Of aery threats to awe whom yet with deeds Thou canst not. Haft thou turn'd the least of these To flight, or if to fall, but that they rife 285 Unvanquish'd, easier to tranfact with me 290 That thou shouldft hope, imperious, and with threats I fly not, but have fought thee far and nigh. 295 Of Пnλedu, un ♪n μ2 £781001 ye, ver. 262? where Satan is call'd νηπυτιον ὡς, Ελπεο δε διξεθαι 289. The firife which thou call ft evil,] The author gave it The ftrife which thou call' bateful. the author of evil, of evil difplay'd in acts of hateful ftrife: and fo in &c. I think that bateful would ver. 275. evil go with thee along have been a more accurate expreffion, but evil is juftifiable. Pearce. 298. can relate, &c.] The This appears from Michael's words accufative cafe after the verbs reabove, ver. 264. ful to all. Thefe acts of hateful firife, hate- late and liken is fight before menwho though with the tongue of Angels tion'd, and here understood. For can relate that fight or to what conSpicuous things on earth can liken it, fo Of Angels, can relate, or to what things 300 Of Godlike pow'r? for likeft Gods they seem'd, In horror; from each hand with speed retir'd, fo confpicuous as to lift human imagination &c. A general battel is a fcene of too much confufion, and therefore the poets relieve themfelves and their readers by draw ing now and then a fingle combat between fome of their principal heroes, as between Paris and Menelaus, Hector and Ajax, Hector and Achilles in the Iliad, and between Turnus and Pallas, Æneas and Mezentius, Turnus and Æneas in the Æneid: and very fine they are, but fall very fhort of the fub 7 310 Two planets rushing from aspéct malign Of fierceft oppofition in mid fky 314 Should combat, and their jarring spheres confound. Together both with next to' almighty arm (fays Dr. Bentley) that Milton gave it warfare instead of war were. I fuppofe the Doctor to mean, that in the common reading there is wanting a copulative particle between the 312th and 313th verses. Now how does the Doctor's aktera. tion mend the matter? Broke and In with his ufual judgment. Æn. VIII. 691. -pelago credas innare revulfas Cycladas, aut montes concurrere montibus altos. But (as Mr. Thyer obferves) he has leffen'd the grandeur and fublimity the idle fuperftitious notion of the of this fimile by tarnishing it with malignancy of planets in a parti cular afpect or oppofition, as the judicial aftrologers term it. 316. Together both with next to almighty arm the paffage fhould be pointed with Uplifted imminent,] So I conceive Sprung (he fays) are both participles of the ablative cafe. Suppofe them fo; will there not be wanting in the Doctor's reading a copulative particle between the 311th and 312th verses, to connect broke and Sprung? So that the fault of Milton (if it be a fault) is not remov'd from the poem by the the comma after imminent, and not Doctor, but only fhifted to another after verfe. We had better keep then arm, that the words uplifted the old reading, and allow the poet tion with arm, rather than with may be join'd in conftructhe liberty of dropping the copulative before the words Two planets, on account of that fire of imagination which was kindled, and the highth of that noble fury with which he was poffefsid. Pearce. 313. Two planets &c.] Milton feems to have taken the hint of this fimile from that of Virgil, but varied and applied to his fubject imminent froke or they following. The arm 321.from the armoury of God 320 In might or fwift prevention: but the fword Milton, notwithstanding the fublime genius he was mafter of, has in this book drawn to his affiftance all the helps he could meet with among the ancient poets. The fword of Michael, which makes fo great a havoc among the bad Angels, was given him, we are told, out of the armoury of God, Was giv'n him temper'd fo, that neither keen Nor folid might refift that edge: it met The fword of Satan with fteep force to fmite Descending, and in half cut sheer; This paffage is a copy of that in Virgil, wherein the poet tells us, that the fword of Eneas, which was given him by a deity, broke into pieces the fword of Turnus, which came from a mortal forge. As the moral in this place is divine, fo by the way we may obferve, that the bestowing on a man who is favor'd by Heaven fuch an allegorical weapon, is very conformable to the old eaftern way of thinking. Not only Homer has All made ufe of it, but we find the Jewish hero in the book of Maccabees, 2 Maccab. XV. 15, 16. who had fought the battels of the chofen people with fo much glory and fuccefs, receiving in his dream a fword from the hand of the prophet Jeremiah. Addifon. Taffo likewife mentions the armoury of God, Cant. 7. St. 80. But this account of Michael's fword feems to be copied from Arthegal's in Spenfer, Fairy Queen, B. 5. Cant. 1. St. 10. For of most perfect metal it was made, And was of no less virtue, than of fame. For there no fubftance was fo firm and hard, But it would pierce or cleave, Ne any armour could his dint outwhereso it came; ward, But wherefoever it did light it throughly fhar'd. All his right fide: then Satan first knew pain, We have here a fair opportunity to obferve how finely great geniufes imitate one another. There is a most beautiful paffage in Homer's Iliad, III. 363. where the fword of Menelaus in a duel with Paris breaks in pieces in his hand; and the line in the original is fo contriv'd, that we do not only fee the action, as Euftathius remarks, but almoft fancy we hear the found of the breaking fword in the found of the words, Τείχθατε και τετεαχθα δια τρυφεν εκπεσε χειρθ. As this kind of beauty could hardly be equal'd by Virgil, he has with ly be equal'd by Virgil, he has with great judgment fubftituted another of his own, and has artfully made a break in the verfe to exprefs the breaking fhort of the fword of Turnus against the divine armour of Æneas, Æn. XII. 731. &c. at perfidus enfis Frangitur, in medioque ardentem deferit itu. But he did not think this fufficient, he was fenfible that Homer had ftill the advantage, and therefore goes on after feeming to have done with it, -poftquam arma dei ad Vulcania ventum eft, Mortalis mucro, glacies ceu futilis, ictu Diffiluit; fulvâ refplendent frag mina arenâ. And this beauty being more imitable in our language than the τειχία τε και τετραχθα of Hom mer, the excellent tranflator of Homer has here rather copied Virgil than tranflated Homer, The brittle steel, unfaithful to his hand, Broke fhort: the fragments glit ter'd on the fand. The fword of Satan is broken as well as thofe of Paris and Turnus, but is as thofe of Paris and Turnus, but is broken in a different manner, and confequently a different kind of broke fhort, and were shatter'd inbeauty is proper here. Their's to various fragments; but the fword of Michael was of that irrefiftible fharpness, that it cut the fword of Satan quite and clean in two, and the dividing of the fword in half is very well exprefs'd by half a verfe, as likewife the word defcending is plac'd admirably to exprefs the fenfe. The reader cannot read it over again without perceiving this beauty. Neither does Milton ftop here, but carries on beauties of the fame kind to the defcription of the wound, and the verfes feem almoft |