Or in their pearly shells at ease, attend
Moist nutriment, or under rocks their food
In jointed armour watch: on smooth the seal,
And bended dolphins play: part huge of bulk 410
Wallowing unwieldy', enormous in their gait
Tempest the ocean: there leviathan,
Hugest of living creatures, on the deep
Stretch'd like a promontory sleeps or swims
And seems a moving land, and at his gills
Draws in, and at his trunk spouts out a sea.
Mean while the tepid caves, and fens and shores
Their brood as numerous hatch, from th' egg that
Bursting with kindly rupture forth disclos'd
Their callow young, but feather'd soon and fledge
They summ'd their pens, and soaring th' air sublime
With clang despis'd the ground, under a cloud
In prospect; there the eagle and the stork
On cliffs and cedar tops their eyries build :
Part loosely wing the region, part more wise
In common, rang'd in figure wedge their way,
Intelligent of seasons, and set forth
Their airy caravan high over seas
Flying, and over lands with mutual wing
Easing their flight; so steers the prudent crane 430
Her annual voyage, borne on winds; the air
Floats, as they pass, fann'd with unnumber'd plumes:
From branch to branch the smaller birds with song
Solac'd the woods, and spread their painted wings
Till ev'n, nor then the solemn nightingale
Ceas'd warbling, but all night tun'd her soft lays : Others on silver lakes and rivers bath'd
Their downy breast; the swan with arched neck
Between her white wings mantling proudly, rows
Her state with oary feet: yet oft they quit
The dank, and rising on stiff pennons, tower
The mid aereal sky: Others on ground
Walk'd firm; the crested cock whose clarion sounds
The silent hours, and th other whose gay train
Adorns him, colour'd with the florid hue
Of rainbows and starry' eyes. The waters thus
With fish replenish'd, and the air with fowl,
Ev'ning and morn solemniz'd the fifth day.
The sixth, and of creation last arose
With evening harps and matin, when God said, 450
Let th' earth bring forth soul living in her kind,
Cattle and creeping things, and beast of th' earth,
Each in their kind. The earth obey'd, and straight
Opening her fertile womb teem'd at a birth
Innumerous living creatures, perfect forms,
Limb'd and full grown out of the ground up rose
As from his lair the wild beast where he wons
In forest wild, in thicket, brake or den;
Among the trees in pairs they rose, they walk'd;
The cattle in the fields and meadows green :
Those rare and solitary, these in flocks
Pasturing at once, and in broad herds upsprung.
The grassy clods now calv'd, now half appear'
The tawny lion, pawing to get free
His hinder parts, then springs as broke from bonds,
And rampant shakes his brinded main; the ounce,
The libbard, and the tiger, as the mole
Rising, the crumbled earth above them threw
In hillocs: the swift stag from under ground
Bare up his branching head: scarce from his mould
Behemoth biggest born of earth upheav'd
His vastness: fleec'd the flocks and bleating rose,
As plants: ambiguous between sea and land
The river horse and scaly crocodile.
At once came forth whatever creeps the ground,
Insect or worm: those way'd their limber fans
For wings, and smallest lineaments exact
In all the liveries deck'd of summer's pride
With spots of gold and purple', azure and green :
These as a line their long dimension drew, 480
Streaking the ground with sinuous trace; not all
Minims of nature; some of serpent kind,
Wond'rous in length and corpulence, involv'd
Their snaky folds, and added wings. First crept
The parsimonious emmet, provident
Of future, in small room large heart inclos'd,
Pattern of just equality perhaps
Hereafter, join'd in her popular tribes
Of commonalty: swarming next appear'd
The female bee, that feeds her husband drone 490
Deliciously, and builds her waxen cells
With honey stor'd: the rest are numberless,
And thou their natures knows't, and gav'st them
Needless to thee repeated; nor unknown
The serpent subtlest beast of all the field,
Of huge extent sometimes, with brazen eyes
And hairy mane terrific, though to thee
Not noxious, but obedient at thy call.
Now Heav'n in all her glory shone, and roll'd
Her motions, as the great first Mover's hand
500
First wheel'd their course; earth in her rich attire
Consummate lovely smil'd; air, water, earth,
By fowl, fish, beast, was flown, was swum, was
Frequent; and of the sixth day yet remain'd;
There wanted yet the master work, the end
Of all yet done; a creature who not prone
And brute as other creatures, but indued
With sanctity of reason, might erect
His stature, and upright with front serene
Govern the rest, self-knowing, and from thence 510
Magnanimous to correspond with Heaven,
But grateful to acknowledge whence his good
Descends, thither with heart and voice and eyes
Directed in devotion, to adore
And worship God supreme, who made him chief
Of all his works: therefore th' Omnipotent
Eternal Father (for where is not he
Present?) thus to his Son audibly spake.
Let us make now Man in our image, Man
In our similitude, and let them rule
Over the fish and fowl of sea and air,
Beast of the field, and over all the earth,
And every creeping thing that creeps the ground,
This said, he form'd thee, Adam, thee, O Man,
Dust of the ground, and in thy nostrils breath'd
The breath of life; in his own image he
Created thee, in the image of God
Express, and thou becams't a living soul.
Male he created thee, but thy consórt
Female for race; then bless'd mankind, and said,
Be fruitful, multiply, and fill the earth,
Subdue it, and throughout dominion hold
Over fish of the sea, and fowl of th' air,
And every living thing that moves on th' earth.
Wherever thus created, for no place
Is yet distinct by name, thence, as thou know'st,
He brought thee into this delicious grove,
This garden, planted with the trees of God,
Delectable both to behold and taste;
And freely all their pleasant fruit for food
Gave thee; all sorts are here that all th' earth yields
Variety without end; but of the tree,
Which tasted works knowledge of good and evil, Thou may'st not; in the day thou eat'st, thou dy'st; Death is the penalty impos'd, beware,
And govern well thy appetite, lest Sin
Surprise thee, and her black attendant Death.
Here finish'd he, and all that he had made
View'd, and behold all was entirely good;
So even and morn accomplish'd the sixth day: 550
Yet not till the Creator from his work
Desisting, though unwearied, up return'd,
Up to the Heav'n of Heav'ns his high abode,
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