Sam. Wherever fountain or fresh current flow'd Cho. O, madness, to think use of strongest wines Sam. But what avail'd this temperance, not complete What boots it at one gate to make defence, Effeminately vanquish'd? by which means, Now blind, dishearten'd, shamed, dishonour'd, quell'd, My nation, and the work from Heaven imposed, But to sit idle on the household hearth", years bread; Wherever fountain or fresh current flow'd 550 555 560 565 570 This circumstance was very probably suggested to our author by Tasso's poem "Del Mondo creato," giorna iii. st. 8.-THYER. Mr. Geddes, in his learned and entertaining "Essay on the Composition, &c. of Plato," considers these lines of Milton as possessing much of the same spirit, though applied to another thing, with a passage in the philosopher's "Io," pp. 533, 534, tom. i. edit. Serran., where, speaking of the poets, he says, "As soon as they enter the winding mazes of harmony, they became lymphatic, and rove like the furious Bacchanals, who in their frenzy draw honey and milk out of the rivers. The poets tell us the same thing of themselves," &c. Essay, 1748, p. 184.-TODD. With touch ethereal of Heaven's fiery rod. This description of the first ray of light at the moment of sunrise, is eminently bold and beautiful. We might trace it to Euripides, "Suppl." 652, to which Dr. Hurd refers Milton's "long-level'd rule of streaming light," Comus, v. 340.-DUNSTER. y Whose drink, &c. Samson was a Nazarite, Judges xiii. 7; therefore to drink no wine, nor shave his head. See Numb. vi., Amos ii. 12.-RICHARDSON. 2 But to sit idle on the household hearth, &c. It is supposed, with probability enough, that Milton chose Samson for his subject, because he was a fellow-sufferer with him in the loss of his eyes: however, one may venture to say, that the similitude of their circumstances has enriched the poem with several very pathetic descriptions of the misery of blindness.-THYER. a Craze my limbs. He uses the word " craze "much in the same manner as in the "Par. Lost," b. xii. 210.-NEWTON. Till vermin, or the draffb of servile food, Hasten the welcome end of all my pains. Man. Wilt thou then serve the Philistines with that gift Better at home lie bed-rid, not only idle, Inglorious, unemploy'd, with age outworn. Sam. All otherwise to me my thoughts portend, b Draff. 575 580 385 590 595 The refuse. See "Par. Lost," b. x. 630. Thus Chaucer, "Prol. to the Parsones Tale" Why should I sowen draf out of my fist, And Shakspeare, "Hen. IV." part 1. a. iv. s. 2. "You would think I had a hundred and fifty tattered prodigals, lately come from swine-keeping, from eating draff and husks."-DUNSTER. But God, who caused a fountain at thy prayer The See Judges xv. 18, 19. But Milton differs from our translation of the Bible. translation says that "God clave a hollow place that was in the jaw :" Milton says, that "God caused a fountain from the dry ground to spring ;" and herein he follows the Chaldee paraphrast and the best commentators, who understand it that God made a cleft in some part of the ground or rock, in the place called Lehi; Lehi signifying both a jaw, and a place so called.-NEWTON. d His might continues, &c. A fine preparative, which raises our expectation of some great event to be produced by his strength.-WARBURTON. • So much I feel my genial spirits droop, &c. Here Milton, in the person of Samson, describes exactly his own case, what he felt, and what he thought, in some of his melancholy hours: he could not have written so well but from his own feeling and experience; and the very flow of the verses is melancholy, and excellently adapted to the subject. As Mr. Thyer expresses it, there is a remarkable solemnity and air of melancholy, in the very sound of these verses; and the reader will find it very difficult to pronounce them without that grave and serious tone of voice which is proper for the occasion.-NEWTON. Every reader of taste must subscribe with heartiness to this testimony of Thyer and Newton. The passage is truly pathetic and melodious. Man. Believe not these suggestions, which proceed Must not omits a father's timely care To prosecute the means of thy deliverance Sam. O, that torment should not be confined h In heart, head, breast, and reins; There exercise all his fierce accidents, As on entrails, joints, and limbs, With answerable pains, but more intense, My griefs not only pain me As a lingering disease, But, finding no redress, ferment and rage; Nor less than wounds immedicable Rankle, and fester, and gangrene, To black mortification. Thoughts, my tormentors, arm'd with deadly stings, Exasperate, exulcerate, and raise f And humours black, That mingle with thy fancy. This very just notion of the mind or fancy's being affected, and as it were tainted with the vitiated humours of the body, Milton had before adopted in his "Paradise Lost," where he introduces Satan in the shape of a toad at the ear of Eve, b. iv. 804. Or if, inspiring venom, he might taint The animal spirits, &c. So again in "Comus," v. 809. And settlings of a melancholy blood.