No More Learning

Thus will I live, till he in pity rise,
And the pale shade take me in his cold arms,
And lay me kindly by him in his grave.

_Enter_ COLLINS, _and then_ PEREZ, JULIA _following him. _

_Har. _ No more; your time's now come, you must away.

_Col. _ Now, devils, you have done your worst with tortures; death's a
privation of pain, but they were a continual dying.

_Jul. _ Farewell, my dearest! I may have many husbands,
But never one like thee.

_Per. _ As you love my soul, take hence that woman. --
My English friends, I'm not ashamed of death,
While I have you for partners; I know you innocent,
And so am I, of this pretended plot;
But I am guilty of a greater crime;
For, being married in another country,
The governor's persuasions, and my love
To that ill woman, made me leave the first,
And make this fatal choice.
I'm justly punished; for her sake I die:
The Fiscal, to enjoy her, has accused me.
There is another cause;
By his procurement I should have killed--

_Fisc. _ Away with him, and stop his mouth. [_He is led off. _

_Tow. _ I leave thee, life, with no regret at parting;
Full of whatever thou could'st give, I rise
From thy neglected feast, and go to sleep:
Yet, on this brink of death, my eyes are opened,
And heaven has bid me prophecy to you,
The unjust contrivers of this tragic scene:--
_An age is coming, when an English monarch
With blood shall pay that blood which you have shed:
To save your cities from victorious arms,
You shall invite the waves to hide your earth[1],
And, trembling, to the, tops of houses fly,
While deluges invade your lower rooms:
Then, as with waters you have swelled our bodies,
With damps of waters shall your heads be swoln:
Till, at the last, your sapped foundations fall,
And universal ruin swallows all. _
[_He is led out with the English; the Dutch
remain. _

_Van. Her. _ Ay, ay, we'll venture both ourselves and children for such
another pull.

_1 Dutch. _ Let him prophecy when his head's off.

_2 Dutch. _ There's ne'er a Nostradamus of them all shall fright us
from our gain.

_Fisc. _ Now for a smooth apology, and then a fawning letter to the
king of England; and our work's done.

_Har. _ 'Tis done as I would wish it:
Now, brethren, at my proper cost and charges,
Three days you are my guests; in which good time
We will divide their greatest wealth by lots,
While wantonly we raffle for the rest:
Then, in full rummers, and with joyful hearts,
We'll drink confusion to all English starts. [_Exeunt. _


Footnote:
1. During the French invasion of 1672, the Dutch were obliged to adopt
the desperate defence of cutting their dykes, and inundating the
country.




EPILOGUE


A poet once the Spartans led to fight,
And made them conquer in the muse's right;
So would our poet lead you on this day,
Showing your tortured fathers in his play.
To one well-born the affront is worse, and more,
When he's abused, and baffled by a boor:
With an ill grace the Dutch their mischiefs do,
They've both ill-nature and ill-manners too.
Well may they boast themselves an ancient nation,
For they were bred ere manners were in fashion;
And their new commonwealth has set them free,
Only from honour and civility.
Venetians do not more uncouthly ride[1],
Than did their lubber state mankind bestride;
Their sway became them with as ill a mien,
As their own paunches swell above their chin:
Yet is their empire no true growth, but humour,
And only two kings' touch can cure the tumour[2].
As Cato did his Afric fruits display,
So we before your eyes their Indies lay:
All loyal English will, like him, conclude,
Let Cæsar live, and Carthage be subdued[3]!


Footnotes:
1. The situation of Venice renders it impossible to bring horses into
the town; accordingly, the Venetians are proverbially bad riders.

2. The poet alludes to the king's evil, and to the joint war of France
and England against Holland.

3. Allusions to Cato,--who presented to the Roman Senate the rich figs
of Africa, and reminded them it was but three days sail to the
country which produced such excellent fruit,--were fashionable
during the Dutch war. The Lord Chancellor Shaftesbury had set the
example, by applying to Holland the favourite maxim of the Roman
philosopher, _Delenda est Carthago. _ When that versatile statesman
afterwards fled to Holland, he petitioned to be created a burgess
of Amsterdam, to ensure him against being delivered up to England.
The magistrates conferred on him the freedom desired, with the
memorable words, "_Ab nostra Carthagine nondum deleta, salutem
accipe. _"


* * * * *


THE

STATE OF INNOCENCE,

AND

FALL OF MAN.


AN

OPERA.


--_Utinam modò dicere possem
Carmina digna deâ: Certe est dea carmine digna. _
OVID. MET.




THE STATE OF INNOCENCE, &c.


The "Paradise Lost" of Milton is a work so extraordinary in conception
and execution, that it required a lapse of many years to reconcile the
herd of readers, and of critics, to what was almost too sublime for
ordinary understandings. The poets, in particular, seemed to have
gazed on its excellencies, like the inferior animals on Dryden's
immortal Hind; and, incapable of fully estimating a merit, which, in
some degree, they could not help feeling, many were their absurd
experiments to lower it to the standard of their own comprehension.
One author, deeming the "Paradise Lost" deficient in harmony, was
pleased painfully to turn it into rhyme; and more than one, conceiving
the subject too serious to be treated in verse of any kind, employed
their leisure in humbling it into prose. The names of these
well-judging and considerate persons are preserved by Mr Todd in his
edition of Milton's Poetical Works.

But we must not confound with these effusions of gratuitous folly an
alteration, or imitation, planned and executed by John Dryden;
although we may be at a loss to guess the motives by which he was
guided in hazarding such an attempt. His reverence for Milton and his
high estimation of his poetry, had already called forth the well-known
verses, in which he attributes to him the joint excellencies of the
two most celebrated poets of antiquity; and if other proofs of his
veneration were wanting, they may be found in the preface to this very
production. Had the subject been of a nature which admitted its being
actually represented, we might conceive, that Dryden, who was under
engagements to the theatre, with which it was not always easy to
comply, might have been desirous to shorten his own labour, by
adopting the story sentiments, and language of a poem, which he so
highly esteemed and which might probably have been new to the
generality of his audience. But the _costume_ of our first parents,
had there been no other objection, must have excluded the "State of
Innocence" from the stage, and accordingly it was certainly never
intended for representation. The probable motive, therefore, of this
alteration, was the wish, so common to genius, to exert itself upon a
subject in which another had already attained brilliant success, or,
as Dryden has termed a similar attempt, the desire to shoot in the bow
of Ulysses. Some circumstances in the history of Milton's immortal
poem may have suggested to Dryden the precise form of the present
attempt. It is reported by Voltaire, and seems at length to be
admitted, that the original idea of the "Paradise Lost" was supplied
by an Italian Mystery, or religious play, which Milton witnessed when
abroad[1]; and it is certain, that he intended at first to mould his
poem into a dramatic form[2]. It seems, therefore, likely, that
Dryden, conscious of his own powers, and enthusiastically admiring
those of Milton, was induced to make an experiment upon the forsaken
plan of the blind bard, which, with his usual rapidity of conception
and execution, he completed in the short space of one month. The
spurious copies which got abroad, and perhaps the desire of testifying
his respect for his beautiful patroness, the Duchess of York, form his
own apology for the publication. It is reported by Mr Aubrey that the
step was not taken without Dryden's reverence to Milton being
testified by a personal application for his permission. The aged poet,
conscious that the might of his versification could receive no
addition even from the flowing numbers of Dryden, is stated to have
answered with indifference--"Ay, you may _tag_ my verses, if you
will. "

