Page 110 of 239

123

Think not I shall be nice. So down they sat, And to their viands fell; nor seemingly The Angel, nor in mist—the common gloss Of theologians—but with keen despatch Of real hunger and concective heat To transubstantiate: what redounds, transpires Through spirits with ease; nor wonder, if by fire Of sooty coal the empiric alchymist Can turn, and holds it possible to turn, Metals of drossiest ore to perfect gold, As from the mine. Meanwhile at table Eve Ministered naked, and their flowing cups With pleasant liquors crowned. O innocence, Deserving Paradise! if ever, then, Then had the sons of God excuse to have been Enamoured at that sight; but in those hearts Love unlibidinous reigned, nor jealousy

Was understood, the injured lovers hell. Thus when with meats and drinks they had sufficed, Not burdened nature, sudden mind arose In Adam not to let the occasion pass, Given him by this great conference, to know Of things above his world, and of their being Who dwell in heaven, whose excellence he saw Transcend his own so far: whose radiant forms, Divine effulgence, whose high power, so far Exceeded human: and his wary speech Thus to the empyreal minister he framed:

Inhabitant with God, now know I well Thy favour, in this honour done to man; Under whose lowly roof thou hast vouchsafed To enter, and these earthly fruits to taste, Food not of Angels, yet accepted so,

As that more willingly thou couldst not seem At heaven's high feasts to have fed: yet what compare To whom the winged Hierarch replied: O Adam, one Almighty is, from whom All things proceed, and up to Him return, If not depraved from good, created all

Such to perfection, one first matter all, Endued with various forms, various degrees Of substance, and, in things that live, of life; But more refined, more spirituous, and pure, As nearer to Him placed, or nearer tending Each in their several active spheres assigned, Till body up to spirit work, in bounds Proportioned to each kind. So from the root Springs lighter the green stalk, from thence the leaves More aery, last the bright consummate flower Spirits odorous breathes: flowers and their fruit, Man's nourishment, by gradual scale sublimed, To vital spirits aspire, to animal, To intellectual; give both life and sense, Fancy and understanding; whence the soul Reason receives, and reason is her being, Discursive, or intuitive; discourse If oftest yours, the latter most is ours, Differing but in degree, of kind the same. Wonder not, then, what God for you saw good If I refuse not, but convert, as you,

To proper substance. Time may come when men

With angels may participate, and find

Ethereal, as we; or may, at choice,

Here or in heavenly paradises dwell;

If ye be found obedient, and retain

No inconvenient diet, nor too light fare;

Your bodies may at last turn all to spirit,

And from these corporeal nutriments, perhaps,

Improved by tract of time, and winged, ascend

With keen despatch of real hunger. -This seems a confounding of spirit with matter. But Milton adheres strictly to the sacred text, and there was possibly more reality under such phenomena than is dreamt of in our philosophy. 2 If ever, then, then. - If the time was ever, it was then.