So saying, her rash hand in evil hour Forth reaching to the fruit, she plucked, she eat. Earth felt the wound, and Nature from her seat, Sighing through all her works, gave signs of woe That all was lost. Back to the thicket slunk The guilty Serpent, and well might, for Eve, Intent now only on her taste, naught else Regarded; such delight till then, as seemed, In fruit she never tasted, whether true, Or fancied so through expectation high Of knowledge; nor was Godhead from her thought. Greedily she ingorged without restraint, And knew not eating death. Satiate at length, And hightened as with wine, jocund and boon, Thus to herself she pleasingly began:
“O sovereign, virtuous, precious of all trees In Paradise! of operation blest To sapience, hitherto obscured, infamed, And thy fair fruit let hang, as to no end Created! but henceforth my early care, Not without song, each morning, and due praise, Shall tend thee, and the fertile burden ease Of thy full branches, offered free to all; Till, dieted by thee, I grow mature In knowledge, as the Gods who all things know; Though others envy what they cannot give— For, had the gift been theirs, it had not here Thus grown! Experience,