of malignity, of cruelty or impurity-these baser qualities belong to other and meaner spirits; pride, self-will, the love of power at all costs, are personified in him—

"The unconquerable will,

And study of revenge, immortai hate,

And courage never to submit or yield"

are his, and of these not even Omnipotence can deprive him. These sentiments never desert him, he upbraids the cowardice of his followers, and, conscious of his strength, he dares to doubt the ultimate result of the struggle. By guile if not by force he hopes to regain the realms of bliss; or if that be impossible he may yet make renewed attacks upon his hated foe. Of submission alone he is incapable, " to be weak is to be miserable," his punishment he is resolved to bear with unflinching courage, and he consoles himself under the mental torture which wrings his mighty frame that it is

"Better to reign in hell, than serve in heaven."

In a certain sense he provokes our interest, but though, unlike the Satan of Tasso and Dante, he exhibits no physical deformity, his moral depravity is so vividly depicted that even his fortitude fails to command our sympathy or respect. We do not loathe him as we do Moloch or Belial, still less can we despise him like Mammon and the bestial crew, but we shudder while we stand in awe at the impersonation of spiritual wickedness, though he retain the outward semblance of an archangel, though he be the blasted image of a God.

(70)

EPITOME OF THE VIEWS OF THE BEST

KNOWN CRITICS ON MILTON.

ADDISON Contributed to the Spectator a series of papers which he entitled "A Critique on Paradise Lost." In these essays he compared Milton's epic with the Iliad of Homer, and the Eneid of Virgil, applying to each of them the Aristotelian canons. In accordance with these he maintains that the action of the fable on which an epic is founded should be "one action, an entire action, and a great action." To fulfil the first condition, "to preserve the unity of his action, Homer hastens into the midst of things" (Hor. Ars Poet. 148), and 66 opens his poem with the discord of the princes." So also in Virgil, "Eneas makes his first appearance in the Tyrrhene Seas, and within sight of Italy." And "Milton, in imitation of these two great poets, opens his Paradise Lost with the Infernal Council plotting the fall of man, which is the action he proposed to celebrate." Whatever else is requisite for the comprehension of the story, Homer "artfully interweaves in the several succeeding parts of it;" "Virgil makes his hero relate it by way of episode in the second and third books;" and Milton casts "the battle of the angels and the creation of the world into the fifth, sixth, and seventh books."

or as

"The second qualification required in the action of an epic poem is that it should be an entire action, Aristotle describes it," it should consist of "a beginning, a middle and an end." Such are the plots of the Iliad and Eneid; but "the action in Milton excels both the former in this particular, we see it contrived in Hell, executed upon Earth, and punished in Heaven."

"The third qualification of an epic poem is its greatness.”

"Milton's subject was still greater than” those of Homer or Virgil; "it does not determine the fate of single persons or nations, but of a whole species. The united powers of Hell are joined together for the destruction of mankind,

B

which they effected in part, and would have completed, had not Omnipotence itself interposed. The principal actors are man in his greatest perfection, and woman in her highest beauty: their enemies are the fallen angels, the Messiah their friend, and the Almighty their protector."

The action itself in all these epics takes up a comparatively short time, while the poets have shown their skill “in extending and diversifying it, by the invention of episodes, . and the like poetical ornaments,

sufficient to employ the memory without overcharging it." Milton's task was more difficult than theirs, for they had no fear "of offending the religion of their country," whereas Milton". was obliged to proceed with the greatest caution in everything he added."

"Homer excelled all the heroic poets that ever lived in the multitude and variety of his characters," in what we should now call dramatic power, but with the exceptions "of Sinon and Camilla, which are fine improvements on the Greek poet, there is neither that variety nor novelty in the persons of the Eneid which we meet with in those of the Iliad."

