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it by repudiation. In 1644 he published a work | however, suffered no eclipse from this loss of his

on "The Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce;" and, in the next year, it was followed by "Tetrachordon, or Expositions upon the four chief Places in Scripture which treat of Marriage." He farther reduced his doctrine into practice, by paying his addresses to a young lady of great accomplishments; but, as he was paying a visit to a neighbour and kinsman, he was surprised with the sudden entrance of his wife, who threw herself at his feet, and implored forgiveness. After a short struggle of resentment, he took her to his bosom; and he sealed the reconciliation by opening his house to her father and brothers, when they had been driven from home by the triumph of the republican arms.

In the progress of Milton's prose works, it will be right to mention his "Areopagitica; a Speech of Mr. John Milton, for the Liberty of Unlicensed Printing,"—a work, published in 1644,written with equal spirit and ability, and which, when reprinted in 1738, was affirmed by the editor to be the best defence that had ever then appeared of that essential article of public liberty. In the following year he took care that his poetical character should not be lost to the world, and published his juvenile poems, Latin and English.

Milton's principles of the origin and end of government carried him to a full approbation of the trial and execution of the king; and, in order to conciliate the minds of the people to that act, he published, early in 1649, a work entitled, "The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates; proving that it is lawful, and hath been so held through all ages, for any who have the power, to call to account a tyrant or wicked king; and, after due conviction, to depose and put him to death, if the ordinary magistrate have neglected or denied to do it." Certainly, it would not be easy to express, in stronger terms, an author's resolution to leave no doubts concerning his opinion on this important topic. His appointment to the Latin Secretaryship to the Council of State was, probably, the consequence of his decision.

The learned Frenchman, Salmasius, or Saumaise, having been hired by Charles II., while in Holland, to write a work in favour of the royal cause, which he entitled, "Defensio Regia," Milton was employed to answer it; which he did in 1651, by his celebrated "Defensio pro Populo Anglicano," in which he exercised all his powers of Latin rhetoric, both to justify the republican party, and to confound and vilify the famous scholar against whom he took up the pen. By this piece he acquired a high repu- | tation, both at home and abroad; and he received a present of a thousand pounds from the English government. His book went through several editions; while, on the other hand, the work of Salmasius was suppressed by the States of Holland, in whose service he lived as a professor at Leyden.

sensitive faculties; and he pursued, without intermission, both his official and his controversial occupations. Cromwell, about this time, having assumed the supreme power, with the title of Protector, Milton acted with a subservience towards this usurper which is the part of his conduct that it is the most difficult to justify. It might have been expected, that when the wisest and most conscientious of the republicans had become sensible of his arts, and opposed his ambitious projects, the mind of Milton would neither have been blinded by his hypocrisy, nor overawed by his power. Possibly the real cause of his predilection for Cromwell, was that he saw no refuge from the intolerance of the Presbyterians, but in the moderation of the Protector. And, in fact, the very passage in which he addresses him with the loftiest encomium, contains a free and noble exhortation to him to respect that public liberty, of which he appeared to be the guardian.

Cromwell at length died; and so zealous and sanguine was Milton, to the very last, that one of his latest political productions was, "A ready and easy Way to establish a free Commonwealth.” It was in vain, however, to contend, by pamphlets, with the national inclination; and Charles II. returned in triumph. Milton was discharged from his office, and lay for some time concealed in the house of a friend. The House of Commons desired that his Majesty would issue a proclamation to call in Milton's Defences of the People, and Iconoclastes, together with a book of Goodwyn's. The books were accordingly burnt by the common hangman; but the authors were returned as having absconded; nor, in the act of indemnity, did the name of Milton appear among those of the excepted persons.

