THE STATE of INNOCENCE: Thom AND Price 17.50 FALL of MAN. Defcribed in MILTON'S PARADISE LOST. Render'd into PROSE. With Hiftorical, Philofophical and Explanatory NOTES. From the French of the Learned RAYMOND DE ST. MAUR. By a GENTLEMAN of OXFORD. LONDON: Printed for T. OSBORNE, in Gray's-Inn, and M DCCXLY. Dir. Prekering 40349 PREFACE. N O Poem has bad greater, or juster Praise from the most eminent Judges of Literature, than PARADISE LOST, as well for the Sublimity of the Subject and Sentiments, as the profound and extensive Learning it is enrich'd with. It comprehends almost every Thing within the Extent of human Knowledge; but being wrote in the bigbest Stile of heroick Poetry, and the Thoughts, many of them express'd by Figures of Grammar and Rhetoric, being full of Digreffions and Sentences tranfpofed, as well as difficult Terms in the Mathematicks, History, Aftronomy, Aftrology, Geography, Architecture, Navigation, Anatomy, Alchymy, Divinity, and all other human Arts and Sciences, it bath fo bappened, that many Readers have been unable to see the Beauties of the Poem, for Want of being able to come at the proper Explication of those Things, which have been out of their Reach; and this must happen to a great many; for how few are there who have had Leisure or Opportunity to be Master of all the Sciences? besides which it is necessary they should understand the Hebrew, Chaldee, Arabic, Syriac, Phoenician, and Egyptian, and all the dead Languages, with the living and modern ones, in all their different Dialects: So that it has been a frequent Complaint of the Readers of MILTON, that he has not calculated bis Poem for common Eyes who passing by the most instructive Passages, or elfe uncertainly gueffing at their Meaning and Reading altogether doubtfully, lose the Pleasure and Benefit which, might arise from the thorough Understanding of the improving Lecture, and the moral and philosophical Instructions |