Side 58 af 239

Retire, or taste thy folly, and learn by proof,

Hell-born, not to contend with spirits of heaven!

To whom the goblin, full of wrath, replied: Art thou that traitor-angel, art thou he, Who first broke peace in Heaven, and faith, till then Unbroken; and in proud rebellious arms, Drew after him the third part of heaven's sons Conjured against the Highest; for which both thou And they, outcast from God, are here condemned To waste eternal days in woe and pain? And reckonest thou thyself with Spirits of Heaven, Hell-doomed, and breathest defiance here and scorn, Where I reign king, and, to enrage thee more, Thy king and lord? Back to thy punishment, False fugitive, and to thy speed add wings, Lest with a whip of scorpions I pursue Thy lingering, or with one stroke of this dart Strange horror seize thee, and pangs unfelt before.

So spake the grizzly Terror, and in shape, So speaking and so threatening, grew tenfold More dreadful and deform. On the other side, Incensed with indignation, Satan stood Unterrified, and like a comet burned, That fires the length of Ophiuchus huge¹ In the arctic sky, and from his horrid hair Shakes pestilence and war. Each at the head Levelled his deadly aim; their fatal hands No second stroke intend; and such a frown Each cast at the other, as when two black clouds, With heaven's artillery fraught, come rattling on Over the Caspian, then stand front to front, Hovering a space, till winds the signal blow To join their dark encounter in mid-air: So frowned the mighty combatants, that Hell

Grew darker at their frown; so matched they stood,

For never but once more was either like

To meet so great a Foe: And now great deeds

Had been achieved, whereof all Hell had rung,

Had not the snaky sorceress that sat

Fast by hell-gate, and kept the fatal key,

Risen, and with hideous outery rushed between.

O father! what intends thy hands, she cried,

Against thy only son? What fury, O son!

Possesses thee to bend that mortal dart

Against thy father's head? and know'st for whom;

For Him who sits above, and laughs the while

At thee ordained his drudge, to execute

Whate'er His wrath, which He calls justice, bids;

His wrath, which one day will destroy ye both!"

She spake, and at her words the hellish pest Forebore; then these to her Satan returned:

So strange thy outcry, and thy words so strange

Thou interposest, that my sudden hand,

Prevented, spares to tell thee yet by deeds

What it intends, till first I know of thee,

What thing thou art, thus double-formed, and why,

In this infernal vale first met, thou call'st

Me father, and that phantasm call'st my son:

I know thee not, nor ever saw till now

Sight more detestible than him and thee.

To whom thus the portress of hell-gate replied:

Hast thou forgot me then, and do I seem

Now in thine eye so foul, once deemed so fair

In Heaven; when at the assemby, and in sight

Of all the seraphim with thee combined

In bold conspiracy against Heaven's King,

All on a sudden miserable pain

Surprised thee; dim thine eyes, and dizzy swum

In darkness, while thy head flames thick and fast

Threw forth; till, on the left side opening wide,

Ophiuchus huge.—i.e., serpent holder; one of the northern constellations.