342. To whom thus Adam fervently reply'd. O Woman,] What Eve had just now said required some reprimand from Adam, and it was necessary to describe him as in some degree displeased; but what extreme delicacy has our author shown in choosing the word fervently to express it by? term which tho' it implies some emotion, yet carries nothing in its idea inconsistent with that subserviency of the passions, which subsisted before the fall. In the two foregoing speeches he had made Adam address himself to her in the affectionate terms of "Sole Eve, associate sole," and "Daughter of God and Man, immortal Eve;" but here with great judgment he changes those indearing words for those more authoritative, Q Woman. Indeed throughout this whole conversation, which the poet has in every respect worked up to a faultless perfection, there is the most exact observance of justness and propriety of character. With what strength is the superior excellency of man's understanding here pointed out, and how nicely does our author here sketch out the defects peculiar in general to the female mind? And after all, what great art has he shown in making Adam, contrary to his better reason, grant his spouse's request, beautifully verifying what he had made our general ancestor a little before observe to the Angel? viii. 546, &c. 353. But bid her well beware, and still erect,] It is very true, as Dr. Bentley observes, that erect requires the preceding word to be adjective like itself: but so is ware or wary, and so it is used Matth. xxiv. 50. "The Lord of that servant shall come in a day when he looketh not for him, and in an hour that he is not ware of ;" and 2 Tim. iv. 15. "Of whom be thou ware also;" And therefore be ware should not have been printed as one word, but as two; and then there could have been no mistake. 372. Go; for thy stay, not free, absents thee more;] It is related in the Life of Milton, tha the went into the country in the Whitsuntide vacation, and married his first wife Mary the daughter of Justice Powell of Oxfordshire. She had not lived with him above a month, before she was very desirous of returning to her friends in the country, there to spend the remainder of the summer. We may suppose, that upon this occasion their conversation was somewhat of the same nature as Adam and Eve's; and it was upon some such consideration as this, that after much solicitation he permitted her to go. Go, for thy stay, not free, absents thee more. 385. Thus saying, from ber husband's hand her band Soft she withdrew, &c.] The reader cannot but be pleased with this image. Notwithstanding this difference of judgment, while Adam is reasoning and arguing with her, he still holds her by the hand, which she gently withdraws, a little impatient to be gone, even while she is speaking. And the like a "Wood-nymph light," Oread a nymph of the mountains, or Dryad a nymph of the groves, of the oaks particularly, "or of Delia's train," the train of Diana, who is called Delia, as she was born in the island Delos, she "betook her to the groves," but she surpassed not only Diana's nymphs but Diana herself. 393. To Pales, or Pomona, thus adorn'd, Likest she seem'd, &c.] These four verses Dr. Bentley rejects, as the editor's manufacture. Let us examine his objections to them. For likeliest (says he) he meant likest. So he did, and so the first edition gives it. He objects further that Eve, who was before like the Wood-Nymphs and Delia is here likest to Pales, or Pomona, or Ceres; all unlike one another, and yet Eve is like them all. But he seems not to observe, that Eve is here compared to the latter three, upon a different account, than she was compared to the former. She was likened to the Wood-Nymphs and Delia in regard to her gate; but now that Milton had mentioned her being "arm'd with garden tools," he beautifully compares her to Pales, Pomona, and Ceres, all three Goddesses like to each other in these circumstances, that they were handsome, that they presided over gardening and cultivation of ground, and that they are usually described by the ancient poets as carrying tools of gardening or husbandry in their hands: thus Ovid in Metam. xiv, 628, says of Pomona. Nec jaculo gravis est, sed aduncâ dextera falce. 395-- --Ceres in ber prime, Yet virgin of Proserpina from Jove.] The sense of this is so obvious, that it would be surprizing if any but such a captious pedant as Dr. Bentley would object to it. 404. O much deceiv'd, much failing, bapless Eve, Of thy presum'd return!] That is, much failing of thy presumed return. These beautiful apostrophes and anticipa tions are frequent in the poets, who affect to speak in the character of prophets, and like men inspired with the knowledge of futurity. Thus Virgil to Turnus, Æn. x. 501. O mortals! blind in fate, who never know To bear high fortune, or indure the low. The time shall come, when Turnus, but in vain, Shall wish the fatal belt were far away, And curse the dire remembrance of the day. Dryden. Each flow'r of tender stalk, -mindless the while Herself, though fairest unsupported flower,] We have the same manner of speaking in iv. 269. -where Proserpine gathering flowers, Herself a fairer flow'r by gloomy Dis Was gather'd. A thought that must have pleased our author, since he has it a second time. 434. Nearer be drew, &c.] The several wiles which are put in practice by the tempter, when he found Eve separated from her husband, the many pleasing images of nature which are intermixed in this part of the story, with its gradual and regular progress to the fatal catastrophe, are so very remarkable, that it would be superfluous to point out their respective beauties. Addison. 