-THYER. "Tis but the lees 8 I however Must not omit, &c. Such is also the language of Oceanus to his nephew Prometheus, Esch. "Prom. Vinct."-DUNSTER. h 0, that torment should not be confined, &c. Milton, no doubt, was apprehensive that this long description of Samson's grief and misery might grow tedious to the reader, and therefore here with great judgment varies both his manner of expressing it, and the versification. These sudden starts of impatience are very natural to persons in such circumstances, and this rough and unequal measure of the verse is very well suited to it.-THYER. i Thoughts, my tormentors, arm'd with deadly stings, This descriptive imagery is fine and well pursued. The idea is taken from the effects of poisonous salts in the stomach and bowels, which stimulate, tear, inflame, and exulcerate the tender fibres, and end in a mortification, which he calls "death's benumbing opium," as in that stage the pain is over.-WARBURTON. Dire inflammation, which no cooling herb To death's benumbing opium as my only cure: I was his nursling once m, and choice delight, Promised by heavenly message twice descending. Abstemious I grew up, and thrived amain: He led me on to mightiest deeds, Above the nerve of mortal arm, Against the uncircumcised, our enemies: Whom I by his appointment had provoked, i Or med'cinal liquor. 630 635 640 645 Here "medicinal" is pronounced with the accent upon the last syllable but one, as in Latin; which is more musical than as we commonly pronounce it, "medicinal," with the accent upon the last syllable but two, or "med'cinal" as Milton has used it in "Comus." The same pronounciation occurs in Shakspeare, "Othello," a. v. s. 2 :Drop tears as fast as the Arabian trees Their medicinal gum.-NEWTON. "Medicinal" is not the reading of Milton's own edition: in that it is "medcinal." The supposed emendation of "medicinal" is made in the folio of 1688, and it has been since invariably followed.-TODD. Nor breath of vernal air. So, in that most delightful passage in "Paradise Lost," b. iv. 264 :— airs, vernal airs, Breathing the smell of field and grove.-TODD. He uses "Alp" for mountain in general, as in "Paradise Lost," b. ii. 620. "Alp,"in the strict etymology of the word, signifies a mountain white with snow. We have indeed appropriated the name to the high mountains which separate Italy from France and Germany; but any high mountain may be so called, and so Sidonius Apollinaris calls Mount Athos, speaking of Xerxes cutting through it, "Carm." ii. 510.-NEWTON. Milton took this use of the word from the Italian poets, amongst whom it was very common.-HURD. m I was his nursling once, &c. This part of Samson's speech is little more than a repetition of what he had said before, v. 23 O, wherefore was my birth from Heaven foretold But yet it cannot justly be imputed as a fault to our author. Grief, though eloquent, is not tied to forms; and is besides apt in its own nature frequently to recur to, and repeat, its source and subject.-THYER. No long petition; speedy death, Cho. Many are the sayings of the wise, With studied argument, and much persuasion sought ", But with the afflicted in his pangs their sound Little prevails, or rather seems a tune Harsh, and of dissonant mood P from his complaint; Unless he feel within Some source of consolation from above, Secret refreshings, that repair his strength, And fainting spirits uphold. God of our fathers, what is man ¶! That thou toward him with hand so various, Or might I say contrarious *, Temper❜st thy providence through his short course, The angelick orders, and inferiour creatures mute, 650 655 660 665 670 suppose an error of the press for fraught.-Warburton. 675 But "sought" may mean, collected studiously or with pains; or, it may be used in the sense of recherché in French; curious, refined, far-fetched.-Dunster. • Lenient of grief. Expressed from what we quoted before from Horace, "Ep." 1. i. 34 :— Sunt verba et voces, quibus hunc lenire dolorem P Or rather seems a tune Harsh, and of dissonant mood, &c. Alluding to Ecclus. xxii. 6 : A tale out of season is as music in mourning."-THYER. God of our fathers, what is man! &c. This, and the following paragraph, to ver. 705, seem to be an imitation of the Chorus in Seneca's "Hippolytus," where the immature and undeserved fate of that young hero is lamented, a. iv. 971 : sed cur idem, Qui tanta regis, sub quo vasti Pondera mundi librata suos Ducunt orbes, hominum nimium Securus ades; non sollicitus Prodesse bonis, nocuisse malis?—THYER. This apostrophe opens with a sublime pathos. • Contrarious. This seems to me a harsh word, though Todd shows that it is used by Chaucer. |