8. These great men we trust that we know how to prize; and of these was Milton. The sight of his books, the sound of his name, are refreshing to us. His thoughts resemble those celestial fruits and flowers which the Virgin Martyr of Massinger' sent down from the gardens of Paradise to the earth, distinguished from the productions of other soils, not only by their superior bloom and sweetness, but by their miraculous efficacy to invigorate and to heal. They are powerful, not only to delight, but to elevate and purify. 9. Nor do we envy the man who can study either the life or the writings of the great poet and patriot without aspiring to emulate, not indeed the sublime works with which his genius has enriched our literature, but the zeal with which he labored for the public good, the fortitude with which he endured every private calamity, the lofty disdain with which he looked down on temptation and dangers, the deadly hatred which he bore to bigots and tyrants, and the faith which he so sternly kept with his country and with his fame. T. B. MACAULAY. 2. " III. 188. SATAN'S ENCOUNTER WITH DEATH. LACK it stood as night, BLACK Fierce as ten furies, terrible as hell, And shook a dreadful dart: what seemed his head, The likeness of a kingly crown had on. Satan was now at hand; and from his seat The monster moving onward came as fast, With horrid strides; hell trembled as he strode. The undaunted fiend what this might be admired— Admired, not feared: God and his Son except, Created thing naught valued he, nor shunned; And with disdainful look thus first began :'Whence, and what art thou, execrable shape! That darest, though grim and terrible, advance Philip Massinger, one of the very best of the old English dramatists, was born in 1584, and died in 1640. He wrote a great number of pieces, of which eighteen have been 1 preserved. The "Virgin Martyr," the " Bondman,” the “ Fatal Dowry,” “The City Madam,” and “A New Way to Pay Old Debts," are his best known productions. Thy miscreated front athwart my way To yonder gates? Through them I mean to pass, Who first broke peace in heaven, and faith, till then Drew after him the third part of heaven's sons, 4. So spake the grisly terror: and in shape, 5. So speaking, and so threatening, grew ten-fold Each at the head No second stroke intend; and such a frown Each cast at the other, as when two black clouds, 1 Ophiuchus, (8f`i 'kus), the Serpent-bearer; a cluster of fixed stars whose center is nearly over the equator, opposite to Orion. So frowned the mighty com'batants, that hell Grew darker at their frown; so matched they stood; For never but once more was either like To meet so great a Foe: and now great deeds Fast by hell-gate and kept the fatal key, Risen, and with hideous outcry rushed between. JOHN MILTON. JOHN MILTON, one of the greatest of all poets and scholars, was born in London on the 9th of December, 1608. His father, liberally educated and from a good family, having been disinherited for embracing Protestantism, became a scrivener, and acquired a competent fortune. The firmness and the sufferings of the father for conscience' sake were not lost upon the son, who became a stern, unbending champion of religious freedom. Milton was educated with great care. He studied ancient and modern languages, delighted in poetical reading, and cultivated the musical taste which he inherited from his father. At fifteen he was sent to St. Paul's School, London, and two years later to Christ's College, Cambridge, where he graduated in due course. He wrote several poems at an early age. His "Hymn on the Nativity," composed in his twenty-first year, is one of the noblest of his works, and perhaps the finest lyric in the English language. Leaving the university in 1632, he went to the house of his father, at Hutton in Buckinghamshire, where he lived five years, studying classical literature and writing poems. During this happy period of his life he wrote "L'Allegro," ," "Il Penseroso," "Arcades," "Lycidas," and "Comus." In 1638 the poet visited the Continent, where he remained fifteen months, principally in Italy and France. His study of the works of art during this period probably suggested some of his best poetical creations. On his return to England in 1639 he took up his residence in London. The next twenty years, during the Civil War, the Commonwealth, and the Protectorate, the poet's lyre was mute. A Republican in politics and an Independent in religion, during this stormy period he threw himself promptly and fearlessly into the vortex of the struggle, and, as a controversialist, enrolled his name among the noblest and most eloquent of the writers of old English prose. In 1643 Milton married Mary Powell, the daughter of a high cavalier of Oxfordshire. In 1649 he was appointed Foreign or Latin Secretary to the Council of State, and retained the same position during the Protectorate. For ten years his eyesight had been failing, when, in 1652, he became totally blind. About the same period his first wife died, but he married soon after. His second wife, Catharine Woodcock, died in 1656. The Restoration of 1660 consigned the poet, for the last fourteen years of his life, to an obscurity which gave him leisure to complete the mighty poetical task which was to secure him an immortality of literary fame. In 1664 he married his third wife, Elizabeth Minshul, of a good Cheshire family. In 1665 he completed "Paradise Lost," which was first published in 1667. In 1671 appeared the "Paradise Regained," to which was subjoined "Samson Agonistes." He died on the 8th of November, 1674. For a further description of Milton and his poetry, the reader is referred to the two exercises immediately preceding the above. IV. 189. THE DYING CHRISTIAN TO HIS SOUL.' ITAL spark of heavenly flame, Quit, oh! quit this mortal frame! What is this absorbs me quite,— Lend, lend your wings! I mount, I fly! ALEXANDER POPE. M SECTION XXXVIII. I. 190. MURDER OF KING DUNCAN. 2 ACBETH. Is this a dagger which I see before me, The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee.— I have thee not, and yet I see thee still. Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible Expression, in the delivery of this exquisite little poem, the reader must bear in mind, requires the continued production of the feeble and failing tone of the dying man, while conveying the perfect, enthusiastic confidence of the hopeful Christian. 2 Mac beth', afterward king of Scotland, prompted by ambition, and urged on by his wife, resolves to murder the king, then his guest, and seize the crown. A dagger of the mind; a false creätion, As this which now I draw. Thou marshal'st me the way that I was going; Mine eyes are made the fool o' th' other senses, Thus to mine eyes. Now o'er the one half world Whose howl's his watch, thus with his stealthy pace, Which now suits with it. While I threat he lives; Words to the heat of deeds to cold breath gives. [A bell rings. I go, and it is done; the bell invites me : Hear it not, Duncan; for it is a knell That summons thee to heaven, or to hell. Enter Lady MACBETH. [Exit. Lady M. That which hath made them drunk, hath made me bold: What hath quenched them, hath given me fire.-Hark!-peace! It was the owl that shrieked, the fatal bellman, Which gives the sternest good-night. He is about it— The doors are open; and the surfeited grooms Do mock their charge with snōres: I have drugged their possets, That death and nature do contend about them, 1 Tar quin, two kings of Rome: L.Tarquinius Superbus, here alluded to, seventh in the line of kings, ob tained the throne by the murder of Servius Tullius, whose daughter, Tullia, he had married. |