{
 "id": "john-milton/book-x",
 "title": "Book X",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "John Milton",
 "poet_slug": "john-milton",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Paradise Lost",
 "book_slug": "paradise-lost",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 10,
 "container": "Book X",
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1674,
  "venue": "Paradise Lost (1674)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://github.com/standardebooks/john-milton_paradise-lost"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/john-milton_paradise-lost",
  "file": "book-10.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/000634929"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 1104,
  "n_stanzas": 48,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 56,
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 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Meanwhile the heinous and despiteful act",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of Satan done in Paradise, and how",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He, in the Serpent, had perverted Eve,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Her husband she, to taste the fatal fruit,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Was known in Heaven; for what can scape the eye",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of God all-seeing, or deceive his heart",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Omniscient? who, in all things wise and just,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Hindered not Satan to attempt the mind",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of Man, with strength entire and free will armed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Complete to have discovered and repulsed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Whatever wiles of foe or seeming friend.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For still they knew, and ought to have still remembered,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The high injunction not to taste that fruit,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Whoever tempted; which they not obeying",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Incurred (what could they less?) the penalty,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And, manifold in sin, deserved to fall.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Up into Heaven from Paradise in haste",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The Angelic guards ascended, mute and sad",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For Man; for of his state by this they knew,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Much wondering how the subtle Fiend had stolen",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Entrance unseen. Soon as the unwelcome news",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From Earth arrived at Heaven-gate, displeased",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "All were who heard; dim sadness did not spare",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That time celestial visages, yet, mixed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With pity, violated not their bliss.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "About the new-arrived, in multitudes,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The ethereal people ran, to hear and know",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "How all befell. They towards the throne supreme",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Accountable made haste to make appear",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With righteous plea their utmost vigilance,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And easily approved; when the Most High",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Eternal Father, from his secret cloud",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Amidst, in thunder uttered thus his voice:",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "“Assembled Angels, and ye Powers returned",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From unsuccessful charge, be not dismayed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Nor troubled at these tidings from the Earth,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Which your sincerest care could not prevent,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Foretold so lately what would come to pass,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "When first this Tempter crossed the gulf from Hell.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I told ye then he should prevail and speed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On his bad errand; Man should be seduced",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And flattered out of all, believing lies",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Against his Maker; no decree of mine",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Concurring to necessitate his fall,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or touch with lightest moment of impulse",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His free will, to her own inclining left",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In even scale. But fallen he is; and now",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What rests, but that the mortal sentence pass",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On his transgression, death denounced that day?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Which he presumes already vain and void,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Because not yet inflicted, as he feared,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By some immediate stroke; but soon shall find",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Forbearance no acquittance ere day end:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Justice shall not return, as bounty, scorned.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But whom send I to judge them? whom but thee,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Vicegerent Son? to thee I have transferred",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "All judgment, whether in Heaven, or Earth, or Hell.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Easy it may be seen that I intend",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Mercy colleague with justice, sending thee,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Man’s friend, his Mediator, his designed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Both ransom and Redeemer voluntary,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And destined Man himself to judge Man fallen.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "So spake the Father; and, unfolding bright",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Toward the right hand his glory, on the Son",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Blazed forth unclouded deity; he full",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Resplendent all his Father manifest",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Expressed, and thus divinely answered mild:",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "“Father Eternal, thine is to decree,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Mine both in Heaven and Earth to do thy will",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Supreme, that thou in me, thy Son beloved,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "May’st ever rest well pleased. I go to judge",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On Earth these thy transgressors; but thou know’st,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Whoever judged, the worst on me must light,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "When time shall be; for so I undertook",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Before thee, and, not repenting, this obtain",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of right, that I may mitigate their doom",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On me derived; yet I shall temper so",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Justice with mercy, as may illustrate most",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Them fully satisfied, and thee appease.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Attendance none shall need, nor train, where none",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Are to behold the judgment but the judged,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Those two; the third best absent is condemned,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Convict by flight, and rebel to all law:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Conviction to the Serpent none belongs.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Thus saying, from his radiant seat he rose",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of high collateral glory; Him Thrones and Powers,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Princedoms, and Dominations ministrant",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Accompanied to Heaven-gate, from whence",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Eden and all the coast in prospect lay.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Down he descended straight; the speed of Gods",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Time counts not, though with swiftest minutes winged.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Now was the sun in western cadence low",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From noon, and gentle airs due at their hour",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To fan the Earth now waked, and usher in",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The evening cool, when he, from wrath more cool,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Came, the mild Judge and Intercessor both,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To sentence Man. The voice of God they heard",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Now walking in the garden, by soft winds",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Brought to their ears, while day declined; they heard,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And from his presence hid themselves among",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The thickest trees, both man and wife, till God,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Approaching, thus to Adam called aloud:",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "“Where art thou, Adam, wont with joy to meet",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "My coming seen far off? I miss thee here,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not pleased, thus entertained with solitude,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Where obvious duty erewhile appeared unsought.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or come I less conspicuous, or what change",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Absents thee, or what chance detains? Come forth.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "He came, and with him Eve, more loth, though first",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To offend, discountenanced both, and discomposed;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Love was not in their looks, either to God",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or to each other, but apparent guilt,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And shame, and perturbation, and despair,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Anger, and obstinacy, and hate, and guile.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Whence Adam, faltering long, thus answered brief:",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "“I heard thee in the garden, and of thy voice",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Afraid, being naked, hid myself.” To whom",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The gracious Judge without revile replied:",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "“My voice thou oft hast heard, and hast not feared,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But still rejoiced; how is it now become",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "So dreadful to thee? That thou art naked, who",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Hath told thee? Hast thou eaten of the tree,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Whereof I gave thee charge thou shouldst not eat?”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "To whom thus Adam, sore beset, replied:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "“O Heaven! in evil strait this day I stand",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Before my Judge⁠—either to undergo",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Myself the total crime, or to accuse",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "My other self, the partner of my life;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Whose failing, while her faith to me remains,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I should conceal, and not expose to blame",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By my complaint; but strict necessity",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Subdues me, and calamitous constraint,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Lest on my head both sin and punishment,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "However insupportable, be all",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Devolved; though should I hold my peace, yet thou",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Wouldst easily detect what I conceal.