absurdity as glaring as that of the bigoted Puritans, who objected to some of the noblest and most scriptural prayers ever dictated by wisdom and piety, simply because the Roman Catholics had used them.

Hayley, p. 107. "The ambition of Milton," &c.

I do not approve the so frequent use of this word relatively to Milton. Indeed the fondness for ingrafting a good sense on the word "ambition," is not a Christian impulse in general.

Hayley, p. 110. "Milton himself seems to have thought it allowable in literary contention to vilify, &c. the character of an opponent; but surely this doctrine is unworthy," &c.

If ever it were allowable, in this case it was especially so. But these general observations, without meditation on the particular times and the genius of the times, are most often as unjust as they are always superficial.

(Hayley, p. 133. Hayley is speaking of Milton's panegyric on Cromwell's government :—)

Besides, however Milton might and did regret the immediate necessity, yet what alternative was there? Was it not better that Cromwell should usurp power, to protect religious freedom at least, than that the Presbyterians should usurp it to introduce a religious persecution,-extending the notion of spiritual concerns so far as to leave no freedom even to a man's bedchamber?

(Hayley, p. 250. Hayley's conjectures on the origin of the Paradise Lost:-)

If Milton borrowed a hint from any writer, it was more probably from Strada's Prolusions, in which the Fall of the Angels is pointed out as the noblest subject for a Christian poet.* The more dissimilar the detailed images are, the more likely it is that a great genius should catch the general idea.

* The reference seems generally to be to the 5th Prolusion of the 1st Book. Hic arcus hac tela, quibus olim in magno illo Superum tumultu princeps armorum Michael confixit auctorem proditionis; hic fulmina humanæ mentis terror. * * * In nubibus armatas bello legiones instruam, atque inde pro re nata auxiliares ad terram copias evocabo. Hic mihi Cælites, quos esse ferunt elementorum tutelares,

* * *

*

*

*

prima illa corpora miscebunt.-Sec. 4.-Ed.

(Hayl. p. 294. Extracts from the Adamo of Andreini :,

"Lucifero. Che dal mio centro oscuro

Mi chiama a rimirar cotanta luce?

Who from my dark abyss

Calls me to gaze on this excess of light?"

The words in italics are an unfair translation.

They may sug

gest that Milton really had read and did imitate this drama. The original is, in so great light.' Indeed the whole version is af fectedly and inaccurately Miltonic.

Ib. v. 11. Che di fango opre festi—

Forming thy works of dust (no, dirt)—

Ib. v. 17. Tessa pur stella a stella,

V' aggiunga e luna, e sole.—

Let him unite above

Star upon star, moon, sun.

Let him weave star to star,
Then join both moon and sun!

Ib. v. 21. Ch 'al fin con biasmo e scorno
Vana l'opra sarà, vano il sudore!

Since in the end division

Shall prove his works and all his efforts vain.

Since finally with censure and disdain

Vain shall the work be, and his toil be vain!

1796.*

The reader of Milton must be always on his duty: he is surrounded with sense; it rises in every line; every word is to the purpose. There are no lazy intervals; all has been considered, and demands and merits observation. If this be called obscurity, let it be remembered that it is such an obscurity as is a compli ment to the reader; not that vicious obscurity, which proceeds from a muddled head.

* From a common-place book of Mr. C.'s, communicated by Mr. J. M. Gutch.-Ed.

ASIATIC AND GREEK

LECTURE XL*

MYTHOLOGIES-ROBINSON CRUSOE-USE OF

WORKS OF IMAGINATION IN EDUCATION.

A CONFOUNDING of God with Nature, and an incapacity of finding unity in the manifold and infinity in the individual,—these are the origin of polytheism. The most perfect instance of this kind of theism is that of early Greece; other nations seem to have either transcended, or come short of, the old Hellenic standard,a mythology in itself fundamentally allegorical, and typical of the powers and functions of nature, but subsequently mixed up with a deification of great men and hero-worship,—so that finally the original idea became inextricably combined with the form and attributes of some legendary individual. In Asia, probably from the greater unity of the government and the still surviving influence of patriarchal tradition, the idea of the unity of God, in a distorted reflection of the Mosaic scheme, was much more generally preserved; and accordingly all other super or ultra-human beings could only be represented as ministers of, or rebels against, his will. The Asiatic genii and fairies are, therefore, always endowed with moral qualities, and distinguishable as malignant or benevolent to man. It is this uniform attribution of fixed inoral qualities to the supernatural agents of eastern mythology that particularly separates them from the divinities of old Greece.

