850

All things with double terror: on the ground 8
Outftretch'd he lay, on the cold ground, and oft
Curs'd his creation, death as oft accus'd
Of tardy execution, fince denounc'd

The day of his offenfe. Why comes not death,"
Said he, with one thrice acceptable stroke
855
To end me? shall truth fail to keep her word,
Juftice divine not haften to be just?

But death comes not at call, justice divine
Mends not her flowest pace for pray'rs or cries.

O woods, O fountains, hillocs, dales and bowers, 860
With other echo late I taught your fhades

By night, and lift'ning where the

hapless pair

Sat in their fad difcourfe, and various plaint,

Thence gather'd his own doom; and the next morning, while the fun in Aries rofe, ver. 329. he met Sin and Death in their way to earth; they difcourfe together, and it was after Sin and Death were arriv'd in Paradife, that the Almighty made that speech from ver. 616. to ver. 641. and after that the Angels are order'd to make the changes in nature: fo that this, we conceive, must be fome other night than that immediately after the fall.

To

Ω θανατε, θανατε, πως αe και λεμεν (

Ουτω κατ' ήμαρ, ου δυνη μολείν

πότε;

859. ber floweft pace] Pede The most beautiful paffages compœna claudo. Hor. Od. III. II. 32. for the beauties of this passage, we monly want the feweft notes: and are fure, the reader mut not only perceive them, but must really feel them, if he has any feeling at all. is more moving and pathetic. Nothing in all the ancient tragedies

860. O woods, O fountains, billocs, dales and bowers, With other echo late I taught your fhades To answer, and refound far other Song] Alluding to this part of Adam's morning hymn, V. 202. T 3 Witnefs

To answer, and refound far other fong.
Whom thus afflicted when fad Eve beheld,
Defolate where the fat, approaching nigh,
Soft words to his fierce paffion fhe affay'd:
But her with ftern regard he thus repell'd.

Out of my fight, thou Serpent; that name best Befits thee with him leagu'd, thy felf as falfe And hateful; nothing wants, but that thy fhape, Like his, and color ferpentine may show

870

Thy inward fraud, to warn all creatures from thee
Henceforth; left that too heav'nly form, pretended
To hellish falfhood, fnare them. But for thee
I had perfifted happy', had not thy pride

And wand'ring vanity, when leaft was fafe,
Rejected my forewarning, and disdain'd

Not to be trufted, longing to be feen

875

880

Though by the Dev'il himself, him overweening
To over-reach, but with the Serpent meeting
fool'd and beguil'd, by him thou, I by thee,
To trust thee from my fide, imagin'd wife,
Conftant, mature, proof against all affaults,
And understood not all was but a fhow
Rather than folid virtue', all but a rib
Crooked by nature, bent, as now appears,
More to the part finifter, from me drawn,
Well if thrown out, as fupernumerary

an ordinary commiferation, they kewife contain a very fine moral. The refolution of dying to end our iferies, does not show fuch a deree of magnanimity as a refolution o bear them, and fubmit to the fpenfations of Providence. Our athor has therefore, with great decacy, reprefented Eve as entertain g this thought, and Adam as difproving it. Addifon. 872. left that too heav'nly form, pretended

885

To

or plac'd before: fo we have in Virgil's Georg. I. 270. fegeti prætendere fepem; and in Æn VI. 60 prætentaque Syrtibus arva. So Pliny in his Epiules, Lib. 1. Ep. 16. fays, nec defidiæ noftræ prætendamus alienam. Pearce. Pretended to, held before. So Milton himself explains this phrafe, p. 809. Tol. Edit. but ecclefiaftical is ever pretended to political. Thus Quintil. Pref. to L. 1. Vultum et triftitiam et diffentientem a cæteris habitum peffimis moribus prætendebant, fpeaking of the falfe philofophers. Richardfon.

To bellifh falfhood, fnare them.] r. Bentley chooses rather obtended: it in English the word obtended is leaft as unusual, as the fenfe here 883. And under flood not] The conpretended is. Pretended to fignifies ftruction is I was fool'd and beguil'd ere, as in the Latin tongue, held by thee, and underflood not &c:

T 4

888. To

To my juft number found. O why did God,
Creator wife, that peopled highest Heaven
With Spirits mafculine, create at last

This novelty on earth, this fair defect

Of nature, and not fill the world at once
With Men as Angels without feminine,

Or find fome other way to generate

890

Mankind? this mischief had not then befall'n, 895

888. To my just number found.] The juft number of ribs in a man is twentyfour, twelve on each fide, though fometimes there have been found those who have had thirteen as Galen fays, and very rarely fome who have had but eleven, as Tho. Bartholinus, a famous phyfician, obferved, in a lufy ftrong man whom he diffected in the year 1657, who had but eleven on one fide, and a fmall appearance of a twelfth on the other. Hiftor. Anatom. & Medic. Centur. 5. c. 1. But fome writers have been of opinion that Adam had thirteen ribs on the left fide, and that out of the thirteenth rib God formed Eve: and it is to this opinion that Milton here aliudes, and makes Adam fay, It was well if this rib was thrown out, as fupernumerary to bis just number.

888. O why did God, &c.] This thought was originally of Euripides, who makes Hippolytus in like manner expoftulate with Jupiter for not creating man without women. See Hippol. 616,

And

Ω Ζευ, τι δη κιβδηλον αίθρώποις

κακού,

Turainas, ES QWS NλIX ZATWRISES;
Ει γαρ βροτείον ηθέλες σπαραι
Jer,

Ου κεκ γυναικων χρην παραχεί
θαι το δε. &c.

And Jafon is made to talk in the fame itrain in the Medea, 573.

χρην γαρ αλλοθεν τεν βροτος Παιδος τεκνοποι, θηλυ δ' ε είναι γενΘ,

Ουτω δ' αν εκ ην εδεν ανθρώπων

κακον.

And fuch fentiments as thefe, we
fuppofe, procur'd Euripides the e
of the Woman-hater. Ariofto how-
ever hath ventur'd upon the fame
in Rodomont's invective against
women. Orlando Furiofo, Cant. 17.
St. 120.

Perche fatto non ha l'alma Natura
Che fenza te poteffe nascer l'huomo,
Come s' inefta per umana cura
L'un fopra l'altro il pero, il forba,
e'l pomo?

Why

And more that shall befall, innumerable
Disturbances on earth through female fnares,
And strait conjunction with this sex: for either
He never fhall find out fit mate, but fuch
As fome misfortune brings him, or mistake;
Or whom he wishes most shall feldom gain
Through her perverfeness, but shall see her gain'd
By a far worse, or if the love, withheld

900

By

Lyfander fays in the Midfummer
Night's Dream, A&t I.

The course of true love never did

run smooth;

But either it was different in blood,
Or elfe mifgraffed in refpect of years,
Or else it ftood upon the choice of
friends,

Or if there were a fympathy in
choice,

War, death, or fickness did lay fiege to it &c.

898.

for either

He never fhall find out fit mate, &c.] I have often thought, it was great pity that Adam's fpeech had not ended where these lines begin. The fenfe is quite complete without them; and they seem much fitter for a digreffional obfervation of the author's, fuch as his panegyric on marriage &, than to be put into the mouth of Adam, who could not very naturally be fuppofed at that time to foresee so very circumftantially the inconveniences attending our firait conjunction with this fex, as he expreffes it. Thyer. 916.- and