DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.36582#0282
80 THE DORg GALLERY.
The waters generated by their kinds;
And every bird of wing after his kind ;
And saw that it was good, and bless’d them, saying,
Be fruitful, multiply, and in the seas,
And lakes, and running streams, the waters fill:
And let the fowl be multiplied on the earth.” Book VII, lines 387—398.
Milton’s poetry here very closely follows the account in the first chapter of Genesis.
PLATE XCVI.
SATAN SMITTEN BY MICHAEL.
The opposing forces of the rebel angels and of the army of God being brought face to
face, according to the narrative of Milton, and parley being exhausted, the struggle commences.
Satan and the archangel Michael engage in single combat, the others retiring for a space
to avoid “ the wind of such commotion,” which, says the poet, was far greater than would
be made by two planets rushing against one another in mid-sky, and confounding their
jarring spheres in some general dissolution of Nature’s concord.
“ The sword
Of Michael from the armoury of God
Was given him temper’d so that neither keen
Nor solid might resist that edge : it met
The sword of Satan, with steep force to smite
Descending, and in half cut sheer; nor stay’d,
But, with swift wheel reverse, deep entering, shared
All his right side. Then Satan first knew pain,
And writhed him to and fro, convolv’d; so sore
The griding sword with discontinuous wound
Pass’d through him : but the ethereal substance closed,
Not long divisible ; and from the gash
A stream of nectarous humour issuing flow’d
Sanguine, such as celestial spirits may bleed,
And all his armour stain’d, erewhile so bright.”
Paradise Lost, Book VI., lines 320—334.
The writhing figure of Satan is good ; the bat-like wings full of evil suggestion ; and
the background dark, stormy, and chaotic—drift as of sand, and cloud, and darkness.
The waters generated by their kinds;
And every bird of wing after his kind ;
And saw that it was good, and bless’d them, saying,
Be fruitful, multiply, and in the seas,
And lakes, and running streams, the waters fill:
And let the fowl be multiplied on the earth.” Book VII, lines 387—398.
Milton’s poetry here very closely follows the account in the first chapter of Genesis.
PLATE XCVI.
SATAN SMITTEN BY MICHAEL.
The opposing forces of the rebel angels and of the army of God being brought face to
face, according to the narrative of Milton, and parley being exhausted, the struggle commences.
Satan and the archangel Michael engage in single combat, the others retiring for a space
to avoid “ the wind of such commotion,” which, says the poet, was far greater than would
be made by two planets rushing against one another in mid-sky, and confounding their
jarring spheres in some general dissolution of Nature’s concord.
“ The sword
Of Michael from the armoury of God
Was given him temper’d so that neither keen
Nor solid might resist that edge : it met
The sword of Satan, with steep force to smite
Descending, and in half cut sheer; nor stay’d,
But, with swift wheel reverse, deep entering, shared
All his right side. Then Satan first knew pain,
And writhed him to and fro, convolv’d; so sore
The griding sword with discontinuous wound
Pass’d through him : but the ethereal substance closed,
Not long divisible ; and from the gash
A stream of nectarous humour issuing flow’d
Sanguine, such as celestial spirits may bleed,
And all his armour stain’d, erewhile so bright.”
Paradise Lost, Book VI., lines 320—334.
The writhing figure of Satan is good ; the bat-like wings full of evil suggestion ; and
the background dark, stormy, and chaotic—drift as of sand, and cloud, and darkness.