every greatly amiable muje Of elder ages in thy Milton met; Of our grand Parents, and as Heaven fublime. THOMSON. PARADISE LOST, A POEM IN TWELVE BOOKS. THE AUTHOR JOHN MILTON. ACCORDING TO THE AUTHOR'S LAST DUBLIN: Printed for W. and W. SMITH, P. WILSON, and T. EWING. M DOC LXVM. 1 T THE VERSE. HE measure is English heroic verse without rime, as that of Homer in Greek, and Virgil in Latin; rime being no necessary adjunct or true ornament of poem or good verse, in longer works especially, but the invention of a barbarous age, to set off wretched matter and lame meter; grac'd indeed since by the use of fome famous modern poets, carried away by cuftom, but much to their own vexation, hindrance, and constraint to express many things otherwise, and for the most part worse than else they would have exprest them. Not without cause therefore some both Italian and Spanish poets of prime note have rejected rime both in longer and shorter works, as have also long since our best English tragedies, as a thing of itself, to all judicious ears, trivial and of no true musical delight; which consists only in apt numbers, fit quantity of syllables, and the sense variously drawn out from one verse into a |
