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Through optic glass the Tuscan artist views
At evening from the top of Fesolé,
Or in Valdarno, to descry new lands,
Rivers or mountains in her spotty globe.
His spear, to equal which the tallest pine
Hewn on Norwegian hills, to be the mast
Of some great ammiral, were but a wand,
He walk'd with to support uneasy steps
Over the burning marle, not like those steps
On heaven's azure, and the torrid clime

splendor of Achilles' shield to the moon, Iliad. xix. 273.

αυταρ έπειτα σακος μεγα τι, στι·
βαρον τε,

Είλετο, τουδ' απάνευθε σελας γενετ', ηύτε

μηνης.

but the shield of Satan was large as the moon seen through a telescope, an instrument first applied to celestial observations by Galileo, a native of Tuscany, whom he means here by the Tuscan artist, and afterwards mentions by name in v. 262. a testimony of his honour for so great a man, whom he had known and visited in Italy, as himself informs us in his Areopazilica.

289. Fesolé,] Is a city in Tuscany; Valdarno, or the valley of Arno, a valley there. Richardson.

292. His spear, to equal which the tallest pine, &c.] Homer, Odyss. ix. 322. makes the club of Polyphemus as big as the mast of a ship,

Όσσον β' ίστον νηος

and Virgil gives him a pine to walk with, En. iii. 659.

VOL. I.

290

295

Trunca manu pinus regit et vestigia firmat.

and Tasso arms Tancred and
Argantes with two spears us big
as masts, cant. vi. st. 40.

Posero in resta, e dirizzaro in alto
I duo guerrier le noderose antenne.
These sons of Mavors bore (instead of
spears)

Two knotty masts, which none but
they could lift. Fairfax.
well then might Milton assign
a spear so much larger to su
superior a being.

-

293. Norwegian hills,] The hills of Norway, barren and rocky, but abounding in vast woods, from whence are brought masts of the largest size. Hume.

294. ammiral,] According to its German extraction amiral or amirael, says Hume; from the the Italian ammiraglio, says Richardson more probably. Our author made choice of this, as thinking it of a better sound than admiral: and in Latin he writes ammiralatás curia, the court of admiralty.

294. ammiral,] The ship which carries the admiral. Johnson's Dictionary.

300

Smote on him sore besides, vaulted with fire:
Nathless he so endur'd, till on the beach
Of that inflamed sea he stood, and call'd
His legions, Angel forms, who lay entranc'd
Thick as autumnal leaves that strow the brooks
In Vallombrosa, where th' Etrurian shades
High over-arch'd embow'r; or scatter'd sedge
Afloat, when with fierce winds Orion arm'd
Hath vex'd the Red-sea coast, whose waves o'erthrew

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the woods.

Thick as the leaves in autumn strow Dryden. But Milton's comparison is by far the exactest; for it not only expresses a multitude, but also the posture and situation of the angels. Their lying confusedly in heaps, covering the lake, is finely represented by this image of the leaves in the brooks. And besides the propriety of the application, if we compare the similes themselves, Milton's is by far superior to the other, as it exhibits a real landscape. See An Essay upon Milton's imitations of the Ancients, p. 23.

303. Vallombrosa,] A famous valley in Etruria or Tuscany, so named of Vallis and Umbra, remarkable for the continual cool shades, which the vast number

305

of trees that overspread it afford. Hume.

305. when with fierce winds Orion arm'd, &c.] Orion is a constellation represented in the figure of an armed man, and supposed to be attended with stormy weather, assurgens fluctu nimbosus Orion. Virg. En. i. 539. And the Red-sea abounds so much with sedge, that in the Hebrew Scripture it is called the Sedgy Sea.

306. Hath vex'd the Red-sea coast] Verare is commonly used by the Latin poets to describe the effects of a storm.

-aut mare Caspium Vexant inæquales procellæ

-vindemia nimbis Continuis vexata

Hor. ii. Od. 9.

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Busiris and his Memphian chivalry,

While with perfidious hatred they pursued
The sojourners of Goshen, who beheld
From the safe shore their floating carcases

And broken chariot wheels: so thick bestrown
Abject and lost lay these, covering the flood,
Under amazement of their hideous change.

