UNIT 17 THE LATE RENAISSANCE

Structure
17.0 Objectives
17.1 Introduction
17.2 A Brief Review of the Renaissance
17.2.1 Classical Learning
17.2.2 The Refom~ation
17.2.3 The Emergence of Inlperialisill
17.2.4 The New Cosmology
17.3 The Political and Social Context
17.4 Literary and Cula~ralInfluences on Poetry
17.5 Let's Sum Up
17.6 Revision Questioils
17.7 Additional Reading

17.0 OBJECTIVES

The primary intention of this unit will be to situate the writer in his literary, social
and political context. It will be argued that:
o Milton does not belong strictly to the pesiod coilventionally identified as the
Renaissance.
0 Nevertheless, the diverse strains of thought and practice that are labelled as the
Renaissance had a lasting impact on Milton, and may be seen in his work.
Some of the main political and social transCorn~ationsof the period, which will be
identified in broad tei~ns,also influenced Milton's work significantly.
Milton's writings thus indicate a conflueilce of diverse factors, in wllich 1101 just
Renaissance elements but enlcrgent trends in literature aid culture are all woven
together.
The unit will thus prepare the studeilt for the nlore detailed examination of the life of
Milton and the analyses of his poetry that follow in the re~xainingunits.

171 INTRODUCTION

This unit will begin with a review of the key features of tlle Renaissance, which will
help in identifyiilg and locating the discursive context of Milton's writings. It will
then briefly cover the period in which John Miltoil wrote, focusing specially on the
literary, political and ~Veligiousfactors influencing llis thoudlt and work. We will
explore some of the key issues relating Milton's poetiy Lo the period, including the
political and social context leading up to and running tllrougll the Civil War, literary
and cultural developments of tlle period, and the role of religious upheavals in
political and cultural transfor~nations.A prilnary question that must be addressed is
the question of periodisation, i.e., why we tenn the period when Milton was writing
the Late Renaissance, and in what ways, if any at all, does that label aid our
understanding of Milton's work.

17.2 A BRIEF REVIEW OF TWE RENAISSANCE

'The Renaissance' is the tern1 co~nnlonlyused by historians to refer to the period in

European history dating from the late fourteenth century in Italy, spreading to other
coun$es through the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and probably reaching its
 cullnination in seventeenth centuiy England with the work of Jolln Milton, often
referred to as the last great Renaissance poet. It is difficult to briefly encapsulatc the
many, sometimes contradictory, historical trends that constitute this period, and even
more difficult to identify conlnlonalities that would justify their inclusion ~ ~ n dae r
single period label like 'the Renaissance'. But if we were to attempt a broad sketch,
with our focus especially on the upper and learned classes of the different places and
on h e i r intellectual and cultural productions and developments, some running themes
inay be recognized. These suggest a porous but identifiably cohercnt period, that may
be considered singular if only for the sake of convenience in arriving at an intellectual
history of the period. Some of these theines are as follows:

17.2.1 Classical Learning

Perhaps the most striking feature of the Renaissance was the revival and
popularization of classical learning. This began with the discovery of and a new
interest in the writings of ancient Greece, producing scholarship that added to the
widespread Latin scholxsl~ipof the Middle Ages. It was aided in its popularization to
no small extent by the advent of the printing press (circa 1450?), which was to
transfonn the range and reach of the intellectual and culhiral world subsequently.
This scholarship led to the developinent and centring of intellectual attention on
human rather than divine objects, celebrating the virtues and potential of the human *

individual, or the discourse of I-Iuinanisnl and consequently of Individualisn~,both o i

which we shall return to later.

17.2.2 The Reformation

Another important factor in deteimining the course of the European Renaissance was
the upheaval in Christianity that is referred to as the Reforination. This began as a
series of attacks on the institution of the Rolllan Catholic Church and the proliferation
of breakaway sects and cults. Marlin Luther's (1483-1546) was probably the most
influential in the cffloresceilce of such rejections of the Church during this period.
The many ecclesiastical scllools it generated within Christianity are together referred
to as Protestantism. Most of these wcre pre~nisedon the fundamental obsei-vation that
the pat11 Lo salvation did not lie through the Church, which stood accused of
substantial conuption in its beliefs and its institutional practices, but through the
individual's acceptance of and adherence to the Holy Scriptures. Salvation was thus a
matter of the individual's direct, unmediated relation to God. The Reformation and
the consequeilt Counter Refoimation within the Catholic Church led to scveral
extended wars, political turnloil, and inter- and intra-state conflicts that lasted well
into the seventeenth century, across Europe and Britain. While battled as religious
wars, Ihese conflicts were frequently about political power and control of the state,
with Protestant ideologies finding special appeal with emerging bourgeoisies across
Europe seeking a weightier political say, and greater autono~nyin trade und usu~y,
traditionally frowned upon by the Catholic Church.

17.2.3 The Enlergence of Imperialism

The emergence of European, specifically British imperialisn~,though not oRen

considered integral to understanding the Renaissance, may actually be seen as its
cconomic underpinning. Conullensurate with the expansion of intellectual discourses
was the European discovery of various new continents and countries on the globe,
one of the most significant of these being the Americas. Trade and the settling and
exploitation of these places substantially enriched the European nations, besides
opening out the horizons of the imagination to new geogaphies and peoples. Both
these fonl~sof enrichinent - of the economy and of the iil~agination- provided thc
necessmy prerecluisites for the flourishing of arts and culture that is cl~aracteristicof
thc period in Europe.
 17.2.4 The New Cosmology Tile Late
IZenaissancc
The cosn~ologyof the Middle Ages had been firmly Ptolemaic, envisioning the earth
at the centre of several coilcentric celestial spheres. With the publication of the
Copernican theory in 1543, proposing a heliocentric universe with the earth as one
among inany planets in orbit around the sun, this became deeply controversial.
Though its real i~npactwas felt only several decades later, it was sufficiently
controversial for Milton to refer to it in his own work, and even at that time indicated
the increasing inroads made by scientific discourses and methods into dolllains of
knowledge traditionally held by religion.

Certainly all these factors are still evident at the time Miltoil was writing. However,
his period is also marked by the silnultaneous presence of several new histoiical
trends that actually come to define the fbllowing age, the Age of Enlightenment,
which spans the latter part of the seventeenth ccnt~lryand much of the eighteenth
century. Chief anong these are the celebration of reason, of scientific method in the
pursuit of knowledge, and the pursuit o f a discourse of civic rationality that attempted
to explore and outline h e relations of'iildividual to society. The last was manifested
largely througll a relatively new popularization ofthe genre of political and cultural
criticism, of which Milton was an early aild powerfill exponent. In his poetly too,
these elenlents of an emerging age are engaged with, albeit circumspectly. The power
of reason is explored for instance in Book I of P(~rulii.scLost, in Satan's attempt to
rationalise his fall fiom I-leaven and the consequences for him. The engagenlent with
science is evident in Miltol~'smetaphors and sinliles more than through any actual
employnent of the new scieiltific discourses and methods. And while the whole of
Paradise Lost may be read as an early attc~nptto grapple with the coinplexilies ofthe
relations between individual and state, individual and God and individual and society,
I
the possibilities of a civic rationality we inevitably renounced in favour of 111e inore
Renaissance h-ait of the celebration of the human as div~nebeing rather than as
I
rational being. In the poems we will be examining, it is this theme that appears to
preoccupy Milton more than rationality, as in poems like 'LIAllegro' and '11,
Penseroso'.

Milton lnay tll~lsbc seen to occupy a transitional pcriod in histoiy between two ages,
bearing in 111s worlc the defining intellectual and cultural traits olboth. Ncverthelcss it
appears to be inore appropriate to associate him with the Renaissance - In Sact to
identi tjl him as the last major Renaissance writcr - t11:ln with the Enligl:htcnmcnt,
I
because of his own leaning towards thc intellectual preoccupations and positions 01
that earlier period. To speak of him as repsesentative orthe latc Renaissance -.which
we can now identily as approxiillately thc period from thc early to the middle decades
of the seventeenth century - would thus be reasonably acciiratc. The peculiar position
I he occupies ilcvcrthelcss needs to be f~irtherunderstood in the light of the political
1
I
and historical circumstances of his writing, which wc will now explore.

