After having been thrown out of Heaven with his crew, Satan lay nine days in the burning lake into which he fell. Then, rousing himself, he rose from the liquid flames, flew over the lake, and alighting upon the solid though burning land, thus addressed Beelzebub, who had accompanied him.
"Is this the region, this the soil, the clime,"Said then the lost Archangel, "this the seatThat we must change for Heaven?—this mournful gloomFor that celestial light? Be it so, since HeWho now is sovran can dispose and bidWhat shall be right: farthest from Him is best,Whom reason hath equalled, force hath made supremeAbove his equals. Farewell, happy fields,Where joy forever dwells! Hail, horrors! hail,Infernal World! and thou, profoundest Hell,Receive thy new possessor—one who bringsA mind not to be changed by place or time.The mind is its own place, and in itselfCan make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven.What matter where, if I be still the same,And what I should be, all but less than heWhom thunder hath made greater? Here at leastWe shall be free; the Almighty hath not builtHere for his envy, will not drive us hence:Here we may reign secure; and, in my choice,To reign is worth ambition, though in Hell:Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven.But wherefore let we then our faithful friends,The associates and co-partners of our loss,Lie thus astonished on the oblivious pool,And call them not to share with us their partIn this unhappy mansion, or once moreWith rallied arms to try what may be yetRegained in Heaven, or what more lost in Hell?"So Satan spake; and him BeelzebubThus answered:—"Leader of those armies brightWhich, but the Omnipotent, none could have foiled!If once they hear that voice, their liveliest pledgeOf hope in fears and dangers—heard so oftIn worst extremes, and on the perilous edgeOf battle, when it raged, in all assaultsTheir surest signal—they will soon resumeNew courage and revive, though now they lieGrovelling and prostrate on yon lake of fire,As we erewhile, astounded and amazed;No wonder, fallen from such pernicious highth!"He scarce had ceased when the superior FiendWas moving toward the shore; his ponderous shield,Ethereal temper, massy, large, and round,Behind him cast. The broad circumferenceHung on his shoulders like the moon, whose orbThrough optic glass the Tuscan artist viewsAt evening, from the top of Fesolè,Or in Valdarno, to descry new lands,Rivers, or mountains, in her spotty globe.His spear—to equal which the tallest pineHewn on Norwegian hills, to be the mastOf some great ammiral, were but a wand—He walked with, to support uneasy stepsOver the burning marle, not like those stepsOn Heaven's azure; and the torrid climeSmote on him sore besides, vaulted with fire.Nathless he so endured, till on the beachOf that inflamèd sea he stood, and calledHis legions—Angel Forms, who lay entrancedThick as autumnal leaves that strow the brooksIn Vallombrosa, where the Etrurian shadesHigh over-arched embower; or scattered sedgeAfloat, when the fierce winds Orion armedHath vexed the Red-Sea coast, whose waves o'erthrewBusiris and his Memphian chivalry,While with perfidious hatred they pursuedThe sojourners of Goshen, who beheldFrom the safe shore their floating carcasesAnd broken chariot wheels. So thick bestrewn,Abject and lost, lay these, covering the flood,Under amazement of their hideous change.He called so loud that all the hollow deepOf Hell resounded:—"Princes, Potentates,Warriors, the Flower of Heaven—once yours; now lost,If such astonishment as this can seizeEternal Spirits! Or have ye chosen this placeAfter the toil of battle to reposeYour wearied virtue, for the ease you findTo slumber here, as in the vales of Heaven?Or in this abject posture have ye swornTo adore the Conqueror, who now beholdsCherub and Seraph rolling in the floodWith scattered arms and ensigns, till anonHis swift pursuers from Heaven-gates discernThe advantage, and descending, tread us downThus drooping, or with linked thunderboltsTransfix us to the bottom of this gulf?—Awake, arise, or be for ever fallen!"Book I., 240-330.
This passage forms the beginning of Book III., in which the poet visits the realms of light after having described Hell and its inhabitants.