He now, in reduced circumstances, and under the discountenance of power, removed to a private habitation near his former residence. He had buried his first wife; and a second, the daughter of a Captain Woodcock, in Hackney, died in childbed. To solace his forlorn condition, he desired his friend, Dr. Paget, to look out a third wife for him, who recommended a relation of his own, named Elizabeth Minshull, of a good family in Cheshire. His powerful mind, now centered in itself, and undisturbed by contentions and temporary topics, opened to those great ideas which were continually filling it, and the result was, Paradise Lost. Much discussion has taken place concerning the original conception of this grand performance; but whatever hint may have suggested the rude outline, it is certain that all the creative powers of a strong imagination, and all the accumulated stores of a life devoted to learning, were expended in its completion. Though he appears, at an early age, to have thought of some subject in the heroic times of English history, as peculiarly calculated for English verse, yet his religious turn, and assiduous study of Milton's intense application to study had, for the Hebrew Scriptures, produced a final preference some years preceding, brought on an affection of of a story derived from the Sacred Writings, and the eyes, which gradually impaired his sight; and, giving scope to the introduction of his theological before he wrote his "Defensio," he was warned by system. It would be superfluous, at this time, to his physicians that the effort would probably end in weigh the merits of Milton's great work, which total blindness. This opinion was soon after justi- stands so much beyond competition; but it may be fied by a gutta serena, which seized both his eyes, affirmed, that whatever his other poems can exand subjected the remainder of his life to those pri-hibit of beauty in some parts, or of grandeur in vations which he has so feelingly described in some others, may all be referred to Paradise Lost as passages of his poems. His intellectual powers, the most perfect model of both.

Milton, not exhausted by this great effort, followed it in 1670 by "Paradise Regained," written upon a suggestion of the Quaker Elwood's, and apparently regarded as the theological completion of the Paradise Lost. Although, in point of invention, its inferiority is plainly apparent, yet modern criticism has pronounced that there are passages in it by no means unworthy of the genius of Milton, allowance being made for the small compass of the subject, and his purpose in writing it. Together with it appeared his tragedy of "Sampson Agonistes," composed upon the model of antiquity, and never intended for the stage.

With this work his poetical account closes; and a few pieces in prose can scarcely claim particular notice. He sunk tranquilly under an exhaustion of the vital powers in November, 1674, when he had nearly completed his 66th year. His remains were carried from his house in Bunhill-Fields to the church of St. Giles, Cripplegate, with a numerous and splendid attendance. No monument marked the tomb of this great man, but his memory was honoured with a tomb in 1737, in Westminster Abbey, at the expense of Auditor Benson. The only family whom he left were daughters.

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'Mongst horrid shapes, and shrieks, and sights unFind out some uncouth cell,

[wings,

Where brooding Darkness spreads his jealous And the night-raven sings;

There under ebon shades, and low-brow'd rocks, As ragged as thy locks,

In dark Cimmerian desert ever dwell.
But come, thou goddess fair and free,
In Heaven yclep'd Euphrosyne,
And by men, heart-easing Mirth;
Whom lovely Venus, at a birth,
With two sister Graces more,
To ivy-crowned Bacchus bore :
Or whether (as some sager sing)

The frolic wind, that breathes the spring,
Zephyr, with Aurora playing,
As he met her once a-maying;
There on beds of violets blue,
And fresh-blown roses wash'd in dew,
Fill'd her with thee a daughter fair,
So buxom, blithe, and debonair.

Haste thee, Nymph, and bring with thee
Jest and youthful Jollity,

Quips, and Cranks, and wanton Wiles,
Nods, and Becks, and wreathed Smiles,

Such as hang on Hebe's cheek,
And love to live in dimple sleek;
Sport that wrinkled Care derides,
And laughter holding both his sides.
Come, and trip it, as you go,
On the light fantastic toe;
And in thy right hand lead with thee
The mountain-nymph, sweet Liberty;
And, if I give thee honour due,
Mirth, admit me of thy crew,
To live with her, and live with thee,
In unreproved pleasures free.
To hear the lark begin his flight,
And singing startle the dull Night,
From his watch-tower in the skies,
Till the dappled Dawn doth rise;

Then to come, in spite of sorrow,
And at my window bid good morrow,
Through the sweet-brier, or the vine,
Or the twisted eglantine:
While the cock, with lively din,

Scatters the rear of Darkness thin.