--
17.3 THE POLITICAL AN11
- SOCIAL CONTEXT I

I Following the death of Elizabeth in 1603, the Englisli throne passed from Tudor
I
hands to the Stuarts of Scotland with the Scottish King Jaines IV, who took the title
Jaines I of England as well. I-Iis reign, lasting till 1625 is referred to as the Jacobean
period in English histoiy. It was witness to scveral major tmnsformations in English
society, perhaps the most ilnportailt being the gradual alienation of the court from its
I
increasingly insistent and demanding subjects, and of the Icing froin an increasingly
Puritan Parliament. Population increased sharply, almost doubling in this period, an
increase that was commensurate with steeply rising prices and rents and a
concomitant fall in real wages. Poverty was widely evident and at a new higll, leading
to social unrest and the rapid dissolution of traditional fonns of social relations
between classes and ranks. English society even under Elizabeth had bcgiin sceing
I
Studyitrg Miltoir the emergence of a new trading middle class and a landed gently that began to invest
more and more in bade and conmerce. These sections aggressively challenged
existing orders of social rank and hierarchy with strong Puritan support. The
nobility's increasing financial dependence on social sections outside their own ranks
rendered the crown politically dominant but vulnerable. Charles I who followed
James I in 1625 established a reign of decadent opulence and arbitrary power that
was intended to reflect great power and gloiy but succeeded only in gadually eroding
his moral and political authority, feeding accusations against him of Catholic
synpathies and then demands for substantial curbs in royal power especially from the
increasingly powerful Puritans who dominated the House of Coinmons in Parliament.
By 1641, civil war had erupted betwcen the Royalists and the forces owing alleb''lance
to the leaders of the House of Commons who had challenged the King's power.
Under Thornas Fairfax and Oliver Cromwell, the New Model Amly of the
Coinnlonwealth, successfully gained superiority, eventually leading to the capture
and subsequent execution several years later of Charles in 1649, and to the
declaration of England as a republic named 'the Conunonwealth'. This did not end
civil war in England, however; inisti-ust and antagonism amongst the illembers of the
Parliament eventually led to Cromwell's use of his amly to disband Parliament on
charges of corruption. He then took over direct rule of England, Ireland and Scotland
as Lord Protector of the realm in 1653, iuling till his death in 1658. Thc regicide of
Charles I - an event that had shocked both Catholic and Protestant sentiillents across
Europe - however had had a lasting impact, resulting in repeated challenges to the
legitiinacy of Crornwell's goveinnlent. The Cornrnonwealth reign he established was
eventually dissolved and Charles 11, who had ceaselessly fought Cromwell from exile
in France, was invited to re-assume power in England in 1660 by the remaining
members of the Parliament. But it was only with the Glorious Revolution of 1688 that
it was finally established that Parliament would be the supreine political authority, to
whose inandate even the king would have to submit.

This period of deep strife and civil unrest in England may be seen then as essentially
a nloinent of political and social transition in which the power of'the king became
subject to exaininatioil and regulation by an increasingly poweriiil civil body, the
Parliament. Tllese changes were welconled by the new trading and mercantile
sections, who fought in the name of religion for greater political and econonlic
autonoiny. Alongside these changes at the level of the visible political structure,
English society was also witnessing radical transfoimation. With the gradual
colonisation of the Americas and the expansion of trade, towns and cities becanle
major centres of concentration of finance and labour, pemlitting the quick
popularisation of various strands of Puritanism like the Diggers and the Quakers
espousing radically new proto-socialist ideas, and consequently foinenting civil
unrest. In different ways, these religious ideologies challenged the existing orders and
conventions o f rank, ecclesiastical and political authority, attitudes to private property
andSveiyimportantly, to the relations between the sexes. Woineil took an active part
in the civil unrest, with several emerging as powerful Puritan preachers. Their
presence in an until-now male doillinated public space was a powerful challenge to
patriarchal dispensations, even if this was not their specific intent. Much literature of
the period steins fiom these diverse challenges to a still dominantly feudal-patriarclial
worldview, often talting the forin of pamphleteering and political treatises and tracts,
like some of Milton's works, that sought to intlue~lcepublic opinion and thereby
bring about political and social change. That these were set essentially in temls of a
religious debate should not bliild us to the deeply political intentions and iinplications
of the debate itself. The dominant theme was the question of the autonomy and rights
- political, religious, economic - of the individual in relation to existing fonns of
authority - whether state, church or social conventions - and in its fomlulations drew
heavily on both Renaissance and Refoimation discourses of huinailisill and
individualism. In Inally ways, this question is at the heart of Milton's Paradise Lost
too.
 The Late
17.4 LITERARY AND CULTURAL INFLUENCES ON Renaissar~ce
POETRY

We ]lave already noted the enlergence to prominence of the genre of the essay and the
(usually political) tract. Much of this literature - and of other literary forms of the
period - was focused on religious issues; nevel-theless, the hunianist influences, ideas
and concellls of the High Renaissance left a lasting impact. Many of the genres that
becalne prominent in this period - the verse satire, the epigram, the essay, the
meditation, the masque, the tragicomedy, the pastoral play - were iinpol-ts from
Europe as part of the baggage of Renaissance influences in England. Another feature
of the period with a bearing on the kind of literature it produced was the proliferation
of schools and the promotion of education in the classical languages, literatures and
disciplines like logic and rhetoric, with a11 en~phasison memorising. Writers could
thus draw extensive allusions to earlier works knowing their readers would recognise
them, indicating a highly restricted but homogeneous culture. Much of this writing
was in Latin, and writing in English was either largely experimental or translations of
Continental writers, at least in poetry. While Elizabethans like Spenser, Sydney and
Raleigh did write very successful English verse, they renlained substantially indebted
to Continental, specifically Italian and French writing. It is in the vcrse of John
Donne (1 572-1 631) that an entirely different, particularly English sensibility became
evident: playful, even irreverent, sometimes deliberately shocking but always
retaining a degree of sesiousness and close attention to poetic craft. Later literary
historians were to label the kind of writing practised by Donne and some of his
contemporaries and successors - Ben Jonson, George Herbert, Henry Vaughn,
Andrew Marvel1- 'Metaphysical poetry', alluding to its often abstract and strikingly
unlikely figures of speech. Milton too explored the short lyric in poelns like
'L'allegro' and 'I1 Penseroso', before he essayed the epic Pczrncli.se Lost, although his
own style tended towards the classical Ibrins and themes. 'The doinin'mt poetry of the
period was thus the short lyric.

In theatre, the Jacobean reign saw the peaking of popular theatre and its waning
following repeated Puritan atlncks on it as licentious and promotingvice. The
tragedies and the masques of the Caroline court were thc 1t10st comino11 ~OI-IIIS tllat
were performed, and both employed metrical verse in dialogue. With the closurc of
the theatres and the strenglh of the Puntiins, prose in the fornl of
meditations, pamplilets, essays and tracts becamc a major literay vchiclc by tlle nlid
I
seventeenth century. Mucl~of this as wc have noted centred on issues of religion and
the state. The literature ol'the period was also intlucnced by the new scientific
method of inquiry propounded by Sir Francis Bacon, by the pursuit of sciel~tific
knowledge that it accelerated and by scientific discoveries like those of Copernicus
and Galileo. It makes an oitea playful appearnncc in the poetry of the Metapllysicals,
but its lasting influence was in the challenge it was to throw to religious perceptions
of the world. Milton's fanous liries in the invocation to I-'~~rntli,scLost - asserting that
his epic was to 'justify the ways of God to Men' -- lnny thus be understood in tenns
of either tlie legalistic discourse of the conflict bctwcen the king and Parliament or
that of answering the challenge of scientific inquiry, or both. The sentiments of ,
Jacobean tragedy and its vehicle of metrical vcrse also had a lasting impact on poetry,
judging from the prolific number ornow little-known attcmpts to write the first
English epic in nletrical verse. While severill poets attempted the long narrative or the
epic Solms - Patrick I-Iannay's SI7m.c~tinc11rztl M~II~~IZIZN
(1622), D'Avenant's
Gondib~~.! (1650), W Chnmberlayne's l'licrronrzillr~(1659), to namc just a few -- none
really succeeded till Milton. Jt is reasonable to argue that onc reasoil for Milton's
success was his use of the cpic form to represent the contemporary struggle between
religion and the state as itself an epic struggle, rather tl~anconfining himself to simply
reconstructing the form and its conventional classical themes in Englislz, for its own
sake. That is, Milton rendered the epic topical and contemporary, while retaining its
formal classical moorings. One dimension of the epic's conteinporaniety is its
negotiations with current debates on gender. A problem that was thrown up for
Puritan patriarchy in its promotion of individualisill was that it opens up the question
of women's individuality and autonomy. The resolution of this demanded an
engagement with Biblical notions of free-will and of the culpability of women in the
Fall from Grace. Milton engaged in his poetry with these issues in some detail in the
speeches between Adam and Eve in Paradise Lost.

