And when Satan's eyes are called "baleful," the word, besides indicating the "huge affliction and dismay" that he feels, gives a hint of the woes that are in store for the victims on whom those eyes have not yet lit. It was this habit of "verbal curiosity" and condensation which seduced Milton into punning. Some of his puns are very bad. There is a modern idea that a pun is a thing to laugh at. Milton's puns, like Shakespeare's, give no smallest countenance to this theory. Sometimes he plays with what is merely a chance identity of sound, as where Satan, entering Paradise-- At one slight bound high overleapt all bound. But in most of these cases it seems likely that he believed in an etymological relation between the two words, and so fancied that he was drawing attention to an original unity of meaning. Some such hypothesis is needful to mitigate the atrocity of his worst pun, in _Paradise Regained_, where he describes The ravens with their horny beaks Food to Elijah bringing even and morn-- Though ravenous, taught to abstain from what they brought. Milton was no philologist, and we may be permitted in charity to suppose that he derived "raven" and "ravenous" from the same root. Some of his puns are to be justified for another reason--that they are made the weapons of mockery. So when Satan rails against Abdiel he says-- Thou shalt behold Whether by supplication we intend Address, and to begirt the Almighty Throne Beseeching or besieging. The long punning-bout between Satan and Belial in the Sixth Book exemplifies the more usual form of the Miltonic pun. When he introduces the newly-invented artillery, Satan makes a speech, "scoffing in ambiguous words"-- Ye, who appointed stand, Do as you have in charge, and briefly touch What we propound, and loud that all may hear. And again, when it has taken effect, scattering the heavenly host in unseemly disorder, he says-- If our proposals once again were heard, We should compel them to a quick result. Belial, "in like gamesome mood," replies to the jests of his leader, until, by the providence of Heaven, his wit and his artillery are buried under a weight heavier than themselves. On this whole scene Landor remarks that "the first overt crime of the refractory angels was punning"; and adds, with true Miltonic conciseness, "they fell rapidly after that." Some minor flaws, which may be found in Milton by those who give a close examination to his works, are to be attributed to the same cause--his love of condensed statement. Mixture of metaphors in poetry is often caused merely by the speed of thought, which presents a subject in a new aspect without care taken to adjust or alter the figure. In these cases the obscurity or violence of expression arises not from defect, but from excess of thought. Some few instances occur in Milton, who, in _Lycidas_, writes thus--