418 MISCELLANEOUS TIiOnCnTB. distinct idea of the several verses, which the eye of the reader receives by looking on the book And for this reason a line should never end with a' word which is so closely connected in grammar with the word following, that it requires a continued voice to unite them ; therefore an adjective ought scarce ever to be divided from its substantive; yet may I venture to say Milton has done it too often: As Book VIII. Line 5, 6. in two verses together. " What thanks sufficient, or what recompence " Equal have I to render thee, divine " Historian ?" And in Book IX. Line 44. ' unless an age too late, or cold " Climate, or years damp my intended wing." Book VII. Line 373, speaking of the sun, " Invested with bright rays, jocund to run " His longitude thro' heav'ns high road: the grey " Dawn and the pleiades before him danc'd." It must be confessed, where some important adjective of two or snore syllables follows the substantive, they may be much better separated, as Book VII. Line 194. " Girt with omnipotence, with radiance crown'd, " Of majesty divine, sapience and love " Immense, and all his father in him shone." And book IV. Line 844. " So spoke the cherub, and his grave rebuke, " Severe in youthful beauty, added grace " Invincible." Where the adjective has any thing dependent upon it then it may be very elegantly divided from the substantive, and begin a new line; as in the midmost of the three last cited, ` Severe in youthful beauty.' Milton has sometimes separated other words at the end of a line, which nature,'and grammar, and music seem to unite too, nearly for such a separation ; as Book IV. Line 25. " Nowconscience wakes the bitter memory " Of what he was, what is. and what mùst be " Worse ; of worse deed, worse suffering must ensue." Book VIII. Line 419. No need that thou " Should'st propagate, already infinite." Book VI. Line 452. yet hard " For gods, and too unequal work we find." Again Verse 462. " But pain is perfect misery, the worst " Of evils." And you may find a number of instances of this kind in thil great poet, whereby he has sometimes reduced his verse too much
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