And thou thy self seem'st otherwise inclin'd
Than to a worldly crown; addicted more
To contemplation and profound dispute,
As by that early action may be judg’d,
When, slipping from thy mother's eye, thou went'st
Alone into the temple, there wast found
Amongst the gravest rabbies disputant
On points and questions fitting Moses' chair,
Teaching not taught; the childhood shows the man,
As morning shows the day. Be famous then
By wisdom; as thy empire must extend,
So let extend thy mind o’er all the world
In knowledge, all things in it comprehend :
All knowledge is not couch'd in Moses' law,
The Pentateuch, or what the prophets wrote;
The Gentiles also know, and write, and teach
To admiration, led by nature's light;
And with the Gentiles much thou must converse,
Ruling them by persuasion as thou mean'st;
Without their learning how wilt thou with them,
Or they with thee, hold conversation meet?
How wilt thou reason with them? how refute
Their idolisms, traditions, paradoxes?
Error by his own arms is best evinc'd.
Look once more, ere we leave this specular mount,
Westward, much nearer by south-west, behold
Where on the Ægean shore a city stands
Built nobly, pure the air, and light the soil,
Athens the eye of Greece, mother of arts
And eloquence, native to famous wits,
Or hospitable, in her sweet recess,
City or suburban, studious walks and shades;
See there the olive grove of Academe,
Plato's retirement, where the Attick bird
Trills her thick-warbled notes the summer long ;
There flow'ry hill Hymettus with the sound
Of bees industrious murmur oft invites
To studious musing; there Ilissus rolls
His whispering stream; within the walls then view
The schools of ancient sages; his who bred
Great Alexander to subdue the world,
Lyceum there, and painted Stoa next :
There shalt thou hear and learn the secret power
Of harmony, in tones and numbers hit
By voice or hand, and various-measur'd verse,
Æolian charms and Dorian lyric odes,
pure) : • Athenis tenue cælum.' Cic. de fato. V. Pricæum ad Apulium, p. 76.
And his who gave them breath, but higher sung,
Blind Melesigenes, thence Homer call’d,
Whose poem Phæbus challeng’d for his own.
Thence what the lofty grave tragedians taught
In Chorus or Iambick, teachers best
Of moral prudence, with delight receiv’d,
In brief sententious precepts, while they treat
Of fate, and chance, and change in human life; 265
High actions and high passions best describing.
Thence to the famous orators repair,
Those ancient, whose resistless eloquence
Wielded at will that fierce democraty,
Shook the arsenal, and fulmin'd over Greece,
To Macedon, and Artaxerxes' throne:
To sage philosophy next lend thine ear,
From heav'n descended to the low-rooft house
Of Socrates; see there his tenement,
Whom well inspir’d the oracle pronounc'd
Wisest of men; from whose mouth issu'd forth
Mellifluous streams that water'd all the schools
Of Academics old and new, with those
Surnam’d Peripateticks, and the sect
Epicurean, and the Stoic severe ;
These here revolve, or, as thou lik’st, at home,
Till time mature thee to a kingdom's weight;
These rules will render thee a king complete
Within thy self, much more with empire join’d.
To whom our Saviour sagely thus reply'd.
Think not but that I know these things, or think
I know them not; not therefore am I short
Of knowing what I ought : he who receives
Light from above, from the fountain of light,
No other doctrine needs, though granted true :
But these are false, or little else but dreams,
Conjectures, fancies, built on nothing firm.
The first and wisest of them all profess'd
To know this only, that he nothing knew ;
The next to fabling fell, and smooth conceits ;
A third sort doubted all things, though plain sense ;
Others in virtue plac'd felicity,
But virtue join'd with riches and long life;
In corporal pleasure he and careless ease;
The Stoic last in philosophic pride,
By him call’d virtue; and his virtuous man,
Wise, perfect in himself, and all possessing,
Equal to God, oft shames not to prefer,
As fearing God nor man, contemning all
Wealth, pleasure, pain or torment, death and life, 305
Which when he lists he leaves, or boasts he can,
For all his tedious talk is but vain boast,
Or subtle shifts conviction to evade.
Alas! what can they teach and not mislead,
Ignorant of themselves, of God much more,
And how the world began, and how man fell
Degraded by himself, on grace depending ?
Much of the soul they talk, but all awry,
And in themselves seek virtue, and to themselves
All glory arrogate, to God give none;
Rather accuse him under usual names,
Fortune and fate, as one regardless quite
Of mortal things. Who therefore seeks in these
True wisdom, finds her not, or by delusion
Far worse, her false resemblance only meets,
emphasis of Him,' at ver. 583, instead of accusing Milton of grammatical inaccuracy.
“So Satan fell; and straight a fiery globe
Of Angels on full sail of wing flew nigh,
Who on their plumy bows received him soft.'
That is, 'our Saviour,'him xat' icórmy.
303 Equal] Newton reads .equals.'
313 awry] Drayton's Polyolbion, s. 1.
• But their opinions faild, by error led awry.' Dunster.
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