Suffices that to me strength is my bane, Light, the prime work of God, to me is extinct, Annulled, which might in part my grief have eased. Of man or worm, the vilest here excel me : Without all hope of day! O first-created beam, and thou great Word, And silent as the Moon, When she deserts the night, Hid in her vacant interlunar cave. Since light so necessary is to life, And almost life itself, if it be true That light is in the soul, She all in every part, why was the sight As in the land of darkness, yet in light, By privilege of death and burial, From worst of other evils, pains, and wrongs: But made hereby obnoxious more To all the miseries of life, Life in captivity Among inhuman foes. "But who are these? for with joint pace I hear The tread of many feet steering this way; Chor. This, this is he; softly a while; Let us not break in upon him. O change beyond report, thought, or belief! As one past hope, abandoned, And by himself given over, In slavish habit, ill-fitted weeds O'er-worn and soiled. Or do my eyes misrepresent? Can this be he, That heroic, that renowned, Irresistible Samson? whom, unarmed, 100 110 120 No strength of man, or fiercest wild beast, could withstand; Who tore the lion as the lion tears the kid ; Ran on embattled armies clad in iron, And, weaponless himself, Made arms ridiculous, useless the forgery Of brazen shield and spear, the hammered cuirass, Chalybean-tempered steel, and frock of mail Adamantean proof : 130 But safest he who stood aloof, When insupportably his foot advanced, In scorn of their proud arms and warlike tools, Spurned them to death by troops. The bold Ascalonite Fled from his lion ramp ; old warriors turned Their plaited backs under his heel, Or grovelling soiled their crested helmets in the dust. Then with what trivial weapon came to hand, The jaw of a dead ass, his sword of bone, A thousand foreskins fell, the flower of Palestine, In Ramath-lechi, famous to this day : 140 Then by main force pulled up, and on his shoulders bore, The gates of Azza, post and massy bar, Up to the hill by Hebron, seat of giants old No journey of a Sabbath-day, and loaded so Like whom the Gentiles feign to bear up Heaven. 150 Thy bondage or lost sight, Prison within prison Inseparably dark? Thou art become (O worst imprisonment !) The dungeon of thyself; thy soul (Which men enjoying sight oft without cause complain) Imprisoned now indeed, In real darkness of the body dwells, Shut up from outward light To incorporate with gloomy night; For inward light, alas ! Puts forth no visual beam. O mirror of our fickle state, Since man on earth unparalleled ! The rarer thy example stands, By how much from the top of wondrous glory, To lowest pitch of abject fortune thou art fallen. 160 170 Whom long descent of birth, Or the sphere of fortune, raises; But thee, whose strength, while virtue was her mate, § Universally crowned with highest praises. Sams. I hear the sound of words; their sense the air Chor. He speaks: let us draw nigh. The glory late of Israel, now the grief! Matchless in might, We come, thy friends and neighbours not unknown. To visit or bewail thee; or, if better, Salve to thy sores: apt words have power to swage And are as balm to festered wounds Sams. Your coming, friends, revives me; for I learn How counterfeit a coin they are who 'friends' I would be understood). In prosperous days They swarm, but in adverse withdraw their head, Yet that which was the worst now least afflicts me, 180 190 200 In me; of wisdom nothing more than mean. Chor. Tax not divine disposal. Wisest men ams. The first I saw at Timna, and she pleased That specious monster, my accomplished snare. Israel's oppressors. Of what now I suffer She was not the prime cause, but I myself, 210 220 230 Who, vanquished with a peal of words, (O weakness !) Gave up my fort of silence to a woman. Chor. In seeking just occasion to provoke The Philistine, thy country's enemy, Thou never wast remiss, I bear thee witness; 240 Sams. That fault I take not on me, but transfer On Israel's governors and heads of tribes, |