SAMSON AGONISTES.

THE PERSONS.

SAMSON.

MANOAH, the Father of Samson.

DALILA, his Wife.

HARAPHA of Gath.

Public Officer.

Messenger.

Chorus of Danites.

The Scene before the Prison in Gaza.

SAMSON.

A LITTLE onward lend thy guiding hand
To these dark steps, a little further on;
For yonder bank hath choice of sun or shade:
There I am wont to sit, when any chance
Relieves me from my task of servile toil,
Daily in the common prison else enjoin'd me,
Where I, a prisoner chain'd, scarce freely draw
The air imprison'd also, close and damp,
Unwholesome draught: but here I feel amends,
The breath of Heav'n fresh blowing, pure and sweet,
With day-spring born; here leave me to respire.
This day a solemn feast the people hold

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ΤΟ

To Dagon their sea idol, and forbid
Laborious works; unwillingly this rest
Their superstition yields me; hence with leave
Retiring from the popular noise, I seek

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This unfrequented place to find some ease;
Ease to the body some, none to the mind

From restless thoughts, that like a deadly swarm
Of hornets arm'd, no sooner found alone,
But rush upon me thronging, and present

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Times past, what once I was, and what am now.

O wherefore was my birth from Heaven foretold
Twice by an angel, who at last in sight

Of both my parents, all in flames ascended
From off the altar, where an off'ring burn'd,

As in a fiery column charioting

His god-like presence, and from some great act
Or benefit reveal'd to Abraham's race?

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Why was my breeding order'd and prescrib'd

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As of a person separate to God,

Design'd for great exploits; if I must die

Betray'd, captiv'd, and both my eyes put out,

Made of my enemies the scorn and gaze;

To grind in brazen fetters under task

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With this Heav'n-gifted strength? O glorious strength
Put to the labour of a beast, debas't

Lower than bond-slave! Promise was that I
Should Israel from Philistian yoke deliver;

Ask for this great deliverer now, and find him
Eyeless in Gaza at the mill with slaves,
Himself in bonds under Philistian yoke;

Yet stay, let me not rashly call in doubt
Divine prediction; what if all foretold

Had been fulfill'd but through mine own default,
Whom have I to complain of but myself?
Who this high gift of strength committed to me,
In what part lodg'd, how easily bereft me,
Under the seal of silence could not keep,
But weakly to a woman must reveal it,
O'ercome with importunity and tears.

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O impotence of mind, in body strong!

But what is strength, without a double share
Of wisdom? vast, unwieldly, burdensome,

Proudly secure, yet liable to fall

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By weakest subtleties; not made to rule,
But to subserve where wisdom bears command.

God, when he gave me strength, to show withal

How slight the gift was, hung it in my hair.

But peace; I must not quarrel with the will

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Of highes dispensation, which herein

Haply had ends above my reach to know:
Suffices that to me strength is my bane,
And proves the source of all my miseries;
So many, and so huge, that each apart
Would ask a life to wail; but chief of all,
O loss of sight, of thee I most complain!
Blind among enemies, O worse than chains,
Dungeon, or beggary, or decrepit age!

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Light the prime work of God to me is extinct,
And all her various objects of delight

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Annull'd, which might in part my grief have eas'd,
Inferior to the vilest now become

Of man or worm; the vilest here excel me,
They creep, yet see; I dark in light, expos'd
To daily fraud, contempt, abuse and wrong,
Within doors, or without, still as a fool,
In power of others, never in my own;

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Scarce half I seem to live, dead more than half.
O dark, dark, dark, amid the blaze of noon,
Irrecoverably dark, total eclipse

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Without all hope of day!

O first created beam, and thou great Word,
'Let there be light,' and light was over all;
Why am I thus bereav'd thy prime decree?
The sun to me is dark

And silent as the moon,
When she deserts the night

Hid in her vacant interlunar cave.

Since light so necessary is to life,

And almost life itself, if it be true

That light is in the soul,

She all in every part; why was the sight

To such a tender ball as th' eye confin'd,

So obvious and so easy to be quench't?
And not, as feeling, through all parts diffus'd,
That she might look at will through every pore?
Then had I not been thus exil'd from light;

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As in the land of darkness, yet in light

To live a life half dead, a living death,
And buried; but (O yet more miserable!)
Myself my sepulchre, a moving grave.
Buried, yet not exempt

By privilege of death and burial

From worst of other evils, pains and wrongs;
But made hereby obnoxious more

To all the miseries of life,

Life in captivity

Among inhuman foes.

But who are these? for with joint pace I hear
The tread of many feet steering this way;
Perhaps my enemies who come to stare

At my affliction, and perhaps to insult,

Their daily practice to afflict me more.

CHORUS.

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IIO

Chorus. This, this is he; softly awhile,

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Let us not break in upon him;

O change beyond report, thought, or belief!

See how he lies at random, carelessly diffus'd,

Or do my eyes misrepresent? Can this be he,
That heroic, that renown'd,

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Irresistible Samson? whom unarm'd

No strength of man, or fiercest wild beast could withstand;

Who tore the lion, as the lion tears the kid;

And weaponless himself,

Ran on embattl'd armies clad in iron,

Made arms ridiculous, useless the forgery

Of brazen shield and spear, the hammer'd cuirass,
Chalybean temper'd steel, and frock of mail

Adamantean proof;

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But safest he who stood aloof,

When insupportably his foot advanc't,

In scorn of their proud arms and warlike tools,
Spurn'd them to death by troops.

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The bold Ascalonite

Fled from his lion ramp, old warriors turn'd

Their plated backs under his heel;

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Or grovelling soil'd their crested helmets in the dust.

Then with what trivial weapon came to hand,

The jaw of a dead ass, his sword of bone,

A thousand fore-skins fell, the flower of Palestine,

In Ramath-lechi famous to this day:

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Then by main force pull'd up, and on his shoulders bore

The gates of Azza, post and massy bar,

Up to the hill by Hebron, seat of giants old,

No journey of a sabbath-day, and loaded so;

Like whom the Gentiles feign to bear up Heav'n.
Which shall I first bewail,

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(Which men enjoying sight oft without cause complain)

By how much from the top of wondrous glory,

Strongest of mortal men,

To lowest pitch of abject fortune thou art fall'n.

For him I reckon not in high estate

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Whom long descent of birth

Or the sphere of fortune raises;