Heav'nlie, shee an empty dreame.

VII-40. Say Goddess, what ensu'd when Raphael, / The affable Arch-Angel, had forewarn'd / Adam by dire example to beware / Apostasie, by what befell in Heaven / To those Apostates, least the like befall / In Paradise to Adam or his Race, / Charg'd not to touch the interdicted Tree, / If they transgress, and slight that sole command, / So easily obeyd amid the choice / Of all tastes else to please thir appetite,

VII-50. Though wandring. He with his consorted Eve / The storie heard attentive, and was fill'd / With admiration, and deep Muse to heare / Of things so high and strange, things to thir thought / So unimaginable as hate in Heav'n, / And Warr so neer the Peace of God in bliss / With such confusion: but the evil soon / Driv'n back redounded as a flood on those / From whom it sprung, impossible to mix

VII-59. With Blessedness. Whence Adam soon repeal'd / The doubts that in his heart arose: and now / Led on, yet sinless, with desire to know / What neerer might concern him, how this World / Of Heav'n and Earth conspicious first began, / When, and whereof created, for what cause, / What within Eden or without was done / Before his memorie, as one whose drouth / Yet scarce allay'd still eyes the current streame, / Whose liquid murmur heard new thirst excites,

VII-69. Proceeded thus to ask his Heav'nly Guest.

VII-70. Great things, and full of wonder in our eares,

VII-71. Farr differing from this World, thou hast reveal'd / Divine interpreter, by favour sent / Down from the Empyrean to forewarne / Us timely of what might else have bin our loss, / Unknown, which human knowledg could not reach: / For which to the infinitly Good we owe

VII-77. Immortal thanks, and his admonishment / Receave with solemne purpose to observe / Immutably his sovran will, the end

VII-80. Of what we are. But since thou hast voutsaf't / Gently for our instruction to impart / Things above Earthly thought, which yet concernd / Our knowing, as to highest wisdom seemd, / Deign to descend now lower, and relate / What may no less perhaps availe us known,

VII-86. How first began this Heav'n which we behold / Distant so high, with moving Fires adornd / Innumerable, and this which yeelds or fills / All space, the ambient Aire, wide interfus'd

VII-90. Imbracing round this florid Earth, what cause / Mov'd the Creator in his holy Rest / Through all Eternitie so late to build / In Chaos, and the work begun, how soon

VII-94. Absolv'd, if unforbid thou maist unfould / What wee, not to explore the secrets aske / Of his Eternal Empire, but the more / To magnifie his works, the more we know.

VII-98. And the great Light of Day yet wants to run / Much of his Race though steep, suspens in Heav'n / Held by thy voice, thy potent voice he heares, / And longer will delay to heare thee tell / His Generation, and the rising Birth / Of Nature from the unapparent Deep:

VII-104. Or if the Starr of Eevning and the Moon / Haste to thy audience, Night with her will bring

VII-106. Silence, and Sleep listning to thee will watch, / Or we can bid his absence, till thy Song / End, and dismiss thee ere the Morning shine. / Thus Adam his illustrious Guest besought:

VII-110. And thus the Godlike Angel answerd milde. / This also thy request with caution askt / Obtaine: though to recount Almightie works / What words or tongue of Seraph can suffice, / Or heart of man suffice to comprehend?

VII-115. Yet what thou canst attain, which best may serve / To glorifie the Maker, and inferr / Thee also happier, shall not be withheld / Thy hearing, such Commission from above / I have receav'd, to answer thy desire

VII-120. Of knowledge within bounds; beyond abstain / To ask, nor let thine own inventions hope / Things not reveal'd, which th' invisible King, / Onely Omniscient hath supprest in Night, / To none communicable in Earth or Heaven: / Anough is left besides to search and know.

VII-126. But Knowledge is as food, and needs no less / Her Temperance over Appetite, to know / In measure what the mind may well contain, / Oppresses else with Surfet, and soon turns / Wisdom to Folly, as Nourishment to Winde.

