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BOOK IX.-607-642]

Semblance, and in thy beauty's heavenly ray, United I beheld: no fair to thine Equivalent or second! which compelled Me thus, though importune perhaps, to come And gaze, and worship thee, of right declared Sovereign of creatures, universal dame! So talked the spirited sly snake, and Eve,

PARADISE LOST.

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 untouched, 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 rolled 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 swallowed up and lost, from succour far:

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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 discerned, 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 mixed, 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, Unsucked 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 thurst at once, Powerful persuaders, quickened 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 retained. Thenceforth to speculations high or deep I turned my thoughts, and with capacious mind Considered all things visible in heaven, Or earth, or middle; all things fair and good.

But all that fair and good in thy divine