JOHN MILTON. 1608-1674. JOHN MILTON (1608-1674) was born in Bread Street, Cheapside, 9 Dec., 1608. Educated at St. Paul's School, and Christ's College, Cambridge, he was destined by his family for the Church. From this, however, he was diverted, partly by his strong Puritan bias, partly by an ambition which possessed him from a very early period, to compose a great work which should bring honor this country and to the English language. Full of this lofty purpose, he retired to his father's country residence at Horton, in the county of Bucks. Here he gave himself up to study, and poetical meditation, in preparation for the work to which he had resolved to devote his life. This residence at Horton constitutes Milton's first poetic period, 1632-1638. During these six years he wrote L'Allegro and Il Penseroso, Arcades, Comus, and Lycidas. All these were thrown off by their author as occasional pieces, exercises for practice, preluding to the labor of his Life, which he was all the while meditating. A journey to Italy, 1638-9, was undertaken as a portion of the poet's education which he was giving himself. He was recalled from his tour by the lowering aspect of public affairs at home. For the next twenty years his thoughts were diverted from poetry by the absorbing interest of the civil struggle. His time was occupied, partly by official duties as Latin secretary to the Council of the Commonwealth, partly by the voluntary share he took in the controversies of the time. The public cause to which he had devoted himself being lost, and the ruin of his party consummated in 1660, Milton reverted to his long-cherished poetical scheme. During the twenty years of political agitation this scheme had never been wholly banished from his thoughts. After much besitation, "long choosing and beginning late," both subject and form had been decided on. The poem was to be an epic, and was to treat of the fall and recovery of man. He had begun to compose on this theme as early as 1658, and in 1665 Paradise Lost was completed. Owing to the Plague and the Fire, it was not published till August, 1667. It was originally in ten books, which were afterwards made into twelve, as the normal epical number by subdividing books 7 and 10. The subject of the recovery of man had been dropped out of the plan at an early stage, and was afterwards made the subject of a second poem, Paradise Regained, on a hint given by Milton's young quaker friend, Ellwood. These years of disaster and distress, 1665-6, were specially prolific, if, as is probable, both Paradise Regained and Samson Agonistes were written during them. The two poems came out in one vol. in 1671, and closed Milton's second poetic period. He lived three years longer, during which he occupied himself with carrying through the press a new edition of his Poems (the 1st ed. was 1645) as well as several compilations, which furnished mental occupation without requiring inventive power. He died, 8 Nov., 1674.] THE INVOCATION AND [From Paradise Lost.] Of man's first disobedience, and the fruit woe, With loss of Eden, till one greater Man Of Oreb, or of Sinai, didst inspire In the beginning, how the Heavens and Rose out of Chaos: or, if Sion hill Fast by the oracle of God; I thence Invoke thy aid to my adventurous song, And chiefly thou, O Spirit, that dost Before all temples the upright heart and Wast present, and, with mighty wings Dove-like sat'st brooding on the vast abyss And mad'st it pregnant: what in me is Illumine; what is low raise and support; Say first, for Heaven hides nothing from thy view, Nor the deep tract of Hell; say first, what cause Moved our grand parents, in that happy state, Favor'd of Heaven so highly, to fall off From their Creator, and transgress his will For one restraint, lords of the world besides? Who first seduced them to that foul revolt? The infernal serpent; he it was, whose guile, Stirr'd up with envy and revenge, deceived The mother of mankind, what time his pride Had cast him out of Heaven, with all his host Of rebel angels; by whose aid, aspiring To set himself in glory above his peers, He trusted to have equalled the Most High, If he opposed; and, with ambitious aim Against the throne and monarchy of God, Raised impious war in Heaven, and battle proud, With vain attempt. Him the Almighty power Hurl'd headlong flaming from the ethereal sky, With hideous ruin and combustion, down To bottomless perdition; there to dwell In adamantine chains and penal fire, Who durst defy the Omnipotent to arms. THE FALLEN ANGELS IN THE BURNING LAKE. THE superior fiend Was moving toward the shore: his