The structure and diction of this opera, as it is somewhat improperly
termed, being rather a dramatic poem, strongly indicate the taste of
Charles the Second's reign, for what was ingenious, acute, and
polished, in preference to the simplicity of the true sublime. The
judgment of that age, as has been already noticed, is always to be
referred rather to the head than to the heart; and a poem, written to
please mere critics, requires an introduction and display of art, to
the exclusion of natural beauty. --This explains the extravagant
panegyric of Lee on Dryden's play:

--Milton did the wealthy mine disclose,
And rudely cast what you could well dispose;
He roughly drew, on an old-fashioned ground,
A chaos; for no perfect world was found,
Till through the heap your mighty genius shined:
He was the golden ore, which you refined.
He first beheld the beauteous rustic maid,
And to a place of strength the prize conveyed:
You took her thence; to Court this virgin brought,
Dressed her with gems, new-weaved her hard-spun thought,
And softest language sweetest manners taught;
Till from a comet she a star did rise,
Not to affright, but please, our wondering eyes.

Doubtless there were several critics of that period, who held the
heretical opinion above expressed by Lee. And the imitation was such
as to warrant that conclusion, considering the school in which it was
formed. The scene of the consultation in Pandemonium, and of the
soliloquy of Satan on his arrival in the newly-created universe, would
possess great merit, did they not unfortunately remind us of the
majestic simplicity of Milton. But there is often a sort of Ovidian
point in the diction which seems misplaced. Thus, Asmodeus tells us,
that the devils, ascending from the lake of fire,

Shake off their slumber _first_, and _next_ their fear.

And, with Dryden's usual hate to the poor Dutchmen, the council of
Pandemonium are termed,

_Most High and Mighty_ Lords, who better fell
From heaven, to rise _States General_ of hell.

There is one inconvenience, which, as this poem was intended for
perusal only, the author, one would have thought, might have easily
avoided. This arises from the stage directions, which supply the place
of the terrific and beautiful descriptions of Milton. What idea,
except burlesque, can we form of the expulsion of the fallen angels
from heaven, literally represented by their tumbling down upon the
stage? or what feelings of terror can be excited by the idea of an
opera hell, composed of pasteboard and flaming rosin? If these follies
were not actually to be produced before our eyes, it could serve no
good purpose to excite the image of them in our imaginations. They are
circumstances by which we feel, that scenic deception must be rendered
ridiculous; and ought to be avoided, even in a drama intended for
perusal only, since they cannot be mentioned without exciting
ludicrous combinations. --Even in describing the primitive state of our
first parents, Dryden has displayed some of the false and corrupted
taste of the court of Charles. Eve does not consent to her union with
Adam without coquettish apprehensions of his infidelity, which
circumstances rendered rather improbable; and even in the state of
innocence, she avows the love of sway and of self, which, in a loose
age, is thought the principal attribute of her daughters. It may be
remembered that the Adam of Milton, when first experiencing the powers
of slumber, thought,

I then was passing to my former state
Insensible, and forthwith to dissolve.

The Eve of Dryden expresses the same apprehensions of annihilation
upon a very different occasion. These passages form a contrast highly
favourable to the simplicity and chastity of Milton's taste. The
school logic, employed by Adam and the angels in the first scene of
the fourth act, however misplaced, may be paralleled if not justified,
by similar instances in the "Paradise Lost. "

On the other hand, the "State of Innocence" contains many passages of
varied and happy expression peculiar to our great poet; and the speech
of Lucfier in Paradise (Act third, scene first), approaches in
sublimity to his prototype in Milton, Indeed, altered as this poem was
from the original, in order to accommodate it to the taste of a
frivolous age, it still retained too much fancy to escape the raillery
of the men of wit and fashion, more disposed to "laugh at
extravagance, than to sympathise with feelings of grandeur. " The
"Companion to the Theatre" mentions an objection started by the more
nice and delicate critics, against the anachronism and absurdity of
Lucifer conversing about the world, its form and vicissitudes, at a
time previous to its creation, or, at least, to the possibility of his
knowing any thing of it. But to this objection, which applies to the
"Paradise Lost" also, it is sufficient to reply, that the measure of
intelligence, competent to supernatural beings, being altogether
unknown to us, leaves the poet at liberty to accommodate its extent to
the purposes in which he employs them, without which poetic license,
it would be in vain to introduce them. Dryden, moved by this, and
similar objections, has prefixed to the drama, "An Apology for Heroic
Poetry," and the use of what is technically called "the machinery"
employed in it.

Upon the whole, it may be justly questioned, whether Dryden shewed his
judgment in the choice of a subject which compelled an immediate
parallel betwixt Milton and himself, upon a subject so exclusively
favourable to the powers of the former. Indeed, according to Dennis,
notwithstanding Dryden's admiration of Milton, he evinced sufficiently
by this undertaking, what he himself confessed twenty years
afterwards, that he was not sensible of half the extent of his
excellence. In the "Town and Country Mouse," Mr Bayes is made to term
Milton "a rough unhewen fellow;" and Dryden himself, even in the
dedication to the Translation from Juvenal, a work of his advanced
life, alleges, that, though he found in that poet a true sublimity,
and lofty thoughts, clothed with admirable Grecisms, he did not find
the elegant turn of words and expression proper to the Italian poets
and to Spenser. In the same treatise, he undertakes to excuse, but not
to justify Milton, for his choice of blank verse, affirming that he
possessed neither grace nor facility in rhyming. A consciousness of
the harmony of his own numbers, and a predilection for that kind of
verse, in which he excelled, seemed to have encouraged him to think he
could improve the "Paradise Lost. " Baker observes but too truly, that
the "State of Innocence" recals the idea reprobated by Marvell in his
address to Milton:

Or if a work so infinite be spanned,
Jealous I was, lest some less skilful hand,
Such as disquiet always what is well,
And by ill-imitating would excel,
Might hence presume the whole creation's day
To change in scenes, and shew it in a play.

