This is undoubtedly a just and regular catastrophe, and the poem,
therefore, has a beginning and an end which Aristotle himself could not
have disapproved; but it must be allowed to want a middle, since nothing
passes between the first act and the last, that either hastens or delays
the death of Samson. The whole drama, if its superfluities were cut off,
would scarcely fill a single act; yet this is the tragedy which
ignorance has admired, and bigotry applauded.
No. 140. SATURDAY, JULY 20, 1751.
--_Quis tam Lucili fautor inepte est,
Ut non hoc fateatur?_ HOR. Lib. i. Sat. x. 2.
What doating bigot, to his faults so blind,
As not to grant me this, can Milton find?
It is common, says Bacon, to desire the end without enduring the means.
Every member of society feels and acknowledges the necessity of
detecting crimes, yet scarce any degree of virtue or reputation is able
to secure an informer from publick hatred. The learned world has always
admitted the usefulness of critical disquisitions, yet he that attempts
to show, however modestly, the failures of a celebrated writer, shall
surely irritate his admirers, and incur the imputation of envy,
captiousness, and malignity.
With this danger full in my view, I shall proceed to examine the
sentiments of Milton's tragedy, which, though much less liable to
censure than the disposition of his plan, are, like those of other
writers, sometimes exposed to just exceptions for want of care, or want
of discernment.
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