51. "_Rage_ is often used in the post-Elizabethan writers of the 17th
century, and in the 18th century writers, for inspiration,
enthusiasm" (Hales). Cf. Cowley:
"Who brought green poesy to her perfect age,
And made that art which was a rage?"
and Tickell, _Prol._:
"How hard the task! How rare the godlike rage!"
Cf. also the use of the Latin _rabies_ for the "divine afflatus," as
in _Æneid_, vi. 49.
53. _Full many a gem_, etc. Cf. Bishop Hall, _Contemplations_: "There
is many a rich stone laid up in the bowells of the earth, many a fair
pearle in the bosome of the sea, that never was seene, nor never
shall bee."
_Purest ray serene_. As Hales remarks, this is a favourite
arrangement of epithets with Milton. Cf. _Hymn on Nativity_:
"flower-inwoven tresses torn;" _Comus_: "beckoning shadows dire;"
"every alley green," etc.; _L'Allegro_: "native wood-notes wild;"
_Lycidas_: "sad occasion dear;" "blest kingdoms meek," etc.