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "This woman, whom thou mad’st to be my help,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And gav’st me as thy perfect gift, so good,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "So fit, so acceptable, so divine,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That from her hand I could suspect no ill,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And what she did, whatever in itself,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Her doing seemed to justify the deed;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "She gave me of the tree, and I did eat.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "To whom the Sovereign Presence thus replied:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "“Was she thy God, that her thou didst obey",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Before his voice? or was she made thy guide,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Superior, or but equal, that to her",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thou didst resign thy manhood, and the place",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Wherein God set thee above her, made of thee",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And for thee, whose perfection far excelled",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Hers in all real dignity? Adorned",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "She was indeed, and lovely, to attract",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thy love, not thy subjection; and her gifts",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Were such as under government well seemed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Unseemly to bear rule; which was thy part",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And person, hadst thou known thyself aright.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "So having said, he thus to Eve in few:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "“Say, Woman, what is this which thou hast done?”",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To whom sad Eve, with shame nigh overwhelmed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Confessing soon, yet not before her Judge",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Bold or loquacious, thus abashed replied:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "“The Serpent me beguiled, and I did eat.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Which when the Lord God heard, without delay",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To judgment he proceeded on the accused",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Serpent, though brute, unable to transfer",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The guilt on him who made him instrument",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of mischief, and polluted from the end",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of his creation; justly then accursed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As vitiated in nature. More to know",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Concerned not Man (since he no further knew),",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Nor altered his offence; yet God at last",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To Satan, first in sin, his doom applied,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Though in mysterious terms, judged as then best;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And on the Serpent thus his curse let fall:",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "“Because thou hast done this, thou art accursed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Above all cattle, each beast of the field;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Upon thy belly grovelling thou shalt go,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And dust shalt eat all the days of thy life.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Between thee and the Woman I will put",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Enmity, and between thine and her seed;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Her seed shall bruise thy head, thou bruise his heel.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "So spake this oracle, then verified",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "When Jesus, son of Mary, second Eve,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Saw Satan fall like lightning down from Heaven,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Prince of the air; then, rising from his grave,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Spoiled Principalities and Powers, triumphed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In open show, and with ascension bright",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Captivity led captive through the air,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The realm itself of Satan long usurped,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Whom he shall tread at last under our feet;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Even he who now foretold his fatal bruise,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And to the Woman thus his sentence turned:",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "“Thy sorrow I will greatly multiply",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By thy conception; children thou shalt bring",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In sorrow forth; and to thy husband’s will",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thine shall submit; he over thee shall rule.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "On Adam last thus judgment he pronounced:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "“Because thou hast hearkened to the voice of thy wife,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And eaten of the tree, concerning which",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I charged thee, saying, ‘Thou shalt not eat thereof,’",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Curs’d is the ground for thy sake; thou in sorrow",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Shalt eat thereof all the days of thy life;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thorns also and thistles it shall bring thee forth",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Unbid; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Till thou return unto the ground; for thou",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Out of the ground wast taken: know thy birth,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For dust thou art, and shalt to dust return.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "So judged he Man, both Judge and Saviour sent,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And the instant stroke of death, denounced that day,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Removed far off; then, pitying how they stood",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Before him naked to the air, that now",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Must suffer change, disdained not to begin",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thenceforth the form of servant to assume;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As when he washed his servants’ feet, so now,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As father of his family, he clad",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Their nakedness with skins of beasts, or slain,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or as the snake with youthful coat repaid;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And thought not much to clothe his enemies.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Nor he their outward only with the skins",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of beasts, but inward nakedness, much more",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Opprobrious, with his robe of righteousness",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Arraying, covered from his Father’s sight.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To him with swift ascent he up returned,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Into his blissful bosom reassumed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In glory as of old; to him appeased,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "All, though all-knowing, what had passed with Man",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Recounted, mixing intercession sweet.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Meanwhile, ere thus was sinned and judged on Earth,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Within the gates of Hell sat Sin and Death,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In counterview within the gates, that now",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Stood open wide, belching outrageous flame",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Far into Chaos, since the Fiend passed through,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Sin opening; who thus now to Death began:",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "“O Son, why sit we here each other viewing",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Idly, while Satan, our great author, thrives",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In other worlds, and happier seat provides",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For us, his offspring dear? It cannot be",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But that success attends him; if mishap,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Ere this he had returned, with fury driven",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By his avengers, since no place like this",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Can fit his punishment, or their revenge.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Methinks I feel new strength within me rise,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Wings growing, and dominion given me large",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Beyond this Deep, whatever draws me on,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or sympathy, or some connatural force,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Powerful at greatest distance to unite",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With secret amity things of like kind",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By secretest conveyance. Thou, my shade",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Inseparable, must with me along;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For Death from Sin no power can separate.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But, lest the difficulty of passing back",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Stay his return perhaps over this gulf",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Impassable, impervious, let us try",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Adventurous work, yet to thy power and mine",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not unagreeable, to found a path",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Over this main from Hell to that new World",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Where Satan now prevails; a monument",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of merit high to all the infernal host,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Easing their passage hence, for intercourse",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or transmigration, as their lot shall lead.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Nor can I miss the way, so strongly drawn",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By this new-felt attraction and instinct.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Whom thus the meagre Shadow answered soon:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "“Go whither fate and inclination strong",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Leads thee; I shall not lag behind, nor err",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The way, thou leading; such a scent I draw",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of carnage, prey innumerable, and taste",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The savour of death from all things there that live.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Nor shall I to the work thou enterprisest",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Be wanting, but afford thee equal aid.