pon derous shield, Ethereal temper, massy, large and round, Behind him cast; the broad circumfer ence Hung on his shoulder, like the moon, whose orb Through optic glass the Tuscan artist views At evening from the top of Fesolé, pine Hewn on Norwegian hills, to be the mast Of some great ammiral, were but a wand, He walk'd with, to support uneasy steps, Over the burning marle, not like those steps On Heaven's azure; and the torrid clime Smote on him sore besides, vaulted with fire: Nathless he so endured till on the beach Of that inflaméd sea he stood, and call'd His legions, angel forms, who lay intranced, Thick as autumnal leaves that strew the brooks In Vallombrosa, where the Etrurian shades, High over-arch'd, imbower; or scatter'd sedge Afloat, when with fierce winds Orion arm'd Hath vex'd the Red-Sea coast, whose waves o'erthrew Busiris and his Memphian chivalry, While with perfidious hatred they pursued The sojourners of Goshen, who beheld From the safe shore their floating cai To slumber here, as in the vales of Heaven? Or in this abject posture have ye sworn, T'adore the Conqueror? who now beholds Cherub and seraph rolling in the flood With scatter'd arms and ensigns, till anon His swift pursuers, from Heaven-gates, discern Th' advantage, and, descending, tread us down Thus drooping, or with linkéd thunderbolts Transfix us to the bottom of this gulf. SATAN PRESIDING IN THE INFERNAL COUNCIL. HIGH on a throne of royal state which far Outshone the wealth of Ormus and of Ind, Or where the gorgeous East with richest hand Showers on her kings barbaric pearl and gold, Satan exalted sat, by merit raised To that bad eminence: and, from despair Thus high uplifted beyond hope, aspires Beyond thus high, insatiate to pursue Vain war with Heaven, and, by success untaught, His proud imaginations thus display'd: "Powers and dominions, deities of Heaven; For since no deep within her gulf can hold Immortal vigor, though oppress'd and fall'n, I give not Heaven for lost. From this descent Celestial virtues rising, will appear More glorious and more dread than from no fall, And trust themselves to fear no second fate. Me though just right, and the fix'd laws of Heaven, Did first create your leader; next, free choice, With what besides in counsel or in fight Hath been achieved of merit; yet this loss Thus far at least recover'd, hath much more Establish'd in a safe unenvied throne, Yielded with full consent. The happier state In Heaven, which follows dignity, might draw Envy from each inferior; but who here Will envy whom the highest place exposes Foremost to stand against the Thunderer's aim, Your bulwark, and condemns to greatest share Of endless pain? Where there is then no good For which to strive, no strife can grow up there From faction; for none sure will claim in Hell Precedence; none whose portion is so small Of present pain, that with ambitious mind Will covet more. With this advantage then To union, and firm faith, and firm accord, More than can be in heaven, we now return To claim our just inheritance of old, Whether of open war, or covert guile, We now debate: who can advise may speak." ADDRESS TO LIGHT. HAIL, holy Light, offspring of Heaven, first-born, Or of the Eternal coeternal beam, And never but in unapproached light Dwelt from eternity, dwelt then in thee, Bright effluence of bright essence incre ate. Or hear'st thou rather, pure ethereal stream, Whose fountain who shall tell? Before the Sun, Before the Heavens thou wert, and at the voice Of God, as with a mantle, didst invest The rising world of waters dark and deep, Won from the void and formless infinite. Thee I revisit now with a bolder wing, Escaped the Stygian pool, though long detain'd In that obscure sojourn, while, in my flight, Through utter and through middle darkness borne, With other notes than to the Orphéan lyre, I sung of Chaos and eternal Night; Taught by the heavenly Muse to venture down The dark descent, and up to re-ascend, Though hard and rare: thee I revisit safe, And feel thy sovran vital lamp: but thou Revisit'st not these eyes, that roll in vain To find thy piercing ray, and find no dawn; So thick a drop serene hath quench'd their orbs, Or dim suffusion veil'd. Yet not the more Cease I to wander, where the Muses haunt Clear spring, or shady grove, or sunny hill, Smit with the love of sacred song; but chief Thee, Sion, and the flowery brooks beneath, That wash thy hallowed feet, and warbling flow, Nightly I visit: nor sometimes forget Those other two, equall'd with me in fate So were I equall'd with them in renown, Blind Thamyris, and blind Mæonides, |