We subjoin the following passages as illustrating the melody of his numbers, the grace and dignity of his style, the correspondence of sound with the sentiment, the easy flow of his verses into one another, and the beauty of his cadences.
THE DESCENT OF THE ANGEL RAPHAEL INTO PARADISE.
A seraph wing'd: six wings he wore, to shade
His lineaments divine; the pair that clad
Each shoulder broad, came mantling o'er his breast
With regal ornament; the middle pair
Girt like a starry zone his waist, and round
Skirted his loins and thighs with downy gold,
And odours dipt in Heaven; the third his feet
Shadowed from either heel with feathered mail,
Sky tinctured grain. Like Maia's son he stood,
And shook his plumes, that heavenly fragrance fill'd
The circuit wide.
Book v.
How sweetly did they float upon the wings
Of silence, through the empty vaulted night;
At every fall, smoothing the raven down
Of darkness, till it smiled.
THE BIRTH OF DEATH.
I fled, and cried out Death:
Hell trembled at the hideous name, and sigh'd
From all her caves, and back resounded Death!
EVE EATING THE FORBIDDEN FRUIT.
So saying, her rash hand in evil hour
Forth reaching to the fruit, she plucked, she ate.
Earth felt the wound, and Nature, from her seat
Sighing through all her works, gave signs of woe,
That all was lost.
Book ix.