TO THE LORD GENERAL CROMWELL,
ON THE PROPOSALS OF CERTAIN
MINISTERS AT THE COMMITTEE
FOR PROPAGATION OF THE GOSPEL
Cromwell, our chief of men, who through a
cloud

Not of war only, but detractions rude,
Guided by faith and matchless fortitude,
To peace and truth thy glorious way hast
ploughed,

And on the neck of crowned Fortune proud 5 Has reared God's trophies, and his work pursued,

While Darwen stream, with blood of Scots imbrued,

And Dunbar field, resounds thy praises loud, And Worcester's laureate wreath: yet much remains

When I consider how my light is spent Ere half my days in this dark world and wide,

And that one Talent which is death to hide Lodged with me useless, though my soul more bent

To serve therewith my Maker, and present 5 My true account, lest He returning chide, 'Doth God exact day-labour, light denied?' I fondly ask. But Patience, to prevent That murmur, soon replies, 'God doth not need

Either man's work or his own gifts. Who best

crew, into the great Deep. Which action passed over, the Poem hastens into the midst of things; presenting Satan, with his Angels, now fallen into Hell -described here, not in the Center (for heaven and earth may be supposed as yet not made, certainly not yet accursed), but in a place of utter darkness, fitliest called Chaos. Here Satan, with his Angels lying on the burning lake, thunderstruck and astonished, after a certain space recovers, as from confusion; calls up him who, next in order and dignity, lay by him: they confer of their miserable fall. Satan awakens all his legions, who lay till then in the same manner confounded. They rise: their numbers; array of battle; their chief leaders named, according to the idols known afterwards in Canaan and the countries adjoining. To these Satan directs his speech; comforts them with hope yet of regaining Heaven; but tells them, lastly, of a new world and new kind of creature to be created, according to an ancient prophecy, or report, in Heaven - for that Angels were long before this visible creation was the opinion of many ancient Fathers. To find out the truth of this prophecy, and what to determine thereon, he refers to a full council. What his associates thence attempt. Pandemonium, the palace of Satan, rises, suddenly built out of the Deep: the infernal Peers there sit in council.

OF Man's first disobedience, and the fruit Of that forbidden tree whose mortal taste Brought death into the World, and all our

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In the beginning how the heavens and earth
Rose out of Chaos: or, if Sion hill
Delight thee more, and Siloa's brook that
flowed

Fast by the oracle of God, I thence
Invoke thy aid to my adventrous song,
That with no middle flight intends to soar
Above the Aonian mount, while it pursues 15
Things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme.
And chiefly Thou, O Spirit, that dost prefer
Before all temples the upright heart and
pure,

Instruct me, for Thou know'st; Thou from the first

Wast present, and, with mighty wings outspread,

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Dove-like sat'st brooding on the vast Abyss,
And mad'st it pregnant: what in me is dark
Illumine, what is low raise and support;
That, to the highth of this great argument,
I may assert Eternal Providence,
And justify the ways of God to men.
Say first for Heaven hides nothing from
thy view,

Nor the deep tract of Hell

cause

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say first what

Moved our grand Parents, in that happy state,

Favoured of Heaven so highly, to fall off 30 From their Creator, and transgress his will For one restraint, lords of the World besides?