'Tis base not to acknowledge what we owe.

_Lucif._ Thanks, howe'er due, proclaim subjection yet;
I fought for power to quit the upbraided debt.
Whoe'er expects our thanks, himself repays,
And seems but little, who can want our praise.

_Gab._ What in us duty, shews not want in him;
Blest in himself alone,
To whom no praise we, by good deeds, can add;
Nor can his glory suffer from our bad.
Made for his use; yet he has formed us so,
We, unconstrained, what he commands us do.
So praise we him, and serve him freely best;
Thus thou, by choice, art fallen, and we are blest.

_Ithu._ This, lest thou think thy plea, unanswered, good.
Our question thou evad'st: How didst thou dare
To break hell bounds, and near this human pair
In nightly ambush lie?

_Lucif._ Lives there, who would not seek to force his way,
From pain to ease, from darkness to the day?
Should I, who found the means to 'scape, not dare
To change my sulphurous smoke for upper air?
When I, in fight, sustained your Thunderer,
And heaven on me alone spent half his war,
Think'st thou those wounds were light? Should I not seek
The clemency of some more temperate clime,
To purge my gloom; and, by the sun refined,
Bask in his beams, and bleach me in the wind?

_Gab._ If pain to shun be all thy business here,
Methinks thy fellows the same course should steer.
Is their pain less, who yet behind thee stay?
Or thou less hardy to endure than they?

_Lucif._ Nor one, nor t'other; but, as leaders ought,
I ventured first alone, first danger sought,
And first explored this new-created frame,
Which filled our dusky regions with its fame;
In hopes my fainting troops to settle here,
And to defend against your Thunderer,
This spot of earth; or nearer heaven repair,
And forage to his gates from middle air.

_Ithu._ Fool! to believe thou any part canst gain
From Him, who could'st not thy first ground maintain.

_Gab._ But whether that design, or one as vain,
To attempt the lives of these, first drew thee here,
Avoid the place, and never more appear
Upon this hallowed earth; else prove our might.

_Lucif._ Not that I fear, do I decline the fight:
You I disdain; let me with Him contend,
On whom your limitary powers depend.
More honour from the sender than the sent:
Till then, I have accomplished my intent;
And leave this place, which but augments my pain,
Gazing to wish, yet hopeless to obtain. [_Exit, they following him._

ACT IV.

SCENE I.--_Paradise._