That at her flow'ry work doth sing,

And the waters murmuring

With such consort as they keep,

145

Entice the dewy-feather'd sleep;

And let some strange mysterious dream
Wave at his wings in airy stream
Of lively portraiture display'd,
Softly on my eye-lids laid.

thigh, &c.] Compare P. R. iv.
247. where see the note. Com-
pare also Drayton's Owle, vol. iv.
p. 1492.

See the small brookes as through the
groves they travel,
With the smooth cadence of their

murmuring;
Each bee with honie on her laden thye.
T. Warton.

148. Wave at his wings] Wave is used here as a verb neuter.

148. I do not exactly understand the whole of the context. Is the Dream to wave at Sleep's wings? Doctor Newton will have wave to be a verb neuter: and very justly, as the passage now stands. But let us strike out at, and make wave active.

-Let some strange mysterious dream Wave his wings, in airy stream, &c. "Let some fantastic Dream put "the wings of Sleep in motion, "which shall be displayed, or "expanded, in an airy or soft "stream of visionary imagery, "gently falling or settling on

my eye-lids. Or, his may refer to Dream, and not to Sleep, with much the same sense. the mean time, supposing lively adverbial, as was now common, displayed will connect with pourtraiture, that is, "pourtraiture

150

lively displayed," with this sense, "Wave his wings, in an. airy stream of rich pictures so strongly displayed in vision as "to resemble real life." Or, if lively remain as an adjective, much in the same sense, displayed will signify displaying itself. On the whole, we must not here seek for precise meanings of parts, but acquiesce in a general idea resulting from the whole, which I think is sufficiently seen. T. Warton.

150. Softly on my eye-lids laid.] In the same strain, Fletcher in the Faithful Shepherdess, act ii. s. 1. vol. iii. p. 126.

-Sweetest slumbers

And soft silence, fall in numbers
On your eye-lids.

And in the Tragedy of Valenti-
nian, in an address to Sleep, act
v. s. 2. vol. iv. p. 353.

On this afflicted prince fall like a cloud

In gentle showers.

Nor must I forget an exquisite
passage in Par. L. b. iv. 614.

-The timely dew of sleep
Now falling with soft slumbrous
weight inclines
Our eye-lids.

But for wildness, and perhaps
force, of imagery, in expressing

And as I wake, sweet music breathe

Above, about, or underneath,

151. sweet music breathe &c.]. This thought is taken from Shakespeare's Tempest. Jortin. 151. And as I wake, sweet music" breathe

Above, about, and underneath.] Probably suggested to Milton's imagination by some of the machineries of the Masks under the contrivance of Inigo Jones. Hollinshead, describing a very curious device or spectacle presented before Queen Elizabeth, insists particularly on the secret or mysterious music of some fic titious nymphs, "which," he adds, "surely had been a noble hearing, and the more melo"dious for the varietie [novelty] "thereof, because it should come "secretlie and strangelie out of "the earth." Hist. iii. f. 1297. Jonson, in a Masque called a Particular Entertaynment of the Queene and Prince at Altrope, 1603, has this stage-direction. "To the sound of excellent soft

s. 3. The soldiers are watching
before the palace.
"Musick of
"hautboys under the stage.-2
"Sold. Peace, what noise?
"1 Sold. List, list! Musick i' th'
"uir. 3 Sold. Under the earth,
"&c." Sandys, in the Notes to
his English Ovid, says, that "In
"the garden of the Tuilleries at
"Paris, by an artificial device
underground invented for mu-
sicke, I have known an echo
repeat a verse." Edit. Oxon.
1632. p. 103. Psyche in Apuleius,
sleeping on a green and flowery
bank near a romantic grove, is
awakened by invisible singers
and unseen harps. Aur. Asin. 1.
v. p. 87. b. edit. Beroald. By
the way, the whole of this fic-
tion in Apuleius, where Pysche
wafted by the zephyrs into a de-
licious valley, sees a forest of
huge trees, containing a superb
palace richly constructed of ivory,
gold, and precious stones, in
which a sumptuous banquet ac-
companied with music is most
luxuriously displayed, no person
in the mean time appearing, has
been adopted by the Gothic ro-
mance writers. Rinaldo, in
Tasso's Inchanted Forest, hears
unseen harps and singers, c. xvi.
67. T. Warton.

