Assuredly, I regret that Milton should have written this passage; and yet the adoption of a prayer from a romance on such an occasion does not evince a delicate or deeply sincere mind. We are the creatures of association. There are some excellent moral and even serious lines in Hudibras; but what if a clergyman should adorn his sermon with a quotation from that poem! Would the abstract propriety of the verses leave him "honourably acquitted?" The Christian baptism of a line in Virgil is so far from being a parallel, that it is ridiculously inappropriate,--an absurdity as glaring as that of the bigotted Puritans, who objected to some of the noblest and most scriptural prayers ever dictated by wisdom and piety, simply because the Roman Catholics had used them. (Hayley, p. 107.) "The ambition of Milton," &c. I do not approve the so frequent use of this word relatively to Milton. Indeed the fondness for ingrafting a good sense on the word "ambition," is not a Christian impulse in general. (Hayley, p. 110.) "Milton himself seems to have thought it allowable in literary contention to vilify, &c. the character of an opponent; but surely this doctrine is unworthy," &c. If ever it were allowable, in this ease it was especially so. But these general observations, without meditation on the particular times and the genius of the times, are most often as unjust as they are always superficial. (Hayley, p. 133. Hayley is speaking of Milton's panegyric on Cromwell's government:-) Besides, however Milton might and did regret the immediate necessity, yet what alternative was there? Was it not better that Cromwell should usurp power, to protect religious freedom at least, than that the Presbyterians should usurp it to introduce a religious persecution,--extending the notion of spiritual concerns so far as to leave no freedom even to a man's bedchamber? (Hayley, p. 250. Hayley's conjectures on the origin of the 'Paradise Lost':--) If Milton borrowed a hint from any writer, it was more probably from Strada's Prolusions, in which the Fall of the Angels is pointed out as the noblest subject for a Christian poet.[1] The more dissimilar the detailed images are, the more likely it is that a great genius should catch the general idea. (Hayl. p. 294. Extracts from the 'Adamo' of Andreini:) "Lucifero. Che dal mio centre oscuro Mi chiama a rimirar cotanta luce?" "Who from my dark abyss Calls me to gaze on this 'excess of light?'" The words in italics (single quotation marks: text Ed.) are an unfair translation. They may suggest that Milton really had read and did imitate this drama. The original is 'in so great light.' Indeed the whole version is affectedly and inaccurately Miltonic. (p Ib. v. 11.) Che di fango opre festi-- Forming thy works of 'dust' (no, dirt.--) (Ib. v. 17.) Tessa pur stella a stella V'aggiungo e luna, e sole.--