Sing surprize. Or could we break our way
By force, and at our heels all Hell should rise [ 135 ]
With blackest Insurre, to found
Heavns purest Light, yet reat Enemy
All incorruptible would on his Throne
Sit unpolluted, and th Ethereal mould
Incapable of stain would soon expel [ 140 ]
Her mischief, and purge off the baser fire
Victorious. Thus repulsd, our final hope
Is flat despair; we must exasperate
Th Almighty Victor to spend all his rage,
And that must end us, that must be our cure, [ 145 ]
To be no more; sad cure; for who would loose,
Though full of pain, this intellectual being,
Those thoughts that wahrough Eternity,
To perish rather, swallowd up and lost
In the wide womb of ued night, [ 150 ]
Devoid of sense and motion? and who knows,
Let this be good, whether ry Foe
give it, or will ever? how he
Is doubtful; that he never will is sure.
Will he, so wise, let loose at once his ire, [ 155 ]
Belike through impotence, or unaware,
To give his Ehir wish, and end
Them in his anger, whom his anger saves
To punish endless? wherefore cease we then?
Say they who sel Warr, we are decreed, [ 160 ]
Reservd aind to Eternal woe;
Whatever doing, what we suffer more,
What we suffer worse? is this then worst,
Thus sitting, thus sulting, thus in Arms?
What when we fled amain, pursud and strook [ 165 ]
With Heavns afflig Thunder, and besought
The Deep to shelter us? this Hell then seemd
A refuge from those wounds: or when we lay
d on the burning Lake? that sure was worse.
What if the breath that kindld those grim fires [ 170 ]
Awakd should blow them into sevenfe
And plunge us in the flames? or from above
Should ited vengeance arm again
His red right hand to plague us? what if all
Her stores were opend, and this Firmament [ 175 ]
Of Hell should spout her Cataracts of Fire,
Impe horrors, threatning hideous fall
One day upon our heads; while we perhaps
Designing or exh glorious warr,
Caught in a fierie Tempest shall be hurld [ 180 ]
Ea his rock transfixt, the sport and prey
Of rag whirlwinds, or for ever sunk
Under yon boyling O, t in s;
There to verse with everlasting groans,
Ued, unpitied, unrepreevd, [ 185 ]
Ages of hopeless end; this would be worse.