PARADISE REGAINED.

THE ARGUMENT.

The subject proposed. Invocation of the Holy Spirit. The poem opens with John baptizing at the river Jordan. Jesus coming there is baptized; and is attested by the descent of the Holy Ghost, and by a voice from heaven, to be the Son tit Cine Satan, who is present, upon this immediately flies un into the regions of the air; where, summoning his infernal council, he acquaints them them with his apprehensions that Jesus is that seed of the woman destined to destroy all their power, and points out to them the immediate necessity of bringing the matter to proof, and of attempting, by snares and fraud, to counteract and defeat the person from wnoin they have so much to dread. This office he offers himself to undertake; and, his offer being accepted, sets out on his enterprise. In the meantime in the assembly of holy angels, declares that he has given up his Son to be tempte by Satan; but foretells that the tempter shall be completely defeated by him: upon which the angels sing a hymn of tri umph. Jesus is led up by the Spirit into the wilderness, while he is meditating on the commencement of his great ffice of Saviour of mankind. Pursuing his meditation he parrates, in a soliloquy, w what divine and philanthropic im pulses he had felt from his early youth, and how his mother Mary, on perceiving these dispositions in him, had acquainted him with the circumstances of his birth, and informed him that he was no less a person than the Son of God; to which he adds what his own inquiries and reflections had supplied in confirmation of this great truth, and particular ly dwells on the recent attestation of it at the river Jordan Our Lord passes forty days, fasting, in the wilderness where the wild beasts become mild and harmless in his prewith our Lord, wondering what could have brought him alone into so dangerous a place, and at the same time professing to recognize him for

Satan now a disccer the form of an old pea

with a description of the difficulty of supporting life in the wilderness; and entreats Jesus, if he be really the Son of God, to manifest his divine power by changing some of the stones into bread. Jesus reproves him, and at the same time tells him that he knows who he is. Satar instantly

avob a to resusda ni bus b'nego novas

avows himself, and offers an artful apology for himseif and his conduct. Our blessed Lord-severely reprimands him, and refutes every part of his justification. Satan, with much semblance of humility, still endeavours to justify himself; and professing his admiration of Jesus, and his regard for virtue, requests to be permitted, at a future time, to hear more of his conversation; but is answered, that this mus be as he shall find permission from above. Satan then dis appears, and the book closes with a short description night coming on in the desert.

I, WHO erewhile the happy garden sung
By one man's disobedience lost, now sing
Recover'd Paradise to all mankind,

By one man's firm obedience fully tried
Through all temptation, and the tempter foil'd
In all his wiles, defeated and repuls'd,

And Eden rais'd in the waste wilderness.

Thou Spirit, who ledd'st this glorious eremite nto the desert, his victorious field,

Against the spiritual foe, and brought'st him thence
By proof the undoubted Son of God, inspire,
As thou art wont, my prompted song, else mute,
And bear through highth or depth of nature's
bounds,

With prosperous wing full summ'd, to tell of deeds
Above heroic, though in secret done,

And unrecorded left through many an age;
Worthy to have not remain'd so long unsung

Now had the great proclaimer, with a voice
More awful than the sound of trumpet, cried
Repentance, and heaven's kingdom nigh at hana
To all baptiz'd to his great baptism flock'd
With awe the regions round, and with them came
From Nazareth the son of Joseph deem'd
To the flood Jordan; came, as then obscure,
Unmark'd, unknown; but him the Baptist soon
Descried, divinely warn'd, and witness bore
As to his worthier, and would have resign'd
To him his heavenly office; nor was long
His witness unconfirm'd : on him baptiz'd
Heaven open'd, and in likeness of a dove