A third fault in his Sentiments, is an unnecessary Ostentation of Learning, which likewise occurs very frequently.  It is certain that both Homer and Virgil were Masters of all the Learning of their Times, but it shews it self in their Works after an indirect and concealed manner.  Milton seems ambitious of letting us know, by his Excursions on Free-Will and Predestination, and his many Glances upon History, Astronomy, Geography, and the like, as well as by the Terms and Phrases he sometimes makes use of, that he was acquainted with the whole Circle of Arts and Sciences.

If, in the last place, we consider the Language of this great Poet, we must allow what I have hinted in a former Paper, that it is often too much laboured, and sometimes obscured by old Words, Transpositions, and Foreign Idioms.  Senecas Objection to the Style of a great Author, Riget ejus oratio, nihil in ea placidum nihil lene, is what many Criticks make to Milton:  As I cannot wholly refuse it, so I have already apologized for it in another Paper; to which I may further add, that Milton’s Sentiments and Ideas were so wonderfully Sublime, that it would have been impossible for him to have represented them in their full Strength and Beauty, without having recourse to these Foreign Assistances.  Our Language sunk under him, and was unequal to that Greatness of Soul, which furnished him with such glorious Conceptions.

A second Fault in his Language is, that he often affects a kind of Jingle in his Words, as in the following Passages, and many others: 

  And brought into the World a World of Woe.

 —­Begirt th’ Almighty throne
  Beseeching or besieging—­

  This tempted our attempt—­

  At one slight bound high overleapt all bound.

I know there are Figures for this kind of Speech, that some of the greatest Ancients have been guilty of it, and that Aristotle himself has given it a place in his Rhetorick among the Beauties of that Art. [14] But as it is in its self poor and trifling, it is I think at present universally exploded by all the Masters of Polite Writing.

The last Fault which I shall take notice of in Milton’s Style, is the frequent use of what the Learned call Technical Words, or Terms of Art.  It is one of the great Beauties of Poetry, to make hard things intelligible, and to deliver what is abstruse [of [15]] it self in such easy Language as may be understood by ordinary Readers:  Besides, that the Knowledge of a Poet should rather seem born with him, or inspired, than drawn from Books and Systems.  I have often wondered how Mr. Dryden could translate a Passage out of Virgil after the following manner.

  Tack to the Larboard, and stand off to Sea. 
  Veer Star-board Sea and Land.

Milton makes use of Larboard in the same manner.  When he is upon Building he mentions Doric Pillars, Pilasters, Cornice, Freeze, Architrave.  When he talks of Heavenly Bodies, you meet with Eccliptic and Eccentric, the trepidation, Stars dropping from the Zenith, Rays culminating from the Equator.  To which might be added many Instances of the like kind in several other Arts and Sciences.