No More Learning

Adam, with estranged look, exclaimed:

"Would thou hadst hearkened to my words, and stayed
With me, as I besought thee, when that strange
Desire of wandering, this unhappy morn,
I know not whence possessed thee! We had then
Remained still happy! "

Eve retorts:

"Hadst thou been firm and fixed in thy dissent,
Neither had I transgressed, nor thou with me. "

Then Adam:

"What could I more?
I warned thee, I admonished thee, foretold
The danger, and the lurking enemy
That lay in wait; beyond this had been force. "

Thus they in mutual accusation spent
The fruitless hours, but neither self-condemning;
And of their vain contest appeared no end.


_X. --Sin and Death Triumph_

The Angels left on guard now slowly return from Paradise to Heaven
to report their failure, but are reminded by God that it was
ordained; and the Son is sent down to judge the guilty pair, after
hearing their excuses, and to punish them with the curses of toil
and death. Meantime Sin and Death "snuff the smell of mortal change"
on Earth, and leaving Hell-gate "belching outrageous flame," erect
a broad road from Hell to Earth through Chaos, and as they come in
sight of the World meet Satan steering his way back as an angel,
"between the Centaur and the Scorpion. " He makes Sin and Death his
plenipotentiaries on Earth, adjuring them first to make man their
thrall, and lastly kill; and as they pass to the evil work "the
blasted stars look wan. " The return to Hell is received with loud
acclaim, which comes in the form of a hiss, and Satan and all his
hosts are turned into grovelling snakes. Adam, now in his repentance,
is sternly resentful against Eve, who becomes submissive, and both
pass from remorse to "sorrow unfeigned and humiliation meek. "


_XI. --Repentance and the Doom_

The repentance of the pair is accepted by God, who sends down the
Archangel Michael, with a cohort of cherubim, to announce that death
will not come until time has been given for repentance, but Paradise
can no longer be their home. Whereupon Eve laments.
"O unexpected stroke, worse than of Death!
Must I thus leave thee, Paradise? Thus leave
Thee, native soil? These happy walks and shades,
Fit haunt of gods, where I had hoped to spend
Quiet, though sad, the respite of that day
That must be mortal to us both? O flowers,
That never will in any other climate grow,
My early visitation and my last
At even, which I tied up with tender hand
From the first opening bud and gave ye names,
Who now shall rear ye to the Sun, or rank
Your tribes, and water from the ambrosial fount?
. . . How shall we breathe in other air
Less pure, accustomed to immortal fruits? "

The Angel reminds her:

"Thy going is not lonely; with thee goes
Thy husband; him to follow thou art bound.
Where he abides think there thy native soil. "

Michael then ascending a hill with Adam shows him a vision of the
world's history, while Eve sleeps.


_XII. --Paradise Behind, the World Before_

The history is continued, with its promise of redemption, until Adam
exclaims:

"Full of doubt I stand,
Whether I should repent me now of sin
By me done and occasioned, or rejoice
Much more that much more good thereof shall spring--
To God more glory, more good-will to men. "

Eve awakens from propitious dreams, it having been shown to her that--

"Though all by me is lost,
Such favour I unworthy am vouchsafed.
By me the Promised Seed shall all restore.