The "State of Innocence" seems to have been undertaken by Dryden
during a cessation of his theatrical labours, and was first published
in 1674, shortly after the death of Milton, which took place on the
8th of November in the same year.


Footnotes:
1. The Adamo of Andreini; for an account of which, see Todd's Milton,
Vol. I. the elegant Hayley's Conjectures on the Origin of Paradise
Lost, and Walker's Memoir on Italian Tragedy. The Drama of Andreini
opens with a grand chorus of angels, who sing to this purpose:

Let the rainbow be the fiddle-stick to the fiddle of heaven,
Let the spheres be the strings, and the stars the musical notes;
Let the new-born breezes make the pauses and sharps,
And let time be careful to beat the measure.

2. See a sketch of his plan in Johnson's Life of Milton, and in the
authorities above quoted.




TO

HER ROYAL HIGHNESS,

THE

DUCHESS[1].


MADAM,

Ambition is so far from being a vice in poets, that it is almost
impossible for them to succeed without it. Imagination must be raised,
by a desire of fame, to a desire of pleasing; and they whom, in all
ages, poets have endeavoured most to please, have been the beautiful
and the great. Beauty is their deity, to which they sacrifice, and
greatness is their guardian angel, which protects them. Both these,
are so eminently joined in the person of your royal highness, that it
were not easy for any but a poet to determine which of them outshines
the other. But I confess, madam, I am already biassed in my choice. I
can easily resign to others the praise of your illustrious family, and
that glory which you derive from a long-continued race of princes,
famous for their actions both in peace and war: I can give up, to the
historians of your country, the names of so many generals and heroes
which crowd their annals, and to our own the hopes of those which you
are to produce for the British chronicle. I can yield, without envy,
to the nation of poets, the family of Este, to which Ariosto and Tasso
have owed their patronage, and to which the world has owed their
poems. But I could not, without extreme reluctance, resign the theme
of your beauty to another hand. Give me leave, madam, to acquaint the
world, that I am jealous of this subject; and let it be no dishonour
to you, that, after having raised the admiration of mankind, you have
inspired one man to give it voice. But, with whatsoever vanity this
new honour of being your poet has filled my mind, I confess myself too
weak for the inspiration: the priest was always unequal to the oracle:
the god within him was too mighty for his breast: he laboured with the
sacred revelation, and there was more of the mystery left behind, than
the divinity itself could enable him to express. I can but discover a
part of your excellencies to the world; and that, too, according to
the measure of my own weakness. Like those who have surveyed the moon
by glasses, I can only tell of a new and shining world above us, but
not relate the riches and glories of the place. 'Tis therefore that I
have already waved the subject of your greatness, to resign myself to
the contemplation of what is more peculiarly yours. Greatness is
indeed communicated to some few of both sexes; but beauty is confined
to a more narrow compass: 'tis only in your sex, 'tis not shared by
many, and its supreme perfection is in you alone. And here, madam, I
am proud that I cannot flatter; you have reconciled the differing
judgments of mankind; for all men are equal in their judgment of what
is eminently best. The prize of beauty was disputed only till you were
seen; but now all pretenders have withdrawn their claims: there is no
competition but for the second place; even the fairest of our island,
which is famed for beauties, not daring to commit their cause against
you to the suffrage of those, who most partially adore them. Fortune
has, indeed, but rendered justice to so much excellence, in setting it
so high to public view; or, rather, Providence has done justice to
itself, in placing the most perfect workmanship of heaven, where it
may be admired by all beholders. Had the sun and stars been seated
lower, their glory had not been communicated to all at once, and the
Creator had wanted so much of his praise, as he had made your
condition more obscure: but he has placed you so near a crown, that
you add a lustre to it by your beauty. You are joined to a prince, who
only could deserve you; whose conduct, courage, and success in war;
whose fidelity to his royal brother, whose love for his country, whose
constancy to his friends, whose bounty to his servants, whose justice
to merit, whose inviolable truth, and whose magnanimity in all his
actions, seem to have been rewarded by heaven by the gift of you. You
are never seen but you are blest; and I am sure you bless all those
who see you. We think not the day is long enough when we behold you;
and you are so much the business of our souls, that while you are in
sight, we can neither look nor think on any else. There are no eyes
for other beauties; you only are present, and the rest of your sex are
but the unregarded parts that fill your triumph. Our sight is so
intent on the object of its admiration, that our tongues have not
leisure even to praise you: for language seems too low a thing to
express your excellence; and our souls are speaking so much within,
that they despise all foreign conversation. Every man, even the
dullest, is thinking more than the most eloquent can teach him how to
utter. Thus, madam, in the midst of crowds, you reign in solitude; and
are adored with the deepest veneration, that of silence. 'Tis true,
you are above all mortal wishes; no man desires impossibilities,
because they are beyond the reach of nature. To hope to be a god, is
folly exalted into madness; but, by the laws of our creation, we are
obliged to adore him, and are permitted to love him too at human
distance. 'Tis the nature of perfection to be attractive, but the
excellency of the object refines the nature of the love. It strikes an
impression of awful reverence; 'tis indeed that love which is more
properly a zeal than passion. 'Tis the rapture which anchorites find
in prayer, when a beam of the divinity shines upon them; that which
makes them despise all worldly objects; and yet 'tis all but
contemplation. They are seldom visited from above, but a single vision
so transports them, that it makes up the happiness of their lives.
Mortality cannot bear it often: it finds them in the eagerness and
height of their devotion; they are speechless for the time that it
continues, and prostrate and dead when it departs. That ecstacy had
need be strong, which, without any end, but that of admiration has
power enough to destroy all other passions. You render mankind
insensible to other beauties, and have destroyed the empire of love in
a court which was the seat of his dominion. You have subverted (may I
dare to accuse you of it? ) even our fundamental laws; and reign
absolute over the hearts of a stubborn and free-born people, tenacious
almost to madness of their liberty. The brightest and most victorious
of our ladies make daily complaints of revolted subjects, if they may
be said to be revolted, whose servitude is not accepted; for your
royal highness is too great, and too just a monarch, either to want or
to receive the homage of rebellious fugitives. Yet, if some few among
the multitude continue stedfast to their first pretensions, 'tis an
obedience so lukewarm and languishing, that it merits not the name of
passion; their addresses are so faint, and their vows so hollow to
their sovereigns, that they seem only to maintain their faith out of a
sense of honour: they are ashamed to desist, and yet grow careless to
obtain. Like despairing combatants, they strive against you as if they
had beheld unveiled the magical shield of your Ariosto, which dazzled
the beholders with too much brightness. They can no longer hold up
their arms; they have read their destiny in your eyes:

