Where with her best nurse Contemplation Were all to ruffled, and sometimes impair'd. Examynacyon of A. Askew, p. 24. "Hath not he moche nede of helpe who seketh to soche a surgeon?" So also in Isaiah, ii. 10. "To it shall the Gentiles "seek." T. Warton. 377. She plumes her feathers,] I believe the true reading to be prunes, which Lawes ignorantly altered to plumes, afterwards imperceptibly continued in the poet's own edition. To prune wings, is to smooth, or set them in order, when ruffled. For this is the leading idea. Spenser, F. Q. ii. iii. 36. She gins her feathers foule disfigured And in the M. M. of Thestylis, -At their brightest beams Him proynd in lovley wise. That is, he "pruned his wetted "and disordered wings." Waterfowl, at this day, are said to preene, when they sleek or replace their wet feathers in the sun. See commentators on Shakespeare, P. I. Henry IV. act i. s. 1. Which makes him prune himself, &c. Where Dr. Warburton and Hanmer substituted plume. Upton derives the word from the French brunir, to polish. Notes on Spenser, p. 446. col. 2. Prune her tender wing is in Pope. Prune, amputo, is sometimes written proine, as in Drayton, Polyolb. vol. ii. s. iii. p. 714. [But see fol. edit. 1613.] Here proine, and 380 "there plant." And in other places. Pope says, Contemplation prunes her ruffled wings. See On the Marks of Poetical Imihowever, in Hughes's Thought tation, 12mo. 1757. p. 43. I find, edit. 1735. vol. i. 12mo. p. 171. in a Garden, written 1704, Poems, Here Contemplation prunes her wings. 380. Were all to ruffled,] So read as in editions 1637, 1645, and 1673. Not too, nimis. Allto, or al-to, is, intirely. See Tyrwhitt's Gl. Chaucer, v. Too. Various instances occur in Chaucer and Spenser, and in later writers. "O how the coate of "Christ that was without seam "is all to rent and torn." Homilies, b. i. i. See Hearne's Gl. Langtoft, p. 665. Observat. on Spenser's F. Q. ii. 225. and Upton's Spenser, Notes, p. 391. 594. 625. And the fifteenth general rule for understanding G. Douglass's Virgil, prefixed to Ruddiman's Glossary in the capital edition of that translation. And Upton's Gloss. v. All. The corruption, supposed to be emendation, "all too ruffled," began with Tickell, who had no knowledge of our old language, and has been continued by Fenton, and Dr. Newton. Tonson has the true reading, in 1695, and 1705. T. Warton. an I have restored the old reading. E. He that has light within his own clear breast 2. BROTHER. 'Tis most true, 385 That musing meditation most affects The pensive secrecy of desert cell, Far from the cheerful haunt of men and herds, And sits as safe as in a senate-house; For who would rob a hermit of his weeds, 390 L His few books, or his beads, or maple dish, But beauty, like the fair Hesperian tree 381. He that has light &c.] This whole speech is a remarkably fine encomium on the force of virtue : but there is something so vastly striking and astonishing in these last five lines, that it is impossible to pass them over without stopping to admire and enjoy them. I do not know any place in the whole circle of his poetical performances, where dignity of sentiment and sublimity of expression are so happily united. Thyer. 384. Benighted walks &c.] Instead of these two lines the poet had written at first, Walks in black vapours, though the noontide brand Blaze in the summer solstice. Afterwards he blotted them out, and made this alteration much for the better. 388. of men and herds,] It was at first, men or herds. 389. And sits as safe as in a senate house ;] Not many years after this was written, Milton's friends shewed that the safety of a senate-house was not inviolable. But, when the people turn legislators, what place is safe from the tumults of innovation, and the insults of disobedience? T. Warton. 390. For who would rob &c.] V These two lines at first stood thus in the Manuscript. For who would rob a hermit of his His books, his hairy gown, or maple 393. But beauty, &c.] These sentiments are heightened from the Faithful Shepherdess, act i. s. 1. Laden with blooming gold, had need the guard 395 You may as well spread out the unsunn'd heaps Of miser's treasure by an out-law's den, And tell me it is safe, as bid me hope Danger will wink on opportunity, 400 405 Uninjur'd in this wide surrounding waste: and I know not whether wide is not better than wild, which seems to be sufficiently implied in waste. 