r.

The griding Sword with discontinuous Wound
Passed through him; butt the Ethereal Substance closed
Not long divisible; and from the Gash
A Stream of Nectarous Humour issuing flowed
Sanguine, (such as celestial Spirits may bleed)
And all his Armour stained--

Homer tells us in the same manner, that upon Diomedes wounding the Gods,
there flow'd from the Wound an Ichor, or pure kind of Blood, which was
not bred from mortal Viands; and that tho the Pain was exquisitely
great, the Wound soon closed up and healed in those Beings who are
vested with Immortality.

I question not but Milton in his Description of his furious Moloch
flying from the Battel, and bellowing with the Wound he had received,
had his Eye on Mars in the Iliad; who, upon his being wounded, is
represented as retiring out of the Fight, and making an Outcry louder
than that of a whole Army when it begins the Charge. Homer adds, that
the Greeks and Trojans, who were engaged in a general Battel, were
terrify'd on each side with the bellowing of this wounded Deity. The
Reader will easily observe how Milton has kept all the Horrour of this
Image, without running into the Ridicule of it.

--Where the Might of Gabriel fought,
And with fierce Ensigns pierc'd the deep Array
Of Moloch, furious King! who him defy'd,
And at his Chariot-wheels to drag him bound
Threaten'd, nor from the Holy One of Heavn
Refrained his Tongue blasphemous: but anon
Down cloven to the Waste, with shattered Arms
And uncouth Pain fled bellowing.--

Milton has likewise raised his Description in this Book with many Images
taken out of the poetical Parts of Scripture. The Messiahs Chariot, as
I have before taken notice, is formed upon a Vision of Ezekiel, who, as
Grotius observes, has very much in him of Homers Spirit in the Poetical
Parts of his Prophecy.

The following Lines in that glorious Commission which is given the
Messiah to extirpate the Host of Rebel Angels, is drawn from a Sublime
Passage in the Psalms.

Go then thou Mightiest in thy Fathers Might!
Ascend my Chariot, guide the rapid Wheels
That shake Heavns Basis; bring forth all my War,
My Bow, my Thunder, my Almighty Arms,
Gird on thy Sword on thy puissant Thigh.

The Reader will easily discover many other Strokes of the same nature.

There is no question but Milton had heated his Imagination with the
Fight of the Gods in Homer, before he enter'd upon this Engagement of
the Ang