_Splende lo scudo, a guisa di piropo;
E luce altra non é tanto lucente:
Cader in terra a lo splendor fu d'vopo,
Con gli occhi abbacinati, e senza mente. _

And yet, madam, if I could find in myself the power to leave this
argument of your incomparable beauty, I might turn to one which would
equally oppress me with its greatness; for your conjugal virtues have
deserved to be set as an example, to a less degenerate, less tainted
age. They approach so near to singularity in ours, that I can scarcely
make a panegyric to your royal highness, without a satire on many
others. But your person is a paradise, and your soul a cherubim
within, to guard it. If the excellence of the outside invite the
beholders, the majesty of your mind deters them from too bold
approaches, and turns their admiration into religion. Moral
perfections are raised higher by you in the softer sex; as if men were
of too coarse a mould for heaven to work on, and that the image of
divinity could not be cast to likeness in so harsh a metal. Your
person is so admirable, that it can scarce receive addition, when it
shall be glorified: and your soul, which shines through it, finds it
of a substance so near her own, that she will be pleased to pass an
age within it, and to be confined to such a palace.

I know not how I am hurried back to my former theme; I ought and
purposed to have celebrated those endowments and qualities of your
mind, which were sufficient, even without the graces of your person,
to render you, as you are, the ornament of the court, and the object
of wonder to three kingdoms. But all my praises are but as a bull-rush
cast upon a stream; if they sink not, 'tis because they are borne up
by the strength of the current, which supports their lightness; but
they are carried round again, and return on the eddy where they first
began. I can proceed no farther than your beauty; and even on that too
I have said so little, considering the greatness of the subject, that,
like him who would lodge a bowl upon a precipice, either my praise
falls back, by the weakness of the delivery, or stays not on the top,
but rolls over, and is lost on the other side. I intended this a
dedication; but how can I consider what belongs to myself, when I have
been so long contemplating on you! Be pleased then, madam, to receive
this poem, without entitling so much excellency as yours, to the
faults and imperfections of so mean a writer; and instead of being
favourable to the piece, which merits nothing, forgive the presumption
of the author; who is, with all possible veneration,

Your Royal Highness's
Most obedient, most humble,
Most devoted servant,
JOHN DRYDEN.


Footnote:
1. Mary of Este, daughter of the Duke of Modena, and second wife to
James Duke of York, afterwards James II. She was married to him by
proxy in 1673, and came over in the year following. Notwithstanding
her husband's unpopularity, and her own attachment to the Roman
Catholic religion, her youth, beauty, and innocence secured her
from insult and slander during all the stormy period which preceded
her accession to the crown. Even Burnet, reluctantly, admits the
force of her charms, and the inoffensiveness of her conduct. But
her beauty produced a more lasting effect on the young and gallant,
than on that austere and stubborn partizan; and its force must be
allowed, since it was extolled even when Mary was dethroned and
exiled. Granville, Lord Lansdowne, has praised her in "The Progress
of Beauty;" and I cannot forbear transcribing some of the verses,
on account of the gallant spirit of the author, who scorned to
change with fortune, and continued to admire and celebrate, in
adversity, the charms which he had worshipped in the meridian of
prosperity.

And now, my muse, a nobler flight prepare,
And sing so loud, that heaven and earth may hear.
Behold from Italy an awful ray
Of heavenly light illuminates the day;
Northward she bends, majestically bright,
And here she fixes her imperial light.
Be bold, be bold, my muse, nor fear to raise
Thy voice to her who was thy earliest praise[a].
What though the sullen fates refuse to shine,
Or frown severe on thy audacious line;
Keep thy bright theme within thy steady sight,
The clouds shall fly before thy dazzling light,
And everlasting day direct thy lofty flight.
Thou, who hast never yet put on disguise,
To flatter faction, or descend to vice,
Let no vain fear thy generous ardour tame,
But stand erect, and sound as loud as fame.
As when our eye some prospect would pursue,
Descending from a hill looks round to view,
Passes o'er lawns and meadows, till it gains
Some favourite spot, and fixing there remains;
With equal ardour my transported muse
Flies other objects, this bright theme to chuse.
Queen of our hearts, and charmer of our sight!
A monarch's pride, his glory and delight!
Princess adored and loved! if verse can give
A deathless name, thine shall for ever live;
Invoked where'er the British lion roars,
Extended as the seas that guard the British shores.
The wise immortals, in their seats above,
To crown their labours still appointed love;
Phoebus enjoyed the goddess of the sea,
Alcides had Omphale, James has thee.
O happy James! content thy mighty mind,
Grudge not the world, for still thy queen is kind;
To be but at whose feet more glory brings,
Than 'tis to tread on sceptres and on kings.
Secure of empire in that beauteous breast,
Who would not give their crowns to be so blest?
Was Helen half so fair, so formed for joy,
Well chose the Trojan, and well burned was Troy.
But ah! what strange vicissitudes of fate,
What chance attends on every worldly state!
As when the skies were sacked, the conquered gods,
Compelled from heaven, forsook their blessed abodes;
Wandering in woods, they hid from den to den,
And sought their safety in the shapes of men;
As when the winds with kindling flames conspire,
The blaze increases as they fan the fire;
From roof to roof the burning torrent pours,
Nor spares the palace nor the loftiest towers;
Or as the stately pine, erecting high
Her lofty branches shooting to the sky,
If riven by the thunderbolt of Jove,
Down falls at once the pride of all the grove;
Level with lowest shrubs lies the tall head,
That, reared aloft, as to the clouds was spread,
So--
But cease, my muse, thy colours are too faint;
Shade with a veil those griefs thou can'st not paint.
That sun is set! --

_Progress of Beauty. _

The beauty, which inspired the romantic and unchanging admiration
of Granville, may be allowed to justify some of the flights of
Dryden's panegyric. I fear enough will still remain to justify the
stricture of Johnson, who observes, that Dryden's dedication is an
"attempt to mingle earth and heaven, by praising human excellence
in the language of religion. "

At the date of this address, the Duchess of York was only in her
sixteenth year.

Footnote:
a. He had written verses to the Earl of Peterborough, on the Duke
of York's marriage with the Princess of Modena, before he was
twelve years old.




TO

MR DRYDEN,

ON HIS

POEM OF PARADISE.


