At last surrounds their sight

A globe of circular light,

That with long beams the shame-faced night arrayed; The helmed Cherubim,

And sworded Seraphim,

Are seen in glittering ranks with wings displayed,
Harping in loud and solemn quire,

With unexpressive1 notes, to Heaven's new-born heir.

Such music, as 'tis said,

Before was never made,

But when of old the sons of morning sung,
While the Creator great

His constellations set,

And the well-balanced world on hinges hung,
And cast the dark foundations deep,

And bid the weltering waves their oozy channel keep.

The oracles are dumb;

No voice or hideous hum

Runs through the arched roof in words deceiving:
Apollo from his shrine

Can no more divine,

With hollow shriek the steep of Delphos leaving:
No nightly trance, or breathéd spell,

Inspires the pale-eyed priest from the prophetic cell.

The lonely mountains o'er,

And the resounding shore,

A voice of weeping heard and loud lament:
From haunted spring and dale,

Edgéd with poplar pale,

The parting Genius is with sighing sent;

With flower-inwoven tresses torn,

The nymphs in twilight shade of tangled thickets mourn.

1 Unexpressive-inexpressible-such as cannot be described.

2 The oracles, &c.-All the heathen oracles are said to have ceased at the coming of Christ. "Attention," says Dr. Warton, "is irresistibly awakened and engaged by the air of solemnity and enthusiasm that reigns in this stanza, and some that follow."

3 Weeping, &c.-The lamentations of the fabulous tenants of the woods and glades-the dryads, fauns, nymphs, &c.-at leaving their favourite haunts.

In consecrated earth,

And on the holy hearth,

The Lars and Lemures1 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,

While each peculiar Power foregoes his wonted seat.

Peor and Baälim

Forsake their temples dim,

With that twice-battered god3 of Palestine;
And mooned Ashtaroth,

Heaven's queen and mother both,

Now sits not girt with tapers' holy shine;

The Libyc Hammon+ shrinks his horn;

In vain the Tyrian maids their wounded Thammuz mourn.

And sullen Moloch, fled,

Hath left in shadows dread

His burning idol5 all of blackest hue;

In vain with cymbals' ring,

They call the grisly king,

In dismal dance about the furnace blue:

The brutish gods of Nile as fast,

Isis and Orus, and the dog Anubis, haste.

Nor is Osiris seen

In Memphian grove or green,

Trampling the unshowered grass with lowings loud:
Nor can he be at rest

Within his sacred chest ;

Nought but profoundest hell can be his shroud;
In vain with timbreled anthems dark

The sabled-stoléd sorcerers bear his worshipped ark.

J Lars and Lemures-domestic gods of the Romans, representing the departed spirits of their ancestors.

2 Flamen-the officiating priest of a particular deity and temple.

3 Twice-battered god-Dagon. See 1 Sam. v, 3, 4.

4 Libyc Hammon-Jupiter was worshipped at the Hammonium in Libya, (the oasis now called Siwah,) under the form of a ram.

5 Burning idol, &c.-The brazen idol of Moloch used to be filled with fire, and into its hands, extended for the purpose, infants were put as victims, which soon sank down into the fire and perished there. The cymbals were to drown

the childrens' cries.

He feels from Judah's land
The dreaded Infant's hand;

The rays of Bethlehem blind his dusky eyne;
Nor all the gods beside

Longer dare abide,

Nor Typhon huge ending in snaky twine:
Our Babe, to show his Godhead true,

Can in his swaddling bands1 control the damnéd crew.

So, when the sun in bed,2

Curtained with cloudy red,

Pillows his chin3 upon an orient wave,

The flocking shadows pale

Troop to the infernal jail;

Each fettered ghost slips to his several grave;

And the yellow-skirted fayes

Fly after the night-steeds, leaving their moon-loved maze.

But see, the Virgin blest

Hath laid her Babe to rest;

Time is our tedious song should here have ending:
Heaven's youngest-teemed 5 star

Hath fixed her polished car,

Her sleeping Lord with handmaid lamp attending:
And all about the courtly stable

Bright-harnessed angels sit in order serviceable.

1

Swaddling bands, &c.-In allusion to the story of the infant Hercules, who strangled two serpents in his cradle.

So when the sun, &c.-"Our author has here beautifully applied the vulgar superstition of spirits disappearing at the break of day, as the ground-work of a comparison. All the false gods of every species of heathen religion depart at the birth of Christ, as spectres and demons vanish when the morning dawns: " Warton.

3

Pillows his chin, &c.-" The words pillows' and chin,' throw an air of burlesque and familiarity over a comparison most exquisitely conceived and adapted:' "Warton.

