cise. 20. curious: i. e., arranged carefully and somewhat artificially; Milton seems to be criticizing the artificial landscape gardening of his day. knots: flower-beds. boon=generous, profuse. 28. amiable-lovely. Hesperian fables: in the extreme west, according to Greek mythology, were the gardens of the Hesperides, where stood a tree hung with golden apples. 30. lawns-glades, open spaces between woods; the original sense of the word. ¶33. irriguous: well-watered (Latin "rigare," to water). ¶34. without thorn the rose: this was a fancy of the Church Fathers. ¶42. apply: either "add," or "exercise, be busy with" (cf. "ply"). 44. Pan: he was strictly the god of pastures, woods, and flocks, but is considered here as the god of nature in general; "universal" translates his name (Greek wav, all). ¶47. Enna: in Sicily; there, according to the fable, Proserpina, daughter of Ceres, was seized by Pluto, or Dis, who carried her to the lower world to be his bride. ¶51. Daphne: a grove sacred to Apollo (so named from the nymph who fled him and was turned into a tree), on the river Orontes, in Syria. ¶52 Castalian spring: a spring in the grove of Daphne; named after the Castalian spring at Delphi, in Greece. ¶53. Nyseian isle: the island of Nysa, in Libya, around which flowed the river Triton; it was wonderfully fertile and beautiful; here the infant Bacchus (called Dionysus from the name of the island) was reared in secret, according to the legend as told by Diodorus Siculus (III. lxvii-lxx), whom Milton follows. (410) 54. Cham: the form in the Vulgate for "Ham," the name of Noah's son, from whom the Africans were supposed to be descended; Milton's authority for identifying him with Jupiter Ammon is not known; in Diodorus, Ammon is king of Libya. ¶56. Amalthea: a maiden by whom Ammon had Bacchus. florid: a reference to the flushed face of the god of wine. 57. Rhea's: Rhea, daughter of the god Uranus, was the wife of Ammon. ¶5860. The following passage from Heylin's Microcosmos (1627, 3d ed.) will explain the allusion: "[The hill of Amara is] a dayes journey high: on the toppe whereof are 34 pallaces, in which the yonger sonnes of the emperour are continuallie inclosed, to avoide sedition. They injoy there whatsoeuer is fit for delight or princely education. . . . . This mountaine hath but one ascent vp, which is impregnablie fortified." Cf. Samuel Johnson's Rasselas. Abassin Abyssinian. issue-children. ¶61. By Nilus's head: the source of the Nile was then supposed to be in Abyssinia. ¶73. autoritie-authority; Milton's form is closer to the Italian "autorita," and to the Latin "auctoritas." 77-89. Cf. I Cor. 11:7-15. ¶ 79. hyacinthine locks: cf. the Odyssey, vi. 231, "And from his head caused deep curling locks to flow, like the hyacinth flower" (Butcher and Lang's translation); the adjective when used of hair is usually taken to mean "dark colored," the classical hyacinth being dark (see Theocritus, Idylls, x. 28), but here and in the passage from Homer the idea of "clustering" seems quite as fitting. ¶84. wanton playful, sportive. ¶88. coy-modest. (411) 95. descant: a song with variations on the theme. ¶ 117. reform-re-form. ¶ 120. manuring = tending with the hand (Latin "manus," hand). ¶ 121. wanton too freely running hither and thither, luxuriant. ¶134. charm song (O. E. "cirm," M. E. "cherme" or "chirm," the blended song of many birds); the form "charm" is probably due to the influence of the other word "charm" (=spell), derived from Latin "carmen." (412) 136. orient=bright, with perhaps also a suggestion of the original meaning of ,coming from the east." ¶ 139. grateful = pleasing; cf. "gratifying." (412) PARADISE REGAINED. Book IV. 195-364. Satan has just offered Jesus worlddominion if he would worship him, and Jesus has rebuked him. ¶ 6. What .... I receive: i. e., worship. ¶7. Tetrarchs: subordinate rulers (Greek Teтpápxns, a leader of four companies; Terpa, four, apxev, to rule); here there is a special precision in the use of the word, these fallen angels being the rulers of the four elements of fire, air, water, and earth; cf. "Il Penseroso," ll. 93, 94, P. 349. 9. The sense is, "invoked as god of this world and of the world below"; cf. The Faerie Queene, II. vii. 64, 65, p. 64. ¶21-26. See Luke 2:40-52. (413) 25. Moses' chair: cf. Matt. 23: 2, "The scribes and Pharisees sit in Moses' seat."¶40. idolisms=fallacies, false imaginations; Milton seems to have coined the word; cf. Greek eidwλov, image, fancy, and Bacon's idola, or phantoms, of the market-place, of the theater, etc. (Novum Organum, 1620). 41. evinc't conquered. ¶42. specular mount: mount of observation; cf. Matt. 4:8, "The devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world and the glory of them." ¶47. wits: men of intellect (O. E. "witan," to know; cognate with Latin "videre," to see). ¶ 48. hospitable: some of the most famous residents of Athens, as Zeno, Plato, and Aristotle, were not natives of that city. 48. recess = place of retirement. ¶50. Academe: Plato's place of teaching was a garden with olive trees, about a mile from Athens, near the precinct sacred to the hero Academus. 