Wide on the wasteful Deep.
Courteously and fearlessly Satan addresses himself to the monarch of the nethermost abyss. His speech contains no threats; he asks guidance in his quest; and, with politic forethought, promises that that quest, if successful, shall restore an outlying lost province to Chaos. There is nothing in his words to cause consternation; but the King is afraid:--
Him thus the anarch old,
With faltering speech and visage incomposed,
Answered:--"I know thee, stranger, who thou art--
That mighty leading Angel, who of late
Made head against Heaven's King, though overthrown."
In the war on the plains of Heaven Satan ranges up and down the fighting line, like Cromwell; he fortifies his comrades to endurance, and encourages them to attack. In Hell he stands like a tower:--
His form had yet not lost
All her original brightness, nor appeared