himself? Perhaps no paffages are more frequently or more attentively read than those extrinfick paragraphs; and, fince the end of poetry is pleasure, that cannot be unpoetical with which all are pleased.

The questions, whether the action of the poem be strictly one, whether the poem can be properly termed heroick, and who is the hero, are raised by fuch readers as draw their principles of judgement rather from books than from reafon. Milton, thoughhe intituled Paradife Loft only a poem, yet calls it himself heroick fong. Dryden petulantly and indecently denies the heroifm of Adam, because he was overcome; but there is no reason why the hero fhould not be unfortunate, except established practice, fince fuccefs and virtue do not go neceffarily together. Cato is the hero of Lucan; but Lucan's authority will not be fuffered by Quintilian to decide. However, if success be neceffary, Adam's deceiver was. at last crushed; Adam was reftored to his Maker's favour, and therefore may fecurely refume his human rank.

After the scheme and fabrick of the poem, muft be confidered its component parts, the fentiments and the diction.

The fentiments, as expreffive of manners, or appropriated to characters, are, for the greater part, unexceptionably juft.

Splendid paffages, containing leffons of morality, or precepts of prudence, occur feldom. Such is the original formation of this poem, that, as it admits no human manners till the Fall, it can give little affiftance to human conduct. Its end is to raise the thoughts above fublunary cares or pleasures. Yet the

praise of that fortitude, with which Abdiel maintained his fingularity of virtue against the fcorn of multitudes, may be accommodated to all times; and Raphael's reproof of Adam's curiofity after the planetary motions, with the answer returned by Adam, may be confidently opposed to any rule of life which any poet has delivered.

The thoughts which are occafionally called forth in the progress, are fuch as could only be produced by an imagination in the highest degree fervid and active, to which materials were fupplied by inceffant study and unlimited curiofity. The heat of Milton's mind may be faid to fublimate his learning, to throw off into his work the fpirit of fcience, unmingled with its groffer parts.

He had confidered creation in its whole extent, and his defcriptions are therefore learned. He had accustomed his imagination to unreftrained indulgence, and his conceptions therefore were extenfive. The characteristick quality of his poem is fublimity. He fometimes defcends to the elegant, but his element is the great. He can occafionally inveft himself with grace; but his natural port is gigantick loftinefs *. He can please when pleasure is required; but it is his peculiar power to astonish.

He feems to have been well acquainted with his own genius, and to know what it was that Nature had bestowed upon him more bountifully than upon others; the power of difplaying the vaft, illuminating the fplendid, enforcing the awful, darkening the gloomy, and aggravating the dreadful; he therefore

chofe a fubject on which too much could not be faid, on which he might tire his fancy without the cenfure of extravagance.

The appearances of nature, and the occurrences of life, did not fatiate his appetite of greatnefs. Ta paint things as they are, requires a minute attention, and employs the memory rather than the fancy, Milton's delight was to fport in the wide regions of poffibility; reality was a fcene too narrow for his mind. He fent his faculties out upon difcovery, into worlds where only imagination can travel, and delighted to form new modes of existence, and furnifh fentiment and action to fuperior beings, to trace the counfels of Hell, or accompany the choirs of Heaven.

But he could not be always in other worlds; he muft fometimes revifit earth, and tell of things visible and known. When he cannot raife wonder by the fublimity of his mind, he gives delight by its fertility.

Whatever be his fubject, he never fails to fill the imagination. But his images and descriptions of the fcenes or operations of Nature do not feem to bę always copied from original form, nor to have the freshness, racinefs, and energy, of immediate obfervation. He faw Nature, as Dryden expreffes it, through the fpectacles of books; and on most occafions calls learning to his affiftance. The garden of Eden brings to his mind the vale of Enna, where Proferpine was gathering flowers. Satan makes his way through fighting elements, like Argo between the Cyanean rocks; or Ulyffes between the two Sicilian whirlpools, when he fhunned Charybdis on the lar

board,

board. The mythological allufions have been juftly cenfured, as not being always ufed with notice of their vanity; but they contribute variety to the narration, and produce an alternate exercise of the memory and the fancy.

His fimilies are lefs numerous, and more various, than those of his predeceffors. But he does not confine himself within the limits of rigorous comparison: his great excellence is amplitude; and he expands the adventitious image beyond the dimenfions which the occafion required. Thus comparing the fhield of Satan to the orb of the Moon, he crowds the imagination with the discovery of the telescope, and all the wonders which the telescope difcovers.

Of his moral fentiments it is hardly praise to affirm that they excel thofe of all other poets; for this fuperiority he was indebted to his acquaintance with the facred writings. The ancient epick poets, wanting the light of Revelation, were very unskilful teachers of virtue: their principal characters may be great, but they are not amiable. The reader may rife from their works with a greater degree of active or paffive fortitude, and fometimes of prudence; but he will be able to carry away few precepts of juftice, and none of mercy.

From the Italian writers it appears, that the advantages of even Chriftian knowledge may be poffeffed in vain. Ariofto's pravity is generally known; and, though the Deliverance of Jerufalem may be confidered as a facred subject, the poet has been very sparing of moral inftruction.

In

ent be mgaged, betoids no condition in which he eas by any sort of imagination pace timfeif; he kas, therefore, Inde anal curicity or Sympathy.

We all, indeed, feel the eles of Adam's clobeElence; we all fu like Adam, and the in met all bevall our offences; we have reflets and inficious enemies in the fallen angels, and in the Verfed fpirits *e tare qizdans and friends; in the Redemption of mankind we hope to be included; in the defcrip. tion of Heaven and Hell we are forely interested, as we are all to refide hereafter either in the regions of

But these truths are too important to be new; they have been taught to our infancy; they have mingled with our folitary thoughts and familiar converfations, and are habitually interwoven with the whole texture of life. Being therefore not new, they raife no unaccustomed emotion in the mind; what we knew before, we cannot learn; what is not unexpected, cannot surprise.

Of the ideas fuggefted by thefe awful fcenes, from fome we recede with reverence, except when stated hours require their affociation; and from others we shrink with horrour, or admit them only as falutary inflictions, as counterpoifes to our interests and paffions, Such images rather obftruct the career of fancy than incite it.

Pleasure and terrour are indeed the genuine fources of poetry; but poetical pleasure must be fuch as human imagination can at least conceive; and poe tical terrours fuch as human ftrength and fortitude may combat. The good and evil of Eternity are too ponderous for the wings of wit; the mind finks

under