D Efcend from Heav'n, Urania, by that name If rightly thou art call'd, whofe voice divine Following, above th' Olympian hill I foar, Above the flight of Pegaféan wing. The meaning, not the name I call: for thou 1. Defcend from Heav'n, Urania,] Defcende cœlo, Hor. Od. III. IV. i. but here it is better apply'd, as now his fubject leads him from Heaven to Earth. The word Urania in Greek fignifies heav'nly; and he invokes the heav'nly Mufe as he had done before, I. 6. and as he had faid in the beginning that he intended to foar above th' Aonian mount, fo now he fays very truly that he had effected what he intended, and foars above th' Olympian hill, above the flight of Pegafean ving, that is his fubject was more fublime than the loftieft flights of the Heathen poets. Dr. Bentley propofes Parnaffus inftead of Olympus, but the mountain Olympus is likewife celebrated for the feat of the Mufes, who were therefore called Olympiades, as in Homer, Iliad II. 491. Alder Mira. And fome would read cold Olympus, as in I. 516. Ολυμ on the fnowy top Of cold Olympus Nor Nor of the Mufes nine, nor on the top 8 Before the bills appear'd, or foun tain flow'd, &c.] From Prov. VIII. 24, 25, 30. When there were no depths, I was brought forth; when there were no fountains, abounding with water: Before the mountains were fettled, before the bills was I brought forth: Then was I by him as one brought up with him; and I was daily bis delight, rejoicing always be fore him, or playing according to the Vulgar Latin (ludens coram eo omni tempore) to which Milton alludes, when he fays and with her didst play &c. And fo he quotes it likewife in his Tetrachordon, p. 222. Vol. I. Edit. 1738. "God himfelf conceals "not his own recreations before "the world was built; I was, faith "the eternal Wifdom, daily his de"light, playing always before him." I 10 An printer and poet, Fairy Queen, B. 2. Cant. 2. St. 39. Thus fairly fhe attempered her feast, And pleas'd them all with meet fatiety. agree with the Doctor that thee is better than thy temp'ring. Thyer. in allufion to the difficulty of refpi15 Thy temp'ring:] This is faid ration on high mountains. This empyreal air was too pure and fine for him, but the heavenly Muse temper'd and qualify'd it fo as to make him capable of breathing in it: which is a modeft and beautiful make favorable allowances for any way of befpeaking his reader to failings he may have been guilty of in treating of fo fublime a subject. 17. (as once 14- and drawn empyreal air, Bellerophon, &c.] Bellerophon Thy temp'ring;] Dr.Bentley makes was a beautiful and valiant youth, himself very merry in his infulting fon of Glaucus; who refufing the manner, with the word temp'ring, amorous applications of Antea wife and calls it the printer's blunder; of Prætus king of Argos, was by but I think the following application her falle fuggeftions like those of of it in Spenfer may juftify both Jofeph's mistrefs to her husband, fent An earthly guest, and drawn empyreal air, Left from this flying fteed unrein'd, (as once Half yet remains unfung, but narrower bound fent into Lycia with letters defiring his deftruction; where he was put on several enterprises full of hazard, in which however he came off con queror: but attempting vain-glorioufly to mount up to Heaven on the winged horfe Pegafus, he fell and wander'd in the Aleian plains till he died. Hume and Richardfon. His flory is related at large in the fixth book of Homer's Iliad; but it is to the latter part of it that Milton chiefly allades, ver. 200. &c. Αλλ' ότε δη κακείνος απήχθετο πασι θεοίσι, Ητοι ὁ καππεδιον το Αληίον οιὸς αλατο, 15 20 ver. 4. 21. Half yet remains unfung.] I understand this with Mr. Richardton, Οι θυμον κατεδών, πατὸν ἀνθρώ- that 'tis the half of the epifode, not των αλεείνων. But when at laft, distracted in his mind, Forlook by Heav'n, forfaking human kind, of the whole work, that is here meant; for when the poem was divided into but ten books, that edition had this paffage at the beginning of the feventh as now. The epifode has two principal parts, the war in Heaven, and the new creation; the one was fung, but the other remained unfung, and he is Pope. now entring upon it. but narrower A 4 bound Wide o'er th' Aleian field he chofe to ftray, A long, forlorn, uncomfortable way. Within the visible diurnal sphere; Standing on earth, not rapt above the pole, To hoarfe or mute, though fall'n on evil days, 25 bound. Bound here feems to be a participle as well as unfung. Half yet remains unfung; but this other half is not rapt fo much into the invifible world as the former, it is confin'd in narrower compafs, and bound within the vifible fphere of day. 24. More fafe I fing with mortal voice, unchang'd To boarfe or mute,] Dr. Bentley reads with lofty voice. Why mortal voice? fays the Doctor. I answer, becaufe Milton had faid in ver. 2. that he had follow'd Urania's voice divine. Again (fays the Doctor) if his voice had grown hoarfe, would it not have been ftill mortal? and what is a voice changed to mute? Both thefe queftions are fatisfy'd by putting only a comma, as in the first editions, (not a colon, as the Doctor has done) after mute. The words unchang'd to boarfe or mute refer to I, and not to voice, as he 30 But fuppofes; and then all is good fenfe, and there will be no need to read with the Doctor, To boarfe or low. Pearce. 25.-though fall'n on evil days,] The repetition and turn of the words is very beautiful, -though fall'n on evil days, On evil days though fall'n, and evil tongues; &c. A lively picture this in a few lines of the poet's wretched condition. In darkness, though is fill understood; he was not become boarfe or mute though in darkness, though he was blind, and with dangers compass'd round, and folitude, obnoxious to the government, and having a world of enemies among the royal party, and therefore oblig'd to live very much in privacy and alone. And what ftrength of mind was it, that could not only fupport him under the weight of thefe misfortunes, but ena ble But drive far off the barbarous diffonance ble him to foar to fuch highths, as no human genius ever reached before? 31.- and fit audience find, though few. He had Horace in mind, Sat. I. X. 73. ―neque te ut miretur turba, labores, Contentus paucis lectoribus. 33. Of Bacchus and his revelers,] It is not improbable that the poet intended this as an oblique fatir upon the diffoluteness of Charles the fecond and his court; from whom he feems to apprehend the fate of Orpheus, a famous poet of Thrace, who tho' he is said to have charm'd woods and rocks with his divine fongs, yet was torn to pieces by the Bacchanalian women on Rhodope a mountain of Thrace, nor could the Mufe Calliope his mother defend him. So fail not thou, who thee implores; nor was his with ineffectual, for the government fuffer'd him to live and die unmolested. 35 40 Adam 40.- what enfued when Raphaël, &c.] Longinus has obferved, that there may be a loftinefs in fentiments, where there is no paffion, and brings inftances out of ancient The pathetic, as that great critic authors to fupport this his opinion. obferves, may animate and inflame the fublime, but is not effential to it. Accordingly, as he further remarks, we very often find that those who excel moft in ftirring up the paffions, very often want the talent of writing in the great and fublime manner, and fo on the contrary. Milton has shown himself a master in both these ways of writing. The feventh book, which we are now entring upon, is an inftance of that fublime, which is not mixed and worked up with paffion. The author appears in a kind of compofed and fedate majefty; and tho' the fentiments do not give fo great an emotion, as those in the former book, they abound |