Whom thus afflicted, when sad Eve beheld,
Desolate where she sat, approaching nigh,
Soft words to his fierce passion she assayed;
But her with stern regard he thus repelled:
"Out of my sight, thou serpent! that name best
Befits thee with him leagued, thyself as false
And hateful; nothing wants but that thy shape,
Like his, and colour serpentine, may show
Thy inward fraud, to warn all creatures from thee
Henceforth; lest that too heavenly form pretended
To hellish falsehood snare them. But for thee
I had persisted happy, had not thy pride
And wandering vanity, when least was safe,
Rejected my forewarning, and disdained
Not to be trusted, longing to be seen,
Though by the devil himself, him overweening
To over-reach, but with the serpent meeting
Fooled and beguiled; by him thou, I by thee:
To trust thee from my side, imagined wise,
Constant, mature, proof against all assaults;
And understood not all was but a show,
Rather than solid virtue; all but a rib,
Crooked by nature; bent, as now appears,
More to the part sinister, from me drawn ;
Well if thrown out, as supernumerary
To my just number found. Oh! why did God,
Creator wise, that peopled highest Heaven
With spirits masculine, create at last
This novelty on earth, this fair defect
Of nature, and not fill the world at once
With men, as angels, without feminine,
Or find some other way to generate
Mankind? This mischief had not then befallen,
And more that shall befall, innumerable
Disturbances on earth through female snares,
And strait conjunction with this sex: for either
He never shall find out fit mate, but such
As some misfortune brings him, or mistake;
Or whom he wishes most shall seldom gain
Through her perverseness, but shall see her gained
By a far worse, or if she love, withheld
By parents; or his happiest choice too late
Shall meet, already linked and wedlock-bourd
To a fell adversary, his hate or shame;
Which infinite calamity shall cause
To human life, and household peace confound."
He added not, and from her turned; but Eve, Not so repulsed, with tears that ceased not flowing, And tresses all disordered, at his feet