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notice of in the reign of King James the Firft.

During the civil wars there appeared one, which makes too great a figure in story to be paffed over in filence; I mean that of the redoubted Hudibras, an account of which Butler has transmitted to pofterity in the following lines:

His tawny beard was th' equal grace
Both of his wifdom, and his face;
In cut and dye fo like a tyle,
A fudden view it would beguile:
The upper part thereof was whey,
The nether orange mixt with grey.

The whisker continued for fome time among us after the extirpation of beards; but this is a fubject which I fhall not here enter upon, having difcuffed it at large in a distinct treatife, which I keep by me in manufcript, upon the Mustachoe.

I

If my friend Sir Roger's project of

introducing beards fhould take effect, I fear the luxury of the prefent age would make it a very expenfive fashion. There is no question but the beaux would foon provide themselves with falfe ones of the lighteft colours, and the most immoderate lengths. A fair beard, of the tapeftry fize, which Sir Roger seems to approve, could not come under twenty guineas. The famous golden beard of Æfculapius could hardly be more valuable than one made in the extravagance of the fashion.

Befides we are not certain that the ladies would not come into the mode, when they take the air on horfeback. They already appear in hats and feathers, coats and periwigs; and I fee no reason why we may not fuppofe that they would have their riding beards on the fame occafion.

I may give the moral of this difcourfe in another paper.

N° CCCXXXII. FRIDAY, MARCH 21.

MINUS APTUS ACUTIS

NARIBUS HORUM HOMINUM

HOR. SAT. III. L. 1. V.29.

HE CANNOT BEAR THE RAILLERY OF THE AGE. CREECH.

DEAR SHORT FACE,

N your fpeculation of Wednesday laft you have given us fome account of that worthy fociety of brutes the Mohocks; wherein you have particularly specified the ingenious performances of the lion-tippers, the dancing-matters, and the tumblers: but as you acknowledge you had not then a perfect history of the whole club, you might very easily omit one of the most notable species of it, the Sweaters, which may be reckoned a fort of dancing-mafters too. It is, it feems, the custom for half a dozen, or more, of these well-difpofed favages, as foon as they have inclofed the perfon upon whom they defign the favour of a fweat, to whip out their fwords, and holding them parallel to the horizon, they defcribe a fort of magic circle round about him with the points. As foon as this piece of conjuration is performed, and the patient without doubt already be ginning to wax warm, to forward the operation, that member of the circle, towards whom he is fo rude as to turn his back firth, runs his word directly into that part of the patient wherein

X

fchool-boys are punished; and as it is very natural to imagine this will foon make him tack about to fome other point, every gentleman does himself the fame juftice as often as he receives the affront. After this jig has gone two or three times round, and the patient is thought to have sweat sufficiently, he is very handfomely rubbed down by fome attendants, who carry with them instruments for that purpofe, and fo difcharged. This relation I had from a friend of mine, who has lately been under this difcipline. He tells me he had the honour to dance before the emperor himself, not without the applaufe and acclamations both of his imperial majefty and the whole ring; though I dare fay, neither I nor any of his acquaintance ever dreamt he would have merited any reputation by his activity.

I can affure you, Mr. Spec, I was very near being qualified to have given you a faithful and painful account of this walking bagnio, if I may fo call it, mytelf: for going out the other night along Fleet Street, and having, out of curiofity, juft entered into difcourfe with

a wan

a wandering female who was travelling the fame way, a couple of fellows advanced towards us, drew their fwords, and cried out to each other- A fweat! A fweat!' Whereupon suspecting they were some of the ringleaders of the bagnio, I alfo drew my fword, and demanded a parley; but finding none would be granted me, and perceiving others behind them filing off with great diligence to take me in flank, I began to fweat for fear of being forced to it: but very luckily betaking myfelf to a pair of heels, which I had reafon to believe would do me juftice, I instantly got poffeflion of a very fnug corner in a neighbouring alley that lay in my rear; which poft I maintained for above half an hour with great firmness and refolution, though not letting this fuccefs fo far overcome me, as to make me unmindful of the circumfpection that was neceffary to be obferved upon my advancing again towards the street; hy which prudence and good management I made a handsome and orderly retreat, having fuffered no other damage in this action than the lofs of my baggage, and the dislocation of one of my shoe-heels, which laft I am juft now informed is in a fair way of recovery. These sweaters, by what I can learn from my friend, and by as near a view as I was able to take of them myself, feem to me to have at prefent but a rude kind of difcipline amongst them. It is probable, if you would take a little pains with them, they might be brought into better order. But I will leave this to your own difcretion; and will only add, that if you think it worth while to infert this by way of caution to thofe who have a mind to preferve their skins whole from this fort of cupping, and tell them at the fame time the hazard of treating with nightwalkers, you will perhaps oblige others, as well as your humble fervant,

JACK LIGHTFOOT.

thofe fellows, who are employed as rubbers to this new-fashioned bagnio, have ftruck as bold strokes as ever he did in his life.