VII-131. Know then, that after Lucifer from Heav'n / (So call him, brighter once amidst the Host / Of Angels, then that Starr the Starrs among) / Fell with his flaming Legions through the Deep / Into his place, and the great Son returnd / Victorious with his Saints, th' Omnipotent / Eternal Father from his Throne beheld / Thir multitude, and to his Son thus spake.

VII-139. At least our envious Foe hath fail'd, who thought / All like himself rebellious, by whose aid / This inaccessible high strength, the seat / Of Deitie supream, us dispossest,

VII-143. He trusted to have seis'd, and into fraud / Drew many, whom thir place knows here no more;

VII-145. Yet farr the greater part have kept, I see, / Thir station, Heav'n yet populous retaines / Number sufficient to possess her Realmes / Though wide, and this high Temple to frequent / With Ministeries due and solemn Rites:

VII-150. But least his heart exalt him in the harme / Already done, to have dispeopl'd Heav'n / My damage fondly deem'd, I can repaire

VII-153. That detriment, if such it be to lose

VII-154. Self-lost, and in a moment will create / Another World, out of one man a Race

VII-156. Of men innumerable, there to dwell, / Not here, till by degrees of merit rais'd / They open to themselves at length the way / Up hither, under long obedience tri'd,

VII-160. And Earth be chang'd to Heav'n, and Heav'n to Earth, / One Kingdom, Joy and Union without end.

VII-162. Mean while inhabit laxe, ye Powers of Heav'n,

VII-163. And by my Word, begotten Son, by thee

VII-164. This I perform, speak thou, and be it don:

VII-165. My overshadowing Spirit and might with thee

VII-166. I send along, ride forth, and bid the Deep / Within appointed bounds be Heav'n and Earth,

VII-168. Boundless the Deep, because I am who fill / Infinitude, nor vacuous the space. / Though I uncircumscrib'd my self retire,

VII-171. And put not forth my goodness, which is free / To act or not, Necessitie and Chance / Approach not mee, and what I will is Fate.

VII-174. So spake th' Almightie, and to what he spake / His Word, the Filial Godhead, gave effect.

VII-176. Immediate are the Acts of God, more swift / Then time or motion, but to human ears / Cannot without process of speech be told, / So told as earthly notion can receave.

VII-180. Great triumph and rejoycing was in Heav'n / When such was heard declar'd the Almightie's will;

VII-182. Glorie they sung to the most High, good will / To future men, and in thir dwellings peace: / Glorie to him whose just avenging ire / Had driven out th' ungodly from his sight / And th' habitations of the just; to him / Glorie and praise, whose wisdom had ordain'd / Good out of evil to create, in stead / Of Spirits maligne a better Race to bring / Into thir vacant room, and thence diffuse / His good to Worlds and Ages infinite.

VII-192. So sang the Hierarchies: Mean while the Son / On his great Expedition now appeer'd, / Girt with Omnipotence, with Radiance crown'd / Of Majestie Divine, Sapience and Love / Immense, and all his Father in him shon.

VII-197. About his Chariot numberless were pour'd / Cherub and Seraph, Potentates and Thrones,

VII-199. And Vertues, winged Spirits, and Chariots wing'd, / From the Armoury of God, where stand of old / Myriads between two brazen Mountains lodg'd / Against a solemn day, harnest at hand,

VII-203. Celestial Equipage; and now came forth / Spontaneous, for within them Spirit livd,

VII-205. Attendant on thir Lord: Heav'n op'nd wide / Her ever during Gates, Harmonious sound / On golden Hinges moving, to let forth / The King of Glorie in his powerful Word / And Spirit coming to create new Worlds.

VII-210. On heav'nly ground they stood, and from the shore / They view'd the vast immeasurable Abyss

VII-212. Outrageous as a Sea, dark, wasteful, wilde, / Up from the bottom turn'd by furious windes / And surging waves, as Mountains to assault / Heav'ns highth, and with the Center mix the Pole.

VII-216. Silence, ye troubl'd waves, and thou Deep, peace, / Said then th' Omnific Word, your discord end:

VII-218. Nor staid, but on the Wings of Cherubim / Uplifted, in Paternal Glorie rode / Farr into Chaos, and the World unborn;

VII-221. For Chaos heard his voice: him all his Traine / Follow'd in bright procession to behold / Creation, and the wonders of his might.