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "So saying, with delight he snuffed the smell",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of mortal change on Earth. As when a flock",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of ravenous fowl, though many a league remote,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Against the day of battle, to a field,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Where armies lie encamped, come flying, lured",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With scent of living carcases designed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For death the following day in bloody fight:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "So scented the grim Feature, and upturned",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His nostril wide into the murky air,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Sagacious of his quarry from so far.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Then both, from out Hell-gates, into the waste",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Wide anarchy of Chaos damp and dark",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Flew diverse, and with power (their power was great)",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Hovering upon the waters, what they met",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Solid or slimy, as in raging sea",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Tossed up and down, together crowded drove,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From each side shoaling, towards the mouth of Hell;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As when two polar winds, blowing adverse",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Upon the Cronian sea, together drive",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Mountains of ice, that stop the imagined way",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Beyond Petsora eastward, to the rich",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Cathaian coast. The aggregated soil",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Death with his mace petrific, cold and dry,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As with a trident smote, and fixed as firm",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As Delos, floating once; the rest his look",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Bound with Gorgonian rigour not to move,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And with asphaltic slime; broad as the gate",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Deep to the roots of Hell the gathered beach",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "They fastened, and the mole immense wrought on",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Over the foaming Deep high-arched, a bridge",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of length prodigious, joining to the wall",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Immovable of this now fenceless World,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Forfeit to Death; from hence a passage broad,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Smooth, easy, inoffensive, down to Hell.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "So, if great things to small may be compared,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Xerxes, the liberty of Greece to yoke,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From Susa, his Memnonian palace high,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Came to the sea, and, over Hellespont",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Bridging his way, Europe with Asia joined,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And scourged with many a stroke the indignant waves.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Now had they brought the work by wondrous art",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Pontifical, a ridge of pendent rock,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Over the vexed Abyss, following the track",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of Satan, to the self-same place where he",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "First lighted from his wing, and landed safe",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From out of Chaos, to the outside bare",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of this round World. With pins of adamant",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And chains they made all fast, too fast they made",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And durable; and now in little space",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The confines met of empyrean Heaven",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And of this World, and on the left hand Hell",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With long reach interposed; three several ways,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In sight, to each of these three places led.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And now their way to Earth they had descried,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To Paradise first tending, when, behold",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Satan, in likeness of an Angel bright,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Betwixt the Centaur and the Scorpion steering",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His zenith, while the sun in Aries rose!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Disguised he came; but those his children dear",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Their parent soon discerned, though in disguise.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He, after Eve seduced, unminded slunk",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Into the wood fast by, and, changing shape",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To observe the sequel, saw his guileful act",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By Eve, though all unweeting, seconded",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Upon her husband, saw their shame that sought",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Vain covertures; but when he saw descend",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The Son of God to judge them, terrified",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He fled, not hoping to escape, but shun",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The present, fearing guilty what his wrath",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Might suddenly inflict; that past, returned",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By night, and listening where the hapless pair",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Sat in their sad discourse and various plaint,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thence gathered his own doom; which understood",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not instant, but of future time, with joy",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And tidings fraught, to Hell he now returned,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And at the brink of Chaos, near the foot",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of this new wondrous pontifice, unhoped",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Met who to meet him came, his offspring dear.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Great joy was at their meeting, and at sight",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of that stupendous bridge his joy increased.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Long he admiring stood, till Sin, his fair",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Enchanting daughter, thus the silence, broke:",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "“O Parent, these are thy magnific deeds,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thy trophies, which thou view’st as not thine own;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thou art their author and prime architect;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For I no sooner in my heart divined",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "(My heart, which by a secret harmony",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Still moves with thine, joined in connexion sweet)",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That thou on Earth hadst prospered, which thy looks",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Now also evidence, but straight I felt,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Though distant from thee worlds between, yet felt",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That I must after thee with this thy son;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Such fatal consequence unites us three.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Hell could no longer hold us in her bounds,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Nor this unvoyageable gulf obscure",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Detain from following thy illustrious track.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thou hast achieved our liberty, confined",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Within Hell-gates till now; thou us empowered",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To fortify thus far, and overlay",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With this portentous bridge the dark Abyss.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thine now is all this World; thy virtue hath won",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What thy hands builded not, thy wisdom gained",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With odds what war hath lost, and fully avenged",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Our foil in Heaven: here thou shalt monarch reign,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "There didst not; there let him still victor sway,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As battle hath adjudged, from this new World",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Retiring, by his own doom alienated,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And henceforth monarchy with thee divide",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of all things, parted by the empyreal bounds,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His quadrature, from thy orbicular World,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or try thee now more dangerous to his throne.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Whom thus the Prince of Darkness answered glad:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "“Fair daughter, and thou son and grandchild both,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "High proof ye now have given to be the race",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of Satan (for I glory in the name,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Antagonist of Heaven’s Almighty King),",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Amply have merited of me, of all",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The infernal empire, that so near Heaven’s door",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Triumphal with triumphal act have met,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Mine with this glorious work, and made one realm",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Hell and this World⁠—one realm, one continent",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of easy thoroughfare. Therefore, while I",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Descend through darkness, on your road with ease,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To my associate Powers, them to acquaint",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With these successes, and with them rejoice,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "You two this way, among these numerous orbs,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "All yours, right down to Paradise descend;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "There dwell and reign in bliss; thence on the Earth",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Dominion exercise and in the air,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Chiefly on Man, sole lord of all declared;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Him first make sure your thrall, and lastly kill.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "My substitutes I send ye, and create",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Plenipotent on Earth, of matchless might",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Issuing from me: on your joint vigour now",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "My hold of this new kingdom all depends,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Through Sin to Death exposed by my exploit.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "If your joint power prevail, the affairs of Hell",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "No detriment need fear; go, and be strong.