To answer, and resound far other song.
Whom thus afflicted when sad Eve beheld,
Desolate where the fat, approaching nigh,
Soft words to his fierce passion she assay’d: 863
But her with stern regard he thus repellid.

Out of my fight, thou Serpent; that name best
Befits thee with him leagu’d, thyself as false
And hateful; nothing wants, but that thy shape

, Like his, and color serpentine may show

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

And Witness if I be filent, morn or renewing her addresses to him, with

the whole speech that follows , To hill, or valley, fountain or fresh have something in them exquificely Thade

moving and pathetic: Made vocal by my song, and taught He added not, and from her tan'd; his praile. Thyer.

but Eve E C. 863. Whom thus afiliated when sad Adam's reconcilement to her i

Eveteheld, &c.] The part of work'd up in the same spirit of tenEve in this book is no less paflionate derness. Eve afterwards proposes es and apt to sway the reader in her her husband, in the blindness of her favor. She is represented with great despair, that to prevent their gar tenderness as approaching Adam, from descending upon posterity cher but is spurn’d from him with a spirit thould resolve to live childless; er i of upbraiding and indignation, con that could not be done, they fhould formable to the nature of Man, seek their own deaths by violet whole pallions had now gained the methods. As those sentiments nats dominion over him. The following rally engage the reader to regard paliige, wherein ihe is described as the mother of mankind with steve

even,

875

And wand'ring vanity, when least was fafe,
Rejected my forewarning, and disdain'd
Not to be trusted, longing to be seen
Though by the Dev'il himself, him overweening
To over-reach, but with the Serpent meeting
Fool'd and beguild, by him thou, I by thee, 880
To trust thee from my side, imagin’d wise,
Constant, mature, proof against all assaults,
And understood not all was but a show
Rather than folid virtue', all but a rib
Crooked by nature, bent, as now appears,
More to the part finister, from me drawn,
Well if thrown out, as supernumerary

To

885

han ordinary commiseration, they or plac'd before: so we have in Vir. ikewise contain a very fine moral. gil's Georg. I. 270. segeti pretendere The resolution of dying to end our fepem ; and in Æn VI. 60 pretenniseries, does not show such a de- taque Syrtibus arva. So Pliny in his gree of magnanimity as a resolution Epitiles, Lib. 1. Ep. 16. says, nec o bear them, and submit to the defidiæ noftræ prætendamus alienam. dispensations of Providence. Our

Pearce. author has therefore, with great de- Pretended to, held before. So Milton icacy, represented Eve as entertain himself explains this phrase, p. 809. ang this thought, and Adam as dif- Tol. Edit.' but ecclefiaftical is approving it. Addison.

ever pretended to political. Thus 872. — left that too heav'nly form, Quintil. Pref. to L. 1. Vultum et pretended

triftitiam et dissentientem a cæteris To bellish fall.cod, snare them.] habitum pessimis moribus prætindeDr. Bentley chooses rather obtended: bant, speaking of the false philosobut in English the word obtended is phers. Richardson. u least as unusual, as the sense here 883. And understood nor) The conof pretended is. Pretended to signifies struction is I was fool'd and beguil'd bere, as in the Latin tongue, held by thee, and understood not &c:

888. To

T 4

To my just number found. O why did God,
Creator wise, that peopled highest Heaven
With Spirits masculine, create at last 890
This novelty on earth, this fair defect
Of nature, and not fill the world at once
With Men as Angels without feminine,
Or find some other

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

And 888. To myjust number found.] The Ω Ζευ, τι δη κιβδηλον αθρεπεις jus number of ribs in a man is twenty; X al Xol, four, twelve on each fide, though Turairas, HS Ows na 18 LATWRISE ; sometimes there have been found

Ει γαν βροτειον ηθελες στεροι those who have had thirteen as Galen

gero, fays, and very rarely some who

Ου κεκ γυναικων χρην ταραχέςhave had but eleven, as Tho. Bar

***

Sal Todc. &c. tholinus, a famous physician, observed, in a lusy strong man whom And Jason is made to talk in the he dissected in the year 1657, who same itrain in the Medea, 573. had but eleven on one side, and a small appearance of a twelfth on the other. Hiftor. Anatom. & Medic.

