Eden

A learned and a happy ignorance

       Divided me

     From all the vanity,

   From all the sloth, care, pain, and sorrow that advance

     The madness and the misery

   Of men. No error, no distraction I

   Saw soil the earth, or overcloud the sky.

    I knew not that there was a serpent's sting,

       Whose poison shed

    On men, did overspread

  The world; nor did I dream of such a thing

    As sin, in which mankind lay dead.

  They all were brisk and living wights to me,

  Yea, pure and full of immortality.

   Joy, pleasure, beauty, kindness, glory, love,

      Sleep, day, life, light,

    Peace, melody, my sight,

  My ears and heart did fill and freely move.

    All that I saw did me delight.

  The Universe was then a world of treasure,

  To me an universal world of pleasure.

   Unwelcome penitence was then unknown,

      Vain costly toys,

    Swearing and roaring boys,

  Shops, markets, taverns, coaches, were unshown;

    So all things were that drown'd my joys:

  No thorns chok'd up my path, nor hid the face

  Of bliss and beauty, nor eclips'd the place.

   Only what Adam in his first estate,

      Did I behold;

    Hard silver and dry gold

  As yet lay under ground; my blessed fate

    Was more acquainted with the old

  And innocent delights which he did see

  In his original simplicity.

   Those things which first his Eden did adorn,

      My infancy

    Did crown. Simplicity

  Was my protection when I first was born.

    Mine eyes those treasures first did see

  Which God first made. The first effects of love

  My first enjoyments upon earth did prove;

   And were so great, and so divine, so pure;

      So fair and sweet,

    So true; when I did meet

  Them here at first, they did my soul allure,

    And drew away my infant feet

  Quite from the works of men; that I might see

  The glorious wonders of the Deity.