has drawn his Jupiter, as the Chriftian Idea of the Supreme Being is more Rational and Sublime than that of the Heathens. The particular Objects on which he is described to have caft his Eye, are represented in the moft beautiful and lively Manner.

Now bad th' Almighty Father from above,
(From the pure Empyrean where he fits

High thron'd above all height) bent down his Ege,
His own Works and their Works at once to view.
About him all the Sanctities of Heav'n

Stood thick as Stars, and from his Sight receiv'd
Beatitude paft Uttrance: On his right
The radiant Image of his Glory fat,
His only Son. On Earth he first bebeld
Our two firft Parents, yet the only tre
Of Mankind, in the happy Garden plac'd,
Reaping immortal fruits of Joy and Love ;
Uninterrupted Joy, unrival'd Love,
In blissful Solitude. He then furvey'd
Hell and the Gulph between, and Satan there
Coafting the Wall of Heaven on this fide Night,
In the dun air fublime; and ready now

To floop with wearied wings, and willing feet,
On the bare outfide of this world, that feem'd
Firm land imbofom'd without firmament;
Uncertain which, in Ocean or in Air.
Him God beholding from his profpect high,
Wherein paft, prefent, future be beholds,
Thus to his only Son forefeeing fpake.

SATAN's Approach to the Confines of the Creation, is finely imaged in the Beginning of the Speech which immediately follows. The Effects of this Speech in the bleffed Spirits, and in the Divine Perfon to whom it was addreffed, cannot but fill the Mind of the Reader with a fecret Pleasure and Complacency.

Thus while God fpake, ambrofial fragrance fill'd
All Heav'n, and in the bleffed Spirits elect
Senfe of new Foy ineffable diffus'd.
Beyond Compare the Son of God was feen
Moft glorious; in him all his Father foone

Subftantially

Subftantially exprefs'd; and in his face
Divine Compaffion vifibly appear'd,

Love without end, and without measure Grace.

I need not point out the Beauty of that Circumftance, wherein the whole Hoft of Angels are reprefented as ftanding Mute; nor fhew how proper the Occafion was to produce fuch a Silence in Heaven. The Close of this Divine Colloquy, with the Hymn of Angels that follows upon it, are fo wonderfully Beautiful and Poetical, that I fhould not forbear inferting the whole Paffage, if the Bounds of my Paper would give me leave.

No fooner had th' Almighty ceas'd, but all
The multitude of Angels with a Shout
(Load as from numbers without number, fweet
As from bleft Voices) utt'ring Joy, Heav'n rung
With Jubilee, and loud Hofannas fill'd
Th' eternal regions; &c. &c.

SATAN's Walk upon the Outfide of the Universe which at a Distance appeared to him of a globular Form, but, upon his nearer Approach, looked like an unbounded Plain, is natural and noble: As his Roaming upon the Frontiers of the Creation between that Mafs of Matter, which was wrought into a World, and that shapeless unformed Heap of Materials, which ftill lay in Chaos and Confufion, trikes the Imagination with fomething aftonishingly great and wild. I have before fpoken of the Limbo of Vanity, which the Poet places upon this outermoft Surface of the Universe, and shall here explain my felf more at large on that, and other Parts of the Poem which are of the fame Shadowy Nature.

ARISTOTLE obferves, that the Fable of an Epic Poem should abound in Circumstances that are both credible and astonishing; or as the French Criticks choose to phrase it, the Fable should be filled with the Probable and the Marvellous. This Rule is as fine and just as any in Ariftotle's whole Art of Poetry.

IF the Fable is only Probable, it differs nothing from a true History; if it is only Marvellous, it is no better than a Romance. The great Secret therefore of Heroick Poetry is to relate fuch Circumftances as may produce

in the Reader at the fame time both Belief and Astonishment. This is brought to pass in a well-chofen Fable, by the Account of fuch things as have really happened, or at leaft of fuch things as have happened, according to the received Opinions of Mankind. Milton's Fable is a Mafter-piece of this Nature; as the War in Heaven, the Condition of the fallen Angels, the State of Innocence, the Temptation of the Serpent, and the Fall of Man, though they are very aftonishing in themselves, are not only credible, but actual Points of Faith.

