Aye sung before the sapphire-colour'd throne
To him that sits thereon,

With saintly shout, and solemn jubilee;
Where the bright seraphim, in burning row,
Their loud uplifted angel trumpets blow;
And the cherubick host, in thousand quires,
Touch their immortal harps of golden wires,
With those just spirits that wear victorious palms,
Hymns devout and holy psalms

Singing everlastingly:

That we on earth", with undiscording voice,

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May rightly answer that melodious noise;

As once we did, till disproportion'd sin

Jarr'd against Nature's chime, and with harsh din
Broke the fair musick that all creatures made

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To their great Lord, whose love their motion sway'd
In perfect diapason, whilst they stood

In first obedience, and their state of good.
O, may we soon again renew that song,

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And keep in tune with Heaven, till God ere long
To his celestial concert us unite,

To live with him, and sing in endless moru of light!

Perhaps there are no finer lines in Milton, less obscured by conceit, less embarrassed by affected expressions, and less weakened by pompous epithets: and in this perspicuous and simple style are conveyed some of the noblest ideas of a most sublime philosophy, heightened by metaphors and allusions suitable to the subject.-T. WARTON.

n Besides what her virtues fair, &c.

In Howell's entertaining Letters, there is one to this lady, the Lady Jane Savage, Marchioness of Winchester, dated March 15, 1626. He says, he assisted her in learning Spanish; and that Nature and the Graces exhausted all their treasure and skill in "framing this exact model of female perfection."-T. WARTON.

Her high birth, and her graces sweet,
Quickly found a lover meet°;

The virgin quire for her request
The god that sits at marriage feast:
He at their invoking came,

But with a scarce well-lighted flame "
And in his garland, as he stood,
Ye might discern a cypress bud o.
Once had the early matrons run
To greet her of a lovely son;
And now with second hope she goes,
And calls Lucina to her throes:
But, whether by mischance or blame,
Atropos for Lucina came;

And with remorseless cruelty
Spoil'd at once both fruit and tree:
The hapless babe, before his birth,
Had burial, yet not laid in earth;
And the languish'd mother's womb
Was not long a living tomb.

So have I seen some tender slip,
Saved with care from winter's nip,
The pride of her carnation train,
Pluck'd up by some unheedy swain,
Who only thought to crop the flower
New shot up from vernal shower;
But the fair blossom hangs the head.
Sideways, as on a dying bed;
And those pearls of dew she wears
Prove to be presaging tears,
Which the sad morn had let fall
On her hastening funeral.

"Her high birth, and her graces sweet,
Quickly found a lover meet.

She was the wife of John, Marquis of Winchester, a conspicuous loyalist in the reign of King Charles I., whose magnificent house or castle of Basing in Hampshire withstood an obstinate siege of two years against the rebels, and when taken was levelled to the ground, because in every window was flourished Aymez Loyauté. He died in 1674, and was buried in the church of Englefield in Berkshire; where, on his monument, is an admirable epitaph in English verse written by Dryden, which I have often seen. It is remarkable that both husband and wife should have severally received the honour of an epitaph from two such poets as Milton and Dryden.-T. WARTON.

P He at their invoking came,

But with a scarce well-lighted flame.

Almost literally from his favourite poet Ovid, Metam. x. 4, of Hymen :

Adfuit ille quidem: sed nec solennia verba,

Nec lætos vultus, nec felix attulit omen:

Fax quoque quam tenuit, lacrymoso stridula fumo,

Usque fuit, nullosque invenit motibus igues.-T. WARTON.

Ye might discern a cypress bud.

An emblem of a funeral; and it is called in Virgil "feralis," En. vi. 216, and in Horace, "funebris," Epod. v. 18, and in Spenser "the cypress funeral," Faer. Qu. 1. i. 8.-NEWTON.

Gentle lady, may thy grave
Peace and quiet ever have;
After this thy travel sore
Sweet rest seize thee evermore,
That, to give the world increase
Shorten'd hast thy own life's lease.
Here, besides the sorrowing
That thy noble house doth bring,
Here be tears of perfect moan
Wept for thee in Helicon;

And some flowers, and some bays,
For thy herse, to strow the ways,

Sent thee from the banks of Came',

Devoted to thy virtuous name;

Whilst thou, bright saint, high sitt'st in glory,

Next her, much like to thee in story,

That fair Syrian shepherdess",

Who, after years of barrenness,

The highly-favour'd Joseph bore

To him that served for her before;

And at her next birth, much like thee,
Through pangs fled to felicity',
Far within the bosom bright
Of blazing Majesty and Light:
There with thee, new welcome saint,
Like fortunes may her soul acquaint,
With thee there clad in radiant sheen,
No marchioness, but now a queen.

*Sent thee from the banks of Came.

I have been told that there was a Cambridge collection of verses on her death, among which Milton's elegiac ode first appeared: but I have never seen it, and I rather think this was not the case: at least, we are sure that Milton was now a student at Cambridge. Our marchioness was the daughter of Thomas, Lord Viscount Savage, of Rock-savage in Cheshire; and it is natural to suppose, that her family was well acquainted with the family of Lord Bridgewater, belonging to the same county, for whom Milton wrote the mask of 'Comus.' It is therefore not improbable that Milton wrote this elegy, another poetical favour, in consequence of his acquaintance with the Egerton family. The accomplished lady, here celebrated, died in child-bed of a second son in her twenty-third year, and was the mother of Charles, the first Duke of Bolton.-T. WARTON.

