D Efcend from Heav'n, Urania, by that name are If rightly thou art call'd, whose 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. 1. 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 fear above th' Aonian mount, fo now he fays very truly that he had effected what he intended, and foars above th' Olympian bill, above the fight of Pegafean wing, 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 likewise celebrated for the feat of the Mufes, who were therefore called Olympiades, as in Homer, Iliad II. 491. πιάδες Μεσαι. And fome would read cold Olympus, as in I. 516. Ολυμ 5 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 hills was I brought forth: Then was I by him as one brought up with him; and I was daily his 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 didft play &c. And fo he quotes it likewife in his Tetrachordon, p. 222. Vol. I. Edit. 1738. "God himself conceals "not his own recreations before "the world was built; I was, faith "the eternal Wisdom, daily his delight, playing always before him." ་་ 14 and drawn empyreal air, 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 Mufe temper'd and qualify'd it fo as to make him capable of breathing in it: which is a modeft and beautiful way of befpeaking his reader to make favorable allowances for any failings he may have been guilty of in treating of fo fublime a subject. 17. (as once 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 falfe fuggeftions like thofe of of it in Spenfer may juftify both Jofeph's mistrefs to her husband, fent An earthly gueft, and drawn empyreal air,. Left from this flying fteed unrein'd, (as once Erroneous there to wander and forlorn. Half yet remains unfung, but narrower bound fent into Lycia with letters defiring his deftruction; where he was put on feveral enterprises full of hazard, in which however he came off con queror: but attempting vain-gloriously 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 ftory is related at large in the fixth book of Homer's Iliad; but it is to the latter part of it that Milton chiefly alludes, ver. 200. &c. Aaλ'ôte du nyugives a Taoi Jedlow, Ητοι ὁ καππεδιού το Αλήιον οιος αλατο, των αλεείνων.. But when at last, distracted in his mind, 15 20 Or Juμor natidav, warov a;;w that 'tis the half of the epifode, not 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 now entring upon it. —but narrower A 4 Forfook by Heav'n, forsaking human kind, Wide o'er th' Aleian field he chose A long, forlorn, uncomfortable way. bound. Within the visible diurnal sphere; Standing on earth, not rapt above the pole, Urania, and fit audience find, though few. 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 anfwer, because Milton had faid in ver. 2. that he had follow'd Urania's voice divine. Again (fays the Doctor) if his voice had grown boarfe, would it not have been still mortal? and what is a voice changed to mute? Both thefe questions 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 25 30 But fuppofes; and then all is good fenfe, and there will be no need to read with the Doctor, To hoarfe 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 ftill understood; he was not become hoarfe 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 faid 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 loftiness in sentiments, where there is no paffion, and brings inftances out of ancient authors to fupport this his opinion. The pathetic, as that great critic 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 fhown himself a master in both these ways of writing. The seventh 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 |