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Such happy interview and fair event

Of love and youth not lost, Songs, Garlands, Flours,

And charming Symphonies attachd the heart [ 595 ]

Of Adam, soon enclind to admit delight,

The bent of Nature; which he thus expressd.

True opener of mine eyes, prime Angel blest,

Much better seems this Vision, and more hope

Of peaceful dayes portends, then those two past; [ 600 ]

Those were of hate and death, or pain much worse,

Here Nature seems fulfilld in all her ends.

To whom thus Michael. Judg not what is best

By pleasure, though to Nature seeming meet,

Created, as thou art, to nobler end [ 605 ]

Holie and pure, conformitie divine.

Those Tents thou sawst so pleasant, were the Tents

Of wickedness, wherein shall dwell his Race

Who slew his Brother; studious they appere

Of Arts that polish Life, Inventers rare, [ 610 ]

Unmindful of thir Maker, though his Spirit

Taught them, but they his gifts acknowledgd none.

Yet they a beauteous ofspring shall beget;

For that fair femal Troop thou sawst, that seemd

Of Goddesses, so blithe, so smooth, so gay, [ 615 ]

Yet empty of all good wherein consists

Womans domestic honour and chief praise;

Bred onely and completed to the taste

Of lustful appetence, to sing, to dance,

To dress, and troule the Tongue, and roule the Eye. [ 620 ]

To these that sober Race of Men, whose lives

Religious titld them the Sons of God,

Shall yield up all thir vertue, all thir fame

Ignobly, to the traines and to the smiles

Of these fair Atheists, and now swim in joy, [ 625 ]

(Erelong to swim at large) and laugh; for which

The world erelong a world of tears must weepe.

To whom thus Adam of short joy bereft.

O pittie and shame, that they who to live well

Enterd so faire, should turn aside to tread [ 630 ]

Paths indirect, or in the mid way faint!