77615 WITH INTRODUCTION AND NOTES BY W. BELL, M.A. PROFESSOR OF PHILOSOPHY AND LOGIC, GOVERNMENT COLLEGE, Lahore London NEW YORK: THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 1898 All rights reserved First Edition, April 1898. 3 GLASGOW: PRINTED AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS BY ROBERT MACLEHOSE AND CO. GENERAL INTRODUCTION. I. Pre-literary period, 1608-25. II. Period of College and Country life and Travel, 1625-40. III. Controversial period, 1640-60. IV. Period of Great Poems, 1660-74. I. John Milton was born on December 9th, 1608, about eight years before the death of Shakespeare. His father, a prosperous London scrivener, was a pious and cultured man, and chose as his son's first tutor Thomas Young, a Puritan divine. In his twelfth year 3 |