forest are but his playthings; his imagination hesitates not to paint
Chaos, Heaven, Hell, the widespread Universe in which our world hangs like
a pendant star and across which stretches the Milky Way:

A broad and ample road, whose dust is gold,
And pavement stars.

No other poet could find suitable words for such vast themes, but Milton
never falters. Read the assembly of the fallen hosts before Lucifer in Book
I of _Paradise Lost_, or the opening of Hellgates in Book II, or the
invocation to light in Book III, or Satan's invocation to the sun in Book
IV, or the morning hymn of Adam and Eve in Book V; or open _Paradise
Lost_ anywhere, and you shall soon find some passage which, by the
grandeur of its scene or by the exalted feeling of the poet as he describes
it, awakens in you the feeling of sublimity.

[Sidenote: HARMONY]

The harmony of Milton's verse is its second notable quality. Many of our
poets use blank verse, as many other people walk, as if they had no sense
of rhythm within them; but Milton, by reason of his long study and practice
of music, seems to be always writing to melody. In consequence it is easy
to read his most prolix passages, as it is easy to walk over almost any
kind of ground if one but keeps step to outward or inward music. Not only
is Milton's verse stately and melodious, but he is a perfect master of
words, choosing them for their sound as well as for their sense, as a
musician chooses different instruments to express different emotions. Note
these contrasting descriptions of so simple a matter as the opening of
gates: