This is the lamentation of Eve on being driven out of Paradise. Adam’s reflections are in a different strain, and still finer. After expressing his submission to the will of his Maker, he says:
‘This most afflicts me, that departing hence
As from his face I shall be hid, depriv’d
His blessed countenance; here I could frequent
With worship place by place where he vouchsaf’d
Presence divine, and to my sons relate,
On this mount he appeared, under this tree
Stood visible, among these pines his voice
I heard, here with him at this fountain talk’d:
So many grateful altars I would rear