404.it recks] I care not for, &c. So "what recks it them?" Lycid. v. 122. and Par. L. ix. 173. "Let it, I reck not." And ii. 50." Of god, or hell, or worse, "he recked not." See Note on v. 836. infr. From reck comes retchThirty-nine Articles, where the lessness, or recklessness, in the common reading is, " into wretch"lessness of most unclean living." Artic. xvii. As if, yet with a manifest perversion of terms, a wretched profligacy was intended. The precise meaning is, a carelessness, a confident negligence, consisting "of the most aban"doned course of life." Reck, with its derivatives, is the lan and at present it stands in the guage of Chaucer and Spenser. Manuscript, T. Warton. Lest some ill-greeting touch attempt the person Of our unowned Sister. ELDER BROTHER. I do not, Brother, Infer, as if I thought my Sister's state As you imagine; she' has a hidden strength 2. BROTHER. What hidden strength, Unless the strength of heav'n, if you mean that? I mean that too, but yet a hidden strength, 409. Secure without all doubt, or controversy: Yet where an equal poise &c.] Instead of these lines are the following in the Manuscript. Secure without all doubt or question; 910: I could be willing though now i' th' dark to try A tough encounter with the shaggiest ruffian, That lurks by hedge or lane of this dead circuit, To have her by my side, though I were sure She might be free from peril, where she is. But where an equal poise of hope and fear &c. For encounter he had written at 410 415 first passado, and for hope and fear, hopes and fears. 413. squint suspicion.] Alluding probably in this epithet to Spenser's description of Suspicion in his Mask of Cupid, Faery Queen, b. iii. cant. 12. st. 15. For he was foul, ill-favoured, and grim, Under his eye-brows looking still ascaunce &c. Thyer. 415. As you imagine; &c.] This verse is redundant in the Manuscript, As you imagine, Brother; she has a hidden strength. 'Tis chastity, my Brother, chastity: She that has that, is clad in cómplete steel, And like a quiver'd nymph with arrows keen 420. 'Tis chastity, my Brother, chastity; She that has that, is clad in complete steel, And like a quiver'd nymph with arrows keen, &c.] Perhaps Milton remembered a stanza in Fletcher's Purple Island, published but the preceding year, b. x. st. 27. It is in a personification of Virgin chastitie. With her, her sister went, a warlike maid, Parthenia, all in steele and gilded arms, In needle's stead, a mighty spear she sway'd, &c. See El. iv. 109. T. Warton. 421. She that has that, is clad in cómplete steel, &c.] He has finely improved here upon Horace, Od. i. xxii. 1. Integer vitæ, scelerisque purus &c. and the phrase of complete steel is borrowed from Shakespeare. Hamlet speaking to the Ghost, act i. sc. 7. -What may this mean, That thou, dead corse, again in complete steel Revisit'st thus the glimpses of the moon? And the lines following, before they were corrected, were thus in the Manuscript, She that has that, is clad in complete steel, And may on every needful accident, Be it not done in pride or wilful tempting, Walk through huge forests, and unharbour'd heaths, Infamous hills, and sandy perilous wilds, VOL. IV. 420 Where through the sacred awe of chastity, No savage fierce, bandite, or mountaineer Shall dare to soil her virgin purity. 421. The phrase "complete "steel" was, I rather think, a common expression for "armed "from head to foot." It occurs in Dekker's Untrussing of the Humorous Poet, which was acted by the Lord Chamberlain's servants, and the choir-boys of St. Paul's, in 1602. Hamlet appeared at least before 1598. Again, in The weakest goeth to the wall, of which the first edition was in 1600. Hence an expression in our author's Apology, which also confirms what is here said, s. 1. "Zeal, whose sub"stance is ethereal, arming in "complete diamond, ascends his fiery chariot, &c." Pr. W. i. 114. T. Warton. 422. And like a quiver'd nymph with arrows keen] I make no doubt but Milton in this passage had his eye upon Spenser's Belphoebe, whose character, arms, and manner of life perfectly correspond with this description. What makes it the more certain that personage to represent the is, that Spenser intended under virtue of chastity. Thus in the introduction to the third book of his Faery Queen, complimenting his virgin sovereign Queen Elizabeth, he says, But either Gloriana let her choose, F Thyer. |