VII-224. Then staid the fervid Wheeles, and in his hand / He took the golden Compasses, prepar'd / In Gods Eternal store, to circumscribe / This Universe, and all created things:

VII-228. One foot he center'd, and the other turn'd / Round through the vast profunditie obscure,

VII-230. And said, thus farr extend, thus farr thy bounds, / This be thy just Circumference, O World.

VII-232. Thus God the Heav'n created, thus the Earth, / Matter unform'd and void: Darkness profound / Cover'd th' Abyss: but on the watrie calme

VII-235. His brooding wings the Spirit of God outspred, / And vital vertue infus'd, and vital warmth

VII-237. Throughout the fluid Mass, but downward purg'd / The black tartareous cold Infernal dregs

VII-239. Adverse to life: then founded, then conglob'd / Like things to like, the rest to several place / Disparted, and between spun out the Air,

VII-242. And Earth self ballanc't on her Center hung.

VII-243. Let ther be Light, said God, and forthwith Light / Ethereal, first of things, quintessence pure / Sprung from the Deep, and from her Native East / To journie through the airie gloom began, / Sphear'd in a radiant Cloud, for yet the Sun / Was not; shee in a cloudie Tabernacle

VII-249. Sojourn'd the while. God saw the Light was good;

VII-250. And light from darkness by the Hemisphere / Divided: Light the Day, and Darkness Night

VII-252. He nam'd. Thus was the first Day Eev'n and Morn:

VII-253. Nor past uncelebrated, nor unsung / By the Celestial Quires, when Orient Light / Exhaling first from Darkness they beheld; / Birth-day of Heav'n and Earth; with joy and shout / The hollow Universal Orb they fill'd, / And touch'd thir Golden Harps, and hymning prais'd / God and his works, Creatour him they sung, / Both when first Eevning was, and when first Morn.

VII-261. Again, God said, let ther be Firmament / Amid the Waters, and let it divide

VII-263. The Waters from the Waters: and God made / The Firmament, expanse of liquid, pure, / Transparent, Elemental Air, diffus'd / In circuit to the uttermost convex / Of this great Round: partition firm and sure, / The Waters underneath from those above / Dividing: for as Earth, so he the World / Built on circumfluous Waters calme, in wide / Crystallin Ocean, and the loud misrule / Of Chaos farr remov'd, least fierce extreames / Contiguous might distemper the whole frame:

VII-274. And Heav'n he nam'd the Firmament: So Eev'n

VII-275. And Morning Chorus sung the second Day.

VII-276. The Earth was form'd, but in the Womb as yet / Of Waters, Embryon immature involv'd,

VII-278. Appeer'd not: over all the face of Earth / Main Ocean flow'd, not idle, but with warme / Prolific humour soft'ning all her Globe, / Fermented the great Mother to conceave,

VII-282. Satiate with genial moisture, when God said / Be gather'd now ye Waters under Heav'n / Into one place, and let dry Land appeer.

VII-285. Immediately the Mountains huge appeer / Emergent, and thir broad bare backs upheave / Into the Clouds, thir tops ascend the Skie: / So high as heav'd the tumid Hills, so low / Down sunk a hollow bottom broad and deep,

VII-290. Capacious bed of Waters: thither they / Hasted with glad precipitance, uprowld / As drops on dust conglobing from the drie; / Part rise in crystal Wall, or ridge direct,

VII-294. For haste; such flight the great command impress'd / On the swift flouds: as Armies at the call / Of Trumpet (for of Armies thou hast heard)

VII-297. Troop to thir Standard, so the watrie throng, / Wave rowling after Wave, where way they found, / If steep, with torrent rapture, if through Plaine, / Soft-ebbing; nor withstood them Rock or Hill,

VII-301. But they, or under ground, or circuit wide / With Serpent errour wandring, found thir way,

VII-303. And on the washie Oose deep Channels wore;

VII-304. Easie, e're God had bid the ground be drie, / All but within those banks, where Rivers now / Stream, and perpetual draw thir humid traine. / The dry Land, Earth, and the great receptacle / Of congregated Waters he call'd Seas:

VII-309. And saw that it was good, and said, Let th' Earth / Put forth the verdant Grass, Herb yielding Seed, / And Fruit Tree yielding Fruit after her kind; / Whose Seed is in her self upon the Earth.

