On his return, he took a house in Aldersgate Street, where he superintended the education of di nephew by his sister, and also received other young gentlemen to be boarded and instructed.

In his 35th year, he married Mary the daughter of Richard Powel, Elg; but a feparation, or rather desertion on the wife's part, took place in a month after the ceremony. On her refusing to return, inz defiance of repeated requisitions, Milton was fo provoked, that he was induced to publish several Treatises on the docrine of Divorce ; and also to pay his ad reilus to a young lady of great wit and beauty, A reconciliation was the confequence; for his wifi, in an unexpected interview, throwing herself at his feet, implored and obtained forgiveness. Impreffed with this event, he is fuid to have conceived the pathetic scene in Paradise Loft, in which live addrefieth berfeli to Adam for pardon and peace.

From this period to the restoration, our Author was fo deeply engayid in the controverties of the times, that he found no leisure for polite learning. The Allegro and Pensiroso however appeared in a collection of Latin and English Poems published in 1645. These delightful pieces are undoubtedly the two best descriptive poems that ever were written. Had he left no other monuments but Comus, Lycidas, and this matchless pair, yet would they alone be sufficient to render his name immortal. They were however little noticed on their publication, and remained for near a century ditregarded, or at least scarcely known, while his Polemical Tracis, now only in their titles remembered, made their Author's fortune, and spread bis fame over Europe. Of these, the moft celebrated is his D.ferjio pre Populo Anglicano, answer to Salmahus, Professor of Polite Learning at Leyden, who was employed by Charles II. when in exile, to write the Defenfio Regis. Milton's piece was fo fevere, and so much admired, that it is said to have killed his antagonist with vexation. For this Tract, he was rewarded with a thousand pounds, a fum twenty times greater than he made by all his poetical works put together ! and was also promoted to be Latin Secretary to the Protecter. But for his intellectual acquisitions he paid dear; a gutta serena for some time affected his fight, and he now became totally blind. At this period too, he lost his wife in child-bed, who left him three daughters. Hie foon, however, married again, Catharine daughter of a Captain Woodcock; but she also died in child-bed, within a year after they were married.

On the Restoration, he was obliged to quit his house, together with his employment, and to fecreto himself in an obscure abode in Bartholomew Close. His friends had some difficulty to prevent him from being excepted in the act of oblivion ; to lull research, and to gain time, they used the exe pedient of a mock funeral. By the act of oblivion he was at length freed from danger; his Polemical writings only were burnt by the hands of the common hangman.

From Bartholomew Close he removed to Jewrio Street, and married a third wife, Elizabeth Minftur, of a gentleman's family in Cheshire,

He was now in his 52d year, blind, infirm, and poor ; for he lost his paternal property by the civil wars, and his acquired by the Restoration. But neither his infirmitits, nor the vicissitudes of Fortune, could depress the vigour of his mind, or prevent him from executing a defiga he had long conceived, of writing an Heroic Poem,

The great work of Paradise Loft was finished in 1665, at Chalfont in Backs, where the Author haid taken refuge from the plague, and published in 1667, when he returned to London. . He told the copy to Samuel Simmons for Five Pounds in hand, Five Pounds more when 1 300 should be fold, and the same sum on the publication of the second and third Editions, for each edition. Of this agreement i Milton received in all Fifteen Pounds; and his widow afterwards sold her claims for Eight.

Such was the first reception of a Work that constitutes the glory and boast of English Literature ;a Work that, notwithstanding the severity of criticisin, may be ranked among the nobleft efforts of human genius; for though in variety of character and choice of subject, it may yield to some, yet in grandeur and sublimity it is confessedly superior to all. The measure of this Divine Poem is blank verse; between which and rhyme there are endless disputes for pre-eminence : but surely the essential qualities of Poetry can no more depend on either, than those of a man on the fashion of his clothes.

Doctor Johnson, who could not endure blank verte, yet confesses, that “ He could not prevail on * himself to wish that Milton had been a rhymer.”

