Halleck's New English Literature Part 32

[Ill.u.s.tration: JOHN MILTON, AET. 10.]

His Early Manhood and Life at Horton.--In 1632 Milton left Cambridge and went to live with his father in a country home at Horton, about twenty miles west of London. Milton had been intended for the church; but he felt that he could not subscribe to its intolerance, and that he had another mission to perform. His father accordingly provided sufficient funds for maintaining him for over five years at Horton in a life of studious leisure. The poet's greatest biographer, David Ma.s.son, says "Until Milton was thirty-two years of age, if even then, he did not earn a penny for himself." Such a course would ruin ninety-nine out of every hundred talented young men; but it was the making of Milton. He spent those years in careful study and in writing his immortal early poems.

[Ill.u.s.tration: VISIT OF MILTON TO THE BLIND GALILEO AT THE VILLA D'ARCETRI NEAR FLORENCE IN 1638. _From the painting by T. Lessi._]

In 1638, when he was in his thirtieth year, he determined to broaden his views by travel. He went to Italy, which the Englishmen of his day still regarded as the home of art, culture, and song. After about fifteen months abroad, hearing that his countrymen were on the verge of civil war, he returned home to play his part in the mighty tragedy of the times.

Milton's "Left Hand."--In 1642 the Civil War broke out between the Royalists and the Puritans. He took sides in the struggle for liberty, not with his sword, but with his pen. During this time he wrote little but prose. He regretted that the necessity of the time demanded prose, in the writing of which, he says, "I have the use, as I may account it, but of my left hand."

With that "left hand" he wrote much prose. There is one common quality running through all his prose works, although they treat of the most varied subjects. Every one of these works strikes a blow for fuller liberty in some direction,--for more liberty in church, in state, and in home relations, for the freedom of expressing opinions, and for a system of education which should break away from the leading strings of the inferior methods of the past. His greatest prose work is the _Areopagitica: A Speech for the Liberty of Unlicensed Printing_.

Much of his prose is poetic and adorned with figures of rhetoric. He frequently follows the Latin order, and inverts his sentences, which are often unreasonably long. Sometimes his "left hand" astonishes us by slinking mud at his opponents, and we eagerly await the loosing of the right hand which was to give us _Paradise Lost_.

His Blindness.--The English government from 1649 to 1660 is known as the Commonwealth. The two most striking figures of the time were Oliver Cromwell, who in 1653 was styled the Lord Protector, and John Milton, who was the Secretary for Foreign Tongues.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FACSIMILE OF MILTON'S SIGNATURE IN THE ELEVENTH YEAR OF HIS BLINDNESS._From his application to wed Elizabeth Minshull.

Feb. 11, 1663._]

One of the greatest of European scholars, a professor at Leyden, named Salmasius, had written a book attacking the Commonwealth and upholding the late king. The Council requested Milton to write a fitting answer.

As his eyes were already failing him, he was warned to rest them; but he said that he would willingly sacrifice his eyesight on the altar of liberty. He accordingly wrote in reply his _Pro Populo Anglicano Defensio_, a Latin work, which was published in 1651. This effort cost him his eyesight. In 1652, at the age of forty-three, he was totally blind. In his _Paradise Lost_, he thus alludes to his affliction:--

"Thus with the year Seasons return; but not to me returns Day, or the sweet approach of even or morn, Or sight of vernal bloom or summer's rose, Or flocks, or herds, or human face divine; But clouds instead and ever-during dark Surrounds me, from the cheerful ways of men Cut off."

Life after the Restoration.--In 1660, when Charles II. was made king, the leaders of the Commonwealth had to flee for their lives.

Some went to America for safety while others were caught and executed.

The body of Cromwell was taken from its grave in Westminster Abbey, suspended from the gallows and left to dangle there. Milton was concealed by a friend until the worst of the storm had blown over.

Then some influential friends interceded for him, and his blindness probably won him sympathy.