Hail, holy Light, offspring of Heaven first-born!Or of the Eternal coeternal beamMay I express thee unblamed? since God is light,And never but in unapproachèd lightDwelt from eternity—dwelt then in thee,Bright effluence of bright essence increate!Or hear'st thou rather pure Ethereal stream,Whose fountain who shall tell? Before the Sun,Before the Heavens, thou wert, and at the voiceOf God, as with a mantle, didst investThe rising World of waters dark and deep,Won from the void and formless Infinite!Thee I revisit now with bolder wing,Escaped the Stygian Pool, though long detainedIn that obscure sojourn, while in my flight,Through utter and through middle Darkness borne,With other notes than to the Orphean lyreI sung of Chaos and eternal Night,Taught by the Heavenly Muse to venture downThe dark descent, and up to re-ascend,Though hard and rare. Thee I revisit safe,And feel thy sovran vital lamp; but thouRevisit'st not these eyes, that roll in vainTo find thy piercing ray, and find no dawn;So thick a drop serene hath quenched their orbs,Or dim suffusion veiled. Yet not the moreCease I to wander where the Muses hauntClear spring, or shady grove, or sunny hill,Smit with the love of sacred song; but chiefThee, Sion, and the flowery brooks beneath,That wash thy hallowed feet, and warbling flow,Nightly I visit: nor sometimes forgetThose other two equalled with me in fate,So were I equalled with them in renown,Blind Thamyris and blind Mæonides,And Tiresias and Phineus, prophets old:Then feed on thoughts that voluntary moveHarmonious numbers; as the wakeful birdSings darkling, and, in shadiest covert hid,Tunes her nocturnal note. Thus with the yearSeasons return; but not to me returnsDay, or the sweet approach of even or morn,Or sight of vernal bloom, or summer's rose,Or flocks, or herds, or human face divine;But cloud instead and ever-during darkSurrounds me, from the cheerful ways of menCut off, and, for the book of knowledge fair,Presented with a universal blankOf Nature's works, to me expunged and rased,And wisdom at one entrance quite shut out.So much the rather thou, Celestial Light,Shine inward, and the mind through all her powersIrradiate; there plant eyes; all mist from thencePurge and disperse, that I may see and tellOf things invisible to mortal sight.Book III
"A cold and noble epic."—TAINE.
Paradise regained was written by Milton, judging from a passage in the Autobiography of Thomas Ellwood, in the winter of 1665-6, but was not published until 1671. It was printed at Milton's expense in a small volume together with Samson Agonistes.
Paradise Regained tells the story of Christ's temptation in the Wilderness, and the material was taken from the accounts of Matthew and Luke, which the poet, with great skill, expanded without essentially deviating from them.
The title has been criticised on the ground that the poem should have extended over the whole of Christ's life on earth. But Paradise Regained was written as a sequel to Paradise Lost, and, as in the first poem the poet showed that Paradise was lost by the yielding of Adam and Eve to Satan, so in the second, he wished to show that Paradise was regained by the resistance of Christ to temptation, Satan's defeat signifying the regaining of Paradise for men by giving them the hope of Christ's second coming. Therefore the poem naturally ends with Satan's rebuff and his final abandonment of the attempt on the pinnacle of the Temple.
The poem has been criticised for its shortness, some scholars even affecting to believe it unfinished; its lack of variety, in that it has but two characters, its lack of action, and the absence of figurative language.
But with all these faults, it has a charm of its own, entirely different from that of Paradise Lost. Satan has degenerated during his years of "roaming up and down the earth;" he is no longer the fallen angel of Paradise Lost, who struggled with himself before making evil his good. He is openly given over to evil practices, and makes little effort to play the hypocrite. His temptations are worked up from that of hunger to that of the vision of the kingdoms of the earth with a wonderful power of description which makes up for the lack of action and the few actors. The pathless, rockbound desert, the old man, poorly clad, who accosts the Christ, the mountain-top from which all the earth was visible, the night of horror in the desert, and the sublime figure of the Savior, are all enduring pictures which compensate for any rigidity of treatment. If figurative language is omitted it is because the theme does not need it, and does not show that the poem is less carefully finished than Paradise Lost. Its lack of action and similarity of subject to the longer poem sufficiently account for its not meeting with popular favor. Johnson was correct when he said, "had this poem been written not by Milton, but by some imitator, it would have claimed and received universal praise."
