Thus at their fhady Lodge arriv'd, both flood,
Both turn'd, and under open Sky ador'd

The God that made both Sky, Air, Earth and Heav'n,
Which they beheld, the Moon's refplendent Globe,
And Starry Pole: Thou also mad'st the Night,
Maker omnipotent, and thou the Day, &c.

MOST of the modern heroic Poets have imitated the Ancients, in beginning a Speech without premising, that the Perfon faid thus or thus: but as it is eafy to imitate the Ancients in the Omiffion of two or three Words, it requires Judgment to do it in fuch a Man-ner as they fhall not be miffed, and that the Speech may begin naturally without them. There is a fine Inftance of this Kind out of Homer, in the Twenty-third Chapter of Longinus.

10601616acacacacacao SPECTATOR, N° 327.

-Major rerum mihi nafcitur ordon

A larger Scene of Action is difplay'd.

VIRG.

DRYDEN.

WEvil Spirit practifed upon Eve as the lay a

were told in the foregoing Book how the

fleep, in order to infpire her with Thoughts of Vanity, Pride and Ambition. The Author, who fhews a wonderful Art throughout his whole Poem, in preparing the Reader for the feveral Occurrences that arise in it, founds upon the above mentioned Circumftance the Firft Part of the Fifth Book. Adam, upon his awaking, finds Eve still asleep, with an unusual Difcompofure in her Looks. The Pofture in which he regards her, is described with a Tenderness not to be expreffed,

as

as the Whisper with which he awakens her is the fofteft that ever was conveyed to a Lover's Ear.

His wonder was to find un-waken'd Eve
With Treffes difcompos'd and glowing Cheek
As through unquiet Reft: he on his Side
Leaning half-rais'd, with Looks of cordial Love
Hung over her enamour'd, and beheld
Beauty which, whether waking or asleep,
Shot forth peculiar Graces: Then with Voice
Mild, as when Zephyrus on Flora breathes,
Her Hand foft-touching, whisper'd thus: Awake
My faireft, my efpous'd, my latest found,
Heav'n's laft beft gift, my ever new Delight,
Awake: The Morning shines, and the fresh Field
Calls us, we lofe the Prime, to mark how Spring
Our tended Plants, how blows the Citron-grove,
What drops the Myrrh, and what the balmy Reed;
How Nature paints her Colours; how the Bee
Sits on the Bloom, extracting liquid fweet.
Such Whip'ring wak'd her, but with ftartled Eye
On Adam, whom embracing thus she spake:
O fole in whom my Thoughts find all Repose,
My Glory, my Perfection, glad I fee

Thy Face and Morn return'd

I cannot but take notice, that Milton, in the Conferences between Adam and Eve, had his Eye very frequently upon the Book of Canticles, in which there is a noble Spirit of Eastern Poetry, and very often not unlike what we meet with in Homer, who is generally placed near the Age of Solomon. I think there is no Question but the Poet in the preceding Speech remembered those two Paffages which are fpoken on the like Occafion, and filled with the fame pleafing Images of Nature.

"MY Beloved spake, and said unto me, Rife up, my Love, my Fair-one, and come away: For lo! "the Winter is past, the Rain is over and gone; the "Flowers appear on the Earth; the Time of the "Singing of Birds is come, and the Voice of the "Turtle is heard in our Land. The Fig tree putteth "forth her green Figs, and the Vines with the tender "Grape give a good Smell. Arife, my Love, my "Fair-one, and come away."

"COME, my Beloved, let us go forth into the "Field; let us get up early to the Vineyards, let us "fee if the Vine flourish, whether the tender Grape appear, and the Pomegranates bud forth."

66

HIS preferring the Garden of Eden to that

-Where the Sapient King

Held Dalliance with his fair Ægyptian Spouse,

fhews that the Poet had this delightful Scene in his Mind.

