The Judgement of the Flood :: :: University of Virginia Library

While thus he spake, in Samiasa's heart,
Waked pride misdeeming, exultation vain,
That needed yet the scourge, erelong to fall
And teach still bitterer truth; and scant he knew
How to the flesh had spirit been subdued—
And soon the Sophist, in that Capitol,
Found demonstration of his sensuous creed,
In men, and in their ways. For not, like him,
(As late we witnessed in the Wilderness,)
Foul Hherem had in penitence retired,
But held on Earth his triumph, and in Hell.
—Boast of his high exploit (for such his vaunt),
O'er such supreme intelligence as shone
In that great Monarch, wisest fiends seduced,
The like success to win, to stoop to brute;
That they might soar, by bad ambition stung,
To realty o'er spiritual eminence.
For erst had they, in their rebellious guile,
The sons of Adam moved to be as gods,
But now sought to embrute, and so subdue
To their dominion; ay, and ever since,
His postdiluvian children, with gross art,
Have sunk to Nature sensual, and yet sink;
Whence, not from knowledge, but from ignorance

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Redemption hath been needed, and yet is.
—So went they forth, these devils damned, to damn
The world in second doom: and, first, debased
To infidelity the minds of Men,
Turning the very intellect against
The truth of their own soul; and sowing there,
Within its living soil, first doubt, then death—
And gathered-in quick harvest, by the power
Of Amazarah, and Azaradel.

Well Amazarah knew the sordid Fiend,
And long had known, long joined in mutual pact;
The sordid Fiend, with whom in hour of scorn
She mated: fitting league for her who was
Herself half human only, pride-begot
By demon on a daughter beautiful
Of fratricidal Cain; whence gifted she,
As hath been sung, with charm and magic spell.
Wicked as wise, and bad as beautiful,
The mother she became of progeny
Who called her son Azaradel their sire:
An impish brood, and nurtured cruelly,
To cruel ends; taught, in their innocence,
To pluck the eyes of captives bound supine,
Out from the living socket: and with glee,
With infant glee, such office they performed:
And with the yet-warm orbs she would compose
A Globe of Sorcery, wherein she saw . .
A visual mirrour . . into other worlds,
By Hherem aided in her hideous art.

And now his skill she sought. Dire jealousy
Had fired her soul to madness; since the false
Azaradel, in search of younger charms,
Had wandered: and, to win affection back,
She means to make new covenant with Hell.