Poem 9

The sun was sunk, and after him the star Of Hesperus, whose office is to bring Twilight upon the Earth, short arbiter ’Twixt day and night, and now from end to end Night’s hemisphere had veiled the horizon round; When Satan, who late fled before the threats Of Gabriel out of Eden, now improved In meditated fraud and malice, bent On Man’s destruction, maugre what might hap Of heavier on himself, fearless returned. By night he fled, and at midnight returned From compassing the Earth; cautious of day, Since Uriel, regent of the sun, descried His entrance, and forewarned the Cherubim That kept their watch. Thence, full of anguish, driven, The space of seven continued nights he rode With darkness; thrice the equinoctial line He circled, four times crossed the car of Night From pole to pole, traversing each colure; On the eighth returned, and on the coast averse From entrance or cherubic watch by stealth Found unsuspected way. There was a place (Now not, though sin, not time, first wrought the change) Where Tigris, at the foot of Paradise, Into a gulf shot under ground, till part Rose up a fountain by the Tree of Life. In with the river sunk, and with it rose, Satan, involved in rising mist; then sought Where to lie hid. Sea he had searched and land From Eden over Pontus, and the pool Maeotis, up beyond the river Ob; Downward as far antarctic; and in length West from Orontes to the ocean barred At Darien, thence to the land where flows Ganges and Indus. Thus the orb he roamed With narrow search, and with inspection deep Considered every creature, which of all Most opportune might serve his wiles, and found The serpent subtlest beast of all the field. Him, after long debate, irresolute Of thoughts revolved, his final sentence chose Fit vessel, fittest imp of fraud, in whom To enter, and his dark suggestions hide From sharpest sight; for in the wily snake Whatever sleights none would suspicious mark, As from his wit and native subtlety Proceeding, which, in other beasts observed, Doubt might beget of diabolic power Active within beyond the sense of brute. Thus he resolved, but first from inward grief His bursting passion into plaints thus poured: