Musing and much revolving in his breast
How best the mighty work he might begin
Of Saviour to mankind, and which way first
Publish his God-like office now mature,
One day forth walked alone, the Spirit leading,
And his deep thoughts, the better to converse
With solitude, till, far from track of men,
Thought following thought, and step by step led on,
He entered now the bordering desert wild.
How best the mighty work he might begin
Of Saviour to mankind, and which way first
Publish his God-like office now mature,
One day forth walked alone, the Spirit leading,
And his deep thoughts, the better to converse
With solitude, till, far from track of men,
Thought following thought, and step by step led on,
He entered now the bordering desert wild.
World's Greatest Books - Volume 17 - Poetry and Drama
5 more on each of three editions, of which Milton received
? 10, and his widow ? 8, the rest being unpaid. In English literature
"Paradise Lost" stands alone as an effort of sheer imagination, and its
literary genius is as haunting as its conception is stupendous.
Paradise Regained[AB]
_I. --The Forty Days_
I, who erewhile the happy Garden sung
By one man's disobedience lost, now sing
Recovered Paradise to all mankind,
By one man's firm obedience fully tried
Through all temptation, and the Tempter foiled
In all his wiles, defeated and repulsed,
And Eden raised in the waste Wilderness.
Having thus introduced his subject, the poet describes, on Scriptural
lines, the baptism of John, seen by Satan, "when roving still about
the world. " The Fiend then "flies to his place" and "summons all his
mighty peers"--a gloomy consistory--warning them that the time seems
approaching when they "must bide the stroke of that long-threatened
wound," when "the woman's Seed shall bruise the serpent's head. " They
agree that Satan shall return to earth and act as Tempter. In Heaven,
meantime, God tells the assembly of angels, addressing Gabriel, that
He will expose His Son to Satan, in order that the Son may "show him
worthy of His birth divine and high prediction. " And the angelic choir
sings "Victory and triumph to the Son of God. "
So they in Heaven their odes and vigils tuned.
Meanwhile the Son of God . . .
Musing and much revolving in his breast
How best the mighty work he might begin
Of Saviour to mankind, and which way first
Publish his God-like office now mature,
One day forth walked alone, the Spirit leading,
And his deep thoughts, the better to converse
With solitude, till, far from track of men,
Thought following thought, and step by step led on,
He entered now the bordering desert wild.
Christ then, in meditation, tells reminiscently the story of His life.
Full forty days He passed . . .
Nor tasted human food, nor hunger felt,
Till those days ended; hungered then at last
Among wild beasts. They at His sight grew mild,
Nor sleeping Him nor waking harmed; His walk
The fiery serpent fled and noxious worm;
The lion and fierce tiger glared aloof.
But now an aged man in rural weeds,
Following, as seemed, the quest of some stray ewe,
Or withered sticks to gather, which might serve
Against a winter's day, when winds blow keen,
To warm him wet returned from field at eve,
He saw approach.
This is Satan, and, entering into conversation adjures the Son--
"If thou be the Son of God, command
That out of these hard stones be made Thee bread,
So shalt Thou save Thyself, and us relieve
With food, whereof we wretched seldom taste. "
Christ at once discerns who His tempter is and rebuffs him; and the
Fiend, "now undisguised," goes on to narrate his own history, arguing
that he is not a foe to mankind.
"They to me
Never did wrong or violence. By them
I lost not what I lost; rather by them
I gained what I have gained, and with them dwell
Co-partner in these regions of the world. "
Christ, replying, attributes to Satan the evils of Idolatry and the
crafty oracles of heathendom, which have taken the place of the
"inward oracle in pious hearts," whereupon Satan, "bowing low his gray
dissimulation, disappeared. "
_II. --The Temptation of the Body_
Meanwhile the disciples were gathered "close in a cottage low,"
wondering where Christ could be, and Mary with troubled thoughts,
rehearsed the story of His early life. Satan, returning to the council
of his fellow fiends, in "the middle region of thick air," reports
his failure, and that he has found in the Tempted "amplitude of mind
to greatest deeds.
? 10, and his widow ? 8, the rest being unpaid. In English literature
"Paradise Lost" stands alone as an effort of sheer imagination, and its
literary genius is as haunting as its conception is stupendous.
Paradise Regained[AB]
_I. --The Forty Days_
I, who erewhile the happy Garden sung
By one man's disobedience lost, now sing
Recovered Paradise to all mankind,
By one man's firm obedience fully tried
Through all temptation, and the Tempter foiled
In all his wiles, defeated and repulsed,
And Eden raised in the waste Wilderness.
Having thus introduced his subject, the poet describes, on Scriptural
lines, the baptism of John, seen by Satan, "when roving still about
the world. " The Fiend then "flies to his place" and "summons all his
mighty peers"--a gloomy consistory--warning them that the time seems
approaching when they "must bide the stroke of that long-threatened
wound," when "the woman's Seed shall bruise the serpent's head. " They
agree that Satan shall return to earth and act as Tempter. In Heaven,
meantime, God tells the assembly of angels, addressing Gabriel, that
He will expose His Son to Satan, in order that the Son may "show him
worthy of His birth divine and high prediction. " And the angelic choir
sings "Victory and triumph to the Son of God. "
So they in Heaven their odes and vigils tuned.
Meanwhile the Son of God . . .
Musing and much revolving in his breast
How best the mighty work he might begin
Of Saviour to mankind, and which way first
Publish his God-like office now mature,
One day forth walked alone, the Spirit leading,
And his deep thoughts, the better to converse
With solitude, till, far from track of men,
Thought following thought, and step by step led on,
He entered now the bordering desert wild.
Christ then, in meditation, tells reminiscently the story of His life.
Full forty days He passed . . .
Nor tasted human food, nor hunger felt,
Till those days ended; hungered then at last
Among wild beasts. They at His sight grew mild,
Nor sleeping Him nor waking harmed; His walk
The fiery serpent fled and noxious worm;
The lion and fierce tiger glared aloof.
But now an aged man in rural weeds,
Following, as seemed, the quest of some stray ewe,
Or withered sticks to gather, which might serve
Against a winter's day, when winds blow keen,
To warm him wet returned from field at eve,
He saw approach.
This is Satan, and, entering into conversation adjures the Son--
"If thou be the Son of God, command
That out of these hard stones be made Thee bread,
So shalt Thou save Thyself, and us relieve
With food, whereof we wretched seldom taste. "
Christ at once discerns who His tempter is and rebuffs him; and the
Fiend, "now undisguised," goes on to narrate his own history, arguing
that he is not a foe to mankind.
"They to me
Never did wrong or violence. By them
I lost not what I lost; rather by them
I gained what I have gained, and with them dwell
Co-partner in these regions of the world. "
Christ, replying, attributes to Satan the evils of Idolatry and the
crafty oracles of heathendom, which have taken the place of the
"inward oracle in pious hearts," whereupon Satan, "bowing low his gray
dissimulation, disappeared. "
_II. --The Temptation of the Body_
Meanwhile the disciples were gathered "close in a cottage low,"
wondering where Christ could be, and Mary with troubled thoughts,
rehearsed the story of His early life. Satan, returning to the council
of his fellow fiends, in "the middle region of thick air," reports
his failure, and that he has found in the Tempted "amplitude of mind
to greatest deeds.
