no doubt its sublimity is greatly owing to its conciseness: but our poet enlarges upon it, endeavouring to give some account how light was created the first day, when the sun was not formed till the fourth day. He says that it was sphered in a radiant cloud, and so journeyed round the earth in a cloudy tabernacle; and herein he is justified by the authority of some commentators, though others think this light was the light of the sun, which shone as yet very imperfectly, and did not appear in full lustre till the fourth day.-NEWTON.

19 Ver. 256. With joy and shout. Job xxxviii. 4. 7. "Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth; when the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy?"-NEWTON.

20 Ver. 261. Let there be firmament. See Gen. i. 6:— "Firmament" signifies expansion.-NEWTON.

21 Ver. 274. And heaven. So Gen. i. 8. According to the Hebrews, there were three heavens. The first is the air, wherein the clouds move, and the birds fly; the second is the starry heaven; and the third is the habitation of the angels, and the seat of God's glory. Milton is speaking here of the first heaven, as he mentions the others in other places.-NEWTON.

22 Ver. 283. Be gather'd now, ye waters. See Gen. i. 9; and Psalm civ. 6, et seq.-NEWTON.

23 Ver. 307. The dry land, earth. These are again the words of Genesis formed into verse, i. 10, 11. But when he comes to the descriptive part, he then opens a finer vein of poetry.-NEWTON,

24 Ver. 317. Sudden flower'd. See Esdras vi. 44.TODD.

25 Ver. 374. The Pleiades before him danced. These are beautiful images, and very much resemble the famous picture of the morning by Guido, where the sun is represented in his chariot, with Aurora flying before him, shedding flowers, and seven beautiful nymph-like figures, dancing before and about his chariot, which are commonly taken for the Hours, but possibly may be the Pleiades, as they are seven in number, and it is not easy to assign a reason why the Hours should be signified by that number particularly. The picture is on a ceiling at Rome; but there are copies of it in England, and an excellent print by Jac. Frey. The Pleiades are seven stars in the neck of the constellation Taurus, which, rising about the time of the vernal equinox, are called by the Latins “Vergiliæ.” Our poet, therefore, in saying that the Pleiades danced before the sun at his creation, intimates very plainly that the creation was in the spring according to the common opinion, Virg. Georg. ii. 338, &c.-NEWTON.

26 Ver. 375. Shedding sweet influence. See Job, xxxviii. 31" Canst thou bind the sweet influences of the Pleiades?"-HUME.

27 Ver. 387. And God said, Let the waters. This, and eleven verses following, are almost word for word from Genesis, i. 20—22: the poet afterwards branches out this general account of the fifth day's creation into the several particulars.-NEWTON.

28 Ver. 402. Sculls is undoubtedly shoals.

29 Ver 424. On cliffs and cedar-tops. See Job, xxxix. 27, 28.-NEWTON.

30 Ver. 427. Intelligent of seasons. See Jerem. viii. 7. NEWTON.

31 Ver. 435. The solemn nightingale. Milton's fondness and admiration of the nightingale may be seen, as Newton has remarked, in 'Il Penseroso,' in his first sonnet, and again in 'Paradise Lost,' b. iii. 38; b. iv. 648. 771; b. v. 40; b. viii. 518.-TODD.

ment.

32 Ver. 487. Pattern of just equality. We see that Milton, upon occasion, discovers his principles of governHe enlarges upon the same thought in his 'Ready Way to establish a free Commonwealth,' Prose W. i. 591. He commends the ants or emmets for living in a republic, as the bees are said to live under a monarchy.— NEWTON.

The author keeps

33 Ver. 519. Let us make now man. closely to Scripture in his account of the formation of man, as well as of the other creatures. See Gen. i. 26, 27, 28. There are scarcely any alterations but what were requisite for the verse or were occasioned by the change of the person, as the angel is speaking to Adam. And what additions are made, are plainly of the same original.— NEWTON.

34 Ver. 565. Open, ye everlasting gates! See Psalm xxiv. 7 :—" Lift up your heads, O ye gates; and be ye lifted up, ye everlasting doors; and the King of Glory shall come in." This hymn was sung when the ark of God was carried up into the sanctuary on Mount Sion, and is understood as a prophecy of our Saviour's ascension into Heaven; and therefore is fitly applied by our author to the same Divine Person's ascending thither, after he had created the world.-NEWTON.

In the seventh book the author appears in a kind of composed and sedate majesty; and though the sentiments do not give so great an emotion as those in the former

book, they abound with magnificent ideas. The sixth book, like a troubled ocean, represents greatness in confusion; the seventh affects the imagination like the ocean in a calm; and fills the mind of the reader, without producing in it any thing like tumult or agitation.

Longinus, among the rules which he lays down for succeeding in the sublime way of writing, proposes to his reader, that he should imitate the most celebrated authors who have gone before him, and have been engaged in works of the same nature; as in particular, that, if he writes on a poetical subject, he should consider how Homer would have spoken on such an occasion. By this means one great genius often catches the flame from another; and writes in his spirit without copying servilely after him. There are a thousand shining passages in Virgil, which have been lighted up by Homer.

Milton, though his own natural strength of genius was capable of furnishing out a perfect work, has doubtless very much raised and ennobled his conceptions by such an imitation as that which Longinus has recommended.

In this book, which gives us an account of the six days' work, the poet received but very few assistances from heathen writers, who were strangers to the wonders of creation but, as there are many glorious strokes of poetry upon this subject in Holy Writ, the author has numberless allusions to them through the whole course of this book. The great critic I have before mentioned, though a heathen, has taken notice of the sublime manner in which the lawgiver of the Jews has described the creation in the first book of Genesis; and there are many other passages in Scripture, which rise up to the same majesty, where this subject is touched upon. Milton has shown his judgment very remarkably in making use of such of these as were proper for his poem; and in duly qualifying those high strains of Eastern poetry, which were suited to readers, whose imaginations were set to a higher pitch than those of colder climates.

Adam's speech to the angel, where he desires an account of what passed within the regions of nature before the creation, is very great and solemn. The lines, in which he tells that the day is not too far spent for him to enter upon such a subject, are exquisite in their kind, v. 98.

The angel's encouraging our first parents in a modest pursuit after knowledge, and the causes which he assigns for the creation of the world, are very just and beautiful. The Messiah, by whom, as we are told in Scripture, the heavens were made, comes forth in the power of his Father, surrounded with a host of angels, and clothed with such a majesty, as becomes his entering upon a work, which, according to our conceptions, appears the utmost exertion of Omnipotence. What a beautiful description has our author raised upon that hint in one of the prophets ! "And behold there came four chariots out from between two mountains, and the mountains were mountains of brass:"

About his chariots numberless were pour'd, &c.

I have before taken notice of these chariots of God, and of these gates of heaven; and shall here only add, that Homer gives us the same idea of the latter, as opening of themselves; though he afterwards takes off from it by telling us that the Hours first of all removed those prodigious heaps of clouds which lay as a barrier before them.

I do not know any thing in the whole poem more sublime than the description which follows; where the Messiah is represented at the head of his angels, as looking down into the chaos, calming its confusion, riding into the midst of it, and drawing the first outline of the creation.

The thought of the golden compasses, v. 225, is conceived altogether in Homer's spirit; and is a very noble incident in this wonderful description. Homer, when he speaks of the gods, ascribes to them several arms and instruments, with the same greatness of imagination. Let the reader only peruse the description of Minerva's ægis, or buckler, in the fifth book; with her spear which would over