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4. Smites us into darkness.-This reminds us of the fine lines of Gray in which he makes
allusion to Milton's blindness:

"The living throne, the sapphire blaze,
Where angels tremble while they gaze,
He saw; but, blasted with excess of light,
Closed his eyes in endless night."

Progress of Poetry, 99.

The modern Latin poet Politian has some verses which may have suggested to Milton
the thought in question:

"Ergo his defixus vates, dum singula visu

Explorat miser incauto, dum lumina figit,
Lumina nox pepulit."

5. Combust.-An astrological term applied to a planet when it is in conjunction with the

sun.

6. Syntagma,-manual or compendium of doctrine.

7. To discourse;-i.e., to reason, not to converse. Compare the expression discourse of reason,
Bacon.

8. Took beginning from the old philosophy of this island.-The resemblance between Druidism
and some of the Oriental systems of religion has often been noticed. Strabo speaks of
the identity of certain Druidical rites with religious ceremonies practised in Samo-
thracia. The doctrine of metempsychosis, which was a part of the creed of Pythagoras,
was held by the Druids. Circles of stones similar to Stonehenge are found in the East.
Such beliefs and ceremonies, however, as we refer to travelled from east to west, and
not from west to east.

9. See Tacitus, Agricola, xxi.

10. Propending,-inclining, favourably disposed.

11. Demeaned the matter;-i.e., to manage or treat the matter. (Fr. demener.) This verb
is seldom used transitively with any other object than the reflexive compound pro-
nouns (myself, himself, oneself, &c).

12. Convincement;-i.e., conviction. Our old writers frequently used convince in the sense
in which we now employ convict: "Which of you convinceth me of siu?" John

viii. 46.

"Else might the world convince of levity
As well your counsels as my undertakings."
Troil. and Cress., il 2.

13. Become prophets. -See Numbers, xi. 29.

14. Vex-Note the use of vex as an intransitive verb in the sense of fret or harass oneself:

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15. Derives itself to a common bravery.-The exact sense of derive is, to turn the course of
a stream, or, to lead it to a particular place. Hence it means, to deduce as from a
principle, to follow as next in order or succession: "Company lessens the shame of
vice by sharing it, and abates the torrent of a common odium by deriving it into many
channels."-South. We retain the phrase derive from, but have ceased to use derive to.

16. Pertest, brisk, lively. This is the original meaning of the word, which belongs to the
Celtic element of our language. We now use it in the sense of forward, saucy:

"On the tawny sands and shelves

Trip the pert fairies and the dapper elves."

Milton.

"Awake the pert and nimble spirit of mirth."

Midsummer Night's Dream, i. 1. 17. Rousing herself like a strong man, &c.-Evidently an allusion to the story of Samson, Judges xvi. 20.

18. Mewing her mighty youth.—To mew is a term in falconry, meaning to moult or cast the feathers. Milton compares England, shaking off old corruptions and abuses and rising to new views of truth, to an eagle that casts its first feathers and assumes the plumage of mature and vigorous youth.

19. Unscaling,-freeing from scales. It was believed that the eagle could gaze undazzled at the sun, and was wont to invigorate and purify its sight by flying up towards it. 20. Engrosser.—An engrosser was one who bought up the whole stock of any kind of provision in order to raise the price, and thus to sell at a large profit. The offence of engrossing is punishable at common law. Milton uses the term figuratively, to indicate the licensers of the press, who had by their office a kind of monopoly, and could, by the restriction they were able to impose on the publication of books, cause an intellectual famine.

21. Counsel ye.-Note ye used as an objective form of the pronoun. This anomaly is not uncommon in writers of the seventeenth century:

"O flowers, which I bred up with tender hand,

From the first opening bud, and gave ye names,
Who now shall rear ye?"

Milton, Paradise Lost, xi. 273.

See below: "Who shall then stick closest to ye, and excite others?"

22. Give me the liberty to know, &c.-Not very dissimilar is the sentiment of Tacitus, where he speaks of the rare felicity of the times in which he wrote: "Ubi sentire quae velis et, quae ser tias, dicere licet."-Hist. i. 1.

23. The Lord Brook,--an eminent Parliamentarian leader, killed at the siege of Lichfield, 1643.

24. Who spake oracles only when he was caught.-See Virgil, Georg. iv. 387–414.

25. As Micaiah did before Ahab.—1 Kings xxii. 15, 16.

26. Purchase,-possession or acquisition. As a legal term, purchase meant any mode of acquiring an estate other than by inheritance: "The fox repairs to the wolf's cell, and takes possession of his stores; but he had little joy of the purchase.”—Lestrange.

