TIMENTS, and the LANGUAGE. I have, in the next place, fpoken of the cenfures which our author may incur under each of these heads; of which I might have enlarged the number, if I

many examples in the Paradife Loft: I mean his compound epithets; fuch as "Sky-tinctur'd grain,"-" fable-vested Night,"— "heaven-warning champions,-night-warbling bird,"-" lovelabour'd fong, &c." See many more in Peck's Memoirs of Milton, 1740, pp. 117, &c. Mr. Addison cites only "hell-doom'd." See before, p. 55.

It may not be improper to add a few remarks respecting these combinations of words. They abound in our elder poetry, and are often remarkably fignificant and happy. Spenfer and Shakf peare afford many beautiful inftances. In Sylvefter's Du Bartas, there is fcarcely a page in which a compound epithet may not be found. Dr. Warton has cenfured this immoderate use of them in Sylvefter. Yet there are many epithets of great merit in this voluminous author; and with which Milton appears to have been pleafed; fuch as "love-darting eyn,"-" flowerymantled earth," "fmooth-fliding floods, &c." Browne, in his Britannia's Paftorals, elegantly calls the Morning " lilly-handed :” Other decorations of this kind may be found in his poems. Drayton feems to have been particularly fond of compounds; for, in his fifty-third Sonnet alone, there occur the " filver-fanded fhore," the "nectar-dropping showers,”—the "myrrhe-breathing zephyr," and the "dew-impearled flowers." From Hall's Satires, from the poetry of Daniel, Drummond, Wither, and Crafhaw, many compounds of fine effect might be extracted. Compound epithets indeed were fo much in fashion, in the beginning of the feventeenth century, that they were often admitted into profe. Thus in Stafford's Niobe, or His Age of Teares, 1611, p. 9, fpeaking of immodeft women, "whatfoeuer their luft-darting eyes fhall feize vpon:" Again, fpeaking of a lady's mouth, thofe lippes, the purple porters to that corall-paued palace," p. 122; an epithet, which Milton has differently applied in Comus, v. 886. Many more inftances might be given.

had been difpofed to dwell on fo ungrateful a fubject. I believe, however, that the feverest reader will not find any little fault in heroick poetry, which this author has fallen into, that does not come under one of those heads among which I have diftributed his feveral blemishes.

After having thus treated at large of Paradife Loft, I could not think it fufficient to have celebrated this Poem in the whole, without defcending to particulars. I have, therefore, endeavoured not only to prove that the Poem is beautiful in general, but to point out its particular beauties, and to determine wherein they consist. I have endeavoured to show how some paffages are beautiful by being fublime, others by being foft, others by being natural; which of them are recommended by the paffion, which by the moral, which by the sentiment, and which by the expreffion. I have likewise endeavoured to show how the genius of the poet shines by a happy invention, a distant allusion, or a judicious imitation; how he has copied or improved Homer or Virgil, and raises his own imaginations by the use which he has made of several poetical paffages in Scripture. I might have inferted alfo feveral paffages of Taffo, which our author has imitated; but, as I do not look upon Taffo to be a fufficient voucher, I would not perplex my reader with fuch quotations, as might do 0

VOL. I.

more honour to the Italian than the English poet. In short, I have endeavoured to particularize those innumerable kinds of beauty, which it would be tedious to recapitulate, but which are effential to poetry; and which may be met with in the works of this great author *. ADDISON.

* The preceding criticifm may be found in the following eighteen Papers, in The Spectator, viz. Nos. 267, 273, 279, 285, 291, 297, 303, 309, 315, 321, 327, 333, 339, 345, 351, 357, 363, and 369. I have here formed them into a Preliminary Difcourfe; to which I add, from the 86th, 88th, 90th, 9zd, and 94th Papers in The Rambler, (which feem to have been intended by Dr. Johnson as a Supplement to Mr. Addison's illustration of the FABLE, the CHARACTERS, the SENTIMENTS, and the LANGUAGE,) a criticism on the VERSIFICATION. See p. 197.

I venture to remark, that two paffages of uncommon beauty and excellence have escaped the notice of Mr. Addison: I mean the fpeech of Satan in the ninth book, ver. 99, &c. which exhibits perhaps the finest traits of character in the whole Poem ; and the description of the fame Infernal Being, in the tenth book, after Eve has been feduced, changing his fhape to obferve the fequel; flying when he beholds the Son of God defcend to judge our first parents; returning afterwards, and liftening to their fad difcourfe; and thence gathering his own doom,

"The fecret power a

66

Of harmony, in tones and numbers hit

By voice or hand; and various-meafur'd verfe.”
Par. Reg. B. iv. 255.

ONE of the ancients has obferved, that the burthen of government is encreased upon princes by the virtues of their immediate predeceffours. It is, indeed, always dangerous to be placed in a state of unavoidable comparison with excellence; and the danger is ftill greater when that excellence is confecrated by death, when envy and interest

a Dr. Warton is justly surprised, that Pope fhould notice two great mafters of VERSIFICATION, Waller and Dryden, and yet omit the name of Milton. "What! did Milton contribute nothing to the harmony and extent of our language?-Surely his verfes vary, and refound as much, and display as much majesty and energy, as any that can be found in Dryden." See Effay on Pope, vol. ii. P. 351, edit. 1782.

I shall enlarge these remarks of Dr. Johnson by occafionally. introducing other opinions refpecting MILTON'S VERSIFICA, TION; together with various proofs, that the poet's "skill in harmony was not lefs than his invention or his learning."

cease to act against it, and those paffions by which it was at first vilified and oppofed now stand in its defence, and turn their vehemence against honeft emulation.

'He, that fucceeds a celebrated writer, has the fame difficulties to encounter: He ftands under the shade of exalted merit, and is hindered from rifing to his natural height, by the interception of those beams which should invigorate and quicken him. He applies to that attention which is already engaged, and unwilling to be drawn off from certain fatisfaction; or perhaps to an attention already wearied, and not to be recalled to the fame object. One of the old poets congratulates himself that he has the untrodden regions of Parnaffus before him, and that his garland will be gathered from plantations which no writer had yet culled. But the imitator treads a beaten walk; and, with all his diligence, can only hope to find a few flowers or branches untouched by his predeceffour; the refufe of contempt, or the omiffions of negligence. The Macedonian conquerour, when he was once invited to hear a man that fung like a nightingale, replied with contempt, that he had heard the nightingale herSelf; and the fame treatment must every man expect, whose praise is, that he imitates another.

Yet, in the midst of these difcouraging reflections, I am about to offer to the reader fome ob