I had fent this four and twenty hours fooner, if I had not had the misfortune of being in a great doubt about the orthography of the word Bagnio. I confulted feveral dictionaries, but found no relief; at laft having recourfe both to the bagnio in Newgate Street, and to that in Chancery Lane, and finding the original manufcripts upon the fign-pofts of each to agree literally with my own fpelling, I returned home, full of fatiffaction, in order to difpatch this epistle.

MR. SPECTATOR,

AS you have taken moft of the circum

ftances of human life into confideration, we the underwritten thought it not improper for us alfo to reprefent to you our condition. We are three ladies who live in the country, and the greatest improvements we make is by reading. We have taken a small journal of our lives, and find it extremely oppofite to your laft Tuesday's fpeculation. We rise by seven, and pass the beginning of each day in devotion, and looking into thofe affairs that fall within the occurrences of a retired life; in the afternoon we fometimes enjoy the company of fome friend or neighbour, or elfe work or read; at night we retire to our chambers, and take leave of each other for the whole night at ten o'clock. We take particular care never to be fick of a Sunday. Mr. Spectator, we are all very good maids, but ambitious of characters which we think more laudable, that of being very good wives. If any of your correfpondents inquire for a fpoufe for an honeft country gentleman, whofe eftate is not dipped, and wants a wife that can fave half his revenue, and yet make a better figure than any of his neighbours of the same eftate, with finer bred women, you shall have further notice from, Sir, your courteous, readers,

P.S. My friend will have me acquaint you, that though he would not willingly detract from the merit of that extraordinary strokefman Mr. Sprightly, yet it is his real opinion, that foine of T

MARTHA Busy. DEBORAH THRIFTY, ALICE EARLY.

N° CCCXXXIII.

*

N° CCCXXXIII. SATURDAY, MARCH 22.

-VOCAT IN CERTAMINA DIVOS.

VIRG. EN. VI. V. 172.

HE CALLS EMBATTLED DEITIES TO ARMS.

are now entering upon the

In fhort, the poet never mentions any

WE a book of Paradife Loft, in thing of this battle, but in fuch images

which the poet describes the battle of angels; having raised his reader's expectation, and prepared him for it by feveral paffages in the preceding books. I omitted quoting these paffages in my obfervations on the former books, having purpofely referved them for the opening of this, the fubject of which gave occafion to them. The author's imagination was fo inflamed with this great fcene of action, that wherever he speaks of it, he rifes, if poffible, above himfelf. Thus where he mentions Satan in the beginning of his poem.

-Him the almighty Power Hurl'd headlong flaming from th'etherial sky, With hideous ruin and combustion, down To bottomlefs perdition, there to dwell In adamantine chains and penal fire, Who durft defy th' Omnipotent to arms.

We have likewife feveral noble hints of it in the infernal conference.

O Prince! O Chief of many throned powers,
That led th' embattled Seraphim to war,
Too well I fee and rue the dire event,
That with fad overthrow and foul defeat
Haft loft us heav'n; and all this mighty hoft
In horrible deftruction laid thus low-
But fee the angry victor hath recall'd
His minifters of vengeance and purfuit
Back to the gates of heav'n: the fulph'rous

hail

Shot after us in form, o'erblown hath laid
The fiery furge, that from the precipice
Of heav'n receiv'd us falling; and the thunder,
Wing d with red lightning and impetuous

rage,

Perhaps has spent his fhafts, and ceafes now Tobellow through the vaft and boundless deep.

There are feveral other very fublime images on the fame subject in the firit book, as alfo in the fecond.

What when we fied amain, purfu`d and strook With Heav'ns afflicting thunder, and befought

The deep to helter us; this Hell then feem'd A refuge from thofe wounds

of greatness and terror as are fuitable to the fubject. Among feveral others I cannot forbear quoting that paffage, where the Power, who is described as prefiding over the chaos, speaks in the fecond book.