Bp9785
Centur. 5. c. 1.
But some writers

Παιδας τεκνεθαι, θηλυ δ'α have been of opinion that Adam had

EIV ZI yer, thirteen ribs on the left side, and

Ουτω δ' αν εκ ν «δεν ανθρυτες that out of the thirteenth rib God formed Eve; and it is to this opinion And such sentiments as these

, we that Milton here alludes, and makes suppose, procur'd Euripides the name Adam say, It was well if this rib of the Woman-hater. Ariosto hoswas thrown out, as fupernumerary to ever hath ventur'd upon bis just number.

in Rodomont's invective again

women. Orlando Furioso, Cant. 17. 888. o why did God, &c.] St. 120. This thought was originally of Eu Perche fatto non ha l'alma Natera ripides, who makes Hippolytus in Che senza te potesse nascer l'huomo, like manner expostulate with Jupiter Come s'ioefta per umana cura for not creating man without women. L'un sopra l'altro il pero, il forba, See Hippol. 616.

e'l pomo?

Why

che line

And more that shall befall, inqumerable
Disturbances on earth through female snares,
And strait conjunction with this sex : for either
He never shall find out fit mate, but such
As some misfortune brings him, or mistake ;

900
Or whom he wishes most shall seldom gain
Through her perverseness, but shall see her gain'd
-By a far worse, or if she love, withheld

By Why did not Nature rather so pro. Lysander says in the Midsummer vide

Night's Dream, A& I. Without your help, that man of The course of true love never did

man might come, And one be grafted on another’s fide, But either it was different in blood,

run smooth; As are the apples with the pear and plome? Harrington, St. 97

Or else misgraffed in respect of years,

Or else it ftood upon the choice of Nor are fimilar examples wanting Or if there were a sympathy in

friends, among our English authors. Sir

choice, Thomas Brown in the second part of War, death, or fickness did lay his Religio Medici, Sect. 9.

has some.

fiege to it &c. thing very curious to this purpose, which no doubt Milton had read, 898. that work having been firft publish'd He never shall

find out fit mate, &c.] in the year 1642, about twenty. I have often thought, it was great five years before Paradise Lost. pity that Adam's speech had not Shakespear makes Posthumus cry out ended where these lines begin. The in resentment of Imogen's beha- fense is quite complete without them; viour, Cymbeline, AA. JI. which we and they seem much fitter for a diare sure that our author had read, gressional observation of the author's,

such as his panegyric on marriage Is there no way for men to be, but &c, than to be put into the mouth women

of Adam, who could not very natuMust be half-workers ?

rally be supposed at that time to

foresee so very circumftantially the And the complaints which Adam inconveniences attending our Arait makes of the disafters of love may conjunction with this fex, as he exbe compared with what Shakespear's presses it. Tbyer.

916. — and

for either

911

By parents; or his happiest choice too late
Shall meet, already link'd and wedlock-bound go;
To a fell adversary', his hate or shame :
Which infinite calamity shall cause
To human life, and houshold

peace

confound.
He added not, and from her turn'd; but Eve
Not so repuls’d, with tears that ceas’d not flowing,
And treffes all disorder'd, at his feet
Fell humble, and embracing them, besought
His

peace, , and thus proceeded in her plaint.
Forsake me not thus, Adam, witness Heaven
What love sincere, and reverence in my
I bear thee, and unweeting have offended,
Unhappily deceiv'd; thy suppliant
I beg, and clasp thy knees; bereave me not,

Whereon 916. – and unweeting bave of. Cum versa fors est. Unicum lapke

fended,] Spenser, Fairy mihi Queen, B. 1. Cant. 2. St. 45. Firmamen, unam fpem gravi ad

A etæ malo As all unweeting of that well she

Te mihi reserva, dum licet; — knew. Tbyer.

Tibi nam relicta, quo vadam, 33 bereave me not, ævum exigam ? W bercon I live thy gentle looks, thy aid, &c. ) In this tragical part

925. -- one enmity] There is some our author seems to have had his thing not improbable in Dr. Bender eye upon Grotius's tragedy, Adamus reading, Exul AV.

both joining Caffam, oro, dulci luminis jubare tui Ne me relinquas: nunc tuo auxilio

As join'd in injuries, in enmity: but perhaps the author put are in

heart 911

918.

eft opus,

oppo