Their taste no knowledge works at least of evil, All these are Spirits of air, and woods, and fprings, Thy gentle minifters, who come to pay -375 Thee homage, and acknowledge thee their Lord : What doubt'ft thou Son of God? fit down and eat. To whom thus Jesus temp'rately reply'd.' Said'st thou not that to all things I had right? And who withholds my pow'r that right to use? 380 Shall I receive by gift what of my own, When and where likes me beft, I can command? but fuch as was occafion'd by the different fubjects. Thyer. 368. What doubts the Son of God to fit and eat?] What feems to be ufed here much like the Latin quid,which fignifies both what and why, as we observed in Paradise Loft. II. 329. What fit we then projecting peace and war? 370. Defends the touching] Forbids, prohibits, hinders, as the word is ufed in Paradife Loft XI. 86. XII. 207. where the reader may fee other inftances. 379. Saidst thou not &c] If Christ was really the eternal living Word of God, the Tempter knew the cer I tainty of the confequence, that he Saidft thou not that to all things The right of the Son of God being And who withholds my pow'r that right to use ? In the two next lines Chrift's frict natural propriety is diftinguifh'd from a right by gift. G 4 Shall I can at will, doubt not, as foon as thou, 385 399 And count thy fpecious gifts no gifts but guiles. To whom thus answer'd Satan malecontent. That I have also pow'r to give thou feest ; If This ftrangir knight is fet to him full fone; and by Spenfer, Faery Queen B. 3. Cant. 1. St. 8. Whom ftrange adventure did from Britain fet: and Muiopotmos, Not Bilbo steel, nor brass from Though there be none far fet and in profe as well as in verse by Sir Philip Sidney, Arcad. p. 360. Therewith he told her a far fet tale: Defense of poetry p. 551.and much lefs with far fet maxims of philofophy: as if our old writers had If of that pow'r I bring thee voluntary Chose to impart to thy apparent need, Why shouldst thou not accept it? but I fee Of these things others quickly will dispose, 400 Whose pains have earn'd the far fet spoil. With that Both table and provifion vanish'd quite With found of harpies wings, and talons heard; Only th' impórtune Tempter still remain'd, And When from the mountain-tops, with hideous cry, And clatt'ring wings, the hungry harpies fly; They fnatch the meat. Dryden. And we have a like fcene in Shakespear, in the Tempest Act III. where feveral ftrange shapes bring in a banquet, and afterwards enters Ariel like a harpy, claps his awings upon the table, and with a quaint device the banquet vanishes. 404. Only th' importune Tempter fill remain'd,]The word impórtune is often pronounced with this accent by our old writers, as Spenfer Faery Queen B. 1. Cant. 12. St. 16. And often blame the too impórtune fate: and And with these words his temptation purfu'd. 405 By hunger, that each other creature tames, Thou art not to be harm'd, therefore not mov'd Thy temperance invincible befides, ; For no allurement yields to appetite, And all thy heart is fet on high designs, High actions; but wherewith to be achiev'd? Great acts require great means of enterprise; 410 and B. 2. Cant. 8. St. 38, The which dividing with imThe which dividing with im pórtune fway: and Cant. 11. St. 7. With greedy malice and impórtune tail: whereas now, I think, we commonly pronounce it with the accent upon the last fyllable in the adjective, and always in the verb, importúne. 419. What followers, what re tinue canft thou gain, Or at thy heels the dizzy multitude &c] This is a strange paffage! I read Or at thy heels what dizzy multitude, but it does not please me. Sympfon. There are two words unhappily loft in the fecond line by the neg A ligence of the poet's amanuenfis or printer, which may be reftor'd, I think, with certainty enough. Behold them, Reader, in the place they feem to me to have a right to; confider and judge. Or at thy heels how keep the dizzy multitude. One may almost venture to determin on the fide of these claimants, from what our bleffed Saviour faith, in the beginning of his reply to this speech of the Tempter, Yet wealth without these three is impotent To gain dominion, or to keep it: gain'd. Milton's verfes are not always to be meafur'd by counting fyllables on the fingers ends. There are examples enow in him, and other poets, in blank verfe especially, of thefe Hypercatalectic verfes, as one may A carpenter thy father known, thyfelf 415 Which way or from what hope doft thou afpire 420 Longer than thou canft feed them on thy coft? Money brings honor, friends, conquest, and realms: may call them; where the two last fyllables are redundant. One or two from Milton will be fufficient. Extolling patience as the trujeft fortitude. Samf. Ag. ver. .655. But this is from the Chorus. Take another from a speech of Dalila's, ver. 870. Private refpects muft yield; with grave authority. But an inftance of it from Paradife Loft will be moft to the purpose, IX. 249. For folitude fometimes is beft society. Calton. This reading makes very good fenfe, and clears the fyntax: but moft readers, I imagin, rather than admit fuch a Hypercatalectic verfe, will underftand the dizzy. multitude as the accufative cafe af. What ter the verb gain, making favorable allowances for a little inaccuracy of expreffion. 422. Money brings honor, friends, conqueft, and realms :] Mammon in the Faery Queen attempts the virtue of Sir Guyon with the fame pretences. B. 2. Cant. 7. St. 11. Vain-glorious Elf, faid he, doft thou not weet, That money can thy wants at will fupply? Shields, feeds, and arms, and all things for thee meet It can purvey in twinkling of |