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of Jupiter and Juno on mount Ida, has many of the same circumstances, and often the very words translated, so it concludes exactly after the same manner in a quarrel. Adam awakes much in the same humour as Jupiter, and their cases are somewhat parallel; they are both overcome by their fondness for their wives, and are sensible of their error too late, and then their love turns to resentment, and they grow angry with their wives, when they should rather have been angry with themselves for their weakness in hearkening to them.

1084. O might I bere &c.

Cover me ye Pines, &c.] A wish more ardent and passionate than that of Virgil, Georg. ii. 488.

O, qui me gelidis in valibus Hæmi

Sistat, et ingenti ramorem protegat umbra!

1100. Into the thickest wood; there soon they chose

The fig-tree, &c.] The sacred text says, Gen. iii. 7, that "they sowed fig-leaves together;" and Milton adheres to the Scripture expression, which has given occasion to the sneer, "What could they do for needles and thread? But the origi nal signifies no more than that they twisted the young twigs of the fig-tree round about their waists, in the manner of a Roman crown, for which purpose the fig-tree, of all others, especially in those eastern countries, was the most serviceable; because it hath, as Pliny says, lib. xvi. cap. xxvi. folium maximum umbrosissimumque, the greatest and most shady leaf of all others. And our author follows the best commentators, supposing that this was the Indian fig-tree, the account of which he borrows from Pliny, lib. xii. c. v. as Pliny had done before from Theophrastus. It was not that kind for fruit renown'd," and Pliny says that the largeness of the leaves hindered the fruit from growing; "kâc causâ fructum integens, crescere probibet; rarusque est." "It branches so broad and long that in the ground the bended twigs take root, and daughters grow about the mother tree, a pillar'd shade high overarch'd:" As Pliny says, "Ipsa se semper serens, vastis diffunditur ramis; quorum imi adeo in terram curvantur, ut annuo spatio infigantur, noyamque sibi propaginem faciant circa parentem.

quodam opere topiario-fornicato ambitu." There oft the Indian berdsman sbunning heat shelters in cool, &c; "Intra septem eam æstivant pastores &c," And its leaves are broad as Amaze

nian targe: "Foliorum latitudo peltæ effigiem Amazonicæ habet." Sir Walter Raleigh, upon his own knowledge, gives very much the same account of this Ficus Indica in his History of the World, b. i. c. iv. s. 2.

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Columbus found the American, &c.] Columbus, who made the first discovery of America about the year 1492, found the Americans so girt about the waste with feathers, as Adam and Eve were with fig-leaves.

1162 To whom then first incens'd Adam reply'd.] As Adam is now first angry, his speech is abrupt and his sentences broken.

BOOK X.

16. And manifold in sin, deserv'd to fall.] EVERY sin is complicated in some degree: and the Divines, especially those of Milton's communion, reckon up several sins as included in this one act of eating the forbidden fruit, namely, pride, uxoriousness, wicked curiosity, infidelity, disobedience, &c. so that for such complicated guilt he deserv'd to fall" from his happy state in Paradise.

17. Up into Heav'n, &c.] The tenth book of Paradise Lost has a greater variety of persons in it than any other in the whole poem. The author upon the winding up of this action introduces all those who had any concern in it, and shows with great beauty the influence which it had upon each of them. It is like the last act of a well written tragedy, in which all who had a part in it are generally drawn up before the audience, and represented under those circumstances in which the determination of the action places them. I shall therefore consider this book under four heads, in relation to the celestial, the infernal, the human, and the imaginary persons, who have their respective parts allotted in it. To begin with the celestial persons. The guardian Angels of Paradise are described as returning to Heaven upon the fall of Man, in order to approve their vigilance; their arrival, their manner of reception, with the sorrow which appeared in themselves, and in those Spirits who are said to rejoice at the conversion of a sinner, are very finely laid together in the following lines. Addison. 23.dim sadness did not spare

That time celestial visages, yet mix'd

With pity, violated not their bliss.] What a just and noble idea does our author here give us of the blessedness of a bene

volent temper, and how proper at the same time to obviate the objection that might be made of sadness dwelling in heavenly spirits! Thyer.

Here pity is made to prevent their sadness from violating their bliss: but the latter passion is so far from alleviating the former, that it adds weight to it. If you read "mix'd with pity". in a parenthesis, this cross reasoning will be avoided.

Warburton.

It is plain that Milton conceiv'd sadness" mix'd with pity" to be more consistent with heavenly bliss than sadness without that compassionate temper. There is something pleasing, something divine even in the melancholy of a merciful mind.

43.Against his Maker,] Such as Satan had suggested, that all things did not proceed from God, that God kept the forbidden fruit from them out of envy, &c.

53. Forbearance no acquittance] These proverbial expressions are very improper any where in an epic poem, but much more when they are made to proceed from the mouth of God himself.

56.-to thee I have transfer'd

All judgment,] According to John v. 22.

59. Mercy colleague with justice,] According to that of the Psalmist, "Mercy and truth are met together, righteousness and peace have kissed each other." Psal. lxxxv. 10.

71.

--I go to judge &c.] The same divine Person, who in the foregoing parts of this poem interceded for our first parents before their fall, overthrew the rebel Angels, and created the world, is now represented as descending to Paradise, and pronouncing sentence upon the three offenders. The cool of the evening being a circumstance with which holy Writ introduces this great scene, it is poetically described by our author, who has also kept religiously to the form of words, in which the three several sentences were passed upon Adam, Eve, and the Serpent. The guilt and confusion of our first parents, standing naked before their judge, is touched with great beauty. Addison.

84. Conviction to the serpent none belongs.] No proof is needful against the serpent, compelled by Satan to be the ignorant instrument of his maljce against mankind, now mute and un. able to answer for himself.

86. Of bigh collateral glory:] He uses collateral, as he does most other words, in a sense agreeable to the etymology, side by side. The Son sat at the right hand of the Father, and rising from thence he may properly be said to rise " from his seat of high collateral glory," or as it is elsewhere expressed, vi. 747, ❝from the right hand of glory where he sat." The word was used before in viii. 426.

92. Now was the sun in western cadence low

From noon, and gentle airs &c.] This beautiful description is founded upon this verse, Genesis iii. 8. "And they heard the voice of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day; and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God amongst the trees of the garden.'

102.

-to Adam call'd aloud.

Where art thou Adam?] According to Gen. iii. 9.
116. I heard thee in the garden, and of thy voice
Afraid, being naked, hid myself.] Gen. iii. 10, versified.
121.that thou art naked, who

Hath told thee? Hast thou eaten of the tree,

Whereof I gave thee charge thou shouldst not eat?] Gen. iii.

11, also versified.

137. This Woman, whom thou mad'st to be my help,
And gav'st me as thy perfect gift-

She gave me of the tree, and I did cat.] As in Gen. iii. 12. We see that he still preserves all that is Scripture, though he intermixes other things which were likely enough to have been said and done.

151.

She was indeed, and lovely to attract

-Adorn'd

Thy love, not thy subjection;] The same sort of sentiment as the Angel had inculcated viii. 568.

-fair no doubt, and worthy well

Thy cherishing, thy honouring, and thy love,
Not thy subjection.

And in other parts of his work our author seems to have been a strenuous advocate for keeping up the authority of the husband. 158. Say Woman, what is this which thou hast done ? Gen. i. 13.

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A. - ??? ore to know

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