*

in which we are told he married his third wife. This would make the Samson Agonistes' at least three years prior to the Paradise Regained;' of which we know he had not thought previous to the summer of 1665.

6

In that magnificent passage beginning at 1. 667,

God of our fathers! what is man,

That thou towards him with hand so various,

Or might I say contrarious,

Temper'st thy providence through his short course,

Not evenly, as thou rulest

The angelic orders, and inferior creatures mute,
Irrational and brute?

Nor do I name of men the common rout,

That wandering loose about,

Grow up and perish, as the summer-fly,
Heads without name, no more remember'd;
But such as thou hast solemnly elected,
With gifts and graces eminently adorn'd,

To some great work, thy glory,

And people's safety, which in part they effect.

Yet towards these thus dignified, thou oft,

Amidst their highth of noon,

Changest thy countenance, and thy hand, with no regard

Of highest favours past

From thee on them, or them to thee of service.

Nor only dost degrade them, or remit

To life obscured, which were a fair dismission;

But throw'st them lower than thou didst exalt them high,
Unseemly falls in human eye,

Too grievous for the trespass or omission;

Oft leavest them to the hostile sword

Of heathen and profane, their carcasses

To dogs and fowls a prey, or else captived;

Or to the unjust tribunals, under change of times,

And condemnation of the ingrateful multitude.

*Not till 1665.

feelings at the Restoration. It is the blaze of a mind as gigantic as Samson's form and strength. His imagination is every where on fire both with intellectual and material visions. A vulgar taste in poetry would call the nakedness of his language prosaic but in the enthusiasm of forceful thought the petty ornaments of language are disregarded. It is in the exaltation of the soul, in belief, in visionary presence, that high poetry consists.

We are bound to contemplate the bard in these lofty moods;-to think how his spirit rose above his unprosperous and painful situation;-and with what sublime images, sentiments, and reflections, he soothed himself!-How he glowed when he imagined Samson pulling down destruction on the heads of his foes!-His vigorous and enthusiastic mind roused him to be thus ready to devote himself to the common ruin.

Though now retired, neglected, and subject to many stings of disappointment, I doubt not he was altogether happier than when his mere memory, observation, and judgment were occupied in the coarse conflict of practical affairs. Imagination is more gratifying than memory, and idealism than reality. It is difficult to conceive how so creative a mind could so long bend itself to the servile office of secretaryship: to find correctness of expression in a dead language for diplomatic communications was but a pedantic employment; and a waste of powers which ought only to have been applied to the highest intellectual exertions.

prayer more happily conspicuous; and let me here remark, that, however various the opinions of men may be concerning the merits or demerits of Milton's political character, the integrity of his heart appears to have secured to him the favour of Providence; since it pleased the Giver of all good not only to turn his labour to a peaceful end, but to irradiate his declining life with the most abundant portion of those pure and sublime mental powers, for which he had constantly and fervently prayed, as the choicest bounty of Heaven."

Again, Hayley thinks that at 1. 759 Milton alludes to his own connubial infelicity, and regret for his forgiveness at the repentance of his first wife, suspicious of its sincerity.

But it is not only to the unhappiness of his marriage that Milton alludes in this stern poem: he also renews his political prejudices at 1. 1418. Lords are lordliest in their wine,

And the well-feasted priest then soonest fired
With zeal, if aught religion seem concern'd;
No less the people on their holydays

Impetuous, insolent, &c.

Warton observes that he here expresses his contempt of a nobility and an opulent clergy, that is, lords both spiritual and temporal, who by no means coincided with his levelling and narrow principles of republicanism and Calvinism, and whom he tacitly compares with the lords and priests of the idol Dagon.

There can be no doubt that the whole of this poem arose out of the state of Milton's personal

feelings at the Restoration. It is the blaze of a mind as gigantic as Samson's form and strength. His imagination is every where on fire both with intellectual and material visions. A vulgar taste in poetry would call the nakedness of his language prosaic: but in the enthusiasm of forceful thought the petty ornaments of language are disregarded. It is in the exaltation of the soul, in belief, in visionary presence, that high poetry consists.

We are bound to contemplate the bard in these lofty moods;-to think how his spirit rose above his unprosperous and painful situation ;--and with what sublime images, sentiments, and reflections, he soothed himself!-How he glowed when he imagined Samson pulling down destruction on the heads of his foes!-His vigorous and enthusiastic mind roused him to be thus ready to devote himself to the common ruin.

Though now retired, neglected, and subject to many stings of disappointment, I doubt not he was altogether happier than when his mere memory, observation, and judgment were occupied in the coarse conflict of practical affairs. Imagination is more gratifying than memory, and idealism than reality. It is difficult to conceive how so creative a mind could so long bend itself to the servile office of secretaryship: to find correctness of expression in a dead language for diplomatic communications was but a pedantic employment; and a waste of powers which ought only to have been applied to the highest intellectual exertions.

It is clear, however, that by whatever arguments the poet might reconcile himself to his blindness, there were moments when he felt most bitterly the deprivation: the passages I have cited from Samson Agonistes' prove this. In his poverty he could not employ a skilful and learned amanuensis, who could take down his expressions with facility: the aid and consolation of books, except at the mercy of others, were shut to him. He grieved for the loss of that outward view of the face of nature in which he had delighted: he could no longer roam alone at his own will amid the woods and forests and green fields: he sat of a sunny morning in his house-porch, enjoying the fresh air; but this was in a suburb of the great city, in a confined garden: the freedom of limb, the exhilaration of boundary exercise, the breasting of the blowing wind, the change of the fresh breeze, which varies with each contending step, were not his!

O, dark, dark, dark, amid the blaze of noon!

All was blank, and every footstep was feeble and tottering, and at the mercy of another. We perceive that after a life of such high virtue as he was conscious that he had led, there were bitter hours when he thought this fate hard. As his endowments were sublime, so were his expectations lofty: his temper was naturally scornful; and as he could himself do mighty things, so perhaps he demanded more of others than they could well perform. He had not descended to a mi

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