9
" And now without redemption all mankind
Must have been lost, adjudged to death and hell
By doom severe, had not the Son of God,
In whom the fullness dwells of love divine,
His dearest mediation thus renewed.
'Father, Thy word is passed, man shall find grace;
And shall grace not find means, that finds her way,
The speediest of Thy winged messengers,
To visit all Thy creatures, and to all
Comes unprevented, unimplored, unsought,
Happy for man, so coming; he her aid
Can never seek, once dead in sins and lost;
Atonement for himself or offering meet,
Indebted and undone, hath none to bring:
Behold Me then, Me for him, life for life
I offer, on Me let Thine anger fall;
Account Me man; I for his sake will leave
Thy bosom, and this glory next to Thee
Freely put off, and for him lastly die
Well pleased, on Me let death wreak all his rage;
Under his gloomy power I shall not long
Lie vanquished; Thou hast given Me to possess
Life in Myself forever, by Thee I live,
Though now to death I yield, and am his due
All that of Me can die, yet that debt paid,
Thou wilt not leave Me in the loathsome grave
His prey, nor suffer My unspotted soul
Forever with corruption there to dwell;
But I shall rise victorious, and subdue
My vanquisher, spoiled of his vaunted spoil;
Death his death's wound shall then receive, and stoop
Inglorious, of his mortal sting disarmed. "
― John Milton , Paradise Lost and Other Poems
