Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, CAELICA: 102, by FULKE GREVILLE


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

CAELICA: 102, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: The serpent, sin, by showing human lust
Last Line: And now we know thee, now it is too late.
Alternate Author Name(s): Brooke, 1st Baron; Brooke, Lord


The serpent, sin, by showing human lust
Visions and dreams, enticed man to do
Follies in which exceed his God he must,
And know more than he was created to,
A charm which made the ugly sin seem good,
And is by fall'n spirits only understood.

Now man no sooner from his mean creation
Trode this excess of uncreated sin,
But straight he changed his being to privation,
Horror and death at this gate passing in,
Whereby, immortal life, made for man's good,
Is since become the hell of flesh and blood.

But grant that there were no eternity,
That life were all, and pleasure life of it,
In sin's excess there yet confusions be,
Which spoil his peace, and passionate his wit,
Making his nature less, his reason thrall
To tyranny of vice unnatural.

And as hell fires, not wanting heat, want light,
So these strange witchcrafts, which like pleasure be,
Not wanting fair enticements, want delight,
Inward being nothing but deformity,
And do at open doors let frail powers in
To that straight building, little-ease of sin.

Yet is there aught more wonderful than this?
That man, even in the state of his perfection,
All things uncurst, nothing yet done amiss,
And so in him no base of his defection,
Should fall from God, and break his Maker's will,
Which could have no end but to know the ill.

I ask thee rather, since in paradise
Eternity was object to his passion,
And he in goodness like his Maker wise,
As from His spirit taking life and fashion,
What greater power there was to master this,
Or how a less could work, my question is?

For who made all, 'tis sure yet could not make
Any above himself, as princes can,
So as, against His will no power could take
A creature from Him, nor corrupt a man,
And yet who thinks He marred that made us good,
As well may think God less than flesh and blood.

Where did our being then seek out privation?
Above, within, without us all was pure,
Only the angels, from their discreation,
By smart declared no being was secure,
But that transcendent goodness which subsists
By forming and reforming what it lists.

So as within the man there was no more
But possibility to work upon,
And in these spirits, which were fall'n before,
An abstract curst eternity alone,
Refined by their high places in creation,
To add more craft and malice to temptation.

Now with what force upon these middle spheres,
Of probable, and possibility,
Which no one constant demonstration bears,
And so can neither bind, nor bounded be,
What those could work, that having lost their God,
Aspire to be our tempters and our rod,

Too well is witnessed by this fall of ours,
For we not knowing yet that there was ill
Gave easy credit to deceiving powers
Who wrought upon us only by our will,
Persuading, like it, all was to it free,
Since where no sin was there no law could be.

And as all finite things seek infinite,
From thence deriving what beyond them is,
So man was led by charms of this dark sprite,
Which he could not know till he did amiss,
To trust those serpents, who learned since they fell,
Knew more than we did, even their own made hell.

Which crafty odds made us those clouds embrace,
Where sin in ambush lay to overthrow
Nature, that would presume to fathom Grace,
Or could believe what God said was not so.
Sin, then we knew thee not, and could not hate,
And now we know thee, now it is too late.





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