After describing the battle-field, strewn with shattered armor and broken chariots, the poet pictures the dismay in the ranks of the rebel angels, and describes how Satan drew away his troops so they might rest and be ready to renew the fray on the morrow.  In the silence of that night, he also consults with his adherents how to fight to better advantage on the morrow, insisting that they now know they can never be permanently wounded.  The demons feel confident that, granted better arms, they could secure the advantage, so, when one of their number suggests the manufacture of cannon, all gladly welcome the idea.  Under Satan’s direction some of the evil angels draw from the ground metal, which, molten and poured into moulds, furnishes the engines of destruction they are seeking.  Meanwhile others collect ingredients for ammunition, and, when morning dawns, they have a number of weapons ready for use, which they cunningly conceal in the centre of their fourfold phalanx as they advance.

In the midst of the second encounter, Satan’s squadrons suddenly draw aside to let these cannons belch forth the destruction with which they are charged, an unexpected broadside which fells the good angels by thousands; but, although hosts of them are thus laid low, others spring forward to take their place.  On seeing the havoc wrought by their guns, Satan and his host openly rejoice; but the good angels, perceiving arms are useless against this artillery, throw them away, and, picking up the hills, hurl them at their opponents, whom they bury beneath the weight of mountains.  In fact, had not the Almighty checked this outburst of righteous anger, the fiends would doubtless have been buried so deep they never would have been able to reappear!

On the third day the Almighty proclaims that, as both forces are equal in strength, the fighting will never end unless he interferes.  He therefore summons his only begotten Son to wield the thunder-bolts, his exclusive weapon.  Ever ready to do his Father’s will, the Son accepts, mounts a chariot borne by four cherubs, and sets forth, attended by twenty thousand saints, who wish to witness his triumph.  On seeing him approach, the good angels exult, while the wicked are seized with terror, although they disdain to flee.  Bidding the angelic host watch him triumph single-handed over the foe, the Son of God changes his benignant expression into one of wrath, and hurls his thunder-bolts to such purpose that the rebels long for the mountains to cover them as on the previous day.  With these divine weapons Christ ruthlessly drives Satan and his hosts out of the confines of heaven, over the edge of the abyss, and hurls them all down into the bottomless pit, sending after them peal after peal of thunder, together with dazzling flashes of lightning, but mercifully withholding his deadly bolts, as he purposes not to annihilate, but merely to drive the rebels out of heaven.  Thus, with a din and clatter which the poet graphically describes, Satan and his host fall through space and land nine days later in the fiery lake!