And to the stack, or the barn-door
Stoutly struts his dames before:

Oft listening how the hounds and horn
Cheerly rouse the slumbering Morn,
From the side of some hoar hill,
Through the high wood echoing shrill:
Some time walking, not unseen,
By hedge-row elms, on hillocks green,
Right against the eastern-gate
Where the great Sun begins his state,
Rob'd in flames, and amber light,
The clouds in thousand liveries dight;
While the ploughman, near at hand,
Whistles o'er the furrow'd land,
And the milkmaid singeth blithe,
And the mower whets his sithe,
And every shepherd tells his tale
Under the hawthorn in the dale.
Straight mine eye hath caught new pleasures,
Whilst the landscape round it measures;
Russet lawns, and fallows gray,
Where the nibbling flocks do stray;
Mountains, on whose barren breast,
The labouring clouds do often rest;
Meadows trim with daisies pide,
Shallow brooks, and rivers wide:
Towers and battlements it sees
Bosom'd high in tufted trees,
Where perhaps some beauty lies,
The Cynosure of neighbouring eyes.
Hard by, a cottage chimney smoaks,
From betwixt two aged oaks,
Where Corydon and Thyrsis, met,
Are at their savoury dinner set
Of herbs and other country messes,
Which the neat-handed Phillis dresses;
And then in haste her bower she leaves,
With Thestylis to bind the sheaves;
Or, if the earlier season lead,
To the tann'd haycock in the mead.
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Sometimes with secure delight
The upland hamlets will invite,
When the merry bells ring round,
And the jocund rebecks sound
To many a youth, and many a maid.
Dancing in the chequer'd shade;
And young and old come forth to play
On a sun-shine holiday,
Till the live-long day-light fail :
Then to the spicy nut-brown ale,
With stories told of many a feat,
How faery Mab the junkets eat;
She was pinch'd, and pull'd, she sed;
And he, by friars lantern led,
Tells how the drudging goblin swet,
To earn his cream-bowl duly set,
When in one night, ere glimpse of morn,
His shadowy flail hath thresh'd the corn,
That ten day-labourers could not end;
Then lies him down the lubbar fiend,
And, stretch'd out all the chimney's length,
Basks at the fire his hairy strength;
And crop-full out of doors he flings,
Ere the first cock his matin rings.
Thus done the tales, to bed they creep,
By whispering winds soon lull'd asleep.
Tower'd cities please us then,

And the busy hum of men,

Where throngs of knights and barons bold,
In weeds of peace, high triumphs hold,
With store of ladies, whose bright eyes
Rain influence, and judge the prize
Of wit, or arms, while both contend
To win her grace, whom all commend.
There let Hymen oft appear
In saffron robe, with taper clear,
And pomp, and feast, and revelry,
With mask, and antique pageantry;
Such sights as youthful poets dream
On summer eves by haunted stream.
Then to the well-trod stage anon,
If Jonson's learned sock be on,
Or sweetest Shakspeare, Fancy's child,
Warble his native wood-notes wild.

And ever, against eating cares,
Lap me in soft Lydian airs,
Married to immortal verse;
Such as the meeting soul may pierce,
In notes, with many a winding bout
Of linked sweetness long drawn out,
With wanton heed and giddy cunning;
The melting voice through mazes running,
Untwisting all the chains that tie
The hidden soul of harmony;
That Orpheus' self may heave his head
From golden slumber on a bed

Of heap'd Elysian flowers, and hear
Such strains as would have won the ear

Of Pluto, to have quite set free
His half-regain'd Eurydice.

These delights if thou canst give,
Mirth, with thee I mean to live.

IL PENSEROSO.

