Serpit agens, facilifque docet mortalia corda Senfim immortali affuefcere poffe fono. Quod fi cuncta quidem Deus eft, per cunctaque fufus, In te una loquitur, cætera mutus habet. A VII. Ad eandem. Ltera Torquatum cepit Leonora poetam, Ah miser ille tuo quanto felicius ævo Perditus, et propter te, Leonora, foret! 10 "fully captivated my fenfes, and threw me into fuch raptures, that "I forgot my mortality, et crus etre deja parmi les anges, jouissant des " contentemens des bienkerueux." See Bayle, Dict. BARONI. Hawkins, HIST. MUS. iv. 196. To the excellence of the mother Adriana on the lute, Milton alludes in thefe lines of the fecond of these three Epigrams, v. 4. Et te Pieria fenfiffet voce canentem Aurea MATERNÆ fila movere LYRÆ. When Milton was at Rome, he was introduced to the concerts of Cardinal Barberini, afterwards Pope Urban the eighth, where he heard Leonora fing and her mother play. It was the fashion for all the ingenious ftrangers who visited Rome, to leave fome verses on Leonora. 1. Angelus unicuique, &c.] See Note on Comus, v. 658. 1. Altera Torquatum cepit Leonora.-] In the circumftantial account of the LIFE of Taffo written by his friend and patron G. Battista Manfo, mention is made of three different Ladies of the name of LEONORA, of whom Taffo is there faid to have been fucceffively enamoured. GIER. LIB. edit. Haym, Lond. 4to. 1724. p. 23. The firft was Leonora of Efte, fifter of Alfonfo, Duke of Ferrara, at whose court Taffo refided. This Lady, who was highly accomplished, lived unmarried with her elder fifter D. Lucretia, who had been married, but was feparated from her husband the Duke of Urbino. The Countess of San Vitale was the Second Leonora, to whom Taffo was faid to be much attached, p. 26. Manfo relates, that the Third Leonora was a young lady in the fervice of the Princess of Efte, who was very beautiful, and to whom Taffo paid great attention, p. 27. ૦ ૧૧ 2 He Et te Pieria fenfiffet voce canentem Aurea maternæ fila movere lyræ : Et poteras, ægro fpirans fub corde, quietem C VIII. Ad eandem. 5 10 Redula quid liquidam Sirena Neapoli jactas, Claraque Parthenopes fana Achelöiados ; Littoreamque tua defunctam Naiada ripa, He addreffed many very elegant Love-verfes to each of thefe three different Ladies; but as the pieces addreffed to Leonora Princess of Efte have more PASSION than GALLANTRY, it may juftly be inferred, notwithstanding the pains he took to conceal his affection, that she was the real favourite of his heart. Among the many remarks that have been made on the GIER USALEMME LIBERATA of Taffo, I do not remember to have seen it obferved, that this great poet probably took the hint of his fine fubject, from a book very popular in his time, written by the celebrated Benedetto Accolti, and entitled, DE BELLO A CHRISTIANIS CONTRA BARBAROS GESTO, pro Chrifti Sepulchro et Judæa recuperandis, Lib.iv. Venetiis per Bern. Venetum de Vitalibus. 1532. 4to. It is dedicated to Pietro de Medici. Dr. J. WARTON. This allufion to Taflo's Leonora, and the turn which it takes, are inimitably beautiful. 7. For the story of Pentheus, a king of Thebes, fee Euripides's BACCHE, where he fees two funs, &c. v. 916. Theocritus, IDTLL. xxvi. Virgil, N. iv. 469. But Milton, in torfiffet lumina, alludes to the rage of Pentheus in Ovid, METAM. iii. 577. Afpicit hunc oculis Pentheus, quos ira tremendos 1, 2. Parthenope's tomb was at Naples fhe was one of the Sirens. She is called Parthenope Acheloias, in Silius Italicus, xii. 35. COMUS, V. 878. See By Corpora Chalcidico facra dediffe rogo? Illa quidem vivitque, et amœna Tibridis unda 5 Mutavit rauci murmura Paufilipi. Illic Romulidum ftudiis ornata fecundis, Atque homines cantu detinet atque Deos. IX. In SALMASII HUNDREDAM *. QUT UIS expedivit Salmafio fuam Hundredam, Magifter artis venter, et Jacobei Centum, exulantis vifcera marfupii regis. Cantabit ultro Cardinalitium melos. By the fongs of Sirens fweet, By dead Parthenope's dear tomb, &c. 5 Chalcidicus is elfewhere explained. See EPITAPH, DAMON. V. 182. I need not enlarge on the grotto of Paufilipo, near Naples. *This Epigram is in the DEFENSIO against Salmafius, PROSEWORKS, ii. 296. See an English translation above, p. 376. 1. Salmafius in his Defence of the king, had aukwardly attempted to turn fome of our forenfic appellations into Latin; fuch as, the County-Court, Sheriff's turn, the Hundred of a county, &c. 4. King Charles the fecond, now in exile, and fheltered in Holland, gave Salmafius, who was a profeffor at Leyden, one hundred Jacobufes to write his Defence, 1649. 8. Will change his note: after affronting the pope, will fing the pope's praises with the most obfequious adulation of a cardinal. See the Prologue to Perfius's Satires. G X. In Salmafium*. Audete fcombri, et quicquid eft pifcium falo, Qui frigida hyeme incolitis algentes freta! Veftrum mifertus ille Salmafius Eques Bonus, amicire nuditatem cogitat; Chartæque largus, apparat papyrinos Vobis cucullos, præferentes Claudii Infignia, nomenque et decus, Salmafii : Gestetis ut per omne cetarium forum Equitis clientes, fcriniis mungentium Cubito virorum, et capfulis, gratiffimos *. 