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O dark, dark, dark, amid the blaze of noon, fc180 Irrecoverably dark, total eclipfe quieva ni vin adĉ

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Without all hope of day !

O first created Beam, and thou great Wordprode of

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Let there be light, and light was over all;

Why am I thus bereav'd thy prime decree PR

The fun to me is dark

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And filent as the moon,

When the deferts the night

Hid in her vacant interlunar cave.
Since light fo neceffary is to life,
And almoft life itself, if it be true

387. And filent as the moon, &c] There cannot be a better note on this paffage than what Mr. Warburton has written on this verse of Shakespear 2 Henry VI. Act I. Sc. 8.

Deep night, dark night, the fi

lent of the night, The filent of the night is a claffical expreffion, and means an interlunar night amica filentia lunæ. So Pliny, Inter omnes verò convenit, utiliffime in coitu ejus fterni, quem diem alii interlunii, alii filentis lunæ appellant. Lib. 16. cap. 39. In imitation of this language, Milgon fays,

The fun to me is dark,

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And filent as the moon,
When the deferts the night
Hid in her vacant interlunar cave,
89. Hid in her vacant interlunar

cave. e.] Silens luna is the moon at or near the change, and in conjunction with the fun. Plin. 1. Lib. 16. c. 39. The interlunar cave s here called vacant, quia luna ibi vacat opere et minifterio fuo, because the moon is idle, and useless, and makes no return of light. aoit Meadowcourt.

Alluding, I fuppofe, to the fame notion, which he has adopted from Hefiod in his Paradife Loft. VI. 4 There is a cave

Within the mount of God, faft by his throne,

Where

That light is in the foul, linataro „215 „dich C She all in every part; why was the fight

To such a tender ball as th' eye confin'd,

So obvious and fo eafy to be quench'd?
And not as feeling through all parts diffus'd,

That the might look at will through every pore?
Then had I not been thus exil'd from light,

As in the land of darkness yet in light,

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To live a life half dead, a living death, botas 100 And bury'd; but O yet more miferable

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Myself, my fepulchre, a moving grave,
Bury'd, yet not exempt

Where light and darkness in perpetual round

Lodge and diflodge by turns. See the note on this place. Thyer. 1690. Since light fa necessary is to no life, &c.] This intermixing of his philofophy very much weakens the force and pathos of Samfon's complaint, which in the main is excellent, but I think not altogether fo fine as the poet's lamenta.

tion of his own blindness at the beginning of the third book of the Paradise Loft; fo much better does every body write from his own feeling and experience, than when he imagines only what another would fay upon the fame occafion.

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alfo in Sophocles, Antig. 1283.

- τας γαρ ήδονας Όταν προδωσιν ανδρες, και τις Inp2 εyw

Ζην τετον, αλλ' εμψυχον ή κα και νεκρον Thyer.

102. Myfelf, my fepulchre, a mov

100. To live a life half dead, a ing grave,] This thought is not

By privilege of death and burial

1.

From worst of other evils, pains and wrongs,
But made hereby obnoxious more

To all the miseries of life,

Life in captivity

Among inhuman foes.

But who are these? for with joint pace I hear
The tread of many feet fteering this way;
Perhaps my enemies who come to ftare
At my affliction, and perhaps t' infult,
Their daily practice to afflict me more.

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O change beyond report, thought, or belief \

See how he lies at random, carelefly diffus'd, A With languish'd head unpropt,

very unlike that of Gorgias Leontinus, who called vulturs living Jepulchres, γύπες έμψυχοι τάφοι, for which he incurred the indignation of Longinus; whether justly or no I fhall not say.

Fortin.

111. - fteering this way;] If this be the right reading, the metaphor is extremely hard and abrupt.

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A common man would have faid bearing this way. Warburton.

118. See bore he lies at random, carelefly diffus'd,] This beauti

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ful application of the word diffus'd
Milton has borrow'd from the
Latins. So Ovid ex Ponto. III.
III. 7.

Publica me requies curarum fom-
nus habebat,

Fufaque

As one past hope, abandon'd,

And by himself given over;

120

In flavish habit, ill-fitted weeds

D'er-worn and foil'd;

Dr do my eyes mifreprefent? Can this be he,

That heroic, that renown'd,

Irrefiftible Samfon? whom unarm'd

125

No strength of man, or fierceft wild beaft could with

ftand;

Who tore the lion, as the lion tears the kid,

Ran on imbattel'd armies clad in iron, who don't And weaponless himself,

130 Made arms ridiculous, useless the forgery: l'! Of brazen shield and fpear, the hammer'd cuirafs, Chaly'bean temper'd steel, and frock of mail) Adamantean proof;

But fafeft he who stood aloof,
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Fufaque erant toto languida
O membra toro. Thyer.

133. Chalybean temper'd feel,] That is, the belt temper'd fteel by the Chalybes, who were famous 5among the Ancients for their iron works. Virg. Georg. I. 58.

At Chalybes nudi ferrum
The adjective should be pronounc'd

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135 When

Chalybean with the third fyllable long according to Heinfius's reading of that verfe of Ovid. Faft. IV. 405.

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Es erat in pretio: Chalybeïa maffa latebat:

but Milton makes it thort by the fame poetical liberty, with which he had before ufed 'gean for géan, and Thyéftean for Thyeftéan. 136. When

When infupportably his foot advanc'd,

In fcorn of their proud arms and warlike tools,

Spurn'd them to death by troops. The bold Afcalonite Fled from his lion ramp, old warriors turn'd

Their plated backs under his heel;

140

Or grov❜ling foil'd their crefted helmets in the duft. Then with what trivial weapon came to hand,

The jaw of a dead afs, his fword of bone,

A thoufand fore-skins fell, the flow'r of Palestine, 144 In Ramath-lechi famous to this day.

[bore Then by main force pull'd up, and on his fhoulders The gates of Azza, poft, and maffy bar, Up to the hill by Hebron, feat of giants old, 3:21

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138. The bold Afcalonite] The inhabitant of Afcalon, one of the five principal cities of the Philiftines, mention'd 1 Sam. VI. 17. 145. In Ramath-lechi famous to

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this day: Judges XV. 17. I can't help remarking the great

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difference

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