17.5 LET'S SUM UP

In this unit we identified some of the main features of the phenomenon known as the
Renaissance, and proceeded to examine their relevance to understanding Milton. Our
aim was to by and locate Milton historically, as constituting a transitional moment
between the Renaissance and the period that followed. We have also seen how the
seventeenth century was a period riven by civil war, political and religious turnloil,
and by large scale transformations in the conlposition of English society. Along with
this, we noted how various changes took place in the literary climate of the period,
and suggested that these changes owed partly to the spread of Renaissance ideas and
to the consequences of the Refonnation, in the fonn of the growing power of various
kinds of Puritanism. We noted how these inflected the kind of literature that emerged
as well as explored the debt that Milton's own writing owed to these changes.

17.6 RlEVISION QUESTIONS

1. From your readings in Milton's social and cultural context, do you agree with
the view that Milton is the last of the great Renaissance writers'? Give reasons
for your answer.
2. Identify some of the main features of the English Renaissance that were to
influence Milton's poetic work:
3. To what extent was the Refonnation transfoi~llativeof the Renaissance in
England?
4. What were some of the cultural and political facto1.s that led to the making of
Milton as the first major ~ n ~ l i epic
s h poet?

17.7 ADDITIONAL WADING

Albanese, Denise. New Science, New World. Durham, NC: Duke UP, 1996.
Danielson, Dennis, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Miltotz. Cambridge,
England: Cambridge UP, 1989.
Evans, J. Martin. The Miltonic Moment. Lexington, KY: University Press of
Kentucky, 1998.
Fallon, Stephen M. Milton among tlze Philosophers: Poetry and Materialisr?~
in Seventeenth-Century England. Ithaca, NY: Coluell UP, 1991.
Guibbory, Achsah. Cerernonj~and Community jiona Herbert to Milton:
Literature, Religion, and Cultural Conflict in Seventeenth-Ce~ztu~y England.
Cambridge, England: Cambridge UP, 1998.
Hill, Christopher. Milton and the English Revolution. New York, 1977
Lewalski, Barbara Kiefer. Protestant Poetics and the Seventeenth-century
Religious Lyric. Princeton, N. J.: Princeton University Press, 1979
Marcus, Leah S. Unediting the Renaissance: Shakespeare, Marlowe, Milton.
New York: Routledge, 1996
9. Rogers, John. Tlze Matter of Revolution: Science, Poetry and Politics in the The Late
Age of Milton. Ithaca, NY: Colllell UP, 1996 Renaissance
10. Shifflett, Andrew Eric. Stoicisnz, Politics, and Literature in the Age of
Milton: War and Peace Reconciled. Camblidge, England: Cambridge UP,
1998.
11. Snider, Alvin. Origin and Authority in Seventeenth-Century England: Bacon,
Milton, Butler. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1994
12. Wilding, Michael. Dragons Teeth: Literature in the English Revolution.
Oxford: Oxford UP, 1987.
 UNIT 18 MILTON: THE LIFE
Structure

18.0 Objectives
18.1 Introduction
18.2 An Account of Milton's Life
18.2.1 Childhood and University Life
18.2.2 Religion and Propaganda
18.2.3 Public and Political Life
18.2.4 The Restoration and its Impact
18.3 An Appraisal of Milton's Poetic Career
18.4 Let's Sum Up
18.5 Revision Questions
18.6 Additional Reading

18.0 OBJECTIVES
This unit aims to

e Offer a brief but coinprehensive view of the main features and circun~stancesof
Milton's life.
r Identi@ the various phases in his life when he wrote the different poems we will
study.
Suggest ways in which some of the main events of Milton's life ilnpiilge on his
work.
e Present an overview of Milton's poetic career that will bring out some of the
salient features of his work.

18.1 INTRODUCTION

The importance of exanlining a writer's life is someti~nesforgotten in the necessaly

insistence on close textual interpretation. We forget that such an interpretation can
often gain in richness from a knowledge of the writer's own life and times. This need
not necessarily be through directly correlating the writer's life and hisher works; it
may sin~plybe a matter of bearing in the back of one's mind the circuinstances and
events of the writer's life as a sort of backdrop to the oeuvre. Such a backdrop would
draw attention to some of the less easily evident significations of the oeuvre, and may
sometimes serve explanatorily as well. To this end, this unit will explore the
noi in en to us events in Milton's life as the personal and political stage on which his
anlbitions toward a poetic career were enacted. It will also glance briefly at solne
personal issues from his life in relation to his work, as for instance his marital
relations and his bliildness.

From your reading of the previous unit you would already have an idea of the
importance of the historical events that Milton was observer of and participant in.
What is of further significance is that Milton's personality was such that he could not
but be a key player in the events of his day. Even a cursory reading of the accounts of
his life is sufficient to confml that he was a passionate thinker, committed to the
causes he chose to espouse, yet never determined by them to the extent of beconling
rigid in his ideologies. His refusal to follow any single Protestant school, while
maintaining a lifelong commitment to Protestantism is clear indication also of his
 individuality of thought and integrity of vision. We shall now examine some of these Milton : The Life
in greater detail.

118.2 AN ACCOUNT OF MILTON'S LIFE

18.2.1 Childhood and University Life
Milton was born in London on December 9,1608. When his father, John Milton Sr.
was disinherited by his Roman Catholic grandfather for turning Protestant, he moved
to London and established himself successfully as a notary and moneylender who
paid a great deal of attention to his son's education. Milton is supposed to have led a
rather pampered life at home. He studied at St. Paul's School, London, fiom some
time between 1615 and 1620 till 1625, when he joined Christ's College, Cambridge.
At St. Paul's, he followed the regular curriculum of Latin, Greek and I-Iebrew; but he
also learnt several modem languages fiom private tutors at home. Milton was known
to have been an h i d reader, to the extent that it probably caused the blindness of his
later years, and to have decided early ih his life that he would be a poet and a
humanist scholar. He went on to Cambridge and received his Bachelor of Arts degree
in March 1629 and subsequently his Master of Arts in July 1632. Here he was
nicknamed 'the Lady' for his fineness of features; he was by all accounts a handsome
youth who, by his own account, was throughout his younger days drawn to a life of
sensuality, but forswore it in the pursuit of the higher anlbition of becoming an epic
poet. The chaste Lady of the masque Conzus that he was soon to write, who r e h e s to
succumb to the temptations offered by Comus, appears to embody these sentiments to
some degree. There is sotnesuggestion of conflict with his tutor at Cambridge, and of
a degree of unpopularity which later gave way to respect and even reverence among
both, his peers and his professors, indicative of a proud nature that was not given to
bending to popular opinion.