[Ill.u.s.tration: COMUS t.i.tLE PAGE.]

During his old age his literary work was largely dependent on the kindness of friends, who read to him, and acted as his amanuenses. His ideas of woman having been formed in the light of the old dispensation, he had not given his three daughters such an education as might have led them to take a sympathetic interest in his work.

They accordingly resented his calling on them for help.

During this period of his life, when he was totally blind, he wrote _Paradise Lost, Paradise Regained_, and _Samson Agonistes_. He died in 1674, and was buried beside his father in the chancel of St. Giles, Cripplegate, London.

Minor Poems.--In 1629, while Milton was a student at Cambridge, and only twenty-one years old, he wrote a fine lyrical poem, ent.i.tled _On the Morning of Christ's Nativity_. These 244 lines of verse show that he did not need to be taught the melody of song any more than a young nightingale.

Four remarkable poems were written during his years of studious leisure at Horton,--_L'Allegro, Il Penseroso, Comus,_ and _Lycidas.

L'Allegro_ describes the charms of a merry social life, and _Il Penseroso_ voices the quiet but deep enjoyment of the scholar in retirement. These two poems have been universal favourites.

_Comus_ is a species of dramatic composition known as a Masque, and it is the greatest of its cla.s.s. It far surpa.s.sess any work of a similar kind by Ben Jonson, that prolific writer of Masques. Some critics, like Taine and Saintsbury, consider _Comus_ the finest of Milton's productions. Its 1023 lines can soon be read; and there are few poems of equal length that will better repay careful reading.

_Comus_ is an immortal apotheosis of virtue. While in Geneva in 1639, Milton was asked for his autograph and an expression of sentiment. He chose the closing lines of _Comus_:--

[Ill.u.s.tration: MILTON'S MOTTO FROM COMUS, WITH AUTOGRAPH. _Written in an alb.u.m at Geneva_.]

_Lycidas_, one of the world's great elegies, was written on the death of Milton's cla.s.smate, Edward King. Mark Pattison, one of Milton's biographers, says: "In _Lycidas_ we have reached the high-water mark of English poesy and of Milton's own production."

He is one of the four greatest English sonnet writers. Shakespeare alone surpa.s.ses him in this field. Milton numbers among his pupils Wordsworth and Keats, whose sonnets rank next in merit.

Paradise Lost; Its Inception and Dramatic Plan.--Cambridge University has a list, written by Milton before he was thirty-five, of about one hundred possible subjects for the great poem which he felt it was his life's mission to give to the world. He once thought of selecting Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table; but his final choice was _Paradise Lost_, which stands first on this special list.

There are in addition four separate drafts of the way in which he thought this subject should be treated. This proves that the great work of a man like; Milton was planned while he was young. It is possible that he may even have written a very small part of the poem earlier than the time commonly a.s.signed.

All four drafts show that his early intention was to make the poem a drama, a gigantic Miracle play. The closing of the theaters and the prejudice felt against them during the days of Puritan ascendancy may have influenced Milton to forsake the dramatic for the epic form, but he seems never to have shared the common prejudice against the drama and the stage. His sonnet on Shakespeare shows in what estimation he held that dramatist.

Subject Matter and Form.--About 1658, when Milton was a widower, living alone with his three daughters, he began, in total blindness, to dictate his _Paradise Lost_, sometimes relying on them but more often on any kind friend who might a.s.sist him. The ma.n.u.script accordingly shows a variety of handwriting. The work was published in 1667, after some trouble with a narrow-minded censor who had doubts about granting a license.

The subject matter can be best given in Milton's own lines at the beginning of the poem:--

"Of man's first disobedience, and the fruit Of that forbidden tree, whose mortal taste Brought death into the World, and all our woe, With loss of Eden, till one greater Man Restore us, and regain the blissful seat, Sing, Heavenly Muse..."

The poem treats of Satan's revolt in heaven, of his conflict with the Almighty, and banishment with all the rebellious angels. Their new home in the land of fire and endless pain is described with such a gigantic grasp of the imagination, that the conception has colored all succeeding theology.