H. C. Beeching, On the Prosody of Paradise Regained and Samson Agonistes, 1889;
Charles Dexter Cleveland's Complete Concordance to Milton's Poetical Works, 1867;
William T. Dobson's The Classic Poets, their Lives and Times etc., 1879;
George Gilfillan's Second Gallery of Literary Portraits, 1852, pp. 15-16;
Samuel Johnson's Milton (see his Lives of the Poets, ed. by Mrs. Alexander Napier, 1890, vol. i.);
Thomas Babington Macaulay's Milton (see his Critical and Historical Essays, ed, 10, 1860, vol. i.);
David Masson's Introduction to Paradise Regained (see his ed. of Milton's Poetical works, 1893, vol. iii., pp. 1-14);
David Masson's Life of Milton, 1880, vol. vi., 651-661;
Richard Meadowcourt's Critique on Milton's Paradise Regained, 1732;
A Critical Dissertation on Paradise Regained with Notes, 2d ed. 1748;
John Robert Seeley's Milton (see his Roman Imperialism and other Lectures and Essays, 1871, pp. 152-157);
Mark Pattison's John Milton (English Men of Letters Series), n. d.;
H. A. Taine's History of English Literature, Tr. by H. Van Laun, 1877, vol. ii.
After the expulsion from Paradise of Adam and Eve, Satan and his followers did not return to Hell, but remained on earth, the fallen angels becoming the evil gods of various idolatrous nations and Satan engaging in every kind of evildoing which he knew would vex the Powers of Heaven. All the time he was troubled by the thought of the heavenly foe who he had been told would one day appear on earth to crush him and his rebel angels.
Now John had come out of the wilderness, proclaiming his mission, and among those who came to him to be baptized was one who was deemed the son of Joseph of Nazareth. John recognized in the obscure carpenter's son the one "mightier than he" whose coming he was to proclaim, and this fact was further made clear to the multitude and the observant Satan by the opening of the Heavens and the descent therefrom on Christ's head of the Dove, while a voice was heard declaring, "This is my beloved Son."
Satan, enraged, fled to the council of the fiends to announce to them the presence on earth of their long-dreaded enemy. He was empowered by them to attempt his overthrow, and they were the more confident because of his success with Adam and Eve.
Satan's purpose was known to the Eternal Father, who smiled to see him unwittingly fulfilling the plan so long foreordained for his destruction.
After his baptism, the Father had sent his Son into the wilderness to gain strength for his struggle with Sin and Death, and there Satan, in the guise of an old, poorly clad rustic, found him. Although the Son of God had wandered through the rock-bound, pathless desert, among wild beasts, without food for forty days, he had no fear, believing that some impulse from above had guided him thither before he should go out among men to do his divinely appointed task.
Then, when hunger came upon him as he wandered, thinking of past events and those to come, he met the aged man and was addressed by him.
"Sir, how came you hither, where none who ventures alone escapes alive? I ask because you look not unlike the man I lately saw baptized by John and declared the Son of God."
"I need no guide," replied the Son. "The Power who brought me here will bring me forth."
"Not otherwise than by miracle. Here we subsist only upon dry roots and must often endure parching thirst. If thou art indeed the Son of God, save thyself and relieve us wretched people by changing these stones to bread."
"Men live not by bread alone," replied the Son, "but by the word of God. Moses in the Mount was without food and drink for forty days. Elijah also wandered fasting in the wilderness. Thou knowest who I am as I know who thou art; why shouldest thou suggest distrust to me?"
"'Tis true that I am that unfortunate spirit who fell from Heaven, but I have been permitted to roam around the earth and have not been altogether excluded from Heaven. God allowed me to test Job and prove his worth and to draw Ahab into fraud. Though I have lost much of my original brightness I can still admire all that is illustrious and good. The sons of men should not regard me as an enemy, for I have oft given them aid by oracles, dreams, and portents. My loss was not through them, so their restoration does not grieve me; only that fallen man will be restored and not I."
"Thou deservest to grieve, tissue of lies that thou art!" exclaimed our Savior. "Thou boastest of being released from Hell and permitted to come into Heaven. No joy hast thou there! Thy own malice moved thee to torture Job. Brag not of thy lies, thy oracles for men. Henceforth oracles are dumb, since God has sent his living oracle into the world to teach the truth."
Satan, though angry, still dissembled.
"Accuse me, reprove me, if thou wilt. Fallen as I am, I still love to hear the truth fall from thy lips."
