Page images
PDF
EPUB
[blocks in formation]

18. Thamesis ad incunabula] The Thames, or Isis, rises not very many miles west of Oxford about Cricklade in Gloucestershire. Unless he means the junction of Tame and Isis, fancifully supposed to produce Thamesis, at Dorchester near Oxford.

29. Tollat nefandos civium tumultus, &c.] I fear Milton is here complaining of evils, which his own principles contributed either to produce or promote. But his illustrations are so beautiful, that we forget his politics in his poetry.

In reflecting, however, on those evils, I cannot entirely impute their origin to a growing spirit

25

3

30

of popular faction. If there was anarchy on one part, there was tyranny on the other: the dispute was a conflict "between

governors who ruled by will "not by law, and subjects who "would not suffer the law itself "to control their actions." Balguy's Sermons, p. 55.

33. Immundasque volucres, &c.] He has almost a similar allusion in the Reason of Church Govern ment, &c. He compares prelacy to the python, and adds, "till "like that fen-born serpent she "be shot to death with the darts " of the sun, the pure and pow"erful beams of God's word." Prose Works, i. 74.

Figat Apollinea pharetra,

Phineamque abigat pestem procul amne Pegaseo?

ANTISTROPHE.

Quin tu, libelle, nuntii licet mala

35

[blocks in formation]

Optat peculi, numeroque justo
Sibi pollicitum queritur abesse,
Rogatque venias ille, cujus inclyta
Sunt data virum monumenta curæ :
Teque adytis etiam sacris

Voluit reponi, quibus et ipse præsidet
Æternorum operum custos fidelis ;
Quæstorque gazæ nobilioris,

46. remige penna:] See the note on a kindred allusion in Paradise Lost, "his sail-broad " vans," b. ii. 927. See Observat. Spenser's F. Q. ii. 207. And note on v. 208. Quint. Novembr.

55. The paintings, statues, tapestry, tripods, and other inestimable furniture of Apollo's

45

50

55

temple at Delphi, are often poetically described in the Ion. See particularly, v. 185. seq. v. 1146. seq. Its images of gold are mentioned in the Phoenissæ, v. 228. The riches of the treasures of this celebrated shrine were proverbial even in the days of Homer, Il. b. ix. 404. All these

Quam cui præfuit Iön,

Clarus Erechtheides,

Opulenta dei per templa parentis,

Fulvosque tripodas, donaque Delphica,

Ion Actæa genitus Creusa.

ANTISTROPHE,

Ergo, tu visere lucos

Musarum ibis amœnos ;

Diamque Phœbi rursus ibis in domum,

Oxonia quam valle colit,

Delo posthabita,

Bifidoque Parnassi jugo:

60

65

Ibis honestus,

Postquam egregiam tu quoque sortem
Nactus abis, dextri prece sollicitatus amici.
Illic legeris inter alta nomina

were offerings, Avaluara, Dona
Delphica, made by eminent per-
sonages who visited the temple.
A curious Memoir has been writ-
ten by Mons. Valois, De richesses
du Temple des Delphes, et des dif-
ferens pillages qui en ont etè faits.

Milton was a reader of Euripides, not only with the taste of a poet, but with the minuteness of a Greek critic. His Euripides in two volumes, Paul Stephens's quarto edition, 1602, with many marginal emendations in his own hand, is now the property of Mr. Cradock, of Gumly in Leicestershire. From the library of the learned Bishop Hare, who died in 1740, it passed into the shop of John Whiston the bookseller; whence it was purchased by Doctor Birch, the publisher of Milton's Prose Works, April 12, 1754. Birch

70

left his library to the British Museum. It has Milton's name, with the price of the book, viz. 12s. 6d. Also the date 1634, (the year in which Comus was written,) all in his own hand. Some of the marginal notes have been adopted by Joshua Barnes, in his Euripides. Others have been lately printed by Mr. Jodrell. Milton's daughter Deborah, who used to read to him, related, that he was most delighted with Homer, whom he could almost entirely repeat; and next, with Ovid's Metamorphoses and Euripides. See note on the Nativity, v. 180.

56. Quam cui præfuit Ion, &c.] Ion the treasurer of the Delphic temple, abounding in riches. Euripides's tragedy of Ion evidently occasioned this allusion. Euripides calls Ion, XevooQvλana, v. 54.