Thus Satan; and him thus the Anarch old, With falt'ring fpeech, and vifage incompos'd, Answer'd I know thee, ftranger, who thou art,

That mighty leading angel, who of late Made head against Heav'n's King, tho ' overthrown.

I faw and heard; for fuch a num'rous hoft • Fled not in filence through the frighted deep With ruin upon ruin, rout on rout, Confufion worfe confounded; and Heav'n's 'gates

Pour'd out by millions her victorious bands Purfuing

It required great pregnancy of inven- ́ tion, and Arength of imagination, to fill this battle with fuch circumstances as fhould raife and attonith the mind of the reader; and at the fame time an exactness of judgment, to avoid every thing that might appear light or trivial. Thote who look into Homer, are furprifed to find his battles ftill rifing one above another, and improving in horror to the conclufion of the Iliad. Milton's

fight of angels is wrought up with the fame beauty. It is ushered in with fuch figns of wrath as are fuitable to Omnipo:ence incenfed. The first engagement is carried on under a cope of fire, occafioned by the flights of innumerable burning darts and arrows which are difcharged from either hoft. The fecond onfer is ftill more terrible, as it is filled with thofe artificial thunders, which feem to make the victory doubtfui, and produce a kind of confternation even in the good angels. This is followed by the tearing up of mountains and promontories; till in the latt place, the Meffiah comes forth in the fulness of majesty and terror. The pomp of

his appearance amidst the roarings of his thunders, the flashes of his lightnings, and the noise of his chariot-wheels, is described with the utmost flights of human imagination.

There is nothing in the first and laft day's engagement which does not appear natural, and agreeable enough to the ideas most readers would conceive of a fight between two armies of angels.

The fecond day's engagement is apt to startle an imagination, which has not been raised and qualified for fuch a defcription, by the reading of the ancient poets, and of Homer in particular. It was certainly a very bold thought in our author, to afcribe the first use of artillery to the rebel-angels. But as fuch a pernicious invention may be well fuppofed to have proceeded from fuch authors, fo it enters very properly into the thoughts of that being, who is all along defcribed as afpiring to the majefty of his Maker. Such engines were the only inftruments he could have made ufe of to imitate those thunders, that in all poetry, both facred and profane, are reprefented as the arms of the Almighty. The tearing up the hills was not altogether fo daring a thought as the former. We are, in fome measure, prepared for fuch an incident by the defcription of the giants war, which we meet with among the ancient poets. What ftill made this circumftance the more proper for the poet's ufe, is the opinion of many learned men, that the fable of the giants war, which makes fo great a noife in antiquity, and gave birth to the fublimett defcription in Hefiod's works, was an allegory founded upon this very tradition of a fight be tween the good and bad angels.

It may, perhaps, be worth while to confider with what judgment Milton, in this narration, has avoided every thing that is mean and trivial in the defcriptions of the Latin and Greek poets; and at the fame time improved every great hint which he met with in their works upon this fubject. Homer in that paffage, which Longinus has celebrated for it fublimenefs, and which Virgil and Ovid have copied after him, tells us, that the giants threw Offa upon Olympus, and Pelion upon Offa. He adds an epithet to Pelion (voipuλor) which very much fwells the idea, by bringing up to the reader's imagination all the woods that grew upon it. There

is further a great beauty in his fingling out by name these three remarkable mountains, so well known to the Greeks. This last is fuch a beauty, as the scene of Milton's war could not poffibly furnifh him with. Claudian, in his fragment upon the giants war, has given full scope to that wildness of imagination which was natural to him. He tells us that the giants tore up whole islands by the roots, and threw them at the gods. He defcribes one of them in particular taking up Lemnos in his arms, and whirling it to the fkies, with all Vulcan's fhop in the midst of it. Another tears up mount Ida, with the river Enipeus, which ran down the fides of it; but the poet not content to defcribe him with this mountain upon his fhoulders, tells us that the river flowed down his back as he held it up in that posture. It is vifible to every judicious reader, that fuch ideas favour more of burlesque, than of the fublime. They proceed from a wantonnefs of imagination, and rather divert the inind than aftonish it. Milton has taken every thing that is fublime in thefe feveral paffages, and composes out of them the following great image.

From their foundations loos'ning to and fro, They pluck'd the feated hills, with all their load,

Rocks, waters, woods, and by the fhaggy tops Uplifting bore them in their hands.

We have the full majefty of Homer in this fhort defcription, improved by the imagination of Claudian, without it's puerilities.