VII-313. He scarce had said, when the bare Earth, till then / Desert and bare, unsightly, unadorn'd, / Brought forth the tender Grass, whose verdure clad / Her Universal Face with pleasant green, / Then Herbs of every leaf, that sudden flour'd / Op'ning thir various colours, and made gay / Her bosom smelling sweet: and these scarce blown,

VII-320. Forth flourish't thick the clustring Vine, forth crept / The smelling Gourd, up stood the cornie Reed / Embattell'd in her field: and the humble Shrub, / And Bush with frizl'd hair implicit: last

VII-324. Rose as in Dance the stately Trees, and spred / Thir branches hung with copious Fruit; or gemm'd

VII-326. Thir blossoms: with high woods the hills were crownd, / With tufts the vallies and each fountain side, / With borders long the Rivers. That Earth now

VII-329. Seemd like to Heav'n, a seat where Gods might dwell, / Or wander with delight, and love to haunt

VII-331. Her sacred shades: though God had yet not rain'd / Upon the Earth, and man to till the ground / None was, but from the Earth a dewie Mist / Went up and waterd all the ground, and each / Plant of the field, which e're it was in the Earth / God made, and every Herb, before it grew

VII-337. On the green stemm; God saw that it was good. / So Eev'n and Morn recorded the Third Day.

VII-339. Again th' Almightie spake: Let there be Lights / High in th' expanse of Heaven to divide / The Day from Night; and let them be for Signes, / For Seasons, and for Dayes, and circling Years, / And let them be for Lights as I ordaine / Thir Office in the Firmament of Heav'n

VII-345. To give Light on the Earth; and it was so.

VII-346. And God made two great Lights, great for thir use / To Man, the greater to have rule by Day, / The less by Night alterne: and made the Starrs, / And set them in the Firmament of Heav'n / To illuminate the Earth, and rule the Day / In thir vicissitude, and rule the Night, / And Light from Darkness to divide. God saw,

VII-353. Surveying his great Work, that it was good:

VII-354. For of Celestial Bodies first the Sun / A mightie Spheare he fram'd, unlightsom first, / Though of Ethereal Mould: then form'd the Moon / Globose, and every magnitude of Starrs,

VII-358. And sowd with Starrs the Heav'n thick as a field:

VII-359. Of Light by farr the greater part he took, / Transplanted from her cloudie Shrine, and plac'd / In the Suns Orb, made porous to receive / And drink the liquid Light, firm to retaine / Her gather'd beams, great Palace now of Light.

VII-364. Hither as to thir Fountain other Starrs / Repairing, in thir gold'n Urns draw Light,

VII-366. And hence the Morning Planet guilds her horns; / By tincture or reflection they augment / Thir small peculiar, though from human sight / So farr remote, with diminution seen.

VII-370. First in his East the glorious Lamp was seen, / Regent of Day, and all th' Horizon round / Invested with bright Rayes, jocond to run / His Longitude through Heav'n's high rode: the gray / Dawn, and the Pleiades before him danc'd

VII-375. Shedding sweet influence: less bright the Moon, / But opposite in leveld West was set / His mirror, with full face borrowing her Light / From him, for other light she needed none / In that aspect, and still that distance keepes

VII-380. Till night, then in the East her turn she shines, / Revolvd on Heav'ns great Axle, and her Reign / With thousand lesser Lights dividual holds, / With thousand thousand Starres, that then appeer'd / Spangling the Hemisphere: then first adornd / With thir bright Luminaries that Set and Rose,

VII-386. Glad Eevning and glad Morn crownd the fourth day.

