My hasting days fly on with full career, 5 10 It shall be still in strictest measure even To that same lot, however mean or high, Toward which Time leads me, and the Will of Heaven; All is, if I have grace to use it so, As ever in my great Task-Master's eye. "On our quickest decrees "The inaudible and noiseless foot of Time But the application of steal is different. In Shakspeare, Time comes imperceptibly upon, so as to prevent, our purposes. In Milton, Time, as imperceptibly and silently, in his flight, the poet's twenty-third year. here be forgotten, in a passage of consummate elegance, Sat. ix. 129. "Dum serta, unguenta, puellas, brings on his wing, Juvenal should not "Poscimus, obrepit non intellecta senectus." T. Warton. Nor should a passage of similar elegance in Chaucer be forgotten, Clerke's Tale, v. 7796, ed. Tyrwhitt. "And though your grene youth floure as yet, "In crepeth age alway as still as ston." TODD. VIII. When the assault was intended to the City. CAPTAIN, or Colonel, or Knight in arms, Whose chance on these defenceless doors may seize, If deed of honour did thee ever please, Guard them, and him within protect from harms. He can requite thee; for he knows the charms That call fame on such gentle acts as these, And he can spread thy name o'er lands and seas, Whatever clime the sun's bright circle warms. Lift not thy spear against the Muses' bower: The great Emathian conquerour bid spare 5 10 Ver. 1. Captain, or Colonel, or Knight in arms,] So Shakspeare, K. Richard II. A. i. S. iii. Where Bolingbroke enters, "appellant in armour :" 66 Marshall, ask yonder knight in arms." T. WARTON. See also The Warres of Cyrus king of Persia, 1594. "I trust your loue among the liuing dwels, "And like a champion and a knight at armes." TODD. Ver. 10. The great Emathian conquerour bid spare The house of Pindarus,] As a poet, Milton had as good right to expect this favour as Pindar. Nor was the English monarch less a protector of the arts, and a lover of poetry, than Alexander. As a subject, Milton was too conscious that his situation was precarious, and that his seditious tracts had forfeited all pretensions to his sovereign's mercy. Mr. Bowle here refers us to Pliny, L. vii. c. 29. "Alexander Magnus Pindari vatis familiæ penatibusque jussit parci, cum Thebas caperet." And to the old commentator on Spenser's Pastorals, who relates this incident more at large, and where it might have first struck Milton as a great reader of Spenser. Ælian says, that in this The house of Pindarus, when temple and tower Went to the ground: And the repeated air Of sad Electra's poet had the power To save the Athenian walls from ruin bare. havock, Alexander ETIMHZE honoured the family of Pindar, and suffered his house alone to stand untouched and entire : having killed ninety thousand Thebans, and captivated thirty thousand. T. WARTON. Ver. 11. when temple and tower Went to the ground:] Temple and tower is a frequent combination in the old metrical romances. See Sege of Jerusalem, MSS. Cott. Cal. A. 2. f. 122. And Davie's Alexander, Bibl. Bodl. f. 112. Our author has it again, Par. Reg. B. iii. 268. "O'er hill and dale, "Forest, and field, and flood, temples and towers." And again, in the description of the buildings of Rome, B. iv. 34. "With towers and temples, &c." T. WARTON. Ver. 13. Of sad Electra's poet &c.] Plutarch relates that when the Lacedemonian general Lysander took Athens, it was proposed in a council of war intirely to rase the city, and convert its site into a desart. But during the debate, at a banquet of the chief officers, a certain Phocian sung some fine anastrophicks from a chorus of the Electra of Euripides; which so affected the hearers, that they declared it an unworthy act, to reduce a place, so celebrated for the production of illustrious men, to total ruin and desolation. The lines of Euripides are at v. 168. ̓Αγαμέμνονος ὦ κόρα, ἤλυθον Η λέκτρα ποτὶ σὰν αγροτέραν αὐλάν. It appears, however, that Lysander ordered the walls and fortifi cations to be demolished. See Plutarch, Opp. tom. ii. Vit. p. 807. Par. 1572. 8°. By the epithet sad, Milton denominates the pathetick character of Euripides. Repeated signifies recited. But it has been ingeniously suggested, that the epithet ́sad be IX. To a virtuous young Lady. LADY, that in the prime of earliest youth 5 longs to Electra, who very often calls herself OIKTPA, TAAAINA, &c. in Euripides's play; and says, that all the city gave her the same appellation, κικλησκουσι δε μ' ΑΘΛΙΑΝ Ηλεκτραν πολιηται, T. WARTON. Electra had been before denominated sad by Drummond, in his Elegy on Prince Henry's death: "And sad Electra's sisters, who still weepe." This is one of Milton's best Sonnets, as Mr. Warton observes : It was written in 1642, when the King's army was arrived at Brentford, and had thrown the whole city into consternation. that overween,] He is fond of this word. See Par. Lost, B. x. 878, Par. Reg. B. i. 147, and Prose-Works, i. 141, ed. 1698. and ii. 515. TODD. Ver. 8. pity and ruth.] Here Ruth and ruth are made to rhyme to each other; and it may perhaps of Thy care is fix'd, and zealously attends To fill thy odorous lamp with deeds of light, sure 10 Therefore be Thou, when the bridegroom with his feastful friends Passes to bliss at the mid hour of night, Hast gain'd thy entrance, Virgin wise and pure. fend the niceness of modern ears that the same word should rhyme to itself though in different senses: But our old poets were not so very delicate; and the reader may see parallel instances in Spenser's Faer. Qu. i. vi. 39, vii. vi. 38. NEWTON. The same instances may be found in Tasso, Gier. Lib. C. i. st. xviii. C. xv. st. xvi. &c. Milton's combination of pity and Faer. Qu. i. vi. 12. ruth may be from Spenser. "And won with pity and unwonted ruth." It occurs also in the old metrical Hist. of Sir Bevis of Southampton: "He had such ruth and pity that the teares ran downe plenty." TODD. Ver. 11. And hope that reaps not shame.] Ver. 12. Ἐλπὶς οὐ καται when the bridegroom with his feastful friends] Feastful is an epithet in Spenser. He alludes to the midnight feasting of the Jews before the consummation of marriage. T. WARTON. Feastful is again used in Samson Agon. v. 1741: "On feastful days:" which is also a phrase in Archbishop Parker's translation of the Psalms, p. 234. "Our solempne feastful day." TODD. |