a

145

XV.
Yea Truth and Justice then
Will down return to men,

Orb'd in a rainbow; and like glories wearing
Mercy will sit between,
Thron'd in celestial sheen,

With radiant feet the tissued clouds down steering,
And heav'n, as at some festival,
Will open wide the gates of her high palace hall.

XVI.
But wisest Fate says no,
This must not yet

be

SO,
The babe lies yet in smiling infancy,
That on the bitter cross
Must redeem our loss

So both himself and us to glorify:
Yet first to those ychain'd in sleep,
The wakeful trump of doom must thunder through the

deep,

150

155

-Regna recludat

Γαιαν αναρρηξειε Ποσειδαων ενοσιχθων, Pallida, diis invisa ; superque im. Οικια δε θνητοισι και αθανατοισι φανειη mane barathrum

Εμερδαλό', ευρωεντα, τα τι στυγερουσι θεοι Cernatur, trepidentque immisso lu

Teg. mine Manes.

E. Peering, that is, overlooking or 143. Orb'd in a rainbow; and prying, is frequent in Spenser like glories wearing and Shakespeare. I will give

Mercy will sit between,] one instance from Coriolan. a. ii. The author thus corrected it in

the edition of 1673: in the first And mountainous Error be too edition of 1645 it was thus, deeply pild

Th' enamelld Arras of the rainbow For Truth to over-peer.

wearing; T. Warton. And Mercy set between, &c. Compare Homer, Il. Y. 61.

156. The wakeful trump of Είδεισεν δ' υπενερθεν αναξ ενερων

doom must thunder through the

Αϊδωνευς Auras do sx ogovou adro, xai sext, punoi deep,] A line of great energy, มีted

elegant and sublime. T. Warton.

S. 3.

i

XVII.
With such a horrid clang
As on mount Sinai rang,

While the red fire, and smouldring clouds out brake:
The aged earth aghast,

160 With terror of that blast,

Shall from the surface to the centre shake;
When at the world's last session,
The dreadful Judge in middle air shall spread his throne.

XVIII.
And then at last our bliss

165 Full and perfect is,

But now begins; for from this happy day
Th' old Dragon under ground
In straiter limits bound,
Not half so far casts his usurped sway,

170
And wroth to see his kingdom fail,
Swinges the scaly horror of his folded tail.

speare, p. 435.

157. With such a horrid clang] and Fairfax, xii. 46. Clang is clangour. So of a mul

A mass of solid fire burning bright titude of birds, Par. Lost, vii. Roll'd up in smouldring fumes there 422.

bursteth out: -Soaring the air sublime and xiii. 61. With clang despis'd the ground.

And in each vein'a smouldring fire But see Steevens's note, Tam.

there dwelt. Shr. vol. iii. Johns. Steev. Shake

159. Spenser also has smouldry, T. Warton.

F. Q. i. vii. 13. and iii. xi. 21. 159. -and smouldring clouds] Smouldring or smouldry, hot, A word that I find neither in sweltering. Perhaps from the Junius, nor Skinner, nor Bailey, Anglo-Saxon, Smolt, hot weather. but in Spenser and Fairfax.

T. Warton. Faery Queen, b. i. cant. viii. st. 9.

172. Swinges the scaly horror Inrolld in flames, and smouldring of his folded tail.] These images dreariment:

are plainly copied from Spenser's b. ii. cant. V. st. 3.

description of the old dragon: The smouldring dust did round about and no wonder Milton was fond him smoke:

of it in his younger years, for he

XIX.
The oracles are dumb,
No voice or hideous hum

Runs through the arched roof in words deceiving. 175
Apollo from his shrine
Can no more divine,

With hollow shriek the steep of Delphos leaving. Noʻnightly trance, or breathed spell Inspires the pale-ey'd priest from the prophetic cell. 180

XX. The lonely mountains o'er And the resounding shore,

A voice of weeping heard and loud lament; was still pleased with it when he had commanded her to leave was older, and had his eye upon that temple and return to hell. it several times in the Paradise See Suidas in Augustus Cæsar. Lost.

180. Inspires the pale-ey'd 172. This image is copied, priest.] Milton was impressed says Dr. J. Warton, from the with reading Euripides's Tragedy descriptions of serpents and dra- of Ion, which suggested these gons in the old Romances and ideas. T. Warton. Ariosto. Compare Sylvester's Du 183. A voice of weeping heard Bartas (p. 205. 4to.) W. i. D. 6. and loud lament;] Alluding to of a lion

the story of a voice proclaiming -swindging with his sinewie traine, and immediately was heard a

that the great Pan was dead, T. Warton. great groaning and lamentation.

