seems improper for epic poetry, and the author has failed in other respects. The subject of the poem is the triumph of Henry IV. over the arms of the League: it lies under the same disadvantage with respect to the recentness of the date, &c. with Lucan's Pharsalia; and it would have been better had the author followed the example of Lucan, which he recommends as judicious, concerning the machinery. The poem opens with an interview between Henry, and Elizabeth, Queen of England. He has used fiction in order to bring together these two great personages, and to give his hero an opportunity of relating the exploits of the wars. Now it is well known to every one that Henry never was in England: besides, though Virgil makes Æneas properly enough relate his adventures to Dido, who cannot be supposed to have had any particuler account of them; yet we cannot suppose the Queen of England could be ignorant of what was done by the French King, until he came himself to inform her. The whole poem is employed on the subject of a civil war of the most detestable and bloody kind, and which presents ideas too shocking to the mind to excite our admiration.

His episodes also are not full, for the poem is not long, yet it contains a great many important events, which are generally related in a very imperfect manner. But he is peculiarly unhappy with respect to the machinery; he has introduced chiefly allegorical beings, as Discord, War, Fanaticism, La Politique, and Love, which are the worst that can be employed in epic poetry. By mixing truth and falsehood together they render the whole improbable. The appearance of St. Lewis to Henry IV. is, however, much better; the whole

wrought up with great judgment, and is certainly one of the best parts of the poem. The descent into hell is also well managed.

Although Voltaire is not conspicuous for his zeal for religion, yet he understood the necessity of it in his poetry; hence it is full of the most noble and generous sentiments, and in these consists its greatest merit.

Though Milton's Paradise Lost was published long anterior to the poem I last noticed, the custom I have followed of considering the British writers the last in order, seems to justify my present arrangement. After the criticisms. of Mr. Addison and Dr. Johnson, which are in

VOL. II.

every body's hands, there remains but little to be said upon this extraordinary performance. This being the case, my own sentiments will, I am sure, please you better than those of any other critic. Whether from the nature of his subject, with which every person is familiar; or whether, from any defect of the arrangement, Milton pleases more in detached parts than in the whole. With the plot or fable we are perfectly acquainted; and it is unfortunate for Milton, though happy for society, that the Bible is universally read. The plot does not to me appear to warrant so extensive a detail. The poet probably indulged his own inclination and habits in the middle book, when he makes

"God the Father turn a school divine."

But he should have had some mercy on his readers, who might not have so strong a relish for these metaphysical disputations as he had himself. Yet even this is curious and interesting, not indeed to the multitude, but to all persons who think, and who wish to know the state of theological opinions at that period of time in which Milton wrote. These discussions, I

must observe also, are maintained with dignity, and supported with all the ingenuity and learning that was possible. Milton was perhaps the most learned man of his time; his learning is apparent in almost every line that he has composed; and so far the least interesting parts of Paradise Lost are valuable, as affording an animated picture of the knowledge of the times.

This however is foreign to his praise as an epic poet. In that view we must allow his plot to be regular, his action undisturbed by any collateral circumstances, his characters (in Pandemonium at least) strongly marked and well defined. But still he seems to have protracted his plot beyond the proper limits; and therefore, as Dr. Johnson remarks of the Paradise Lost," its perusal is rather a duty than a pleasure; it is one of those books which the reader admires, and lays down and forgets to take up again." To one excellence of Milton, however, the great critic, whom I have cited, is blind. Milton was a great admirer of the beauties of nature, though he proclaims his ignorance of natural science, in a passage in the Allegro

"Or the twisted eglantine,”

where he undoubtedly confounds the sweetbriar with the woodbine. Still he was an admirer of nature, and in his System of Education, recommends, in the strongest terms, the study of natural philosophy, and natural history. Indeed I know nothing which tends more to expand the mind, and also to afford it rest and complacency in the vexatious turmoils of human life. All that proceeds from the hand of God is good; much that comes from the exertions of man partakes of that frailty and depravity of which he is the natural heir. But the great critic and moralist whom I have just quoted (Dr. Johnson), was somewhat limited in his views. His maxim was

"The proper study of mankind is man."

He therefore could not relish many of the beauties of Milton, which depend upon allusions to the works of nature.

We then assign to Milton all the excellencies of a regular plot or fable. We allow that he is admirable in his delineation of character, except that he fails (as every human intellect must fail) in depicting the Supreme Majesty ; but