Book III, 40: On the Babel-Builders

Svre, if those Babel-Builders had thought good
To raise their heav'n-high Tower before the flood,
The wiser sort of people might deride
Their Folly, and that Folly had salv'd their Pride;
Or had their Faiths but enterpriz'd that Plot,
Their hearts had finisht what their hands could not;
'Twas not for love of Heav'n: nor did they ayme
So much to rayse a Building; as a Name:
They that by Works shall seeke to make intrusion
To Heav'n, find nothing but their owne Confusion.