51. Attic bird: the nightingale; so called because nightingales were very numerous in Attica and are often referred to in Attic literature. ¶ 56. the walls: i. e., the walls of Athens. ¶57. his: Aristotle's; the Lyceum was really outside the walls, ན།59. painted Stoa: the Stoa was a portico in Athens, covered with paintings of scenes from the Persian War; it was the lecturing place of Zeno, founder of the Stoic school of philosophy. ¶ 60. There: i. e., in Athens. ¶63. Eolian charms: songs, such as the poems of Sappho and Alcaeus, in the Æolic dialect. Dorian: the odes of Pindar and of some other Greek lyrists are in the Dorian dialect. (414) 64. gave them breath: i. e., inspired them. 65. Melesigenes: Homer; so called because he was "born" on the banks of the "Meles," in Ionia. thence: thereafter, later, when he had become blind (Greek ò un òpŵr, the not-seeing). ¶ 68. chorus or iambic: the dialogue in Greek tragedies was in iambic verse; the choruses were in various measures. ¶ 75. democraty: Milton apparently preferred this form (which he uses also in his prose) because it is nearer to the Greek onμoкparía. ¶76. fulmined thundered (Latin "fulmen," thunderbolt). ¶77. Macedon: Milton is thinking of Demosthenes, who in his Philippics denounced Philip, king of Macedonia, who was planning to subdue Greece. Artaxerxes': Artaxerxes, son of Xerxes, was king of Persia from 465 to 425 B. C.; Pericles delivered powerful speeches against him. 179, 80. the low-roofed house Of Socrates: Xenophon, in his Memorabilia, makes Socrates say that his house and its contents would hardly bring five minae, about $100. 184. Academics old and new: Plato's Academe, and the Middle Academy and Later Academy, founded in the third century and the second century B. C. 85. Surnamed Peripatetics: the disciples of Aristotle, who was called "Peripatetic" because he "walked about" while lecturing. ¶87. revolve: revolve in mind, turn over, meditate. 92. or, think: i. e., or, suppose. 99, 100. Socrates, whom the oracle at Delphi had pronounced the wisest of men, modestly explained the oracle by saying that he knew that he knew nothing, while other men did not even know that they were ignorant. 101. The next Plato. 102. A third sort: the Pyrrhics, or sceptics. 103. Others: perhaps the followers of Aristotle. (415) 105. he: Epicurus. 106. in philosophic pride: supply "placed felicity" before the phrase. 109. prefer: i. e., to God; the object is "man," l. 107. 127. An empty cloud: there seems to be an allusion to the myth of Ixion, who embraced a cloud, thinking it was Juno, and begat the Centaurs. ¶ 128. Wise men: the reference is to Solomon; see Eccles. 12:12, "Of making many books there is no end; and much study is a weariness of the flesh." (416) 160. statists: statesmen. (416) SAMSON AGONISTES. Lines 1-109, 1,596–1,758. Agonistes struggler, champion. The argument, by Milton, is as follows: "Samson made captive, blind, and now in the prison of Gaza, there to labor as in a common workhouse, on a festival day, in the general cessation from labor, comes forth into the open air, to a place nigh, somewhat retired, there to sit awhile to bemoan his condition. Where he happens at length to be visited by certain friends and equals of his tribe, which make the Chorus, who seek to comfort him what they can: then by his old father, Manoa, who endeavors the like, and withal tells him his purpose to procure his liberty by ransom; lastly, that this feast was proclaimed by the Philistines as a day of thanksgiving for their deliverance from the hands of Samson, which yet more troubles him. Manoa then departs to prosecute his endeavor with the Philistian lords for Samson's redemption; who in the meantime is visited by other persons; and lastly by a public officer to require his coming to the feast before the lords and people, to play or show his strength in their presence; he at first refuses, dismissing the public officer with absolute denial to come; at length, persuaded inwardly that this was from God, he yields to go along with him, who now came the second time with great threatenings to fetch him. The Chorus yet remaining on the place, Manoa returns full of joy, hopeful to procure ere long his son's deliverance: in the midst of which discourse an Ebrew comes in haste, confusedly at first and afterwards more distinctly relating the catastrophe, what Samson had done to the Philistines, and by accident to himself, wherewith the tragedy ends." (416) Samson's Lament. (417) 13. sea-idol: see Paradise Lost, I. 462, 463, p. 398. ¶ 23-32. See Judges, chap. 13. ¶45. Had been = would have been. but through = except for. ¶ 50, 51. See Judges 16:16, 17. (418) 70. prime = earliest. ¶87. silent as the moon: "luna silens" was the Latin expres ions for the absence of the moon. (419) 106. obnoxious = subject to harm (Latin "ob," against, "noxa," harm). (420) 24. cataphracts: men in mail, on horses in mail (Greek karádpaktos, covered). 52, 53. The sense is, As when mountains tremble with the force of pent-up winds and waters. (421) 74. sublime lifted up. ¶ 79. Silo: Shiloh; the tabernacle and ark of Jehovah were there at that time. 87. fond foolish. ¶90. Insensate without sense, foolish. to sense reprobate: knowing truth, but so morally depraved that they do not follow it. 95. virtue valor. 97. dragon= serpent. 