His Cambridge years display little love for scholastic logic; he preferred and
celebrated instead the ideas and literatures of Renaissance humanism, blending a '
firmly rooted Christianity with Platonism. According to him he was first taken up by
the sensuality of Ovidian and other Roman poetry, but later took greater interest in
the idealism of Dante, Petrarch, and Edmund Spenser. This was to lead to a
fascination with Platonic philosopliy and finally to the mysticism of the biblical
'Book of Revelations'. During these years he also honed his p~eticcraft in Latin,
writing poetry that was highly sensuous in style. Two of his English poems survive
fiom this period: 'On the Death of a Fair Infant' and 'At a Vacation Exercise', both
witten in 1628. His first great poem in Endish, 'On the Moming of Christ's Nativity'
which we will shortly examine in detail, was written in the Clristrnas season of 1629-
30. It reflects the maturation to fullness of his poetical craft and,its innate tendencies,
its religious theme and its hold over fonn as well as meter anticipating the work of
his later days. 'L'Allegro' and 'I1 Penseroso' (both written in 163 11) though less
ambitious than the 'Nativity' poem atid more reflective, in a pastoral vein, continue to
reflect this mastery, as we shall see,

18.2.2 Religion and Propaganda

I On leaving Cambridge, it was assumed he would join the Chwcll, given his scholarly
and literary gifts; but he rejected this outright, staying by his intention to become a
I
poet and scholar and deprecating the tyranny of the Church. This raised the problem
of financial means, which he solved by staying with his parents, first at Hammersmith
and then at Horton, for six years until 1638. 'Ad Patrem' ('To Father'), is his
I expression simultaneously of gratitude to his father and a defense of the career he had
i chosen: During these six years, alongside writing Comus (1634) and Lycidas (1637),
he was to also study intensely the Greek and Latin writers and read extensively in
diverse disciplines like religion, politics, philosophy, geography, history, astronomy,
mathematics and music - a liberal scl~olarsl~ip that was unavailable to him in
 Cambridge and that he was to later deploy even in his poetry with subtlety and
power. Comus was a masque that first dramatized his favoured theme of the grand
conflict between good and evil, while Lycidas, employing the form of the classical
pastoral elegy, may be seen as his first attempt to justify God's ways to 'men'.
Following his mother's death in 1637, a year later Milton travelled to Italy, winning
some recognition for his early Latin poetry. He also visited the imprisoned
astronomer Galileo Galilei, a meeting he considered significant enough to mention in
the Areopagilica. News of growing civil and political strife at home forced him to cut
short his tour and return liome the next year, to settle in London and work as a tutor.

Between 1641 and 1645, he was also to write various trenchantly argued tracts on
church reform, divorce and censorship that participated directly h d passionately in
tlie debates of the day. The picture that emerges by this time is that of a poet deeply
. engaged with and participating in the major issues of his day with a weighty
erudition. By 1660, the culmination of the civil wars in England, Milton had written
at least eighteen major prose works defending the Puritan rebellion and attacking its
enemies, including some supporting the regicide of Charles I. It was evidently a
period when he suspended his poetic ambitions in order to serve through his prose the
Puritan cause in the political upheavals of the time. The exceptions were the
versification of a few psalms and the writing of seventeen sonnets, ranging in subject
from the deeply personal to the political. All of Milton's prose works reflect a stern
and ardent concern with the protection of individual freedom of speech and dignity,
and condemned tyranny of any kind, whether by church or state. He repeatedly and
insistently demanded the separation of the separation of religion froin politics (in
terms that, it may be noted, have high relevance to our own current Indian context),
advocating a republicanism and an almost heretical view of the Bible that were higllly
controversial and brought both suspicion and notoriety. His Areopagitica, a speech
for the liberty of unlicensedprintzng, to theparliament of England (1644) is a classic
among his writings on these issues, as also his Doctrine anti Discipline of Divorce
(1643) and Of Education (1644), an almost typically Renaissance humanist text on
the ideal Christian education for young boys. The divorce tract was probably the
result of his own disastrous marriage to Mary Powell in 1642. Mary, half his age, was
the uneducated daughter of a11 Oxfordshire royalist squire who owed his father
money. The incompatibility was evident, and six weeks after the marriage Ma~ywent
back to her family, refusing to return to Milton. For Milton the marriage was
obviously a tragic mistake, and he argued in the Doctrine that the sole existing
justification for divorce - adultery - was perhaps a lesser evil than a fundamental
incompatibility that forced the maintenance of a loveless union. Mary and Milton
were reunited in 1645 by friends. He went on to take in the entire Powell family of
ten members for almost a year, when they were impoverished by tlie civil war. Before
Mary died in 1652, Milton had three daughters by her. What is o f consequence f i r us
is that this strange union led to a highly controvelsial tract that developed on Milton's
own personal crisis and presented it as a hndrlmnental social issue, fiarning it in tlle
discourse of the oppressive laws of the church. But in doing so, he also opened the
question of women's role in marriage, proposing an equality of relation and even the
(albeit theoretical) possibility of female superiority, even if he did not practise this in
his ow11family, in relation to either his wife or his daughters. These opinions throw a
great deal of usehl light on the figuring of Eve in Book IXof Paradise Lost.
I
18.2.3 Public and Political Life

By 1649, Milton had been invited by Cromwell to be a secretary for foreign

languages to the Council of State. Though it was not a policy making position but ,
I
rather a public relations one, in which he was expected to defend and support the
government, Milton accepted it, eager for a inore hands on participation in the
,I
politics of his time. As part of this task, he wrote liis first defence of regicide,
I
Ei@noklastes, in October 1649 and was to follow it wit11 several others. The success I

of these was tempered by the realisation of his failing eyesight, which turned to
colnplete blindness by the end of 1652, which was also the same year his wife Mary Milton : The Life :
i
died. Despite the blindness, he continued to write the political tracts of defence he
was employed to - several of them in Latin, addressing a European audience -
although his duties were substantially reduced. In 1656 he married Katherine
Woodcock and had a daughter by her, only to see them both die in 1658. He was also
at this time working on the important A Treatise on C/zristian Doctrine, finished
some time around 1659-60, that offers many of the theological arguments that were
to form the core of the debate in Paradise Lost. Like most Anglicans of that time,
Milton was raised in a Calvinist badition, and considered himself one for a very long
period. By the lime of the writing of Paradisc Lost however, he had begun to accept
the Al~niniandoctrine which asserted the salvation of all believers, unlike popular
Calvinism which pronounced the salvation ofjust a select few, and strove
continuously to reconcile this theologically to the idea of the freedom of the
individual to rational choice. The figuring of Satan in Paradise Lost is a brilliant
embodiment of the ideological tensions of this position. Toward the cnd of his life he
had renounced affiliations to all Christian sects, claiming a theological independence
that was quite radical for thc time.

18.2.4 The Restoration and After

The Restoration of 1660 was a deeply disillusioning mornent for Milton, although his
last political pamphlet written that year continued, very courageously, to argue for the
Conunonwealth f o m ~of government that he had so arduously supported, and
condemned the English people for being slavish. With the return of monarchy,
Milton's life was in danger, and he had to go into hiding for some months, The
passage of the Act of Oblivioll grarltillg clemency to the suppol-lers of the
Conunoilwealth eventually made it safe for hirn to emerge, but even then only with
the support and intervention of fiiends like the poet Andrew Marvel1 and the
playwright Willianl Davenant, and probably because his complele blindness
suggested he was now con~pletelyl~arrnlcsstoo. He lived the years froin then till his
death in straitened financial circumstances. From 1660 to 1665, Milton concenlrated
on further study with the aid of his third wife Elizabeth Munshell, whom he married
in 1663, and hisdaughters, who also took the dictation of his magnum opus, Par(~(list,
Lost. It was published finally in 1667, to be followed in 1671 by the publicalion of
Paradise Heg~iincdand S(~nuotiAgonisies, Milton did not survive long aftcr this, and
already severely ill, he died on 8 Noven~ber1674 of gout.