VII-387. And God said, let the Waters generate / Reptil with Spawn abundant, living Soule: / And let Fowle flie above the Earth, with wings / Displayd on the op'n Firmament of Heav'n.

VII-391. And God created the great Whales, and each / Soul living, each that crept, which plenteously / The waters generated by thir kindes, / And every Bird of wing after his kinde;

VII-395. And saw that it was good, and bless'd them, saying, / Be fruitful, multiply, and in the Seas / And Lakes and running Streams the waters fill; / And let the Fowle be multiply'd on the Earth.

VII-399. Forthwith the Sounds and Seas, each Creek and Bay / With Frie innumerable swarme, and Shoales / Of Fish that with thir Finns and shining Scales / Glide under the green Wave, in Sculles that oft / Bank the mid Sea: part single or with mate / Graze the Sea weed thir pasture, and through Groves / Of Coral stray, or sporting with quick glance / Show to the Sun thir wav'd coats dropt with Gold,

VII-407. Or in thir Pearlie shells at ease, attend / Moist nutriment, or under Rocks thir food / In jointed Armour watch: on smooth the Seale, / And bended Dolphins play: part huge of bulk / Wallowing unweildie, enormous in thir Gate

VII-412. Tempest the Ocean: there Leviathan / Hugest of living Creatures, on the Deep / Stretcht like a Promontorie sleeps or swimmes, / And seems a moving Land, and at his Gilles / Draws in, and at his Trunck spouts out a Sea.

VII-417. Mean while the tepid Caves, and Fens and shoares / Thir Brood as numerous hatch, from the Egg that soon / Bursting with kindly rupture forth disclos'd / Thir callow young, but featherd soon and fledge / They summ'd thir Penns, and soaring th' air sublime / With clang despis'd the ground, under a cloud

VII-423. In prospect; there the Eagle and the Stork / On Cliffs and Cedar tops thir Eyries build:

VII-425. Part loosly wing the Region, part more wise / In common, rang'd in figure wedge thir way, / Intelligent of seasons, and set forth / Thir Aierie Caravan high over Sea's / Flying, and over Lands with mutual wing / Easing thir flight; so stears the prudent Crane / Her annual Voiage, born on Windes; the Aire, / Floats, as they pass, fann'd with unnumber'd plumes:

VII-433. From Branch to Branch the smaller Birds with song / Solac'd the Woods, and spred thir painted wings / Till Ev'n, nor then the solemn Nightingal / Ceas'd warbling, but all night tun'd her soft layes:

VII-437. Others on Silver Lakes and Rivers Bath'd / Thir downie Brest; the Swan with Arched neck / Between her white wings mantling proudly, Rowes / Her state with Oarie feet: yet oft they quit / The Dank, and rising on stiff Pennons, towre

VII-442. The mid Aereal Skie: Others on ground / Walk'd firm; the crested Cock whose clarion sounds / The silent hours, and th' other whose gay Traine / Adorns him, colour'd with the Florid hue

VII-446. Of Rainbows and Starrie Eyes. The Waters thus / With Fish replenisht, and the Aire, with Fowle, / Ev'ning and Morn solemniz'd the Fift day.

VII-449. The Sixt, and of Creation last arose

VII-450. With Eevning Harps and Mattin, when God said, / Let th' Earth bring forth Soul living in her kinde, / Cattel and Creeping things, and Beast of the Earth,

VII-453. Each in their kinde. The Earth obey'd, and strait / op'ning her fertile Woomb teem'd at a Birth / Innumerous living Creatures, perfet formes,

VII-456. Limb'd and full grown: out of the ground up rose / As from his Laire the wilde Beast where he wonns / In Forrest wilde, in Thicket, Brake, or Den; / Among the Trees in Pairs they rose, they walk'd:

VII-460. The Cattel in the Fields and Meddowes green: / Those rare and solitarie, these in flocks / Pasturing at once, and in broad Herds upsprung.