100. villatic of a farm (Latin "villa" farm). (422) 104. self-begotten bird: the phoenix, of which there was supposed to be only one at a time in the world; at certain intervals it was consumed, and sprang, renewed, from its own ashes. ¶ 105. embost-inclosed in a wood, imbosked (Italian "bosco," a wood). ¶ 107. holocaust: a whole burnt offering (Greek öλos, whole, xaiw, to burn). ¶ 112. secular=living through successive ages (Latin "saecula," ages). 113. Manoa: the father of Samson. 118. Sons of Caphtor: the Philistines; "Caphtor" was a name for Crete, whence it was thought that the Philistines had originally come. (423) 160. acquist - acquisition. CONTEMPORARY CRITICISM "Although not openly acknowledged by the author, yet it [Comus] is a legitimate offspring, so lovely and so much desired that the often copying of it hath tired my pen to give my several friends satisfaction and brought me to a necessity of producing it to the public view."-Henry Lawes' dedication of the 1637 edition of Comus. "Since your going, you have charged me with new obligations, both for a very kind letter from you, dated the 6th of this month, and for a dainty piece of entertainment [Comus) which came therewith; wherein I should much commend the tragical part, if the lyrical did not ravish me with a certain Doric delicacy in your songs and odes, whereunto I must plainly confess to have seen yet nothing parallel in our language: ipsa mollities ['softness itself']. But I must not omit to tell you that I now only owe you thanks for intimating unto me (how modestly soever) the true artificer. For the work itself I had viewed some good while before with singular delight, having received it from our common friend, Mr. R."-Sir Henry Wotton, provost of Eton College, in a letter to Milton, April 13, 1638. "The author's more peculiar excellency in these studies was too well known to conceal his papers or to keep me from attempting to solicit them from him. Let the event guide itself which way it will, I shall deserve of the age by bringing into the light as true a birth as the Muses have brought forth since our famous Spenser wrote; whose poems in these English ones are as rarely imitated as sweetly excelled."-Humphrey Moseley, the publisher of Milton's minor poems, 1645, "The Stationer to the Reader." That majesty which through thy work doth reign And things divine thou treat'st of in such state As them preserves, and thee, inviolate. At once delight and horror on us seize, Thou sing'st with so much gravity and ease. And above human flight doth soar aloft Where couldst thou words of such a compass find? In number, weight, and measure, needs not rhyme. -Andrew Marvell, 1674. "With the remaining tragedies I shall also send you some reflections on that Paradise Lost of Milton's, which some are pleased to call a poem, and assert rhyme against the slender sophistry wherewith he attacks it."-Thomas Rymer, The Tragedies of the Last Age, 1678. To the dead bard your fame a little owes, A chaos, for no perfect world was found Till through the heap your mighty genius shined: He was the golden ore which you refined. Betwixt ye both is framed a nobler piece Than e'er was drawn in Italy or Greece. -Nathaniel Lee, prefatory poem on Dryden's State of Innocence, 1674. "I cannot, without injury to the deceased author of Paradise Lost, but acknowledge that this poem has received its entire foundation, part of the design, and many of the ornaments from him. What I have borrowed will be so easily discerned from my mean productions that I shall not need to point the reader to the places; and truly I should be sorry, for my own sake, that any one should take the pains to compare them together, the original being undoubtedly one of the greatest, most noble, and most sublime poems which either this age or nation has produced. And though I could not refuse the partiality of my friend, who is pleased to commend me in his verses, I hope they will rather be esteemed the effect of his love to me than of his deliberate and sober judgment."-John Dryden, preface to The State of Innocence, 1674. "Milton's Paradise Lost is admirable; but am I therefore bound to maintain that there are no flats amongst his elevations, when it is evident he creeps along sometimes for above an hundred lines together? Cannot I admire the height of his invention and the strength of his expression, without defending his antiquated words and the perpetual harshness of their sound?"— Dryden, preface to the Second Miscellany, 1685. "As for Mr. Milton, whom we all admire with so much justice, his subject is not that of an heroic poem, properly so called. His design is the losing of our happiness; his event is not prosperous, like that of all other epic works; his heavenly machines are many, and his human persons are but two. But I will not take Mr. Rymer's work out of his hands: he has promised the world a critique on that author; wherein though he will not allow his poem for heroic, I hope he will grant us that his thoughts are elevated, his words sounding, and that no man has so happily copied the manner of Homer, or so copiously translated his Grecisms and the Latin elegances of Virgil. It is true, he runs into a flat of thought, sometimes for a hundred lines together, but it is when he has got into a track of Scripture. His antiquated words were his choice, not his necessity; for therein he imitated Spenser, as Spenser did Chaucer. . . . . Neither will I justify Milton for his blank verse, though I may excuse him by the example of Hannibal Caro and other Italians who have used it; for, whatever causes he alleges for the abolishing of rhyme (which I have not now the leisure to examine), his own particular reason is plainly this-that rhyme was not his talent; he had neither the ease of doing it, nor the graces of it: which is manifest in his Juvenilia, or verses written in his youth, where his rhyme is always constrained and forced, .... and comes hardly from him, at an age when the soul is most pliant, and the passion of love makes almost every man a rhymer though not a poet.