18.3 AN APPRAISAL OF MTLTON'S POETIC CAREER

Milton is considered by many lo be the ~ ~ l oimportant

st and influential poet in thc
English language after William Shakespeare. Hc was to have a lasling impact on the
work in particular of poets like William Wordsworth, Percy Shelley and William
Butler Yeats. From his early precocity in learning and interest in poetry it is evident
that he was not only gifted but aware of his gifls, and willing to hone them through
years of reading and writing. It is also clear that Milton's understanding of the poetic
vocation was, from t l ~ every beginning, an exalted one. He saw hinlself as the tlve
successor of Spenser, in that he wanted to ruse the classical heritage of the
Renaissance with the Christian spirit of the Refomlation, wbile remaining a
quintessentially English poet. It is in this sense that Milton is also a1 intensely self-
reflexive poet, whose poetry is suffused with the awareness of its own ainbition and
vocation. When we examine some of the shorter poems, this sense of self-awareness
in the poetry will becoine clearer, but for immediate reference for the student, it may
be worth looking at Milton's 'Lycidas', a poem in which the poet explicitly poses the
question of the worth of poetry and of the poetic vocation. The iinportant point to
note is that the answer for Milton was always a religious one, in the sense that he saw
his poetry as always at the service of Christianity, In this sense, poetry was a spiritual
vocation, divinely inspired by a religious muse and therefore in continuation with his
Studying Milton religious interests, rather than a means of self aggrandizement. However, it is also
clear that for Milton the religious was not divorced from the political. This political
sensibility manifested in several ways: in his intense conviction in religious
autonomy, in his belief that the only true rejoinder to classical literature and
philosophy would have to be an elaborate Christian one, and in the conconlitant need
to espouse contemporary Protestant English culture as tlie true Christian one. The
consequence was inevitably a strongly English-nationalistic sensibility which was
worked out in both humanist and Protestant-religious terms in his poetry.

In addition to tlie strongly political dimension of his poetic work, almost all of
Milton's poetry is sufhsed by a musicality that underscores his singular attention to
enhancing the poetics of the English language specifically. That is, the rhymes and
rhythms native to English are explored and exploited with lyrical skill in all his
poems, whether in the lighter mode of the shorter poems or in the inore weighty and
sonorous tones of Paradise Lost. The following lines fi-om 'L'Allegro7 illustrate this
point:

While the Cock with lively din,

Scatters the rear of darknes thin,
And to the stack, or the Barn dore,
Stoutly struts his Dames before,
Oft list'ning how the Hounds and horn,
Chearly rouse the slumbring morn,
From the side of som Hoar Hill,
Through the high wood echoing shrill. (11.49-56)

This ear for sound and the consequent enhancing of the musical potential of the
English language was one of the lasting legacies of Milton to succeeding poets, many
of whom remained envious of him in these abilities. The musicality of his poetry was
sometilnes conjoined with a striking sensuality of imagery, as in the following lines
from 'Lycidas' :

That on the green terf suck the honied showres,

And purple all the ground with vernal flowres.
Bring the rathe Primrose that forsaken dies.
The tufted Crow-toe, and pale Gessamine,
The white Pink, and the Pansie fi-eakt with jeat,
The glowing Violet.
The Musk-rose, and the well attir'd Woodbine.
With Cowslips wan that hang the pensive hed,
And every flower that sad embroidery wears:'
Bid Amaranthus all his beauty shed.. .. [ll. 140-91

What is interesting is that this was to grow into an important dimension of his poetry
especially after his blindness set in, and is especially in evidence in the early parts of
his epic Paradise Lost.

18.4 LET'S SUM UP

In this unit, we undertook to examine some of the key events and circumstances of
the life of John Milton, beginning with his childhood years and the years as a student
in Cambridge, in which he had an early inclination to a poetic career. We went on to
explore in some detail Milton's involvement in the political and religious *oil of
his age, focussing especially on the importance of religious politics to his public and
personal life. We noted how his poetic career was temporarily put on hold by his ,
involvement in the civil war and the twenty year Commonwealth reign. We explored
the impact of his blindness and his fall fiom political favour on his life, and the Milton : The Life ,I
subsequent return to his original vocation as a poet. We then had an overview of this
vocation and poetic career, examining Milton's chief achievements and contributions
as a poet. We shall now further elaborate on that overview, studying the matters that
came to be of concern to hiin in both his poetic and prose work, while also exploring
the factors that shaped them at the fonnal level.

18.5 REVISION QUESTIONS

1. Milton's life is largely a record of conflicts between diverse interests. Do you

agree'?
2. Through your readings here ancl in other sources, give an account of the
nature and extent of the influence of Puritanism in Milton's life, To what
extent is this enhanced or countennanded by his classical learning?

18.6 ADDITIONAL READING

Brown, Cedric C. john Millo,z: A Litemiy Life. New York: St. Martin's,
1995.
Campbell, Gordon. A Milt011 Cltro~zolog)~. New York: Macnlillan St.
Martin's, 1997.
Danielson, Dennis, ed. Tlze Cantbridge Companio~zto Milton. Cambridge,
England: Cambridge UP, 1989,
Grose, Christopher. Milton and the Sense of Tradition. New Haven: Yale UP,
1988.
Guillory, John. "Milton, Narcissism, Gender: On the Genealogy of Male
Self-Esteem." Critical E s s n ~ ~on s Johrt Milton, Edited by Christopher
Kendrick. New York: G.K. Hall, 1995, 165-193.
Hill, Christopher. Milton alzd llte Elzglislt Revolution. New York, 1977
Lewalski, Barbara K. The Lije ofJolzrz Milton. Oxford: Blackwell, 2000.
Loewenstein, David. Representing Rcvoliition in Miltoll a~zd Eiis
Contumnporarics: Religion, Politics, und Polelnic~in Radical Puritnnism.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001.
Low, Lisa Elaine and Anthony John I-Inrding eds. klilton, the Metnplzysiculs,
and Ronznnticisnz. Cambridge, Engltuld: Cambridge UP, 1994.
Miller, David. John Milton: Poetly. Boston: Twayile Pilblishers, 1978.
Orgel, Stephen and Jonathan Goldberg, eds. Tlic Oxfo~dAzithors John
Miltorz. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1991.
Shawcross, John T. John Milton: Tlte SeCf'und tlic Worlrl. Lexington, KY:
University Press of Kentucky, 1993.
Spaeth, Sigrn~mcl.Milton's Knowledge of Music. Ann ARbor MI: Uiliversily
of Michigan Press, 1963.
Zagorin, Perez. Milton: Aristocrat & Rebel: The Poet and his Politics. New
York: D.S. Brewer, 1992.
UNIT 19 A SURVEY OF MILTON'S LESSER
POEMS AND PROSE
Structure

Objectives
Introduction
Early Works
19.2.1 'On the Death of a Fair Infant'
19.2.2 'At a Vacation Exercise'
Major Sources and Influences
Milton's Poetic Evolution and the Minor Poems
Milton's Prose
19.5.1 The Old Prose and its Conditions
19.5.2 Milton and the New Prose
Let's Sum Up
Revision Questions
Additional Reading

19.0 OBJECTIVES

e The unit is intended to familiarize the reader with the few extant early poems
of John Milton. While no extended analysis is offered, the poems are
examined in sufficient detail to enable the student to study them on hisfer
own.
It will atlelnpt to identify the main currents that influenced Milton's thought
and work in the early part of his life. It will also identify the literary sources
that he picked up and that were to remain central to all his work.
It wilI then move on to examine the next phase, in which his writings were
primarily political and consisted mainly of prose pamphlets. In this, it will
explore the relations between his prose and poetry.
The overarching intent of tliis unit is to provide the student with a base from
which s/he can pursue further study of Milton's work, witliin and outside this
block.

