From haunted spring, and dale Edg'd with poplar pale, The parting Genius is with fighing fent; The nymphs in twilight fhade of tangled thicket mourn. The lovers of poetry, and to fuch only I write, will not be displeased at my presenting them alfo with the following image, which is fo ftrongly conceived, that methinks I fee at this instant the dæmon it represents; And fullen Moloch fled Hath left in fhadows dread, His burning idol all of blackest hue They call the griefly king, ; In difmal dance about the furnace blue. + Attention is irresistibly awoke and engaged by that air of folemnity, and enthusiasm, that reigns in the following stanzas: On the morning of Chrift's nativity. Newton's edition, octavo. Vol. 2. pag. 28, 29. of the miscellaneous poems. + See also verfes written at a Solemn mufic, and on the Paffion, in the fame volume, and a vacation exercise, pag. y. in all which are to be found many strokes of the fublime. The The oracles are dumb, No voice or hideous hum, Runs through the arched roof in words deceiving; Inspires the pale-ey'd prieft from the prophetic cell. Such is the power of true poetry, that one is almost inclined to believe the fuperftitions here alluded to, to be real; and the succeeding circumstances make one start and look around; In confecrated earth, And on the holy hearth, The lars and lemurs moan with midnight plaint; In urns and altars round A drear and dying found Affrights the flamens at their service quaint! Methinks we behold the priests interrupted in the middle of the fecret ceremonies they were performing, "in their temples dim," gazing with ghaftly eyes on each other, and terrified and wondering from whence these aërial voices should proceed! I have dwelt Pag. 28. chiefly chiefly on this ode as much less celebrated than L'Allegro and Il Penforofo, which are now univerfally known, but which by a ftrange fatality lay in a fort of obscurity, the private enjoyment of a few curious readers, till they were set to admirable mufic by Mr. Handel. And indeed this Volume of Milton's mifcellaneous poems has not till very lately met with fuitable regard. Shall I offend any rational admirer of POPE by remarking, that these juvenile descriptive poems of Milton, as well as his latin elegies, are of a strain far more exalted than any the former author can boaft? Let me add at the fame time, what justice obliges me to add, that they are far more incorrect. For in the very ode before us, occur one or two paffages, that are puerile and affected, to a degree not to be parallelled in the purer, but lefs elevated, compofitions of POPE. The feafon being winter, Milton has faid, that in honour to Jefus, Nature in awe to him And And afterwards obferves, in a very epigrammatic and very forced thought, unfuitable to the dignity of the subject and of the rest of the ode, that, "fhe wooed the air, to hide her guilty front with innocent show,”. And on her naked fhame, * Pollute with finful blame, The faintly veil of maiden white to throw, Confounded that her maker's eyes Should look fo near upon her foul deformities. "C'eft affez, to apply the words of the fenfible Voltaire, d'avoir cru appercevoir quelques erreurs d'invention dans ce grand genie; c'eft une confolation pour un efprit auffi bornè que le mien, d'etre bien perfuadé que les plus grands hommes fe trompent comme le vulgaire." It would be unpardonable to conclude these remarks on descriptive poesy, without taking notice of the SEASONS of Thomson, who had peculiar and powerful talents for * Milton's Miscellaneous Poems, vol. 2. pag. 19. this fpecies of compofition. Let the reader therefore pardon a digreffion, if such it be, on his merits and character. Thomson was bleffed with a strong and copious fancy; he hath enriched poetry with a variety of new and original images, which he painted from nature itself, and from his own actual obfervations: his descriptions have therefore a diftinctness and truth, which are utterly wanting to those, of poets who have only copied from each other, and have never looked abroad on the objects themselves. Thomson was accuftomed to wander away into the country for days and for weeks, attentive to, " each rural fight, each rural found;" while many a poet who has dwelt for years in the Strand, has attempted to defcribe fields and rivers, and generally fucceeded accordingly. Hence that naufeous repetition of the fame circumftances; hence that difgufting impropriety of introducing what may be called a fet of hereditary images, without proper regard to the age, or climate, or occafion, in which they were formerly used. Though the diction of the |