None was, but from the earth a dewy mist

Went up and water'd all the ground, and each Plant of the field, which, ere it was in th' earth, God made, and ev'ry herb, before it grew 336 On the green stem; God saw that it was good: So ev❜n and morn recorded the third day.

Again th' Almighty spake, Let there be lights High in th' expanse of Heav'n, to divide 340 The day from night; and let them be for signs, For seasons, and for days, and circling years; And let them be for lights, as I ordain Their office in the firmament of Heav'n,

To give light on the earth: and it was so. 345 And God made two great lights, great for their

use

350

To Man; the greater to have rule by day,
The less by night altern; and made the stars,
And set them in the firmament of Heav'n
T'illuminate the earth, and rule the day
In their vicissitude, and rule the night,
And light from darkness to divide.
Surveying his great work, that it was good:
For, of celestial bodies, first the sun,

God saw,

A mighty sphere, he fram'd, unlightsome first, Though of ethereal mould: then form'd the moon Globose, and ev'ry magnitude of stars,

And sow'd with stars the Heav'n thick as a field : Of light by far the greater part he took, Transplanted from her cloudy shrine, and plac'd In the sun's orb, made porous to receive

361

And drink the liquid light, firm to retain
Her gather'd beams, great palace now of light.
Hither, as to their fountain, other stars

Repairing, in their golden urns draw light, 365
And hence the morning planet gilds her horns;
By tincture or reflection they augment
Their small peculiar, though for human sight
So far remote, with diminution seen.

First in his east the glorious lamp was seen, 370
Regent of day, and all th' horizon round
Invested with bright rays, jocund to run

His longitude through Heav'n's high road. The grey

Dawn and the Pleiades before him danc'd,
Shedding sweet influence. Less bright the moon,
But opposite in levell'd west was set 376
His mirror, with full face borrowing her light
From him, for other light she needed none
In that aspect; and still that distance keeps
Till night, then in the east her turn she shines,
Revolv'd on Heav'n's great axle; and her reign
With thousand lesser lights dividual holds,
With thousand thousand stars, that then appear'd
Spangling the hemisphere. Then first ador'd
With her bright luminaries that set and rose, 385
Glad ev'ning and glad morn crown'd the fourth

day.

And God said, Let the waters generate Reptile with spawn abundant, living soul: And let fowl fly above the earth, with wings

Display'd on th' open firmament of Heav'n. 390 And God created the great whales, and each Soul living, each that crept, which plenteously The waters generated by their kinds,

And ev'ry bird of wing after his kind;

And saw that it was good, and bless'd them, say

、ing,

395

Be fruitful, multiply, and in the seas,
And lakes, and running streams the waters fill;
And let the fowl be multiply'd on th' earth.
Forth with the sounds and seas, each creek and bay
With fry innumerable swarm, and shoals
Of fish that with their fins and shining scales
Glide under the green wave, in sculls that oft
Bank the mid-sea: part single or with mate
Graze the sea-weed their pasture, and through

groves

400

Of coral stray, or sporting with quick glance, 405
Show to the sun their wav'd coats dropt with gold,
Or in their pearly shells at ease, attend
Moist nutriment, or under rocks their food
In jointed armour watch. On smooth the seal,
And bended dolphins play: part huge of bulk 410
Wallowing unwieldy', enormous in their gait,
Tempest the ocean: there leviathan,
Hugest of living creatures, on the deep
Stretch'd like a promontory, sleeps or swims,
And seems a moving land, and at his gills 415
Draws in, and at his trunk spouts out a sea.
Mean while the tepid caves, and fens, and shores

Their brood as num'rous hatch, from th' egg that soon

421

Bursting with kindly rupture forth disclos'd
Their callow young, but feather'd soon and fledge
They summ'd their pens, and soaring th' air sub-
lime,
With clang despis'd the ground, under a cloud
In prospect: there the eagle and the stork
On cliffs and cedar tops their eyries build :
Part loosely wing the region, part more wise 425
In common, rang'd in figure, wedge their way,
Intelligent of seasons, and set forth

Their aery caravan high over seas

Flying, and over lands, with mutual wing, 429 Easing their flight; so steers the prudent crane Her annual voyage, borne on winds; the air Floats, as they pass, fann'd with unnumber'd plumes.

From branch to branch the smaller birds with song
Solac'd the woods, and spread their painted wings
Till ev'n, nor then the solemn nightingale 435
Ceas'd warbling, but all night tun'd her soft lays :
Others on silver lakes and rivers bath'd

Their downy breast. The swan with arched neck
Between her white wings mantling proudly, rows
Her state with oary feet; yet oft they quit 440
The dank, and rising on stiff
pennons, tow'r
The mid aëreal sky: others on ground
Walk'd firm.

sounds

The crested cock, whose clarion

The silent hours, and th' other whose gay train Adorns him, colour'd with the florid hue 445 Of rainbows and starry' eyes. The waters thus With fish replenish'd, and the air with fowl, Ev'ning and morn solemniz'd the fifth day.

449

The sixth, and of creation last, arose With ev'ning harps and matin, when God said, Let th' earth bring forth soul-living in her kind, Cattle and creeping things, and beast of th' earth, Each in their kind. The earth obey'd; and straight

Op'ning her fertile womb, teem'd at a birth Innum'rous living creatures, perfect forms, 455 Limb'd and full grown. Out of the ground up

rose

As from his lair the wild beast, where he wons
In forest wild, in thicket, brake, or den;
Among the trees in pairs they rose, they walk'd:
The cattle in the fields and meadows green: 460
Those rare and solitary, these in flocks,

Past'ring at once, and in broad herds upsprung.
The grassy clods now calv'd; now half appear'd
The tawny lion, pawing to get free

His hinder parts, then springs as broke from

bonds,

465 And rampant shakes his brinded mane: theounce, The libbard, and the tiger, as the mole Rising, the crumbled earth above them threw In hillocs: the swift stag from under ground 469 Bare up his branching head: scarce from his mould