Innocence Once Lost - Religious Classics Collection. Джон Мильтон
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Название: Innocence Once Lost - Religious Classics Collection

Автор: Джон Мильтон

Издательство: Bookwire

Жанр: Языкознание

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isbn: 4064066499129

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СКАЧАТЬ And if the going farther be denied us,

       Let us retrace our steps together swiftly."

      And that Lord, who had led me thitherward,

       Said unto me: "Fear not; because our passage

       None can take from us, it by Such is given.

      But here await me, and thy weary spirit

       Comfort and nourish with a better hope;

       For in this nether world I will not leave thee."

      So onward goes and there abandons me

       My Father sweet, and I remain in doubt,

       For No and Yes within my head contend.

      I could not hear what he proposed to them;

       But with them there he did not linger long,

       Ere each within in rivalry ran back.

      They closed the portals, those our adversaries,

       On my Lord's breast, who had remained without

       And turned to me with footsteps far between.

      His eyes cast down, his forehead shorn had he

       Of all its boldness, and he said, with sighs,

       "Who has denied to me the dolesome houses?"

      And unto me: "Thou, because I am angry,

       Fear not, for I will conquer in the trial,

       Whatever for defence within be planned.

      This arrogance of theirs is nothing new;

       For once they used it at less secret gate,

       Which finds itself without a fastening still.

      O'er it didst thou behold the dead inscription;

       And now this side of it descends the steep,

       Passing across the circles without escort,

      One by whose means the city shall be opened."

      Canto IX. The Furies and Medusa. The Angel. The City of Dis. The Sixth Circle: Heresiarchs.

       Table of Contents

      That hue which cowardice brought out on me,

       Beholding my Conductor backward turn,

       Sooner repressed within him his new colour.

      He stopped attentive, like a man who listens,

       Because the eye could not conduct him far

       Through the black air, and through the heavy fog.

      "Still it behoveth us to win the fight,"

       Began he; "Else. . .Such offered us herself. . .

       O how I long that some one here arrive!"

      Well I perceived, as soon as the beginning

       He covered up with what came afterward,

       That they were words quite different from the first;

      But none the less his saying gave me fear,

       Because I carried out the broken phrase,

       Perhaps to a worse meaning than he had.

      "Into this bottom of the doleful conch

       Doth any e'er descend from the first grade,

       Which for its pain has only hope cut off?"

      This question put I; and he answered me:

       "Seldom it comes to pass that one of us

       Maketh the journey upon which I go.

      True is it, once before I here below

       Was conjured by that pitiless Erictho,

       Who summoned back the shades unto their bodies.

      Naked of me short while the flesh had been,

       Before within that wall she made me enter,

       To bring a spirit from the circle of Judas;

      That is the lowest region and the darkest,

       And farthest from the heaven which circles all.

       Well know I the way; therefore be reassured.

      This fen, which a prodigious stench exhales,

       Encompasses about the city dolent,

       Where now we cannot enter without anger."

      And more he said, but not in mind I have it;

       Because mine eye had altogether drawn me

       Tow'rds the high tower with the red-flaming summit,

      Where in a moment saw I swift uprisen

       The three infernal Furies stained with blood,

       Who had the limbs of women and their mien,

      And with the greenest hydras were begirt;

       Small serpents and cerastes were their tresses,

       Wherewith their horrid temples were entwined.

      And he who well the handmaids of the Queen

       Of everlasting lamentation knew,

       Said unto me: "Behold the fierce Erinnys.

      This is Megaera, on the left-hand side;

       She who is weeping on the right, Alecto;

       Tisiphone is between;" and then was silent.

      Each one her breast was rending with her nails;

       They beat them with their palms, and cried so loud,

       That I for dread pressed close unto the Poet.

      "Medusa come, so we to stone will change him!"

       All shouted looking down; "in evil hour

       Avenged we not on Theseus his assault!"

      "Turn thyself round, and keep thine eyes close shut,

       For if the Gorgon appear, СКАЧАТЬ