THE next Method of reconciling Miracles with Credibility, is by a happy Invention of the Poet; as in particular, when he introduces Agents of a fuperior Nature, who are capable of effecting what is wonderful, and what is not to be met with in the ordinary course of things. Ulyffes's Ship being turned into a Rock, and Æneas's Fleet into a Shoal of Water-Nymphs, though they are very furprizing Accidents, are nevertheless probable, when we are told that they were the Gods who thus transformed them. It is this kind of Machinery which fills the Poems both of Homer and Virgil with fuch Circumftances as are wonderful, but not impoffible, and fo frequently produce in the Reader the most pleasing Paffion that can rife in the Mind of Man, which is Admiration. If there be any Inftance in the Eneid liable to Exception upon this Account, it is in the Beginning of the Third Book, where Eneas is reprefented as tearing up the Myrtle that dropped Blood. To qualify this wonderful Circumftance, Polydorus tells a Story from the Root of the Myrtle, that the barbarous Inhabitants of the Country having pierced him with Spears and Arrows, the Wood which was left in his Body took Root in his Wounds, and gave Birth to that bleeding Tree. This Circumstance feems to have the Marvellous without the Probable, because it is represented as proceeding from natural Causes, without the Interpofition of any God, or other Supernatural Power capable of producing it. The Spears and Arrows grow of themselves, without fo much as the Modern Help of an Enchantment. If we look into the Fiction of Milton's Fable, though we find it full of furprifing Incidents, they are generally fuited to our Notions of the Things and Perfons defcribed, and tempered with a due

a due Measure of Probability. I muft only make an Exception to the Limbo of Vanity, with his Episode of Sin and Death, and fome of the imaginary Perfons in his Chaos. Thefe Paffages are astonishing, but not credible; the Reader cannot fo far impofe upon himself as to fee a Possibility in them; they are the Defcription of Dreams and Shadows, not of Things or Perfons. I know that many Criticks look upon the Stories of Circe, Polypheme, the Sirens, nay the whole Odyssey and Iliad, to be Allegories; but allowing this to be true, they are Fables, which, confidering the Opinions of Mankind that prevailed in the Age of the Poet, might poffibly have been according to the Letter. The Perfons are fuch as might have acted what is afcribed to them, as the Circumftances in which they are reprefented, might poffibly have been Truths and Realities. This Appearance of Probability is fo abfolutely requifite in the greater kinds of Poetry, that Ariftotle obferves the Ancient Tragick Writers made ufe of the Names of fuch great Men as had actually lived in the World, tho' the Tragedy proceeded upon Adventures they were never engaged in, on purpose to make the Subject more Credible. In a word, befides the hidden Meaning of an Epic Allegory, the Plain literal Senfe ought to appear Probable. The Story should be fuch as an ordinary Reader may acquiefce in, whatever Natural, Moral or Political Truth may be discovered in it by Men of greater Penetration.

SATAN, after having long wander'd upon the Surface or outmoft Wall of the Universe, discovers at laft a wide Gap in it, which led into the Creation, and is defcribed as the opening through which the Angels pass to and fro into the lower World, upon their Errands to Mankind. His Sitting upon the Brink of this Passage, and taking a Survey of the whole Face of Nature that appeared to him new and fresh in all its Beauties, with the Simile illuftrating this Circumstance, fills the Mind of the Reader with as furprifing and glorious an Idea as any that arifes in the whole Poem. He looks down into that vaft Hollow of the Univerfe with the Eye, or (as Milion calls it in his firtt Book) with the Ken of an Angel. He furveys all the Wonders in this immenfe Amphitheatre that lie between both the Poles

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of Heaven, and takes in at one View the whole round of the Creation.

HIS Flight between the feveral Worlds that shined on every fide of him, with the particular Description of the Sun, are fet forth in all the Wantonnefs of a luxuriant Imagination. His Shape, Speech and Behaviour upon his transforming himself into an Angel of Light, are touched with exquifite Beauty. The Poet's Thought of directing Satan to the Sun, which in the vulgar Opinion of Mankind is the most confpicuous Part of the Creation, and the placing in it an Angel, is a Circumftance very finely contrived, and the more adjusted to a Poetical Probability, as it was a received Doctrine among the most famous Philofophers, that every Orb had its Intelligence; and as an Apostle in Sacred Writ is faid to have feen fuch an Angel in the Sun. In the Anfwer which this Angel returns to the difguifed evil Spirit, there is fuch a becoming Majefty as is altogether fuitable to a fuperior Being. The Part of it in which he reprefents himself as present at the Creation, is very noble in it self, and not only proper where it is introduced, but requifite to prepare the Reader for what follows in the Seventh Book.

I faw when at his Word the formless Mafs,
This World's material Mould, came to a Heap:
Confufion beard bis Voice, and wild Uproar
Stood rul'd, food vaft Infinitude confin'd;
Till at bis jecond Bidding Darkness fled,
Light fbone, &c.

IN the following Part of the Speech he points out the Earth with fuch Circumstances, that the Reader can fcarce forbear fancying himself employed on the fame diftant View of it.

Look downward on that Globe whofe hither Side
With Light from bence, tho' but reflected, fbines;
That place is Earth, the Seat of Man, that Light
His Day, &c.

I must not conclude my Reflections upon this Third Book of Paradife Loft, without taking notice of that celebrated Complaint of Milton with which it opens, and which certainly deferves all the Praises that have been