PREFATORY NOTE. ALTHOUGH "explanatory notes" are advertised in Tonson's 1695 edition of Paradise Regained, with Samson Agonistes, and the Minor Poems, the first real Commentary on Paradise Regained appeared in 1752, when NEWTON completed his edition of the Poetical Works collectively by adding the single quarto volume containing Paradise Regained, Samson, and the Minor Poems to his two quarto volumes of 1749 containing the Paradise Lost. Besides Newton's own Notes to Paradise Regained there appeared Notes to the Poem from some of his coadjutors on the Paradise Lost (see p. 101), especially THYER, JORTIN, and WARBURTON, and also from some new coadjutors, among whom was MR. CALTON, a Lincolnshire clergyman. Not satisfied with what had thus been done, and thinking that Paradise Regained had been unduly neglected in comparison with Paradise Lost, CHARLES DUNSTER, M.A., issued in 1795, in a handsome quarto volume, a separate edition of the Poem, with the text in large type, and abundant footnotes in small type, partly a reproduction of those of Newton and his coadjutors, partly contributions by himself. The Notes in this Variorum edition of Paradise Regained by Dunster were substantially preserved by Todd in his successive Variorum editions of the Poetical Works of 1801, 1809, 1826, and 1842, where indeed (Dunster's own volume being scarce) they are most accessible. In these, however, there were additional Notes by TODD himself, with some derived from other sources, more particularly from MSS. of the two brothers THOMAS WARTON and JOSEPH WARTON, communicated to Todd by their nephew. Since Todd the only annotators of the Poem that need be mentioned here are MR. KEIGHTLEY, MR. R. C. BROWNE, and MR. J. M. Ross, (see antè, p. 103). The Notes of Mr. Ross, however, are only to Books III. and IV.So far as use has been made in the following Notes of the materials provided by these preceding commentators, it has been on the principles explained in the Preface to the Notes on Paradise Lost, PP. 103-106. 282 PARADISE REGAINED. NOTES. BOOK I. I-7. I, who," &c. In this manner of referring, at the opening of a new poem, to his previous poem of Paradise Lost, Milton, as Newton noted, follows precedent. Prefixed to the Eneid are the lines, attributed by some to Virgil himself— “Ille ego qui quondam gracili modulatus avenâ Spenser also opens his Faery Queene with the following reference to his smaller pastoral poems which had preceded it : "Lo! I, the man whose Muse whilom did mask, For trumpets stern to change mine oaten reeds." But there is a far closer relation between the Paradise Regained and Paradise Lost than between either the Eneid and Virgil's preceding poems, or the Faery Queene and the preceding pastoral poems of Spenser. As these first seven lines indicate, the one is a sequel and retrievement of the other. 4-7. "By one man's firm obedience," &c. On this passage, as announcing the theme of the entire poem, see pp. 5, 6 of the Introduction. It may be added that Milton in this poem resumes the history of his former hero, Satan, in order to show the fulfilment of the prophecy with which his former poem ended, that the seed of the Woman should bruise the head of the Serpent. It is to be recollected that the passages of Scripture on which the poem is mainly founded are Matthew iii. and iv. 1-11; Mark i. 1-15; Luke iii. 2-23 and iv. 1-14; and John, chap. i. In line 4, as Newton noted, there is a reference to Rom. v. 19, and in line 7, as Dunster noted, to Isaiah li. 3. 8-17. "Thou Spirit," &c. With this compare the similar invocations, Par. Lost, I. 1-26, and VII. 1—39; also IX. 13-47. See notes on those passages. 8. "Eremite," the old and more correct form of hermit, from the Greek ipnuirns, a dweller in the desert. Todd notes that the spelling hermit is older than Milton's time; indeed hermite and heremite alternate with ermite and eremite in the oldest English writings. 14. "full summed." See Par. Lost, VII. 421, and note there. 18-32. John i. 33. "Now had," &c. Matt. iii. 13-17; Luke iii. 23; and Dunster quotes also Isaiah lxviii. 1. 33-35. "That heard the Adversary, &c." sary." Dunster quotes Job i. 7. Satan means "Adver 39-42. "Flies to his place," &c. Compare In Quintum Novembris, 7 et seq. 42. "consistory." It is not unlikely, as Thyer noted, that Milton. chose this word as being the name more particularly of ecclesiastical courts, Papal or English. In Par. Lost, X. 457, the council of evil Spirits is called "their dark divan." (Dunster.) 44, 45. "O ancient Powers of Air," &c. It is to be remembered that, at the loss of Paradise, such a road or bridge was established over Chaos between Hell and the Universe of Man that the Fallen Angels were able thenceforth to go and come at their pleasure between the two, and in fact to consider the Universe an extension of their infernal empire. They are here supposed, accordingly, to have since then resided more in the Universe of Man-" this wide World "--than in Hell; and chiefly they are supposed to have made the Air their residence. See Ephes. ii. 2, and vi. 12 (Dunster), and refer to Par. Lost, X. 188-190, 260, 261, 320-324, 375-381, 399, 400, 463-467. 62. “infringed"; in its primary sense, "broken in upon,” ""shattered." 74. "Purified to receive him pure." 1 John iii. 3. (Newton.) 83. "A perfect dove": i.e. a real dove, not a seeming one. Luke iii. 22. 84. "sovran." Though in the original editions of Paradise Lost this word is always spelt sovran, it is here spelt sov'raign both in the First and in the Second Edition-propably because the person who saw Paradise Regained through the press inclined to our present form of the word, sovereign, which derives it from the French rather than from the Italian. The present is the only case in which the word occurs in Par. Reg.; nor does it once occur in Samson Ag. 85. "This is," &c. One rather wonders why Milton did not dictate in this line "I am" instead of "am." The metre of the line would still have been as good as that of many another line in the poem. |