An Introduction to the Prose and Poetical Works of John Milton / Comprising All the Autobiographic Passages in His Works, the More Explicit Presentations of His Ideas of True Liberty.

by John Milton

Venus now wakes, and wakens Love.

Come, let us our rites begin, 125

—'Tis only daylight that makes sin—

Which these dun shades will ne'er report.

Hail, goddess of nocturnal sport,

Dark-veiled Cotytto, to whom the secret flame

Of midnight torches burns! mysterious dame, 130

That ne'er art called but when the dragon womb

Of Stygian darkness spets her thickest gloom,

And makes one blot of all the air!