Forgive me, awful poet, if a muse,
Whom artless nature did for plainness chuse,
In loose attire presents her humble thought,
Of this best poem that you ever wrought.
This fairest labour of your teeming brain
I would embrace, but not with flatt'ry stain.
Something I would to your vast virtue raise,
But scorn to daub it with a fulsome praise;
That would but blot the work I would commend,
And shew a court-admirer, not a friend.
To the dead bard your fame a little owes,
For Milton did the wealthy mine disclose,
And rudely cast what you could well dispose:
He roughly drew, on an old fashioned ground,
A chaos; for no perfect world was found,
Till through the heap your mighty genius shined:
He was the golden ore, which you refined.
He first beheld the beauteous rustic maid,
And to a place of strength the prize conveyed:
You took her thence; to court this virgin brought,
Drest her with gems, new weaved her hard-spun thought,
And softest language sweetest manners taught;
Till from a comet she a star doth rise,
Not to affright, but please, our wondering eyes.
Betwixt you both is trained a nobler piece,
Than e'er was drawn in Italy or Greece.
Thou from his source of thoughts even souls dost bring,
As smiling gods from sullen Saturn spring.
When night's dull mask the face of heaven does wear,
'Tis doubtful light, but here and there a star,
Which serves the dreadful shadows to display,
That vanish at the rising of the day;
But then bright robes the meadows all adorn,
And the world looks as it were newly born.
So, when your sense his mystic reason cleared,
The melancholy scene all gay appeared;
Now light leapt up, and a new glory smiled,
And all throughout was mighty, all was mild.
Before this palace, which thy wit did build,
Which various fancy did so gaudy gild,
And judgment has with solid riches filled,
My humbler muse begs she may sentry stand,
Amongst the rest that guard this Eden land.
But there's no need, for ev'n thy foes conspire
Thy praise, and, hating thee, thy work admire.
On then, O mightiest of the inspired men!
Monarch of verse! new themes employ thy pen.
The troubles of majestic Charles set down;
Not David vanquished more to reach a crown.
Praise him as Cowley did that Hebrew king:
Thy theme's as great; do thou as greatly sing.
Then thou may'st boldly to his favour rise,
Look down, and the base serpent's hiss despise;
From thund'ring envy safe in laurel sit,
While clam'rous critics their vile heads submit,
Condemned for treason at the bar of wit.

NAT. LEE.




THE

AUTHOR'S APOLOGY

FOR

HEROIC POETRY, AND POETIC LICENCE.


To satisfy the curiosity of those, who will give themselves the
trouble of reading the ensuing poem, I think myself obliged to render
them a reason why I publish an opera which was never acted. In the
first place, I shall not be ashamed to own, that my chiefest motive
was, the ambition which I acknowledged in the Epistle. I was desirous
to lay at the feet of so beautiful and excellent a princess, a work,
which, I confess, was unworthy her, but which, I hope, she will have
the goodness to forgive. I was also induced to it in my own defence;
many hundred copies of it being dispersed abroad without my knowledge,
or consent: so that every one gathering new faults, it became at
length a libel against me; and I saw, with some disdain, more nonsense
than either I, or as bad a poet, could have crammed into it, at a
month's warning; in which time it was wholly written, and not since
revised. After this, I cannot, without injury to the deceased author
of "Paradise Lost," but acknowledge, that this poem has received its
entire foundation, part of the design, and many of the ornaments, from
him. What I have borrowed will be so easily discerned from my mean
productions, that I shall not need to point the reader to the places:
And truly I should be sorry, for my own sake, that any one should take
the pains to compare them together; the original being undoubtedly one
of the greatest, most noble, and most sublime poems, which either this
age or nation has produced. And though I could not refuse the
partiality of my friend, who is pleased to commend me in his verses, I
hope they will rather be esteemed the effect of his love to me, than
of his deliberate and sober judgment. His genius is able to make
beautiful what he pleases: Yet, as he has been too favourable to me, I
doubt not but he will hear of his kindness from many of our
contemporaries for we are fallen into an age of illiterate,
censorious, and detracting people, who, thus qualified, set up for
critics.

In the first place, I must take leave to tell them, that they wholly
mistake the nature of criticism, who think its business is principally
to find fault. Criticism, as it was first instituted by Aristotle, was
meant a standard of judging well; the chiefest part of which is, to
observe those excellencies which should delight a reasonable reader.
If the design, the conduct, the thoughts, and the expressions of a
poem, be generally such as proceed from a true genius of poetry, the
critic ought to pass his judgement in favour of the author. It is
malicious and unmanly to snarl at the little lapses of a pen, from
which Virgil himself stands not exempted. Horace acknowledges, that
honest Homer nods sometimes: He is not equally awake in every line;
but he leaves it also as a standing measure for our judgments,

--Non, _ubi plura nitent in carmine, paucis_
Offendi _maculis, quas aut incuria fudit,
Aut humana parùm cavit natura. _--

And Longinus, who was undoubtedly, after Aristotle the greatest critic
amongst the Greeks, in his twenty-seventh chapter, [Greek: PERI
HUPSOUS], has judiciously preferred the sublime genius that sometimes
errs, to the middling or indifferent one, which makes few faults, but
seldom or never rises to any excellence. He compares the first to a
man of large possessions, who has not leisure to consider of every
slight expence, will not debase himself to the management of every
trifle: Particular sums are not laid out, or spared, to the greatest
advantage in his economy; but are sometimes suffered to run to waste,
while he is only careful of the main. On the other side, he likens the
mediocrity of wit, to one of a mean fortune, who manages his store
with extreme frugality, or rather parsimony; but who, with fear of
running into profuseness, never arrives to the magnificence of living.
This kind of genius writes indeed correctly. A wary man he is in
grammar, very nice as to solecism or barbarism, judges to a hair of
little decencies, knows better than any man what is not to be written,
and never hazards himself so far as to fall, but plods on
deliberately, and, as a grave man ought, is sure to put his staff
before him. In short, he sets his heart upon it, and with wonderful
care makes his business sure; that is, in plain English, neither to be
blamed nor praised. --I could, says my author, find out some blemishes
in Homer; and am perhaps as naturally inclined to be disgusted at a
fault as another man; but, after all, to speak impartially, his
failings are such, as are only marks of human frailty: they are little
mistakes, or rather negligences, which have escaped his pen in the
fervour of his writing; the sublimity of his spirit carries it with me
against his carelessness; and though Apollonius his "Argonauts," and
Theocritus his "Idyllia," are more free from errors, there is not any
man of so false a judgment, who would chuse rather to have been
Apollonius or Theocritus, than Homer.