Unmoved by his false words the Savior of men declared that he neither forbade nor invited his presence, and Satan, bowing low, disappeared as night fell over the desert.
In the mean time, those at Bethabara who had rejoiced at the declaration of John and had talked with the Messiah, were deeply grieved to find him gone and with him their hope of deliverance. His mother, too, was troubled at his absence, but comforted herself with the thought of his former absences, afterwards explained.
Satan, hastening from the desert, sought his troop of evil spirits to warn them that his undertaking was no easy one, and to summon them to his assistance.
Night fell on the Son of God, still fasting, wondering what would be the end. In sleep he was visited by dreams of Elijah, raven-fed, and of the same prophet fed by the angel in the desert, and as he dreamed that he ate with them, the lark's song awoke him and he wandered into a pleasant grove. As he viewed it, charmed by its beauty, a man appeared before him, no rustic this time, but one attired in the apparel of city or court.
"I have returned, wondering that thou still remainest here, hungering. Hagar once wandered here; the children of Israel, and the Prophet, but all these were fed by the hand of Heaven. Thou alone art forgotten and goest tormented by hunger."
Though the Son of God declared that he had no need to eat, Satan invited his attention to a table, set under a spreading tree. Upon it was heaped every known delicacy; by it waited youths handsome as Ganymede, and among the trees tripped naiads and nymphs of Diana, with fruits and flowers. Exquisite music was heard, and the perfumes of Araby filled the air.
"Why not sit and eat?" continued Satan. "These foods are not forbidden, and all these gentle ministers are ready to do thee homage."
"What hast thou to do with my hunger?" demanded Jesus. "Should I receive as a gift from thee what I myself could command if I so desired? I too could bring a table here, and swift-winged angels to attend me. Thy gifts are but guiles."
"I am forever suspected," responded Satan, as the table vanished. "Hunger cannot move thee, set on high designs. But what canst thou, a lowly carpenter's son, accomplish without aid? Where wilt thou find authority, where followers? First get riches; hearken to me, for fortune is in my hand. Wealth will win, while virtue, valor, and wisdom sit and wait in vain."
"Yet what can wealth do without these?" replied Jesus patiently. "How can it gain dominion, and keep it when gained? Gideon, Jephtha, David, and among the heathen (for I am not ignorant of history) Quinctius, Fabricius, Curius, Regulus, all these have risen from the depths and achieved the highest deeds. Then, why may not I accomplish as much, even more, without wealth, which but cumbers the wise man, and slackens virtue, rather than prompts it to worthy deeds? Suppose I reject both riches and realms? Not because the regal diadem is a wreath of thorns and he who wears it bears each man's burden, for the king's chief praise is the manner in which he bears this burden for the public. But he who rules himself is greater than a king, and he who cannot do this should not aspire to royal power. But it is surely more kingly to lead nations blinded by error into the light of God's truth. This dominion is over the nobler part of man. And it has ever been thought greater and nobler to give a kingdom and to lay down authority than to assume it. Therefore thy riches are needless both in themselves, and to gain a kingdom which would better be missed than gained."
Satan, though for a moment struck dumb by this answer to his arguments, soon collected himself and suggested that while the Savior knew so well what was best to know, say, and do, that if known he would be regarded as an oracle, still he did wrong to despise glory and deprive earth of his great deeds, citing as examples of more active spirits accomplishing much when younger than he, the young Alexander, Scipio, Pompey, and Caesar. But the Savior replied that the glory which consisted of the approval of the rabble was only to be despised. The true glory was that of the man who dared to be truly good, who though little known on earth, was famous in Heaven. Such men did not lay waste fields, sack, pillage, and slay, but by deeds of peace won the approval of the Father. Such was Job, oft tempted by Satan; such was Socrates, who suffered unjust death for teaching truth. And the Son of God had come upon earth not to win glory for himself as vain men do, but for Him who sent him.
"Thy Father does not despise glory," sneered Satan. "He demands it from his angels, from men, even from us, his foes."
"With reason," answered the Son, "since he created all things, though not for glory. And what slighter recompense could he expect from men who could return nothing else?"
Satan, remembering his own ambition and his fall, was silent for a moment, and then spoke to remind the Savior that he was born to the throne of David, but that it must be wrested from the Roman by force of arms. It was his duty to do this and save his people from oppression.