Authorum, Graiæ simul et Latinæ

Antiqua gentis lumina, et verum decus.

EPODOS.

Vos tandem haud vacui mei labores,
Quicquid hoc sterile fudit ingenium,

Jam sero placidam sperare jubeo

Perfunctam invidia requiem, sedesque beatas,
Quas bonus Hermes,

Et tutela dabit solers Roüsi;

75

Quo neque lingua procax vulgi penetrabit, atque longe

Turba legentum prava facesset :

At ultimi nepotes,

Et cordatior ætas,

Judicia rebus æquiora forsitan

Adhibebit, integro sinu.

Tum, livore sepulto,

Si quid meremur sana posteritas sciet,
Rousio favente.

80

85

Ode tribus constat Strophis, totidemque Antistrophis, una demum Epodo clausis, quas tametsi omnes nec versuum numero, nec certis ubique colis exacte respondeant, ita tamen secuimus, commode legendi potius, quam ad antiquos concinendi modos rationem spectantes. Alioquin hoc genus rectius fortasse dici monostrophicum debuerat. Metra partim sunt narà axéow, partim &Toλsλvμéva. Phaleucia quæ sunt, Spondæum tertio loco bis admittunt, quod idem in secunda loco Catullus ad libitum fecit.

78. If he meant this verse for an hendecasyllable, there is a false quantity in solers. The first syllable is notoriously long.

78. See a long and learned criticism upon the measures of this Ode in note (r), Symmons's

Life of Milton, p. 281-284. ed. 2d. E.

86. The reader will recollect, that this Ode was written and sent in 1646. Milton here alludes to the severe censures which he had lately suffered, not only from

the episcopal but even froin the presbyterian party. About the year 1641, our author, well knowing how much the puritans wanted the assistance of abilities and learning, attacked the order of bishops and the intire constitution of the Church of England, in three or four large and laboured treatises. One of these, his Reply to Bishop Hall's Remonstrance, was answered the same year by an anonymous antagonist, supposed to be the bishop's son; who calls Milton a blasphemer, a drunkard, a profane swearer, and a frequenter of brothels, asserting at the same time, that he was expelled the University of Cambridge for a perpetual course of riot and debauchery. About the year 1644, Milton published his tracts on Divorce. Here he quarrelled with his own friends. These pieces were instantly anathematised by the thunder of the presbyterian clergy, from the pulpit, the press, and the tribunal of the Assembly of Divines at Westminster. By the leaders of that persuasion, who were now predominant, and who began in their turn to find that novelties were dangerous, he was even summoned before the House of Lords. It is in reference to the rough and perhaps undeserved treatment which he received, in consequence of the publication of these dissertations in defence of domestic liberty, that he complains in his twelfth Sonnet.

I did but prompt the age to quit their clogs

By the known rules of ancient liberty,

When strait a barbarous noise environs me

Of owls and cuckows, asses, apes, and dogs, &c.

And the preceding Sonnet on the same subject is thus entitled, "On the Detraction which fol"lowed upon my writing cer➡ "tain Treatises."

But these were only the beginnings of obloquy. He was again to appeal to posterity for indulgence. Evil Tongues, together with many Evil Days, were still in reserve. The commonwealth was to be disannulled, and monarchy to be restored. The Defence of the King's Murder was not yet burnt by the common hangman. In the year 1676, his official Latin Letters were printed. In the Preface, the editor says of the author, "Est forsan dignissimus

[ocr errors]

qui ab omnibus legeretur Mil"tonus, nisi styli sui facundiam

66

et puritatem turpissimis moribus "inquinasset." Winstanly thus characterises our author. "He "is one whose natural parts might deservedly give him

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

a place among the principal of "our English poets-But his "fame is gone out like a candle "in a snuff, and his memory "will always stink, which might "have ever lived in honourable repute, had he not been a "notorious traytor, &c." Lives, of the Poets, p. 175. edit. 1687.

[ocr errors]

I mention these descriptions of Milton, among many others of a like kind which appeared soon after his death, because they probably contain the tone of the public opinion, and seem to represent the general and established estimation of his character at that time; and as they are here delivered dispassionately, and not thrown out in the heat of controversy and calumniation.

Upon the whole, and with

« ՆախորդըՇարունակել »