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Lay sleeping, ran before, but found her waked;
And thus with words not sad she him received.

Whence thou return'st, and whither went'st, I know;
For GOD is also in sleep, and dreams advise,
Which He hath sent propitious, some great good
Presaging, since with sorrow and heart's distress
Wearied I fell asleep: but now lead on;
In me is no delay; with thee to go

Is to stay here; without thee here to stay
Is to go hence unwilling; thou to me
Art all things under heav'n, all places thou,
Who for my wilful crime art banish'd hence.
This further consolation yet secure

I carry hence; though all by me is lost,
Such favour I unworthy am vouchsafed,
By me the Promised Seed shall all restore.

So spake our mother Eve, and Adam heard
Well pleased, but answer'd not; for now too nigh
Th' Archangel stood, and from the other hill
To their fix'd station all in bright array
The Cherubim descended; on the ground
Gilding meteorous, as ev'ning mist

Ris'n from a river o'er the marish' glides,
And gathers ground fast at the labourer's heel
Homeward returning. High in front advanced
The brandish'd sword of GOD before them blazed
Fierce as a comet; which with torrid heat,
And vapour as the Libyan air adust,
Began to parch that temperate clime: whereat
In either hand the hast'ning angel caught
Our ling'ring parents, and to the eastern gate
Led them direct, and down the cliff as fast
To the subjected plain; then disappear'd.
They looking back all th' eastern side beheld
Of Paradise, so late their happy seat,
Waved over by that flaming brand, the gate
With dreadful faces throng'd and fiery arms:

1 An old word for marsh.

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Some natural tears they dropp'd, but wiped them soon;
The world was all before them, where to choose

Their place of rest, and Providence their guide.
They, hand in hand with wand'ring steps and slow,
Through Eden took their solitary way.

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"They, hand in hand with wandering steps and slow, Through Eden took their solitary way."-p. 366.

Paradise Begained.

BOOK L

I, WHO erewhile the happy garden sung,
By one man's disobedience lost, now sing
Recover'd Paradise to all mankind,

By one man's firm obedience fully tried
Through all temptation, and the tempter foil'd
In all his wiles, defeated, and repulsed,
And Eden raised in the waste wilderness.

Thou Spirit, who led'st this glorious Eremite
Into the desert, His victorious field,

Against the spiritual foe, and brought'st Him thence
By proof the undoubted Son of God, inspire,
As thou art wont, my prompted song, else mute,
And bear through highth or depth of nature's bounds
With prosperous wing full summ'd' to tell of deeds
Above heroic, though in secret done,

And unrecorded left through many an age,
Worthy t' have not remain'd so long unsung.

Now had the great Proclaimer,2 with a voice
More awful than the sound of trumpet, cried
Repentance, and heaven's kingdom nigh at hand
To all baptized: to his great baptism flock'd
With awe the regions round, and with them came
From Nazareth the Son of Joseph deem'd
To the flood Jordan, came, as then obscure,
Unmark'd, unknown; but Him the Baptist soon
Descried, divinely warn'd, and witness bore
As to his worthier, and would have resign'd

1 Full featherod, a term used in falconry.

1 John the Baptist

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