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ADAM's Speech, at parting with the Angel, has in it a Deference and Gratitude agreeable to an inferior Nature, and at the fame Time a certain Dignity and Greatnefs fuitable to the Father of Mankind in his State of Innocence.

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IF

SPECTATOR, N° 351.

In te omnis domus inclinata recumbit.

On thee the Fortunes of our Houfe depend.

VIRG.

Homer

F we look into the three great Heroic Poems which have appeared in the World, we may obferve that they are built upon very flight Foundations. lived near 300 Years after the Trojan War, and, as the Writing of History was not then in ufe among the Greeks, we may very well fuppofe, that the Tradition of Achilles and Uyes had brought down but very few Particulars to his Knowledge, tho' there is no Queftion but he has wrought into his two Poems fuch of their remarkable Adventures as were ftill talked of among his Contemporaries.

THE Story of Eneas, on which Virgil founded his Poem, was likewise very bare of Circumitances, and by that Means afforded him an Opportunity of embellishing it with Fiction, and giving a full Range to his own Invention. We find, however, that he has interwoven, in the Courfe of his Fable, the principal Particulars, which were generally believed among the Romans, of Eneas's Voyage and Settlement in Italy.

THE Reader may find an Abridgment of the whole Story, as collected out of the ancient Hiftorians, and as it was received among the Romans, in Dionyfius Halicarnaffeus.

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SINCE

SINCE none of the Critics have confidered Virgil's Fable with relation to this Hiftory of Æneas; it may not, perhaps, be amiss to examine it in this Light, fo far as regards my prefent purpose. Whoever looks into the Abridgment above-mentioned, will find that the Character of Æneas is filled with Piety to the Gods, and a fuperftitious Obfervation of Prodigies, Oracles, and Predictions. Virgil has not only preserved this Character in the Perfon of Eneas, but has given a Place in his Poem to thofe particular Prophecies which he found recorded of him in Hiftory and Tradition. The Poet took the Matters of Fact as they came down to him, and circumftanced them after his own Manner, to make them appear the more natural, agreeable, or surprising. I believe very many Readers have been fhocked at that ludicrous Prophecy, which one of the Harpies pronounces to the Trojans in the Third Book, namely, that before they had built their intended City, they should be reduced by Hunger to eat their very Tables. But, when they hear, that this was one of the Circumstances that had been tranfmitted to the Romans in the History of Eneas, they will think the Poet did very well in taking notice of it. The Hiftorian above-mentioned acquaints us, a Prophetefs had foretold Eneas, that he fhould take his Voyage Weftward, till his Companions fhould eat their Tables, and that accordingly, upon his landing in Italy, as they were eating their Flesh upon Cakes of Bread for want of ther Conveniencies, they afterwards fed on the Cakes themselves; upon which one of the Company faid merrily, We are eating our Tables. They immediately took the Hint, fays the Hiftorian, and concluded the Prophecy to be fulfilled. As Virgil did not think it proper to omit fo material a Particular in the Hiftory of Æneas, it may be worth while to confider with how much Judgment he has qualified it, and taken off every thing that might have appeared improper for a Paffage in an Heroic Poem. The Prophetess who foretells it is an hungry Harpy, as the Perfon who difcovers it is young Afcanius

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Heus etiam menfas confumimus, inquit Iulus!

SUCH an Obfervation, which is beautiful in the Mouth of a Boy, would have been ridiculous from any other of the Company. I am apt to think, that the changing of the Trojan Fleet into Water-nymphs, which is the most violent Machine of the whole Eneid, and has given Offence to feveral Critics, may be accounted for the fame Way. Virgil himself, before he begins that Relation, premises that what he was going to tell appeared incredible, but that it was juftified by Tradition. What further confirms me, that this Change of the Fleet was a celebrated Circumstance in the History of Enas is, that Ovid has given a Place to the fame Metamorphofis in his Account of the Heathen Mythology.

