HIS preferring Annihilation to Shame or Mifery, is alfo highly fuitable to his Character; as the Comfort he draws from their disturbing the Peace of Heaven, that if it be not Victory it is Revenge, is a Sentiment truly diabolical, and becoming the Bitterness of this implacable Spirit.

BELIAL is defcribed, in the first Book, as the Idol of the lewd and luxurious. He is in the fecond Book, pursuant to that Defcription, characterised as timorous and flothful; and if we look into the fixth Book, we find him celebrated in the Battel of Angels for Nothing but that Scoffing Speech which he makes to Satan, on their fuppofed Advantage over the Enemy. As his Appearance is uniform, and of a Piece, in these three feveral Views, we find his Sentiments in the infernal Affembly every Way conformable to his Character. Such are his Apprehenfions of a fecond Battel, his Horrors of Annihilation, his preferring to be miferable rather than not to be. I need not observe, that the Contraft of Thought in this Speech, and that which precedes it, gives an agreeable Variety to the Debate.

MAMMON's Character is fo fully drawn in the firft Book, that the Poet adds Nothing to it in the Second. We were before told, that he was the first who taught Mankind to ransack the Earth for Gold and Silver, and that he was the Architect of Pandemonium, or the infernal Palace, where the evil Spirits were to meet in Council. His Speech in this Book

is every where fuitable to fo depraved a Character. How proper is that Reflection, of their being unable to tafte the Happiness of Heaven were they actually there, in the Mouth of one, who while he was in Heaven, is faid to have had his Mind dazled with the outward Pomps and Glories of the Place, and to have been more intent on the Riches of the Pavement, than on the beatifick Vifion. I fhall alfo leave the Reader to judge how agreeable the following Sentiments are to the fame Character.

This deep World

Of Darkness do we dread? How oft amidst
Thick Cloud and dark doth Heav'ns all-ruling Sire
Chufe to refide, his Glory unobfcured,

And with the Majefty of Darkness round
Covers his Throne; from whence deep Thunders roar
Muftring their Rage, and Heav'n refembles Hell?
As he our Darkness, cannot we his Light
Imitate when we pleafe? This defart Soil,
Wants not her hidden Luftre, Gems and Gold;
Nor want we Skill or Art, from whence to raise
Magnificence, and what can Heav'n fhew more?

BEELZEBUB, who is reckon'd the second in Dignity that fell, and is in the first Book, the fecond that awakens out of the Trance, and confers with Satan upon the Situation of their Affairs, maintains his Rank in the Book now before us. There is a wonderful Majefty defcribed in his rifing up to fpeak. He acts as Kind of Moderator between the two oppofite

Parties,

345 Parties, and propofes a third Undertaking, which the whole Affembly gives into. The Motion he makes of detaching one of their Body in Search of a new World is grounded upon a Project devised by Satan, and curforily propofed by him in the following Lines of the firft Book.

Space may produce new Worlds, whereof fo rife
There went a Fame in Heav'n, that he e'er long
Intended to create, and therein plant

A Generation, whom his choice regard
Should favour equal to the Sons of Heav'n :
Thither, if but to pry, shall be perhaps
Our first Eruption, thither or elsewhere:
For this infernal Pit shall never hold
Celestial Spirits in bondage, nor th' Abyss
Long under Darkness cover. But thefe Thoughts
Full Counsel must mature:

IT is on this Project that Beelzebub grounds his Proposal,

What if we find

Some easier Enterprize? There is a Place
(If ancient and prophetic Fame in Heav'n
Err not) another World, the happy Seat
Of fome new Race call'd MAN, about this Time
To be created like to us, though less
In Power and Excellence, but favour'd more
Of him who rules above; fo was his Will
Pronounc'd among the Gods, and by an Oath,
That shook Heav'ns whole Circumference,confirm'd.

THE

N° 309. THE Reader may obferve how juft it was, not to omit in the firft Book the Project upon which the whole Poem turns: As also that the Prince of the fall'n Angels was the only proper Person to give it Birth, and that the next to him in Dignity was the fitreft to fecond and support it.

THERE is befides, I think, fomething wonderfully beautiful, and very apt to affect the Reader's Imagination, in this antient Prophecy or Report in Heaven, concerning the Creation of Man. Nothing could fhew more the Dignity of the Species, than this Tradi tion which ran of them before their Existence. They are represented to have been the Talk of Heaven, before they were created. Virgil in compliment to the Roman Common-wealth, makes the Heroes of it appear in their State of Pre-existence; but Milton does a far greater Honour to Mankind in general, as he gives us a Glimpse of them even before they are in Being.

THE rifing of this great Affembly is de fcribed in a very fublime and poetical Manner.

Their rifing all at once was as the found
Of Thunder beard remote - - -

THE Diverfions of the fallen Angels, with the particular Account of their Place of Habitation, are described with great Pregnancy of Thought, and Copioufnefs of Invention. The Diversions are every way fuitable to Beings who had Nothing left them but Strength and Know

Knowledge mifapplied. Such are their Contentions at the Race, and in Feats of Arms, with their Entertainment in the following Lines.

Others with vaft Typhæan Rage more fell
Rend up both Rocks and Hills and ride the Air
In Whirlwind; Hell fcarce holds the wild uproar.

THEIR Mufick is employed in celebrat ing their own criminal Exploits, and their Difcourfe in founding the unfathomable Depths of Fate, Free-will and Fore-knowledge.

THE feveral Circumftances in the Defcription of Hell are very finely imagined; as the four Rivers which difgorge themselves into the Sea of Fire, the Extreams of Cold and Heat, and the River of Oblivion. The monftrous Animals produced in that infernal World are reprefented by a fingle Line, which gives us a more horrid Idea of them, than a much longer Description would have done.

Nature breeds, Perverse, all monstrous, all prodigious Things, Abominable, inutterable, and worfe

Than Fables yet have feign'd, or fear conceiv'd, Gorgons, and Hydra's, and Chimera's dire.

THIS Episode 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