That considerable disappointment was felt on the first appearance of the Paradise Regained, and that the author's sensibility" was hurt by the very inferior rank assigned to this with reference to his former poem, are facts which are very generally known. The Paradise Regained possessed no charms for the multitude; and it seems to have fallen immediately into that state of disregard from which it has not had the power or the good fortune to emerge. Struck indeed with the beauties which occur in it, with the weight of sentiment and the knowledge which it every where displays, some superior men have endeavoured to conciliate the public regard in its favour, and even to assert for it the higher honours of heroic song. Jortin, whose remarks uniformly bear testimony to the peculiar rectitude of his mind, speaks of it in terms of just and appropriate praise; and Warburton, who with all the science and the acuteness, wanted the fine and sensitive perception of an accomplished critic, extravagantly pronounces it to be "a charming

" Milton certainly did not prefer the "Paradise Regained," but he could not hear with patience" (these are Philips's words) the former "censured to be much inferior" to the latter. This surely is sufficient proof of the incompetency of an author to decide on the relative merits of his own works; and requires no aggravation from any mistatement of the fact.

poem, nothing inferior in the poetry and the sentiments to the Paradise Lost."

The opinion however of these great men seems to have been without influence on that of the public; and a very able and laboured attempt in the present day, to lift into popularity this second birth of Milton's epic muse, has terminated equally in failure.

In 1796 an edition of this poem was published by Mr. Dunster; in whom unquestionably are united the leading requisites of a critic, extensive reading with an acute and discriminating intellect. Combining the zeal of an editor with the ingenuity of an advocate, he has not only ascertained with precision the genuine beauties of the Paradise Regained, but, having first persuaded himself, he is solicitous to persuade us to discover charms in its blemishes, and fecundity in its dearth. In the judgment of this critic, the absence of poetic imagery and of poetic numbers, in the Paradise Regained, results from the profundity of taste and the most refined artifice; is a chaste reserve of ornament, a learned style of writing, to be relished indeed only by the few, but by the favoured and initiated few to be acknowledged as the pride of composition and the last happy effect of consummate and victorious art.

If my plan would admit of any particular discussion of this editor's opinions and remarks, it would be easy, as I conceive, to convict them of essential and radical error: but to account for their ill success with the public, no minute or subtle disquisition will be necessary.

The first purpose of poetry is to please, and that poem which does not obviously please, which does not flatter the ear and make its immediate appeal to the imagination or the heart, has imperfectly accomplished its design, and must not hope for any extensive controll over the popular mind. In a composition, in which the charm and fascination proper to poetry are generally prevalent, criticism may explain the causes of those effects which are delightful to us, and may establish or extend the fame of the author: but to a poem, of which the beauties are so coy and retreating as to require to be anxiously sought and forcibly dragged into light, the services which the friendliness of criticism can render are very unimportant. It is in vain to tell us that we ought to be, if we are not pleased; and, if our understandings can be brought into subjection by the critic, our fancies revolting from his authority will assert their freedom, and, turning from the

object of subtle and laboured panegyric, will seek their peculiar luxuries wherever they may be found.

On the fate of the Paradise Regained the voice of the public, which on a question of poetic excellence cannot for any long time be erroneous, has irrevocably decided. Not to object to the impropriety of the title, which would certainly be more consistent with a work on the death and the resurrection of our blessed Lord, the extreme narrowness of the plan of the poem, the small proportion of it which is assigned to action and the large part which is given to disputations and didactic dialogue, its paucity of characters and of poetic imagery, and, lastly, its general deficiency in the charm of numbers must for ever preclude it from any extended range of popularity. It may be liked and applauded by those who are resolute to like and are hardy to applaud: but to the great body of the readers of poetry, let the critics amuse themselves with their exertions as they please, it will always be "caviare." It is embellished however with several exquisite passages, and it certainly shows, in some of its finer parts, the still existing author of the Paradise Lost.

On the merits of the " Samson Agonistes" there has fortunately been no important contrariety of opinion. By the universal suffrage it has been pronounced a manly, noble, and pathetic drama, the progeny of a mind equally exalted, sensitive and poetic. Its delineation of character, though not various, is discriminate and true; its sentiments are uniformly weighty and dignified; its diction is severe, exquisite, and sublime; and over the whole is thrown an awful and majestic gloom, which subdues at the same time that it elevates the imagination.

With reference however either to its conduct or to its execution, it cannot be considered as a faultless piece. On the subject of its conduct, I must concur with Dr. John

PAYWITTYS (Agonistes) Certator, Qui certat gymnica certamina, Athleta, Pugil. (Step. Thes.) A contender in those public games of Greece, which were peculiarly called Aywves (Agones); and given with admirable propriety to Samson, as the hero of this drama, the catastrophe of which results from the exhibition of his strength in the public games of the Philistines. It is strange that this most obvious meaning of the title should have escaped Dr. Newton. "Samson Agonistes-that is," he says, "Samson an actor, Samson being represented in a play!!" Dr. N. has perversely adopted the second, and least strictly proper sense assigned by Stephens to Aywiolys-that of histrio, actor scenicus. This is admitted without any remark or correction by Mr. Todd into his first edition of Milton's Poet. Works: but in his second, (published more than two years after this note had appeared,) he produces a note by Mr. Dunster, in which the error of Dr. N. is noticed and rectified.