If none regard; Heav’n wakes with all his eyes,
Whom to behold but thee, Nature’s desire?
In whose sight all things joy, with ravishment
Attracted by thy beauty still to gaze.’
This is the very topic, too, on which the Serpent afterwards enlarges with so much artful insinuation and fatal confidence of success. ‘So talked the spirited sly snake.’ The conclusion of the foregoing scene, in which Eve relates her dream and Adam comforts her, is such an exquisite piece of description, that, though not to our immediate purpose, we cannot refrain from quoting it:
‘So cheer’d he his fair spouse, and she was cheer’d;
But silently a gentle tear let fall
From either eye, and wip’d them with her hair;
Two other precious drops that ready stood,
Each in their crystal sluice, he ere they fell