Tow'red cities please us then, And the busy hum of men, Where throngs of knights and barons bold 119 Where throngs of knights and barons bold &c.] It may perhaps be objected that this is a little unnatural, since tilts and tourneaments were disused when Milton wrote this poem: but when one considers how short a time they had been laid aside, and what a considerable figure these make in Milton's favourite authors, his introducing them here is easily accounted for, and I think as easily to be excused. Thyer. 120. triumphs] Triumphs. are shews, such as masks, revels, &c. See note on Sams. Agon. 1312. Pomp also had a technical sense in masques, train, retinue, procession. See notes on P. L. viii. 60. and Sams. Agon. 449 and 1312. T. Warton. 121. With store of ladies,] An expression probably taken from Sydney's Astrophel and Stella, st. 106. 120 125 "Pris ne doit ne peult estre car elles sont toutes les pronesses faietes, et par elles en "doit estre le pris donne." See also c. cxxvii. and the articles of the Justes at Westminster, 1509. Hardyng's Chron. c. xlv. Robert of Gloucester, vol. i. 190. and Geoff. Monm. b. ix. c. xiv. T. Warton. 125. There let Hymen oft ap pear In saffron robe, with taper clear, &c.] For, according to Shakespeare, Love's Lab. Lost, act iv. s. 3. For revels, dances, masks, and merry hours Fore-run fair love, strewing her way with flowers. In these pageantries, exhibited with great splendour, and a waste of allegoric invention, at the nuptials of noble personages, the classical Hymen was of course introduced as an actor, with his proper habit and symbols. Thus in Jonson's " Hymenai, or the "solemnities of Masque and Bar"riers at a Marriage," is this stage-direction: "On the other And pomp, and feast, and revelry, "hand entered Hymen, in a saf"fron-coloured robe, his under"vestures white, his sockes yellow, a yellow veile of silke on "his left arm, his head crowned "with roses and marjoram, in "his right hand a torch." Works, ed. 1616. Masques, p. 912. see also ibid. p. 939. See also Spenser's Epithalamion, st. ii. and the Poeticall Miscellanies of Ph. Fletcher. Cambr. 1613. 4to. p. 58. T. Warton. 132. If Jonson's &c.] We see by this, that Milton's favourite dramatic entertainments were Jonson's Comedies, and Shakespeare's Plays: and in a few words he touches the distinguishing characteristics of these two famous poets, the art of Jonson and nature of Shakespeare, the learning of the one and the genius of the other: and there is this farther propriety in his praising of Shakespeare, that while he commends, he imitates him. Love's Labour's Lost, act i. sc. 1. This child of fancy, that Armado hight. 134. Warble his native woodnotes wild.] Milton shews his judgment here, in celebrating 130 135 Shakespeare's Comedies, rather than his Tragedies. For models of the latter, he refers us rightly, in his Penseroso, to the Grecian scene, v. 97. Hurd. There is good reason to suppose that Milton threw many additions and corrections into the Theatrum Poetarum, a book published by his nephew, Edward Philips, in 1675. It contains criticisms far above the taste of that period: among these is the following judgment on Shakespeare, which was not then, I believe, the general opinion, and which perfectly coincides both with the sentiment and words of the text. " In "tragedy, never any expressed a more lofty and tragic height, never any represented nature "more purely to the life: and "where the polishments of art re tr Married to immortal verse, Such as the meeting soul may pierce In notes, with many a winding bout The melting voice through mazes running, The hidden soul of harmony; That Orpheus self may heave his head 140 145 So also in the Mask, speaking of berton, on Leonidas, considers Circe and the Sirens, Who as they sung, would take the prison'd soul, And lap it in ElysiumIt may be observed, that Milton's imagination glows with a particular brightness not only in this charming passage, but in every other where he has occasion to describe the power of music, which shews how fond he was of it, and finely exemplifies Horace's maxim, Verbaque provisam rem non invita sequentur. Thyer. The Lydian music was very soft Softly sweet, in Lydian measures, 136. Lap me in soft Lydian airs.] An acute critic, Dr. Pem the uncertain mixture of iambic and trochaic verses, of which we have here an example, as a blemish in our poet's versification. I own, I think this mixture has a good effect in the passage before us, and in many others. As in Il Penseroso, v. Of heap'd Elysian flow'rs, and hear Such strains as would have won the ear Of Pluto, to have quite set free His half regain'd Eurydice. These delights if thou canst give, XIV. Il Penseroso*. HENCE vain deluding joys, The brood of folly without father bred, How little you bestead, Or fill the fixed mind with all your toys? from that of most other poets, that it is marked with a degree of dignity. T. Warton. 151. These delights if thou canst give, Mirth, with thee I mean to live.] The concluding turn of this and the following poem is borrowed from the conclusion of two beautiful little pieces of Shakespeare, entitled, The Passionate Shepherd to his Love, and the Nymph's Reply to the Shepherd; If these delights thy mind may move, Then live with me, and be my love. These two poems are printed at length in the notes upon the third act of the Merry Wives of Windsor, in Mr. Warburton's edition. * Il Penseroso is the thoughtful melancholy man; and Mr. Thyer concurred with me in ob 150 serving, that this poem, both in its model and principal circumstances, is taken from a song in praise of melancholy in Fletcher's comedy called The Nice Valor, or Passionate Madman. The reader will not be displeased to see it here, as it is well worth transcribing. Hence all you vain delights, Wherein you spend your folly; Oh sweetest Melancholy. A midnight bell, a parting groan, Dwell in some idle brain, And fancies fond with gaudy shapes possess, As thick and numberless As the gay motes that people the sun-beams, Or likest hovering dreams The fickle pensioners of Morpheus' train. 5 10 Then stretch our bones in a still forth without a father. Theog. gloomy valley, Nothing's so dainty sweet, as lovely Melancholy. 1. Hence vain deluding joys, &c.] From a distich, as Mr. Bowle observes, in Sylvester, the translator of Du Bartas, Workes, ed. fol. 1621. 1084. p. Hence, hence, false pleasures, momentary joyes," Mocke us no more with your illuding toyes! The imagery which follows, v. 5. and seq. is immediately from his Cave of Sleep in Du Bartas, p. 316. ed. fol. 1621. (See note on L'Allegro, v. 10.) He there mentions Morpheus, and his fantasticke swarme of dreames green, red, 66 "that hovered"—" " and yellow, tawny, black, and " and yellow, tawny, black, and "blew"-and these resemble Th' unnumbered motes which in the sun do play. And afterwards he calls the gawdy swarme of dreames." Hence Milton's fancies fond, gaudy shapes, numberless gay motes in the sun-beams, and the hovering dreams of Morpheus. T. Warton. 2. The brood of folly without father bred,] He assigns the same kind of origin to these fantastic joys, as Hesiod does to dreams, which he says the Night brings As thik as motis in the sunné beme. 7. But it was now a common illustration. See Drayton, Mus. Elys. Nymph. vi. vol. iv. p. 1494. Randolph's Poems, ed. 1640. p. 97. Caxton's Golden Legend, ed. 1483. fol. 306. b. Sylvester certainly suggested the idea. T. Warton. 10. The fickle pensioners of Morpheus' train.] Fickle is transitory, perpetually shifting, as in Shakespeare's Sonnet cxxvi."Time's fickle glass."-Pensioners became a common appellation in our poetry for train, attendants, retinue, &c. As in the Mids. N. Dr. act ii. s. 1. of the faery queen, The cowslips tall her pensioners be. |