He cometh to redeme the kynde of Man I feare, "Hygh tyme is it than for me the cooles to fteare. "I wyll not leaue hym tyll I knowe what he ys, "And what he entendeth in thys fame border heare. "Subtyltie muft helpe, els all wyll be amys; "A godly pretence outwardly must I beare, Semynge relygyoufe, deuoute, and fad in my geare. "If he be come now for the redempcyon of Man, "As I feare he is, I wyll ftoppe hym if I can. "Hic, fimulata religione, Chriftum aggreditur. "It is a grat ioye, by my holydome, to fe "So vertuouse a lyfe in a yonge man as yow be: "As here thus to wander in godly contemplacyon, "And to lyue alone in the defart folytarye. Jefus Chriftus. Your pleafure is it to vtter your fantasye. Satan tentator. "A brother am I of thys defart wylderneffe, Jefus Chriftus. "I difdayne nothynge, which is of God trulye. Satan tentator. Than wyll I be bolde a lyttle with you to walke." I have only to obferve that Satan here affumes a religious habit, or in other words is a hermit, as he himself relates, fign. D. iij. b. Scriptures I knowe non; for I am but an hermyte, I; "I maye faye to yow, it is no part of our flody: "We relygyoufe men Jyue all in contemplacyon; Scriptures to ftodye, is not our occupacyon.” Such is the garb in which Milton, and other writers alfo, array him on this occafion, as we shall prefently fee. But I proceed to Satan's temptation, in which (as in Milton more diffufely the charms of women and the pleasures of the table are propofed, fign. E. i. b. E. ij. a. "Lo, how faye ye now, is not here a plefaunt fyght? "If ye wyll, ye maye haue here all the worldes delyght. "Here is to be feene the kyngedome of Arabye, "With all the regyons of Affryck, Europe, and Afye, "And their whole delyghtes, their pompe, their magnificence, "Their ryches, their honour, their welth, their concupyfcence. "Here is golde and fyluer in wonderfull habundaunce, "Silkes, veluetes, tiffues, with wynes and Spyces of plefaunce. "Here are fayre women, of countenance ameable, "With all kyndes of meates to the body dylectable, &c." After the ineffectual attempts of Satan, the angels come and minister to our Saviour, concluding, "Our maner is it most hyghlye to reioyce "Whan Man hath comfort, whych we now declare in voyce. "Hic dulce canticum coram Chrifto depromunt." In 1611 Giles Fletcher published Chrift's Victorie and Triumph; an elegant and impreffive poem in four parts, of which the fecond, entitled Chrift's Triumph on Earth, describes the Temptation. But to this poem the Paradife Regained owes little obligation. Perhaps the Italian Mufe might afford a hint. In the following facred poem, confifting of ten books, "La Humanita del Figlivolo di Dio, in ottaua rima, per Theofilo Folengo, Mantoano. Venegia, 1533," 4.0, the fourth book treats largely of the Temptation: from which I will cite the defcriptive fcene, after the Devil has tempted our Lord, and has been rebuked with the reply "Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, &c." "Al fuon di tanta, et tal fententia un grido "Ecco à la menfa l' inuitar fott' ombra, "Che fol l'humanità del figlio ingombra, "Diftrutta fù dapo 1 digiun fofferto, "Per fuo non già, ma ben per nostro merto." There had been published alfo at Venice, in 1518, "La Vita et Paffione di Chrifto, &c. compofta per Antonio Cornozano. In terza rima." The subject of the fixth chapter of the first book is the Temptation: to which is prefixed a wooden cut, wherein Satan is represented as an old man with a long beard, offering bread to our Lord. The Tempter indeed is an aged man, like the Tempter of Milton, in Vifcher's cuts to the Bible, as noticed by Mr. Thyer; and in Salvator Rofa's fine painting of the Temptation, as noticed by Mr. Dunfter. See the Life of Milton in the first volume. The Devil is alfo reprefented in a monaftick habit by Luca Giordano, in a picture of the Temptation, which made a part of the Duffeldorp collection. But poetry likewife feems to have painted, not feldom, the gray dissimulation of the Tempter in fimilar colours. Giles Fletcher exhibits him disguised as a hermit, approaching our Saviour: "At length an aged fire far off he [our Saviour] faw And this description is probably indebted to Spenfer's Archimago, whofe character and appearance might alfo be in Milton's remembrance. See Faer. Qu. i. i. 29. "At length they chaunft to meet upon the way "An aged sire, in long blacke weeds yclad, &c." See alfo F. Q. i. vi. 35. Milton draws the Tempter in the habit of an aged Francifcan in his admirable verfes In Quint. Novembris. In the Trag. Hift. of Dr. Fauftus, 1616, the magician thus addreffes the Devil : "Goe, and returne an old Francifcan frier; "That holy shape becomes a Deuill beit!” There is a poem, entitled "Monachos mentiti Daemones," in Wierus De Præftigiis Dæmonum, Bafil, 1583, p. 84. in which the affumed difguife is fomewhat fimilar: "Ecce per obfcuræ tenebrofa crepufcula noctis "Vique folent rafo vertice tonfus erat.” In Rofs's defcription of the Temptation, Chriftiados lib. viii. ed. 1638. p. 178, he is alfo thus painted, by the adaptation of Virgilian phrafes: "His actis, deferta petit fpælæa ferarum : "Hic inter vaftas rupes, atque horrida luftra, K Vfque quater denis jejunia longa diebus "Hîc ad radices fcopuli defeffus Iefus "interea [Satan] fefe transformat in ora "Sordidus ex humero nodo dependet amictus, "Et frontem obfcenam rugis arat." There is an Italian poem, which I have not feen, entitled Il Digiuno di Chrifto nel Deferto by Giovanni Nizzoli, dated in 1611. And I obferve alfo among the works of P. Antonio Glielmo (who died in 1644), enumerated by Craffo in his "Elogii d'huomini letterati," Il Calvario Laureato, Poema: a kindred fubject perhaps with that of Paradije Regained; the mention of which Italian title induces us to acknowledge, with gratitude, the existence of a Calvary in our own poetry; of which the plan is the faultless plan of a Paradife regained; the fpirit is truly Miltonick; and the language, at the same time, original. By the obfervation of an eminent Englishman we may indeed be led to fuppofe that Italy fuggefted, in fome degree, the idea of Paradife Regained, as well as of Paradife Loft; for thus the writer fpeaks, at no great lapfe of time from Milton's death, in defcribing + Florence: "Hinc quoque Miltoni deductum Nobile Carmen, 66 Atque Paradifi forma refumpta fui." TODD. See the reafons for fuppofing Italy to have excited Milton's defign of writing Paradife Loft, in the Inquiry into the Origin of that Poem, in the fecond volume of this edition. + From H. Newton's (the Envoy Extraordinary to the court of Tuscany, at the commencement of the last century,) Epiftola, Orationes, et Carmina, &c. 4to. Lucæ, 1710. Carm. p. 13. In Mortem Stephani Waller, &c. Elegia, 1707. See this book noticed in the Lift of Italian tranflations of Milton's poetry in the first volume of this edition. |