dences of great geniufes writing upon fimilar fubjects. Admitting them to be fuch only, no tolerable reafon can be affign'd why the fame fhould not occur in the fame manner in the Paradise Regain'd: whereas upon the other fuppofition of their being real, the difference of the two poems in this refpect is eafily accounted for. It is very certain, that Milton form'd his firft defign of writing an epic poem very foon after his return from Italy, if not before, and highly probable that he then intended it after the Italian model, as he fays, fpeaking of this defign in his Reafon of Church Government, that "he apply'd himself to that refolu"tion which Ariosto follow'd a

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"Goths, or Charlemain against "the Lombards." This would naturally lead him to a frequent perufal of the choiceft wits of that country; and altho' he dropt his first scheme, and was fome confiderable time before he executed the prefent work, yet ftill the impreffions he had first receiv'd would be fresh in his imagination, and he would of courfe be drawn to imitate their particular beauties, tho' he avoided following them in his general plan. The cafe was far otherwife when the Paradife Regain'd was compos'd. As Mr. Elwood informs us, Milton did not fo much as think of it till he was advanced in years, and it is not very likely, confidering the troubles and infirmities he had long labor'd under, that his ftudies had been much employ'd about that time among the fprightly Italians, or indeed any writers of that turn. Confiftent with this fuppofition we find it of a quite different ftamp, and instead of allufions to poets either ancient or modern, it is full of moral and philofophical reafonings, to which fort of thoughts an afflicted old age must have turned our author's mind.

F. Hayman inv.

C.Grignion foulp