Paradise Lost, however, is not without faults ; perfection in this life is unattainable. The at: tempt of the Author to give language and sentiments to the Deity, is where he seems to have mof:

failed in the execution : But in such an attempt, what mortal could have succeeded? Other excepzons it has also endured in passing the fiery ordeal of Dr. Johnson's criticism, who seems to have extended his abfurd dislike of the man to his writings. Yet every reader capable of relishing true Poetry will agree with him in concluding, “ That this work is not the greatest of Heroic Poems,

only because it is not the first.”

Three years after the publication of Paradise Lost, the author published Sampson Agonistes, a Tragedy, in the purest stile of the Greek Drama, and Paradise Regained, which he is said to have preferred to his great work, but in which preference he remains alone.

Paradise Regained hath suffered much in the comparison; it is obscured by the splendour of Paradife Loft, as the lustre of the morning star is absorbed in the ineridian blaze; but had any other than Lilton been the author, it would have claimed and received universal praise.

Our great author, now quite worn out with the gout, paid the debt of nature on the roth of November 1674, in his 66th year, at his house in Bunhill-Fields, and was buried in St. Giles's, Cripplegate; his funeral was splendidly and numerously attended. He left 1500 1. to his family; a proof, notwithstanding his great losses, that he never was in indigence.

A smali monument, with his bust, has been erected, not long since, to his memory, in Westminster Abbey.

Miilton, in ftature, did not exceed the middle size, but was formed with perfect symmetry, and was, moreover, in his youth, eminently beautiful; of which many portraits yet to be seen, as well as the following epigram of the Marquis of Villa, are incontestible proofs:

Ut mens, forma, decor, facies, mos, si Pietas fic;

Non Anglus, verum hercle Angelus ipfe fores. Haish (omitting the exception of his religion) may be thus rendered :

So perfect thou, in mind, in forni and face ;

Thou’rt not of Englih, but Angelic race. Of his habits-he was abstemious in his diet, and naturally disliked all strong liquors : In his youth he studied late, but afterwards reversed his hours. His amusements consisted in the conversation of tis friends, and in music, in which he was a proficient. After he became blind, he was aslisted in his ftudies by his daughters, whom he taught to read Hebrew, Greek, and Latin, without their underLanding any of them; and for transcribing, he employed any casual acquaintance.

His literature was great; he was a perfect master of Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Italian, French, and Spanish ; of the English Poets, he preferred Spencer, Shakespeare and Cowley. His political principles were republican, and his theological opinions tended to Arminianism. His deportment was erect, "pen, atlable; his convertation casy, cheerful, and instructive ; his wit, on all occasions, at command, facerious, grave, or satirical, as the subject required ; his judgment just and penetrating; his apprekunfion quick; his memory tenacious of what he read; his reading only not so extensive as his 117s, for that was universal. With so many accomplishments, not to have faults and missortunes to be laid in the balance, with the fame and felicity of writing Paradilc Loft, would have been too great a portion for humanit;.

IN

PARADISUM AMISSAM

SUMMI POETE

JOHANNIS MILTONI.
Qui legis Amiffam Paradisum, grandia magni Quantis, et quam funestis concurritur iris,
Carmina Miltoni, quid nisi cuncta legis?

Dum ferus hic stellas protegit, ille rapit !
Res cun&as, et cunctarum primordia rerum,

Dum vulsos montes seu tela reciproca torquent, Et fata, et fines continet ifte liber.

Et non mortali defuper igne pluunt : Intima panduntur magni penctralia mundi,

Stat dubius cui se parti concedat Olympus, Scribitur et toto quicquid in orbe latet :

Et metuit pugnæ non superesse suæ. Terræque, tractusque maris, cælemque profundum, At simul in cælis Meffiæ insignia fulgent, Sulphureumque Erebi, flammivomusque specus :

Et currus animes, armaque digna Deo, Quæque colunt terras, potumque et Tartara cæca, Horendumque rotz strident, et læva rotarum Quæque colunt summi lucida regna poli :

Erumpunt torvis fulgura luminibus,
Et quodcunque ullis conclusum est finibus ufquam, Et flamme vibrant, et vera tonitura rauco
Et fine fine Chaos, et sine fine Deus :

Admistis flammis insonuere polo :
Et sine fine magis, fi quid magis est fine fine,

Excidit attonitis mens omnis, et impetus omnis, In Chrifto erga homines conciliatus amor.

