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other time, with more facility and with more fpirit, than during the heat and languor of Summer. Whenever the Poem was wrote, it was finished in 1665; and confidering the difficulties which the author lay under, his uneafipefs on account of the public affairs and his own, his age and infirmities. his gout and blindness, his not being in circumftances to maintain an amanuenfis, but obliged to make use of any hand that came next to write his verfes as he made them, it is really wonderful, that he should have the spirit to undertake fuch a work, and much more, that he should ever bring it to perfection. After the Poem was finished, ftill new difficulties retarded the publication of it. It was in danger of being fuppreffed through the malice or ignorance of the licenfer, who took exception at fome paffages, and particularly at that noble fimile, in the first book, of the fun in an eclipfe, in which he fancied that he had difcovered treafon. It was with difficulty too that the author could fell the copy; and he fold it at last only for five pounds, but was to receive five pounds more after the fale of 1300 of the first impreffion, five pounds more after the fale of as many of the fecond impreffion, and five more after the fale of as many of the third; and the number of each impreffion was not to exceed 1500. What a poor confideration was this for fuch an ineftimable performance! and how much more do others get by the works of great authors than the authors themselves! This original contract with Samuel Simmons the printer is dated April 27. 1667, and is in the hands of Mr. Tonfon the bookfeller. The first edition in ten books was printed in a finall quarto, and, before it could be disposed of, had three or more different title-pages of the years 1667, 1668, and 1669; and two years almoft elapfed before 13co copies could be fold, or before the author was entitled to his fecond five pounds, for which his receipt, still in being, is dated April 26. 1669. This was probably all that he received; for he lived not to enjoy the benefits of the fecond edition, which was not published till 1674, in which year he died. The fecond edition

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was printed in a fmall octavo, was corrected by the author himself, and the number of books was augmented from ten to twelve, with the addition or fome few verses; and this alteration was made with great judgment, not for the fake of fuch a fancift i beauty as refembling the number of books in the Eneid, but for the more regular difpofition of the Poem, because the feventh and tenth books were be fore too long, and are more fitly divided each int two. The third edition was published in 1678; a: i it appears that Milton had left his remaining right in the copy to his widow; and the agreed with Simmons the printer to accept eight pounds in full c all demands. Her receipt for the money is dated Dec. 21. 1680. A little before this Simmons had covenanted to affign the whole right of copy to Brabazon Aylmer the bookfeller for twenty five pounds; and Aylmer afterwards fold it to old Jacob Tonfon at two different times; one half Aug. 17. r683, and the other half March 24. 1690. By the laft affignment it appears, that the book was growing into repute, and rifing in valuation. And to what perverfeness could it be owing, that it was not better received at first ? We conceive there were principally two reafons: the prejudices against the author on account of his principles and party; and many no doubt were offended with the novelty of a poem that was not in rhyme. Rhymer, who was a redoubted critic in those days, would not fo much as allow it to be a poem on this account, and declared war against Milton as well as against Shakespear; and threatened that he would write reflections upon the Paradife Loft, which fome. (fays he,) are pleased to call a poem, and woulł affert rhyme against the flender fophiflry wherewith the author attacks it. Such a man as Bishop Burnet maketh it a fort of objection to Milton, that he affected to write in blank verfe without rhyme. The fame reason induced Dryden to turn the principal parts of Paradife Loft into rhyme in his opera, called, The State of Innocence and Fall of Man; to tag his lines,. * See Rhymer's Tragedies of the laft age confidered, p. 143.

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as Milton himself expreffed it, alluding to the fashion then of wearing tags of metal at the end of their ribands. We are told indeed by Mr. Richardson, that Sir George Hungerford, an ancient member of parliament, told him, that Sir John Denham came into the Houfe one morning with a sheet of Paradise Loft wet from the prefs in his hand; and being afked what he had there, faid, that he had part of the noblest poem that ever was written in any language or in any age. However, it is certain that the book was unknown till about two years after, when the Earl of Dorfet looking about for books in Little Britain, accidentally met with Paradife Loft; and being furprised at fome paffages in dipping here and there, bought it. The bookfeller begged his Lordship to fpeak in its favour, if he liked it, for the impreffion lay on his hands as wafte paper. The Earl having read it, fent it to Dryden; who in a fhort time returned it with this anfwer, "This man cuts us all out, and the ancients too." Dryden's epigram upon Milton is well known; and fo are the Latin verfes by Dr. Barrow, and the English ones by Andrew Marvel, Efq; which are ufually prefixed to the Paradife Loft, and were published with the fecond edition. But fill the poem was not generally known and efteemed, nor met with the deferved applaufe, till after the folio edition in 1688. The Duke of Buckingam, in his Effay on Poetry, prefers Taffo and Spenfer to Milton; and it is related in the life of the witty Earl of Rochester, that he had no notion of a better peet than Cowley. And it may furprise any reader, that Sir William Temple, in his Effay on Foetry, publifhed in 1686, or thereabout, takes no notice at all of Milton; nay, he expressly faith, that after Ariofto, Taffo, and Spenfer, he knoweth none of the moderns who have made any achievements in he roic poetry worth recording. And what can we think, that he had not read or heard of the Paradife Loft, or that the author's politics had prejudiced him against his poetry? It was happy that all great men were not of his mind. The bookfeller was advised and encouraged to undertake the folio edition by Mr. Sommers, afterwards