"All things in due time," replied the Savior. "If the Writ tells of my sufferings, my tribulations, of violence done unto me, it also tells of my reign without end. I can wait. He who suffers best, can do best; he who obeys first, reigns best; and why shouldest thou be so anxious to hasten my rule when it means thy destruction?"
"When hope is gone, what is there left to fear? My punishment will come whether thou reign or no. I could hope that thy reign would stand between me and the anger of thy Father. And if I haste to the worst that can be, why shouldest thou go so slowly to the best? Perhaps thou fearest the dangerous enterprise, thou who, pent up in Galilean towns, hast seen so little."
So saying, he took the Son up into a high mountain at the foot of which stretched a vast plain. Two rivers watered the fertile land. The hills were covered with flocks; vast cities could be seen, and here and there, so wide was the land, a barren desert. Then the Tempter pointed out the vast cities of Assyria, Nineveh, Babylon, Persepolis, Bactra, and the vast host of the Parthian king, even then marching against the Scythians. As they watched the great host of mailed warriors, accompanied by chariots, elephants, archers, engineers, Satan pursued his argument. Suppose the Son should take possession of his kingdom; how should he hope to keep it in peace between two such powerful enemies as the Parthians and the Romans? It would be better to conquer first the nearest, the Parthians, and this could be done with Satan's help. In doing this he would not only be able to occupy his throne but would deliver the offspring of the Ten Tribes of Israel, who, scattered among the Medes, still served as slaves.
But the Savior, in response, only questioned Satan as to why he had suddenly become so solicitous for the salvation of the Tribes when he himself had once tempted David to number Israel and had thus brought pestilence upon them. And as to the Ten Tribes, they had brought their punishment upon themselves, and must serve the enemy and their idols until the Father should see fit to release them.
Though embarrassed by the failure of his wiles, Satan could not yet yield. Turning to the western side of the mountain, he pointed out to the Savior a long, narrow plain, bordered on the south by the sea and protected from northern blasts by a mountain range. There, crowning the seven hills stood the imperial city adorned with porches, theatres, baths, aqueducts, and palaces. Satan pointed out the different objects of interest in splendid Rome, the Capitol, Mt. Palatine, crowned by the imperial palace, and the great gates, through which issued or entered a continuous stream of praetors, proconsuls, lictors, legions, embassies, on all the roads which led through the far-stretching empire, even to those of the Asian kings, and remote Britain. All the glory of the world, he argued, lay in Parthia and Rome, and Rome was greater. He who ruled her was indeed ruler of the world, and yet its present emperor was old, weak, lascivious, without heir, and lived at Capreae, his public cares entrusted to his favorite. How easily could the Son of God force from him the power and lift the yoke from his people!
But the splendor of the scene allured neither the eye nor the mind of the Son. The gluttonies, the gorgeous feasts, the hollow compliments and lies of the people did not attract him. His mission, he told his Tempter, was not yet to free that people, once just and frugal, now debased by their insatiable ambition. When the time came for him to sit on David's throne, this with all other kingdoms of the earth would be shattered while his kingdom would be eternal.
"Though thou despisest my offers," cried Satan, "thou knowest that I esteem them highly, and will not part with them for nought. This is the condition; Wilt thou fall down and worship me as thy superior lord?"
"It is written, thou accursed one," responded the Savior in disdain, "that thou shouldst worship and serve the Lord thy God alone. Who gave thee the kingdoms of the earth if He did not? And what gratitude thou showest! Get thee behind me! Truly thou art Satan!"
Satan, abashed but not silenced, pointed southwest toward Athens. Since the Savior seemed to prefer a contemplative life, why should he not seek that seat of learning? All wisdom was not contained in Moses' law and the writings of the prophets. Let him master the learning of the great Athenian teachers, philosophers and orators, and he would be a king within himself.
But the Savior assured Satan that, having received light from above, he knew how false and fallacious were the boasted philosophies of the Greeks. Their philosophers, ignorant of themselves and of God, and arrogating all glory to themselves and ascribing none to Him, were unable to impart wisdom to any one. From Hebrew psalm and hymn, and captive harps in Babylon, the Greeks derived their arts, and the results, the odious praises of their vicious gods, could not compare with the songs of Sion in praise of the Father. Their orators, too, were far below the Hebrew prophets. "Stay in the wilderness, then," thundered Satan, wroth at this failure. "Since neither riches nor arms, nor power, nor yet the contemplative life please thee, it is for thee the fittest place! But the time will yet come when violence, stripes, and a cruel death will make thee long for me and my proffered power. Truly the stars promise thee a kingdom, but of what kind and when I cannot read."
