Life Of John Milton by Richard Garnett (best free novels TXT) 📖
- Author: Richard Garnett
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To Return To Town With Safety Until About February In The Following
Year, Leaving, It Has Been Asserted, A Record Of Himself At Chalfont In
The Shape Of A Sonnet On The Pestilence Regarded As A Judgment For The
Sins Of The King, Written With A Diamond On A Window-Pane--As If The
Blind Poet Could Write Even With A Pen! The Verses, Nevertheless, May
Not Impossibly Be Genuine: They Are Almost Too Miltonic For An Imitator
Between 1665 And 1738, When They Were First Published.
The Public Calamity Of 1666 Affected Milton More Nearly Than That Of
1665. The Great Fire Came Within A Quarter Of A Mile Of His House, And
Though He Happily Escaped The Fate Of Shirley, And Did Not Make One Of
The Helpless Crowd Of The Homeless And Destitute, His Means Were
Seriously Abridged By The Destruction Of The House In Bread Street Where
He Had First Seen The Light, And Which He Had Retained Through All The
Chapter 10 Pg 96Vicissitudes Of His Fortunes. He Could Not, Probably, Have Published
"Paradise Lost" Without The Co-Operation Of Samuel Symmons. Symmons's
Endeavours To Push The Sale Of The Book Make The Bibliographical History
Of The First Edition Unusually Interesting. There Were At Least Nine
Different Issues, As Fresh Batches Were Successively Bound Up, With
Frequent Alterations Of Title-Page As Reasonable Cause Became Apparent
To The Strategic Symmons. First Milton's Name Is Given In Full, Then He
Is Reduced To Initials, Then Restored; Symmons's Own Name, At First
Suppressed, By And By Appears; His Agents Are Frequently Changed; And
The Title Is Altered To Suit The Year Of Issue, That The Book May Seem A
Novelty. The Most Important Of All These Alterations Is One In Which The
Author Must Have Actively Participated--The Introduction Of The Argument
Which, A Hundred And Forty Years Afterwards, Was To Cause Harriet
Martineau To Take Up "Paradise Lost" At The Age Of Seven, And Of The
Note On The Metre Conveying "A Reason Of That Which Stumbled Many, Why
This Poem Rimes Not." Partly, Perhaps, By Help Of These Devices,
Certainly Without Any Aid From Advertising Or Reviewing, The Impression
Of Thirteen Hundred Copies Was Disposed Of Within Twenty Months, As
Attested By Milton's Receipt For His Second Five Pounds, April 26,
1669--Two Years, Less One Day, Since The Signature Of The Original
Contract. The First Printed Notice Appeared After The Edition Had Been
Entirely Sold. It Was By Milton's Nephew, Edward Phillips, And Was
Contained In A Little Latin Essay Appended To Buchlerus's "Treasury Of
Poetical Phrases."
"John Milton, In Addition To Other Most Elegant Writings Of His,
Both In English And Latin, Has Recently Published 'Paradise Lost,'
A Poem Which, Whether We Regard The Sublimity Of The Subject, Or
The Combined Pleasantness And Majesty Of The Style, Or The
Sublimity Of The Invention, Or The Beauty Of Its Images And
Descriptions Of Nature, Will, If I Mistake Not, Receive The Name
Of Truly Heroic, Inasmuch As By The Suffrages Of Many Not
Unqualified To Judge, It Is Reputed To Have Reached The Perfection
Of This Kind Of Poetry."
The "Many Not Unqualified" Undoubtedly Included The First Critic Of The
Age, Dryden. Lord Buckhurst Is Also Named As An Admirer--Pleasing
Anecdotes Respecting The Practical Expression Of His Admiration, And Of
Sir John Denham's, Seem Apocryphal.
While "Paradise Lost" Was Thus Slowly Upbearing Its Author To The
Highest Heaven Of Fame, Milton Was Achieving Other Titles To Renown, One
Of Which He Deemed Nothing Inferior. We Shall Remember Ellwood's Hint
That He Might Find Something To Say About Paradise Found, And The "Muse"
Into Which It Cast Him. When, Says The Quaker, He Waited Upon Milton
After The Latter's Return To London, Milton "Showed Me His Second Poem,
Called 'Paradise Regained,' And In A Pleasant Tone Said To Me, 'This Is
Owing To You; For You Put It Into My Head By The Question You Put To Me
At Chalfont; Which Before I Had Not Thought Of.'" Ellwood Does Not Tell
Us The Date Of This Visit, And Phillips May Be Right In Believing That
"Paradise Regained" Was Entirely Composed After The Publication Of
"Paradise Lost"; But It Seems Unlikely That The Conception Should Have
Slumbered So Long In Milton's Mind, And The Most Probable Date Is
Between Michaelmas, 1665, And Lady-Day, 1666. Phillips Records That
Chapter 10 Pg 97Milton Could Never Hear With Patience "Paradise Regained" "Censured To
Be Much Inferior" To "Paradise Lost." "The Most Judicious," He Adds,
Agreed With Him, While Allowing That "The Subject Might Not Afford Such
Variety Of Invention," Which Was Probably All That The Injudicious
Meant. There Is No External Evidence Of The Date Of His Next And Last
Poem, "Samson Agonistes," But Its Development Of Miltonic Mannerisms
Would Incline Us To Assign It To The Latest Period Possible. The Poems
Were Licensed By Milton's Old Friend, Thomas Tomkyns, July 2, 1670, But
Did Not Appear Until 1671. They Were Published In The Same Volume, But
With Distinct Title-Pages And Paginations; The Publisher Was John
Starkey; The Printer An Anonymous "J.M.," Who Was Far From Equalling
Symmons In Elegance And Correctness.