"Bethink you, father; for the difference

Is purchase of a heavy curse from Rome,
Or the light loss of England for a friend."
King John, iii. 1.

27. A linen decency.- Here is an allusion to the surplice, a vestment which was a terrible offence and stumbling-block to the Puritans.

28. Subdichotomies,-subdivisions. Dichotomy (dixa teμvw), is a cutting into two parts. The Latin prefix before a word of Greek origin is somewhat anomalous. The general meaning of the passage to which the word belongs is, that a dead uniformity in rites and ceremonies is more hurtful to the life and purity of a Church than separation into many sects and parties.

29. Extirpate.-The use of this form, instead of that with the inflection ed, is common in writers of the early part of the seventeenth century: "Reduce things to the first institution, and observe wherein and how they have degenerate."-Bacon, Essays, Of Great Place. "Which revolution of state was no sooner over, but Socrates, whom they

had made a person criminal, was made a person heroical, and his memory accumulate with honours divine and human."-Ibid., Advancement of Learning, I. ii. 8. In these examples we have the Latin word in the first stage of its naturalization; the Latin inflection denoting the past participle passive has been modified, but the corresponding English inflection has not yet been annexed.

30. Whose first appearance. . . . is more unsightly, &c.-This suggests to us what the prophet says of the great Representative of truth Himself: "He hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him.”—Isaiah liii. 2.

1. Estate,-state:

ABRAHAM COWLEY.

ON LIBERTY.

"A good old commander, and a most kind gentleman;

I pray you what thinks he of our estate?"

Shakspere, Henry V. iv. 1.

"More especially we pray for the good estate of the Catholic Church."-Liturgy. 2. A stoical paradox,—a paradox similar to those which the Stoic philosophers were accustomed to propound. The Stoics delighted to put forth propositions contrary to received opinion, and apparently contradicting ordinary experience. Such was their assertion -that "pain is no evil;" "that all sins are equal;" and that the wise man, as Horace expresses it" Et sutor bonus et solus formosus, et est rex."-Serm. I. iii. 125.

3. After the attaining of it.-This and similar phrases admit of two forms of construction. We may either say (as here), "After the attaining of it," or after attaining it. The latter is the more modern use. It must be noticed that there is a little difference in the grammatical character of the two forms. The participle in ing, immediately preceded by a preposition, and immediately followed by a noun or pronoun, is a gerund. If the article be inserted between the preposition and the participle, and the preposition of interpose between the participle and its object, then the participle is converted into a participial noun. In some writers we occasionally find a mixture of these two constructions: "Thus much I thought might be allowed me to say, for the giving some idea of what these sages or learned men were or may have been."-Sir W. Temple's Essays. This is inaccurate, and must not be imitated.

4. Like Atalanta for golden apples.-Atalanta, an Arcadian princess, wishing to live unmarried, and being very swift of foot, adopted the plan of challenging all her suitors to run with her, on the condition that she would marry him who outstript her in the race, but that all who were beaten must be put to death. After several had fallen victims to the attempt, Hippomanes, son of Macareus, by throwing down at intervals three golden apples given him by Venus, won the victory; for while Atalanta, attracted by the beauty of the apples, stooped to gather them, he passed her, and reached the goal in triumph.

5. "The driver is run away with by the horses, and the team does not obey the reins."— Virgil, Georg. i. 514.

6. They put on the habit of suppliants, &c.-For an account of the mode of canvassing among the Romans, see Smith's Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, art. Ambitus.

7. To the rout.-The word rout, akin to the German rotte, means mob or rabble. It is perhaps of the same etymological origin as crowd (Sax. cread, cruth):—

"...... If you know

That I profess myself in banqueting

To all the rout, then hold me dangerous."

Shakspere, Julius Caesar, i. 2.

8. Laveer, to change the course in sailing; to tack:

"How easy 'tis, when destiny proves kind,

With full-spread sails to run before the wind!
But those that 'gainst stiff gales laveering go,
Must be at once resolved and skilful too."

Dryden.

9. Zopyrus.-The story is told in Herodotus, iii. 152-158. Megabysus, the father of Zopyrus, was one of the seven conspirators who overthrew the tyranny of the usurper Smerdis the Magian.-Herodotus, iii.

