listic doctors, and the profound Jacob Behmen with his fucceffors; how in a trivial inftance did both Scaliger and Voffius fling away a deal of pains in mifinterpreting a line of Martial, that would not puzzle a school-boy tolerably taught? Among the ancients 'twas customary to fwear by what they esteemed most dear; to this custom the poet alludes, not without fome malicious wit, in an epigram, where the Jew fwears by the temple of the Thunderer; (the word Jehovah did not fuit a Roman mouth;) "I don't believe you, fays Martial, fwear by your pathic, your "boy Anchialus, who is dearer to you, than "the God you pretend to adore."

"Ecce negas, jurafque mihi per templa tonantis. "Non credo: jura, verpe, per Anchialum.

I knew an ingenious man who, having thoroughly perfuaded himself that Virgil's Aeneid was a history of the times, apply'd the several characters there drawn to perfons of the Auguftan age. Who could Drances represent but

Cicero ?

I Mart, ep. XI, 95. vid. Scalig. in prolegom. ad libros de emendatione temporum. Et Voff. in notis ad Catullum. And our learned Spencer, who has examin'd the corrections of these critics.

"Lingua melior, fed frigida beilo "Dextera.

"Genus huic materna fuperbum

"Nobilitas dabat, incertum de patre ferebat.

Nor could any thing be more like, than Sergefthus and Catiline of the Sergian family. In the description of the games, he dashes his ship thro' over eagerness against the rock. And the rock that Catiline fplit on was his unbridled, licentious temper.

These and some other obfervations, too numerous to be mention'd here, paffed off very well; they carried an air of ingenuity with them, if not of truth. But when Iopas was Virgil, Dido Cleopatra, Achates Maecenas or Agrippa, Iapis Antonius Mufa, &c. what was this but playing the Procruftes with historical facts?

SUPPOSE, in like manner, one had a mind to try the fame experiment on Milton, and to imagine that frequently he hinted at those times, in which he himself had fo great a share both as a writer, and an actor. Thus, for instance, Abdiel may be the poet himself :

2 Virg. Aen. XI, 358. &c. What he adds-incertum de patre ferebat, is exactly agreeable to what Plutarch relates of the accounts of Cicero's father. His mother's name was Helvia, one of the most honorable families of Rome,

"Nor

"Nor number nor example with him wrought "To fwerve from truth, or change his conftant

"mind

"Tho' fingle.

This was all thy care,

"To ftand approv'd in fight of God, tho' "worlds

"Judg'd thee perverse."

'Tis not to be fuppofed that the commonwealthfman Milton could bear to see an earthly monarch idolized, deified, called the lord, the anointed, the representative of God: no, that fight he endured not; he drew his pen, and anfwer'd himself the royal writer,

3 ΩΣ ΕΙΠΩΝ ΠΡΟΣ ΟΝ ΜΕΓΑΛΗΤΟΡΑ ΘΥΜΟΝ,

thus exploring his own undaunted heart,

"O heav'n, that fuch refemblance of the highest "Should yet remain, where faith and realty "Remain not !"

Who cannot fee whom he meant, and what particular facts he pointed at in these lines? "So fpake the fiend, and with Neceffity "The Tyrant's plea, excus'd his devilish deeds."

Nor can any one want an interpretation for Nimrod, on whofe character he dwells fo long.

"Till one fhall rife

"Of proud ambitious heart, who (not content "With fair equality, fraternal ftate) "Will arrogate dominion undeferv'd "Over his brethren, and quite difpoffefs "Concord, and law of nature from the earth: "Hunting, (and men, not beafts fhall be his game)

"With war and hoftile fnare, fuch as refufe <c Subjection to his empire tyrannous. "A mighty hunter thence he shall be stil'd "Before the Lord, as in defpite of heav'n "Or of heav'n claiming fecond fov'reignty: "And from rebellion fhall derive his name, "Tho' of rebellion others be accufe."

Could the character of Charles the fecond, with his rabble rout of riotous courtiers, or the cavalier fpirit and party juft after the restoration be mark'd stronger and plainer, than in the beginning of the seventh book?

"But drive far off the barbarous diffonance "Of Bacchus and his revellers, &c.

It needs not be told what nation he points at in the twelfth book.

"Yet

"Yet fometimes nations will decline fo low "From virtue (which is reason) that no wrong, "But justice, and fome fatal curfe annex'd, Deprives them of their outward liberty, "Their inward lost."

Again, how plain are the civil wars imagined in the fixth book? The Michaels and Gabriels, &c. would have lengthen'd out the battles endlefs, nor would any folution been found s had not Cromwell, putting on celestial armour, ΤΗΝ ΠΑΝΟΠΛΙΑΝ ΤΟΥ ΘΕΟΥ, (for this was * Milton's opinion) like the Meffiah all armed in heavenly panoply, and afcending his fiery chariot,

4 Milton points out this allegory himfelf, in his defence of Smectym. p. 180. fol. edit. Then (that I may have

leave to foare awhile as the poets ufe) then ZEAL, **whofe fubftance is ethereal, arming in compleat diamond, "afcends his fiery chariot drawn with two blazing meteors,

66

figured like beafts, but of a higher breed, than any the "zodiack yields, resembling two of those four which "Ezechiel and St. John faw, the one visaged like a lion, to express a power, high autority and indignation; the "other of count'nance like a man, to caft derifion and scorn

upon perverfe and fraudulent feducers: with these the "invincible warrior ZEAL fhaking loosely the flack reins "drives over the heads of fcatiet prelats and fuch as art "insolent to maintain traditions, brufing their ftiff necks "under his flaming wheels." I have often thought that