And dulcimer, all organs of sweet stop, Fuming from golden censers hid the mount. 600 Thy pow'r; what thought can measure thee or tongue Relate thee? greater now in thy return Than from the giant angels; thee that day The incense fuming from golden censers seems to be founded on Rev. viii. 3, 4. And an angel came and stood at the altar, having a golden censer; and the smoke of the incense ascended up before God out of the angel's hand. Milton had seen too their manner of incensing in the churches abroad, and he seems to have approved something of it by transferring it to heaven. And I have known some very good protestants wish that we had retained the moderate but not the superstitious use of incense in our churches, as thinking it might contribute to the sweetness and salubrity of those places. 605 602. Great are thy works, Jehovah, &c.] Milton is generally truly orthodox. In this hymn the angels intimate the unity of the Son with the Father, singing to both as one God, Jehovah. 605. Than from the giant angels;] The word giant is used not to express the stature and size of the angels, but that disposition of mind, which is always ascribed to giants, viz. a proud, fierce, and aspiring temper. And this the Hebrew word Gibbor signifies, which is rendered a giant in Scripture. Pearce. Dr. Pearce's construction of the word giant, as if it meant only fierce, proud, and aspiring. is in my opinion a little forced; nor yet do I think that there is any reason to change it into rebel, as Dr. Bentley would have it. Milton, I doubt not, intended to allude to Hesiod's giant war, but I do not see with Dr. Bentley, that therefore he must insinuate that this relation is as fabulous as that. He probably designed by this expression to hint his opinion, that the Thy thunders magnified; but to create Is greater than created to destroy. Who can impair thee, mighty King, or bound Of spi'rits apostate and their counsels vain fictions of the Greek poets owed their rise to some uncertain clouded tradition of this real event, and their giants were, if they had understood the story right, his fallen angels. Thyer. 619. On the clear hyaline,] This word is expressed from the Greek vim, and is immediately translated the glassy sea. For Milton, when he uses Greek words, sometimes gives the English with them, as in speaking of the rivers of hell, ii. 577. &c. and so the galaxy he immediately translates that milky way. The glassy sea is the same as the crystalline ocean, ver. 271. Kai sy5101 610 615 620 του θρόνου θαλασσα ύαλίνη, όμοια xguraλλ. Rev. iv. 6. And before the throne was a sea of glass, like unto crystal. 621.perhaps a world Of destin'd habitation ;] Milton was not willing to make the angel assert positively that every star was a world designed to be inhabited, and therefore adds perhaps, this notion of the plurality of worlds being not so well established in those days as in these. 624. Earth with her nether ocean] To distinguish it from the crystalline ocean, the waters above the firmament. Their pleasant dwelling place. Thrice happy men, 625 And worship him, and in reward to rule So sung they, and the empyréan rung Inform'd by thee might know; if else thou seek'st 631. thrice happy if they Virg. Georg. ii. 458. know Their happiness,] 630 635 640 O fortunatos nimium, sua si bona norint. THE ARGUMENT. ADAM enquires concerning celestial motions, is doubtfully answered, and exhorted to search rather things more worthy of knowledge: Adam assents, and still desirous to detain Raphael, relates to him what he remembered since his own creation, his placing in Paradise, his talk with God concerning solitude and fit society, his first meeting and nuptials with Eve, his discourse with the Angel thereupon; who after admonitions repeated departs. |