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "So saying, he dismissed them; they with speed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Their course through thickest constellations held,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Spreading their bane; the blasted stars looked wan,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And planets, planet-struck, real eclipse",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Then suffered. The other way Satan went down",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The causey to Hell-gate; on either side",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Disparted Chaos over-built exclaimed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And with rebounding surge the bars assailed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That scorned his indignation. Through the gate,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Wide open and unguarded, Satan passed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And all about found desolate; for those",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Appointed to sit there had left their charge,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Flown to the upper World; the rest were all",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Far to the inland retired, about the walls",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of Pandemonium, city and proud seat",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of Lucifer, so by allusion called",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of that bright star to Satan paragoned;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "There kept their watch the legions, while the Grand",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In council sat, solicitous what chance",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Might intercept their Emperor sent; so he",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Departing gave command, and they observed.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As when the Tartar from his Russian foe,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By Astracan, over the snowy plains",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Retires, or Bactrian Sophi, from the horns",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of Turkish crescent, leaves all waste beyond",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The realm of Aladule, in his retreat",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To Tauris or Casbeen: so these, the late",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Heaven-banished host, left desert utmost Hell",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Many a dark league, reduced in careful watch",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Round their metropolis, and now expecting",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Each hour their great adventurer from the search",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of foreign worlds. He through the midst unmarked,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In show plebeian Angel militant",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of lowest order, passed; and, from the door",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of that Plutonian hall, invisible",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Ascended his high throne, which, under state",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of richest texture spread, at the upper end",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Was placed in regal lustre. Down a while",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He sat, and round about him saw unseen.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "At last, as from a cloud, his fulgent head",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And shape star-bright appeared, or brighter, clad",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With what permissive glory since his fall",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Was left him, or false glitter. All amazed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "At that so sudden blaze, the Stygian throng",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Bent their aspect, and whom they wished beheld,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Their mighty Chief returned: loud was the acclaim.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Forth rushed in haste the great consulting peers,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Raised from their dark divan, and with like joy",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Congratulant approached him, who with hand",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Silence, and with these words attention, won:",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "“Thrones, Dominations, Princedoms, Virtues, Powers!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For in possession such, not only of right,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I call ye, and declare ye now, returned,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Successful beyond hope, to lead ye forth",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Triumphant out of this infernal pit",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Abominable, accursed, the house of woe,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And dungeon of our tyrant! Now possess,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As lords, a spacious World, to our native Heaven",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Little inferior, by my adventure hard",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With peril great achieved. Long were to tell",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What I have done, what suffered, with what pain",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Voyaged the unreal, vast, unbounded Deep",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of horrible confusion, over which",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By Sin and Death a broad way now is paved,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To expedite your glorious march; but I",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Toiled out my uncouth passage, forced to ride",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The untractable Abyss, plunged in the womb",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of unoriginal Night and Chaos wild,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That, jealous of their secrets, fiercely opposed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "My journey strange, with clamorous uproar",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Protesting Fate supreme; thence how I found",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The new-created World, which fame in Heaven",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Long had foretold, a fabric wonderful,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of absolute perfection; therein Man",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Placed in a Paradise, by our exile",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Made happy. Him by fraud I have seduced",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From his Creator, and, the more to increase",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Your wonder, with an apple! He, thereat",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Offended⁠—worth your laughter!⁠—hath given up",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Both his beloved Man and all his World",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To Sin and Death a prey, and so to us,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Without our hazard, labour, or alarm,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To range in, and to dwell, and over Man",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To rule, as over all he should have ruled.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "True is, me also he hath judged, or rather",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Me not, but the brute serpent, in whose shape",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Man I deceived: that which to me belongs",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Is enmity, which he will put between",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Me and mankind; I am to bruise his heel;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His seed⁠—when is not set⁠—shall bruise my head:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A world who would not purchase with a bruise,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or much more grievous pain? Ye have the account",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of my performance; what remains, ye Gods,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But up and enter now into full bliss?”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "So having said, a while he stood, expecting",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Their universal shout and high applause",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To fill his ear; when, contrary, he hears,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On all sides, from innumerable tongues,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A dismal universal hiss, the sound",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of public scorn. He wondered, but not long",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Had leisure, wondering at himself now more;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His visage drawn he felt to sharp and spare,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His arms clung to his ribs, his legs entwining",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Each other, till, supplanted, down he fell",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A monstrous serpent on his belly prone,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Reluctant, but in vain; a greater power",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Now ruled him, punished in the shape he sinned,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "According to his doom. He would have spoke,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But hiss for hiss returned with forked tongue",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To forked tongue; for now were all transformed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Alike, to serpents all, as accessories",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To his bold riot. Dreadful was the din",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of hissing through the hall, thick-swarming now",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With complicated monsters, head and tail,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Scorpion, and asp, and amphisbaena dire,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Cerastes horned, hydrus, and ellops drear,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And dipsas (not so thick swarmed once the soil",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Bedropt with blood of Gorgon, or the isle",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Ophiusa); but still greatest he the midst,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Now dragon grown, larger than whom the sun",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Engendered in the Pythian vale on slime,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Huge Python; and his power no less he seemed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Above the rest still to retain. They all",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Him followed, issuing forth to the open field,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Where all yet left of that revolted rout,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Heaven-fallen, in station stood or just array,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Sublime with expectation when to see",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In triumph issuing forth their glorious Chief;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "They saw, but other sight instead, a crowd",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of ugly serpents! Horror on them fell,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And horrid sympathy; for what they saw",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "They felt themselves now changing: down their arms,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Down fell both spear and shield; down they as fast,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And the dire hiss renewed, and the dire form",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Catched by contagion, like in punishment,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As in their crime. Thus was the applause they meant",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Turned to exploding hiss, triumph to shame",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Cast on themselves from their own mouths. There stood",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A grove hard by, sprung up with this their change,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His will who reigns