When to the promis'd land their fathers pafs'd; To his due time and providence I leave them. 440

So fpake Ifrael's true king, and to the Fiend Made answer meet, that made void all his wiles. So fares it when with truth falfhood contends.

The end of the Third Book.

THE

FOURTH BOOK

O F

PARADISE

REGA I N'D.

I

REGA I N'D.

BOOK IV.

ERPLEX'D and troubled at his bad success

PERPI

The Tempter flood, nor had what to reply,
Discover'd in his fraud, thrown from his hope
So oft, and the perfuafive rhetoric

That fleek'd his tongue, and won so much on Eve, 5
So little here, nay loft; but Eve was Eve,
This far is over-match, who self-deceiv'd
And rash, before-hand had no better weigh'd
The strength he was to cope with, or his own:
But as a man who had been matchlefs held

10

In cunning, over-reach'd where least he thought,
To falve his credit, and for very spite,
Still will be tempting him who foils him ftill,
And never cease, though to his shame the more;
Or as a swarm of flies in vintage time,
About the wine-press where sweet must is pour'd,
Beat off, returns as oft with humming found;
Or furging waves against a folid rock,
I 2

15

Though