[AZAZIEL _and_ SAMIASA _fly off, and disappear with_ ANAH _and_ AHOLIBAMAH. _Japh._ They are gone! They have disappeared amidst the roar Of the forsaken world; and never more, Whether they live, or die with all Earth's life, Now near its last, can aught restore Anah unto these eyes. _Chorus of Mortals_. Oh son of Noah! mercy on thy kind! What! wilt thou leave us all--all--_all_ behind? While safe amidst the elemental strife, 830 Thou sitt'st within thy guarded ark? _A Mother_ (_offering her infant to_ JAPHET). Oh, let this child embark! I brought him forth in woe, But thought it joy To see him to my bosom clinging so. Why was he born? What hath he done-- My unweaned son-- To move Jehovah's wrath or scorn? What is there in this milk of mine, that Death 840 Should stir all Heaven and Earth up to destroy My boy, And roll the waters o'er his placid breath? Save him, thou seed of Seth! Or curséd be--with him who made Thee and thy race, for which we are betrayed! _Japh._ Peace! 'tis no hour for curses, but for prayer! _Chorus of Mortals_. For prayer!!! And where Shall prayer ascend, 850 When the swoln clouds unto the mountains bend And burst, And gushing oceans every barrier rend, Until the very deserts know no thirst? Accursed Be he who made thee and thy sire! We deem our curses vain; we must expire; But as we know the worst, Why should our hymns be raised, our knees be bent Before the implacable Omnipotent, 860 Since we must fall the same? If he hath made Earth, let it be his shame, To make a world for torture.--Lo! they come, The loathsome waters, in their rage! And with their roar make wholesome nature dumb! The forest's trees (coeval with the hour When Paradise upsprung, Ere Eve gave Adam knowledge for her dower, Or Adam his first hymn of slavery sung), So massy, vast, yet green in their old age, 870 Are overtopped, Their summer blossoms by the surges lopped, Which rise, and rise, and rise. Vainly we look up to the lowering skies-- They meet the seas, And shut out God from our beseeching eyes. Fly, son of Noah, fly! and take thine ease, In thine allotted ocean-tent; And view, all floating o'er the element, The corpses of the world of thy young days: 880 Then to Jehovah raise Thy song of praise!