The Spectator Volume Ii Part 91

I have before taken notice of these Chariots of G.o.d, and of these Gates of Heaven; and shall here only add, that Homer gives us the same Idea of the latter, as opening of themselves; tho he afterwards takes off from it, by telling us, that the Hours first of all removed those prodigious Heaps of Clouds which lay as a Barrier before them.

I do not know any thing in the whole Poem more sublime than the Description which follows, where the Messiah is represented at the head of his Angels, as looking down into the Chaos, calming its Confusion, riding into the midst of it, and drawing the first Out-Line of the Creation.

On Heavenly Ground they stood, and from the Sh.o.r.e They view'd the vast immeasurable Abyss, Outrageous as a Sea, dark, wasteful, wild; Up from the bottom turned by furious Winds And surging Waves, as Mountains to a.s.sault Heavens height, and with the Center mix the Pole.

Silence, ye troubled Waves, and thou Deep, Peace!

Said then th' Omnific Word, your Discord end:

Nor staid; but, on the Wings of Cherubim Up-lifted, in Paternal Glory rode Far into Chaos, and the World unborn; For Chaos heard his Voice. Him all His Train Follow'd in bright Procession, to behold Creation, and the Wonders, of his Might.

Then staid the fervid Wheels, and in his Hand He took the Golden Compa.s.ses, prepar'd In G.o.ds eternal Store, to circ.u.mscribe This Universe, and all created Things: One Foot he center'd, and the other turn'd Round, through the vast Profundity obscure; And said, Thus far extend, thus far thy bounds, This be thy just Circ.u.mference, O World!

The Thought of the Golden Compa.s.ses is conceived altogether in Homers Spirit, and is a very n.o.ble Incident in this wonderful Description.

Homer, when he speaks of the G.o.ds, ascribes to them several Arms and Instruments with the same greatness of Imagination. Let the Reader only peruse the Description of Minerva's aegis, or Buckler, in the Fifth Book, with her Spear, which would overturn whole Squadrons, and her Helmet, that was sufficient to cover an Army drawn out of an hundred Cities: The Golden Compa.s.ses in the above-mentioned Pa.s.sage appear a very natural Instrument in the Hand of him, whom Plato somewhere calls the Divine Geometrician. As Poetry delights in cloathing abstracted Ideas in Allegories and sensible Images, we find a magnificent Description of the Creation form'd after the same manner in one of the Prophets, wherein he describes the Almighty Architect as measuring the Waters in the Hollow of his Hand, meting out the Heavens with his Span, comprehending the Dust of the Earth in a Measure, weighing the Mountains in Scales, and the Hills in a Balance. Another of them describing the Supreme Being in this great Work of Creation, represents him as laying the Foundations of the Earth, and stretching a Line upon it: And in another place as garnishing the Heavens, stretching out the North over the empty Place, and hanging the Earth upon nothing. This last n.o.ble Thought Milton has express'd in the following Verse:

And Earth self-ballanc'd on her Center hung.

The Beauties of Description in this Book lie so very thick, that it is impossible to enumerate them in this Paper. The Poet has employ'd on them the whole Energy of our Tongue. The several great Scenes of the Creation rise up to view one after another, in such a manner, that the Reader seems present at this wonderful Work, and to a.s.sist among the Choirs of Angels, who are the Spectators of it. How glorious is the Conclusion of the first Day.

--Thus was the first Day Ev'n and Morn Nor past uncelebrated nor unsung By the Celestial Quires, when Orient Light Exhaling first from Darkness they beheld; Birth-day of Heavn and Earth! with Joy and Shout The hollow universal Orb they fill'd.

We have the same elevation of Thought in the third Day, when the Mountains were brought forth, and the Deep was made.

Immediately the Mountains huge appear Emergent, and their broad bare Backs up-heave Into the Clouds, their Tops ascend the Sky: So high as heav'd the tumid Hills, so low Down sunk a hollow Bottom, broad and deep, Capacious Bed of Waters--

We have also the rising of the whole vegetable World described in this Days Work, which is filled with all the Graces that other Poets have lavish'd on their Descriptions of the Spring, and leads the Readers Imagination into a Theatre equally surprising and beautiful.

The several Glories of the Heavns make their Appearance on the Fourth Day.

First in his East the glorious Lamp was seen, Regent of Day; and all th' Horizon round Invested with bright Rays, jocund to round His Longitude through Heavns high Road: the gray Dawn, and the Pleiades before him danced, Shedding sweet Influence. Less bright the Moon, But opposite in level'd West was set, His Mirror, with full face borrowing her Light From him, for other Lights she needed none In that aspect, and still that distance keeps Till Night; then in the East her turn she shines, Revolv'd on Heavns great Axle, and her Reign With thousand lesser Lights dividual holds, With thousand thousand Stars! that then appear'd Spangling the Hemisphere--

One would wonder how the Poet could be so concise in his Description of the six Days Works, as to comprehend them within the bounds of an Episode, and at the same time so particular, as to give us a lively Idea of them. This is still more remarkable in his Account of the Fifth and Sixth Days, in which he has drawn out to our View the whole Animal Creation, from the Reptil to the Behemoth. As the Lion and the Leviathan are two of the n.o.blest Productions in [the [7]] World of living Creatures, the Reader will find a most exquisite Spirit of Poetry in the Account which our Author gives us of them. The Sixth Day concludes with the Formation of Man, upon which the Angel takes occasion, as he did after the Battel in Heaven, to remind Adam of his Obedience, which was the princ.i.p.al Design of this his Visit.

