Chapter 24 twenty two
He ceasd; and Satan staid not to reply, [ 1010 ]
But glad that now his Sea should find a shore,
With fresh alacritie and force renewed
Springs upward like a Pyramid of fire
Into the wilde expansion, and through the shock
Of fighting Elements, on all sides round [ 1015 ]
Environd wins his way; harder beset
And more endangered, then when Argo passd
Through Bosporus betwixt the justling Rocks:
Or when Ulysses on the Larbord shunnd
Charybdis, and by th other whirlpool steard. [ 1020 ]
So he with difficulty and labor hard
Moved on, with difficulty and labor hee;
But hee once past, soon after when man fell,
Strange alteration! Sin and Death amain
Following his track, such was the will of Heavn, [ 1025 ]
Pavd after him a broad and beatn way
Over the dark Abyss, whose boiling Gulf
Tamely endurd a Bridge of wondrous length
From Hell continud reaching th utmost Orbe
Of this frail World; by which the Spirits perverse [ 1030 ]
With easy intercourse pass to and fro
To tempt or punish mortals, except whom
God and good Angels guard by special grace.
But now at last the sacred influence
Of light appears, and from the walls of Heavn [ 1035 ]
Shoots farr into the bosom of dim Night
A glimmering dawn; here Nature first begins
Her fardest verge, and Chaos to retire
As from her outmost works a brokn foe
With tumult less and with less hostile din, [ 1040 ]
That Satan with less toil, and now with ease
Wafts on the calmer wave by dubious light
And like a weather-beaten Vessel holds
Gladly the Port, though Shrouds and Tackle torn;
Or in the emptier waste, resembling Air, [ 1045 ]
Weighs his spread wings, at lease to behold
Farr off th Empyreal Heavn, extended wide
In circuit, undetermined square or round,
With Opal Towrs and Battlements adorned
Of living Saphire, once his native Seat; [ 1050 ]
And fast by hanging in a golden Chain
This pendant world, in bigness as a Starr
Of smallest Magnitude close by the Moon.
Thither full fraught with mischievous revenge,
Accurst, and in a cursed hour he hies. [ 1055 ]