On the side of invention there is nothing remarkable; but, on the side of art, what a {159} divine graciousness there is in its tone and manner; what incomparable skill in the management of the verse! Note the quiet monosyllabic beginning, taking note, as it were, of the decree of mercy, and then the expansion of it, the loving voice pressing forward in freer movement as it confidently proclaims the happy results that cannot fail to follow. And observe the peculiarly Miltonic interlacing of the whole, line leading to line and word to word: the "grace" of the first line giving the key to the "grace" of the second, the repeated "find" of the second line and the repeated "all" of the fourth, the "comes" of the fifth line leading on to the "coming" of the sixth. To make a list of such details as these is not to explain the effect which they produce; that is the secret of Milton's genius. So is that cunning variety in the rhythm of the verses: three pauses in the first line, two in the second, only one in the third: the principal pause after the sixth syllable in both the first two lines, and yet the words and their accents so artfully varied that not the slightest monotony is felt; the suggestion of easy flight in the smooth unbroken movement of the third line-- "The speediest of thy winged messengers." {160} Milton knew that an utterance of this kind, in which the Bible had anticipated him a hundred times, admitted of no novelty in itself; and his reverence forbade him to give his invention free rein in these high matters. But what he could do he did. The matter of the speech he leaves as he found it; what the Son says every reader has heard before: but after this manner he has not heard it. In passing through Milton's hands all has been transformed into a new birth by the consummate craftsmanship of a supreme artist.