tion. Here are no funeral games, nor is there any long description of a fhield. The short digreffions at the beginning of the third, seventh, and ninth books, might doubtless be fpared; but fuperfluities fo beautiful, who would take away? or who does not wish that the author of the Iliad had gratified fucceeding ages with a little knowledge of himself? Perhaps no paffages are more frequently or more attentively readthan those extrinfick paragraphs; and, fince the end of poetry is pleasure, that cannot be unpoetical with which all are pleased.

The questions, whether the action of the poem be ftrictly one, whether the poem can be properly termed beroick, and who is the hero, are raised by such readers as draw their principles of judgement rather from books than from reafon. Milton, though he intituled Paradife Loft only a poem, yet calls it himself beroick fong. Dryden, petulantly and indecently, denies the heroifm of Adam, because he was overcome; but there is no reason why the hero fhould not be unfortu nate, except established practice, fince fuccefs and virtue do not go neceffarily together. Cato is the hero of Lucan; but Lucan's authority will not be fuffered by Quintilian to decide. However, if fuccefs be neceffary, Adam's deceiver was at laft crufhed; Adam was restored to his Maker's favour, and therefore may fecurely resume his human rank.

After the scheme and fabrick of the poem, muft be confidered its component parts, the fentiments and the diction.

The fentiments, as expreffive of manners, or appropriated to characters, are, for the greater part, unexceptionably just.

Splendid

Splendid paffages, containing leffons of morality, or precepts of prudence, occur feldom. Such is the original forination of this poem, that as it admits no human manners till the Fall, it can give little affistance to human conduct. Its end is to raise the thoughts above fublunary cares or pleafures. Yet the praise of that fortitude, with which Abdiel maintained his fingularity of virtue against the fcorn of multitudes, may be accommodated to all times; and Raphael's reproof of Adam's curiofity after the planetary motions, with the answer returned by Adam, may be confidently opposed to any rule of life which any poet has delivered.

The thoughts which are occafionally called forth in the progrefs, are fuch as could only be produced by an imagination in the highest degree fervid and active, to which materials were, fupplied by inceffant study and unlimited curiofity. The heat of Milton's mind might be faid to fublimate his learning, to throw off into his work the spirit of science, unmingled with its groffer parts.

He had confidered creation in its whole extent, and his defcriptions are therefore learned. He had accuftomed his imagination to unreftrained indulgence, and his conceptions therefore were extensive. The characteristick quality of his poem is fublimity. He fometimes defcends to the elegant, but his element is the great. He can occafionally inveft himself with grace; but his natural port is gigantick loftiness *. He can pleafe when pleasure is required; but it is his peculiar power to astonish.

Algarotti terms it gigantefca fublimità Miltoniana. Orig. Edit. YOL. II.

M

He

He feems to have been well acquainted with his own genius, and to know what it was that Nature had beftowed upon him more bountifully than upon others; the power of difplaying the vaft, illuminating the fplendid, enforcing the awful, darkening the gloomy, and aggravating the dreadful: he therefore chose a subject on which too much could not be faid, on which he might tire his fancy without the cenfure of extravagance.

The appearances of nature, and the occurrences of life, did not fatiate his appetite of greatnefs. To paint things as they are, requires a minute attention, and employs the memory rather than the fancy.. Milton's delight was to fport in the wide regions of poffibility; reality was a fcene too narrow for his mind. He fent his faculties out upon discovery, into worlds where only imagination can travel, and delighted to form new modes of existence, and furnish fentiment and action to fuperior beings, to trace the counfels of hell, or accompany the choirs of heaven.

But he could not be always in other worlds; he must fometimes revifit earth, and tell of things vifible and known. When he cannot raife wonder by the fublimity of his mind, he gives delight by its fertility.

Whatever be his fubject, he never fails to fill the imagination. But his images and defcriptions of the fcenes or operations of Nature do not feem to be always copied from original form, nor to have the freshnefs, racinefs, and energy of immediate obfervation. He faw Nature, as Dryden expreffes it, through the Spectacles of books; and on most occafions calls learning to his affiftance. The garden of Eden brings to his mind the vale of Enna, where Proferpine was gather

ing flowers. Satan makes his way through fighting elements, like Argo between the Cyanean rocks, or Ulyffes between the two Sicilian whirlpools, when he fhunned Charybdis on the larboard. The mythological allufions have been justly cenfured, as not being always used with notice of their vanity; but they contribute variety to the narration, and produce an alternate exercise of the memory and the fancy.

His fimilies are lefs numerous, and more various, than those of his predeceffors. But he does not confine himself within the limits of rigorous comparison : his great excellence is amplitude, and he expands the adventitious image beyond the dimenfions which the occafion required. Thus comparing the fhield of Satan to the orb of the Moon, he crouds the imagination with the discovery of the telescope, and all the wonders which the telescope discovers.

Of his moral fentiments it is hardly praife to affirm that they excel thofe of all other poets; for this fuperiority he was indebted to his acquaintance with the facred writings. The ancient epick poets, wanting the light of Revelation, were very unfkilful teachers of virtue their principal characters may be great, but they are not amiable. The reader may rife from their works with a greater degree of active or paffive fortitude, and sometimes of prudence; but he will be able to carry away few precepts of justice, and none of mercy.

From the Italian writers it appears, that the advantages of even Chriftian knowledge may be poffeffed in vain. Ariofto's pravity is generally known; and though the Deliverance of Jerusalem may be confidered

as a facred fubject, the poet has been very sparing of moral instruction.

In Milton every line breathes fanctity of thought, and purity of manners, except when the train of the narration requires the introduction of the rebellious fpirits; and even they are compelled to acknowledge their fubjection to God, in fuch a manner as excites reverence, and confirms piety.

Of human beings there are but two; but thofe two are the parents of mankind, venerable before their fall for dignity and innocence, and amiable after it for repentance and fubmiffion. In their firft ftate their affection is tender without weakness, and their piety sublime without prefumption. When they have finned, they shew how discord begins in mutual frailty, and how it ought to cease in mutual forbearance; how confidence of the divine favour is forfeited by fin, and how hope of pardon may be obtained by penitence and prayer. A ftate of innocence we can only conceive, if indeed, in our prefent mifery, it be poffible to conceive it ; but the fentiments and worship proper to a fallen and offending being, we have all to learn, as we have all to practise.

The poet, whatever be done, is always great. Our progenitors, in their first state, converfed with angels; even when folly and fin had degraded them, they had not in their humiliation the port of mean fuitors; and they rife again to reverential regard, when we find that their prayers were heard.

As human paffions did not enter the world before the Fall, there is in the Paradife Loft little opportunity for the pathetick; but what little there is has not been loft. That paffion which is peculiar to rational

nature,