the saints are enabled to triumph over him, feeble and impotent as they are: however persecution may attack and harrass them, let them be courageous and undaunted, not loving their lives, even to the death, in the cause of Christ; for, though they fall, they shall rise again to certain victory and glory; nor shall death bring down their heads so low, as to render them unworthy of wearing a crown of eternal life.

701 Lest, with a whip of scorpions, I pursue.

For, whereas my father put a heavy yoke upon you, I will put more to your yoke: my father chastised you with whips, but I will chastise you with scorpions. 2 Chron. x. 11.

709 That fires the length of Ophiuchus huge.

A northern constellation, called the serpent, consisting of twenty-nine stars. The fable is taken from Hercules, who squeezed two serpents to death in his cradle; or, from Esculapius, whom they worshipped under the form of a serpent. Here it means the dragon, a northern constellation, which astronomers call Hercules, Esculapius, and Serpentarius.

716 Over the Caspian.

The Caspian Sea, in Asia, is, properly, an immense lake, having no connection with any other portion of water.

722 For never,

but once more, was either like

To meet so great a foe.

He will swallow up death in victory: and the Lord God will wipe away long from all faces; and the rebuke of his people shall he take away

760

787

from off all the earth; for the Lord God hath spoken it. Isaiah, xxv. 8.

It is a consideration, which must carry awe and solemnity, grief and lamentation, throughout all ages, that, by one man, sin entered into the world; and death made such a progress, by the entrance of sin, as to pass upon all men in consequence of that act. O God, how terrible are thy judgments; and yet, how rich thy compassion, in appointing the second Adam to repair the ruin and dissolution of the first; yea, more than to repair them, to deliver us from all our most aggravated transgressions, if we believe in him, and receive the gift of righteousness; to cause us to reign in life by him; to bring us to a more exalted and secure happiness than Adam himself enjoyed in the day which he was created, or than Eden, the garden of God, could afford!

I fled, and cried out, death.

Thrice welcome death!

That, after many a painful, bleeding step,
Conducts us to our home, and lands us safe,
On the long-wish'd-for shore. Prodigious change!
Our bane turn'd to a blessing! death, disarm'd,
Loses its fellness quite: all thanks to him
Who scourg'd the venom out! Sure the last end
Of the good man, is peace. How calm his exit!
Night-dews fall not more gently to the ground,
Nor weary, worn-out winds expire so soft:

Behold him, in the evening tide of life,

A life well spent, whose early care it was,

His riper years should not upbraid his green:

By unperceived degrees he wears away;
Yet, like the sun, seems larger at his setting!
High in his faith and hopes, look how he reaches'
After the prize in view; and, like a bird
That's hamper'd, struggles hard to get away;
While the glad gates of sight are wide expanded
To let new glories in, the first fair fruits
Of the fast-coming harvest! Then, O then!
Each earth-born joy grows vile, or disappears,
Shrunk to a thing of nought. O, how he longs
To have have his passport sign'd, and be dismiss'd!
'Tis done, and now he's happy.

858 Into this gloom of Tartarus profound.

BLAIR.

The place of punishment for the wicked, in the infernal regions.

875 Which, but herself, not all the Stygian powers. Belonging to the river Styx, infernal.

883 Of Erebus.

The poets often used the word Erebus, to signify the place of torment itself, particularly that part where dwelt the souls of those that had led a virtuous life, from whence they passed into the Elysian fields.

890 Before their eyes, in sudden view, appear.

894

A land of darkness, as darkness itself, and of the shadow of death, without any order, and where the light is as darkness. Job, x. 22. where eldest night

And Chaos, ancestors of nature.

The mass of matter, from which all things were made.

904 Of Barca or Cyrene's torrid soil.

Two cities of Lybia Cyrenaica, in Africa. 916 His dark materials to create more worlds. Darkness was upon the face of the deep. Genesis, i. 2.

The goddess of war; she prepared the chariot and horses for Mars, when he went to battle. 939 Quench'd in a boggy Syrtis.

Sand banks, dangerous in navigation.

943 As when a gryphon.

A fabulous, terrible and rapacious bird; said to be partly like an eagle, and partly like a lion. Guardians of hidden gold; and dedicated to Apollo, the god and maker of gold. To this monster the poet compares Satan.

945 Pursues the Arimaspiam.

Arimaspias, a river of Scythia, with golden sands. They say, that the neighhouring inhabitants have but one eye, in the middle of the forehead; and wage continual war against the griffins, monstrous animals that collect the gold of the rivers.

964 Orcus and Ades.

Titles of Pluto, said to be the king of the lower regions.

1017

than when Argo pass'd.

The name of the famous ship, which carried Jason and his fifty-four companions to Colchis, when they resolved to recover the golden fleece. This ship was the first that ever sailed on the sea, as some report.

1018 Bosphorus and Bosporus.

Two narrow straits, situated at the confines of Europe and Asia. One was called Cimmerian, and joined the Paulus Mœotis to the Euxine, and is called, by the moderns, the Straits of Caffa ; and the other, which was called the Thracian Bosporus, and now the Straits of Constantinople, made a communication between the Euxine Sea and the Propontis, so very narrow, that in a calm day, persons on the opposite banks could talk to

each other.

1019 Or when Ulysses on the larboard shunn'd.

King of Ithaca, celebrated for his wisdom and great exploits at Troy; being ignorant of the art of navigation, he was shipwrecked, and driven from one island to another, in the Mediterranean Sea, during ten years, before he returned to his kingdom, which was in great confusion during his absence. He was aware of the power of the Sirens, who, it is said, lived in a small island near the Cape Palermo in Sicily. The Sirens were informed, by an oracle, that as soon as any one passed by them, without suffering themselves to be charmed by their songs, they should perish; and their melody prevailed, till Ulysses had to pass, when he ordered his companions to stop their ears with wax, and himself to be tied to the mast of his ship, and no attention to be paid to his commands, should he wish to stay and listen to the song. This was a salutary precaution, Ulysses made signs for his companions to stop; but they were disregarded, and the fatal coast was passed with safety. The history and adven