19.1 INTRODUCTION

Any poetic career can show a wide variety of tendencies and inclinations. Milton's is
no exception. In tlie course of tliis unit, it will become clear that Milton's poetic and
literary life can be broadly divided into three phases: the early phase of idealistic and
artistic concerns; the middle phase of deep iilvolvement in politics and religion,
marked in his work by a dorilinance of prose; and a late poetic phase, following his
blindness, when he dissociated himself froin politics and focused entirely on the
writing of the two major epics, Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained. Despite this
wide range of literary activity, all of Milton's work can be seen to carry some
recurrent themes, motifs and styles. In the course of this unit, we shall attempt to
identify and analyze some of these commonalities. Our concern in doing so is not so
much to relate Milton's life to his work in singular correspondences, as to locate and
exanzine the continuities and discontinuities that mark his literaiy career, and the
implications of these for our understanding of his work.
 I
- A Survey of Milton's
19.2 EARLY WORKS Lesser Poenls and
Prose

The date of Milton's decision to become a poet cannot be detemmined with any
accuracy, but the decision was probably taken early. The verse paraphrases of Psalnls
114 and 136 are tlme earliest extant poetic pieces and they date fi011m his final year at
St Paul's School. They already show tlme poetic promise that Milton was to fulfill in
later years. These two English paraphrases, and four epigrmmms (tluee Latin and one
Greek) which have tentatively been dated to 1624, are the only surviving pieces from
his pre-Cambridge verse. In the subsequent undergraduate years (February 1625-
March 1629) at Cambridge Milton wrote a lot of Latin poeby, wlmic11 is not of any
immediate relevance to our study. Only hvo English poeins (both belongng to 1628)
remain from this period: On the Death o f a Fair Infant, written after the death of his
little niece in January 1628, and At a Vacntiotz Exercise, written in July or August of
the sane year. Let us briefly examine these two poems, to get a sense of the kind of
poetic temperament the early Milton displayed. We need not study them in any detail
to note that both are already engaging in tlme lofty themes that characterize Milton's
poetry.

19.2.1 'On the Death of a Pair Infant'

'On the Death of a Fair Infant', an Elizabethan-style elegy on t11e death of his baby
niece Anne Phillips, is the first of Milton's own English poems (as opposed to the
paraphrases of the psalms) still extant, written early in 1628. Addressed fonnally to
tlme infant for the most part, the poem follows an already well-established tradition of
the allegorizing and Christianizing of classical myth (Potter, 107). In the poem,
Milton allegorises the child's death as being at the hands of Winter (personified here
as a cold being seeking the warmth of love), who wishes to take her as bride and
involuntarily kills her with his touch. The child herself is transfonmled into a quasi-
divine being who, in her deal11 arid in hcr boundless innocence, will now serve as
medium between a sinful humanity and a wratlmhl God:

But oh why didst thou not stay here below

To bless us with thy lmeav'n-lov'd innocence,
To slake his wrath who~llsin has made our foe
To tun1 Swift-rushing black perdition hence,
Or drive away the slaugl~teringpestilence,
To stand 'twixt us and our deserved smart
But thou canst best pelform that office where thou art, (11. 64-70)

With that consolation, the poet then turns to address the mother in the last stanza, and
consoles her with the thought that if she bore this loss in this spirit, she would be
rewarded with another child, probably a son, who 'till the world's last-end shall inake
thy nanle to live'. Already in this poem Milton's lofly the~nesand style are evident,
albeit in a so~newlmatinmature manner (for evidently the original child being
mourned disappears under tlme weight of tlme classicisms that Milton loads the poem
with!) and h i s is true of his other surviving poem from this period.

19.2.2 'At a Vacation Exercise9

In 'At a Vacation Exercise', written in July 1628 he was to affirm his devotion to
English, a style fkee from eccentricity, and exalted themes concerning nature and
humanity. It was also the first instance when Milton was to make a public declaration
of his poetic ambitions. Tile poeln is part of a Latin prose speech hat Milton
delivered to the festive assenlbly marking Qleend of the college year. He interrupts
the speech wit11 the poenz to 'hail [his] native Language', i.e. English, and goes on to
declare how he would use it:
 Yet I had rather, if I were to choose,
Thy service in some graver subject use,
Such as may make thee search thy coffers round
Before thou clothe nly fancy in fit sound:
Such where the deep transported mind inay soar
Above the wheeling poles, and at heaven's door
Look in, and see each blissful deity
How he before the thunderous throne doth lie,
Listening to what unsholn Apollo sings
To the touch of golden wires, while Hebe brings
Inunortal nectar to her kingly sire:
Then passing tluough the spheres of watchful fire,
And misty regions of wide air next under,
And hills of snow and lofts of piled thunder,
May tell at length how green-eyed Neptune raves,
In heaven's defiance mustering all his waves;
Then sing of secret things that came to pass
When beldame Nature in her cradle was;
And last of kings and queens and heroes old,
Such as the wise Demodocus once told
In solemn songs at king Alcinous' feast,
While sad Ulysses' soul and all the rest
Are held with his melodious hannony
In willing chains and sweet captivity.

What is evident from this passage is the unique poetic vision that was to characterize
Milton's work even in his later and more acconlplished verse. He sets forth here the
vocation of the poet that was to prove so highly influential. The unusual occasion
which he chose to announce his decision indicates the importance he gave his
intended poetic calling. Moreover, the patriotic announcenlent to write in English
clearly rejects the humanist emphasis on Latin. It also marks an ilnpo~tantchange in
Milton's poetic career, for in 1628 he had,written only three English poems (the two
Psalm paraphrases and 'On the Death of a Fair Infant'), with the majority of his
poetry in Latin. In the foIlowing decade he wrote mainly in English, with only three
Latin poems and some Italian sonnets. Clearly Milton had determined to become a
serious English poet, electing to follow Spenser and Sidney rather than Virgil and
Buchanan.

19.3 MAJOR SOURCES AND INFLUENCES

From what we have already read of Milton's life and times, it should be clear that,
being a voracious reader, the sources that Milton drew on or alluded to in his work
would be many. Yet what is equally clear is that one lasting source of mxterial for -
as well as influence on - Milton's thought was the Bible, and its imprint is evident
directly or indirectly in almost all his work. In the introduction to this Block, we
covered some of the basic narrative and mythic elements of the Bible that were to
emerge in Milton's writings. But for Milton the Bible was obviously inuch inore than
just a storehouse of narratives, it was in fact the single most important explanation for
the existence of humanity. Its presence in his work is thus as inuch for its theological
as its mythological content, At times, Milton even evokes the style and tone of the
Bible in his work, especially of the Old Testament with which he was particularly
impressed. Biblical motifs and conceins are evident in his lesser poems as well as in
the epic Paradise Lost, as for instance in his first major lyric, 'On the Morning of
Christ's Nativity'.
 I
seventeenth centuiy readers would have been intimately familiar with Biblical A Survey of Miltoa's I
themes like the Genesis story of the Fall of Man, which Milton picks up in Parodise Lesser Poems and !,
Lost. Besides being part of their religious education, it had already received much Prose I
attention by earlier writers and poets. But we tend to forget that part of any school
education in the seventeenth century was also readings in classical literature,
including writers like Homer, Ovid, Virgil, Cicero, Longinus and Horace, allusions to
whom would therefore be easily identifiable to Milton's contemporary readers. But
Milton was also often deliberately erudite in his work, osteiltatiously displaying his
mastery of western learning and literature beyond that which would be fanliliar to the
average seventeenth century reader. For, if we add to the usual education Milton's
own voluminous studies in the classics, and in other disciplines like theology,
philosophy, astronomy, history, etc., along with the Bible, we find a inonulnental
corpus of writers and works that act as source material for Milton's own writings.
Milton drew on these for themes and ideas as much as for models of style: Virgil for
instance was the illode1 for the epic as well as the pastoral, which Milton used in
p o e m like 'Lycidas' and 'L'Allegro', and Cicero provided the illode1 for almost all
prose writers of the age. The Greek Aristotle and the Latin Longillus would have
offered Milton strong theories of genre to negotiate in his work. Likewise, Ovid's
Metamorphoses provided Milton with illany allegorical situations and ideas that we
will find sprinkled throughout his poetry. But Milton was also familiar with the work
of the more recent sixteenth century poets like Beinbo, Della Casa and Tasso, from
whom he may have derived the idea of writing an epic in blank verse. Among
English writers, Milton himself claiined Ednluild Spenser as an important
predecessor, while his soilnets suggest the iniluence of Shakespeare, whom he
celebrated in his poetry. The influence of the ibrmer's TIie Sltepherd's Calenhr is
especially evident in Milton's more pastoral poems, while that of the latter may be
found in the kinship between Shakespearean figures like Macbeth and Milton's own
Satan. He had however, as we have notcd in the previous Unit, little in comnlon with
the poets and poetic fashions of his own age.

