Thy praise hee also who forbids thy use, 750 Conceales not from us, naming thee the Tree Of Knowledge, knowledge both of good and evil; Forbids us then to taste, but his forbidding Commends thee more, while it inferrs the good By thee communicated, and our want: For good unknown, sure is not had, or had And yet unknown, is as not had at all. In plain then, what forbids he but to know, Forbids us good, forbids us to be wise? Such prohibitions binde not. But if Death 760 Bind us with after-bands, what profits then Our inward freedom? In the day we eate Of this fair Fruit, our doom is, we shall die. How dies the Serpent? hee hath eat'n and lives, And knows, and speaks, and reasons, and discernes, Irrational till then. For us alone Was death invented? or to us deni'd This intellectual food, for beasts reserv'd? For Beasts it seems: yet that one Beast which first Hath tasted, envies not, but brings with joy 770 The good befall'n him, Author unsuspect, Friendly to man, farr from deceit or guile. What fear I then, rather what know to feare Under this ignorance of Good and Evil, Of God or Death, of Law or Penaltie? Here grows the Cure of all, this Fruit Divine, Fair to the Eye, inviting to the Taste, Of vertue to make wise: what hinders then To reach, and feed at once both Bodie and Mind? So saying, her rash hand in evil hour 780 Forth reaching to the Fruit, she pluck'd, she eat: Earth felt the wound, and Nature from her seat Sighing through all her Works gave signs of woe, That all was lost. Back to the Thicket slunk The guiltie Serpent, and well might, for Eve Intent now wholly on her taste, naught else Regarded, such delight till then, as seemd, In Fruit she never tasted, whether true Or fansied so, through expectation high Of knowledg, nor was God-head from her thought. 790 Greedily she ingorg'd without restraint, And knew not eating Death: Satiate at length, And hight'nd as with Wine, jocond and boon, Thus to her self she pleasingly began. O Sovran, vertuous, precious of all Trees In Paradise, of operation blest To Sapience, hitherto obscur'd, infam'd, And thy fair Fruit let hang, as to no end Created; but henceforth my early care, Not without Song, each Morning, and due praise 800 Shall tend thee, and the fertil burden ease Of thy full branches offer'd free to all; Till dieted by thee I grow mature In knowledge, as the Gods who all things know; Though others envie what they cannot give; For had the gift bin theirs, it had not here Thus grown. Experience, next to thee I owe, Best guide; not following thee, I had remaind In ignorance, thou op'nst Wisdoms way, And giv'st access, though secret she retire. 810 And I perhaps am secret; Heav'n is high,