It is worth our consideration a little, to examine how much these
hypercritics in English poetry differ from the opinion of the Greek
and Latin judges of antiquity; from the Italians and French, who have
succeeded them; and, indeed, from the general taste and approbation of
all ages. Heroic poetry, which they condemn, has ever been esteemed,
and ever will be, the greatest work of human nature: In that rank has
Aristotle placed it; and Longinus is so full of the like expressions,
that he abundantly confirms the other's testimony. Horace as plainly
delivers his opinion, and particularly praises Homer in these verses:

_Trojani Belli scriptorem, maxime Lolli,
Dum tu declamas Romæ, Præneste relegi:
Qui quid sit pulchrum, quid turpe, quid utile, quid non,
Plenius ac melius Chrysippo et Crantore dicit. _

And in another place, modestly excluding himself from the number of
poets, because he only writ odes and satires, he tells you a poet is
such an one,

--_Cui mens divinior, atque os
Magna soniturum. _

Quotations are superfluous in an established truth; otherwise I could
reckon up, amongst the moderns, all the Italian commentators on
Aristotle's book of poetry; and, amongst the French, the greatest of
this age, Boileau and Rapin; the latter of which is alone sufficient,
were all other critics lost, to teach anew the rules of writing. Any
man, who will seriously consider the nature of an epic poem, how it
agrees with that of poetry in general, which is to instruct and to
delight, what actions it describes, and what persons they are chiefly
whom it informs, will find it a work which indeed is full of
difficulty in the attempt, but admirable when it is well performed. I
write not this with the least intention to undervalue the other parts
of poetry: for Comedy is both excellently instructive, and extremely
pleasant; satire lashes vice into reformation, and humour represents
folly so as to render it ridiculous. Many of our present writers are
eminent in both these kinds; and, particularly, the author of the
"Plain Dealer," whom I am proud to call my friend, has obliged all
honest and virtuous men, by one of the most bold, most general, and
most useful satires, which has ever been presented on the English
theatre. I do not dispute the preference of Tragedy; let every man
enjoy his taste: but it is unjust, that they, who have not the least
notion of heroic writing, should therefore condemn the pleasure which
others receive from it, because they cannot comprehend it. Let them
please their appetites in eating what they like; but let them not
force their dish on all the table. They, who would combat general
authority with particular opinion, must first establish themselves a
reputation of understanding better than other men. Are all the flights
of heroic poetry to be concluded bombast, unnatural, and mere madness,
because they are not affected with their excellencies? It is just as
reasonable as to conclude there is no day, because a blind man cannot
distinguish of light and colours. Ought they not rather, in modesty,
to doubt of their own judgments, when they think this or that
expression in Homer, Virgil, Tasso, or Milton's "Paradise," to be too
far strained, than positively to conclude, that it is all fustian, and
mere nonsense? It is true, there are limits to be set betwixt the
boldness and rashness of a poet; but he must understand those limits,
who pretends to judge as well as he who undertakes to write: and he
who has no liking to the whole, ought, in reason, to be excluded from
censuring of the parts. He must be a lawyer before he mounts the
tribunal; and the judicature of one court, too, does not qualify a man
to preside in another. He may be an excellent pleader in the Chancery,
who is not fit to rule the Common Pleas. But I will presume for once
to tell them, that the boldest strokes of poetry, when they are
managed artfully, are those which most delight the reader.

Virgil and Horace, the severest writers of the severest age, have made
frequent use of the hardest metaphors, and of the strongest
hyperboles; and in this case the best authority is the best argument;
for generally to have pleased, and through all ages, must bear the
force of universal tradition. And if you would appeal from thence to
right reason, you will gain no more by it in effect, than, first, to
set up your reason against those authors; and, secondly, against all
those who have admired them. You must prove, why that ought not to
have pleased, which has pleased the most learned, and the most
judicious; and, to be thought knowing, you must first put the fool
upon all mankind. If you can enter more deeply, than they have done,
into the causes and resorts of that which moves pleasure in a reader,
the field is open, you may be heard: But those springs of human nature
are not so easily discovered by every superficial judge: It requires
philosophy, as well as poetry, to sound the depth of all the passions;
what they are in themselves, and how they are to be provoked: And in
this science the best poets have excelled. Aristotle raised the fabric
of his poetry from observation of those things, in which Euripides,
Sophocles, and Æschylus pleased: He considered how they raised the
passions, and thence has drawn rules for our imitation. From hence
have sprung the tropes and figures, for which they wanted a name, who
first practised them, and succeeded in them. Thus I grant you, that
the knowledge of nature was the original rule; and that all poets
ought to study her, as well as Aristotle and Horace, her interpreters.
But then this also undeniably follows, that those things, which
delight all ages, must have been an imitation of nature; which is all
I contend. Therefore is rhetoric made an art; therefore the names of
so many tropes and figures were invented; because it was observed they
had such and such effect upon the audience. Therefore catachreses and
hyperboles have found their place amongst them; not that they were to
be avoided, but to be used judiciously, and placed in poetry, as
heightenings and shadows are in painting, to make the figure bolder,
and cause it to stand off to sight.

_Nec retia cervis
Ulla dolum meditantur;_

says Virgil in his Eclogues: and speaking of Leander, in his Georgics,

_Nocte natat cæca serus freta, quem super ingens
Porta tonat cæli, et scopulis illisa reclamant
Æquora:_

In both of these, you see, he fears not to give voice and thought to
things inanimate.

Will you arraign your master, Horace, for his hardness of expression,
when he describes the death of Cleopatra, and says she did--_asperos
tractare serpentes, ut atrum corpore combiberet cenenum,_--because the
body, in that action, performs what is proper to the mouth?

As for hyperboles, I will neither quote Lucan, nor Statius, men of an
unbounded imagination, but who often wanted the poize of judgment. The
divine Virgil was not liable to that exception; and yet he describes
Polyphemus thus:

_--Graditurque per æquor
Jam medium; necdum fluctus latera ardua tinxit. _

In imitation of this place, our admirable Cowley thus paints Goliah:

The valley, now, this monster seemed to fill;
And we, methought, looked up to him from our hill:

where the two words, _seemed_ and _methought_, have mollified the
figure; and yet if they had not been there, the fright of the
Israelites might have excused their belief of the giant's stature[1].

In the eighth of the Æneids, Virgil paints the swiftness of Camilla
thus:

_Ilia vel intactæ segetis per summa volaret
Gramina, nec teneras cursu læsisset aristas;
Vel mare per medium, fluctu suspensa tumenti,
Ferret iter, celeres nec tingeret æquore plantas. _

You are not obliged, as in history, to a literal belief of what the
poet says; but you are pleased with the image, without being cozened
by the fiction.

Yet even in history, Longinus quotes Herodotus on this occasion of
hyperboles. The Lacedemonians, says he, at the straits of Thermopylæ,
defended themselves to the last extremity; and when their arms failed
them, fought it out with their nails and teeth; till at length, (the
Persians shooting continually upon them) they lay buried under the
arrows of their enemies. It is not reasonable, (continues the critic)
to believe, that men could defend themselves with their nails and
teeth from an armed multitude; nor that they lay buried under a pile
of darts and arrows; and yet there wants not probability for the
figure: because the hyperbole seems not to have been made for the sake
of the description; but rather to have been produced from the
occasion.

