Page:Paradise lost by Milton, John.djvu/255

With glory attributed to the high
Creator. Something yet of doubt remains,
Which only the solution can resolve.—
When I behold this goodly frame, this World
Of heaven and earth consisting, and compute
Their magnitudes; this earth, a spot, a grain,
An atom, with the firmament compared
And all her numbered stars, that seem to roll
Spaces incomprehensible—for such20
Their distance argues, and their swift return
Diurnal—merely to officiate light
Round this opacous earth, this punctual spot,
One day and night, in all their vast survey
Useless besides—reasoning I oft admire
How Nature, wise and frugal, could commit
Such disproportions, with superfluous hand
So many nobler bodies to create,
Greater so manifold, to this one use,
For aught appears, and on their orbs impose30
Such restless revolution, day by day
Repeated, while the sedentary earth,
That better might with far less compass move,
Served by more noble than herself, attains
Her end without least motion, and receives,
As tribute, such a sumless journey brought
Of incorporeal speed, her warmth and light;
Speed, to describe whose swiftness number fails."
So spake our sire, and by his countenance seemed