liant throng having passed through Heaven's gates, which opened wide
their portals, they beheld in front of them the dark abyss of Chaos--a
tempest-tossed sea of warring elements upturned in wild confusion. At
God's instant command silence and peace reigned over the deep, and
tranquil calm succeeded noisy discord. Then on the wings of Cherubim He
rode far into Chaos, and with His golden compasses decreed the
dimensions of the universe by circumscribing the vast vacuity of space.
Into the elements which hasted to their several places, His Spirit
infused vital warmth and caused the formless mass of matter to assume
the figure of a sphere, and thus the Earth poised on her axis
unsupported, and in darkness shrouded hung suspended in space. The
placing of the golden compasses in the hands of the Creator, with which
He measured out the heavens, is a noble conception on the part of
Milton, and one most appropriate, since the construction of the universe
is based upon the principles of geometrical science.

'Let there be Light!' said God; and forthwith Light
Ethereal, first of things, quintessence pure,
Sprung from the Deep; and from her native east
To journey through the aery gloom began,
Sphered in a radiant cloud; for yet the Sun
Was not; she in a cloudy tabernacle
Sojourned the while. God saw the light was good;
And light from darkness by the hemisphere
Divided; light the day, and darkness night
He named. Thus was the first day even and morn:
Nor passed uncelebrated, nor unsung
By the celestial quires, when orient light
Exhaling first from darkness they beheld;
Birthday of Heaven and Earth; with joy and shout
The hollow universal orb they filled,
And touched their golden harps, and hymning praised
God and his works: Creator Him they sung,
Both when first evening was, and when first morn.--vii. 243-60.

The appearance of Light, which sprung into existence at the fiat of the
Creator, was the next great event witnessed by beholding
angels--birthday of Heaven and Earth, first morning and first evening,
which the celestial choirs celebrated with praise and shouts of joy.
The creation of the firmament was the great work of the second day.

Again God said, 'Let there be firmament
Amid the waters, and let it divide
The waters from the waters!' And God made
The firmament, expanse of liquid, pure,
Transparent, elemental air, diffused