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From Heaven acceptance; but the bloody fact
Will be avenged; and the other's faith, approved,
Lose no reward, though here thou see him die,
Rolling in dust and gore." To which our sire:
"Alas! both for the deed, and for the cause !
But have I now seen death?

I must return to native dust?

Is this the way

O sight

Of terror, foul and ugly to behold!

Horrid to think, how horrible to feel!"

To whom thus Michael: "Death thou hast seen

In his first shape on man; but many shapes

Of death, and many are the ways that lead

To his grim cave; all dismal, yet to sense

More terrible at the entrance than within.

Some, as thou saw'st, by violent stroke shall die; By fire, flood, famine; by intemperance more

In meats and drinks, which on the earth shall bring
Diseases dire, of which a monstrous crew
Before thee shall appear, that thou may'st know
What misery the inabstinence of Eve

Shall bring on men." Immediately a place
Before his eyes appear'd, sad, noisome, dark;
A lazar-house it seem'd, wherein were laid
Numbers of all diseased; all maladies
Of ghastly spasm, or racking torture, qualms
Of heart-sick agony, all feverous kinds,
Convulsions, epilepsies, fierce catarrhs,
Intestine stone and ulcer, colic pangs,
Demoniac frenzy, moping melancholy,
And moon-struck madness, pining atrophy,
Marasmus, and wide-wasting pestilence,
Dropsies, and asthmas, and joint-racking rheums.
Dire was the tossing, deep the groans: Despair
Tended the sick, busiest from couch to couch;
And over them triumphant Death his dart
Shook, but delay'd to strike, though oft invoked
With vows, as their chief good, and final hope.
Sight so deform what heart of rock could long,
Dry-eyed, behold? Adam could not, but wept,
Though not of woman born; compassion quell'd
His best of man, and gave him up to tears
A space, till firmer thoughts restrain'd excess
And, scarce recovering words, his plaint renew'd:
"O miserable mankind, to what fall
Degraded, to what wretched state reserved!
Better end here unborn. Why is life given
To be thus wrested from us? rather, why

Obtruded on us thus? who, if we knew
What we receive, would either not accept
Life offer'd, or soon beg to lay it down,
Glad to be so dismiss'd in peace. Can thus
The image of God in man, created once
So goodly and erect, though faulty since,
To such unsightly sufferings be debased
Under inhuman pains? Why should not man,
Retaining still divine similitude

In part, from such deformities be free,

And, for his Maker's image sake, exempt?"

"Their Maker's image," answer'd Michael, “then Forsook them, when themselves they vilified To serve ungovern'd appetite, and took

His image whom they served, a brutish vice,
Inductive mainly to the sin of Eve.
Therefore so abject is their punishment,
Disfiguring not God's likeness, but their own;
Or if his likeness, by themselves defaced;
While they pervert pure nature's healthful rules
To loathsome sickness; worthily, since they
God's image did not reverence in themselves."

"I yield it just," said Adam, "and submit:
But is there yet no other way, besides
These painful passages, how we may come
To death, and mix with our connatural dust?"

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"There is," said Michael," if thou well observe The rule of Not too much,' by temperance taught, In what thou eat'st and drink'st, seeking from thence Due nourishment, not gluttonous delight;

Till many years over thy head return,

So may'st thou live, till, like ripe fruit, thou drop
Into thy mother's lap, or be with ease

Gather'd, not harshly pluck'd, for death mature:

This is old age; but, then, thou must outlive

Thy youth, thy strength, thy beauty, which will change
To wither'd, weak, and grey; thy senses then,
Obtuse, all taste of pleasure must forego,

To what thou hast; and for the air of youth,
Hopeful and cheerful, in thy blood will reign
A melancholy damp of cold and dry,
To weigh thy spirits down, and last consume
The balm of life." To whom our ancestor :

"Henceforth I fly not death, nor would prolong
Life much; bent, rather, how I may be quit,
Fairest and easiest, of this cumbrous charge,
Which I must keep till my appointed day
Of rendering up, and patiently attend
My dissolution." Michael replied:

"Nor love thy life, nor hate; but what thou livest Live well; how long, or short, permit to Heaven: And now prepare thee for another sight."

He look'd, and saw a spacious plain, whereon Were tents of various hue; by some were herds Of cattle grazing; others, whence the sound Of instruments, that made melodious chime, Was heard, of harp and organ, and who moved Their stops and chords was seen; his volant touch, Instinct through all proportions, low and high, Fled and pursued transverse the resonant fugue. In other part stood one who, at the forge Labouring, two massy clods of iron and brass Had melted (whether found where casual fire Had wasted woods on mountain or in vale, Down to the veins of earth, thence gliding hot To some cave's mouth, or whether wash'd by stream From under ground); the liquid ore he drain'd Into fit moulds prepared, from which he form'd,

First, his own tools; then, what might else be wrought Fusil or graven in metal. After these,

But on the hither side, a different sort,

From the high neighbouring hills, which was their seat,
Down to the plain descended; by their guise
Just men they seem'd, and all their study bent
To worship God aright, and know his works

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