As he disappeared, darkness fell, and the Son of God, still hungry and cold, sought rest under a sheltering tree. But Satan watched near, and forbade rest. Thunder and lightning shook the Heavens; rain drenched the earth; the fury of the winds was loosed, and in their path the sturdiest trees were uprooted. Ghosts, furies, raved around the holy one, but, unshaken by fear, he endured all calmly, and came forth, as the bright sun shone upon the earth, to meet again the Prince of Darkness.
Enraged that the terrors of the night had had no effect upon his enemy, Satan cried out that he still doubted that the wanderer in the wilderness was the Son of God in the true sense, and would therefore try him another way.
So speaking, he caught him up and bore him through the air unto Jerusalem, and setting him on the highest pinnacle of the glorious Temple, said scornfully:—
"Stand there, if thou canst; I have placed thee highest in thy Father's house. Now show if thou art indeed the Son of God. Cast thyself down, for it is written that He will command his angels concerning thee, so that they in their hands shall uplift thee."
"It is also written," said Jesus, "'Tempt not the Lord thy God.'" And as he so spoke and stood, Satan, overcome with amazement, fell whence he had expected to see his conqueror fall, and, struck with dread and anguish at his certain defeat, fled to his rebel angels.
Straightway, a "fiery globe" of angels received the Son on their pinions, bore him from the pinnacle into a flowery vale, and there refreshed him with ambrosial food and water from the Fount of Life, while all around him the angelic choir sang his praises for the conquest of his enemy, and encouraged him to go forth on his work of saving mankind. Thence, rested and refreshed, he arose, and went, unobserved, home to his mother's house.
Satan, meeting the Savior in the wilderness, tempted him to change the stones to bread, and then, after endeavoring to awake in him a longing for wealth and power, appealed to his ambition by leading him to a mountain top, and displaying to him the kingdoms of the earth.
With that (such power was given him then), he {Satan} tookThe Son of God up to a mountain high.It was a mountain at whose verdant feetA spacious plain outstretched in circuit wideLay pleasant; from his side two rivers flowed,The one winding, the other straight, and left betweenFair champaign, with less rivers interveined,Then meeting joined their tribute to the sea.Fertile of corn the glebe, of oil, and wine;With herds the pasture thronged, with flocks the hills;Huge cities and high-towered, that well might seemThe seats of mightiest monarchs; and so largeThe prospect was that here and there was roomFor barren desert, fountainless and dry.To this high mountain-top the Tempter broughtOur Saviour, and new train of words began:—"Well have we speeded, and o'er hill and dale,Forest, and field, and flood, temples and towers,Cut shorter many a league. Here thou behold'stAssyria, and her empire's ancient bounds,Araxes and the Caspian lake; thence onAs far as Indus east, Euphrates west,And oft beyond; to south the Persian bay,And, inaccessible, the Arabian drouth:Here, Nineveh, of length within her wallSeveral days' journey, built by Ninus old,Of that first golden monarchy the seat,And seat of Salmanassar, whose successIsrael in long captivity still mourns;There Babylon, the wonder of all tongues,As ancient, but rebuilt by him who twiceJudah and all thy father David's houseLed captive, and Jerusalem laid waste,Till Cyrus set them free; Persepolis,His city, there thou seest, and Bactra there;Ecbatana her structure vast there shows,And Hecatompylos her hundred gates;There Susa by Choaspes, amber stream,The drink of none but kings; of later fame,Built by Emathian or by Parthian hands,The great Seleucia, Nisibis, and thereArtaxata, Teredon, Ctesiphon,Turning with easy eye, thou may'st behold.All these the Parthian (now some ages pastBy great Arsaces led, who founded firstThat empire) under his dominion holds,From the luxurious kings of Antioch won.And just in time thou com'st to have a viewOf his great power; for now the Parthian kingIn Ctesiphon hath gathered all his hostAgainst the Scythian, whose incursions wildHave wasted Sogdiana; to her aidHe marches now in haste. See though from far,His thousands, in what martial equipageThey issue