SAMSON AGONISTES
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��She purposed to betray me, and (which was
worse
Than undissembled hate) with what con- tempt 400 She sought to make me traitor to myself. Yet, the fourth time, when, mustering all
her wiles,
With blandished parleys, feminine assaults, Tongue-batteries, she surceased not day nor
night To storm me, over-watched and wearied
out, At times when men seek most repose and
rest,
I yielded, and unlocked her all my heart, Who, with a grain of manhood well re- solved,
Might easily have shook off all her snares; But foul effeminacy held me yoked 4 i Her bond-slave. O indignity, O blot To Honour and Religion ! servile mind Rewarded well with servile punishment ! The base degree to which I now am fallen, These rags, this grinding, is not yet so base As was my former servitude, ignoble, Unmanly, ignominious, infamous, True slavery; and that blindness worse
than this,
That saw not how degenerately I served. Man. I cannot praise thy marriage- choices, son 420 Rather approved them not; but thou didst
plead Divine impulsion prompting how thou
might'st
Find some occasion to infest our foes. I state not that ; this I am sure our foes Found soon occasion thereby to make thee Their captive, and their triumph ; thou the
sooner
Temptation found'st, or over-potent charms, To violate the sacred trust of silence Deposited within thee which to have
kept
Tacit was in thy power. True; and thou bear'st 430
Enough, and more, the burden of that fault, Bitterly hast thou paid, and still art pay- ing ;
That rigid score. A worse thing yet re- mains:
This day the Philistines a popular feast Here celebrate in Gaza, and proclaim Great pomp, and sacrifice, and praises loud, To Dagon, as their god who hath delivered
��Thee, Samson, bound and blind, into their
hands Them out of thine, who slew'st them many
a slain.
So Dagon shall be magnified, and God, 44 o Besides whom is no god, compared with
idols,
Disglorified, blasphemed, and had in scorn By the idolatrous rout amidst their wine; Which to have come to pass by means of
thee, Samson, of all thy sufferings think the
heaviest, Of all reproach the most with shame that
ever Could have befallen thee and thy father's
house. Sams. Father, I do acknowledge and
confess That I this honour, I this pomp, have
brought 449
To Dagon, and advanced his praises high Among the Heathen round to God have
brought
Dishonour, obloquy, and oped the mouths Of idolists and atheists; have brought
scandal
To Israel, diffidence of God, and doubt In feeble hearts, prepense enough before To waver, or fall off and join with idols: Which is my chief affliction, shame and
sorrow,
The anguish of my soul, that suffers not Mine eye to harbour sleep, or thoughts to
rest. 459
This only hope relieves me, that the strife With me hath end. All the contest is now 'Twixt God and Dagon. Dagon hath pre- sumed,
Me overthrown, to enter lists with God, His deity comparing and preferring Before the God of Abraham. He, be sure, Will not connive, or linger, thus provoked, But will arise, and his great name assert. Dagon must stoop, and shall ere long re- ceive
Such a discomfit as shall quite despoil him Of all these boasted trophies won on me, 470 And with confusion blank his Worshipers. Man. With cause this hope relieves thee ;
and these words
I as a prophecy receive ; for God (Nothing more certain) will not long defer To vindicate the glory of his name Against all competition, nor will long
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