Turning our tortures into horrid arms
Against the torturer; when to meet the noise
Of his almighty engine he shall hear
Infernal thunder, and for lightning see
Black fire and horror shot with equal rage
Among his angels, and his throne itself
Mix'd with Tartarean sulphur, and strange fire,
His own invented torments. But perhaps
The way seems difficult and steep, to scale
With upright wing against a higher foe.
Let such bethink them, if the sleepy drench
Of that forgetful lake benumb not still,
That in our proper motion we ascend
Up to our native seat: descent and fall
To us is adverse. Who but felt of late,
When the fierce foe hung on our broken rear,
Insulting, and pursued as through the deep,
With what compulsion and laborious flight
We sunk thus low? The ascent is easy then;
The event is fear'd: should we again provoke
Our stronger, some worse way his wrath may
To our destruction, if there be in Hell
Fear to be worse destroy'd: what can be worse
Than to dwell here, driven out from bliss, condemn'd
In this abhorréd deep to utter woe;

Where pain of unextinguishable fire
Must exercise us without hope of end,
The vassals of his anger, when the scourge
Inexorably, and the torturing hour,

find

Calls us to penance? More destroy'd than thus,
We should be quite abolish'd, and expire.

What fear we then? what doubt we to incense
His utmost ire? which, to the height enraged,
Will either quite consume us, and reduce
To nothing this essential, (happier far
Than miserable to have eternal being.)
Or, if our substance be indeed divine,
And cannot cease to be, we are at worst
On this side nothing; and by proof we feel
Our power sufficient to disturb his Heaven,
And with perpetual inroads to aların,
Though inaccessible, his fatal throne:
Which, if not victory, is yet revenge."

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He ended, frowning; and his look denounced
Desperate revenge, and battle dangerous
To less than gods. On the other side, up rose
Belial, in act more graceful and humane;
A fairer person lost not Heaven; he seem'd
For dignity composed and high exploit:
But all was false and hollow; though his tongue
Dropt manna, and could make the worse appear
The better reason, to perplex and dash
Maturest counsels; for his thoughts were low;
To vice industrious, but to nobler deeds
Timorous and slothful; yet he pleased the ear,
And with persuasive accent thus began.

"I should be much for open war, O Peers!
As not behind in hate, if what was urged
Main reason to persuade immediate war
Did not dissuade me most, and seem to cast
Ominous conjecture on the whole success;
When he, who most excels in fact of arms,
In what he counsels and in what excels
Mistrustful, grounds his courage on despair
And utter dissolution, as the scope
Of all his aim, after some dire revenge.

First, what revenge? The towers of Heaven are fill'd
With arméd watch, that render all access
Impregnable; oft on the bordering deep
Encamp their legions, or with obscure wing
Scout far and wide into the realm of night,
Scorning surprise. Or, could we break our way
By force, and at our heels all Hell should rise
With blackest insurrection, to confound
Heaven's purest light, yet our great enemy,
All incorruptible, would on his throne
Sit unpolluted, and the ethereal mould,
Incapable of stain, would soon expel
Her mischief, and purge off the baser fire,
Victorious. Thus repulsed, our final hope
Is flat despair: we must exasperate
The almighty Victor to spend all his rage,
And that must end us-that must be our cure,
To be no more: sad cure; for who would lose,
Though full of pain, this intellectual being;
Those thoughts that wander through eternity;

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Caught in a fiery tempest, shall be hurid Each on las rock, transfind the sport and prey Of wracking whiriwnds, or forever sunk Under you boiling ocean.wrapt in chams; There to converse with everlasting groans,