cause they had espoused, without bringing them to the outrageousness
of blows. Now our religion, says he, is deprived of the greatest
part of those machines--at least, the most shining in epic poetry.
Though St. Michael in Ariosto seeks out Discord to send her amongst
the Pagans, and finds her in a convent of friars, where peace should
reign (which indeed is fine satire); and Satan in Tasso excites
Soliman to an attempt by night on the Christian camp, and brings a
host of devils to his assistance; yet the Archangel in the former
example, when Discord was restive and would not be drawn from her
beloved monastery with fair words, has the whip-hand of her, drags
her out with many stripes, sets her on God's name about her
business, and makes her know the difference of strength betwixt a
nuncio of heaven and a minister of hell. The same angel in the
latter instance from Tasso (as if God had never another messenger
belonging to the court, but was confined, like Jupiter to Mercury,
and Juno to Iris), when he sees his time--that is, when half of the
Christians are already killed, and all the rest are in a fair way to
be routed--stickles betwixt the remainders of God's host and the
race of fiends, pulls the devils backward by the tails, and drives
them from their quarry; or otherwise the whole business had
miscarried, and Jerusalem remained untaken. This, says Boileau, is
a very unequal match for the poor devils, who are sure to come by
the worst of it in the combat; for nothing is more easy than for an
Almighty Power to bring His old rebels to reason when He pleases.
Consequently what pleasure, what entertainment, can be raised from
so pitiful a machine, where we see the success of the battle from
the very beginning of it? unless that as we are Christians, we are
glad that we have gotten God on our side to maul our enemies when we
cannot do the work ourselves. For if the poet had given the
faithful more courage, which had cost him nothing, or at least have