When I broke loofe from that great Body of Writers who have employed their Wit and Parts in propagating Vice and Irreligion, I did not question but I should be treated as an odd kind of Fellow that had a Mind to appear fingular in my Way of Writing: But the general Reception I have found, convinces me that the World is not fo corrupt as we are apt to imagine; and that if those Men of Parts who have been employed in viciating the Age had endeavoured to rectify and amend it, they needed not to have facrificed their good Senfe and Virtue to their Fame and Reputation. No Man is fo funk in Vice and Ignorance, but there are ftill fome hidden Seeds of Goodness and Knowledge in him; which give him a Relish of fuch Reflections and Speculations as have an Aptnefs in* them* to improve the Mind and to make the Heart better.

I have fhewn in a former Paper, with how much Care I have avoided all fuch Thoughts as are loose, obfcene, or immoral; and I believe my Reader would still think the better of me, if he knew the Pains I am at in qualifying what I write after such a Manner, that nothing may be interpreted as aimed at private Perfons. For this Reafon when I. draw any faulty Character, I confider all those Perfons to whom the Malice of the World may poffibly apply it, and take care to dash it with fuch particular Circumftances as may prevent all fuch ill-natured Applications. If I write any thing on a black Man, I run over in my Mind all the eminent Perfons in the Nation who are of that Complection: When I place an imaginary Name at the Head of a Character, I examine every Syllable and Letter of it, that it may not bear any Resemblance to one that is real. I know very well the Value which every Man fets upon his Reputation, and how painful. it is to be exposed to the Mirth and Derifion of the Publick, and fhould therefore fcorn to divert my Reader at the Expence of any private Man.

As I have been thus tender of every particular Person's Reputation, so I have taken more than ordi

AT THE RECEPTION OF HIS PAPERS.

13

nary Care not to give Offence to those who appear in the higher Figures of Life, I would not make my self merry even with a Piece of Pasteboard that is invested with a publick Character; for which Reason I have never glanced upon the late designed Proceffion of his Holinefs and his Attendants, notwithstanding it might have afforded Matter to many ludicrous Speculations. Among thofe Advantages which the Publick may reap from this Paper, it is not the least, that it draws Mens Minds off from the Bitterness of Party, and furnishes them with Subjects of Discourse that may be treated without Warmth or Paffion. This is faid to have been the first Design of those Gentlemen who fet on Foot the Royal Society; and had then a very good Effect, as it turned many of the greatest Genius's of that Age to the Difquifitions of natural Knowledge, who, if they had engaged in Politicks with the fame Parts and Application, might have set their Country in a Flame. The Air-Pump, the Barometer, the Quadrant, and the like Inventions, were thrown out to those busy Spirits, as Tubs and Barrels are to a Whale, that he may let the Ship fail on without Disturbance, while he diverts himself with those innocent Amusements.

I have been so very scrupulous in this Particular of not hurting any Man's Reputation, that I have forborn mentioning even fuch Authors as I could not name with Honour. This I must confefs to have been a Piece of very great Self-denial: For as the Publick relishes nothing better than the Ridicule which turns upon a Writer of any Eminence, so there is nothing which a Man that has but a very ordinary Talent in Ridicule may execute with greater Ease. One might raise Laughter for a Quarter of a Year together upon the Works of a Person who has published but a very few Volumes. For which Reasons I am aftonished, that those who have appeared against this Paper have made so very little of it. The Criticisms which I have hitherto published, have been made with an Intention rather tc discover Beauties and Excellencies in the

Writers of my own Time, than to publish any of their Faults and Imperfections. In the mean while I should take it for a very great Favour from some of my underhand Detractors, if they would break all Measures with me fo far, as to give me a Pretence for examining their Performances with an impartial Eye: Nor fhall I look upon it as any Breach of Charity to criticise the Author, fo long as I keep clear of the Perfon.

In the mean while, till I am provoked to such Hoftilities, I fhall from Time to Time endeavour to do Justice to those who have distinguished themselves in the politer Parts of Learning, and to point out fuch Beauties in their Works as may have escaped the Obfervation of others.

