175 Christ seeks force-captured Adam; treads the path
Himself where death wrought ruin; permeates
All the old heroes’ monuments; inspects
Each one; the One of whom all types were full;
Begins e’en from the womb to expel the death
180 Conceived simultaneously with seed
Of flesh within the bosom; purging all
Life’s stages with a silent wisdom; debts
Assuming; ready to cleanse all, and give
Their Maker back the many whom the one
185 Had scattered. And, because one direful man
Down-sunk in pit iniquitous did fall,
By dragon-subdued virgin’s suasion led;
Because he pleased her wittingly; because
He left his heavenly covering behind:
190 Because the “tree” their nakedness did prove;
Because dark death coerced them: in like wise
Out of the self-same mass re-made returns
Renewed now,—the flower of flesh, and host
Of peace,—a flesh from espoused virgin born,
195 Not of man’s seed; conjoined to its own
Artificer; without the debt of death.
These mandates of the Father through bright stars
An angel carries down, that angel-fame
The tidings may accredit; telling how
200 “A virgin’s debts a virgin, flesh’s flesh,
Should pay.” Thus introduced, the Giant-Babe,
The Elder-Boy, the Stripling-Man, pursues
Death’s trail. Thereafter, when completed was
The ripe age of man’s strength, when man is wont
205 To see the lives that were his fellows drop
By slow degrees away, and to be changed
In mien to wrinkles foul and limbs inert,
While blood forsakes his veins, his course he stayed,
And suffered not his fleshly garb to age.
210 Upon what day or in what place did fall
Most famous Adam, or outstretched his hand
Rashly to touch the tree, on that same day,
Returning as the years revolve, within
The stadium of the “tree” the brave Athlete,
215 ’Countering, outstretched His hands, and, penalty
For praise pursuing, quite did vanquish death,
Because He left death of His own accord
Behind, disrobing Him of fleshly slough,
And of death’s dues; and to the “tree” affixed