he is a kind of abstract woman; essentially a
typical being; an official "mother of all living." Yet she is a real
interesting woman, not only full of delicacy and sweetness, but with
all the undefinable fascination, the charm of personality, which such
typical characters hardly ever have. By what consummate miracle of wit
this charm of individuality is preserved, without impairing the general
idea which is ever present to us, we cannot explain, for we do not know.

Adam is far less successful. He has good hair,--"hyacinthine locks"
that "from his parted forelock manly hung"; a "fair large front" and
"eye sublime": but he has little else that we care for. There is, in
truth, no opportunity of displaying manly virtues, even if he possessed
them. He has only to yield to his wife's solicitations, which he does.
Nor are we sure that he does it well: he is very tedious. He indulges
in sermons which are good; but most men cannot but fear that so
delightful a being as Eve must have found him tiresome. She steps
away, however, and goes to sleep at some of the worst points.

Dr. Johnson remarked that after all, "Paradise Lost" was one of the
books which no one wished longer: we fear, in this irreverent
generation, some wish it shorter. Hardly any reader would be sorry if
some portions of the latter books had been spared him. Coleridge,
indeed, discovered profound mysteries in the last; but in what could
not Coleridge find a mystery if he wished? Dryden more wisely remarked
that Milton became tedious when he entered upon a "track of Scripture."
[21] Nor is it surprising that such is the case. The style of many
parts of Scripture is such that it will not bear addition or
subtraction. A word less or an idea more, and the effect upon the mind
is the same no longer. Nothing can be more tiresome than a sermonic
amplification of such passages. It is almost too much when, as from
the pulpit, a paraphrastic commentary is prepared for our spiritual
improvement. In deference to the intention, we bear it, but we bear it
unwillingly; and we cannot endure it at all when, as in poems, the
object is to awaken our fancy rather than to improve our conduct. The
account of the creation in the book of Genesis is one of the
compositions from which no sensitive imagination would subtract an
iota, to which it could not bear to add a word. Milton's paraphrase is
alike copious and ineffective. The universe is, in railway phrase,
"open