Page:Paradise lost by Milton, John.djvu/388

Forsook them, when themselves they vilified
To serve ungoverned Appetite, and took
His image whom they served, a brutish vice,
Inductive mainly to the sin of Eve.
Therefore so abject is their punishment520
Disfiguring not God's likeness, but their own;
Or if his likeness, by themselves defaced,
While they pervert pure Nature's healthful rules
To loathsome sickness; worthily, since they
God's image did not reverence in themselves."
"I yield it just," said Adam, "and submit.
But is there yet no other way beside
These painful passages, how we may come
To death, and mix with our connatural dust?"529
"There is," said Michael, "if thou well observe
The rule of Not too much, by temperance taught,
In what thou eatest and drinkest, seeking from thence
Due nourishment, not gluttonous delight,
Till many years over thy head return.
So mayest thou live, till, like ripe fruit, thou drop
Into thy mother's lap, or be with ease
Gathered, not harshly plucked, for death mature.
This is old-age. But then thou must outlive
Thy youth, thy strength, thy beauty, which will change