Not long divisible, and from the gash A stream of nectarous humour issuing flowed Homer tells us in the same manner, that upon Diomedes wounding the gods, there flowed from the wound an ichor, or pure kind of blood, which was not bred from mortal viands; and that though the pain was exquisitely great, the wound soon closed up, and healed, in those beings who are vested with immortality. I question not but Milton, in his description of his furious Moloch flying from the battle, and bellowing with the wound he had received, had his eye on Mars in the Iliad; who, upon his being wounded, is represented as retiring out of the fight, and making an outcry louder than that of a whole army when it begins the charge. Homer adds, that the Greeks and Trojans, who were engaged in a general battle, were terrified on each side with the bellowing of this wounded deity. The reader will easily observe how Milton has kept all the horror of this image, without running into the ridicule of it. -Where the might of Gabriel fought, Milton has likewise raised his description in this book with many images taken out of the poetical parts of Scripture. The Messiah's chariot, as I have before taken notice, is formed upon a vision of Ezekiel, who, as Grotius observes, has very much in him of Homer's spirit' in the poetical parts of his prophecy. The following lines in that glorious commission which is Much in him of Homer's spirit.] Rather, a spirit much above Homer's: witness the gradual departure of the Divine presence from the holy temple and city, by several successive stages; with dreadful prophecies intermixed, till, in the end, the glory of the Lord, charioted by living wheels and winged cherubims, takes its station upon the mountain which is on the east side of the city-the most sublime and terrible idea that is to be met with in any author. See Ezekiel, ch. x. xi. given the Messiah to extirpate the host of rebel angels, is drawn from a sublime passage in the Psalms. Go then, thou mightiest, in thy Father's might, The reader will easily discover many other strokes of the same nature. There is no question but Milton had heated his imagination with the fight of the gods in Homer, before he entered upon this engagement of the angels. Homer there gives us a scene of men, heroes, and gods, mixed together in battle. Mars animates the contending armies, and lifts up his voice in such a manner, that it is heard distinctly amidst all the shouts and confusion of the fight. Jupiter at the same time thunders over their heads; while Neptune raises such a tempest, that the whole field of battle, and all the tops of the mountains, shake about them. The poet tells us, that Pluto himself, whose habitation was in the very centre of the earth, was so affrighted at the shock, that he leaped from his throne. Homer afterwards describes Vulcan as pouring down a storm of fire upon the river Xanthus, and Minerva as throwing a rock at Mars; who, he tells us, covered seven acres in his fall. As Homer has introduced into his battle of the gods everything that is great and terrible in nature, Milton has filled his fight of good and bad angels with all the like circumstances of horror. The shout of armies, and rattling of brazen chariots, the hurling of rocks and mountains, the earthquake, the fire, the thunder, are all of them employed to lift up the reader's imagination, and give him a suitable idea of so great an action. With what art has the poet represented the whole body of the earth trembling, even before it was created! All heaven resounded; and had earth been then, In how sublime and just a manner does he afterwards describe the whole heaven shaking under the wheels of the Messiah's chariot, with that exception of the throne of God! -Under his burning wheels The stedfast empyrean shook throughout, Notwithstanding the Messiah appears clothed with so much terror and majesty, the poet has still found means to make his readers conceive an idea of him beyond what he himself was able to describe. Yet half his strength he put not forth, but checked His thunder in mid volley; for he meant Not to destroy, but root them out of heaven. In a word, Milton's genius, which was so great in itself, and so strengthened by all the helps of learning, appears in this book every way equal to his subject, which was the most sublime that could enter into the thoughts of a poet. As he knew all the arts of affecting the mind, he knew it was necessary to give it certain resting-places and opportunities of recovering itself from time to time: he has, therefore, with great address interspersed several speeches, reflections, similitudes, and the like reliefs, to diversify his narration, and ease the attention of the reader, that he might come fresh to his great action; and by such a contrast of ideas, have a more lively taste of the nobler parts of his description. No. 339. SATURDAY, MARCH 29. -Ut his exordia primis Omnia, et ipse tener Mundi concreverit orbis. Cœperit, et rerum paullatim sumere formas. VIRG. LONGINUS has observed, that there may be a loftiness in sentiments where there is no passion, and brings instances out of ancient authors to support this his opinion. The pathetic, as that great critic observes, may animate and inflame the sublime, but is not essential to it. Accordingly, as he further remarks, we very often find that those who excel most in stirring up the passions, very often want the talent of writing in the great and sublime manner; and so on the contrary. Milton has shown himself a master in both these ways of writing. The seventh book, which we are now entering upon, is an instance of that sublime which is not mixt and worked up with passion. The author appears in a kind of composed and sedate majesty; and though the sentiments do not give so great an emotion as those in the former book, they abound with as magnificent ideas. The sixth book, like a troubled ocean, represents greatness in confusion; the seventh affects the imagination like the ocean in a calm, and fills the mind of the reader, without producing in it anything like tumult or agitation. The critic above-mentioned, among the rules which he lays down for succeeding in the sublime way of writing, proposes to his reader that he should imitate the most celebrated authors who have gone before him, and been engaged in works of the same nature; as in particular, that if he writes on a poetical subject, he should consider how Homer would have spoken on such an occasion. By this means one great genius often catches the flame from another, and writes in his spirit without copying servilely after him. There are a thousand shining passages in Virgil, which have been · lighted up by Homer. Milton, though his own natural strength of genius was capable of furnishing out a perfect work, has doubtless very much raised and ennobled his conceptions, by such an imitation as that which Longinus has recommended. In this book, which gives us an account of the six days' works, the poet received but very few assistances from heathen writers, who were strangers to the wonders of creation. But as there are many glorious strokes of poetry upon this subject in holy writ, the author has numberless allusions to them through the whole course of this book. The great critic I have before mentioned, though an heathen, has taken notice of the sublime manner in which the law-giver of the Jews has described the creation in the first chapter of Genesis; and there are many other passages in Scripture, which rise up in the same majesty, where this subject is touched upon. Milton has shown his judgment very remarkably, in making use of such of these as were proper for his poem, and in duly qualifying those high strains of Eastern poetry, which were suited to readers whose imaginations were set to an higher pitch than those of colder climates. Adam's speech to the angel, wherein he desires an account of what had passed within the regions of nature before the creation, is very great and solemn. The following lines, in which he tells him, that the day is not too far spent for him to enter upon such a subject, are exquisite in their kind. And the great light of day yet wants to run Much of his race, though steep, suspense in heaven Held by thy voice, thy potent voice he hears, His generation, &c.— The angel's encouraging our first parents in a modest pursuit after knowledge, with the causes which he assigns for the creation of the world, are very just and beautiful. The Messiah, by whom, as we are told in Scripture, the worlds were made, comes forth in the power of his Father, surrounded with an host of angels, and clothed with such a majesty as becomes his entering upon a work, which, according to our conceptions, appears the utmost exertion of omnipotence. What a beautiful description has our author raised upon that hint in one of the prophets; "And behold there came four chariots out from between two mountains, and the mountains were mountains of brass." About his chariot numberless were poured, I have before taken notice of these chariots of God, and of these gates of heaven, and shall here only add, that Homer gives us the same idea of the latter as opening of themselves, though he afterwards takes off from it, by telling us, that the hours first of all removed those prodigious heaps of clouds which lay as a barrier before them. I do not know anything in the whole poem more sublime than the description which follows, where the Messiah is represented at the head of his angels, as looking down into the Chaos, calming its confusion, riding into the midst of it, and drawing the first outline of the creation. On heavenly ground they stood, and from the shore |