It is true, the boldness of the figures is to be hidden sometimes by
the address of the poet; that they may work their effect upon the
mind, without discovering the art which caused it. And therefore they
are principally to be used in passion; when we speak more warmly, and
with more precipitation than at other times: For then, _Si vis me
flere, dolendum est primum ipsi tibi;_ the poet must put on the
passion he endeavours to represent: A man in such an occasion is not
cool enough, either to reason rightly, or to talk calmly. Aggravations
are then in their proper places; interrogations, exclamations,
hyperbata, or a disordered connection of discourse, are graceful
there, because they are natural. The sum of all depends on what before
I hinted, that this boldness of expression is not to be blamed, if it
be managed by the coolness and discretion which is necessary to a
poet.

Yet before I leave this subject, I cannot but take notice how
disingenuous our adversaries appear: All that is dull, insipid,
languishing, and without sinews, in a poem, they call an imitation of
nature: They only offend our most equitable judges, who think beyond
them; and lively images and elocution are never to be forgiven.

What fustian, as they call it, have I heard these gentlemen find out
in Mr Cowley's Odes! I acknowledge myself unworthy to defend so
excellent an author, neither have I room to do it here; only in
general I will say, that nothing can appear more beautiful to me, than
the strength of those images which they condemn.

Imaging is, in itself, the very height and life of poetry. It is, as
Longinus describes it, a discourse, which, by a kind of enthusiasm, or
extraordinary emotion of the soul, makes it seem to us, that we behold
those things which the poet paints, so as to be pleased with them, and
to admire them.

If poetry be imitation, that part of it must needs be best, which
describes most lively our actions and passions; our virtues and our
vices; our follies and our humours: For neither is comedy without its
part of imaging; and they who do it best are certainly the most
excellent in their kind. This is too plainly proved to be denied: But
how are poetical fictions, how are hippocentaurs and chimeras, or how
are angels and immaterial substances to be imaged; which, some of
them, are things quite out of nature; others, such whereof we can have
no notion? This is the last refuge of our adversaries; and more than
any of them have yet had the wit to object against us. The answer is
easy to the first part of it: The fiction of some beings which are not
in nature, (second notions, as the logicians call them) has been
founded on the conjunction of two natures, which have a real separate
being. So hippocentaurs were imaged, by joining the natures of a man
and horse together; as Lucretius tells us, who has used this word of
_image_ oftener than any of the poets:

_Nam certè ex vivo centauri non fit imago,
Nulla fuit quoniam talis natura animai:
Verùm ubi equi atque hominis, casu, convenit imago,
Hærescit facilè extemplò,_ &c.

The same reason may also be alleged for chimeras and the rest. And
poets may be allowed the like liberty, for describing things which
really exist not, if they are founded on popular belief. Of this
nature are fairies, pigmies, and the extraordinary effects of magic;
for it is still an imitation, though of other men's fancies: and thus
are Shakespeare's "Tempest," his "Midsummer Night's Dream," and Ben
Jonson's "Masque of Witches" to be defended. For immaterial
substances, we are authorised by Scripture in their description: and
herein the text accommodates itself to vulgar apprehension, in giving
angels the likeness of beautiful young men. Thus, after the pagan
divinity, has Homer drawn his gods with human faces: and thus we have
notions of things above us, by describing them like other beings more
within our knowledge.

I wish I could produce any one example of excellent imaging in all
this poem. Perhaps I cannot; but that which comes nearest it, is in
these four lines, which have been sufficiently canvassed by my
well-natured censors:

Seraph and cherub, careless of their charge,
And wanton, in full ease now live at large:
Unguarded leave the passes of the sky,
And all dissolved in hallelujahs lie.

I have heard (says one of them) of anchovies _dissolved_ in sauce; but
never of an angel _in hallelujahs. _ A mighty witticism! (if you will
pardon a new word,) but there is some difference between a laugher and
a critic. He might have burlesqued Virgil too, from whom I took the
image. _Invadunt urbem, somno vinoque sepultam. _ A city's being
buried, is just as proper on occasion, as an angel's being dissolved
in ease, and songs of triumph. Mr Cowley lies as open too in many
places:

Where their vast courts the mother waters keep, &c.

For if the mass of waters be the mothers, then their daughters, the
little streams, are bound, in all good manners, to make courtesy to
them, and ask them blessing. How easy it is to turn into ridicule the
best descriptions, when once a man is in the humour of laughing, till
he wheezes at his own dull jest! but an image, which is strongly and
beautifully set before the eyes of the reader, will still be poetry,
when the merry fit is over, and last when the other is forgotten.

I promised to say somewhat of Poetic Licence, but have in part
anticipated my discourse already. Poetic Licence, I take to be the
liberty which poets have assumed to themselves, in all ages, of
speaking things in verse, which are beyond the severity of prose. It
is that particular character, which distinguishes and sets the bounds
betwixt _oratio soluta_, and poetry. This, as to what regards the
thought, or imagination of a poet, consists in fiction: but then those
thoughts must be expressed; and here arise two other branches of it;
for if this licence be included in a single word, it admits of tropes;
if in a sentence or proposition, of figures; both which are of a much
larger extent, and more forcibly to be used in verse than prose. This
is that birth-right which is derived to us from our great forefathers,
even from Homer down to Ben; and they, who would deny it to us, have,
in plain terms, the fox's quarrel to the grapes--they cannot reach it.

How far these liberties are to be extended, I will not presume to
determine here, since Horace does not. But it is certain that they are
to be varied, according to the language and age in which an author
writes. That which would be allowed to a Grecian poet, Martial tells
you, would not be suffered in a Roman; and it is evident, that the
English does more nearly follow the strictness of the latter, than the
freedoms of the former. Connection of epithets, or the conjunction of
two words in one, are frequent and elegant in the Greek, which yet Sir
Philip Sidney, and the translator of Du Bartas, have unluckily
attempted in the English; though this, I confess, is not so proper an
instance of poetic licence, as it is of variety of idiom in languages.

Horace a little explains himself on this subject of _Licentia
Poetica_, in these verses:

_--Pictoribus atque Poetis
Quidlibet audendi semper fuit æqua potestas: . . .
Sed non, ut placidis coeant immitia, non ut
Serpentes avibus geminentur, tigribus hædi. _

He would have a poem of a piece; not to begin with one thing, and end
with another: He restrains it so far, that thoughts of an unlike
nature ought not to be joined together. That were indeed to make a
chaos. He taxed not Homer, nor the divine Virgil, for interesting
their gods in the wars of Troy and Italy; neither, had he now lived,
would he have taxed Milton, as our false critics have presumed to do,
for his choice of a supernatural argument; but he would have blamed my
author, who was a Christian, had he introduced into his poem heathen
deities, as Tasso is condemned by Rapin on the like occasion; and as
Camoëns, the author of the "Lusiads," ought to be censured by all his
readers, when he brings in Bacchus and Christ into the same adventure
of his fable.

