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More to the part sinister, from me drawn,
Well if thrown out, as supernumerary
To my just number found. O why did God,

888. To my just number found.] The just number of ribs in a man is twenty-four, twelve on each side, though sometimes there have been found those who have had thirteen, as Galen says, and very rarely some who have had but eleven, as Tho. Bartholinus, a famous physician, observed, in a lusty strong man whom he dissected in the year 1657, who had but eleven on one side, and a small appearance of a twelfth on the other. Hist. Anatom. et Medic. Centur. 5. c. 1. But some writers have been of opinion, that Adam had thirteen ribs on the left side, and that out of the thirteenth rib God formed Eve: and it is to this opinion that Milton here alludes, and makes Adam say, It was well if this rib was thrown out, as supernumerary to his just number.

888. -O why did God, &c.] This thought was originally of Euripides, who makes Hippolytus in like manner expostulate with Jupiter for not creating man without women. See Hippol. 616.

Ω Ζευ, τι δε κιβδηλον ανθρωποις κακον,
Γυναίκας, εις φως ηλια κατώκισας ;
Ει γαρ βροτείον ηθελες σπείραι γενος,
Ουκ εκ γυναικών χρην παρασχέσθαι
Todi. &c.

And Jason is made to talk in the same strain in the Medea, 573.

-χρην γαρ αλλοθεν ποθην βροτως Haidas Texverbal, enλuvys, Ούτω δ' αν εκ ην εδεν ανθρωποις κακον. And such sentiments as these, we

suppose, procured Euripides the name of the Woman-hater. Ariosto however hath ventured upon the same in Rodomont's invective against women. Orlando Furioso, cant. xxvii. st. 120,

Perche fatto non ha l'alma Natura
Che senza te potesse nascer l'huomo,
Come s'inesta per umana cura,
L'un sopra l'altro il pero, il sorbo,
e'l pomo?

Why did not Nature rather so pro-
vide

Without your help, that man of man might come,

And one be grafted on another's side,

As are the apples with the pear and

plome? Harrington, st. 97. Nor are similar examples wanting among our English authors. Sir Thomas Brown, in the second part of his Religio Medici, sect 9. has something very curious to this purpose, which no doubt Milton had read, that work having been first published in the year 1642, about twentyfive years before Paradise Lost. Shakespeare makes Posthumus cry out in resentment of Imogen's behaviour, Cymbeline, act ii. which we are sure that our author had read,

Is there no way for men to be, but

women

Must be half-workers?

And the complaints which Adam makes of the disasters of love may be compared with what Shakespeare's Lysander says in the Midsummer Night's Dream, act i.

Creator wise, that peopled highest heaven
With spirits masculine, create at last
This novelty on earth, this fair defect

Of nature, and not fill the world at once
With men as angels without feminine,

Or find some other way to generate

Mankind? this mischief had not then befall'n,
And more that shall befall, innumerable
Disturbances on earth through female snares,
And strait conjunction with this sex: for either
He never shall find out fit mate, but such
As some misfortune brings him, or mistake;
Or whom he wishes most shall seldom gain
Through her perverseness, but shall see her gain'd
By a far worse, or if she love, withheld
By parents; or his happiest choice too late
Shall meet, already link'd and wedlock-bound
To a fell adversary', his hate or shame :
Which infinite calamity shall cause

To human life, and household peace confound.
He added not, and from her turn'd; but Eve

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speech had not ended where these lines begin. The sense is quite complete without them; and they seem much fitter for a digressional observation of the author's, such as his panegyric on marriage, &c. than to be put into the mouth of Adam, who could not very naturally be supposed at that time to foresee so very circumstantially the inconveniences attending our strait conjunction with this sex, as he expresses it. Thyer.

Not so repuls'd, with tears that ceas'd not flowing, 910
And tresses all disorder'd, at his feet

Fell humble, and embracing them, besought
His peace, and thus proceeded in her plaint.
Forsake me not thus, Adam, witness Heaven
What love sincere, and reverence in my
I bear thee, and unweeting have offended,
Unhappily deceiv'd; thy suppliant

heart

I beg, and clasp thy knees; bereave me not,
Whereon I live, thy gentle looks, thy aid,
Thy counsel in this uttermost distress,
My only strength and stay: forlorn of thee,
Whither shall I betake me, where subsist?

915

920

While yet we live, scarce one short hour perhaps,
Between us two let there be peace, both joining,

925

Against a foe by doom express assign'd us,

As join'd in injuries, one enmity

That cruel serpent: On me exercise not
Thy hatred for this misery befall'n,
On me already lost, me than thyself

More miserable; both have sinn'd, but thou
Against God only', I against God and thee,
And to the place of judgment will return,

916. -and unweeting have offended,] Spenser, Faery Queen, b. i. cant. ii. st. 45. As all unweeting of that well she

knew.

Thyer. 925. -one enmity] There is something not improbable in Dr. Bentley's reading,

--both joining

As join'd in injuries, in enmity:
VOL. II.

930

but perhaps the author put owe in opposition to both; both joining one enmity.

926. Against a foe by doom express assign'd us,] For it was part of the sentence pronounced upon the Serpent, Ĝen. iii. 15. I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed.

There with my cries importune Heav'n, that all
The sentence from thy head remov'd may light
On me, sole cause to thee of all this woe,
Me, me only, just object of his ire.

She ended weeping, and her lowly plight,
Immoveable till peace obtain❜d from fault
Acknowledg'd and deplor'd, in Adam wrought
Commiseration; soon his heart relented

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to meet him at a friend's whom he often visited, and there fell prostrate before him, imploring forgiveness and reconciliation. It is not to be doubted (says Mr. Fenton) but an interview of that nature, so little expected, must wonderfully affect him : made on his imagination conand perhaps the impressions it tributed much to the painting of that pathetic scene in Paradise Lost, in which Eve addresseth herself to Adam for pardon and peace. At the intercession of his friends who were present, after a short reluctance, he generously sacrificed all his re

sentment to her tears:

soon his heart relented Tow'ards her, his life so late and sole delight,

Now at his feet submissive in distress.

Mr. Thyer thus farther enlarges upon the same subject. "This

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picture of Eve's distress, her "submissive tender address to "her husband, and his generous "reconcilement to her, are ex

Itremely beautiful, I had al"most said beyond any thing "in the whole poem; and that "reader must have a very sour "and unfriendly turn of mind,

Tow'ards her, his life so late and sole delight,
Now at his feet submissive in distress,
Creature so fair his reconcilement seeking,
His counsel, whom she had displeas'd, his aid;
As one disarm'd, his anger all he lost,

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And thus with peaceful words uprais'd her soon.
Unwary', and too desirous, as before,

So now of what thou know'st not, who desir'st
The punishment all on thyself; alas,

Bear thine own first, ill able to sustain

His full wrath, whose thou feel'st as yet least part,
And my displeasure bear'st so ill. If

prayers

Could alter high decrees, I to that place

Would speed before thee, and be louder heard,
That on my head all might be visited,

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Thy frailty and infirmer sex forgiven,

To me committed and by me expos'd.
But rise, let us no more contend, nor blame

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"honourablest things,-and have "in himself the experience and practice of all that which is praiseworthy: of the truth of "which observation he himself " is, I think, a shining instance "in this charming scene now "before us, since there is little room to doubt but that the particular beauties of it are owing to an interview of the same nature which he had "with his own wife, and that "he is only here describing "those tender and generous "sentiments, which he then "felt and experienced."

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