"Paradise Regained" Is In One Point Of View The Confutation Of A
Celebrated But Eccentric Definition Of Poetry As A "Criticism Of Life."
If This Were True It Would Be A Greater Work Than "Paradise Lost," Which
Must Be Violently Strained To Admit A Definition Not Wholly Inapplicable
To The Minor Poem. If, Again, Wordsworth And Coleridge Are Right In
Pronouncing "Paradise Regained" The Most Perfect Of Milton's Works In
Point Of Execution, The Proof Is Afforded That Perfect Execution Is Not
The Chief Test Of Poetic Excellence. Whatever These Great Men May Have
Propounded In Theory, It Cannot Be Believed That They Would Not Have
Rather Written The First Two Books Of "Paradise Lost" Than Ten Such
Poems As "Paradise Regained," And Yet They Affirm That Milton's Power Is
Even More Advantageously Exhibited In The Latter Work Than In The Other.
There Can Be No Solution Except That Greatness In Poetry Depends Mainly
Upon The Subject, And That The Subject Of "Paradise Lost" Is Infinitely
The Finer. Perhaps This Should Not Be. Perhaps To "The Visual Nerve
Purged With Euphrasy And Rue" The Spectacle Of The Human Soul
Successfully Resisting Supernatural Temptation Would Be More Impressive
Than The Material Sublimities Of "Paradise Lost," But Ordinary Vision
Sees Otherwise. Satan "Floating Many A Rood" On The Sulphurous Lake, Or
"Up To The Fiery Concave Towering High," Or Confronting Death At The
Gate Of Hell, Kindles The Imagination With Quite Other Fire Than The
Sage Circumspection And The Meek Fortitude Of The Son Of God. "The
Reason," Says Blake, "Why Milton Wrote In Fetters When He Wrote Of
Angels And God, And At Liberty When Of Devils And Hell, Is Because He
Was A True Poet, And Of The Devil's Party Without Knowing It." The
Passages In "Paradise Regained" Which Most Nearly Approach The
Magnificence Of "Paradise Lost," Are Those Least Closely Connected With
The Proper Action Of The Poem, The Episodes With Which Milton's
Consummate Art And Opulent Fancy Have Veiled The Bareness Of His
Subject. The Description Of The Parthian Military Expedition; The
Picture, Equally Gorgeous And Accurate, Of The Roman Empire At The
Zenith Of Its Greatness; The Condensation Into A Single Speech Of All
That Has Made Greece Dear To Humanity--These Are The Shining Peaks Of
The Regained "Paradise," Marvels Of Art And Eloquence, Yet, Unlike
"Paradise Lost," Beautiful Rather Than Awful. The Faults Inherent In The
Theme Cannot Be Imputed To The Poet. No Human Skill Could Make The
Second Adam As Great An Object Of Sympathy As The First: It Is Enough,
And It Is Wonderful, That Spotless Virtue Should Be So Entirely Exempt
From Formality And Dulness. The Baffled Satan, Beaten At His Own
Weapons, Is Necessarily A Much Less Interesting Personage Than The
Chapter 10 Pg 98Heroic Adventurer Of "Paradise Lost." Milton Has Done What Can Be Done
By Softening Satan's Reprobate Mood With Exquisite Strokes Of Pathos:--
"Though I Have Lost
Much Lustre Of My Native Brightness, Lost
To Be Beloved Of God, I Have Not Lost
To Love, At Least Contemplate And Admire
What I See Excellent In Good Or Fair,
Or Virtuous; I Should So Have Lost All Sense."
These Words, Though Spoken With A Deceitful Intention, Express A Truth.
Milton's Satan Is A Long Way From Goethe's Mephistopheles. Profound,
Too, Is The Pathos Of--
"I Would Be At The Worst, Worst Is My Best,
My Harbour, And My Ultimate Repose."
The General Sobriety Of The Style Of "Paradise Regained" Is A Fertile
Theme For The Critics. It Is, Indeed, Carried To The Verge Of Baldness;
Frigidity, Used By Pattison, Is Too Strong A Word. This Does Not Seem To
Be Any Token Of A Decay Of Poetical Power. As Writers Advance In Life
Their Characteristics Usually Grow Upon Them, And Develop Into
Mannerisms. In "Paradise Regained," And Yet More Markedly In "Samson
Agonistes," Milton Seems To Have Prided Himself On Showing How
Independent He Could Be Of The Ordinary Poetical Stock-In-Trade. Except
In His Splendid Episodical Descriptions He Seeks To Impress By The Massy
Substance Of His Verse. It Is A Great Proof Of The Essentially Poetical
Quality Of His Mind That Though He Thus Often Becomes Jejune, He Is
Never Prosaic. He Is Ever Unmistakably The Poet, Even When His Beauties
Are Rather Those Of The Orator Or The Moralist. The Following Sound
Remark, For Instance, Would Not Have Been Poetry In Pope; It Is Poetry
In Milton:--
"Who Reads
Incessantly, And To His Reading Brings Not
A Spirit And Judgment Equal Or Superior
(And What He Brings What Need He Elsewhere Seek?)
Uncertain And Unsettled Still Remains?
Deep Versed In Books And Shallow In Himself."
Perhaps, Too, The Sparse Flowers Of Pure Poetry Are More Exquisite From
Their Contrast With The General Austerity:--
"The Field, All Iron, Cast A Gleaming Brown."
"Morning Fair
Came Forth With Pilgrim Steps In Amice Gray."
Poetic Magic These, And Milton Is Still Milton.
"I Have Lately Read His Samson, Which Has More Of The Antique Spirit
Than Any Production Of Any Other Modern Poet. He Is Very Great." Thus
Goethe To Eckermann, In His Old Age. The Period Of Life Is Noticeable,
For "Samson Agonistes" Is An Old Man's Poem As Respects Author And
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