John Milton (1608-1674)

Paradise Lost

Book Three (Induction)

Переклав Олександр Жомнір

Книга Третя (Вступ)

1: Hail holy light, ofspring of Heav’n first-born,
2: Or of th’ Eternal Coeternal beam
3: May I express thee unblam’d? since God is light,
4: And never but in unapproached light
5: Dwelt from Eternitie, dwelt then in thee,
6: Bright effluence of bright essence increate.
7: Or hear’st thou rather pure Ethereal stream,
8: Whose Fountain who shall tell? before the Sun,
9: Before the Heavens thou wert, and at the voice
10: Of God, as with a Mantle didst invest
11: The rising world of waters dark and deep,
12: Won from the void and formless infinite.
13: Thee I re-visit now with bolder wing,
14: Escap’t the STYGIAN Pool, though long detain’d
15: In that obscure sojourn, while in my flight
16: Through utter and through middle darkness borne
17: With other notes then to th’ ORPHEAN Lyre
18: I sung of CHAOS and ETERNAL NIGHT,
19: Taught by the heav’nly Muse to venture down
20: The dark descent, and up to reascend,
21: Though hard and rare: thee I revisit safe,
22: And feel thy sovran vital Lamp; but thou
23: Revisit’st not these eyes, that rowle in vain
24: To find thy piercing ray, and find no dawn;
25: So thick a drop serene hath quencht thir Orbs,
26: Or dim suffusion veild. Yet not the more
27: Cease I to wander where the Muses haunt
28: Cleer Spring, or shadie Grove, or Sunnie Hill,
29: Smit with the love of sacred song; but chief
30: Thee SION and the flowrie Brooks beneath
31: That wash thy hallowd feet, and warbling flow,
32: Nightly I visit: nor somtimes forget
33: Those other two equal’d with me in Fate,
34: So were I equal’d with them in renown,
35: Blind THAMYRIS and blind MAEONIDES,
36: And TIRESIAS and PHINEUS Prophets old.
37: Then feed on thoughts, that voluntarie move
38: Harmonious numbers; as the wakeful Bird
39: Sings darkling, and in shadiest Covert hid
40: Tunes her nocturnal Note. Thus with the Year
41: Seasons return, but not to me returns
42: Day, or the sweet approach of Ev’n or Morn,
43: Or sight of vernal bloom, or Summers Rose,
44: Or flocks, or herds, or human face divine;
45: But cloud in stead, and ever-during dark
46: Surrounds me, from the chearful waies of men
47: Cut off, and for the book of knowledg fair
48: Presented with a Universal blanc
49: Of Natures works to mee expung’d and ras’d,
50: And wisdome at one entrance quite shut out.
51: So much the rather thou Celestial light
52: Shine inward, and the mind through all her powers
53: Irradiate, there plant eyes, all mist from thence
54: Purge and disperse, that I may see and tell
55: Of things invisible to mortal sight.