above, to aggravate",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Their penance, laden with fair fruit, like that",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Which grew in Paradise, the bait of Eve",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Used by the Tempter. On that prospect strange",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Their earnest eyes they fixed, imagining",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For one forbidden tree a multitude",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Now risen, to work them further woe or shame;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Yet, parched with scalding thirst and hunger fierce,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Though to delude them sent, could not abstain,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But on they rolled in heaps, and, up the trees",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Climbing, sat thicker than the snaky locks",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That curled Megaera. Greedily they plucked",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The fruitage fair to sight, like that which grew",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Near that bituminous lake where Sodom flamed;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "This, more delusive, not the touch, but taste",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Deceived; they, fondly thinking to allay",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Their appetite with gust, instead of fruit",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Chewed bitter ashes, which the offended taste",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With spattering noise rejected. Oft they assayed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Hunger and thirst constraining; drugged as oft,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With hatefulest disrelish writhed their jaws,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With soot and cinders filled; so oft they fell",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Into the same illusion, not as Man",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Whom they triumphed once lapsed. Thus were they plagued",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And worn with famine long, and ceaseless hiss,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Till their lost shape, permitted, they resumed;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Yearly enjoined, some say, to undergo",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "This annual humbling certain numbered days,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To dash their pride, and joy for Man seduced.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "However, some tradition they dispersed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Among the heathen of their purchase got,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And fabled how the Serpent, whom they called",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Ophion, with Eurynome (the wide-",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Encroaching Eve perhaps), had first the rule",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of high Olympus, thence by Saturn driven",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And Ops, ere yet Dictaean Jove was born.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Meanwhile in Paradise the Hellish pair",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Too soon arrived; Sin there in power before,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Once actual, now in body, and to dwell",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Habitual habitant; behind her Death,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Close following pace for pace, not mounted yet",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On his pale horse; to whom Sin thus began:",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "“Second of Satan sprung, all-conquering Death!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What think’st thou of our empire now, though earned",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With travail difficult? not better far",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Than still at Hell’s dark threshold to have sat watch,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Unnamed, undreaded, and thyself half-starved?”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Whom thus the Sin-born Monster answered soon:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "“To me, who with eternal famine pine,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Alike is Hell, or Paradise, or Heaven;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "There best, where most with ravin I may meet;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Which here, though plenteous, all too little seems",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To stuff this maw, this vast unhide-bound corpse.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "To whom the incestuous Mother thus replied:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "“Thou therefore on these herbs, and fruits, and flowers,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Feed first; on each beast next, and fish, and fowl,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "No homely morsels; and whatever thing",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The scythe of Time mows down devour unspared;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Till I, in Man residing, through the race,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His thoughts, his looks, words, actions, all infect,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And season him thy last and sweetest prey.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "This said, they both betook them several ways,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Both to destroy, or unimmortal make",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "All kinds, and for destruction to mature",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Sooner or later; which the Almighty seeing,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From his transcendent seat the Saints among,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To those bright Orders uttered thus his voice:",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "“See with what heat these dogs of Hell advance",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To waste and havoc yonder World, which I",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "So fair and good created, and had still",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Kept in that state, had not the folly of Man",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Let in these wasteful furies, who impute",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Folly to me (so doth the Prince of Hell",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And his adherents), that with so much ease",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I suffer them to enter and possess",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A place so heavenly, and conniving seem",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To gratify my scornful enemies,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That laugh, as if, transported with some fit",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of passion, I to them had quitted all,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "At random yielded up to their misrule;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And know not that I called and drew them thither,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "My Hell-hounds, to lick up the draff and filth",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Which Man’s polluting sin with taint hath shed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On what was pure; till, crammed and gorged, nigh burst",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With sucked and glutted offal, at one sling",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of thy victorious arm, well-pleasing Son,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Both Sin, and Death, and yawning Grave at last,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Through Chaos hurled, obstruct the mouth of Hell",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For ever, and seal up his ravenous jaws.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Then Heaven and Earth, renewed, shall be made pure",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To sanctity that shall receive no stain:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Till then the curse pronounced on both precedes.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "He ended, and the Heavenly audience loud",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Sung Hallelujah, as the sound of seas,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Through multitude that sung: “Just are thy ways,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Righteous are thy decrees on all thy works;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Who can extenuate thee?” Next, to the Son,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Destined restorer of mankind, by whom",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "New Heaven and Earth shall to the ages rise,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or down from Heaven descend. Such was their song,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "While the Creator, calling forth by name",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His mighty Angels, gave them several charge,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As sorted best with present things. The sun",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Had first his precept so to move, so shine,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As might affect the Earth with cold and heat",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Scarce tolerable, and from the north to call",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Decrepit winter, from the south to bring",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Solstitial summer’s heat. To the blanc moon",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Her office they prescribed; to the other five",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Their planetary motions and aspects,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In sextile, square, and trine, and opposite,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of noxious efficacy, and when to join",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In synod unbenign; and taught the fixed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Their influence malignant when to shower;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Which of them rising with the sun, or falling,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Should prove tempestuous. To the winds they set",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Their corners, when with bluster to confound",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Sea, air, and shore; the thunder when to roll",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With terror through the dark aerial hall.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Some say he bid his Angels turn askance",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The poles of Earth twice ten degrees and more",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From the sun’s axle; they with labour pushed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Oblique the centric globe: some say the sun",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Was bid turn reins from the equinoctial road",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Like distant breadth to Taurus with the seven",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Atlantic Sisters, and the Spartan Twins,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Up to the Tropic Crab; thence down amain",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By Leo and the Virgin and the Scales,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As deep as Capricorn; to bring in change",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of seasons to each clime: else had the spring",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Perpetual smiled on Earth with vernant flowers,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Equal in days and nights, except to those",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Beyond the polar circles; to them day",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Had unbenighted shone, while the low sun,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To recompense his distance, in their sight",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Had rounded still the horizon, and not known",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or east or west; which had forbid the snow",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From cold Estotiland, and south as far",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Beneath Magellan. At that tasted fruit",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The sun, as from Thyestean banquet, turned",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His course intended: else how had the World",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Inhabited, though sinless, more than now",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Avoided pinching cold and scorching heat?