I need not point out the defcription of the fallen angels feeing the promon tories hanging over their heads in fuch a dreadful manner, with the other numberless beauties in this book, which are fo confpicuous, that they cannot escape the notice of the most ordinary reader.

There are indeed fo many wonderful ftrokes of poetry in this book, and fuch a variety of fublime ideas, that it would have been impoffible to have given them a place within the bounds of this paper. Befides that I find it in a great meature done to my hand at the end of my Lord Rofcommon's Effay on Tranflated Poetry, I shall refer my reader thither for fome of the mafter-strokes of the fixth book of Paradife Loft, though at the fame time there are many others which that noble author has not taken notice of,

Milton,

Milton, notwithstanding the fublime genius he was mafter of, has in this book drawn to his affiftance all the helps he could meet with among the ancient poets. The fword of Michael, which makes fo great a havock among the bad angels, was given him, we are told, out of the armory of God.

-But the fword

Of Michael from the armory of God
Was giv'n him temper'd fo, that neither keen
Nor folid might refift that edge: it met
The fword of Satan, with fteep force to fmite
Defcending, and in half cut fheer-

This paffage is a copy of that in Virgil, wherein the poet tells us, that the fword of Æneas, which was given him by a deity, broke into pieces the fword of Turnus, which came from a mortal forge. As the moral in this place is divine, fo by the way we may obferve that the beftowing on a man who is favoured by Heaven fuch an allegorical weapon, is very conformable to the old eaftern way of thinking. Not only Homer has made ufe of it, but we find the Jewish hero in the book of Maccabces, who had fought the battles of the chofen people with fo much glory and fuccefs, receiving in his dream a fword from the hand of the prophet Jeremiah. The following paffage, wherein Satan is defcribed as wounded by the fword of Michael, is in imitation of Homer,

The griding fword with difcontinuous wound Pafs'd thro' him; but th' ethereal fubftance

clos'd,

Not long divifible; and from the gash

A ftream of nectarous humour iffuing flow'd Sanguine, fuch as celeftial fpirits may bleed, And all his armour ftain'd

Homer tells us in the same manner, that upon Diomedes wounding the gods, there flowed from the wound an ichor, or pure kind of biood, which was not bred from mortal viands; and that though the pain was exquifitely great, the wound foon clofed up and healed in thofe beings who are vefted with immitality,

I question not but Milton, in his defeription of his furious Moloch flying from the battle, and bellowing with the wound he had received, had his eye on Mars in the Iliad; who, upon his being wounded, is reprefented as retiring out of the fight, and making an outcry

louder than that of a whole army when it begins the charge. Homer adds, that the Greeks and Trojans, who were engaged in a general battle, were terrified on each fide with the bellowing of this wounded deity. The reader will easily obferve how Milton has kept all the hor ror of this image, without running into the ridicule of it.

Where the might of Gabriel fought, And with fierce enfigns pierc'd the deep array Of Moloch, furious king; who him defy'd, And at his chariot-wheels to drag him bound Threaten'd, nor from the Holy One of heav'n Refrain'd his tongue blafphemous; but anon Down cloven to he waift, with shatter'd arms And uncouth pain fled bellowing

Milton has likewife raifed his defcription in this book with many images taken out of the poetical parts of Scripture. The Meffiah's chariot, as I have before taken notice, is formed upon a vilion of Ezekiel, who, as Grotius obferves, has very much in him of Homer's fpirit in the poetical parts of his prophecy.

The following lines, in that glorious commiffion which is given the Meffiah to extirpate the host of rebel angels, are drawn from a fublime paffage in the Pfalms.

Go then thou Mightieft in thy Father's might, Afcend my chariot, guide the rapid wheels That shake heav'n's bafis; bring forth all

my war, 1

My bow, my thunder, my almighty arms, Gird on thy fword on thy puiffant thigh.

The reader will eafily discover many other ftrokes of the fame nature.

There is no queftion but Milton had heated his imagination with the fight of the gods in Homer, before he entered into this engagement of the angels. Homer there gives us a fcene of men, heroes and gods, mixed together in battle. Mars animates the contending armies, and lifts up his voice in fuch a manner, that it is heard distinctly amidst all the fhouts-and confusion of the fight. Jupiter at the fame time thunders over their heads; while Neptune raises fuch a

tempeft, that the whole field of battle and all the tops of the mountains shake about them. The poet tells us, that Pluto himself, whose habitation was in the very centre of the earth, was so affrighted at the shock, that he leapt from

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