That fair Syrian shepherdess.

Rachel. See Gen. xxix. 9; xxxv. 18.-T. WARTON.

Through pangs fled to felicity.

We cannot too much admire the beauty of this line: I wish it had closed the poem; which it would have done with singular effect. What follows serves only to weaken it; and the last verse is an eminent instance of the bathos, where the "saint clad in radiant sheen" sinks into a marchioness and a queen: but Milton seldom closes his little poems well.-DUNSTER.

There is a pleasing vein of lyric sweetness and ease in Milton's use of this metre, which is that of 'L'Allegro' and 'Il Penseroso:' he has used it with equal success in Comus's festive song, and the last speech of the Spirit, in 'Comus,' 93, 922. From these specimens we may justly wish that he had used it more frequently. Perhaps in Comus's song it has a peculiar propriety: it has certainly a happy effect.-T. WARTON.

SONG ON MAY MORNING.

Now the bright morning-star, day's harbinger,
Comes dancing from the east, and leads with her
The flowery May, who from her green lap throws
The yellow cowslip and the pale primrose.
Hail, bounteous May, that dost inspire
Mirth, and youth, and warm desire;
Woods and groves are of thy dressing;
Hill and dale doth boast thy blessing!
Thus we salute thee with our early song,
And welcome thee, and wish thee long.

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This beautiful little song presents an eminent proof of Milton's attention to the effect of metre, in that admirable change of numbers, with which he describes the appearance of the May morning, and salutes her after she has appeared; as different as the subject is, and produced by the transition from iambics to trochaics. So in 'L'Allegro,' he banishes Melancholy in iambics, but invites Euphrosyne and her attendants in trochaics. -TODD.

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MISCELLANIES.

ANNO ETATIS XIX.

At a vacation Exercise in the College, part Latin, part English. The Latin
speeches ended, the English thus began:-

HAIL, native Language, that by sinews weak
Didst move my first endeavouring tongue to speak;
And madest imperfect words with childish trips,
Half unpronounced, slide through my infant lips;
Driving dumb Silence from the portal door,
Where he had mutely sat two years before!
Here I salute thee, and thy pardon ask,
That now I use thee in my latter task:

Small loss it is that thence can come unto thee;

I know my tongue but little grace can do thee:
Thou need'st not be ambitious to be first;
Believe me, I have thither pack'd the worst:
And if it happen as I did forecast,

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The daintiest dishes shall be served up last.

I pray thee, then, deny me not thy aid

For this same small neglect that I have made :

But haste thee straight to do me once a pleasure,

And from thy wardrobe bring thy chiefest treasure ;

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a Written in 1627 it is hard to say why these poems did not first appear in edition 1645. They were first added, but misplaced, in edition 1673.-T. WARTON.

Not those new-fangled toys, and trimming slight,
Which takes our late fantasticks with delight;
But cull those richest robes, and gayest attire,
Which deepest spirits and choicest wits desire.
I have some naked thoughts that rove about,
And loudly knock to have their passage out;
And, weary of their place, do only stay,
Till thou hast deck'd them in thy best array;
That so they may, without suspect or fears,
Fly swiftly to this fair assembly's ears:
Yet I had rather, if I were to chuse,
Thy service in some graver subject use,
Such as may make thee search thy coffers round,
Before thou clothe my fancy in fit sound:
Such where the deep transported mind may soar
Above the wheeling poles, and at heaven's door
Look in, and see each blissful deity,

How he before the thunderous throne doth lic,
Listening to what unshorn Apollo sings

To the touch of golden wires, while Hebe brings
Immortal nectar to her kingly sire:

Then passing through the spheres of watchful fire",
And misty regions of wide air next under,

And hills of snow, and lofts of piled thunder,
May tell at length how green-eyed Neptune' raves,
In Heaven's defiance mustering all his waves;

Not those new-fangled toys, and trimming slight,

Which takes our late fantasticks with delight.

Perhaps he here alludes to Lily's "Euphues,” a book full of affected phraseology, which pretended to reform or refine the English language; and whose effects, although it was published some years before, still remained. The ladies and the courtiers were all instructed in this new style: and it was esteemed a mark of ignorance or unpoliteness not to understand Euphuism.-T. WARTON.

Yet I had rather, if I were to chuse,

Thy service in some graver subject use, &c.

It appears, by this address of Milton to his native language, that even in these green years he had the ambition to think of writing an epic poem; and it is worth the curious reader's attention to observe how much the 'Paradise Lost' corresponds in its circumstances to the prophetic wish he now formed.-THYER.

Here are strong indications of a young mind anticipating the subject of the 'Paradise Lost,' if we substitute Christian for pagan ideas. He was now deep in the Greek poets.-T. WARTON.

& Unshorn Apollo.

An epithet, by which he is distinguished in the Greek and Latin poets.-NEWTON. Watchful fire.

e

See Ode, Chr. Nativity,' v. 21:-"And all the spangled host keep watch in order bright."-HURD.

We have "vigil flamma" in Ovid, Trist. iii. v. 4: and "vigiles flammas," Art. Am. iii. 463.-T. WARTON.

Virgil, Georg. iv. 451. Of Proteus:

Green-eyed Neptune.

Ardentes oculos intorsit lumine glauco.-T. WARTON.

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