upon his transforming himself into an angel of light,
are touched with exquisite beauty. The poet's thought
of directing Satan to the sun, which in the vulgar
opinion of mankind is the most conspicuous part of
the creation, the placing in it an angel, is a circum-
stance very finely contrived, and the more adjusted to
a poctical probability, as it was a received doctrine
among the most famous philosophers, that every orb
had its intelligence; and as an apostle in sacred writ is
'said to have seen such an angel in the sun. In the an-
swer which this angel returns to the disguised evil spi-
rit, there is such a becoming majesty as is altogether
suitable to a superior being. The part of it in which
he represents himself as present at the creation, is
very noble in itself, and not only proper where it is
introduced, but requisite to prepare the reader for
what follows in the seventh book:

I saw when at his word the formless mass,
This world's material mould, came to a heap :
Confusion heard his voice, and wild uproar
Stood rul'd, stood vast infinitude confin'd;
Til at his second bidding darkness fled,
Light shone, &c.'

In the following part of the speech he points out the earth with such circumstances, that the reader can scarce forbear fancying himself employed on the same distant view of it:

'Look downward on the globe whose hither side
With light from hence, tho' but reflected, shines;
That place is earth, the seat of man, that light
His day, &c.'

I must not conclude my reflections upon this third book of Paradise Lost, without taking notice of

tha t

that celebrated complaint of Milton with which it opens, and which certainly deserves all the praises that have been given it; though, as I have before hinted, it may rather be looked on as an excrescence than as an essential part of the poem. The same observation might be applied to that beautiful digression upon hypocrisy in the same book.

CRITIQUE ON MILTON'S PARADISE LOST. No. 321.

THOSE Who know how many volumes have been written on the poems of Homer and Virgil will easily pardon the length of my discourse upon Milton. The Paradise Lost is looked upon by the best judges as the greatest production, or at least the noblest work of genius, in our language, and therefore deserves to be set before an English reader in its full beauty. For this reason, though I have endeavoured to give a general idea of its graces and imperfections in my six first Papers, I thought myself obliged to bestow one upon every book in particular. The first three books. I have already dispatched, and am now entering upon the fourth. I need not acquaint my reader that there are multitudes of beauties in this great author, especially in the descriptive parts of this poem, which I have not touched upon, it being my intention to point out those only which appear to me the most exquisite, or those which are not so obvious to ordinary readers. Every one that has read the critics who have written upon the Odyssey, the Iliad, and the Æneid, knows very well, that though they agree in their opinions of the great beauties in those poems, they have nevertheless

each

each of them discovered several master-strokes which have escaped the observation of the rest. In the same manner, I question not but any writer who shall treat of this subject after me may find several beauties in Milton which I have not taken notice of. I must likewise observe, that as the greatest masters of critical learning differ among one another, as to some particular points in an epic poem, I have not bound myself scrupulously to the rules which any one of them has laid down upon that art, but have taken the liberty sometimes to join with one, and sometimes with another, and sometimes to differ from all of them, when I have thought that the reason of the thing was on my side.

We may consider the beauties of the fourth book under three heads. In the first are those pictures of still-life which we meet with in the description of Eden, Paradise, Adam's bower, &c. In the next are the machines, which comprehend the speeches and behaviour of the good and bad angels. In the last is the conduct of Adam and Eve, who are the principal actors in the poem.

In the description of Paradise, the poet has observed Aristotle's rule of lavishing all the ornaments of diction on the weak unactive parts of the fable which are not supported by the beauty of sentiments and characters. Accordingly the reader may observe, that the expressions are more florid and elaborate in these descriptions than in most other parts of the poem. I must further add, that though the drawings of gardens, rivers, rainbows, and the like dead pieces of nature, are justly censured in a heroic poem, when they run out into an unnecessary length; the description of Paradise would have been faulty, had not the

poct been very particular in it, not only as it is the scene of the principal action, but as it is requisite to give us an idea of that happiness from which our first parents fell. The plan of it is wonderfully beautiful, and formed upon the short sketch which we have of it in holy writ. Milton's exuberance of imagination has poured forth such a redundancy of ornaments on this seat of happiness and innocence, that it would be endless to point out each particular.

I must not quit this head, without further observ→ ing, that there is scarce a speech of Adam and Eve in the whole poem, wherein the sentiments and allusions are not taken from this their delightful habitation. The reader, during their whole course of action, always finds himself in the walks of Paradise. In short, as the critics have remarked, that in those poems wherein shepherds are actors, the thoughts ought always to take a tincture from the woods, fields, and rivers; so we may observe, that our first parents seldom lose sight of their happy station in any thing they speak or do; and, if the reader will give me leave to use the expression, that their thoughts are always Paradisiacal.

We are in the next place to consider the machines of the fourth book. Satan being now within prospect of Eden, and looking round upon the glories of the creation, is filled with sentiments different from those which he discovered whilst he was in hell. The place inspires him with thoughts more adapted to it. He reflects upon the happy condition from whence he fell, and breaks forth into a speech that is softened with several transient touches of remorse and selfaccusation: but at length he confirms himself in impenitence, and in his design of drawing man into his

own

Divine compassion visibly appear'd,

Love without end, and without measure grace.'

I need not point out the beauty of that circumstance, wherein the whole host of angels are represented as standing mute; nor show how proper the occasion was to produce such a silence in heaven. The close of this divine colloquy, with the hymn of angels that follows upon it, are so wonderfully beautiful and poetical, that I should not forbear inserting the whole passage, if the bounds of my Paper would give me leave.

'No sooner had th'Almighty ceas'd, but als
The multitude of angels with a shout

(Loud as from numbers without number, sweet
As from blest voices) utt'ring joy, heav'n rung
With jubilee, and loud Hosannas fill'd
Th' eternal regions'; &c. &c.-

Satan's walk upon the outside of the universe, which at a distance appeared to him of a globular form, but, upon his nearer approach, looked like an unbounded plain, is natural and noble: as his roaming upon the frontiers of the creation between that mass of matter, which was wrought into a world, and that shapeless unformed heap of materials which still lay in chaos and confusion, strikes the imagination with something astonishingly great and wild. I have before spoken of the Limbo of Vanity, which the poet places upon this outermost surface of the universe, and shall here explain myself more at large on that, and other parts of the poem, which are of the same shadowy nature. Aristotle observes, that the fable of an epic poem should abound in circumstances that are both credible

and