See more to this purpose in Plu176. Apollo from his shrine tarch's treatise De oraculorum

Can no more divine, &c.] defectu. Our author builds here

upon

the 183. Although Milton was well common hypothesis of the oracles acquainted with all the Greek being struck dumb at the coming writers in their original lanof Christ, which is allowable guages, and might have seen the enough in a young poet: and in ground-work of this tradition of this

passage he alludes particue a voice proclaiming the death of larly to the famous story of Au, the great Pan, and cessation of gustus Cæsar's consulting the oracles, in Plutarch on the DePythia or priestess of Apollo who fect of Oracles, and the fifth should reign after him, and her book of Eusebius's Præparat. answering that an Hebrew boy Evangel. yet it is most probable,

&c.

185

From haunted spring, and dale
Edg'd with poplar pale,

The parting Genius is with sighing sent;
With flow'r-inwoven tresses torn
The nymphs in twilight shade of tangled thickets mourn.

that the whole allusion was sug- ed. 1630. But this is a second gested to his imagination by a edition. And Sandys has much note of the old commentator on the same story. Travels, p. 11. Spenser's Pastorals in May, who ed. 1627. Compare Par. Reg. copied Lavaterus's treatise de i. 456. If we connect the three Lemuribus, newly translated into lines (181–183.) with the geneEnglisb. “ About the time that ral subject of the last stanza, o our Lord suffered his most undoubtedly Milton, in the voice “ bitter passion, certaine persons of weeping and loud lament, re“ sayling from Italie to Cyprus, ferred to this story, from what“ and passing bya .certaine iles soever source it was drawn. But o called Paxa, heard a voyce if, without such a retrospect, “ calling Thamus, Thamus, the they belong only to the context “ pylot of the ship; who, giving and purport of their own stanza,

eare to the cry, was bidden he implies the lamentations of “ when he came to Palodas to the nymphs and wood-gods at “ tell, that the great god Pan their leaving their haunts. r was dead: which he doubting And surely nothing could be “ to doe, yet for that when he more allowable, not only in a 66 came to Palodas there was

young poet, but in a poet of any “ such a calme of wind, that the age, than this allusion to the • ship stood still in the sea un- notion of the cessation of oracles “ moored, he was forced to cry at the coming of Christ. And “ aloud, that Pan was dead: how poetically is it extended to « wherewithall, there was heard the pagan divinities and the “ such piteous outcries and dread- oriental idolatries? The words “ ful shrieking, as hath not been of v. 183. voice of weeping &c. " the like.

By which Pan, are from Matt. ii. 18. In Rama though of some be understood was there a voice heard, lamenta“the great Sathanas,' whose tion, and weeping, fc. T. War

kingdom was at that time by ton. “ Christ conquered, and the gates 187. With flow'r-inwoven tresses “ of hell broken up, for at that torn.] See note on interwove in “ time all Oracles surceased, and Par. Lost, i. 261. Inwove is also “ enchanted spirits that were not uncommon in Milton. See

wont to delude the people Par. L. iii. 352. iv. 693. Spenser “ thenceforth held their peace, gives the first instance that I can “ &c.” So also Hakewill in his recollect. T. Warton. Apologie, lib. iii. sect. ii. p. 208. VOL. III.

eb

a

XXI.
In consecrated earth,
And on the holy hearth,

190
The Lars, and Lemures moan with midnight plaint;
In urns, and altars round,
A drear and dying sound

Affrights the Flamens at their service quaint; And the chill marble seems to sweat,

195 While each peculiar pow'r foregoes his wonted seat.

XXII.
Peor and Baälim
Forsake their temples dim,

With that twice batter'd God of Palestine;
And mooned Ashtaroth,
Heav'n's queen and mother both,

Now sits not girt with tapers holy shine;
The Lybic Hammon shrinks his horn,
In vain the Tyrian maids their wounded Thammuzmourn.

XXIII.
And sullen Moloch fled,
Hath left in shadows dread

200

205

191. Lars, and Lemures] House- therefore we may suppose Milton hold gods and night spirits. Fla- was so well instructed in this mens, priests.

kind of learning 199. With that twice batter'd 201. Heav'ri's queen and mother God of Palestine;) Dagon, who both,] She was called regina was twice battered by Samson, cæli and mater Deúm. See Selden. Judges xvi. and by the ark of 202. Shine is a substantive in God, 1 Sam. v. Our author is Harrington's Ariosto, c. xxxvii. larger in his account of these 15. In Jonson's Panegyre, 1603. deities in the first book of the And Drummond, Sonnets, sign. Paradise Lost, and thither we B. ed. 1616. And in other places: must refer our reader, and to the but see Observal. on Spenser's notes there. Selden had a few F. Q. ii. 181. T. Warton. years before published his De 205. And sullen Moloch fled, Diis Syris Syntagmata duo, and &c.] In Sandys's Travels, p. 186.