The Poet afterwards represents the Messiah returning into Heaven, and taking a Survey of his great Work. There is something inexpressibly Sublime in this part of the Poem, where the Author describes that great Period of Time, filled with so many Glorious Circ.u.mstances; when the Heavens and Earth were finished; when the Messiah ascended up in triumph thro the Everlasting Gates; when he looked down with pleasure upon his new Creation; when every Part of Nature seem'd to rejoice in its Existence; when the Morning-Stars sang together, and all the Sons of G.o.d shouted for joy.

So Ev'n and Morn accomplished the sixth Day: Yet not till the Creator from his Work Desisting, tho unwearied, up return'd, Up to the Heavn of Heavns, his high Abode; Thence to behold this new created World, Th' Addition of his Empire, how it shewed In prospect from his Throne, how good, how fair, Answering his great Idea: Up he rode, Follow'd with Acclamation, and the Sound Symphonious of ten thousand Harps, that tuned Angelick Harmonies; the Earth, the Air Resounding (thou rememberst, for thou heardst) The Heavens and all the Constellations rung; The Planets in their Station listning stood, While the bright Pomp ascended jubilant.

Open, ye everlasting Gates, they sung, Open, ye Heavens, your living Doors; let in The great Creator from his Work return'd Magnificent, his six Days Work, a World!

I cannot conclude this Book upon the Creation, without mentioning a Poem which has lately appeared under that t.i.tle. [8] The Work was undertaken with so good an Intention, and is executed with so great a Mastery, that it deserves to be looked upon as one of the most useful and n.o.ble Productions in our English Verse. The Reader cannot but be pleased to find the Depths of Philosophy enlivened with all the Charms of Poetry, and to see so great a Strength of Reason, amidst so beautiful a Redundancy of the Imagination. The Author has shewn us that Design in all the Works of Nature, which necessarily leads us to the Knowledge of its first Cause. In short, he has ill.u.s.trated, by numberless and incontestable Instances, that Divine Wisdom, which the Son of Sirach has so n.o.bly ascribed to the Supreme Being in his Formation of the World, when he tells us, that He created her, and saw her, and numbered her, and poured her out upon all his Works.

L.

[Footnote 1: [Ovid.]]

[Footnote 2: On the Sublime, -- 8.]

[Footnote 3: --14.]

[Footnote 4: Longinus, -- 9:

"So likewise the Jewish legislator, no ordinary person, having conceived a just idea of the power of G.o.d, has n.o.bly expressed it in the beginning of his law. And G.o.d said,--What? Let there be Light, and there was Light. Let the Earth be, and the Earth was." ]

[Footnote 5: [looks like]:--]

[Footnote 6: Zechariah vi. i. ]

[Footnote 7: this]

[Footnote 8: Sir Richard Blackmore's Creation appeared in 1712. Besides this praise of it from Addison, its religious character caused Dr.

Johnson to say that if Blackmore

had written nothing else it would have transmitted him to posterity among the first favourites of the English muse.

But even with the help of all his epics it has failed to secure him any such place in the estimation of posterity. This work is not an epic, but described on its t.i.tle page as a Philosophical Poem, Demonstrating the Existence and Providence of a G.o.d. It argues in blank verse, in the first two of its seven books, the existence of a Deity from evidences of design in the structure and qualities of earth and sea, in the celestial bodies and the air; in the next three books it argues against objections raised by Atheists, Atomists, and Fatalists; in the sixth book proceeds with evidences of design, taking the structure of man's body for its theme; and in the next, which is the last book, treats in the same way of the Instincts of Animals and of the Faculties and Operations of the Soul. This is the manner of the Poem:

The Sea does next demand our View; and there No less the Marks of perfect skill appear.

When first the Atoms to the Congress came, And by their Concourse form'd the mighty Frame, What did the Liquid to th' a.s.sembly call To give their Aid to form the ponderous Ball?

First, tell us, why did any come? next, why In such a disproportion to the Dry!

Why were the Moist in Number so outdone, That to a Thousand Dry, they are but one,

It is hardly a mark of perfect skill that there are five or six thousand of such dry lines in Blackmore's poem, and not even one that should lead a critic to speak in the same breath of Blackmore and Milton.]

No. 340 Monday, March 31, 1712. Steele.

Quis novus hic nostris successit sedibus Hospes?

Quem sese Ore ferens! quam forti Pectore et Armis!