Concocted and adusted they reduc'd To blackest grain, and into store convey'd ; With silent circumspection unespied. Now when fair morn orient in heav'n appear'd, 516. Part hidden veins digg'd up (nor hath this earth Entrails unlike) of mineral and stone,] Dr. Bentley has carried on the mark of parenthesis to the end of the verse; but it should be placed after unlike: and the stone may have been mentioned here as what they used for balls. That stone-bullets have been in use, see Chambers's Univ. Dict. in Cannon. Or Milton by the word stone here would express more distinctly that the metal, of which they made their engines and balls, was inclosed in and mixed with a stony substance in the mine. See Furetiere's French Dictionary upon the word mineral. Pearce. 520. -pernicious with one touch to fire.] The incentive reed is indeed pernicious as the engines VOI. I. 515 520 525 Look'd round, and scouts each coast light-armed scour, Where lodg'd, or whither fled, or if for fight, Arm, warriors, arm for fight; the foe at hand, ally applied to the light, but here very poetically to the hills, the dawn first appearing over them, and they seeming to bring the rising day; as the evening star is said likewise first to appear on his hill-top, viii. 520. 532.-halt:] Milton spells it as the Italians do alto, but we commonly write it with an h like the French and Germans. 533. in slow But firm battalion ;] The reason of their being both a slow and firm battalion is suggested a little afterwards. They were slow in drawing their cannon, and firm in order to conceal it, ver. 551. 535. Zophiel,] In Hebrew, the spy of God. Hume. 539. -so thick a cloud He comes,] This metaphor is usual in all languages, and in almo t all authors, to express a great multitude. We have it in Heb. xii. 530 535 540 1. Seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses &c. We have EDOS way in Homer, Iliad. iv. 247: nimbus peditum in Virgil, Æn. vii. 793. and clouds of foot in Paradise Regained, iii. 327. We have peditum equitumque nubes in Livy, lib. v. and even nubem belli in Virgil, Æn. x. 809. and armorum nubem in Statius, Theb. iv. 839. 541. Sad resolution and secure:] By sad here is meant sour and sullen, as tristis in Latin and tristo in Italian signify. Pearce. Or possibly it means no more than serious or in earnest, a sense frequent in all our old authors. And I remember a remarkable instance of the use of the word in Lord Bacon's Advice to Villiers Duke of Buckingham; "But if it were "an embassy of weight, con "cerning affairs of state, choice His adamantine coat gird well, and each Fit well his helm, gripe fast his orbed shield, So warn'd he them aware themselves, and soon Instant without disturb they took alarm, And onward mov'd imbattel'd: when behold was made of some sad person "of known judgment, wisdom, " and experience, and not of a young man, not weighed in "state matters, &c." If sad there be not false printed for staid or sage. So it is used in Spenser for sober, grave, sedate. Faery Queen, b. ii. cant. ii. st. 14. A sober sad, and comely courteous dame, and in other places. 541. -let each 545 550 555 His sharpen'd spear let every Gre. cian wield, And every Grecian fix his brazen shield, &c. Pope. 546. -barb'd with fire.] Bearded, headed, with fire. the French barbe, and the Latin barba a beard. Hume. Of 548.quit of all impediment ;] The carriages and baggage of an army were called in Latin impedimenta: and the good angels are said to be quit of all impediment, in opposition to the others His adamantine coat gird well, encumbered with their heavy artillery. and each Fit well his helm, gripe fast his orbed shield,] This is plainly copied from Aga- Εν μεν τις δόρυ θήξασθω, εν δ' ασπίδα 552. in hollow cube] Dr. Bentley reads square, but see my note on ver. 399. Pearce. 553. Training] Drawing in train, from the term, train of artillery. Vanguard, to right and left the front unfold; 568. So scoffing in ambiguous words, &c.] We cannot pretend entirely to justify this punning scene: but we should consider that there is very little of this kind of wit any where in the poem but in this place, and in this we may suppose Milton to have sacrificed to the taste of his times, when puns were better relished than they are at present in the learned world; and I know not whether we are not grown too delicate and fastidious in this particular. It is certain the ancients practised them more both in their conversation and in their writings; and Aristotle recommends them in his book of Rhetoric, and likewise Cicero in his treatise of Oratory; and if we should condemn them absolutely, we must condemn half of the good sayings of the greatest wits of Greece and Rome. They are less proper indeed in serious works, and not at all becoming the majesty of an epic poem; but our author seems to have been betrayed into this excess in great measure by his love and 560 565 admiration of Homer. For this account of the angels jesting and insulting one another is not unlike some passages in the sixteenth book of the Iliad, Eneas throws a spear at Meriones; and he artfully avoiding it, Eneas jests upon his dancing, the Cretans (the countrymen of Meriones) being famous dancers. A little afterwards in the same book, Patroclus kills Hector's charioteer, who falls headlong from the chariot, upon which Patroclus insults him for several lines together upon his skill in diving, and says that if he was at sea, he might catch excellent oysters. Milton's jests cannot be lower and more trivial than these; but if he is like Homer in his faults, let it be remembered that he is like him in his beauties too. And Mr. Thyer farther observes, that Milton is the less to be blamed for this punning scene, when one considers the characters of the speakers, such kind of insulting wit being most peculiar to proud contemptuous spirits. Had ended when to right and left the front On wheels, (for like to pillars most they seem'd, 570 575 Stood waving tipp'd with fire; while we suspense 580 574. Or hollow'd bodies &c.] We must carefully preserve the parenthesis here, as Milton himself has put it. The construction then will be, Which to our eyes discovered a triple row of pillars laid on wheels, of brass, iron, stony mould, or substance, had not their mouths gaped wide, and shewed that they were not pillars; the intermediate words containing a reason why he called them pillars (for like to pillars most they seemed or hollowed bodies &c.) being included in a parenthesis. 576. Brass, iron, stony mould,] Mould here signifies substance, but Dr. Bentley by reading cast in mould changes the sense of it to one of a very different nature. By this emendation (he says) he has rid the poem of stone cannon: but such cannon have been heard of elsewhere, and are now to be seen (I think) at Delft in Holland. Whether they ever were, or could have been used in war, may be ques tioned: but it is probable that Milton, by seeing such stone cannon in foreign countries, was led to mention them here as part of Satan's artillery. Pearce. We read before that these angels digged up veins of mineral and stone, ver. 517. and that may account for the brass, iron, stony substance here. 578. Portending hollow truce:] Here Raphael himself cannot help continuing the pun. 580. Stood waving] This must certainly be an error of the press, occasioned by stood in the line before or in the line following; but then it is a wonder that Milton did not correct it in his second edition. Dr. Bentley reads, -and in his hand a reed Held waving tipp'd wîth fire; and we should substitute some such word as this, as it makes better sense, as well as avoids the repetition of stood three times so near together. |