Mean while in utmost longitude, where Heav'n With earth and ocean meets, the setting fun 540 Slowly defcended, and with right aspéct Against the eastern gate of Paradife Confpicuous far, winding with one ascent 539.in utmost longitude,] At the utmoft length, at the fartheft distance. Longitude is length, as in V. 754. -from one entire globofe Stretch'd into longitude; and it is particularly apply'd to the distance from eaft to weft. See the notes upon III. 555, 574. 541. Slowly defcended,] Dr. Bentley objects to this verfe for a frivolous reafon, and reads Had low defcended, becaufe the fun paffes equal spaces in equal times. This is true (as Dr. Pearce replies) in philofophy, but in poetry it is ufual to reprefent it otherwife. But I have a trouge objection to this verfe, which is that it feems to contradict what is faid before, ver. 353 The fun-was hafting now vith prone carreer To th' ocean iles, 545 Still and to reconcile them I think we muft read Had low defcended or perhaps Lowly defcended, or understand it as Dr. Pearce explains it, that the fun defcended lowly at this time, because Uriel its Angel came on a fun-beam to Paradife, and was to return on the fame beam; which he could not well have done if the fun had moved on with its ufual rapidity of course. 549. -Gabriel] One of the Arch-Angels, fent to fhow Daniel the vifion of the four monarchies and the feventy weeks, Dan. VII. and IX. and to the Virgin Mary to reveal the incarnation of our Saviour, Luke I. His name in the Hebrew fignifies the man of God, or the firength and power of God; well by our author pofted as chief_of the angelic guards placed about Paradife. Hume. 551. heroic games] They were not now upon the watch, they awaited night; but their arms were Still as it rofe, impoffible to climb. Th' unarmed youth of Heav'n, but nigh at hand were ready. The Angels would not be idle, but employ'd themfelves in these noble exercises. So the foldiers of Achilles during his quarrel with Agamemnon, and fo the infernal Spirits, when their chief was gone in fearch of the new creation, II. 528. Richardfon. 555-gliding through the even] That is thro' that part of the hemifphere, where it was then evening. Evening (fays Dr. Bentley) is no place of space to glide thro': no more is day or night, and yet in the fenfe, which I have given to even, Milton fays in the next verfe but one thwarts the night, and elsewhere speaks of the confines of day. Pearce. In ver. 792. Uriel is faid to be arriv'd from the fun's decline, which is no more a place than the evening, but beautifully poetical; and juftify'd by Virgil, Georg. IV. 59. where a fwarm of bees fails thro' the glowing fummer: In Nare per æftatem liquidam fu fpexeris agmen. Richardson. 556. On a fun beam,] Uriel's gliding down to the earth upon a fun-beam, with the poet's device to make him defcend, as well in his return to the fun, as in his coming from it, is a prettinefs that might have been admired in a little fanciful poet, but feems below the genius of Milton. The defcription of the hoft of armed Angels walking their nightly round in Paradife, is of another fpirit, So faying, on he led his radiant files Dazling the moon; as that account of the hymns which our firft parents used to hear them fing in thefe their midnight walks, is altogether divine, and inexpreffibly amufing to the imagination. Addifon. As Uriel was coming from the fun to In autumn thwarts the night, when vapors fir'd Impress the air, and shows the mariner 560 Gabriel, to thee thy course by lot hath given Charge and strict watch, that to this happy place No evil thing approach or enter in. to the earth, his coming upon a fun-beam was the most direct and level course that he could take; for the fun's rays were now pointed right against the eastern gate of Paradife, where Gabriel was fitting, and to whom Uriel was going. And the thought of making him glide on a fun beam, I have been inform'd, is taken from fome capital picture of fome great Italian mafter, where an Angel is made to defcend in like manner. I Since recollect, it is from a picture of Annibal Caracci in the French king's cabinet. 556.-fwift as a shooting ftar &c.] Homer in like manner compares Minerva's defcent from Heaven to a fhooting star, Iliad IV. 74. Βη δε κατ' ελύμποιο καρήνων αίξασα, λομήτεω, Η ναύτησι τερας, το ερατω ευρεί λαων, Milton adds that this fhooting ftar thearts or croffes the night in autumn, because then thefe phænomena are most common after the heat of fummer, when the vapors taking fire make violent impreffions and agitations in the air, and they Where Dr. Clark fays, Non To ufually portend tempeftuous wea Λαμπρον του δε τε πολλοίαπο σπινθηρες ναι. ther, 565 This day at highth of noon came to my sphere Alien 563. No evil thing approach or enter in.] Dr. Bentley objects that the natural order is inverted, enter after approach; for if the very approach was ftopt, the entrance was impoffible. But the order feems rightly observed in the common reading, if we allow the sense to be this, Not to suffer any evil thing to approach, or at leaft to enter in. Pearce. 567. God's latest image:] For the first was Christ, and before Man were the Angels. So in III. 151. Man is called God's youngest fon. 567.I deferib'd his way] Some read defcry'd, but defcrib'd is propereft. He defcrib'd to Satan or fhow'd him the way to Paradife, as it is faid he did in III. 722, 733. and mark'd bis aery gate; For it was sportive in many an acry wheel, as we read in the conclufion of the third book; and it was well taken notice of there, as fuch ufe is made of it here. And the fame we may obferve of the turbulent paffions difcover'd in him on mount Niphates in this book, ver. 1.5 Alien from Heav'n, with paffions foul obscur'd: To whom the winged warrior thus return'd. 580 So 130. Uriel mark'd them then, and reports them now. 590. Return'd on that bright beam, whofe point now rais'd] He fuppofes, that he flides back on the fame beam that he came upon; which fun-beam he confiders not as a flowing punctum of light, but as a continued rod extending from fun to earth. The extremity of this rod, while Uriel was difcourfing, and the fun gradually defcending, muft needs be raised up higher than when he came upon it; and confequently the rod bore him flope downward back again. This has been reprefented as a pretty device, but below the genius of Milton, [See Mr. Addison's remark on ver. 556.] To make Uriel defcend, for more eafe and expedition, both in his way from the fun, and to the fun again. But Milton had no fuch device here: he makes Uriel come from the fun, not on a defcending, but on a level ray, ver. 541, from the fun's right afped to the eaft in the very margin of the horizon. Here's no trick then or device; but perhaps a too great affectation to how his philofophy; as in the next lines, on this common occafion of the fun's fetting, he starts a doubt whether that is produc'd in the Ptolemaic or Copernican way. But this little foible he makes ample amends for. Bentley. 592. Be |