“Out of my sight, thou serpent! that name best Befits thee, with him leagued, thyself as false And hateful: nothing wants, but that thy shape, Like his, and colour serpentine, may show Thy inward fraud, to warn all creatures from thee Henceforth; lest that too heavenly form, pretended To hellish falsehood, snare them. But for thee I had persisted happy, had not thy pride And wandering vanity, when least was safe, Rejected my forewarning, and disdained Not to be trusted, longing to be seen, Though by the Devil himself, him overweening To overreach; but, with the Serpent meeting, Fooled and beguiled; by him thou, I by thee, To trust thee from my side, imagined wise, Constant, mature, proof against all assaults; And understood not all was but a show, Rather than solid virtue, all but a rib Crooked by nature⁠—bent, as now appears, More to the part sinister⁠—from me drawn; Well if thrown out, as supernumerary To my just number found! Oh, why did God, Creator wise, that peopled highest Heaven With Spirits masculine, create at last