Note 323 — THE LIFE OF SAMUEL JOHNSON, LL.D. (continued 2)

Hannah More wrote of this day (Memoirs, i. 212):—'I accused Dr. Johnson of not having done justice to the Allegro and Penseroso. He spoke disparagingly of both. I praised Lycidas, which he absolutely abused, adding, "if Milton had not written the Paradise Lost, he would have only ranked among the minor Poets. He was a Phidias that could cut a Colossus out of a rock, but could not cut heads out of cherry-stones."' See post, June 13, 1784. The Allegro and Penseroso Johnson described as 'two noble efforts of imagination.' Of Lycidas he wrote:—'Surely no man could have fancied that he read it with pleasure, had he not known the author.' Works, vii. 121, 2.