the Hills was not altogether fo daring a Thought as the former. We are, in fome measure, prepared for fuch an Incident by the Description of the Gyants War, which we meet with among the Ancient Poets. What still made this Circumftance the more proper for the Poets ufe, is the Opinion of many learned Men, that the Fable of the Gyants War, which makes fo great a Noise in Antiquity, [and gave Birth to the fublimeft Description in Heftod's Works,] was an Allegory founded upon this very Tradition of a Fight between the good and bad Angels.

It may, perhaps, be worth while to confider with what Judgment Milton, in this Narration, has avoided every thing that is mean and trivial in the Descriptions of the Latin and Greek Poets; and, at the same time, improved every great Hint which he met with in their Works upon this Subject. Homer in that Paffage, which Longinus has celebrated for its Sublimeness, and which Virgil and Ovid have copied after him, tells us, that the Gyants threw Offa upon Olympus, and Pelion upon Offa. He adds an Epithet to Pelion (eivooiquλXov) which very much fwells the Idea, by bringing up to the Reader's Imagination all the Woods that grew upon it. There is further a great Beauty in his fingling out by Name thefe three remarkable Mountains fo well known to the Greeks. This laft is fuch a Beauty as the Scene of Milton's War could not poffibly furnish him with. Claudian in his Fragment upon the Gyants War, has given full Scope to that wildness of Imagination which was natural to him. He tells us, that the Gyants tore up whole Iflands by the Roots, and threw them at the Gods. He describes one of them in particular taking up Lemnos in his Arms, and whirling it to the Skies, with all Vulcan's Shop in the midst of it. Another tears up Mount Ida, with the River Enipeus which ran down the sides of but the Poet, not content to describe him with this Mountain upon his Shoulders, tells us that the River flowed down his Back, as he held it up in that

it ;

Posture. It is visible to every judicious Reader, that such Ideas favour more of Burlesque than of the Sublime. They proceed from a Wantonness of Imagination, and rather divert the Mind than astonish it. Milton has taken every thing that is Sublime in these feveral Paffages, and composes out of them the following great Image.

From their Foundations loofning to and fro

They pluck'd the feated Hills with all their load,
Rocks, Waters, Woods, and by the shaggy tops
Up-lifting bore them in their Hands:-

We have the full Majesty of Homer in this short Description, improved by the Imagination of Claudian, without its Puerilities.

I need not point out the Description of the fallen Angels, feeing the Promontories hanging over their Heads in fuch a dreadful manner, with the other numberless Beauties in this Book, which are so confpicuous, that they cannot escape the Notice of the moft ordinary Reader.

There are indeed fo many wonderful ftroaks of Poetry in this Book, and fuch a variety of Sublime Ideas, that it would have been impoffible to have given them a place within the bounds of this Paper. Befides that, I find it in a great measure done to my Hand, at the end of my Lord Rofcommon's Effay on Tranflated Poetry. I fhall refer my Reader thither for fome of the Mafter-Stroaks in the Sixth Book of Paradife Loft, tho' at the fame time there are many others which that noble Author has not taken notice of.

Milton, notwithstanding the Sublime Genius he was Master of, has in this Book drawn to his Affistance all the helps he could meet with among the Ancient Poets. The Sword of Michael, which makes fo great an havock among the bad Angels, was given him, we are told, out of the Armory of God.

-But the Sword

Of Michael from the Armory of God

Was giv'n him temper'd fo, that neither keen
Nor folid might refift that edge: it met
The Sword of Satan with fleep force to fmite
Defcending, and in half cut sheere,-

This Paffage is a Copy of that in Virgil, wherein the Poet tells us, that the Sword of Æneas, which was given him by a Deity, broke into pieces the Sword of Turnus, which came from a Mortal Forge: As the Moral in this place is Divine, fo by the way we may obferve, that the bestowing on a Man who is favour'd by Heaven fuch an Allegorical Weapon, is very conformable to the old Eastern way of Thinking. Not only Homer has made use of it, but we find the Jewish Hero in the Book of Maccabees, who had fought the Battels of the chofen People with so much Glory and Succefs, receiving in his Dream a Sword from the hand of the Prophet Jeremy [Jeremiah]. The following Paffage, wherein Satan is defcribed as wounded by the Sword of Michael, is in imitation of Homer. The girding Sword with difcontinuous wound Pafs'd through him, but th Ethereal fubflance clofed Not long divifible, and from the gash