The action proceeds with a council of the fallen angels to devise means for alleviating their condition and annoying the Almighty. They decide to strike him through his child, and they plot the fall of man.

In short, _Paradise Lost_ is an intensely dramatic story of the loss of Eden. The greatest actors that ever sprang from a poet's brain appear before us on the stage, which is at one time the sulphurous pit of h.e.l.l, at another the bright plains of heaven, and at another the Elysium of our first parents.

In form the poem is an epic in twelve books, containing a total of 10,565 lines. It is written in blank verse of wonderful melody and variety.

Paradise Regained and Samson Agonistes.--After finishing _Paradise Lost_, Milton wrote two more poems, which he published in 1671.

_Paradise Regained_ is in great part a paraphrase of the first eleven verses of the fourth chapters of _St. Matthew_. The poem is in four books of blank verse and contains 2070 lines. Although it is written with great art and finish, _Paradise Regained_ shows a falling off in Milton's genius. There is less ornament and less to arouse human interest.

_Samson Agonistes_ (Samson the Struggler) is a tragedy containing 1758 lines, based on the sixteenth chapter of _Judges_. This poem, modeled after the Greek drama, is hampered by a strict observance of the dramatic unities. It is vastly inferior to the _Paradise Lost. Samson Agonistes_ contains scarcely any of the glorious imagery of Milton's earlier poems. It has been called "the most unadorned poem that can be found."

CHARACTERISTICS OF MILTON'S POETRY

Variety in his Early Work.--A line in _Lycidas_ says:--

"He touched the tender stops of various quills,"

and this may be said of Milton. His early poems show great variety.

There are the dirge notes in _Lycidas_; the sights, sounds, and odors of the country, in _L'Allegro_; the delights of "the studious cloister's pale," in _Il Penseroso_; the impelling presence of his "great Task-Master," in the sonnets.

Although Milton is noted for his seriousness and sublimity, we must not be blind to the fact that his minor poems show great delicacy of touch. The epilogue of the Spirit at the end of _Comus_ is an instance of exquisite airy fancy pa.s.sing into n.o.ble imagination at the close.

In 1638 Sir Henry Wotton wrote to Milton this intelligent criticism of _Comus_: "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_."

Limitations.--In giving attention to Milton's variety, we should not forget that when we judge him by Elizabethan standards his limitations are apparent. As varied as are his excellences, his range is far narrower than Shakespeare's. He has little sense of humor and less sympathy with human life than either Shakespeare or Burns. Milton became acquainted with flowers through the medium of a book before he noticed them in the fields. Consequently, in speaking of flowers and birds, he sometimes makes those mistakes to which the bookish man is more p.r.o.ne than the child who first hears the story of Nature from her own lips. Unlike Shakespeare and Burns, Milton had the misfortune to spend his childhood in a large city. Again, while increasing age seemed to impose no limitations on Shakespeare's genius, his touch being as delicate in _The Tempest_ as in his first plays, Milton's style, on the other hand, grew frigid and devoid of imagery toward the end of his life.

Sublimity.--The most striking characteristic of Milton's poetry is sublimity, which consists, first, in the subject matter. In the opening lines of _Paradise Lost_ he speaks of his "adventurous song"--

"That with no middle flight intends to soar Above the Aonian mount, while it pursues Things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme."

Milton succeeded in his intention. The English language has not another poem that approaches _Paradise Lost_ in sustained sublimity.

In the second place, we must note the sublimity of treatment. Milton's own mind was cast in a sublime mold. This quality of mind is evident even in his figures of rhetoric. The Milky Way appears to him as the royal highway to heaven:--

"A broad and ample road, whose dust is gold, And pavement stars."[3]

When Death and Satan meet, Milton wishes the horror of the scene to manifest something of the sublime. What other poet could, in fewer words, have conveyed a stronger impression of the effect of the frown of those powers?