HENCE, vain deluding Joys,

The brood of Folly, without father bred!
How little you bested,

Or fill the fixed mind with all your toys!

Dwell in some idle brain,

And fancies fond with gaudy shapes possess, As thick and numberless

As the gay motes that people the sun-beams; Or likest hovering dreams,

The fickle pensioners of Morpheus' train.
But hail, thou goddess, sage and holy,
Hail, divinest Melancholy!

Whose saintly visage is too bright
To hit the sense of human sight,
And therefore to our weaker view
O'erlaid with black, staid Wisdom's hue;
Black, but such as in esteem
Prince Memnon's sister might beseem,
Or that starr'd Ethiop queen that strove
To set her beauty's praise above

The sea-nymphs, and their powers offended:
Yet thou art higher far descended:
Thee bright-hair'd Vesta, long of yore,
To solitary Saturn bore;

His daughter she; in Saturn's reign,
Such mixture was not held a stain:
Oft in glimmering bowers and glades
He met her, and in secret shades
Of woody Ida's inmost grove,
Whilst yet there was no fear of Jove.
Come, pensive Nun, devout and pure,
Sober, stedfast, and demure,
All in a robe of darkest grain,
Flowing with majestic train,
And sable stole of Cyprus lawn,
Over thy decent shoulders drawn.
Come, but keep thy wonted state,
With even step, and musing gait ;
And looks commercing with the skies,
Thy rapt soul sitting in thine eyes:
There, held in holy passion still,
Forget thyself to marble, till
With a sad leaden downward cast
Thou fix them on the earth as fast:
And join with thee calm Peace, and Quiet,
Spare Fast, that oft with gods doth diet,
And hears the Muses in a ring

Aye round about Jove's altar sing:
And add to these retired Leisure,
That in trim gardens takes his pleasure:
But first, and chiefest, with thee bring,
Him that yon soars on golden wing,
Guiding the fiery-wheeled throne,
The cherub Contemplation;
And the mute Silence hist along,
'Less Philomel will deign a song,
In her sweetest saddest plight,
Smoothing the rugged brow of Night,
While Cynthia checks her dragon yoke,
Gently o'er the accustom'd oak:

Sweet bird, that shunn'st the noise of folly,

Most musical, most melancholy!

Thee, chantress, oft, the woods among,

I woo, to hear thy even-song;

And, missing thee, I walk unseen
On the dry smooth-shaven green,
To behold the wandering Moon,
Riding near her highest noon,
Like one that had been led astray
Through the Heaven's wide pathless way;
And oft, as if her head she bow'd,
Stooping through a fleecy cloud.
Oft, on a plat of rising ground,

I hear the far-off Curfeu sound,

Over some wide-water'd shore,
Swinging slow with sullen roar :
Or, if the air will not permit,
Some still removed place will fit,
Where glowing embers through the room
Teach light to counterfeit a gloom;
Far from all resort of mirth,
Save the cricket on the hearth,
Or the belman's drowsy charm,
To bless the doors from nightly harm.
Or let my lamp at midnight hour,
Be seen in some high lonely tower,
Where I may oft out-watch the Bear,
With thrice-great Hermes, or unsphere
The spirit of Plato, to unfold

What worlds or what vast regions hold
The immortal mind, that hath forsook
Her mansion in this fleshly nook:
And of those demons that are found
In fire, air, flood, or under ground,
Whose power hath a true consent
With planet, or with element.
Sometime let gorgeous Tragedy
In scepter'd pall come sweeping by,
Presenting Thebes, or Pelops' line,
Or the tale of Troy divine;
Or what (though rare) of later age
Ennobled hath the buskin'd stage.

But, O sad virgin, that thy power
Might raise Museus from his bower!
Or bid the soul of Orpheus sing
Such notes, as, warbled to the string,
Drew iron tears down Pluto's cheek,
And made Hell grant what love did seek!
Or call up him that left half-told
The story of Cambuscan bold,
Of Camball, and of Algarsife,
And who had Canace to wife,

That own'd the virtuous ring and glass;
And of the wondrous horse of brass.
On which the Tartar king did ride :
And if aught else great bards beside
In sage and solemn tunes have sung,
Of turneys, and of trophies hung,
Of forests, and enchantments drear,
Where more is meant than meets the ear.