A ftream of Nectarous humour iffuing flow'd
Sanguin, fuch as celestial Spirits may bleed,
And all his Armour flain'd-

Homer tells us in the fame manner, that upon Diomedes wounding the Gods, there flow'd from the Wound an Ichor, or pure kind of Blood, which was not bred from Mortal Viands; and that tho' the Pain was exquifitely great, the Wound foon closed up and healed in those Beings who are vested with Immortality.

I queftion not but Milton in his Description of his furious Moloch flying from the Battel, and bellowing with the Wound he had receiv'd, had his Eye upon Mars in the Iliad, who upon his being wounded, is reprefented as retiring out of the Fight, and making an Outcry louder than that of a whole Army when it

G

begins the Charge. Homer adds, that the Greeks and Trojans, who were engaged in a general Battel, were terrified on each fide with the bellowing of this wounded Deity. The Reader will easily observe how Milton has kept all the horrour of this Image without running into the Ridicule of it.

Where the might of Gabriel fought,

And with fierce Enfigns pierc'd the deep array
Of Moloc furious King, who him defy'd,
And at his Chariot wheels to drag him bound
Threaten'd, nor from the Holy One of Heav'n
Refrain'd his tongue blafphemous; but anon
Down clov'n to the waste, with shatter'd Arms
And uncouth pain fled bellowing.—

Milton has likewife rais'd his Defcription in this Book with many Images taken out of the Poetical Parts of Scripture. The Meffiah's Chariot, as I have before taken notice, is form'd upon a Vision of Ezekiel, who, as Grotius obferves, has very much in him of Homer's Spirit in the Poetical Parts of his Prophecy.

The following Lines in that glorious Commiffion which is given the Meffiah to extirpate the Host of Rebel Angels, is drawn from a Sublime Paffage in the Pfalms.

Go then thou mightiest in thy Father's might
Afcend my Chariot, guide the rapid wheels
That Shake Heav'ns bafis, bring forth all my War
My Bow, my thunder, my almighty arms,
Gird on thy fword on thy puiffant thigh.

The Reader will easily discover many other Stroaks of the fame nature.

There is no queftion but Milton had heated his Imagination with the Fight of the Gods in Homer, before he entered upon this Engagement of the Angels. Homer there gives us a Scene of Men, Heroes and Gods mixed together in Battel. Mars animates

the contending Armies, and lifts up his Voice in fuch. a manner, that it is heard diftinctly amidst all the Shouts and Confufion of the Fight. Fupiter at the fame time Thunders over their Heads; while Neptune raises such a Tempest, that the whole Field of Battel. and all the tops of the Mountains shake about them, The Poet tells us, that Pluto himself, whofe Habitation was in the very Center of the Earth, was fo a[f]frighted at the shock, that he leapt from his Throne. Homer afterwards defcribes Vulcan as pouring down a Storm of Fire upon the River Xanthus, and Minerva as throwing a Rock at Mars; who, he tells us, covered feven Acres in his Fall.

As Homer has introduced into his Battel of the Gods every thing that is great and terrible in Nature, Milton has filled his Fight of Good and Bad Angels with all the like Circumstances of Horrour. The Shout of Armies, the Rattling of Brazen Chariots, the Hurling of Rocks and Mountains, the Earthquake, the Fire, the Thunder, are all of them employed to lift up the Reader's Imagination, and give him a fuitable Idea of fo great an Action. With what Art has the Poet represented the whole Body of the Earth trembling, even before it was created.

All Heaven refounded, and had Earth been then
All Earth had to its Center fhook-

In how fublime and just a manner does he afterwards describe the whole Heaven shaking under the Wheels of the Meffiah's Chariot, with that Exception to the Throne of God?

-Under his burning Wheels

The fteadfast Empyrean hook throughout,
All but the Throne it felf of God-

Notwithstanding the Meffiah appears cloathed with fo much Terrour and Majefty, the Poet has ftill found means to make his Readers conceive an Idea of him, beyond what he himself was able to describe.