Yet it is not altogether improbable that in the Samothracian or Cabeiric mysteries the link between the Asiatic and Greek popular schemes of mythology lay concealed. Of these mysteries there are conflicting accounts, and, perhaps, there were variations of doctrine in the lapse of ages and intercourse with other systems. But, upon a review of all that is left to us on this subject

* Partly from Mr. Green's note.-Ed.

Compare with the doctrine of this lecture, Schelling's Ueber die Gottheiten von Samothrace, and Creutzer's criticism of it, together with his own account of the eldest religion of Greece: Symbolik, Sechstes Capitel. Werke, 2 Th. 53, 302-377.-Am. Ed.

in the writings of the ancients, we may, I think, make out thus much of an interesting fact,-that Cabiri, impliedly at least, meant socii, complices, having a hypostatic or fundamental union with, or relation to, each other; that these mysterious divinities were, ultimately at least, divided into a higher and lower triad ; that the lower triad, primi quia infimi, consisted of the old Titanic deities or powers of nature, under the obscure names of Axieros, Axiokersos and Axiokersa, representing symbolically different modifications of animal desire or material action, such as hunger, thirst, and fire, without consciousness; that the higher triad, ultimi quia superiores, consisted of Jupiter (Pallas, or Apollo, or Bacchus, or Mercury, mystically called Cadmilos) and Venus, representing, as before, the vous or reason, the λóyos or word or communicative power, and the lows or love; that the Cadmilos or Mercury, they manifested, communicated, or sent, appeared not only in his proper person as second of the higher triad, but also as a mediator between the higher and lower triad, and so there were seven divinities; and, indeed, according to some authorities, it might seem that the Cadmilos acted once as a mediator of the higher, and once of the lower, triad, and that so there were eight Cabeiric divinities. The lower or Titanic powers being subdued, chaos ceased, and creation began in the reign of the divinities of mind and love; but the chaotic gods still existed in the abyss, and the notion of evoking them was the origin, the idea, of the Greek necromancy.

These mysteries, like all the others, were certainly in connection with either the Phoenician or Egyptian systems, perhaps with both. Hence the old Cabeiric powers were soon made to answer the corresponding popular divinities; and the lower triad was called by the uninitiated, Ceres, Vulcan, or Pluto, and Proserpine, and the Cadmilos became Mercury. It is not without ground that I direct your attention, under these circumstances to the probable derivation of some portion of this most remarkable system from patriarchal tradition, and to the connection of the Cabeiri with the Kabbala.

The Samothracian mysteries continued in celebrity till some time after the commencement of the Christian era.* But they

In the reign of Tiberius, A.D. 18, Germanicus attempted to visit Samothrace;-illum in regressu sacra Samothracum visere nitentem obvii aquilones depulere. Tacit. Ann. ii. c. 54.-Ed.

gradually sank with the rest of the ancient system of mythology, to which, in fact, they did not properly belong. The peculiar doctrines, however, were preserved in the memories of the initiated, and handed down by individuals. No doubt they were propagated in Europe, and it is not improbable that Paracelsus received many of his opinions from such persons, and I think a connection may be traced between him and Jacob Behmen.

The Asiatic supernatural beings are all produced by imagining an excessive magnitude, or an excessive smallness combined with great power; and the broken associations, which must have given rise to such conceptions, are the sources of the interest which they inspire, as exhibiting, through the working of the imagination, the idea of power in the will. This is delightfully exemplified in the Arabian Nights' Entertainments, and indeed, more or less, in other works of the same kind. In all these there is the same activity of mind as in dreaming, that is an exertion of the fancy in the combination and recombination of familiar objects so as to produce novel and wonderful imagery. To this must be added that these tales cause no deep feeling of a moral kind—whether of religion or love; but an impulse of motion is communicated to the mind without excitement, and this is the reason of their being so generally read and admired.

I think it not unlikely that the Milesian Tales contained the germs of many of those now in the Arabian Nights; indeed it is scarcely possible to doubt that the Greek Empire must have left deep impression on the Persian intellect. So also many of the Roman Catholic legends are taken from Apuleius. In that exquisite story of Cupid and Psyche, the allegory is of no injury to the dramatic vividness of the tale. It is evidently a philosophic attempt to parry Christianity with a quasi-Platonic account of the fall and redemption of the soul.

The charm of De Foe's works, especially of Robinson Crusoe, is founded on the same principle. It always interests, never agitates. Crusoe himself is merely a representative of humanity in general; neither his intellectual or his moral qualities set him above the middle degree of mankind; his only prominent characteristic is the spirit of enterprise and wandering, which is, nevertheless, a very common disposition. You will observe that all that is wonderful in this tale is the result of external circumstances of things which fortune brings to Crusoe's hand.