Emathia jacuisset Oeta. Nec fraude turpi Palladis invidæ Vidisset occisum Ilion Hectora, aut Quem larva Pelidis peremit Ense Locro, Jove lacrymante. Numenque trinum fallere si queant author grounds a comparison, Par. Lost, ii. 543. "Felt th' "envenom'd robe, &c." 15. Quem larva Pelidis peremit, &c.] Sarpedon, who was slain by Patroclus, disguised in the armour of Achilles. At his death his father wept a shower of blood. See the sixteenth Iliad. 17. Si triste fatum, &c.] “If in"chantments could have stopped "death, Circe, the mother of Telegonus by Ulysses, would "have still lived; and Medea, "the sister of Egialus or Ab"syrtus, with her magical rod." Telegonus killed his father Ulysses, and is the same who is called parricida by Horace. Milton denominates Circe Telegoni parens, from Ovid, Epist. Pont. iii. i. 123. Telegonique parens vertendis nota figuris. 17. verba Hecateïa] Ovid, Metam. xiv. 44. Hecateia carmina miscet. 15 20 25 22. Artes medentum, ignotaque gramina,] Not so much the power, as the skill, of medicine. This appears from the names which follow. 23. -Machaon, &c.] Ma chaon, the son of Esculapius, one of the Grecian leaders at the siege of Troy, and a physician, was killed by Eurypylus. See the Iliad. But the death of Machaon, by the spear of Eurypylus, is not in the Iliad, but in Quintus Calaber, where it is circumstantially related, as Mr. Steevens remarks, Paralip. vi. 406. I must add, that Quintus Calaber is not an author at present very familiar to boys of seventeen. According to Philips, he was one of the classics whom Milton taught in his school. "Quintus Čalaber his poem of "the Trojan War continued from "Homer." Life, p. xvii. 25.-Philyreie, &c.] Chiron, Sagitta Echidnæ perlita sanguine, the son of Philyra, a precep- 27. Nec tela te, &c.] Esculapius, who was cut out of his mother's womb by his father Apollo. Jupiter struck him dead with lightning, for restoring Hippolytus to life. 29. Tuque O] O is here open in a situation in which it is never found open in the Roman classics. Symmons. 29. Tuque O alumno major Apol line,] Certainly we should read Apollinis. But who was this pupil of Apollo in medicine? Had it been Æsculapius, the transition would have been more easy. But Esculapius was sent by Apollo to Chiron, to be educated in that art. I think therefore, although Milton's allusions in these pieces are chiefly to established Grecian fable, we should here understand Virgil's Iapis, who was Phoebo ante alios dilectus, and to whom he imparted suas artes, sua munera. En. xii. 391. seq. It should be remembered, that the word alumnus is more extensively, favourite, votary, &c. In Milton's Latin poems, it is often difficult to ascertain the names of persons and places. To shew his learning, he frequently clouds his meaning by obscure or obsolete patronymics, and by the substitution of appellations formed from remote genealogical, historical, and even geographical allusions. But this was one of Ovid's affectations. Milton's habitual propensity to classical illustration, more particularly from the Grecian story, appears even in his State Letters written for Cromwell. In one of them, Cromwell congratulates King Charles Gustavus on the birth of a son in the midst of other good news, 1655. In this, says he, you resemble Philip of Macedon, who at one and the same time received the tidings of Alexander's birth and the conquest of the Illyrians. Prose W. ii. 445. 29. Admitting Warton's sense of alumnus, it is evident that Esculapius is here intended. E. At fila rupit Persephone tua, Faucibus eripuisse mortis. Elysio spatiere campo. In Quintum Novembris.* Anno Etatis 17. 43. The thought is in Juvenal and Persius. * This little poem, as containing a council, conspiracy, and 40 45 5 10 expedition of Satan, may be considered as an early and promising prolusion of Milton's genius to the Paradise Lost. 15 Regnaque olivifera vertit florentia pace: Cui nomen dederat quondam Neptunia proles; Ante expugnatæ crudelia sæcula Troja. At simul hanc, opibusque et festa pace beatam, 15. Regnaque olivifera vertit florentia pace:] Olivifer is an Ovidian epithet, Fast. iii. 151. Primus oliviferis Romam deductus ab arvis. And in the Ibis, " Olivifera Sicyone," v. 317. A great fault of the versification of this poem is, that it is too monotonous, and that there is no intermixture of a variety of pauses. But it should be remembered, that young writers are misled by specious beauties. 23. populos Summanus et urbes,] Summanus is an obsolete and uncommon name for Pluto, or the god of ghosts and night, summus manium, which Milton most probably had from Ovid, Fast. vi. 731. The name 20 25 30 occurs in Plautus, Cicero, Pliny, and other ancient critics. 27. Cui nomen dederat quondam Neptunia proles;] "Albion a giant, son of Neptune, who "called the [this] island after "his own name, and ruled it "forty-four years. Till at length passing over into Gaul, in aid "of his brother Lestrygon, "against whom Hercules was hasting out of Spain into Italy, "he was there slain in fight, "&c." Milton's Hist. Engl. b. i. Prose Works, ii. 2. Drayton has the same fable, Polyolb. s. xviii.. 31. At simul hanc, opibusque et festa pace beatam, &c.] The whole context is from Ovid's Envy, Metam. ii. 794. Aspicit, et pingues donis Cerealibus agros, 35 40 45 50 Jamque pruinosas velox superaverat Alpes, Et tenet Ausoniæ fines: a parte sinistra Nimbifer Appenninus erat, priscique Sabini, Dextra veneficiis infamis Hetruria, nec non Te furtiva, Tibris, Thetidi videt oscula dantem; Hinc Mavortigenæ consistit in arce Quirini. Reddiderant dubiam jam sera crepuscula lucem, Cum circumgreditur totam Tricoronifer urbem, 55 Panificosque Deos portat, scapulisque virorum -Tandem Tritonida conspicit arcem, virentem: Vixque tenet lachrymas, &c. 48. Jamque pruinosas velox superaverat Alpes,] Lucan, i. 183. Jam gelidas Cæsar cursu superaverat Alpes. 54. Reddiderant dubiam jam sera crepuscula lucem,] Ovid, Metam. i. 219. -Traherent cum sera crepuscula lucem. 55. He describes the proces sion of the Pope to Saint Peter's church at Rome, on the eve of Saint Peter's day. |