NONE of the Critics I have met with having confidered the Fable of the Eneid in this Light, and taken notice how the Tradition, on which it was founded, authorifes thofe Parts in it which appear the most exceptionable; I hope the Length of this Reflexion will not make it unacceptable to the curious Part of my Readers.

THE Hiftory, which was the Bafis of Milton's Poem, is still shorter than either that of the Iliad or Eneid. The Poet has likewife taken care to infert every Circumftance of it in the Body of his Fable. The Ninth Book, which we are here to confider, is raised upon that brief Account in Scripture, wherein we are told that the Serpent was more fubtle than any Beast of the Field, that he had tempted the Woman to eat of the forbidden Fruit, that fhe was overcome by this Tempta tion, and that Adam followed her Example. From these few Particulars Milton has formed one of the most entertaining Fables that Invention ever produced. He has difpofed of these several Circumstances among fo many agreeable and natural Fictions of his own, that his whole Story looks only like a Comment upon Sacred Writ, or rather feems to be a full and complete Relation of what the other is only an Epitome. I have infifted

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the longer on this Confideration, as I look upon the Difpofition and Contrivance of the Fable to be the principal Beauty of the Ninth Book, which has more Story in it, and is fuller of Incidents, than any other in the whole Poem. Satan's traverfing the Globe, and ftill keeping within the Shadow of the Night, as fearing to be difcovered by the Angel of the Sun, who had before detected him, is one of those beautiful Imaginations with which he introduces this his fecond Series of Adventures. Having examined the Nature of every Creature, and found out one which was the most proper for his Purpose, he again returns to Paradife; and, to avoid Difcovery, finks by Night with a River that ran under the Garden, and rifes up again through a Fountain that iffued from it by the Tree of Life. The Poet, who, as we have before taken notice, fpeaks as little as poffible in his own Perfon, and, after the Example of Homer, fills every Part of his Work with Manners and Characters, introduces a Soliloquy of this infernal Agent, who was thus reftlefs in the Deftruction of Man. He is then defcribed as gliding through the Garden under the Refemblance of a Mist, in order to find out that Creature in which he defigned to tempt our first Parents. This Defcription has fomething in it very poetical and surprising.

So faying, through each Thicket dark or dry,
Like a black Mift, low creeping, he held on
His midnight Search, where foonest he might find
The Serpent: bim faft fleeping foon be found
In Labyrinth of many a Round felf-roll'd,
His Head the midft, well flor'd with fubtle Wiles.

THE Author afterwards gives us a Defcription of the Morning, which is wonderfully fuitable to a Divine Poem, and peculiar to that first Season of Nature: He represents the Earth, before it was curft, as a great Altar breathing out its Incense from all Parts, and fending up a pleasant Savour to the Noftrils of its Creator; to which

which he adds a noble Idea of Adam and Eve as offering their Morning Worship, and filling up the univerfal Confort of Praise and Adoration.

Now when a facred Light began to dawn

In Eden on the humid Flowers, that breath'd
Their Morning Incenfe, when all Things that breathe
From th' Earth's great Altar send up filent Praise
To the Creator, and his Noftrils fill

With grateful Smell; forth came the human Pair,
And join'd their vocal Worship to the Choir
Of Creatures wanting Voice.

THE Difpute which follows between our two first Parents is represented with great Art. It proceeds from a Difference of Judgment, not of Paffion, and is managed with Reafon, not with Heat: It is fuch a Difpute as we may fuppofe might have happened in Paradife, had Man continued happy and innocent. There is a great Delicacy in the Moralities which are interfperfed in Adam's Difcourfe, and which the most ordinary Reader cannot but take notice of. That Force of Love which the Father of Mankind fo finely defcribes in the Eighth Book, and which is inferted in the foregoing Paper, fhews itself here in many beautiful Inftances; as in thofe fond Regards he cast towards Eve at her parting from him.

Her long with ardent Look his Eye pursued
Delighted, but defiring more her Stay.
Oft be to her his Charge of quick Return
Repeated; he to him as oft engag'd
To be return'd by Noon amid the Bower.

IN his Impatience and Amusement during her Abfence:

Adam

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