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "These changes in the heavens, though slow, produced",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Like change on sea and land, sideral blast,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Vapour, and mist, and exhalation hot,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Corrupt and pestilent. Now from the north",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of Norumbega, and the Samoed shore,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Bursting their brazen dungeon, armed with ice",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And snow and hail and stormy gust and flaw,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Boreas and Caecias and Argestes loud",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And Thrascias rend the woods and seas upturn;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With adverse blasts upturns them from the south",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Notus and Afer black with thundrous clouds",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From Serraliona; thwart of these, as fierce",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Forth rush the Levant and the Ponent winds,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Eurus and Zephyr with their lateral noise,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Sirocco, and Libecchio. Thus began",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Outrage from lifeless things; but Discord first,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Daughter of Sin, among the irrational",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Death introduced through fierce antipathy:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Beast now with beast ’gan war, and fowl with fowl,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And fish with fish; to graze the herb all leaving",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Devoured each other; nor stood much in awe",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of Man, but fled him, or with countenance grim",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Glared on him passing. These were from without",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The growing miseries, which Adam saw",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Already in part, though hid in gloomiest shade,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To sorrow abandoned, but worse felt within,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And, in a troubled sea of passion tost,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thus to disburden sought with sad complaint:",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "“O miserable of happy! is this the end",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of this new glorious World, and me so late",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The glory of that glory? who now, become",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Accursed of blessed, hide me from the face",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of God, whom to behold was then my highth",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of happiness! Yet well, if here would end",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The misery; I deserved it, and would bear",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "My own deservings; but this will not serve:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "All that I eat or drink, or shall beget,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Is propagated curse. O voice, once heard",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Delightfully, ‘Increase and multiply’;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Now death to hear! for what can I increase",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or multiply, but curses on my head?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Who, of all ages to succeed, but, feeling",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The evil on him brought by me, will curse",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "My head? ‘Ill fare our Ancestor impure!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For this we may thank Adam!’ but his thanks",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Shall be the execration; so, besides",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Mine own that bide upon me, all from me",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Shall with a fierce reflux on me redound,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On me, as on their natural centre, light",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Heavy, though in their place. O fleeting joys",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of Paradise, dear bought with lasting woes!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Did I request thee, Maker, from my clay",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To mould me Man? did I solicit thee",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From darkness to promote me, or here place",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In this delicious garden? As my will",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Concurred not to my being, it were but right",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And equal to reduce me to my dust,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Desirous to resign and render back",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "All I received, unable to perform",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thy terms too hard, by which I was to hold",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The good I sought not. To the loss of that,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Sufficient penalty, why hast thou added",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The sense of endless woes? inexplicable",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thy justice seems. Yet, to say truth, too late",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I thus contest; then should have been refused",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Those terms whatever, when they were proposed.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thou didst accept them: wilt thou enjoy the good,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Then cavil the conditions? And though God",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Made thee without thy leave, what if thy son",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Prove disobedient, and, reproved, retort,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "‘Wherefore didst thou beget me? I sought it not!’",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Wouldst thou admit for his contempt of thee",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That proud excuse? yet him not thy election,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But natural necessity, begot.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "God made thee of choice his own, and of his own",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To serve him; thy reward was of his grace;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thy punishment then justly is at his will.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Be it so, for I submit; his doom is fair,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That dust I am, and shall to dust return.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "O welcome hour whenever! Why delays",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His hand to execute what his decree",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Fixed on this day? Why do I overlive?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Why am I mocked with death, and lengthened out",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To deathless pain? How gladly would I meet",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Mortality, my sentence, and be earth",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Insensible! how glad would lay me down",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As in my mother’s lap! There I should rest",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And sleep secure; his dreadful voice no more",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Would thunder in my ears; no fear of worse",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To me and to my offspring would torment me",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With cruel expectation. Yet one doubt",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Pursues me still, lest all I cannot die;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Lest that pure breath of life, the spirit of Man",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Which God inspired, cannot together perish",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With this corporeal clod; then, in the grave,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or in some other dismal place, who knows",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But I shall die a living death? O thought",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Horrid, if true! Yet why? It was but breath",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of life that sinned: what dies but what had life",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And sin? the body properly hath neither.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "All of me then shall die: let this appease",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The doubt, since human reach no further knows.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For though the Lord of all be infinite,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Is his wrath also? Be it, Man is not so,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But mortal doomed. How can he exercise",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Wrath without end on Man, whom death must end?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Can he make deathless death? That were to make",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Strange contradiction; which to God himself",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Impossible is held, as argument",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of weakness, not of power. Will he draw out,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For anger’s sake, finite to infinite",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In punished Man, to satisfy his rigour",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Satisfied never? That were to extend",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His sentence beyond dust and Nature’s law;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By which all causes else according still",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To the reception of their matter act,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not to the extent of their own sphere. But say",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That death be not one stroke, as I supposed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Bereaving sense, but endless misery",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From this day onward, which I feel begun",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Both in me and without me, and so last",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To perpetuity⁠—Ay me! that fear",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Comes thundering back with dreadful revolution",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On my defenceless head! Both Death and I",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Am found eternal, and incorporate both:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Nor I on my part single; in me all",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Posterity stands cursed. Fair patrimony",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That I must leave ye, sons! Oh, were I able",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To waste it all myself, and leave ye none!