152. Above, about, or under-
neath.]
This romantic passage
has been imitated by an author
of a strong imagination, an ad-
mirer and follower of our poet,
Thomson, in Summer, first edit.
p. 39. The context is altered
rather for the worse in the later
editions.

Sent by some Spirit to mortals good,

Or th' unseen Genius of the wood.

for our churches, all images, "shrines, tabernacles, roodlofts, " and monuments of idolatry, are removed, taken downe, " and defaced: onelie the stories "in the glass-windowes

66

ex

cepted, which for want of suf"ficient store of new stuffe, and "by reason of extream charge "that should grow by the alter"ation of the same into white panes throughout the realme, are not altogether abolished in "most places at once, but by "little and little suffered to decaie, that white glasse may be "provided and set up in their 66 roomes. B. ii. c. i. p. 138. col. 2.30. In Comus we find the verb story, v. 516.

What the sage poets, taught by th' heavenly Muse,

Storied of old in high immortal verse. In Chaucer, storial occurs for historical. Leg. Cleopatr. v. 123. p. 343. edit. Ürr.

And this is storial sothe, it is no fable. Nathan. Chytraeus, a German, not an inelegant Latin poet, in his Iler Anglicum, describing the costly furniture of the houses in London, says that the walls of

160

the rooms were hung with storia, or histories, and painted tapestries. Poemata, Rostoch. 1579. p. 171. a. 12mo.

Totius ast urbis quam sit pretiosa
supellex;

Parietibus quam sint storia, pictique
tapetes,
Inducti.-

[Unless the true reading be sto-
rea, i. e. mats, or carpets.]

meus

In barbarous Latinity, storia is sometimes used for historia. " Item volo et ordino, quod liber Chronicarum et Storiarum "Franciæ, scriptarum in Gallico, "&c." Prolog. ad Chron. Franc. tom. iii. Collect. Historic. Franc. p. 152. Again, of a benefactor to a monastery, "Fecit aliam "vestem cum storiis crucifixi "Domini." S. Anastas. in S. Leon. iii. Apud Murator. p. 200. tom. iii. To this extract many others from monastic records might be easily added, which prove the frequent use of the word storia for scriptural history. T. Warton.

160. Casting a dim religious light.] Mr. Pope has imitated this in his Eloisa to Abelard, ver. 143.

Where awful arches make a noon

In service high, and anthems clear,

As may with sweetness, through mine ear,
Dissolve me into ecstasies,

And bring all heav'n before mine eyes.

And may at last my weary age
Find out the peaceful hermitage,
The hairy gown and mossy cell,
Where I may sit and rightly spell
Of every star that heav'n doth shew,
And every herb that sips the dew;

natic age against Church music. Thyer.

Of this species of pensive pleasure, he speaks in a very different tone in the Answer to the Eikon Bas. s. xxiv. In his prayer he "[the king] remembered what "voices of joy and gladness there "were in his chapel, God's house "in his opinion, between the singing men and the organs: "-the vanity, superstition, and "misdevotion of which place, 66 was a scandal far and near; "wherein so many things were 66 sung and prayed in those songs "which were not understood, "&c." Again, with similar contempt, s. xxv. His glory in the gaudy copes, and painted windows, and chaunted service86 book, &c." Pr. W. i. 429. 531. T. Warton.

167. And may at last my weary age &c.] There is something extremely pleasing and proper in this last circumstance, not merely as it varies and enlarges the picture but as it adds such a perfection and completeness to it, by

165

170

conducting the Penseroso so happily to the last scene of life, as leaves the reader's mind fully satisfied: and if preferring the one would not look like censuring the other, I would say that in this respect this poem claims a superiority over the Allegro, which, although designed with equal judgment, and executed with no less spirit, yet ends as if something more might still have been added. Thyer.

It should be remarked, that Milton wishes to die in the character of the melancholy man. T. Warton.

172. And every herb that sips the dew.] It seems probable that Milton was a student in botany. For he speaks with great pleasure of the hopes he had formed of being assisted in this study by his friend Charles Deodate, who was a physician. Epitaph. Da

mon. 150.

Tu mihi percurres medicos, tua gra-
mina, succos, &c.
T. Warton.