As the first Place among our English Poets is due to Milton, and as I have drawn more Quotations out of him than from any other, I fhall enter into a regular Criticism upon his Paradife loft, which I fhall publish every Saturday till I have given my Thoughts upon that Poem. I fhall not however prefume to impofe upon others my own particular Judgment on this Author, but only deliver it as my private Opinion. Criticism is of a very large Extent, and every particular Master in this Art has his favourite Paffages in an Author, which do not equally ftrike the best Judges. It will be fufficient for me if I difcover many Beauties or Imperfections which others have not attended to, and I should be very glad to see any of our eminent Writers publish their Discoveries on the fame Subject. In fhort, I would always be understood to write my Papers of Criticism in the Spirit which Horace has expreffed in those two famous Lines,

-Si quid novifli rectius iftis

Candidus imperti, fi non his utere mecum.

If you have made any better Remarks of your own, communicate them with Candour; if not, make use of these I present you with.

The SPECTATOR.

Propert.

Cedite Romani Scriptores, cedite Graii.
{Give place, ye Roman, and ye Grecian Wits.}

Saturday, January, 5. 1712.

0.5.

HERE is nothing in Nature fo irkfom[e] as general Discourses, especially when they turn chiefly upon Words. For this Reason I fhall wave the Difcuffion of that Point which was started fome Years fince, Whether Milton's Paradife Loft may be called an-De Heroick Poem? Those who will not give it that Title, may call it (if they please) a Divine Poem. It will be fufficient to its Perfection, if it has in it all the Beauties of the highest kind of Poetry; and as for those who fay [alledge] it is not an Heroick Poem, they advance no more to the Diminution of it, than if they should say Adam is not Æneas, nor Eve Helen.

I shall therefore examine it by the Rules of Epic Poetry, and fee whether it falls fhort of the Iliad or Eneid, in the Beauties which are essential to that kind of Writing. The firft Thing to be confidered in an Epic Poem, is the Fable, which is perfect or imperfect, according as the Action which it relates is more or less fo. This Action should have three Qualifications in it. First, It fhould be but one Action. Secondly, It should be an entire Action; ." and Thirdly, It should be a great Action. To confider the Action of the Iliad, Eneid, and Paradife Loft in these three feveral Lights. Homer to preserve the Unity of his Action haftens into the midst of things, as Horace has obferved: Had he gone up

a.

One

narrativos

16 THE FABLE PERFECT OR IMPERFECT AS IS THE ACTION.

to Leda's Egg, or begun much later, even at the Rape of Helen, or the Investing of Troy, it is manifest that the Story of the Poem would have been a Series of feveral Actions. He therefore opens his Poem with the Discord of his Princes, and with great Art interweaves in the feveral fucceeding parts of it, an account of every thing [material] which relates to the Story [them], and had paffed before that fatal Diffension. After the fame manner Æneas makes his first appearance in the Tyrrhene Seas, and within fight of Italy, because the Action proposed to be celebrated was that of his Settling himself in Latium. But because it was neceffary for the Reader to know what had happened to him in the taking of Troy, and in the preceding parts of his Voyage, Virgil makes his Hero relate it by way of Episode in the second and third Books of the Eneid. The Contents of both which Books come before those of the first Book in the Thread of the Story, tho' for preferving of this Unity of Action, they follow them in the Difpofition of the Poem. Milton, in Imitation of these two great Poets, opens his Paradife Loft with an Infernal Council plotting the Fall of Man, which is the Action he propofed to celebrate; and as for those great Actions, which preceded in point of time, the Battel of the Angels, and the Creation of the World, (which would have entirely destroyed the Unity of his Principal Action, had he related them in the fame Order that they happened) he cast them into the fifth, fixth and feventh Books, by way of Episode to this noble Poem.

Ariftotle himself allows, that Homer has nothing to boast of as to the Unity of his Fable, tho' at the same time that great Critick and Philofopher endeavours to palliate this Imperfection in the Greek Poet, by imputing it in fome Measure to the very Nature of an Epic Poem. Some have been of Opinion, that the Eneid labours alfo in this particular, and has Episodes which may be looked upon as Excrefcencies rather than as Parts of the Action. On the contrary, the