Morning having come, Adam and Eve awake, and after their usual song of praise set out to attend the garden.  But Eve insists that as long as they are together they allow themselves to be distracted from their labors, and proposes that they work independently until the noon hour brings them together to share their simple repast.  Although reluctant at first to be parted from his beloved, Adam, hearing her exclaim he does not trust her, yields to her pleading.  Thus, the serpent, ranging through the garden, perceives Eve alone among the roses, and rejoices to think he can make his first attempt upon what he rightly deems the weaker vessel.  Although not without compunction, he wends his way toward her and startles her by addressing her in a human voice.  When she inquires how it happens a beast can communicate with her, the serpent rejoins that, although at first speechless like other beasts, he no sooner tasted a certain fruit than he was gifted with greater knowledge than he had yet enjoyed and endowed with the power of speech.  Deeming the fruit of such a tree might have equally beneficial effects upon her and make her more nearly equal to her consort, Eve longs to partake of it too, and readily follows her guide to the centre of the garden.  But, when the serpent points out the forbidden tree, Eve prepares to withdraw, until the tempter assures her God’s prohibition was not intended to be obeyed.  He argues that, although he has tasted the fruit he continues to live and has obtained new faculties, and by this specious reasoning induces Eve to pluck and eat the fruit.  As it touches her lips nature gives “signs of woe,” and the guilty serpent links back into the thicket, leaving Eve to gorge upon the fruit whose taste affords her keener delight than she ever experienced before.  In laudatory terms she now promises to care for the tree, and then wonders whether Adam will perceive any difference in her, and whether it will be wise to impart to him the happiness she has tasted.  Although at first doubtful, Eve, fearing lest death may ensue and Adam replace her by another partner, determines to induce her husband to share this food too, for she loves Adam too dearly to live without him.

  “Confirmed then I resolve,
  Adam shall share with me in bliss or woe: 
  So dear I love him, that with him all deaths
  I could endure, without him live no life.”

This decision reached, Eve hastens to Adam, and volubly explains that the tree is not what God depicted, for the serpent, having tasted of its fruit, has been endowed with eloquence so persuasive that he has induced her to taste it too.  Horror-stricken, Adam wails his wife is lost; then he wonders how he will be able to exist without her, and is amazed to think she should have yielded to the very first onslaught of their foe.  But, after this first outburst of grief, he vows he will share her doom and die with her.  Having made a decision so flattering to Eve, he accepts