10. We are gotten up.-The use of the verb to be as an auxiliary was formerly common in relations where we now give the preference to have: "When we were arrived upon the verge of his estate, we stopped at a little inn to rest ourselves and our horses."-Addison, Spectator. "After we were gotten from them, and had launched."-Acts xxi. 1. 11. "Three hundred chains confine the amorous Pirithons."- Horace, Ode III. iv. 80. The following passage from Bacon will illustrate the views expressed by Cowley in this Essay: "Men in great place are thrice servants: servants of the sovereign or state; servants of fame; and servants of business: so as they have no freedom, neither in their persons, nor in their actions, nor in their times. It is a strange desire, to seek power and to lose liberty; to seek power over others, and to lose power over a man's self. The rising unto place is laborious; and by pains men come to greater pains: and it is sometimes base; and by indignities men come to dignities."- Essay, Of Great Place. 12. Strike him in the face like dors.-A dor is a dor-beetle. This insect, while "wheeling his droning flight" in the summer twilight, often strikes against the person of the passer-by.

13. "Beyond everything august.'

14. The epidemical disease of life itself. This expression may have been in the mind of Pope when he wrote the following lines:

"The muse but served to ease some friend, not wife,

To help me through this long disease, my life."
Prologue to the Satires.

15. A slave "in saturnalibus,”-an allusion to that custom among the Romans which allowed to the slaves a season of license during the Saturnalia (a feast held at the close of December). On that occasion the slaves were dressed in their masters' clothes, treated to a sumptuous banquet, waited on by their own masters, and permitted to indulge in great freedom of speech and action.

16. "The unhappy man, curtailing his own enjoyments, has with difficulty, and little by little, saved up from his allowance."-Terence, Phormeo, i. 1.

17. "Who then is free? The man who is wise and master of himself."-Horace, Serm. II., vii. 83.

THE SHORTNESS OF LIFE AND UNCERTAINTY OF RICHES.

1. Were to cross.-See Note 10 on former Essay.

2. "The short span of life forbids us to entertain a long hope."-Horace, Ode I. iv. 15.

3. "How great is the folly of those who entertain long expectations!"

4. A mighty husband thou wouldst seem.-An excellent economist, we should now say: "Edward I. showed himself a right good husband; owner of a lordship ill husbanded." -Davies.

There's husbandry in heaven,

Their candles are all out."

Shakspere, Macbeth, ii 1.

JOHN LOCKE.

ON RETENTION.

1. No more but this.-Some editions have than instead of but; and than is no doubt preferablo as far as respects the grammar. The use of but after a comparative is, however, not uncommon in old writers: "No more but so."-Shakspere, Hamlet, ii. 1.

2. On this attempt of Locke's to explain the faculty of memory, see remarks by Reid, Essay, iii. ch. 7. Reid says that Locke's "system of ideas gives no light to this faculty, but rather tends to darken it; as little does it make us understand how we remember, and by what means have the certain knowledge of, things past."

Accompanied with. In the older language there was more accuracy in marking the distinction between the use of the prepositions with and by after such a verb as accompany. With is used with reference to the association or presence of any quality, condition, or state. By refers to a personal agent who accompanies. It is true, however, that the phrase accompany with was often used with reference to persons:

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5. Both the young and old.—A very common inaccuracy. The article should be used before old. The following are instances of similar errors: "This veil of flesh parts the visible and invisible world."- Bishop Sherlock. "It was read by the high and the low, the learned and illiterate."-Johnson, Life of Swift.

6. The attention of the student is called to this passage, as affording an example of composition at once more imaginative and more rhythmical than is often to be found in Locke.

7. Affections.-Used in the sense of conditions or attributes.

8. Default, means here defect. The word strictly, in its primary sense, means error or neglect. Fr. defaut, connected with faillir; Lat. fallere. The word is now little used but as a law term.

9. Brutes have memory.-Aristotle makes a distinction between memory and recollection. He allows brutes to have memory, but denies that they have recollection. By recollec tion he understands that degree of memory which involves a conscious effort of the will to recall ideas.

BEGINNING OF POLITICAL SOCIETIES.

1. Conclude,- (lit.) to shut up or confine; i.e., to include in the same responsibility: "God hath concluded them all in unbelief, that he might have mercy upon all."-Rom. xi. 32. Hooker also speaks of the body of Christ as being "concluded within the grave."

2. Acts. This use of the verb in a transitive sense is peculiar. It seems equivalent to actuates,-i.e., puts in action: "Perhaps they are as proud as Lucifer, as covetous as Demas, as false as Judas, and, in the whole course of their conversation, act, and are acted, not by devotion, but design."--South's Sermons.

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