VII-463. The grassie Clods now Calv'd, now half appeer'd / The Tawnie Lion, pawing to get free / His hinder parts, then springs as broke from Bonds,

VII-466. And Rampant shakes his Brinded main; the Ounce, / The Libbard, and the Tyger, as the Moale / Rising, the crumbl'd Earth above them threw

VII-469. In Hillocks; the swift Stag from under ground

VII-470. Bore up his branching head: scarse from his mould / Behemoth biggest born of Earth upheav'd

VII-472. His vastness: Fleec't the Flocks and bleating rose, / As Plants: ambiguous between Sea and Land / The River Horse and scalie Crocodile.

VII-475. At once came forth whatever creeps the ground,

VII-476. Insect or Worme; those wav'd thir limber fans / For wings, and smallest Lineaments exact / In all the Liveries dect of Summers pride / With spots of Gold and Purple, azure and green:

VII-480. These as a line thir long dimension drew, / Streaking the ground with sinuous trace; not all

VII-482. Minims of Nature; some of Serpent kinde / Wondrous in length and corpulence involv'd / Thir Snakie foulds, and added wings. First crept

VII-485. The Parsimonious Emmet, provident / Of future, in small room large heart enclos'd, / Pattern of just equalitie perhaps / Hereafter, join'd in her popular Tribes

VII-489. Of Commonaltie: swarming next appeer'd / The Female Bee that feeds her Husband Drone / Deliciously, and builds her waxen Cells

VII-492. With Honey stor'd: the rest are numberless, / And thou thir Natures know'st, and gav'st them Names,

VII-494. Needless to thee repeated; nor unknown / The Serpent suttl'st Beast of all the field, / Of huge extent somtimes, with brazen Eyes / And hairie Main terrific, though to thee / Not noxious, but obedient at thy call.

VII-499. Now Heav'n in all her Glorie shon, and rowld / Her motions, as the great first-Movers hand / First wheeld thir course; Earth in her rich attire / Consummate lovly smil'd; Aire,, Water, Earth, / By Fowl, Fish, Beast, was flown, was swum, was walkt

VII-504. Frequent; and of the Sixt day yet remain'd;

VII-505. There wanted yet the Master work, the end / Of all yet don; a Creature who not prone / And Brute as other Creatures, but endu'd / With Sanctitie of Reason, might erect / His Stature, and upright with Front serene

VII-510. Govern the rest, self-knowing, and from thence / Magnanimous to correspond with Heav'n, / But grateful to acknowledge whence his good / Descends, thither with heart and voice and eyes / Directed in Devotion, to adore / And worship God Supream, who made him chief

VII-516. Of all his works: therefore the Omnipotent / Eternal Father (For where is not hee / Present) thus to his Son audibly spake.

VII-519. Let us make now Man in our image, Man / In our similitude, and let them rule / Over the Fish and Fowle of Sea and Aire,, / Beast of the Field, and over all the Earth, / And every creeping thing that creeps the ground.

VII-524. This said, he formd thee, Adam, thee O Man / Dust of the ground, and in thy nostrils breath'd / The breath of Life; in his own Image hee / Created thee, in the Image of God / Express, and thou becam'st a living Soul.

VII-529. Male he created thee, but thy consort

VII-530. Female for Race; then bless'd Mankinde, and said, / Be fruitful, multiplie, and fill the Earth, / Subdue it, and throughout Dominion hold / Over Fish of the Sea, and Fowle of the Aire,, / And every living thing that moves on the Earth. / Wherever thus created, for no place

VII-536. Is yet distinct by name, thence, as thou know'st / He brought thee into this delicious Grove, / This Garden, planted with the Trees of God, / Delectable both to behold and taste;

VII-540. And freely all thir pleasant fruit for food / Gave thee, all sorts are here that all th' Earth yields, / Varietie without end; but of the Tree / Which tasted works knowledge of Good and Evil,

VII-544. Thou mai'st not; in the day thou eat'st, thou di'st; / Death is the penaltie impos'd, beware, / And govern well thy appetite, least sin / Surprise thee, and her black attendant Death.

