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for, having every help and accommodation at hand, he had no need of uncommon expedients.

Being driven from all publick stations, he is yet too great not to be traced by curiofity to his retirement; where he has been found by Mr. Richardson, the fondest of his admirers, fitting before his door in a grey coat of coarfe cloth, in warm fultry weather, to enjoy the fresh air; and fo, as well as in his own room, receiving the vifits of people of distinguished parts as well as quality. His vifitors of high quality muft now be imagined to be few; but men of parts might reasonably court the converfation of a man fo generally illuftrious, that foreigners are reported, by Wood, to have vifited the house in Bread-street where he was born.

According to another account, he was feen in a small house, neatly enough dreffed in black cloaths, fitting in a room bung with rusty green; pale but not cadaverous, with chalkftones in his hands. He faid, that if it were not for the gout, his blindness would be tolerable.

In the intervals of his pain, being made unable to ufe the common exercises, he used to swing in a chair, and fometimes played upon an organ *.

He was now confeffedly and visibly employed upon his poem, of which the progrefs might be noted by thofe with whom he was familiar; for he was obliged, when he had compofed as many lines as his memory would conveniently retain, to employ fome friend in writing them, having, at least for part of the time, no

* Milton's father, as has been mentioned in a preceding note, was well skilled in mufic; and we are told by Aubrey, that he taught it to his fon, who, as Wood adds, befides that he could play on the organ, was able to bear a part in vocal and inftrumental mufic, an accomplishment which, in his time, it was deemed difgraceful for perfons well educated to want.

regular

regular attendant. This gave opportunity to obfervations and reports.

Mr. Philips obferves, that there was a very remarkable circumftance in the compofure of Paradife Loft, "which I have a particular reafon," fays he, "to re"member; for whereas I had the perufal of it from "the very beginning, for fome years, as I went "from time to time to vifit him, in parcels of ten, "twenty, or thirty verfes at a time (which, being "written by whatever hand came next, might poffibly "want correction as to the orthography and pointing), 66 having, as the fummer came on, not been fhewed any for a confiderable while, and defiring the reason "thereof, was answered, that his vein never happily "flowed but from the Autumnal Equinox to the Ver"nal; and that whatever he attempted at other times

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was never to his fatisfaction, though he courted his "fancy never fo much; fo that, in all the years he "was about this poem, he may be faid to have spent "half his time therein."

Upon this relation Toland remarks, that in his opinion Philips has miftaken the time of the year; for Milton, in his Elegies, declares that with the advance of the Spring he feels the increafe of his poetical force, redeunt in carmina vires. To this it is anfwered, that Philips could hardly mistake time fo well marked; and it may be added, that Milton might find different times of the year favourable to different parts of life, Mr. Richardfon conceives it impoffible that fuch a work fhould be fufpended for fix months, or for one. It may go on fafter or flower, but it must go on. By what neceffity it must continually go on, or why it might not be laid aside and refumed, it is not eafy to difcover.

This dependance of the foul upon the feafons, those temporary and periodical ebbs and flows of intellect, may, I fuppofe, juftly be derided as the fumes of vain imagination. Sapiens dominabitur aftris. The author that thinks himself weather-bound will find, with a little help from hellebore, that he is only idle or exhausted. But while this notion has poffeffion of the head, it produces the inability which it supposes. Our powers owe much of their energy to our hopes; poffunt quia poffe videntur. When fuccefs feems attainable, diligence is enforced; but when it is admitted that the faculties are fuppreffed by a crofs wind, or a cloudy fky, the day is given up without refiftance; for who can contend with the courfe of Nature?

From fuch prepoffeffions Milton feems not to have been free. There prevailed in his time an opinion that the world was in its decay, and that we have had the misfortune to be produced in the decrepitude of Nature. It was fufpected that the whole creation languished, that neither trees nor animals had the height or bulk of their predeceffors, and that every thing was daily finking by gradual diminution*. Milton appears to fufpect that fouls partake of the general degeneracy, and is not without fome fear that his book is to be written in an age too late for heroick poefy.

*This opinion is, with great learning and ingenuity, refuted in a book now very little known, "An Apology or Declaration of the "Power and Providence of God in the Government of the World," by Dr. George Hakewill, Lond. folio, 1635. The first who ventured to propagate it in this country was Dr. Gabriel Goodman, bifhop of Gloucester, a man of a versatile temper, and the author of a book entitled, "The Fall of Man, or the Corruption of Nature "proved by natural reafon." Lond. 1616 and 1624, quarto. He was plundered in the Ufurpation, turned Roman Catholic, and died in obscurity. Vide Athen. Oxon, vol. I. 727.

Another

Another opinion wanders about the world, and fometimes finds reception among wife men; an opinion that restrains the operations of the mind to particular regions, and fuppofes that a lucklefs mortal may be born in a degree of latitude too high or too low for wifdom or for wit. From this fancy, wild as it is, he had not wholly cleared his head, when he feared left the climate of his country might be too cold for flights of imagination.

Into a mind already occupied by fuch fancies, another not more reafonable might cafily find its way. He that could fear left his genius had fallen upon too old a world, or too chill a climate, might confiftently magnify to himself the influence of the feafons, and believe his faculties to be vigorous only half the year.

His fubmiffion to the seasons was at least more reafonable than his dread of decaying Nature, or a frigid zone; for general caufes muft operate uniformly in a general abatement of mental power; if lefs could be performed by the writer, lefs likewife would content the judges of his work. Among this lagging race of frofty grovellers he might still have rifen into eminence by producing fomething which they should not willingly let die. However inferior to the heroes who were born in better ages, he might still be great among his contemporaries, with the hope of growing every day greater in the dwindle of pofterity. He might ftill be a giant among the pygmies, the one-eyed monarch of the blind.

Of his artifices of ftudy, or particular hours of compofition, we have little account, and there was perhaps little to be told. Richardfon, who feems to have been very diligent in his enquiries, but difcovers al

ways

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! ways a wish to find Milton difcriminated from other
men, relates, that "he would fometimes lie awake"
"whole nights, but not a verfe could he make; and
"on a fudden his poetical faculty would rufh upon
"him with an impetus or aftrum, and his daughter
"was immediately called to fecure what came.
"other times he would dictate perhaps forty lines
"in a breath, and then reduce them to half the
"number."

At

These burfts of light, and involutions of darkness; thefe tranfient and involuntary excurfions and retroceffions of invention, having fome appearance of deviation from the common train of Nature, are eagerly caught by the lovers of a wonder. Yet fomething of this inequality happens to every man in every mode of exertion, manual or mental. The mechanick cannot handle his hammer and his file at all times with equal dexterity; there are hours, he knows not why, when his hand is out. By Mr. Richardfon's relation, cafually conveyed, much regard cannot be claimed. That, in his intellectual hour, Milton called for his daughter to fecure what came, may be queftioned; for unluckily it happens to be known that his daughters were never taught to write; nor would he have been obliged, as is univerfally confeffed, to have employed any cafual vifiter in difburthening his memory, if his daughter could have performed the office.

The story of reducing his exuberance has been told of other authors, and, though doubtlefs true of every fertile and copious mind, feems to have been gratuitoufly transferred to Milton.

What he has told us, and we cannot now know more, is, that he compofed much of his poem in the night VOL. II.

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