But while these sources and lines of influence are useful in understanding Milton's
literary craft and its context, as well as in tracing points of coiltinuity and originality
in relation to a longer tradition, they cannot explain Milton's unique poetic
individuality. What is unique to Milton's poetic slyle is inore than the sinlple
aggregate of these sources and influences on his writing. As we noted earlier, perhaps
the most remarkable quality of Milton's poetry is the importance of sound, rhythm
and music to the fulfillment of meaning in it, n qualily that distinguishes his verse
more than any other. Its intensification in his later poetiy inay be partially explained
by the fact of his blindness, but its definitive presence cven in his early work is
indicative of m affinity to music that precedes this condition, and suggests that
Milton attempted lo fill his writing with the more ephemeral efrect of nlusic itself,
This has led some critics to remark, rather unkindly, that while Shakespeare's voice is
hardly ever evident in his own work, there is evidence orno other voice but his own
in Milton's (Legouis and Cazainian, 1954: 575). At all events, one can identify music
as a source and an inlluencc on Milton's work that reil~aiilsless easily detectable, yet
perhaps more important than it appears.

19.4 MILTON'S POETIC EVOLUTION AND THE MINOR

POEMS

We had noted in the previous unit that Milton started his poetic career and had
decided to write an epic fairly early in his life. These ambitions took shape and were
realised over a poetic career that was in fact suspended for many years, during the
time of his (official and unofficial) service to the Conlmonwealth. We also noted that
the first major work in his adult life as a poet was 'On the Morning of Christ's
Nativity' (1629-30), when he was twenty-four years old. The poem is replete with
Studyirlg Milton many of tlie themes and images to be found in Puradise Lost, written inore than forty
years later. This in itself 1s the strongest indication of the preoccupation wit11and the
continuity of especially Biblical motifs and ideas in Milton's poetic work. It also
in~tiateda lyriclsn~that was developed and continued in the twirl poems of 'L'allegro'
and '11 Penseroso'. These two poems were the last of the nlajor long poeins that
Milton was to write for some time, and his poetic work after this period till the
wiiting ofPrz-rrrrlisrLosr is confined to some hymns and sonnets, of which we shall
study two, Sor~iiefs19 and 23. What is interesting is that in all the variety that Milton
displays in his shorter poetic worlts, he remains aloof from the 'inetaphysical'
fashions of his age, with most of his shorter works serving as sketches toward that
final magnum opus, Paradise Lost. But between the writing of the shorter poelns and
the two epics, Milton devoted hiii~selfto writing powerful, polelnicai and iilfluential
prose tracts that concerned themselves with the inajor political and social issues of his
time.

19.5 MILTON'S PROSE

19.5.1 The Old Prose and its Conditions

The efflorescence of prose in the 17"' century is a matter of some interest. While
prose as a style of writing had been popular for some centuries, it received a
tremendous boost in the invention of the mechanical press, the Gutenberg press, in
the 15'" century. In the succeeding centuries, this invention was to transform the
world. But specifically with regard to prose, the press facilitated the quick and easy
transmission of info~mation,opinion and knowledge. Besides freeing writers from the
patronage system and injecting them directly into a market system, by which readers
buying their books directly supported the writers, by the same token the mechanical
press also pei-tnitted writers greater freedom in what they wrote. Under tlie patronage
system, writers had to submit to the surveillance of their patrons. With the wide-
ranging discoveries and concerns of the Renaissance, a host of new knowledges
entered the public domain through this fieedom and efficiency offered by the
mechanical press. Part of the new intellectualism was an individualism that was in
harmony with the writer's need to break out of the patronage system; ailother part of
it was a secular and inquiring vision that demanded a more objective examination of
the world, unbounded by the subjective and highly emotive charges of relib'~ I O U Sor
social affiliations. The quest for alternative political orders and systeins of authority
spawned a chaos of styles, and the new styles reflected the urgency of the quest itself,
Robert Burton's Anato~nyof Melalzcholy (1621), a compendious inixture of learning,
pseudoscience, and anecdote woven ostensibly into a study of human
psycl~opathology,is one exaiilple of the kind of,prose that marked the early
seventeenth century. In the 1620s with tlie first corantos, or courants (news books),
generated by interest in the Tllii-ty Years' War, another style einerged, resulting from
a drainatic shift from an elite to a mass readership, and a11efflorescence ofpopular
journalism that accompanied the political confusion of the 1640s. 'l'hese two kinds of
styles may be seen as counterpoints to each other: the one polite, decent even when
highly iiitellectual and radical, maintaining the civilities of political debale; and the
other, like the tracts of the Levellers, Ranters and Diggers, scurrilous, populist,
breaching every convention of literary Laste and often considered vulgar and obscene.

This draillatic emergence of the genre of prose was not unrelated to tl~cpoetry of the
period. We must relnelnber that the school of poetry subsequently refcrreci to as the
Metaphysicals emerged alongside this popularization of prose. It was marltedly
different fro111the courtier poetry of the previous century, characte~.izedby wit,
playfulness, en~diteand often obscure allusions, and perhaps most illlportantly, a
vision of the world [hat was broad, nlore inclusive and deeply conteniporary. The
language was terse, staccato in rliythm, often colloquial and conversat~onal,and
replete with unconvelltional rind sometimes shocking imageiy. 'The effects and
infl,.~enceof the popularization of prose is thus cvidcnt in this poetry. Milton's poetic
work, while distant from the Metaphysicals, is not witliout its own resollances of the
new prose styles. While he remained deeply rooted it1 lienaissance a~lclclassicai
genres and styles, his poetry too often reflects the new i~iclusivenessand
contemporaneity of the Metaphysicals. Further, Milton's vision is sweeping, striving
to blend the historical with the inythic, and it is in this perhaps that tlie inlluence of
the new prose is most evident: for the attention to contemporaiy themes is intertwinetl
wit11 a vast erudition of history, politics, mythology, geography and science,
attempting to weave the whole into a total system - a hallmark of the new prose.

19.5.2 Milt011 and the New Prose

While this appears to be lllore in consollance with thc work of the more intellectual
and systematic thinkers like Burton and Thomas Hobbes, Milton's own prose work is
closer to the other variety of prose writing - perhaps as mucll because he wanted to
inaintain poetry as a vehicle of the lofty and sublime, as because his conceims in his
prose were explicitly political and polemical. Yet these too are not without bearing
for his poetical work. In the years 1641--60 he was allnost wholly devoted in his
writings to pamphleteering in the cause of religious and civil liberty. As his work
went on, he was sustained by the conviction that in his defenses of liberty lle was, in
another way, fuliilling his epic and patriotic aspirations. I-Iis early tracts were attacks
on the Episcopal hierarchy of the church, which he fo~oundto be too close to the
Roman Catholic Church. But it was in 1643, with the 'Doctrine and Discipline of
Divorce' (wllich was followed by three more tracts in 1644 and 1645 on the same
theme) that he emerged as a highly controversial yet influential voice in England. In
these trellchantly argued tracts, Milton contended thar adultery might be less valid
than incon~patibilityas Ille only rcason for divorce. I-Ie argued that the coercive bond
of a loveless marriage was dcstructive of human dipity, and therefore as valid if not
Inore valid a reason for divorce. Milton's stand on divorce may have been
substantially influenced by his own unhappy marriage; whatever his personal reasons,
his open ehpousal of this new reason for divorce invited censure and even abuse by
royalists and Presbyterians cqually, as a libertine stand, Rut what is significant for us
is that the vision of the circumstance of marriago that Milton lays out in thcse tracts -
as a union of lovc, a divinely gifted blessing, which is to be dutifully yet lovingly
honored and maintained, but not ireither of thc partncrs find the union itself
intolerable. For Milton, it then ceases to be a mariage, and is oiily a mutually
destructive bond. This vision of marriage is what is carried into his poctiy anci
reflected by Adam and Eve in P(irc1disc Losl.

