Chapter 5 4
Scorning surprise. Or could we break our way
By force, and at our heels all Hell should rise [ 135 ]
With blackest Insurrection, to confound
Heavns purest Light, yet our great Enemy
All incorruptible would on his Throne
Sit unpolluted, and th Ethereal mold
Incapable of stain would soon expel [ 140 ]
Her mischief, and purge off the baser fire
Victorious. Thus repulsed, our final hope
Is flat despair; we must exasperate
Th Almighty Victor to spend all his rage,
And that must end us, that must be our cure, [ 145 ]
To be no more; sad cure; for who would loose,
Though full of pain, this intellectual being,
Those thoughts that wander through Eternity,
To perish rather, swallowed up and lost
In the wide womb of uncreated night, [ 150 ]
Devoid of sense and motion? and who knows,
Let this be good, whether our angry Foe
Can give it, or will ever? how he can
Is doubtful; that he never will be sure.
Will he, so wise, let loose at once his ire, [ 155 ]
Belike through impotence, or unaware,
To give his Enemies thir wish, and end
Them in his anger, whom his anger saves
To punish endless? Wherefore cease we then?
Say they who counsel Warr, we are decreed, [ 160 ]
Reserve and destind to Eternal woe;
Whatever doing, what can we suffer more,
What can we suffer worse? is this then worst,
Thus sitting, thus consulting, thus in Arms?
What when we fled amain, pursud and strook [ 165 ]
With Heavns afflicting Thunder, and besought
The Deep to shelter us? this Hell then seemsd
A refuge from those wounds: or when we lay
Chaind on the burning Lake? That sure was worse.
What if the breath that kindld those grim fires [ 170 ]
Awakd should blow them into sevenfold rage
And plunge us in the flames? or from above
Should interrupted vengeance arm again
His red right hand to plague us? what if all
Her stores were opened, and this Firmament [ 175 ]
Of Hell should spout her Cataracts of Fire,
Impendent horrors, threatening hideous fall
One day upon our heads; while we perhaps
Designing or exhorting glorious warr,
Caught in a fierie Tempest shall be hurld [ 180 ]
Each on his rock transfixt, the sport and prey
Of racking whirlwinds, or for ever sunk
Under yon boyling Ocean, wrapt in Chains;
There to converse with everlasting groans,
Unrespited, unpitied, unrepreeved, [ 185 ]
Ages of hopeless end; this would be worse.