"If we look into the characters of Milton we shall find that he has introduced all the variety that his fable was capable of receiving." It is true that the whole human species comprised at that time but two individuals, "yet by presenting them in the highest innocence and perfection, and in the most abject state of guilt and infirmity," he has made of them "four distinct characters." "The two last are indeed very common and obvious, but the two first are not only more magnificent, but more new than any either in Homer or Virgil, or indeed in the whole circle of nature."

As if sensible of this scarcity of actors, Milton has introduced two fictitious ones in the persons of Sin and Death, but though he has worked out of them a very beautiful allegory, such shadowy and unreal characters are unsuited to the plan of an epic poem and fail to evoke the sympathy of the reader. "Another principal actor in this poem is the great enemy of mankind." Aristotle greatly admires the adventures and the craft of Ulysses in the Odyssey, but Milton's Satan is

incomparably superior in conception in each respect. "We may likewise observe with how much art the poet has varied several characters of the persons that speak in his infernal assembly. On the contrary, how has he represented the whole Godhead exerting itself towards man in its full benevolence under the threefold distinction of a Creator, a Redeemer and a Comforter!"

"The angels are indeed as much diversified in Milton, and distinguished by their proper parts, as the gods are in Homer or Virgil. The reader will find nothing ascribed to Uriel, Gabriel, Michael or Raphael, which is not in a particular manner suitable to their respective characters."

Homer and Virgil "with great judgment" chose "for their heroes persons who were nearly related to the people for whom they wrote," but then they lose "this advantage among those readers to whom their heroes are strangers or indifferent persons."

66 Milton's poem is admirable in this respect, since it is impossible for any of its readers, whatever nation, country or people he may belong to, not to be related to the persons who are its principal actors," they being "not only our progenitors but our representatives, we have an actual interest in everything they do, and no less than our utmost happiness is concerned, and lies at stake in all their behaviour."

With respect to the sentiments ascribed to the several heroes and actors in their poems, "it was the fault of the age and not of Homer if there wants that delicacy which now appears in the works of men of much inferior genius." Virgil excelled in this, and "Milton shines likewise." Besides his "characters most of them lie out of nature and were to be formed purely by his own invention." "It shows a greater genius in Shakspeare to have drawn his Caliban, than his Hotspur or Julius Cæsar." "The loves of Dido and Æneas are only copies of what has passed between other persons. Adam and Eve before the fall are a different species from that of mankind who are descended from them; and none but a poet of the most unbounded invention and the most exquisite judgment could have filled their conversation and

behaviour with so many apt circumstances during their state of innocence." "Milton's chief talent, and indeed his distinguishing excellence, lies in the sublimity of his thoughts.

It is impossible for the imagination of man to distend itself with greater ideas than those which he has laid together in his first, second, and sixth books."

The sentiments of an epic should be always either natural or sublime. There are two kinds which should always be avoided, viz. "the unnatural and affected and the mean and vulgar." Homer and Virgil never fall into the former error, and in the Eneid there is but one incident, that of Menoenætes drying himself on the rock [Æn. v. 180] which can well raise a laugh, but the circumstances of the games are sufficient to justify the exception. "The only piece of pleasantry in the Paradise Lost is [in vi. 607-629] where the evil spirits are described as rallying the angels upon the success of their newinvented artillery. This passage I look upon to be the most exceptionable in the whole poem, as being nothing else but a string of puns and these too very indifferent."

Such pedantic and awkward Grecisms as the following— "God and his Son except

and

Created thing nought valued he, nor shunned,"

"Adam the goodliest man of men since born

His sons, the fairest of her daughters Eve,"

ill suit the genius of our language, and though an instance occurs in Col. i. 15, they convey to the English reader, as they did to Addison, the impression that the Divine Persons are classed with created things, and Adam and Eve confused with their posterity.

Of mean and common expressions we may mention

"Eremites and friars,

White, black and gray, with all their trumpery;"

"A while discourse they hold

No fear lest dinner cool;"

"Ill fare our ancestors impure;

For this we may thank Adam."