- The air attrite to fire, as late the clouds Justling or push'd with winds rude in their shock Tine the Sant lightning, whose thwart Aame driv'n down 1075 Kindles the gummy bark of fir or pine, And sends a comfortable heat from far, Which might supply the sun : such fire to use, And what may else be remedy or cure To evils which our own misdeeds have wrought, He will instruct us praying, and of grace 1081 Beseeching him, so as we need not fear To vapores, &c. His top was bald, and wasted with Primitus : inde omnis flammarum worms, diditur ardor. His honor decay'd, his branches fere. Multa videmus enim cæleftibus in cita flammis And again, Fulgere, quom cæli donavit plaga How falls it then that this faded oak, Whofe body is fere, whose branches Now for the rise of fire: Swift thunbroke. der thrown From broken fulphurous clouds first And by our author in his Lycidas, brought it down; with ivy never fere. For many things take fire, when lightning Aies, 1072. Or by collision of two bodies And sulphurous vapors fill the lower grind skies ; &c Creech. The air attrite to fire, as late the clouds &c.] Our poet had 1075. Tine the fant lightning, ] Lucretius here in mind, and plainly To tine is deriv'd from the Saxon alludes to his account of the origin iynan to light, to kindle ; from of fire, V. 1091. whence also we have the word Fulmen detulit in terras mortalibus tinder. ignem U 3 1092. and THE ARGUMENT, The Son of God presents to his Father the prayers of our first parents now repenting, and intercedes for them; God accepts them, but declares that they must no longer abide in Paradise; sends Michael with a band of Cherubim to dispofsels them; but first to reveal to Adam future things: Michael's coming down. Adam shows to Eve certain ominous signs; he discerns Michael's approach, goes out to meet him: the Angel denounces their departure. Eve's Lamentation. Adam pleads, but submits : The Angel leads him up a high hill, sets before him in vision what thall happen till the flood. to |