EVE's Dream is full of thofe high Conceits engendring Pride, which, we are told, the Devil endeavoured to inftill into her. Of this Kind is that Part of it where fhe fancies herself awakened by Adam in the following beautiful Lines:

Why fleep't thou, Eve? Now is the pleafant Time,
The cool, the filent, fave where Silence yields
To the night-warbling Bird, that now awake
Tunes fweeteft his love-labour'd Song; now reigns
Full orb'd the Moon, and with more pleafing Light
Shadowy fets off the Face of Things: In vain
If none regard; Heav'n wakes with all his Eyes,
Whom to behold but thee, Nature's Defire,
In whofe Sight all Things joy, with Ravishment
Attracted by thy Beauty fill to gaze!

AN

AN injudicious Poet would have made Adam talk thro' the whole Work, in fuch Sentiments as thefe. But Flattery and Falfhood are not the Courtship of Milton's Adam, and could not be heard by Eve in her State of Innocence, excepting only in a Dream produc'd on purpose to taint her Imagination. Other vain Sentiments of the fame Kind in this Relation of her Dream, will be obvious to every Reader. Tho' the Catastrophe of the Poem is finely prefaged on this Occafion, the Particulars of it are fo artfully fhadowed, that they do not anticipate the Story which follows in the Ninth Book. I fhall only add, that tho' the Vision itself is founded upon Truth, the Circumftances of it are full of that Wildness and Inconfiftency which are natural to a Dream. Adam, conformable to his fuperior Character for Wisdom, inftructs and comforts Eve upon this Occafion.

So chear'd be his fair Spoufe, and fhe was chear'd,
But filently a gentle Tear let fall

From either Eye, and wip'd them with her Hair;
Two other precious Drops that ready ftood,
Each in their cryftal Sluice, be ere they fell
Kifs'd as the gracious Signs of fweet Remorfe
And pious Awe, that fear'd to have offended.

THE Morning Hymn is written in Imitation of one of thofe Pfalms, where, in the Overflowings of Gratitude and Praife, the Pfalmift calls not only upon the Angels, but upon the moft confpicuous Parts of the inanimate Creation, to join with him in extolling their Common Maker. Invocations of this Nature fill the Mind with glorious Ideas of God's Works, and awaken that divine Enthusiasm, which is so natural to Devotion. But if this calling upon the dead Parts of Nature is at all Times a proper Kind of Worship, it was in a particular Manner fuitable to our firft Parents, who had the Creation fresh upon their Minds, and had

E 2

not

not feen the various Difpenfations of Providence, nor confequently could be acquainted with thofe many Topics of Praife which might afford Matter to the Devotions of their Pofterity. I need not remark the beautful Spirit of Poetry which runs through this whole Hymn, nor the Holiness of that Refolution with which it concludes.

HAVING already mentioned those Speeches which are affigned to the Perfons in this Poem, I proceed to the Defcription which the Poet gives of Raphael. His Departure from before the Throne, and his Flight through the Choirs of Angels, is finely imaged. As Milton every where fills his Poem with Circumftances that are marvellous and aftonishing, he describes the Gate of Heaven as framed after fuch a Manner that it opened of itself upon the Approach of the Angel who was to pass through it.

-till at the Gate

Of Heav'n arriv'd, the Gate felf-open'd wide,
On golden Hinges turning, as by Work
Divine the Sov'reign Architect had fram'd.

The Poet here feems to have regarded two or three Paffages in the 18th Iliad, as that in particular, where, fpeaking of Vulcan, Homer fays, that he had made twenty Tripodes, running on golden Wheels, which, upon Occafion, might go of themfelves to the Affembly of the Gods, and, when there was no more Ufe for them, return again after the fame Manner. Scaliger has rallied Homer very feverely upon this Point, as M. Dacier has endeavoured to defend it. I will not pretend to determine, whether in this Particular of Homer, the Marvellous does not lofe Sight of the Probable. As the Miraculous Workmanship of Milton's Gates is not fo extraordinary as this of the Tripodes, fo I am perfuaded he would not have mentioned it, had not he been fupported in it by a Paffage in the Scripture, which fpeaks of Wheels in Heaven that had Life in

them,