Sunday, August 8, 2010

''Successful beyond hope''


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From Milton, Paradise Lost (1674):
Thrones, Dominations, Princedoms, Virtues, Powers;
For in possession such, not only of right,
I call ye, and declare ye now; return'd
Successful beyond hope, to lead ye forth
Triumphant out of this infernal Pit
Abominable, accurst, the house of woe,
And Dungeon of our Tyrant: Now possess,
As Lords, a spacious World, to our native Heaven
Little inferior, by my adventure hard
With peril great achiev'd. (X.460-69)

(Illustration is John Martin, Satan on His Throne, 1824.)

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