they pour forth in soothing harmony, and, methinks, together
praise for that they were accounted worthy to be created.[26]

For the charming legend of Paradise was to many Christian minds of
this time what the long-lost bliss of Elysium and the Golden Age had
been to the Hellenic poets and the Roman elegist--the theme of much
vivid imagery and highly-coloured word-painting.

Eternal spring softens the air, a healing flame floods the world
with light, all the elements glow in healing warmth; as the
shades of night fade, day rises.... Then the feathered flocks fly
joyfully through the air, beating it with their wings in the rush
of their passage, and with flattering satisfaction their voices
are heard, and I think they praise God that they were found
worthy to be created; some shine in snowy white, some in purple,
some in saffron, some in yellow gold; others have white feathers
round the eyes, while neck and breast are of the bright tint of
the hyacinth ... and upon the branches, the birds are moved to
and fro with them by the wind.

This shews careful observation of detail; but, for the most part,
such idyllic feeling was checked by lofty religious thoughts.

'Man,' he cries, 'should rule over Nature, over all that it contains,
over all earth offers in fruit, flowers, and verdure that tree and
vine, sea and spring, can give.' He summons all creation to praise
the Creator--stars and seasons, hail-storm and lightning, earth, sea,
river and spring, cloud and night, plants, animals, and light; and he
describes the flood in bold flights of fancy.

In the three books of Avitus[27] we have 'a complete poem of the lost
Paradise, far removed from a mere paraphrase or versification of the
Bible,'[28] which shews artistic leanings and sympathetic feeling
here and there. As Catullus[29] pictures the stars looking down upon
the quiet love of mortals by night, and Theocritus[30] makes the
cypresses their only witnesses, the Christian poet surrounds the
marriage of our first parents with the sympathy of Nature:

And angel voices joined in harmony and sang to the chaste and
pure; Paradise was their wedding-chamber, earth their dowry, and
the stars of heaven rejoiced with gladsome radiance.... The
kindness of heaven maintains eternal spring there; the tumultuous
south wind does not penetrate, the clouds forsake an air which is
always pure.... The soil has n