Paradise Lost.
Manuscript of Book I, in the hand of an amanuensis, ca. 1665.
Purchased by Pierpont Morgan, 1904
There went a fame in Heav'n, that hee ere long
Intended to create, and therein plant
A generation, whom his choice regard
Should favour equall to the sonns of Heaven:
Thither, if but to prie, shall be perhaps
[ ]r first eruption; thither or else where:
For this infernal pit shall never hold
Celestial Spirits in bondage, nor th' Abysse
Long under darkness cover. But these thoughts
Full counsell must mature: peace is despair'd,
For who can think submission? warr then, warr
Op'n or understood must be resolv'd.
He spake: and to confirm his words, out flew
Millions of flaming swords, drawn from the thighs
Of mighty Cherubim; the sudden blaze
Farr round illumin'd hell: highly they rag'd
Against the Highest, and fierce with grasped arm's
Clash'd on thir sounding shields the din of warr,
Hurling defiance toward the vault of heav'n.
There stood a hill not farr whose griesly top
Belch'd fire and rowling smoak; the rest entire
Shon with a glossie scurf, undoubted signe
That in his woomb was hid metallic Ore,
The work of Sulphur. Thither wing'd with speed
Paradise Lost. Manuscript of Book I, in the hand of an amanuensis, ca. 1665.