forth, steel bows and shafts their arms,Of equal dread in flight or in pursuit—All horsemen, in which fight they most excel;See how in warlike muster they appear,In rhombs, and wedges, and half-moons, and wings."He looked, and saw what numbers numberlessThe city gates outpoured, light-armed troopsIn coats of mail and military pride.In mail their horses clad, yet fleet and strong,Prancing their riders bore, the flower and choiceOf many provinces from bound to bound—From Arachosia, from Candaor east,And Margiana, to the Hyrcanian cliffsOf Caucasus, and dark Iberian dales;From Atropatia, and the neighboring plainsOf Adiabene, Media, and the southOf Susiana, to Balsara's haven.He saw them in their forms of battle ranged,How quick they wheeled, and flying behind them shotSharp sleet of arrowy showers against the faceOf their pursuers, and overcame by flight;The field all iron cast a gleaming brown.Nor wanted clouds of foot, nor, on each horn,Cuirassiers all in steel for standing fight,Chariots, or elephants indorsed with towersOf archers; nor of labouring pioneersA multitude, with spades and axes armed,To lay hills plain, fell woods, or valleys fill,Or where plain was raise hill, or overlayWith bridges rivers proud, as with a yoke:Mules after these, camels and dromedaries,And waggons fraught with utensils of war.Such forces met not, nor so wide a camp,When Agrican, with all his northern powers,Besieged Albracca, as romances tell,The city of Gallaphrone, from thence to winThe fairest of her sex, Angelica,His daughter, sought by many prowest knights,Both Paynim and the peers of Charlemain.Such and so numerous was their chivalry.Book III.He brought our Saviour to the western sideOf that high mountain, whence he might beholdAnother plain, long, but in breadth not wide,Washed by the southern sea, and on the northTo equal length backed with a ridge of hillsThat screened the fruits of the earth and seats of menFrom cold Septentrion blasts; thence in the midstDivided by a river, off whose banksOn each side an imperial city stood,With towers and temples proudly elevateOn seven small hills, with palaces adorned,Porches and theatres, baths, aqueducts,Statues and trophies, and triumphal arcs,Gardens and groves, presented to his eyesAbove the highth of mountains interposed—By what strange parallax, or optic skillOf vision, multiplied through air, or glassOf telescope, were curious to inquire.And now the Tempter thus his silence broke:—"The city which thou seest no other deemThan great and glorious Rome Queen of the EarthSo far renowned, and with the spoils enrichedOf nations. There the Capitol thou seest,Above the rest lifting his stately headOn the Tarpeian rock, her citadelImpregnable; and there Mount Palatine,The imperial palace, compass huge, and highThe structure, skill of noblest architects,With gilded battlements, conspicuous far,Turrets, and terraces, and glittering spires.Many a fair edifice besides, more likeHouses of gods—so well have I disposedMy aery microscope—thou may'st behold,Outside and inside both, pillars and roofsCarved work, the hand of famed artificersIn cedar, marble, ivory, or gold.Thence to the gates cast round thine eye, and seeWhat conflux issuing forth, or entering in:Praetors, proconsuls to their provincesHasting, or on return, in robes of state;Lictors and rods, the ensigns of their power;Legions and cohorts, turms of horse and wings;Or embassies from regions far remote,In various habits, on the Appian road,Or on the Aemilian—some from farthest south,Syene, and where the shadow both way falls,Meroe, Nilotic isle, and, more to west,The realm of Bocchus to the Blackmoor sea;From the Asian kings (and Parthian among these),From India and the Golden Chersoness,And utmost Indian isle Taprobane,Dusk faces with white silken turbants wreathed;From Gallia, Gades, and the British west;Germans, and Scythians, and Sarmatians northBeyond Danubius to the Tauric pool.All nations now to Rome obedience pay—To Rome's great Emperor, whose wide domain,In ample territory, wealth and power,Civility of manners, arts and arms,And long renown, thou justly may'st preferBefore the Parthian. These two thrones except,The rest are barbarous, and scarce worth the sight,Shared among petty kings too far removed;These having shown thee, I have shown thee allThe kingdoms of the world, and all their glory".Book IV.