As with the force of winds and waters pent, When mountains tremble, those two massy pillars He tugg'd, he shook, till down they came and drew 1650. Pull'd down the same destruction on himself; CHORUS. 1655 Of dire necessity, whose law in death conjoin'd SEMICHORUS. While their hearts were jocund and sublime, Drunk with idolatry, drunk with wine, And fat regorg'd of bulls and goats, 1670 In Silo his bright sanctuary: Among them he a spi'rit of frenzy sent, And urg'd them on with mad desire Unweetingly importun'd Their own destruction to come speedy upon them. So fond are mortal men Fall'n into wrath divine, As their own ruin on themselves t' invite, And with blindness internal struck. SEMICHORUS. But he though blind of sight, Despis'd and thought extinguish'd quite, With inward eyes illuminated, His fiery virtue rous'd From under ashes into sudden flame, And as an evening dragon came, 1674. In Silv] Where the tabernacle and ark were at that time. 1682. So fond are mortal men, &c.] Agreeable to the common maxim, Quos Deus vult perdere dementat prius. Thyer. 1675 1680 1685 1690 1692. And as an evening dragon came &c.] Mr. Calton says that Milton certainly dictated And not as an evening dragon came. Samson did not set upon them like an evening dragon; but darted ruin on their heads like ticas alites, Plin. lib. xxiii. sect, 17. the thunder-bearing eagle. Mr. Richardson. Sympson to the same purpose proposes to read And not as evening dragon came but as an eagle &c. Mr. Thyer understands it otherwise, and explains it without any alteration of the text, to which rather I incline. It is common enough among the ancient poets to meet with several similies brought in to illustrate one action, when one cannot be found that will hold in every circumstance. Milton does the same here, introducing this of the dragon merely in allusion to the order in which the Philistians were placed in the amphitheatre, and the subsequent one of the eagle to express the rapidity of that vengeance which Samson took of his enemies. 1695. -villatic fowl ;] Villa 1695. —but as an eagle &c.] In the Ajax of Sophocles it is said that his enemies, if they saw him appear, would be terrified like birds at the appearance of the vulture or eagle, ver. 167. Αλλ' ότι γαρ dn &c. The Greek verses, I think, are faulty, and as I remember, are corrected not amiss by Dawes in his Miscell. Critic. Jortin. 1700. —imbost.] Concealed, covered. Spenser, Faery Queen, b. i. cant. iii. st. 24. A knight her met in mighty arms imbost. Richardson. 1702. -a holocaust] An entire burnt-offering. Else generally only part of the beast was burnt. Richardson. 1706. her fame survives A secular bird ages of lives. MANOAH. Come, come, no time for lamentation now; Nor much more cause; Samson hath quit himself Like Samson, and heroically hath finish'd A life heroic, on his enemies Fully reveng'd, hath left them years of mourning, And lamentation to the sons of Caphtor The construction and meaning of the whole period I conceive to be this, Virtue given for lost, like the phoenix consumed and now teemed from out her ashy womb, revives, reflourishes, and though her body die which was the case of Samson, yet her fame survives a phoenix many ages: for the comma after survives in all the editions should be omitted, as Mr. Calton has observed as well as myself. The phoenix, says he, lived a thousand years according to some, [see Bochart's Hierozoicon, pars secunda, p. 817.] and hence it is called here a secular bird. Ergo quoniam sex diebus cuncta Dei opera perfecta sunt; per secula sex, id est annorum sex millia, manere hoc statu mundum necesse est. Lactantius, Div. Inst. lib. vii. c. 14. The fame of virtue (the Semichorus saith) survives, outlives this secular bird many ages. The comma, which is in all the editions after survives, breaks the construction. 1706. Had this been the intended construction, he should rather have said "the secular "bird." But survives may be perhaps more naturally contrasted with dies; "her body 1710 "dies" but "her fame survives," i. e. continues to live, " ages of "lives." And "a secular bird" may refer to the person implied in the possessive pronoun "her," a construction common in Milton. If this be so, virtue will have been confused in the course of the passage with the bird to which it is compared, a thing not unparalleled in our author. E. This solemn introduction of the phoenix is a gross outrage of poetical propriety. It is faulty, not only as it is incongruous to the personage to whom it is ascribed, but as it is so evidently contrary to reason and nature, that it ought never to be mentioned but as a fable in a serious poem. Johnson. 1713. to the sons of Caphtor] Caphtor it should be, and not Chaptor, as in several editions: and the sons of Caphtor are Philistines, originally of the island Caphtor or Crete. The people were called Caphtorim, Cherethim, Ceretim, and afterwards Cretians. A colony of them settled in Palestine, and there went by the name of Philistim. Meadowcourt. Through all Philistian bounds; to Israel 1715 1720 Nothing is here for tears, nothing to wail Or knock the breast, no weakness, no contempt, Soak'd in his enemies' blood, and from the stream Home to his father's house: there will I build him 1725 1730 1735 1730. Will send for all my kin-house of his father, came down dred, all my friends, &c.] This is founded upon what the Scripture saith, Judges xvi. 31. which the poet has finely improved. Then his brethren, and all the and took him, and brought him up, and buried him between Zorah and Eshtaol in the burying-place of Manoah his father. |