Dr. Bentley throws out six lines here, as the Editor's, not Milton's: his chief reason is, That that single event of Moses's passing the Red-sea has no relation to a constant quality of it, that in stormy weather it is strowed with sedge. But it is very usual with Homer and Virgil (and therefore may be allowed to Milton) in a comparison, after they have shewn the resemblance, to go off from the main purpose and finish with some other image, which was occasioned by the comparison, but is itself very different from it. Milton has done thus in almost all his similitudes; and therefore what he does so frequently, cannot be allowed to be an objection to the genuineness of this passage before us. As to Milton's making Pharaoh to be Busiris (which is another of the Doctor's objections to the passage) there is authority enough for to justify a poet in doing so, though not an historian: it has been supposed by some, and therefore Milton might follow that opinion. Chivalry for cavalry, and cavalry (says Dr. Bentley) for chariotry, is twice wrong. But it is rather twice right: for chivalry (from the French che

310

valerie) signifies not only knighthood, but those who use horses in fight, both such as ride on horses and such as ride in chariots drawn by them: in the sense of riding and fighting on horseback this word chivalry is used in ver. 765. and in many places of Fairfax's Tasso, as in cant. v. st. 9. cant. viii. st. 67. cant. xx. st. 61. In the sense of riding and fighting in chariots. drawn by horses, Milton uses the word chivalry in Par. Reg. iii. ver. 344. compared with ver. 328. Pearce.

308 -perfidious hatred] Because Pharaoh, after leave given to the Israelites to depart, followed after them like fugitives. Hume.

310. From the safe shore their floating carcases &c.] Much has been said of the long similitudes of Homer, Virgil, and our author, wherein they fetch a compass as it were to draw in new images, besides those in which the direct point of likeness consists. I think they have been sufficiently justified in the general: but in this before us, while the poet is digressing, he raises a new similitude from the floating carcases of the Egyptians. Heylin.

He call'd so loud, that all the hollow deep

Of hell resounded. Princes, Potentates,

Warriors, the flow'r of heav'n, once yours, now lost,
If such astonishment as this can seize

Eternal Spi'rits; or have ye chos'n this place
After the toil of battle to repose

find

Your wearied virtue, for the ease you
To slumber here, as in the vales of heaven?
Or in this abject posture have ye sworn
To' adore the conqueror? who now beholds
Cherub and Seraph rolling in the flood
With scatter'd arms and ensigns, till anon
His swift pursuers from heav'n gates discern
Th' advantage, and descending tread us down
Thus drooping, or with linked thunderbolts
Transfix us to the bottom of this gulf.
Awake, arise, or be for ever fall'n.

315

320

325

330

They heard, and were abash'd, and up they sprung Upon the wing, as when men wont to watch

On duty, sleeping found by whom they dread,
Rouse and bestir themselves ere well awake.
Nor did they not perceive the evil plight
In which they were, or the fierce pains not feel;
Yet to their general's voice they soon obey'd
Innumerable. As when the potent rod

328. with linked thunderbolts
Transfix us to the bottom of this
gulf.]
This alludes to the fate of Ajax
Oileus,

Illum expirantem transfixo pectore flammas

Turbine corripuit, scopuloque infixit acuto. Virg. Æn. i. 44, 45.

335

Who pleaseth to read the Devil's speech to his damned assembly in Tasso, cant. iv. from stanza 9 to stanza 18, will find our author has seen him, though borrowed little of him. Hume.

338. As when the potent rod &c.] See Exod. x. 13. Moses stretched forth his rod over the

Of Amram's son, in Egypt's evil day,

Wav'd round the coast, up call'd a pitchy cloud
Of locusts, warping on the eastern wind,
That o'er the realm of impious Pharaoh hung
Like night, and darken'd all the land of Nile :
So numberless were those bad angels seen
Hovering on wing under the cope of hell
'Twixt upper, nether, and surrounding fires;
Till, as a signal giv'n, th' up-lifted spear
Of their great Sultan waving to direct
Their course, in even balance down they light
On the firm brimstone, and fill all the plain;
A multitude, like which the populous north

340

345

350

zen loins, it is the Scripture expression of children and descendants coming out of the loins, as Gen. xxxv. 11. Kings shall come

land of Egypt, and the Lord brought an east-wind upon the land, and the east-wind brought the locusts: and the locusts went up over all the land of Egypt-out of thy loins; and these are so that the land was darkened. called frozen loins only on ac341 warping] Working themselves forward, a sea term. Hume and Richardson.

351. A multitude, like which &c.] This comparison doth not fall below the rest, as some have imagined. They were thick as the leaves, and numberless as the locusts, but such a multitude the north never poured forth; and we may observe that the subject of this comparison rises very much above the others, leaves and locusts. The populous north, as the northern parts of the world are observed to be more fruitful of people, than the hotter countries: Sir William Temple calls it the northern hive. Poured never, a very proper word to express the inundations of these northern nations. From her fro

count of the coldness of the climate. To pass Rhene or the Danaw. He might have said consistently with his verse The Rhine or Danube, but he chose the more uncommon names Rhene of the Latin, and Danaw of the German, both which words are used too in Spenser. When her barbarous sons &c. They were truly barbarous; for besides exercising several cruelties, they destroyed all the monuments of learning and politeness wherever they came. Came like a deluge, Spenser describing the same people has the same simile, Faery Queen, b. ii. cant. 10. st. 15.

And overflow'd all countries far away, Like Noye's great flood with their importune sway.

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