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Empress, the way is ready, and not long;
Beyond a row of myrtles, on a flat,

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Fast by a fountain, one small thicket pass'd
Of blowing myrrh and balm: if thou accept
My conduct, I can bring thee thither soon.
Lead then, said Eve. He, leading, swiftly roll'd 630
In tangles, and made intricate seem straight,
To mischief swift. Hope elevates, and joy
Brightens his crest; as when a wandering fire,
Compact of unctuous vapor, which the night
Condenses, and the cold environs round,
Kindled through agitation to a flame,

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Which oft, they say, some evil Spirit attends,
Hovering and blazing with delusive light,
Misleads the amazed night-wanderer from his way
To bogs and mires, and oft through pond or pool; 640
There swallow'd up and lost, from succor far.
So glister'd the dire Snake, and into fraud

Led Eve, our credulous mother, to the tree
Of prohibition, root of all our woe;

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Which when she saw, thus to her guide she spake:
Serpent, we might have spared our coming hither,
Fruitless to me, though fruit be here to excess,
The credit of whose virtue rest with thee;
Wondrous indeed, if cause of such effects.
But of this tree we may not taste nor touch;
God so commanded, and left that command
Sole daughter of his voice; the rest, we live
Law to ourselves; our reason is our law.

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To whom the Tempter guilefully replied: Indeed! hath God then said that of the fruit Of all these garden-trees ye shall not eat, Yet Lords declared of all in earth or air?

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To whom thus Eve, yet sinless: Of the fruit

Of each tree in the garden we may eat;

But of the fruit of this fair tree amidst

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The garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat

Thereof, nor shall ye touch it, lest ye die.

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She scarce had said, though brief, when now more

The Tempter, but with show of zeal and love

To Man, and indignation at his wrong,

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New part puts on; and, as to passion moved
Fluctuates disturb'd, yet comely and in act
Raised, as of some great matter to begin
As when of old some orator renown'd,
In Athens or free Rome, where eloquence

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Flourish'd, since mute! to some great cause address'd,
Stood in himself collected; while each part,
Motion, each act won audience ere the tongue;
Sometimes in height began, as no delay

Of preface brooking, through his zeal of right:
So standing, moving, or to height up grown,
The Tempter, all impassion'd thus began:

O sacred, wise, and wisdom-giving Plant,
Mother of science! now I feel thy power
Within me clear; not only to discern
Things in their causes, but to trace the ways
Of highest agents, deem'd however wise.
Queen of this universe! do not believe
Those rigid threats of death: ye shall not die:
How should you? by the fruit? it gives you life
To knowledge; by the threatener? look on me,
Me, who have touch'd and tasted; yet both live,
And life more perfect have attained than Fate
Meant me, by venturing higher than my lot.
Shall that be shut to Man, which to the Beast
Is open? or will God incense his ire
For such a petty trespass? and not praise
Rather your dauntless virtue, whom the pain
Of death denounced, whatever thing death be,
Deterr'd not from achieving what might lead
To happier life, knowledge of good and evil.

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Of good, how just! of evil, if what is evil
Be real, why not known, since easier shunn'd?
God therefore cannot hurt ye, and be just;
Not just, not God; not fear'd then, nor obey'd:
Your fear itself of death removes the fear.
Why then was this forbid? Why, but to awe?
Why, but to keep ye low and ignorant
His worshippers? He knows that in the day
Ye eat thereof, your eyes that seem so clear,
Yet are but dim, shall perfectly be then
Open'd and clear'd, and ye shall be as Gods,
Knowing both good and evil, as they know.
That ye shall be as Gods, since I as Man,
Internal Man, is but proportion meet;
I, of brute, human; ye, of human, Gods.
So ye shall die perhaps, by putting off

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Human, to put on Gods; death to be wish'd,

Though threaten'd, which no worse than this can bring.

And what are Gods, that Man may not become

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As they, participating Godlike food?

The Gods are first, and that advantage use
On our belief, that all from them proceeds:
I question it; for this fair earth I see,
Warm'd by the sun, producing every kind;
Them, nothing: if they all things, who enclosed
Knowledge of good and evil in this tree,
That whoso eats thereof forthwith attains
Wisdom without their leave? and wherein lies
The offence, that Man should thus attain to know?
What can your knowledge hurt him, or this tree
Impart against his will, if all be his?

Or is it envy? and can envy dwell

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In heavenly breasts?-These, these, and many more

Causes import your need of this fair fruit.

Goddess humane, reach then, and freely taste!
He ended; and his words, replete with guile,

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Into her heart too easy entrance won:
Fix'd on the fruit she gazed, which to behold
Might tempt alone; and in her ears the sound
Yet rung of his persuasive words, impregn'd
With reason to her seeming, and with truth:
Meanwhile the hour of noon drew on and waked
An eager appetite, raised by the smell

So savory of that fruit, which with desire,
Inclinable now grown to touch or taste,
Solicited her longing eye; yet first

Pausing awhile, thus to herself she mused:

Great are thy virtues, doubtless, best of fruits, Though kept from man, and worthy to be admired; Whose taste, too long forborne, at first essay Gave elocution to the mute, and taught

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The tongue not made for speech to speak thy praise:
Thy praise he also, who forbids thy use,
Conceals not from us, naming thee the tree

Of knowledge, knowledge both of good and evil;
Forbids us then to taste! but his forbidding
Commends thee more, while it infers the good
By thee communicated, and our want;
For good unknown sure is not had: or, had
And yet unknown is as not had at all.
In plain then, what forbids he but to know,
Forbids us good, forbids us to be wise?
Such prohibitions bind not. But if death
Bind us with after-bands, what profits then
Our inward freedom? In the day we eat
Of this fair fruit, our doom is we shall die!

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How dies the Serpent? he hath eaten, and lives, And knows, and speaks, and reasons, and discerns, Irrational till then. For us alone

Was death invented? or to us denied

This intellectual food, for beasts reserved?

For beasts it seems: yet that one beast which first

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Hath tasted envies not, but brings with joy
The good befall'n him, author unsuspect,

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Friendly to man, far from deceit or guile.
What fear I then? rather, what know to fear
Under this ignorance of good and evil,
Of God or death, of law or penalty?
Here grows the cure of all, this fruit divine,
Fair to the eye, inviting to the taste,

Of virtue to make wise: What hinders then

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To reach, and feed at once both body and mind?
So saying, her rash hand in evil hour

Forth reaching to the fruit, she pluck'd, she eat! 780
Earth felt the wound; and Nature from her seat,
Sighing through all her works, gave signs of woe,
That all was lost. Back to the thicket slunk
The guilty Serpent; and well might; for Eve,
Intent now wholly on her taste, nought else
Regarded; such delight till then, as seem'd,
In fruit she never tasted, whether true
Or fancied so, through expectation high

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Of knowledge; nor was Godhead from her thought. Greedily she ingorged without restraint,

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And new not eating death. Satiate at length,

And heighten'd as with wine, jocund and boon,
Thus to herself she pleasingly began:

O sov'reign, virtuous, precious of all trees

In Paradise! of operation bless'd

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To sapience, hitherto obscured, infamed,

And thy fair fruit let hang, as to no end
Created; but henceforth my early care,

Not without song, each morning, and due praise,
Shall tend thee, and the fertile burden ease

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Of thy full branches offer'd free to all;

Till, dieted by thee, I grow mature

In knowledge, as the Gods, who all things know;
Though others envy what they cannot give:

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