If, in the last place, we consider the Language of this great Poet, we must allow what I have hinted in a former Paper, that it is [often] too much laboured, and fometimes obfcured by old Words, Tranfpofitions, and Foreign Idioms. Seneca's Objection to the Stile of a great Author, Riget ejus oratio, nihil in eâ placidum, nihil lene, is what many Criticks make to Milton : as I cannot wholly refute it, so I have already apologized for it in another Paper; to which I may further add, that Milton's Sentiments and Ideas were so wonderfully Sublime, that it would have been impoffible for him to have represented them in their full Strength and Beauty, without having recourse to these Foreign Assistances. Our Language funk under him, and was unequal to that greatnefs of Soul, which furnished him with fuch glorious Conceptions.

A fecond Fault in his Language is, that he often affects a kind of Jingle in his Words, as in the following Paffages, and many others:

And brought into the World a World of woe.
-Begirt th Almighty Throne

Befeeching or befieging

This tempted our attempt

At one Slight bound high overleapt all bound.

I know there are Figures of this kind of Speech, that some of the greatest Ancients have been guilty of it, and that Aristotle himself has given it a place in his Rhetorick among the Beauties of that Art. But as it is in itsself poor and trifling, it is I think at present univerfally exploded by all the Mafters of polite Writing.

The laft Fault which I shall take notice of in Milton's Stile, is the frequent use of what the Learned call Technical Words, or Terms of Art. It is one of the great Beauties of Poetry, to make hard things intelligible, and to deliver what is abstruse of it self in fuch eafy Language as may be understood by ordinary Readers: Befides that the Knowledge of a Poet should rather feem born with him, or inspired, than

OBSCURE, JINGLING, AND TECHNICAL.

49

drawn from Books and Systems. I have often wondered how Mr. Dryden could tranflate a Paffage of Virgil after the following manner.

Tack to the Larboard, and fland off to Sea,

Veer Star-board Sea and Land.

Milton makes ufe of Larboard in the fame manner. When he is upon Building he mentions Doric Pillars, Pilafters, Cornice, Freeze, Architrave. When he talks of Heavenly Bodies, you meet with Eccliptick, and Eccentric, the trepidation, Stars dropping from the Zenith, Rays culminating from the Equator. To which might be added many Inftances of the like kind in feveral other Arts and Sciences.

I shall in my next Saturday's Paper [Papers] give an Account of the many particular Beauties in Milton, which would have been too long to infert under thofe general Heads I have already treated of, and with which I intend to conclude this Piece of Criticism.

The SPECTATOR.

-volet hæc fub luce videri,

Fudicis argutum quæ non formidat acumen. Hor. -Some choofe the clearest Light,

And boldly challenge the moft piercing Eye. Rofcommon.}

Nature.

Saturday, February 16. 1712.

Have feen in the Works of a Modern Philofopher, a Map of the Spots in the Sun. My laft Paper of the Faults and Blemishes in Milton's Paradife Loft, may be confider'd as a Piece of the fame To pursue the Allufion: As it is obferv'd, that among the bright parts of the Luminous Body above-mentioned, there are fome which glow more intenfely, and dart a ftronger Light than others; fo, notwithstanding I have already fhewn Milton's Poem to be very beautiful in general, I fhall now proceed to take notice of fuch Beauties as appear to me more exquifite than the reft. Milton has proposed the Subject of his Poem in the following Verses.

Of Mans firft difobedience, and the fruit
Of that forbidden tree, whofe mortal tafle
Brought Death into the World and all our woe,
With lofs of Eden, 'till one greater Man
Reflore us, and regain the blissful Seat,
Sing Heav'nly Mufe

Thefe Lines are perhaps as plain, fimple and unadorned as any of the whole Poem, in which particular the Author has conform'd himself to the Example of Homer, and the Precept of Horace.

His Invocation to a Work which turns in a great

measure upon the Creation of the World, is very properly made to the Mufe who infpired Mofes in thofe Books from whence our Author drew his Subject, and to the Holy Spirit who is therein represented as operating after a particular manner in the first Production of Nature. This whole Exordium rifes very happily into noble Language and Sentiment, as I think the Transition to the Fable is exquifitely beautiful and natural.

The nine Days Astonishment, in which the Angels lay entranced after their dreadful Overthrow and Fall from Heaven, before they could recover either the ufe of Thought or Speech, is a noble Circumstance, and very finely imagined. The Division of Hell into Seas of Fire, and into firm Ground impregnated with the fame furious Element, with that particular Circumstance of the exclusion of Hope from those Infernal Regions, are Inftances of the fame great and fruitful Invention.

The Thoughts in the firft Speech and Description of Satan, who is one of the principal Actors in this Poem, are wonderfully proper to give us a full Idea of him. His Pride, Envy and Revenge, Obstinacy, Despair and Impenitence, are all of them very artfully interwoven. In short, his firft Speech is a Complication of all thofe Paffions which difcover themselves separately in feveral other of his Speeches in the Poem. The whole part of this great Enemy of Mankind is filled with fuch Incidents as are very apt to raise and terrifie the Reader's Imagination. Of this Nature, in the Book now before us, is his being the first that awakens out of the general Trance, with his Posture on the burning Lake, his rifing from it, and the Description of his Shield and Spear.

Thus Satan talking to his nearest mate,
With head up-lift above the wave, and eyes
That fparkling blazed, his other parts befide
Prone on the Flood, extended long and large,

Lay floating many a rood

Forthwith upright he rears from off the poo!
His mighty Stature; on each hand the flames
Driv'n backward flope their pointing Spires, and rowľd
In Billows, leave ith midft a horrid vale.
Then with expanded wings he fteers his flight
Aloft, incumbent on the dusky Air

That felt unufual weight

-His pondrous Shield

Ethereal temper, maffie, large and round
Behind him caft; the broad circumference
Hung on his Shoulders like the Moon, whofe orb
Thro' Optick Glafs the Tufcan Artists view
At Ev'ning from the top of Fefole,
Or in Valdarno to defery new Lands,
Rivers or Mountains on her fpotty Globe.
His Spear to equal which the tallest pine
Hewn on Norwegian Hills to be the Maft
Of fome great Ammiral, were but a wand
He walk'd with to fupport uneafie Steps
Over the burning Marl

To which we may add his Call to the fallen Angels that lay plunged and stupified in the Sea of Fire.

He call'd fo loud, that all the hollow deep

Of Hell refounded

But there is no single Paffage in the whole Poem worked up to a greater Sublimity, than that wherein his Person is described in those celebrated Lines:

He, above the reft

In fhape and gefture proudly eminent
Stood like a Tower, &c.

His Sentiments are every way answerable to his Character, and are* fuitable to a created Being of the most exalted and moft depraved Nature. Such is that in which he takes Poffeffion of his Place of Torments.