Thus, Night, oft see me in thy pale career,
Till civil-suited Morn appear,

Not trick'd and frounc'd as she was wont
With the Attic boy to hunt,
But kercheft in a comely cloud,
While rocking winds are piping loud,
Or ushered with a shower still
When the gust hath blown his fill,
Ending on the russling leaves,
With minute drops from off the eaves.
And, when the Sun begins to fling
His flaring beams, me, goddess, bring
To arched walks of twilight groves,
And shadows brown, that Sylvan loves,
Of pine, or monumental oak,
Where the rude axe, with heaved stroke,
Was never heard the nymphs to daunt,
Or fright them from their hallow'd haunt.
There in close covert by some brook,
Where no profaner eye may look,
Hide me from day's garish eye,
While the bee with honied thigh,
That at her flowery work doth sing,
And the waters murmuring,

LYCIDAS.

With such consort as they keep,
Entice the dewy feather'd Sleep;
And let some strange mysterious dream
Wave at his wings in aery stream
Of lively portraiture display'd,
Softly on my eye-lids laid.

And, as I wake, sweet music breathe
Above, about, or underneath,
Sent by some spirit to mortal good,
Or the unseen genius of the wood.
But let my due feet never fail
To walk the studious cloysters pale,
And love the high-embowed roof,
With antic pillars massy proof,
And storied windows richly dight,
Casting a dim religious light:
There let the pealing organ blow,
To the full-voic'd quire below,
In service high and anthems clear,
As may with sweetness, through mine ear,
Dissolve me into ecstacies,

And bring all Heaven before mine eyes.
And may at last my weary age
Find out the peaceful hermitage,
The hairy gown and mossy cell,
Where I may sit and rightly spell
Of every star that Heaven doth shew,
And every herb that sips the dew;
Till old experience do attain
To something like prophetic strain.

These pleasures, Melancholy, give,
And I with thee will choose to live.

LYCIDAS.

YET once more, O ye laurels, and once more,
Ye myrtles brown, with ivy never-sere,
I come to pluck your berries harsh and crude:
And, with forc'd fingers rude,

Shatter your leaves before the mellowing year:
Bitter constraint, and sad occasion dear,
Compels me to disturb your season due:
For Lycidas is dead, dead ere his prime,
Young Lycidas, and hath not left his peer:
Who would not sing for Lycidas? he knew
Himself to sing, and build the lofty rhyme.
He must not float upon his watery bier
Unwept, and welter to the parching wind,
Without the meed of some melodious tear.
Begin then, Sisters of the sacred well,

That from beneath the seat of Jove doth spring;
Begin, and somewhat loudly sweep the string.
Hence with denial vain, and coy excuse:
So may some gentle Muse

With lucky words favour my destin'd urn;
And, as he passes, turn

And bid fair peace be to my sable shroud.

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For we were nurs'd upon the self-same hill,
Fed the same flock, by fountain, shade, and rill.
Together both, ere the high lawns appear'd
Under the opening eye-lids of the Morn,
We drove afield, and both together heard
What time the gray-fly winds her sultry horn,
Battening our flocks with the fresh dews of night,
Oft till the star, that rose, at evening bright,
Toward Heaven's descent had slop'd his westering
wheel.

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Meanwhile the rural ditties were not mute, Temper'd to the oaten flute;

Rough Satyrs danc'd, and Fawns with cloven heel From the glad sound would not be absent long; And old Damætas lov'd to hear our song.