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "So disinherited, how would ye bless",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Me, now your curse! Ah, why should all mankind,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For one man’s fault, thus guiltless be condemned,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "If guiltless? But from me what can proceed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But all corrupt, both mind and will depraved",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not to do only, but to will the same",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With me? How can they then acquitted stand",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In sight of God? Him, after all disputes,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Forced I absolve; all my evasions vain",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And reasonings, though through mazes, lead me still",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But to my own conviction: first and last",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On me, me only, as the source and spring",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of all corruption, all the blame lights due;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "So might the wrath! Fond wish! couldst thou support",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That burden, heavier than the Earth to bear;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Than all the World much heavier, though divided",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With that bad woman? Thus, what thou desir’st,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And what thou fear’st, alike destroys all hope",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of refuge, and concludes thee miserable",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Beyond all past example and future;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To Satan only like, both crime and doom.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "O Conscience! into what abyss of fears",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And horrors hast thou driven me; out of which",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I find no way, from deep to deeper plunged!”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Thus Adam to himself lamented loud",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Through the still night, not now, as ere Man fell,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Wholesome and cool and mild, but with black air",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Accompanied, with damps and dreadful gloom;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Which to his evil conscience represented",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "All things with double terror. On the ground",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Outstretched he lay, on the cold ground, and oft",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Cursed his creation; Death as oft accused",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of tardy execution, since denounced",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The day of his offence. “Why comes not Death,”",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Said he, “with one thrice-acceptable stroke",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To end me? Shall Truth fail to keep her word,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Justice divine not hasten to be just?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But Death comes not at call; Justice divine",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Mends not her slowest pace for prayers or cries.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "O woods, O fountains, hillocks, dales, and bowers!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With other echo late I taught your shades",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To answer, and resound far other song.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Whom thus afflicted when sad Eve beheld,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Desolate where she sat, approaching nigh,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Soft words to his fierce passion she assayed;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But her with stern regard he thus repelled:",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "“Out of my sight, thou serpent! that name best",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Befits thee, with him leagued, thyself as false",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And hateful: nothing wants, but that thy shape,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Like his, and colour serpentine, may show",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thy inward fraud, to warn all creatures from thee",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Henceforth; lest that too heavenly form, pretended",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To hellish falsehood, snare them. But for thee",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I had persisted happy, had not thy pride",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And wandering vanity, when least was safe,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Rejected my forewarning, and disdained",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not to be trusted, longing to be seen,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Though by the Devil himself, him overweening",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To overreach; but, with the Serpent meeting,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Fooled and beguiled; by him thou, I by thee,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To trust thee from my side, imagined wise,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Constant, mature, proof against all assaults;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And understood not all was but a show,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Rather than solid virtue, all but a rib",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Crooked by nature⁠—bent, as now appears,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "More to the part sinister⁠—from me drawn;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Well if thrown out, as supernumerary",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To my just number found! Oh, why did God,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Creator wise, that peopled highest Heaven",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With Spirits masculine, create at last",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "This novelty on Earth, this fair defect",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of Nature, and not fill the World at once",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With men, as Angels, without feminine;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or find some other way to generate",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Mankind? This mischief had not then befallen,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And more that shall befall⁠—innumerable",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Disturbances on Earth through female snares,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And strait conjunction with this sex. For either",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He never shall find out fit mate, but such",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As some misfortune brings him, or mistake;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or whom he wishes most shall seldom gain,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Through her perverseness, but shall see her gained",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By a far worse, or, if she love, withheld",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By parents; or his happiest choice too late",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Shall meet, already linked and wedlock-bound",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To a fell adversary, his hate or shame:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Which infinite calamity shall cause",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To human life, and household peace confound.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "He added not, and from her turned; but Eve,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not so repulsed, with tears that ceased not flowing,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And tresses all disordered, at his feet",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Fell humble, and, embracing them, besought",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His peace, and thus proceeded in her plaint:",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "“Forsake me not thus, Adam! witness Heaven",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What love sincere and reverence in my heart",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I bear thee, and unweeting have offended,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Unhappily deceived! Thy suppliant",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I beg, and clasp thy knees; bereave me not,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Whereon I live, thy gentle looks, thy aid,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thy counsel in this uttermost distress,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "My only strength and stay; forlorn of thee,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Whither shall I betake me, where subsist?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "While yet we live, scarce one short hour perhaps,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Between us two let there be peace; both joining,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As joined in injuries, one enmity",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Against a foe by doom express assigned us,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That cruel Serpent. On me exercise not",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thy hatred for this misery befallen;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On me already lost, me than thyself",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "More miserable. Both have sinned; but thou",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Against God only; I against God and thee,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And to the place of judgment will return,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "There with my cries importune Heaven, that all",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The sentence, from thy head removed, may light",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On me, sole cause to thee of all this woe,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Me, me only, just object of His ire.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "She ended weeping; and her lowly plight,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Immovable till peace obtained from fault",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Acknowledged and deplored, in Adam wrought",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Commiseration. Soon his heart relented",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Towards her, his life so late and sole delight,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Now at his feet submissive in distress,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Creature so fair his reconcilement seeking,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His counsel, whom she had displeased, his aid;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As one disarmed, his anger all he lost,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And thus with peaceful words upraised her soon:",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "“Unwary, and too desirous, as before",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "So now, of what thou know’st not, who desir’st",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The punishment all on thyself! Alas!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Bear thine own first, ill able to sustain",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His full wrath, whose thou feel’st as yet least part,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And my displeasure bear’st so ill. If prayers",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Could alter high decrees, I to that place",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Would speed before thee, and be louder heard,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That on my head all might be visited,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thy frailty and infirmer sex forgiven,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To me committed, and by me exposed.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But rise; let us no more contend, nor blame",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Each other, blamed enough elsewhere, but strive",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In offices of love, how we may lighten",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Each other’s burden, in our share of woe;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Since this day’s death denounced, if aught I see,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Will prove no sudden, but a slow-paced evil,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A long day’s dying, to augment our pain,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And to our seed (O hapless seed!) derived.