l:MPSON AND BENTLEY
181
ff, especially 383, he invents a "key word" for Milton,
all,
and de–
clares that the poet does not use this key word "for any but a
wholesale and unquestioned emotion." Disregarding compounds like
"Almighty," Milton uses "all" no less than eight times during the
speeches of Belial and Mammon. Presumably their feeling is very
wholesale indeed, and one would be hard put to find a retail passage
in Milton. In dealing with Pearce, Bentley, and the discussion which
they centered on VI 178, Empson fuddles a couple of issues strangely
in "quoting them both on the 'sound' issue."
God and Nature bid the same,
When he who rules is worthiest, and excels
Them whom he governs. This is servitude..
Bentley amends "governs" to "rules" and "servitude" to "servility,"
the first alteration on the grounds of "force and rotundity," the sec–
ond on grounds of dramatic coherence, because Satan's original ac–
cusation is of "servility." Empson clips off the Milton quote after
"governs," quotes Bentley in support of the first change, and then as
a reply misquotes Pearce on the second, altering his words into com–
plete nonsense.
"Bentley is always ruthless," Empson says, "about large orna–
mental comparisons." But this is neither a full nor an accurate de–
scription of Bentley's position; a random glance shows plenty of elab–
orate similes which he accepts without question. For example, he does
not criticize except in minor details the shield like a moon seen in
a telescope (I 268), the bad angels like a cloud of locusts (I 337),
the bad angels like a hive of bees (I 768), the applause like bluster–
ing winds (II 285), the rejoicing after the consult like calm after
a storm (II 488), Satan like a comet (II 708), Death and Satan like
two black clouds (II 714), Satan like a vulture on Imaus bred
(III 431), or Satan like a scout finding a metropolis (III 543).
Bentley does have a more suspicious attitude toward metaphor
than Milton does; one sign of this is that he likes natural comparisons,
but is impatient of anything which seems to involve unusual book–
learning, strained conceits, or a confusion of mythological systems.
His poetic feeling is strikingly localized in natural objects; but within
his limits, he's perfectly tolerant of the most ornate comparisons.
Of Milton's loose grammar Empson says that he often uses "and"