But, O the heavy change, now thou art gone,
Now thou art gone, and never must return!
Thee, shepherd, thee the woods, and desert caves
With wild thyme and the gadding vine o'ergrown,
And all their echoes, mourn:

The willows, and the hazel copses green,
Shall now no more be seen

Fanning their joyous leaves to thy soft lays.
As killing as the canker to the rose,

Or taint-worm to the weanling herds that graze,
Or frost to flowers, that their gay wardrobe wear,
When first the white-thorn blows;
Such, Lycidas, thy loss to shepherds' ear.

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Where were ye, Nymphs, when the remorseless deep

Clos'd o'er the head of your lov'd Lycidas?
For neither were ye playing on the steep,
Where your old bards, the famous Druids, lie,
Nor on the shaggy top of Mona high,

Nor yet where Deva spreads her wizard stream:
Ay me! I fondly dream!

Had ye been there

done?

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for what could that have

What could the Muse herself that Orpheus bore,
The Muse herself, for her enchanting son,
Whom universal Nature did lament,
When, by the rout that made the hideous roar,
His gory visage down the stream was sent,
Down the swift Hebrus to the Lesbian shore?

Alas! what boots it with incessant care
To tend the homely, slighted, shepherd's trade,
And strictly meditate the thankless Muse?
Were it not better done, as others use,
To sport with Amaryllis in the shade,
Or with the tangles of Neæra's hair?

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Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise
(That last infirmity of noble mind)
To scorn delights and live laborious days;
But the fair guerdon when we hope to find,
And think to burst out into sudden blaze,
Comes the blind Fury with the abhorred shears,
And slits the thin-spun life. "But not the praise,"
Phoebus replied, and touch'd my trembling ears;
"Fame is no plant that grows on mortal soil,
Nor in the glistering foil

Set off to the world, nor in broad rumour lies:
But lives and spreads aloft by those pure eyes,
And perfect witness of all-judging Jove;
As he pronounces lastly on each deed,

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Of so much fame in Heaven expect thy meed."
O fountain Arethuse, and thou honour'd flood,
Smooth-sliding Mincius, crown'd with vocal reeds!
That strain I heard was of a higher mood:
But now my oat proceeds,

And listens to the herald of the sea
That came in Neptune's plea ;

He ask'd the waves, and ask'd the felon winds,
What hard mishap hath doom'd this gentle swain?
And question'd every gust of rugged wings
That blows from off each beaked promontory:
They knew not of his story;

And sage Hippotades their answer brings,
That not a blast was from his dungeon stray'd;
The air was calm, and on the level brine
Sleek Panope with all her sisters play'd.

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Return, Alpheus, the dread voice is past,
That shrunk thy streams; return, Sicilian Muse,
And call the vales, and bid them hither cast
Their bells, and flowerets of a thousand hues.
Ye valleys low, where the mild whispers use
Of shades, and wanton winds, and gushing brooks,
On whose fresh lap the swart-star sparely looks;
Throw hither all your quaint enamell'd eyes,
That on the green turf suck the honied showers,
And purple all the ground with vernal flowers.
Bring the rathe primrose that forsaken dies,
The tufted crow-toe, and pale jessamine,
The white pink, and the pansy freak'd with jet,
The glowing violet,

The musk-rose, and the well-attired wood-bine,
With cowslips wan that hang the pensive head,
And every flower that sad embroidery wears :
Bid Amaranthus all his beauty shed,
And daffadillies fill their cups with tears,
To strew the laureat herse where Lycid lies.
For, so to interpose a little ease,

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Let our frail thoughts dally with false surmise; Ay me! whilst thee the shores and sounding seas 90 Wash far away, where'er thy bones are hurl'd, Whether beyond the stormy Hebrides, Where thou, perhaps, under the whelming tide, Visit'st the bottom of the monstrous world; Or whether thou, to our moist vows denied, Sleep'st by the fable of Bellerus old, Where the great vision of the guarded mount Looks toward Namancos and Bayona's hold; Look homeward, angel, now, and melt with ruth: And, O ye dolphins, waft the hapless youth.

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