VII-548. Here finish'd hee, and all that he had made / View'd, and behold all was entirely good; / So Ev'n and Morn accomplish't the Sixt day: / Yet not till the Creator from his work

VII-552. Desisting, though unwearied, up returnd / Up to the Heav'n of Heav'ns his high abode, / Thence to behold this new created World / Th' addition of his Empire, how it shew'd / In prospect from his Throne, how good, how faire,

VII-557. Answering his great Idea. Up he rode / Followd with acclamation and the sound / Symphonious of ten thousand Harpes that tun'd / Angelic harmonies: the Earth, the Aire, / Resounded, (thou remember'st for thou heardst) / The Heav'ns and all the Constellations rung, / The Planets in thir stations list'ning stood, / While the bright Pomp ascended jubilant.

VII-566. Open, ye everlasting Gates, they sung, / Open, ye Heav'ns, your living dores; let in / The great Creator from his work returnd / Magnificent, his Six days work, a World; / Open, and henceforth oft; for God will deigne / To visit oft the dwellings of just Men / Delighted, and with frequent intercourse / Thither will send his winged Messengers / On errands of supernal Grace. So sung

VII-574. The glorious Train ascending: He through Heav'n, / That open'd wide her blazing Portals, led / To Gods Eternal house direct the way,

VII-577. A broad and ample rode, whose dust is Gold / And pavement Starrs, as Starrs to thee appeer, / Seen in the Galaxie, that Milkie way / Which nightly as a circling Zone thou seest

VII-581. Pouderd with Starrs. And now on Earth the Seventh / Eev'ning arose in Eden, for the Sun / Was set, and twilight from the East came on, / Forerunning Night; when at the holy mount / Of Heav'ns high-seated top, th' Impereal Throne / Of Godhead, fixt for ever firm and sure, / The Filial Power arriv'd, and sate him down / With his great Father (for he also went / Invisible, yet staid, such priviledge / Hath Omnipresence) and the work ordain'd, / Author and end of all things, and from work

VII-592. Now resting, bless'd and hallowd the Seav'nth day, / As resting on that day from all his work,

VII-594. But not in silence holy kept; the Harp / Had work and rested not, the solemn Pipe, / And Dulcimer, all Organs of sweet stop, / All sounds on Fret by String or Golden Wire / Temper'd soft Tunings, intermixt with Voice / Choral or Unison; of incense Clouds / Fuming from Golden Censers hid the Mount.

VII-601. Creation and the Six dayes acts they sung, / Great are thy works, Jehovah, infinite / Thy power; what thought can measure thee or tongue

VII-604. Relate thee; greater now in thy return / Then from the Giant Angels; thee that day / Thy Thunders magnifi'd; but to create / Is greater then created to destroy.

VII-608. Who can impair thee, mighty King, or bound / Thy Empire? easily the proud attempt / Of Spirits apostat and thir Counsels vaine / Thou hast repeld, while impiously they thought / Thee to diminish, and from thee withdraw

VII-613. The number of thy worshippers. Who seekes / To lessen thee, against his purpose serves / To manifest the more thy might: his evil / Thou usest, and from thence creat'st more good.

VII-617. Witness this new-made World, another Heav'n / From Heaven Gate not farr, founded in view / On the cleer Hyaline, the Glassie Sea;

VII-620. Of amplitude almost immense, with Starr's / Numerous, and every Starr perhaps a World / Of destind habitation; but thou know'st

VII-623. Thir seasons: among these the seat of men, / Earth with her nether Ocean circumfus'd, / Thir pleasant dwelling place. Thrice happie men, / And sons of men, whom God hath thus advanc't, / Created in his Image, there to dwell / And worship him, and in reward to rule / Over his Works, on Earth, in Sea, or Air, / And multiply a Race of Worshippers / Holy and just: thrice happie if they know / Thir happiness, and persevere upright.

VII-633. So sung they, and the Empyrean rung,

VII-634. With Halleluiahs: Thus was Sabbath kept.

VII-635. And thy request think now fulfill'd, that ask'd / How first this World and face of things began, / And what before thy memorie was don / From the beginning, that posteritie

VII-639. Informd by thee might know; if else thou seek'st / Aught, not surpassing human measure, say.