To whom thus Raphael answer'd heav'nly meek. 218. Nor are thy lips ungrace ful,] Alluding to Ps. xlv. 3. Full of grace are thy lips. 221. Inward and outward both, his image fair:] One would think by this word outward that Milton was of the sect of Anthropomorphites, as well as Materialists. Warburton. 225. Than of our fellow-servant,] So the angel says unto St. John, Rev. xxii. 9. I am thy fellow-servant. 229. For I that day was absent,] The sixth day of creation. Of all the rest, of which he has given an account, he might have been an eye-witness, and speak from his own knowledge: what he has said of this day's work, 220 225 230 of Adam's original, to be sure, he must have had by hear-say or inspiration. Milton had very good reason to make the angel absent now, not only to vary his speaker, but because Adam could best, or only, tell some particulars not to be omitted. Richardson. 231. the gates of hell;] Homer, Iliad. xxiii. 71. wuλas aïda.. 283. To see that none thence issued forth &c.] As man was to be the principal work of God in this lower world, and (according to Milton's hypothesis) a creature to supply the loss of the fallen angels, so particular care is taken at his creation. The angels on that day keep watch 235 Or enemy, while God was in his work, Pleas'd with thy words no less than thou with mine. and guard at the gates of hell, that none may issue forth to interrupt the sacred work. At the same time that this was a very good reason for the angel's absence, it is likewise doing honour to the Man with whom he was conversing. 240. Fast we found, fast shut &c.] There is no question but our poet drew the image in what follows from that in Virgil's sixth book, where Eneas and the Sibyl stand before the adamantine gates, which are there described as shut upon the place of torments, and listen to the groans, the clank of chains, and the noise of iron whips, that were heard in those regions of pain and sorrow. Addison. The reader will not be displeased to see the passage, Æn. vi. 557. 245 Hinc exaudiri gemitus, et sæva so nare Verbera; tum stridor ferri, tractæ. que catenæ : Constitit Æneas, strepitumque exterritus hausit. From hence are heard the groans of ghosts, the pains Of sounding lashes and of dragging chains: The Trojan stood astonished at their cries. Dryden. And in like manner Astolfo in Orlando Furioso is represented listening at the mouth of hell, cant. xxxiv. st. 4. L'orecchie attente à lo spiraglio tenne, E l'aria ne senti percossa, e rotta Segno evidente, quivi esser l'inferno. And heard most woeful mourning, plaints and cries, Such as from hell were likely to So spake the godlike pow'r, and thus our sire. Is hard; for who himself beginning knew? In balmy sweat, which with his beams the sun 253. As new wak'd from soundest sleep &c.] Adam then proceeds to give an account of his condition and sentiments immediately after his creation. How agreeably does he represent the posture in which he found himself, the beautiful landscape that surrounded him, and the gladness of heart which grew up in him on that occasion! Adam is afterwards described as surprised at his own existence, and taking a survey of himself, and of all the works of nature. He likewise is represented as discovering by the light of reason, that he and every thing about him must have been the effect of some being infinitely good and powerful, and that this being had a right to his worship and adoration. His first address to the sun and to those parts of the creation which made the most distinguished figure, is very natural and amusing to the imagination. His next sentiment, when upon his first going to sleep he fancies himself losing his existence, and 250 255 falling away into nothing, can never be sufficiently admired. His dream, in which he still preserves the consciousness of his existence, together with his removal into the garden which was prepared for his reception, are also circumstances finely imagined, and grounded upon what is delivered in sacred story. These and the like wonderful incidents in this part of the work have in them all the beauties of novelty, at the same time that they have all the graces of nature. They are such as none but a great genius could have thought of, though, upon the perusal of them, they seem to rise of themselves from the subject of which he treats. In a word, though they are natural, they are not obvious, which is the true character of all fine writing. Addison. 256. —reaking] Or reeking is the same as steaming or smoking, from the Saxon Rec smoke. This idea is not the most delicate. 260 By quick instinctive motion up I sprung, Both are beautiful, but we will adhere to the first, not only because it is in Milton's own editions, which we would never alter in the least pointing, unless it is manifestly an error of the printer, but this sense is the best. Moreover the period is rounder, the cadence more musical, and the expression more poetical. "the returning Gospel imbathe "his soul with the fragrance of "6 heaven." Richardson. Mr. Richardson might have further observed, that Milton himself had expressed the same thought with more beauty if possible in iv. 153. where, speaking of Satan's approach to the garden of Paradise, he says, -And of pure now purer air Meets his approach, and to the heart inspires Vernal delight and joy, able to drive Thyer. 267. Myself I then perus'd,] So in Hamlet, act ii. sc. 1. He falls to such perusal of my face. and Juliet, -Let me peruse this face! By fragrance Milton has endea- And in the last scene of Romeo voured to give an idea of that exquisite and delicious joy of heart Homer so often expresses by tara, a word that signifies the fragrance that flowers emit after a shower or dew. Milton has used like expression in his treatise of Reformation, p. 2. Edit. 1738." Me"thinks a sovran and reviving "joy must needs rush into the "bosom of him that reads or Now, Hector, I have fed mine eyes I have with exact view perused thee, It may be observed, that the Survey'd, and sometimes went, and sometimes ran But who I was, or where, or from what cause, Knew not; to speak I tried, and forthwith spake ; Whate'er I saw. Thou sun, said I, fair light, 270 275 And thou enlighten'd earth, so fresh and gay, 280 285 There is a contradiction between this and ver. 352, &c. In the first passage Adam says that he could name whatever he saw, the second, he says, that God before he got into Paradise. In gave him that ability when the beasts came to him in Paradise. For this last passage alludes to the rabbinical opinion, that he gave names according to their natures, (clearer expressed, ver. 438, &c.) and the knowledge of their natures, he says, God then suddenly endued him with. Warburton. |