O what avails me now that honor high 66 70 In fuch a feafon born when scarce a shed Could be obtain'd to fhelter him or me From the bleak air; a ftable was our warmth, 75 Thence into Egypt, till the murd❜rous king paffionate feeling of her grief. If this reading was but poffeffed of the editions, nothing could be objected to it. Calton. I am no friend to alterations of the text, unless they are abfolutely neceffary. The conftruction is But to his mother within her 63. Within her breaft though calm, From A fentiment much of the fame kind with that in the Paradife Loft, where upon the fall of our firft parents it is faid X. 23. --dim fadnefs did not fpare That time celestial visages, yet mix'd With pity, violated not their and Thyer. 79. -in From Egypt home return'd, in Nazareth 80 Hath been our dwelling many years; his life That to the fall and rifing he should be Spoken against, that through my very foul 99 intent 95 I will not argue that, nor will repine. He could not lofe himself; but went about the faint, and the tenderness of the 105 The 103. My heart hath been a flore- Thus Mary pond'ring oft,] Alluding to what is faid of her, Luke II. 19. But Mary kept all these things, and pondred them in her heart: and again, ver. 51. but his mother kept all thefe fayings in her heart: fo confiftent is the part that the acts here with her character in Scripture. 110. —with The while her fon tracing the desert wild, Had left him vacant, and with speed was gone Where all his potentates in council fat; Solicitous from th' element Each of his reign allotted, rightlier call'd Pow'rs of fire, air, water, and earth beneath,] It was a notion among the Ancients, efpecially among the Platonifts, that there were Demons in each element, fome visible, others invifible, in the æther, and fire, and air, and water, fo that no part of the world was devoid of foul : εισι δε και άλλοι δαίμονες, ἑς και καλοίη αν τις γενιητες θεός, καθ' έκασον των τοιχείων, οἱ μεν ὁρατοι, οἱ δὲ αορατοί, εν τε αι θερι, και πυρί, αερί τε, και ύδατι, ὡς μηδεν κοσμα μερα ψυγης αμοιρον είναι, as Alcinous in his fummary of the Platonic doctrines fays cap. 5. Michael Pfellus, in his dialogue concerning the operation of Demons, from whence Milton borrowed fome Solicitous and blank he thus began. 120 Princes, Heav'n's ancient Sons, ethereal Thrones, Demonian Spirits now, from th' element Each of his reign allotted, rightlier call'd Pow'rs of fire, air, water, and earth beneath, So may we hold our place and these mild feats 125 Without new trouble; fuch an enemy Is risen to invade us, who no less Threatens than our expulfion down to Hell; fome of his notions of Spirits (as we obferved in a note upon the Paradife Loft I. 423.) speaks to the fame purpose, that there are many kinds of Demons, and of all forts of forms and bodies, fo that the air above us and around us is full, the earth and the fea are full, and the inmoft and deepeft receffes: πολλα δαιμοιων γενη, και παοδαπα τας ιδέας και τα σω ματα· ὡς είναι πλήρη μεν τον αέρα, τον τε ὑπερθεν ἡμων και τον περὶ ἡμας πλήρη δε γαιαν και θαλατίαν, και τις μυχαιτατες και βυδιες [βυθιας] του 8, p. 41. and he divides them into fix kinds, the fiery, the aery, the earthy, the watry, the fubterraneous, and the lucifugous: TO διάπυρον, το αερίου, το χθόνιον, το έδραιον τε και ενάλιον, το υποχθονίον, 130 Have |