PART II.—WORKS

CHAPTER I

EARLIEST POEMS IN ENGLISH

IN discussing Milton's minor poems, exclusive of the sonnets, it is well to adopt some convenient lines of division. There is SO little that is juvenile about his work that the usual twofold classification will hardly suffice; there is such variety that his own separation into Latin and English is not fully satisfactory. Perhaps we shall do well to adopt a new division of our own - to treat first the English poems written before the retirement at Horton, excluding the elegies; next the Latin poems, except the "Epitaphium Damonis," and kindred verses; then the companion poems, "L'Allegro" and "Il Penseroso," with a few pendant pieces; then "Arcades" and "Comus," both being masques; and finally "Lycidas,”

together with the other elegies of which it is This division has the advantage

the crown.

of being sufficiently chronological, while at the same time it groups the poems according to their kinds.

We have already seen that as a boy of fifteen Milton attempted paraphrases of Psalms cxiv. and cxxxvi. It was just such a beginning as might have been expected of him, and as the pieces probably represent all that we have of his ante-Cambridge compositions, they possess considerable interest. Minute critics have inferred from them his acquaintance with Spenser and Sylvester's translation of Du Bartas, but it would be fairer to lay stress on the original vigor displayed.

and

"And caused the golden-tressèd sun
All the day long his course to run,"

"The ruddy waves he cleft in twain
Of the Erythræan main,"

are couplets premonitory of the splendid rhythm of the later works, whether or not they contain borrowed epithets.

The English poems composed at Cambridge

an

number exactly eleven, if the little "Song on May Morning" be assigned to that period. Five of these, the elegies on the "Fair Infant" and the Marchioness of Winchester, the two humorous pieces on Hobson, the carrier, and the lines on Shakspere, can be best discussed in detail along with "Lycidas." Two of the others are sonnets, and will be appropriately treated with their fellow-poems in this form. We are thus left to take account of only four pieces, a complete and a fragmentary ode, a song, and an academical exercise amount of verse that would be unworthy of separate treatment but for the fact that it contains Milton's single ode, one of the supreme specimens of its class in our literature. discussing it, however, we must remember that while these eleven Cambridge poems do not represent great fecundity, they do represent both scope and mastery of genius. The two serious elegies are excellent, the lines on Shakspere are noble and indicative of a fine culture, and the sonnets are marked by pure, if serious, charm. In short, it is a body of verse full of promise, as well as evidencing much achieve

Before

ment an achievement sufficient, had he never written another line, to have preserved Milton's name along with those of Barnfield and other minor Elizabethans, though in a somewhat higher category.

The elegy on a "Fair Infant" seems to date from Milton's second year at Cambridge, 1625-26; next in chronological order comes the fragmentary "At a Vacation Exercise," which dates from 1628, the year before he took his Bachelor's degree. He had been appointed to deliver a Latin speech at certain sportive exercises held by the undergraduates. His thesis was the familiar one that all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, but he presented it under a much more decorous title. He was assisted by other students who represented fictitious characters on this special occasion the 'Predicaments' of Aristotle. Milton, in spite of his serious nature, managed to play well his part of "Father" to the unruly assemblage, hence his speech contains jocularities and now unintelligible personal allusions. Suddenly he introduced an innovation; he passed from Latin into English,

apostrophizing nobly his native tongue, and declaiming solemnly fifty sonorous couplets. Much of the poem is dead to us now; but the style cannot die, because it is prophetic of the future master. Even the undergraduates bent on fun must have stood dumb with pride for their brilliant colleague who could thus sing,

"Of kings and queens and heroes old,

Such as the wise Demodocus once told
In solemn songs at King Alcinous' feast."

But Milton would not try their patience, for he soon called up his "Predicaments," and ended with some lines about the chief English rivers that long puzzled the critics until it was discovered not many years ago that the dignified poet was probably punning on the names of two young freshmen, sons of a Sir John Rivers.

His next poetic performance, dating from Christmas, 1629, must have still more astonished his fellow-students, if any of them were permitted to hear it. The famous stanzas entitled "On the Morning of Christ's Nativity," which Hallam has declared to be an ode,