438. Imborder'd on each bank,] Dr. Bentley believes that Milton gave it Imbroider'd, proper to thick-woven. But imborder'd is the right word according to Bishop Kennet, who in his glossary to his Parochial Antiquities in the word Bordarii says, "Some derive it from the old Gallic bords, the limits or extremes of any extent: as the borders of a county and the borderers or inhabitants in those parts. Whence the bordure of a garment, and to imborder, which we corrupt imbroider.” See also Furetier's French Dictionary on the words Brodeur and Embordurer. Pearce. 439. Spot more delicious &c.] He is not speaking here of Paradise in general, but of this particular spot, the handiwork of Eve; and he says it was more delicious than the gardens of Adonis or Alcinous are feign'd to be. "Of reviv'd Adonis ;” TO L. 111. for after he was killed by the wild boar, it is said that at Ve◄ nus's request he was restored to life. His anniversary festival was opened with sorrow and mourning for his death, and conIcluded with singing and rejoicing for his revival. It is very true, as Dr. Bentley says, "the gardens of Adonis," so frequently mentioned by Greek writers, Plato, Plutarch, &c. were nothing but portable earthen pots with some lettice or fennel growing in them, and thrown away the next day after the yearly festival of Adonis: " whence the gardens of Adonis grew to be a proverb of contempt for any fruitless, fading, perishable affair." But, as Dr. Pearce replies, Why did the Grecians on Adonis's festival carry these small earthen gardens about in honour of him? Was it not because they had a tradition, that when he was alive he delighted in gardens, and had a magnificent one? Pliny mentions the gardens of Adonis and Alcinous together as Milton does. "There is nothing that the Ancients admired more than the gardens of the Hesperides, and those of the kings Adonis and Alcinous." "Alcinous, host to old Laertes' son," that is to Ulysses whom he entertained in his return from Troy, as Homer informs us, Odyssey book the 7th, where he gives us a charming description of his gardens; which Mr. Pope selected from other parts of Homer's works, and translated and published in the Guardian before he attempted the rest. "Or that, not mystic," not fabulous as the rest, not allegorical as some have fancied, but a real garden, which Solomon made for his wife, the daughter of Pharaoh king of Egypt. See Canticles. And thus, as the most beautiful countries in the world, iv. 268-285, could not vie with Paradise, so neither could the most delicious gardens equal this "flow'ry plat, the sweet recess of Eve." 450.tedded grass.] Grass just mowed and spread. for drying. See Lyes Junii Etymologicum under the word "Tede. 457--ber beav'nly form &c.] This is a scene of much the same nature with that betwixt the Saracen king Aladin and the Italian virgin Sophronia in the 2d Canto of Tasso's Jerusalern: and tho' perhaps it would be going too far to say that Milton has borrowed from thence, yet I think it must give the reader some pleasure to see how two great geniuses naturally fall into the same thoughts upon similar subjects. 462. His fierceness of the fierce intent] Tho' Dr. Bentley thinks it jejune, yet such a repetition is not uncommon in the best poets Et nostro doluisti sæpe dolore. Virg. Æn. i. 669. 468. Though in mid Heav'n,] That is, would do though he were in Heaven, or it may be understood as if he were sometimes in Heaven, and justified by Job i. 6. ii. 1. "There was a day, when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan came also among them to present him self before the Lord." And Satan speaks to the same purpose in Paradise Regain'd, i. 366. -Nor from the Heav'n of Heav'ns Hath he excluded my resort sometimes, &c. 478. other joy To me is lost.] How exactly does Milton make Satan keep up the character he had assumed in the fourth book, where he says, Evil be thou my good, &c. 486.-exempt from wound,] As Eve had said before that they were "not capable of death or pain," ver. 283, that is as long as they continued innocent. 499. Fold above fold &c.] We have the description of such a sort of serpent in Ovid. Met. iii. 32. Translated thus by Addison. Fire broke in flashes when he glanc'd his eyes; His tow'ring crest was glorious to behold, His shoulders and his sides were scal'd with gold. And gazing round him overlook'd the wood. 504.--never since of serpent kind &c.] Satan is not here compared and preferred to the finest and most memorable serpents of antiquity, the Python and the rest; but only to the most memorable of those serpents into which others were transformed; and with the greater propriety, as he was himself now transformed into a serpent. And in this view it is said that none were "lovelier, not those that in Illyria chang'd Hermione and Cadmus." Cadmus and his wife Harmonia or Hermione, for she is called by either name, and I presume Milton thought Hermione and Cadmus more musical in verse, as it certainly is, than Harmonia and Cadmus. This Cadmus, together |