-John Dryden, A Discourse on Satire, 1692. .... "John Milton was one whose natural parts might deservedly give him a place amongst the principal of our English poets. . . But his fame is gone out like a candle in a snuff, and his memory will always stink, which might have ever lived in honorable repute, had not he been a notorious traitor and most impiously and villainously belied that blessed martyr, King Charles the First."-William Winstanley, The Lives of the Most Famous English Poets, 1687. "One of the greatest and most daring geniuses that has appeared in the world, and who has made his country a glorious present of the most lofty but most irregular poem that has been produced by the mind of man. . . . . Milton was the first who in the space of almost four thousand years resolved, for his country's honor and his own, to present the world with an original poem; that is to say, a poem that should have his own thoughts, his own images, and his own spirit. In order to do this he was resolved to write a poem, that by virtue of its extraordinary subject, cannot so properly be said to be against the rules as it may be affirmed to be above them all. We shall now show for what reasons the choice of Milton's subject, as it set him free from the obligations which he lay under to the poetical laws, so it necessarily threw him upon new thoughts, new images, and an original spirit. In the next place we shall show that his thoughts, his images, and, by consequence too, his spirit, are actually new, and different from those of Homer and Virgil. Thirdly, we shall show that, besides their newness, they have vastly the advantage of Homer and Virgil."-John Dennis, prospectus of The Grounds of Criticism in Poetry, 1704. .... "All Milton's thoughts are wonderfully just and natural in that inimitable description which Adam makes of himself in the eighth book of Paradise Lost."-Richard Steele, The Tatler, April 23, 1709. "I shall conclude this paper with Milton's inimitable description of Adam's awakening his Eve in paradise. . . . . The fondness of the posture in which Adam is represented, and the softness of his whisper, are passages in this divine poem that are above all commendation and rather to be admired than praised."-Richard Steele, The Tatler, December 14, 1710. .... "Aristotle himself allows that Homer has nothing to boast of as to the unity of his fable. Some have been of opinion that the Eneid also labors in this particular. . . . . On the contrary, the poem [Paradise Lost] which we have now under our consideration hath no other episodes than such as naturally arise from the subject, and yet is filled with such a multitude of astonishing incidents that it gives us at the same time a pleasure of the greatest variety and of the greatest simplicity. The third qualification of an epic poem is its greatness. Milton's subject was still greater than either of the former [the Iliad and the Eneid); it does not determine the fate of single persons or nations, but of a whole species. The united powers of hell are joined together for the destruction of mankind, which they effected in part, and would have completed had not Omnipotence itself interposed. The principal actors are man in his greatest perfection and woman in her highest beauty. Their enemies are the fallen angels; the Messiah, their friend; and the Almighty, their protector. In short, everything that is great in the whole circle of being, whether within the verge of nature or out of it, has a proper part assigned it in this noble poem. ... Another principal actor in this poem is the great Enemy of Mankind. The part of Ulysses in Homer's Odyssey is very much admired by Aristotle, as perplexing that fable with very agreeable plots and intricacies; ... .... but the crafty being I have now mentioned makes a much longer voyage than Ulysses, puts in practice many more wiles and stratagems, and hides himself under a greater variety of shapes and appear. ances, all of which are severally detected, to the great delight and surprise of the reader. Milton's chief talent, and indeed his distinguishing excellence, lies in the sublimity of his thoughts. There are others of the moderns who rival him in every other part of poetry; but in the greatness of his sentiments he triumphs over all the poets, both modern and ancient, Homer only excepted. It is impossible for the imagination of man to distend itself with greater ideas than those which he has laid together in his first, second, and sixth books. . . . . The |