4 Fly after the night-steeds--i. e. the fairies depart at the approach of morning. 5 Youngest-teemed-last-created, see note 4, p. 32.

LYCIDA S.1

ABRIDGED.

YET Once more,2 O ye laurels, and once more
Ye myrtles brown, with ivy never sere,

I come to pluck your berries harsh and crude,
And, with forced fingers rude,

Shatter your leaves before the mellowing year.
Bitter constraint, and sad occasion dear,
Compels me to disturb your season due :
For Lycidas is dead, dead ere his prime,
Young Lycidas, and hath not left his peer.

1 This monody was written on occasion of the death of Milton's friend, Mr. Edward King, who was drowned in the Irish Sea, in 1637. It was published in 1638.

It is aptly remarked by Dr. Warton, with regard to this beautiful poem, that "He who wishes to know whether he has a true taste for poetry or not, should consider, whether he is highly delighted or not with the perusal of Milton's Lycidas." "Nothing," says an able critic, (Quarterly Review, vol. xxxvi, p. 45.) "was ever so unearthly as Milton's poetry. The most unpromising subject, after passing through his heated mind, comes out purged, and purified, and refined : the terrestrial body dissolves in the process, and we behold in its stead a glorified body. That which was by nature a frail and perishable flower, when transplanted, to his fancy becomes immortal amaranth."" The same writer, after referring to "Comus" as an illustration of this remark, thus also adduces "Lycidas." "His friend perishes by sea as he passes from Chester to Ireland. Again, Milton clothes this naked fact in imagery of his own; and Mr. King is no longer his college companion, but the shepherd with whom he had been accustomed to drive a-field under the opening eye-lids of the morn'—and the crazy vessel is no more a material hulk, but capable of perfidy, and rigged with curses, and built in an eclipse:-and his fellow-students are not besought to honour his memory with their funeral songs, but the muses who loved him are called upon to purple the ground where, in imagination at least, he lies, with fresh flowers, and to lavish upon it the embroidery of spring. The mind of Milton was perfect fairy-land; and every thought which entered it, whether grave or gay, magnificent or mean, quickly partook of a fairy form. We do not believe that he loved his friend less, because he chose to call him Lycidas instead of Mr. King. He thought in romance: the daily occurrences of life were translated into romance, almost before his mind could act upon them."

2 Yet once more, &c.-The poet begins as if he were called on by this sad and unexpected occasion, to break a resolution he had previously made, to refrain from poetry until his genius should be more matured. Hence he speaks of "berries harsh and crude," or unripe. The laurels, myrtles, and ivy, perhaps, mark the poetical, affectionate, and mournful character of the composition. Some however refer the crudeness and immaturity to Mr. King's youth.

Who would not sing for Lycidas? he knew
Himself to sing, and build the lofty rhyme.1
He must not float upon his watery bier
Unwept, and welter to the parching wind,
Without the meed of some melodious tear.

Begin then, Sisters of the sacred well,
That from beneath the seat of Jove doth spring,
Begin, and somewhat loudly sweep the string.
Hence with denial vain, and coy excuse:
So may some gentle Muse

With lucky words3 favor my destined urn,
And, as he passes, turn

And bid fair peace be to my sable shroud.
For we were nurst upon the self-same hill,
Fed the same flock,5 by fountain, shade, and rill.
Together both, ere the high lawns appeared
Under the opening eye-lids of the morn,

6

We drove a-field, and both together heard
What time the gray-fly winds her sultry horn,
Battening our flocks with the fresh dews of night,
Oft till the star that rose at evening, bright,

Toward heaven's descent had sloped his westering wheel.
Meanwhile the rural ditties were not mute,

Tempered to the oaten flute;

Rough satyrs danced, and fauns with cloven heel
From the glad sound would not be absent long;
And old Damotas loved to hear our song.

But oh, the heavy change, now thou art gone,

Now thou art gone, and never must return!

Thee, shepherd, thee the woods, and desert caves,

1

2

Rhyme-i. e. verse, as opposed to prose.

Sisters, &c.-The muses, who haunt the fountain Hippocrene, which flows from Mount Helicon, on which there was an altar to Jupiter.

3 Lucky words-words of benediction, or blessing.

4 We were nurst upon, &c.—i. e. we both studied at the same place.

5 Fed the same flock, &c.-All the imagery throughout this poem which represents Mr. King, or the author, as shepherds, refers to their character as students of literature, perhaps especially classical poetry.

6 We drove a-field-i. e. we drove our flocks a field, or began our studies together. Having thus alluded to their studies in the morning, in the next few lines, he indicates that they were carried on together throughout the day until evening.

7 Battening-making fat.