afterwards Lord Sommers, who not only fubfcribed himself, but was zealous in promoting the fubfcription: And in the lift of subscribers are fome of the most eminent names of that time; and amongst the reft Sir Roger L'Eftrange, though he had formerly written a piece, entitled, No blind guides, &c. against Milton's notes on Dr. Griffith's fermon. There were two edi-tions more in folio; one in 1692, the other in 1695, which was the fixth: For the poem was now fo well' received, that, notwithstanding the price of it was four times greater than before, the fale increased doublé the number every year, as we find from the dedication of the smaller editions to Lord Sommers. Since that time not only various editions have been printed, but alfo various notes and tranflations. Patrick Hume, a Scotfman, was the first who wrote annotations upon Paradife Loft; and his notes were printed at the end of the folio edition in 1695. Mr. Addifon's Specta tors upon the fubject contributed not a little to establishing the character and illustrating the beauties of the poem. In 1732 appeared Dr. Bentley's new edition with notes; and the year following Dr. Pearce, the prefent Bishop of Bangor, publifhed his review of the text, in which the chief of Dr. Bentley's emendations are confidered, and several other emendations and obfervations are offered to the public. And the year after that Meff. Richardson, father and fon, publifhed their explanatory notes and remarks. The poem has also been tranflated into several languages, Latin Italian, French, and Dutch; and proposals have been made for translating it into Greek. The Dutch tranflation is in blank verfe, and printed at Harlem. The French have a tranflation by M. Dupré de St. Maur: but nothing fhoweth the weakness and imperfection of their language more, than that they have few or no good poetical verfions of the greatest poets; they are forced to tranflate Homer, Virgil, and Milton, into profe; and blank verfe their language has not harmo ny and dignity enough to fupport; their tragedies, and many of their comedies, are in rhyme. Rolli, the famous Italian mafter in England, made an Italian translations

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tranflation; and Mr. Richardfon the fon faw another at Florence in manuscript, by the learned Abbé Salvini, who tranflated Addifon's Cato into Italian. One William Hog or Hogeus tranflated Paradife Lost, Paradife Regain'd, and Samfon Agonistes, into Latin verfe, in 1690; but his verfion is very unworthy of the originals. There is a better tranflation of the Paradife Loft by Mr. Thomas Power, fellow of Trinitycollege, Cambridge, the first book of which was printed in 1691, and the reft in manufcript is in the library of that college. The learned Dr. Trap has alfo publifhed a tranflation into Latin verfe; and the world is in expectation of another, that will furpafs all the reft, by Mr. William Dobfon of New-college, Oxford. So that, by one means or other, Milton is now confidered as an English claffic; and the Paradife Loft is generally esteemed the noblest and most fublime of modern poems, and equal at least to the best of the ancient; the honour of this country, and the envy and admiration of all others!

In 1670 Milton published his Hiftory of Britain, that part especially now called England. He began it above twenty years before, but was frequently interrupted by other avocations; and he defigned to have brought it down to his own times, but ftopt at the Norman conqueft; for indeed he was not well able to pursue it any further by reafon of his blindness, and he was engaged in other more delightful ftudies, having a genius turned for poetry rather than hiftory. Bithop Kennet begins his complete hiftory of England with this work of Milton, as being the beft draught, the clearest and most authentic account of thofe early times; and his ftyle is freer and easier than in most of his other works, more plain and fimple, lefs figurative and metaphorical, and better fuiced to the nature of history, has enough of the Latin turn and idiom to give it an air of antiquity, and fometimes rifes to a furpifing dignity and majefty,

In 1670 his Paradise Regain'd and Samfon Agonistes were licensed together, but were not published till the year following. The first thought of Paradife Regain'd

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