Of leaves and fuming rills, Aurora's fan, Ye Mifts and Exhalations that now rile Fro hill or fieaming lake &c. but they do not make a noise as fung, but only as rills. Aurora's fan, the fanning winds among the leaves may be properly call'd the fan of the morning, and it is not unatual to refer a thing which follows two fubftantives to the firit of the two only. Lightly difpers'd, Drey fays at dispel fleep is better than dipit: but tho' to difp peep may be the more ufual expreflion, yet to di perje fleep may be jutry'd by very great authority, for Sophocles makes ufe of the very fame. Soph. Trachin. 993. ΤΟ 15 Mild, Evandrum ex humili tecto lux fufcitat alma, Et matutini volucrum fub culmine cantus. The chearful morn falutes Evander's eyes, And fongs of chirping birds invite to rife. Dryden. And Erminia likewife in Taffo by the iweet noife of birds, winds, and waters, Cant. 7. St. 5. Non fi deftò fin che garrir gli augelli, Non fent lieti, e falutar gli albori, E mormorare il fiume, e gli arbofcelli, E con l'onda fcherzar l'aura, e co' fiori. Mild, as when Zephyrus on Flora breathes, Her hand soft touching, whisper'd thus. Awake Heav'n's last best gift, my ever new delight, 25 Such The rattling boughs and leaves," 16. Mild, as when Zephyrus on their part did Bear. Fairfax. Milton (as Dr. Greenwood adds), hath exactly copied this paffage in Taffo, but greatly improv'd upon it by adjufting one part of it to the peculiar mildnefs of the climate in Paradife. Here were no whistling, winds to rattle among the boughs, but only gentle gales to fan the leaves; which did not difpel fleep as Dr. Bentley would have it (for this word feems to carry an idea of force) but in our author's beautiful expreffion, lightly difpers'd it. 5-th' only found] This Dr. Bentley calls ftrange diction, and he will have it to be early found: but the prefent reading is countenanc'd by the following line in Spenfer, Faery Queen, B. 5. Cant. 11. St. 30. As if the only found thereof the fear'd. Thyer. Fiora breathes,] As when the foft western gales breathe on the flowers. Exceeding poetical Richardfon. and beautiful. For this delightful fimile Milton was probably oblig'd to his admir'd Ben Johnfon in his Mask of Love reconcil'd to Virtue. The fair will think you do 'em wrong, Go choose among- -but with a mind As gentle as the froaking wind Song 3d. Thyer. we lofe the prime,] The prime of the day; as he calls it elsewhere 21. -that fweet hour of prime, ver. 170. and IX. 200. The feafon prime for sweetek fents and airs. The Such whisp'ring wak'd her, but with startled eye On Adam, whom embracing, thus the spake. O fole in whom my thoughts find all repofe, Thy face, and morn return'd; for I this night 30 But 26. Such whiff'ring wak'd her,] We were told in the foregoing book how the evil Spirit practiced upon Eve as the lay afleep, in order to infpire her with thoughts of vanity, pride, and ambition. The author, who fhows a wonderful art throughout his whole poem, in preparing the reader for the feveral Occurrences that arife in it, founds upon the above-mention'd circumftance the first part of the fifth book. Adam upon his awaking finds Eve ftill afleep, with an unufual difcompofure in her looks. The pofture in which he regards her, is defcribed with a tendernefs not to be exprefs'd, as the whifper with which he awakens her, is the fofteft that ever was convey'd to a lover's ear. 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 plac'd near the age of Solomon. I think there is no que ftion but the poet in the preceding fpeech remember'd those two par fages which are spoken on the like occafion, and fill'd with the fame pleafing images of nature, Cant. II. 10, &c. My beloved spake and faid unto me, Rife up, my love, my fair one, and come away; for lo the winter is paft, the rain is over and gone, the flowers appear on the earth, the time of the finging 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 grapes give a good smell. Arife my love, my fair one, and come away- Cant. VII. 11, 12. Come, my beloved, let us go forth into the field, let us get up early to the vineyards, let us fee if the vine florift, But of offenfe and trouble, which my mind 35 Knew never till this irksome night: methought 40 Full pofe to taint her imagination. Other vain fentiments of the fame kind florib, whether the tender grapes ap- only in a dream produced on pur pear, and the pomegranate bud forth.. -His preferring the garden of in this relation of her dream will Eden to that, where the fapient king Held dalliance with his fair Egyptian spouse, IX. 443. hows that the poet had this delightful scene in view. Addifon. 35. methought. Clofe at mine ear &c.] Eve's dream is full of thofe high conceits ingendring pride, which we are told the Devil endevor'd to inftil into her. Of this kind is that part of it where the fancies herself awaken'd by Adam in the following beautiful lines, Why fleep'it thou Eve? &c. An injudicious poet would have made Adam talk thro' the whole work in fuch fentiments as thefe: but flattery and falfhood are not the courtship of Milton's Adam, and could not be heard by Eve in her fate of innocence, excepting be obvious to every reader. Tho the catastrophe of the poem is fmely 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 vifion itself is founded upon truth, the circumftances of it are full of that wildness and inconfiftency, which are natural to a dream. Addifon. 41. Tunes fweeteft his love-labor'd Jong;] Spenfer in his Epithalamion, a poem which Milton feems often to imitate, has it “the "bird's love-learned fong." muft farther obferve that our auWe thor takes great liberties in his use of the genders, fometimes making him and her and it of the fame thing or creature. We have a very remarkable inftance in VI. 878. Full orb'd the moon, and with more pleasing light I rofe as at thy call, but found thee not; 45 And on, methought, alone I pafs'd through ways 50 One fhap'd and wing'd like one of those from Heaven |