Et callis dextris irrita tela cadunt; Hæc qui speraret quis crederet efle futura? Ad pænas fugiunt, et ceu foret Orcus asylum, Et tamen hæc hodie terra Britanna legit.

Infernis certant condere se tenebris. O quantos in bella duces! quæ protulit arma!

Cedite Romani scriptores, cedite Graii, Quæ canit, et quanta prælia dira tuba!

Et quos fama recens vel celebravit annus. Calcites acies! atque in certamine cælum! Hæc quicunque leget tantum ceciniffe putabit Et quæ calestes pugna deceret acros!

Mæonidem ranas, Virgilium culices.
Quantus in æthereis tollit se Lucifer armis !
Arque ipfo graditur vix Michaele minor !

SAMUEL BARROW, M, D.

ON PARADISE LOST.

find,

Wrex I beheld the poet blind, yet bold,
In slender book his vait design unfold,
Melfiah crown'd, God's reconcil'd decree,
Rebelling angels, the forbidden tree,
Heav'n, hell, carth, chaos, all; the argument
Held me a while misdoubting his intent,
That he would ruin (for 1 law him strong)
The sacred truths to table and old song ;
So Sampson grop'd the temple's posts in spite)
The world o'erwhelming to revenge his fight.

Yet as I read, full growing less severe,
Ilik'd his project, the succets did fear,
Through that wide field how he his way should
O'er which lame faith leads understanding blind;
Leit te perplex'd the things he would explain,
And what was easy he should render vain.

Or if a work so infinite he spann'd,
Jealous I was, that some less skilful hand
(Such as disquiet always what is well,
And by ill imitating would excel)

fight hence presume the whole creation's day
To change in scenes, and shew it in a play.

Pardon me, mighty poet ! nor despise
My causeless, yet noe impious, surmise.
But I am now convinc'd, and none will dare
Within thy labours to pretend a share.
Thou hast not miss’d one thought that could be fit
And all that was improper dos gmit ;

So that no room is here for writers left,
But to detect their ignorance or theft.

That majefty whichthrough thy work dothreign,
Draws the devout, deterring the profane :
And things divine thou treat'st of in such state
As them preserves, and thee, inviolate.
At once delight and horror on us seize,
Thou sing'lt with so much gravity and ease;
And above human flight does soar aloft;
With plume so strong, so equal, and so soft ;
The bird nam'd from that paradise you sing
So never fags, but always keeps on wing.

Where couldst thou wordsof such a compass find?
Whence furnish such a vast expanse of mind ?
Just heaven thee, like Tiresias, to requite,
Rewards with prophesy thy loss of sight.

Well might'st thou scorn thy readers to allure
With tinkling rhyme, of thy own sense secure;
While the Town-Bays writes all the while and

spells,
And like a pack-horse tires without his bells :
There fancies, like our bushy points, appear,
The poets tag them, we for fashion wear.
I too, transported by the mode, commend,
And while I meant to praise thee, must offend.
Thy verse, created, like thy theme, sublime,
In number, weight, and measure, needs not rhyme.

ANDREW MARVEL. THE VERSE.

THE measure is Englis heroic verfe without rhyme, as that of Homer in Greek, and Virgil in Latin :

ryhme being no necessary adjunct or true ornament of poem or good verse, in longer works especially, but the invention of a barbarous age, to set off wretched matter and lame metre; grac'd indeed fonce by the use of Some famous modern poets, carried away by ciufom, but much to tbeir own vexation, bindrance, and constraint, to express many things otherwise, and for the most part, worse tban else they would bave expressed them. Not without cause, therefore, some both Italian and Spanish poets of prime note, bave rejected rhyme both in longer and sporter works, as have also long since our best English tragedies, as a thing of itself, to all judim rious

cars, trivial, and of no true musical delight; wbicb confifts only in apt numbers, fit quantity of Syllables, and the fenfe variously drawn out from one verse into another, not in the jingling sound of like endings, a fault avoided by the learned ancients both in poetry and all good oratory. This neglee?, then, of rhyme, fa little is to be taken for a defect, though it may seem so perhaps to vulgar readers, that it rather is to be effecmed an example fet, the first in English, of ancient liberty recovered to beroic poem, from tbe troublesome and modern bondage of rbyming.