To me so friendly grown above the rest Of brutal kind, that daily are in sight? Say, for such wonder claims attention due. To whom the guileful tempter thus replied: Empress of this fair world, resplendent Eve! Easy to me it is to tell thee all
What thou command'st; and right thou shouldst be obey'd :
I was at first as other beasts that graze
The trodden herb, of abject thoughts and low,
As was my food; nor aught but food discern'd,
Or sex, and apprehended nothing high: Till, on a day roving the field, I chanced A goodly tree far distant to behold Loaden with fruit of fairest colours mix'd, Ruddy and gold: I nearer drew to gaze; When from the boughs a savoury odour blown, Grateful to appetite, more pleased my sense Than smell of sweetest fennel, or the teats Of ewe or goat dropping with milk at even, Unsuck'd of lamb or kid, that tend their play. To satisfy the sharp desire I had Of tasting those fair apples, I resolved Not to defer; hunger and thirst at once, Powerful persuaders, quicken'd at the scent Of that alluring fruit, urged me so keen. About the mossy trunk I wound me soon; For, high from ground, the branches would require Thy utmost reach or Adam's: round the tree All other beasts that saw, with like desire Longing and envying stood, but could not reach. Amid the tree now got, where plenty hung Tempting so nigh, to pluck and eat my fill I spared not; for such pleasure till that hour, At feed or fountain, never had I found. Sated at length, ere long I might perceive Strange alteration in me, to degree
Of reason in my inward powers; and speech Wanted not long; though to this shape retain'd. Thenceforth to speculations high or deep
I turn'd my thoughts, and with capacious mind Consider'd all things visible in heaven, Or earth, or middle; all things fair and good: But all that fair and good in thy divine Semblance, and in thy beauty's heavenly ray, United I beheld; no fair to thine Equivalent or second! which compell'd Me thus, though importune perhaps, to come And gaze, and worship thee, of right declared Sovran of creatures, universal dame!
So talk'd the spirited sly snake; and Eve, Yet more amazed, unwary thus replied:
Serpent, thy overpraising leaves in doubt The virtue of that fruit, in thee first proved:
But say, where grows the tree? from hence how far? For many are the trees of God that grow
In Paradise, and various, yet unknown To us; in such abundance lies our choice, As leaves a greater store of fruit untouch'd Still hanging incorruptible, till men Grow up to their provision, and more hands Help to disburden nature of her birth.
To whom the wily adder, blithe and glad : Empress, the way is ready, and not long; Beyond a row of myrtles, on a flat, Fast by a fountain, one small thicket past 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 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 vapour, which the night Condenses, and the cold environs round, Kindled through agitation to a flame, 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; There swallow'd up and lost, from succour 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;
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 i; our reason is our law.
To whom the tempter guilefully replied:
Milton has shown more art in taking off the common objections to the Mosaic history of the temptation, by the addition of some circumstances of his own invention, than in any other theological part of his poem.-WARBUrton.
See Rom. ii. 14: "These having not the law, are a law unto themselves."RICHARDSON.
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?
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 The garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat Thereof, nor shall ye touch it, lest ye die.
She scarce had said, though brief, when now more bold The tempter, but with show of zeal and love
To man, and indignation at his wrong,
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
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 highth began, as no delay
Of preface brooking, through his zeal of right: So standing, moving, or to highth upgrown, 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 1; How should you? by the fruit? it gives you life To knowledge; by the threatener? look on me, Me, who have touched and tasted; yet both live, And life more perfect have attain'd 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
See Gen. iii. 1: "Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden!" In which our author has followed the Chaldee paraphrase, intrepreting the Hebrew particle indeed. Is it true that God has forbidden you to eat of the fruits of Paradise? as if He had forbidden them to taste, not of one, but of all the trees; another of Satan's sly insinuations. The Hebrew particle yea, or indeed, plainly shows that the short and summary account which Moses gives of the serpent's temptation has respect to some previous discourse, which could, in all probability, be no other than what Milton has pitched upon.-HUME.
See Gen. iii. 4: “And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die.” And it is very artfully contrived by Milton to make the serpent give an instance in himself.-NEWTON.
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; 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 m 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.
Though threaten'd, which no worse than this can bring.
So ye shall die perhaps, by putting off
Human, to put on gods; death to be wish'd,
And what are gods, that man may not become
The gods are first, and that advantage use
As they, participating godlike food?
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
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,
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
m Your fear itself of death.
Justice is inseparable from the very being and essence of God; so that could He be unjust, He would be no longer God, and then neither to be obeyed nor feared; so that the fear of death, which does imply injustice in God, destroys itself, because God can as well cease to be, as to be just a Satanic syllogism.-HUME.
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 savoury 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 assay Gave elocution to the mute, and taught
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! 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 Hath tasted envies not, but brings with joy The good befallen him, authour unsuspect, Friendly to man, far from deceit or guile. What fear I then? rather, what know to fear Under this ignorance of good or 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 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! 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, naught else
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