As a drama it is deficient. The action is not probable. A Mafque, in those parts where fupernatural intervention is admitted, must indeed be given up to all the freaks of imagination; but, fo far as the action is merely human, it ought to be reasonable, which can hardly be faid of the conduct of the two brothers; who, when their fifter finks with fatigue in a pathlefs wilderness, wander both away together in search of berries too far to find their way back, and leave a helpless Lady to all the fadness and danger of folitude. This however is a defect overbalanced by its convenience, What deferves more reprehenfion is, that the prologue spoken in the wild wood by the attendant Spirit is addreffed to the audience; a mode of communication fo contrary to the nature of dramatick reprefentation, that no precedents can fupport it., The difcourfe of the Spirit is too long; an objection that may be made to almost all the following fpeeches: they have not the fpritelinefs of a dialogue animated by reciprocal Q4 con contention, but feem rather declamations deliberately compofed, and formally repeated, on a moral question. The auditor therefore liftens as to a lecture, without paffion, without anxiety. The fong of Comus has airinefs and jollity; but, what may recommend Milton's morals as well as his poetry, the invitations to pleasure are so general, that they excite no diftinct images of corrupt enjoyment, and take no dangerous hold on the fancy. The following foliloquies of Comus and the Lady are elegant, but tedious The fong must owe much to the voice, if it ever can delight. At last the Brothers entes, with too much tranquillity; and when they have feared left their fifter fhould be in danger, and hoped that he is not in danger, the Elder makes a fpeech in praife of chastity, and the Younger finds how fine it is to be a philofopher. Then defcends the Spirit in form of a fhepherd; and the Brother, instead of being in hafte to afk his help, praifes his finging, and enquires his business in that place. It is remarkable, that at this interview the Brother is taken with a fhort fit of rhyming. The Spirit relates that the Lady is in the power of Comus; the Brother moralifes again; and the Spirit makes a long narration, of no use because it is falfe, and therefore unfuitable to a good Being. In all these parts the language is poetical, and the fentiments are generous; but there is fomething wanting to allure attention. The dispute between the Lady and Comus is the most animated and affecting fcene of the drama, and wants nothing but a brifker reciprocation of objections and replies, to invite attention, and detain it. The fongs are vigorous, and full of imagery; but they are harsh in their diction, and not very mufical in their numbers. Throughout the whole, the figures are too bold, and the language too luxuriant for dialogue. It is a drama in the epic ftyle, inelegantly fplendid, and tediously instructive. The The Sonnets were written in different parts of Milton's life, upon different occafions. They deserve not any particular criticism; for of the beft it can only be faid, that they are not bad; and perhaps only the eighth and the twenty-first are truly entitled to this flender commendation. The fabrick of a fonnet, however adapted to the Italian language, has never fucceeded in ours, which, having greater variety of termination, requires the rhymes to be often changed. Thofe little pieces may be dispatched without much anxiety; a greater work calls for greater care. I am now to examine Paradife Loft; a poem, which, confidered with respect to defign, may claim the first place, and with respect to performance the fecond, among the productions of the human mind. By the general confent of criticks, the firft praife of genius is due to the writer of an epick poem, as it requires an affemblage of all the powers which are fingly fufficient for other compofitions. Poetry is the art of uniting pleasure with truth, by calling imagination to the help of reafon. Epick poetry undertakes undertakes to teach the most important truths by the most pleasing precepts, and therefore relates fome great event in the most affecting manner. History must supply the writer with the rudiments of narration, which he muft improve and exalt by a nobler art, animate by dramatick energy, and diverfify by retrospection and anticipation; morality must teach him the exact bounds, and different fhades, of vice and virtue: from policy, and the practice of life, he has to learn the difcriminations of character, and the tendency of the paffions, either fingle or combined; and phyfiology muft fupply him with illuftrations and images. To put these materials to poetical use, is required an imagination capable of painting nature, and realizing fiction. Nor is he yet a poet till he has attained the whole extenfion of his language, diftinguished all the delicacies of phrase, and all the colours of words, and learned to adjust their different founds to all the varieties of metrical modulation. Boffu is of opinion that the poet's first work is to find a moral, which his fable is afterwards to illuftrate and establish. This feems |