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "To whom thus Eve, recovering heart, replied:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "“Adam, by sad experiment I know",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "How little weight my words with thee can find,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Found so erroneous, thence by just event",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Found so unfortunate; nevertheless,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Restored by thee, vile as I am, to place",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of new acceptance, hopeful to regain",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thy love, the sole contentment of my heart,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Living or dying from thee I will not hide",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What thoughts in my unquiet breast are risen,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Tending to some relief of our extremes,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or end, though sharp and sad, yet tolerable,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As in our evils, and of easier choice.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "If care of our descent perplex us most,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Which must be born to certain woe, devoured",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By Death at last (and miserable it is",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To be to others cause of misery,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Our own begotten, and of our loins to bring",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Into this cursed World a woeful race,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That after wretched life must be at last",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Food for so foul a monster), in thy power",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "It lies, yet ere conception, to prevent",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The race unblest, to being yet unbegot.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Childless thou art, childless remain; so Death",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Shall be deceived his glut, and with us two",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Be forced to satisfy his ravenous maw.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But if thou judge it hard and difficult,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Conversing, looking, loving, to abstain",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From love’s due rites, nuptial embraces sweet,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And with desire to languish without hope,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Before the present object languishing",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With like desire, which would be misery",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And torment less than none of what we dread;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Then, both our selves and seed at once to free",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From what we fear for both, let us make short,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Let us seek Death, or, he not found, supply",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With our own hands his office on ourselves.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Why stand we longer shivering under fears",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That show no end but death, and have the power,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of many ways to die the shortest choosing,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Destruction with destruction to destroy?”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "She ended here, or vehement despair",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Broke off the rest; so much of death her thoughts",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Had entertained as dyed her cheeks with pale.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But Adam, with such counsel nothing swayed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To better hopes his more attentive mind",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Labouring had raised, and thus to Eve replied:",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "“Eve, thy contempt of life and pleasure seems",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To argue in thee something more sublime",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And excellent than what thy mind contemns;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But self-destruction therefore sought refutes",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That excellence thought in thee, and implies,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not thy contempt, but anguish and regret",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For loss of life and pleasure overloved.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or if thou covet death, as utmost end",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of misery, so thinking to evade",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The penalty pronounced, doubt not but God",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Hath wiselier armed his vengeful ire than so",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To be forestalled; much more I fear lest death",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "So snatched will not exempt us from the pain",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We are by doom to pay; rather such acts",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of contumacy will provoke the Highest",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To make death in us live. Then let us seek",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Some safer resolution, which methinks",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I have in view, calling to mind with heed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Part of our sentence, that thy seed shall bruise",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The Serpent’s head; piteous amends! unless",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Be meant, whom I conjecture, our grand foe,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Satan, who in the serpent hath contrived",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Against us this deceit. To crush his head",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Would be revenge indeed; which will be lost",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By death brought on ourselves, or childless days",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Resolved as thou proposest; so our foe",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Shall scape his punishment ordained, and we",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Instead shall double ours upon our heads.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "No more be mentioned then of violence",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Against ourselves, and wilful barrenness,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That cuts us off from hope, and savours only",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Rancour and pride, impatience and despite,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Reluctance against God and his just yoke",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Laid on our necks. Remember with what mild",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And gracious temper he both heard and judged,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Without wrath or reviling; we expected",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Immediate dissolution, which we thought",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Was meant by death that day; when, lo! to thee",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Pains only in child-bearing were foretold,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And bringing forth, soon recompensed with joy,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Fruit of thy womb; on me the curse aslope",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Glanced on the ground: with labour I must earn",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "My bread; what harm? Idleness had been worse;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "My labour will sustain me; and, lest cold",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or heat should injure us, his timely care",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Hath, unbesought, provided, and his hands",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Clothed us unworthy, pitying while he judged;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "How much more, if we pray him, will his ear",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Be open, and his heart to pity incline,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And teach us further by what means to shun",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The inclement seasons, rain, ice, hail, and snow!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Which now the sky with various face begins",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To show us in this mountain, while the winds",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Blow moist and keen, shattering the graceful locks",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of these fair spreading trees; which bids us seek",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Some better shroud, some better warmth to cherish",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Our limbs benumbed, ere this diurnal star",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Leave cold the night, how we his gathered beams",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Reflected may with matter sere foment,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or by collision of two bodies grind",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The air attrite to fire; as late the clouds,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Justling or pushed with winds, rude in their shock,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Tine the slant lightning, whose thwart flame driven down",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Kindles the gummy bark of fir or pine,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And sends a comfortable heat from far,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Which might supply the sun. Such fire to use,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And what may else be remedy or cure",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To evils which our own misdeeds have wrought,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He will instruct us praying, and of grace",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Beseeching him; so as we need not fear",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To pass commodiously this life, sustained",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By him with many comforts, till we end",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In dust, our final rest and native home.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What better can we do, than, to the place",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Repairing where he judged us, prostrate fall",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Before him reverent, and there confess",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Humbly our faults, and pardon beg, with tears",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Watering the ground, and with our sighs the air",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Frequenting, sent from hearts contrite, in sign",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of sorrow unfeigned and humiliation meek?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Undoubtedly he will relent, and turn",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From his displeasure; in whose look serene,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "When angry most he seemed and most severe,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What else but favour, grace, and mercy shone?”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "So spake our father penitent; nor Eve",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Felt less remorse. They, forthwith to the place",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Repairing where he judged them, prostrate fell",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Before him reverent, and both confessed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Humbly their faults, and pardon begged, with tears",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Watering the ground, and with their sighs the air",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Frequenting, sent from hearts contrite, in sign",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of sorrow unfeigned and humiliation meek.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}