us’d in sacred Hebrew Poetry, in due place, and in a due manner; Bel boweth down, Nebo stoopeth, says Isaiah.  And what a noble Description has the same Prophet of the Fall of Lucifer?  Nor can I see why it may not be as convenient and agreeable, as ’tis lawful to transplant ’em from Hebrew Poetry to our own, if we use ’em as they did.  And then for Angels, Prophets, and Oracles, it wou’d be strange, if they shou’d not strike the Mind as agreeably when real and true, as the Daemons, or Oracles, or Prophets of the Heathens, form’d, as has been said, partly from mistaken Fragments, or Traditions of sacred Story, partly indeed from the Juggles of the Heathen Priests, and crafty Ambitious Daemons.  On the whole, we have all the Advantages they had, and yet more than they, for Heroic Poetry in these matters.  As for that Question of Boileau’s, “What Pleasure can it be to hear the howlings of repining Lucifer?” I think ’tis easier to answer than to find out what shew of Reason he had for asking it, or why Lucifer mayn’t howl as pleasantly as either Cerberus, or Enceladus.  And let any one read but his Speech, in Milton’s Paradise, almost equall’d in Mr. Dryden’s State of Innocence, and I’m mistaken if he’s not of the same Mind; or if he be not, and it gives him no pleasure, I dare affirm ’tis for want of a true taste of what’s really admirable.

But Boileau comes to a stronger Objection, both against the Names and use of these Daemons, by way of Machine, I mean, in Christian Poetry;

  The Mysteries we Christians must believe
  Disdain such shifting Pageants to receive.

Thus has his Translator turn’d him; and taking it in that Sence, the meaning must be, that it disgraces Christianity, to mix its Mysteries with Stories of Daemons, Angels, &c.  But sure it can never be any disgrace, to represent it really as it is, with the frequent Intervention of those invisible and powerful Agents, both good and evil, in the Affairs of Mankind, which our Saviour has both asserted and demonstrated in his Gospel, both by Theory and Practice:  Whence we learn, that there are really vast numbers of these Spirits, some tempting, or tormenting, others guarding and protecting Mortals:  Nay, a subordination too among them, and that they are always vigilant, some for our Destruction, others for our Preservation, and that, as it seems, of every individual Man; and if this be true in general, I’m sure ’tis probable In particular:  Nor can it be any disgrace to Christianity, to apply general Probabilities to particular Cases, or to mention these Daemons in Poetry any more than in Divinity.

But indeed the Translator has here mended Boileau’s Thought, or at least made it more plausible and defensible, tho he has miss’d his Sence; for these are his Lines: 

  De la foi d’une Christien les Mysteres terribles
  D’ Ornemens egayes ne sont point susceptibles.