The irksome hours, till his great chief return. As at th' Olympian games or Pythian fields; 530 the images are rais'd in proportion to the nature of the beings who are here described. We may fuppofe too that the author had an eye to the diverfions and entertainments of the departed heroes in Virgil's Elyfium, Æn. VI. 642. Pars in gramineis exercent mem- 534 Wag'd in the troubled sky,] Pars pedibus plaudunt choreas, et So Shakespear in 1 Hen. IV. A&t. I. carmina dicunt, &c. Their aery limbs in fports they And on the green contend the fing; VOL. I. calls these appearances the meteors of a troubled Heaven. 536.-and couch their fpears] Fix them in their refts. Couch from coucher (French) to place. A reft was made in the breaft of the armour, and was call'd a reft from arrefter (French) to ftay. K Richardfon. 539. Others Till thickeft legions clofe; with feats of arms $39. Others with waft Typhaan rage &c.] Others with rage like that of Typhoeus or Typhon, one of the giants who warred against Heaven, of whom fee before I. 199. The contraft here is very remarkable. Some are employ'd in fportive games and exercifes, while others rend up both rocks and hills, and make wild uproar. Some again are finging in a valley, while others are difcourfing and arguing on a hill; and thefe are reprefented as fitting, while others march different ways to difcover that infernal world. Every company is drawn in contrast both to that which goes before, and that which follows... 542. As when Alcides, &c.] As when Hercules named Jedes from his grandfather Alceus, from Occhalia erozon'd gwith conqueft, after his return from the conqueft of Occhalia a city of Baotia, having brought with him from thence lofe 545 Into the king's daughter, felt th' envenom'd robe, which was fent him by Dejanira in jealoufy of his new miftrefs, and, stuck fo close to his skin that he could not pull off the one without pulling off the other, and tore through pain up by the roots Theffalian pines, and Lichas who had brought him the poifon'd robe, from the top of Oeta, a mountain in the borders of Theffaly, threw into th' Euboic fea, the fea near Euboca an iland in the Archipelago. The madnefs of Hercules was a fubject for tragedy among the Aneients (Hexxλng pairoμer by Euripides, Hercules furens by Seneca) but our author has comprised the principal circumftances in this fimilitude, and feems more particularly to have copied Ovid, Met. IX. 136. Into th' Euboic fea. Others more mild, With notes angelical to many a harp Their own heroic deeds and hapless fall 559 By doom of battel; and complain that fate fhort of his ufual fublimity and propriety. How much does the image of Alcides tearing up Thef falian pines &c fink below that of the Angels rending up both rocks and hills, and riding the air in whirlwind! and how faintly and infignificantly does the allufion end with the low circumftance of Lichas being thrown into the Euboic fea! 550.and complain that fate Free virtue fhould inthrall to force or chance.] This is taken from the famous distich of Euripides, which Brutus ufed, when he ilew himself; Ω τλήμον αρετη, λόγω αρ' ησθ', εγω δη σε Ως έργον ήσκων συ δ ̓ ἄρ ̓ εδέλευσας βια. In fome places for Big force it is quoted Tuxy fortune. Milton has well comprehended both, inthrall to force or chance. Bentley. The thronging audience. In discourse more sweet 555 (For eloquence the foul, fong charms the sense,) Others apart fat on a hill retir'd; In thoughts more elevate, and reafon'd high The harmony fufpended bell; but is it not much better with the parenthefis coming between? which fufpends as it were the event, raifes the reader's attention, and gives a greater force to the fen tence. But the harmony (What could it lefs when Spirits immortal fing?) Sufpended Hell, &c. 555. In difcourfe more fweet] Our poet fo juflly prefers difcourfe to the higheft harmony, that he has feated his reafoning Angels on a hill as high and elevated as their thoughts, leaving the fongfters in their humble valley. Hume. 559.-foreknowledge, will, and fate, 560 565 Yet Fix'd fate, free will, foreknovs ledge abfolute,] The turn of the words here is admirable, and very well expreffes the wand'rings and mazes of their difcourfe. And the turn of the words is greatly improv'd, and render'd ftill more beautiful by the addition of an epithet to each of them. 565. Vain wisdom all, and falfe philofophy: Good and evil, and de finibus bonorum et malorum,&c. were more particularly the fubjects of difputation among the philofophers and fophifts of old, as providence, free will, &c. were among the fchool-men and divines of later times, especially upon the introduction of the free notions of Ar minius upon thefe fubjects: and our author fhows herein what an opinion Yet with a pleafing forcery could charm 570 575 Abhorred 572. The difmal world,] The feveral circumftances in the description of Hell are finely imagin'd; as the four rivers which difgorge themfelves into the fea of fire, the extremes of cold and heat, and the river of oblivion. The monftrous animals produced in that infernal world are represented by a fingle line, which gives us a more horrid idea of them, than a much longer defcription of them would have done. This epifode of the fallen Spirits and their place of habitation comes in very happily to unbend the mind of the reader from its attention to the debate. An ordinary poet would indeed have fpun out fo many circumftances to a great length, and by that means have weaken'd, instead of illuftrated, the principal fable. Addifon. K 3 $77. 46 |