5 10 *This is in the DEFENSIO SECUNDA, ut fupr. ii. 322. It is there introduced with the following ridicule on Morus, the fubject of the next Epigram, for having predicted the wonders to be worked by Salmafius's new edition, or rather reply. "Tu igitur, ut pifciculus "ille anteambulo, præcurris Balænam Salmafii." 7. Claudius Salmafius. Milton fneers at a circumstance which was true: Salmafius was really of an ancient and noble family. 9. Cubito mungentium, a cant appellation among the Romans for Fifemongers. It was faid to Horace, of his father, by way of laughing at his low birth," Quoties ego vidi patrem tuum cubito emungentem ?” Sueton. VIT. HORAT. p. 525. Lipf. 1748. Horace's father was a feller of fish. The joke is, that the fheets of Salmafius's new book, would be fit for nothing better than to wrap up fish: that they should be configned to the ftalls and fhelves of fishmongers. He applies the fame farcafm to his Confuter who defended epifcopacy, APOL. SMECTYMN. §. viii. "Whose beft folios are predestined to no better "purpose, than to make winding fheets in Lent for pilchards.” PROSE-WORKS. i. 121. * Christina, queen of Sweden, among other learned men who fed her vanity, had invited Salmafius to her court, where he wrote his DEFENSIO. She had peftered him with Latin letters seven pages long, and told him he would fet out for Holland to fetch him, if he did not come. When he arrived, he was often indisposed on account of the coldness of the climate and on these occafions, the queen would would herfelf call on him in a morning; and, locking the door of his apartment, ufed to light his fire, give him his breakfast, and stay with him fome hours. This behaviour gave rife to fcandalous ftories, and our critic's wife grew jealous. It is feemingly a flander, what was first thrown out in the MERCURIUS POLITICUS, that Chriftina, when Salmafius had published his work, difmiffed him with contempt, as a parafite and an advocate of tyranny. [See alfo Milton against More, PROSE-WORKS, ii. 317. 329. and Philips, ibid. p. 397.] But the cafe was, to fay nothing that Christina loved both to be flattered and to tyrannife, Salmafius had now been long preparing to return to Holland, to fulfill his engagements with the univerfity of Leyden : fhe offered him large rewards and appointments to remain in Sweden, and greatly regretted his departure. And on his death, very fhortly afterwards, fhe wrote his widow a letter in French, full of concern for his lofs, and refpect for his memory. See his VITA and EPISTOLE, by Ant. Clementius, pp. 52. 71. Lugd. Bat. 1656. 4to. Such, however was Chriftina's levity, or hypocrify, or caprice, that it is poffible fhe might have acted inconfiftently in fome parts of this bufinefs. For what I have faid, I have quoted a good authority. It appears indeed from fome of Voffius's Epiftles, that at least she commended the wit and ftyle of Milton's performance: merely perhaps for the idle pleasure of piquing Salmafius. See Burman's SYLLOG. EPISTOL. vol. iii. p. 596. 259. 270. 271. 313. 663. 665. Of her majefty's oftentatious or rather accidental attentions to learning, fome traites appear in a letter from Cromwell's envoy at Upfall, 1653. Thurlow's STATE-PAPERS, vol. ii. 104. "While fhe was more bookishly "given, she had it in her thoughts to inftitute an Order of Parnaffus; "but fhee being of late more addicted to the court than Scholars, " and having in a paftoral comedie herfelfe acted a fhepheardeffe part "called Amaranta, the humour tooke her to inftitute for her order "that of Amaranta: fhee in the creation invefts with a scarfe, &c." Her learned schemes were fometimes interrupted by an amour with a prime minifter, or foreign embaffadour: unlefs perhaps any of her literary fycophants had the good fortune to poffefs fome other pleafing arts, and knew how to intrigue as well as to write. She fhewed neither tafte nor judgment in rewarding the degrees or kinds of the merit of the authors with which she was surrounded: and the fometimes careffed buffoons of ability, who entertained the court with a burlefque of her most favourite literary characters. It is perhaps hardly poffible to read any thing more ridiculous, more unworthy of a scholar, or more difgraceful to learning itself, than Nicholas Heinfius's epiftles to Chriftina. In which, to fay nothing of the abject expreffions of adulation, he pays the moft fervile compliments to her royal knowledge, in confulting her majesty on various matters of erudition, in telling her what libraries he had examined, what Greek manufcripts he had collated, what Roman infcriptions he had collected for her inspection, and what conjectural emendations he had made on difficult paffages of the |