From that which has been said, it may be collected, that the
definition of wit (which has been so often attempted, and ever
unsuccessfully by many poets,) is only this: That it is a propriety of
thoughts and words; or, in other terms, thoughts and words elegantly
adapted to the subject. If our critics will join issue on this
definition, that we may _convenire in aliquo tertio_; if they will
take it as a granted principle, it will be easy to put an end to this
dispute. No man will disagree from another's judgment concerning the
dignity of style in heroic poetry; but all reasonable men will
conclude it necessary, that sublime subjects ought to be adorned with
the sublimest, and consequently often, with the most figurative
expressions. In the mean time I will not run into their fault of
imposing my opinions on other men, any more than I would my writings
on their taste: I have only laid down, and that superficially enough,
my present thoughts; and shall be glad to be taught better by those
who pretend to reform our poetry.


Footnote:
1. With all this mitigation, the passage seems horrible bombast.




THE

STATE OF INNOCENCE,

AND

FALL OF MAN.


ACT I.

SCENE I. --_Represents a Chaos, or a confused Mass of Matter; the Stage
is almost wholly dark: A Symphony of warlike Music is heard for some
time; then from the Heavens, (which are opened) fall the rebellious
Angels, wheeling in Air, and seeming transfixed with Thunderbolts:
The bottom of the Stage being opened, receives the Angels, who fall
out of sight. Tunes of Victory are played, and an Hymn sung; Angels
discovered above, brandishing their Swords: The Music ceasing, and
the Heavens being closed, the Scene shifts, and on a sudden
represents Hell: Part of the Scene is a Lake of Brimstone, or
rolling Fire; the Earth of a burnt Colour: The fallen Angels appear
on the Lake, lying prostrate; a Tune of Horror and Lamentation is
heard. _

LUCIFER, _raising himself on the Lake. _

_Lucif. _ Is this the seat our conqueror has given?
And this the climate we must change for heaven?
These regions and this realm my wars have got;
This mournful empire is the loser's lot:
In liquid burnings, or on dry, to dwell,
Is all the sad variety of hell.
But see, the victor has recalled, from far,
The avenging storms, his ministers of war:
His shafts are spent, and his tired thunders sleep,
Nor longer bellow through the boundless deep.
Best take the occasion, and these waves forsake,
While time is given. --Ho, Asmoday, awake,
If thou art he! But ah! how changed from him,
Companion of my arms! how wan! how dim!
How faded all thy glories are! I see
Myself too well, and my own change in thee.

_Asm. _ Prince of the thrones, who in the fields of light
Led'st forth the embattled seraphim to fight;
Who shook the power of heaven's eternal state,
Had broke it too, if not upheld by fate;
But now those hopes are fled: Thus low we lie,
Shut from his day, and that contended sky,
And lost, as far as heavenly forms can die;
Yet, not all perished: We defy him still,
And yet wage war, with our unconquered will.

_Lucif. _ Strength may return.

_Asm. _ Already of thy virtue I partake,
Erected by thy voice.

_Lucif. _ See on the lake
Our troops, like scattered leaves in autumn, lie;
First let us raise ourselves, and seek the dry,
Perhaps more easy dwelling.

_Asm. _ From the beach
Thy well-known voice the sleeping gods will reach,
And wake the immortal sense, which thunder's noise
Had quelled, and lightning deep had driven within them.

_Lucif. _ With wings expanded wide, ourselves we'll rear,
And fly incumbent on the dusky air. --
Hell, thy new lord receive!
Heaven cannot envy me an empire here. [_Both fly to dry Land. _

_Asm. _ Thus far we have prevailed; if that be gain,
Which is but change of place, not change of pain.
Now summon we the rest.

_Lucif. _ Dominions, Powers, ye chiefs of heaven's bright host,
(Of heaven, once your's; but now in battle lost)
Wake from your slumber! Are your beds of down?
Sleep you so easy there? Or fear the frown
Of him who threw you hence, and joys to see
Your abject state confess his victory?
Rise, rise, ere from his battlements he view
Your prostrate postures, and his bolts renew,
To strike you deeper down.

_Asm. _ They wake, they hear,
Shake off their slumber first, and next their fear;
And only for the appointed signal stay.

_Lucif. _ Rise from the flood, and hither wing your way.

_Mol. _ [_From the Lake. _]
Thine to command; our part is to obey.
[_The rest of the Devils rise up, and fly to the
Land. _

_Lucif. _ So, now we are ourselves again an host,
Fit to tempt fate, once more, for what we lost;
To o'erleap the etherial fence, or if so high
We cannot climb, to undermine his sky,
And blow him up, who justly rules us now,
Because more strong: Should he be forced to bow.
The right were ours again: 'Tis just to win
The highest place; to attempt, and fail, is sin.

_Mol. _ Changed as we are, we're yet from homage free;
We have, by hell, at least gained liberty:
That's worth our fall; thus low though we are driven,
Better to rule in hell, than serve in heaven.

_Lucif. _ There spoke the better half of Lucifer!

_Asm. _ 'Tis fit in frequent senate we confer,
And then determine how to steer our course;
To wage new war by fraud, or open force.
The doom's now past; submission were in vain.

_Mol. _ And were it not, such baseness I disdain;
I would not stoop, to purchase all above,
And should contemn a power, whom prayer could move,
As one unworthy to have conquered me.

_Beelzebub. _ Moloch, in that all are resolved, like thee.
The means are unproposed; but 'tis not fit
Our dark divan in public view should sit;
Or what we plot against the Thunderer,
The ignoble crowd of vulgar devils hear.

_Luci. _ A golden palace let be raised on high;
To imitate? No, to outshine the sky!
All mines are ours, and gold above the rest:
Let this be done; and quick as 'twas exprest.

_A Palace rises, where sit, as in council,_ LUCIFER, ASMODAY,
MOLOCH, BELIAL, BEELZEBUB, _and_ SATAN.

Most high and mighty lords, who better fell
From heaven, to rise states-general of hell,
Nor yet repent, though ruined and undone,
Our upper provinces already won,
Such pride there is in souls created free,
Such hate of universal monarchy;
Speak, for we therefore meet:
If peace you chuse, your suffrages declare;
Or means propound, to carry on the war.

_Mol. _ My sentence is for war; that open too:
Unskilled in stratagems, plain force I know:
Treaties are vain to losers; nor would we,
Should heaven grant peace, submit to sovereignty.
We can no caution give we will adore;
And he above is warned to trust no more.
What then remains but battle?

_Satan.