Paradise regain'd, a poem. To which is added Samson agonistes; and Poems upon several occasions, with a Tractate of education

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Page 367 - The end, then, of learning is to repair the ruins of our first parents by regaining to know God aright and out of that knowledge to love him, to imitate him, to be like him as we may the nearest by possessing our souls of true virtue, which being united to the heavenly grace of faith makes up the highest perfection.
Page 212 - And though the shady gloom Had given day her room, The sun himself withheld his wonted speed, And hid his head for shame...
Page 234 - WHAT needs my Shakespeare, for his honour'd bones, The labour of an age in piled stones? Or that his hallow'd relics should be hid Under a star-ypointing pyramid? Dear son of memory, great heir of fame, What need'st thou such weak witness of thy name? Thou, in our wonder and astonishment, Hast built thyself a livelong monument.
Page 209 - THIS is the month, and this the happy morn Wherein the Son of Heaven's Eternal King Of wedded maid and virgin mother born, Our great redemption from above did bring...
Page 210 - Muse, shall not thy sacred vein Afford a present to the Infant God? Hast thou no verse, no hymn, or solemn strain, To welcome him to this his new abode, Now while the Heav'n by the sun's team untrod, Hath took no print of the approaching light...
Page 211 - But peaceful was the night Wherein the Prince of light His reign of peace upon the earth began; The winds with wonder whist, Smoothly the waters kissed Whispering new joys to the mild ocean — Who now hath quite forgot to rave, While birds of calm sit brooding on the charmed wave.
Page 189 - Begin to cast a beam on the outward shape, The unpolluted temple of the mind, And turns it, by degrees, to the soul's essence, Till all be made immortal : but when lust, By unchaste looks, loose gestures, and foul talk, But most by lewd and lavish act of sin, Lets in defilement to the inward parts, The soul grows clotted by contagion, Imbodies, and imbrutes, till she quite lose The divine property of her first being.
Page 235 - Here lies old Hobson. Death hath broke his girt, And here, alas! hath laid him in the dirt; Or else, the ways being foul, twenty to one He's here stuck in a slough, and overthrown. 'Twas such a shifter that, if truth were known, Death was half glad when he had got him down; For he had any time this ten years full Dodged with him betwixt Cambridge and The Bull.
Page 211 - Pollute with sinful blame, The saintly veil of maiden white to throw ; Confounded, that her Maker's eyes Should look so near upon her foul deformities.
Page 240 - Warblest at eve, when all the woods are still, Thou with fresh hope the lover's heart dost fill, While the jolly hours lead on propitious May ; Thy liquid notes that close the eye of day, First heard before the shallow cuckoo's bill, Portend success in love ; O if Jove's will Have linked that amorous power to thy soft lay, Now timely sing, ere the rude bird of hate...

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