In subsequent tracts like his most famous pamphlets, 'Of Education' pnd
'Areopagitica', Milton was to explore other themes that were lo reflect in his epic.
The first tract was a treatise on humanist education in the line of Brasmus. It
advocated the study of thc ancient classics, but subordinated to the Bible and
Christian teaching - a balance of emphases that is evident in all his goctiy. The
second was written in response to a Parliamentary decrce demanding that all
published work be licensed by the official licenser. Milton's argument in this work,
characteristically publislled without a license, was that diverse and conflicting
opinions ought to be allowed to debate fi-eelyin public space, without the mediation
of a censoring authority. I-Ie argued that this was essential for moral and intellectual
growth, and believed that truth would triumph over falsel~ooclin such debates. It is
now considered a classic work in defense of civil liberties, but probably had little
illlpact in its own tirne. But thc reasoning at the heart of this tract was to pose a
serious ideological and theological problem I'or Milton in tl~ecreation of the figure of
Satan in P(o*acliseLost, Along with the politics of rebellloll against the king and the
advocacy of a more egalitarian mle, Satan also almost comes to represent for Milton
the suppressed and censored voice that he writes of in the 'Areopagitica'. 111fact it is
arslable that Milton never really manages lo resolve coinplelely the contradictions in
the political and religious represelltations of Satan in this epic. Another tract that
reflects these concerns but from different point of view was the 'Eikonoklastcs',
 written in defense of regicide, following the severe attacks on the Coilunonwealth
fiom Catholic quarters, for the execution of King Charles I. It is perhaps only to be
expected that the defense is based less on rational argument and more on scurrilously
attacking critics like Claudius Salinasius, discrediting him through personal abuse as
a monstrous enemy of a sacred cause.

In these years he had also busied himself with a nlonumental history of Britain and a
Defense of the People of England. 'A Treatise on Christian Doctrine', finished by
about 1658-60, indicated a certain centrality of themes in his work. In this work, he
spelt out some of his central differences from orthodox Cluistianity, primarily in his
rejection of the concept of the holy trinity and of the doctrine of predestination, and
his manifest belief in the humanity, rather than the divinity, of Christ. I-Ie continued
to write tracts espousing religious and civil freedom, like 'A Treatise of Civil Power
in Ecclesiastical Causes' down to his last political tract, 'The Readie and Easie Way
to Establish a Free Comnonwealtl~',published in March 1660. It was a patently a
defiant effort, considering that the tide was changing, and it was already clear that
England was returning to monarchy under Charles 11. Milton's prose work may thus
be seen as an important bridge between his early poetic phase, when his concerns
were priillarily aesthetic and idealistic, and his later epic phase, when he set about to
realize his ambitious project of creating a contemporary mythology.

19.6 LET'S SUM UP

In this unit we studied two phases of Milton's life, the early phase, when he began
wiiting poetry in English, and the middle phase, when he concentrated his intellectual
and creative energies in prose, in the cause of the Commonwealth. We examined
somc of the more inlportant influences on his writing and the sources that he turned
to. We noted his use of such sources and the significance in particular of their
amalgamation into an entire system of thought and vision, blending the classical and
the Christian in such a way that the fonner served the interests of the latter. We also
noted that this fusion of diverse traditions, far f?om rendering Milton a plagiarist,
sei-ves to emphasise the uniqueness of his volce, in prose and in poetry. The unit also
attempted to draw out the relations between Milton's prose conce~nsand his poetic
oeuvre. In doing so, it sought to lay the foundation for a con~prehensive
understanding of the circunlstances and factors involved in Milton's poetry. As we
noted in the Introduction, the longer epics are for reasons of space, outside our
inmediate attention; but the study of this block should help the student pursue a n
examination of the epics on hislher own. We may now continue to examine the more
well-known of Milton's shorter poetic works in the following units.

19.7 REVISION QUESTIONS

1. In your considered opinion, does Milton's early work bear signs of the poetic
ambitions that he later fulfils? Analyse any one poem to substantiate your
answer.
2. From your study of this unit, and from other readings, identify the primary
influences and the main literary sources that are to be found in Milton's early
poetic work.
3. What in your opinion could be the reason(s) ibr Milton's enlphasis on prose
in the nziddle years of his life?
4. Examine and discuss the relations between Milton's poetic and prose oeuvre.
 A Survey of Milton's
19.8 ADDITIONAL READING Lesser Poems and
Prose

I. Brown, Cedric C. Joktz MiLtoti: A Literary Llfe. New York: St. Martin's,
1995.
2. Corns, Thonlas N. "Milton Before 'Lycidas'." Graham Parry and Joad
Raynond, eds. Milton crtid tlre Tertns oJ'Liho-ty.Cambridge: Brewer, 2002.
3. Evans, J. Marlin. The MiLtotzic Monletzt. Lexington, KY: U~liversityPress of
Kentucky, 1998.
4. Grose, Cllristopher. MiLtotl ~ t z dthe Sense oJ'Tratlitiotz. New Haven: Yale UP,
1988.
5. Ilill, Cllristoplier. Illiltorr ant1 the EtigLislz Kevollctlotz. New York, 1977
6. L,egouis, Eiliile and Louis Cazainian. A Histoly of Englislz Literature.
London: Dent and Sons, 1954.
7. Loewenstein, David and James Grantham Tulner, cds. Politics, Poetics, urzd
Hertnstleulics in Miltoti's Prose. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1990
8. Potter, Lois. A PreJilce to Milton. Preface Books. N. York: Longman, 1986.
9. Shawcross, John T. John Miltqtr: The SclJ'~lt~tl lhc World. Lexington, KY:
University Press of'Kentucky, 1993.
UNIT 20 'ON THE MORNING OF CHRIST'S
NATIVITY' AND 'LYCPDAS'
Structure

20.0 Objectives
20.1 Introduction
20.2 'On the Morning of Christ's Nativity'
20.3 'Lycidas'
20.4 Let's Sum Up
20.5 Revision Questioils
20.6 Additional Reading

20.0 OBJECTIVES

I. This unit, along with the next, will discuss some of Milton's inore well-
known lyrics.
o This particular unit will focus on two poems, 'On the Morning of Christ's
Nativity' and 'Lycidas'.
0 In analyzing these two poems, it will examine the generic f o i ~ n that
s Milton
employs and reworks to his own specific ends.
0 Anlong the many cotnplex issues involved, the unit will focus on the
relationship between classical and Christian traditions of thought in Milton's
work.
0 The unit will also examine in some detail the musicality of Milton's poetry.

20.1 INTRODUCTION

These poems reflect a diversity of concems and poetical techniques, which

complenlent each other, as well as reflect many of the concems and styles that go into
the making of Milton's magnum opus, Paradise Lost. The unit will therefore focus as
much on the formal elements of the poems as on their explication. The first poem,
'On the Morning of Christ's Nativity', explicitly displays Milton's early passion for
Christian lore as a source for poetic attention, as well as his persislent Lendency to
cast it as the overriding frame of signification and meaning in his poetiy. While his
erudition and intimate familiarity with classical texts and culture is evident in both
the poems, both poenls promote the Christian over the classical. The second of lhe
two poems, 'Lycidas' may also be seen as a struggle within his poetic self between
these two traditions for supremacy. While these issues will come up for discussion in
the course of the unit, we will also examine some formal dimensions to both the
poems.

20.2 'ON THE MORNING OF CHRIST'S NATIVITY'

The poem consists of four opening stanzas of seven lines each, followed by the main
'Hymn' of twenty-seven stanzas of eight lines each, The opening four stanzas follow
a rhyme scheme different from the rest of the poem and the rhymes themselves are
not very consistently accurate, nor the meter evenly maintained through the poem.
For the most part the foot remains iambic, swinging between the rather rare trimeter 'On the Morning of
(line with six syllables alternately stressed) and the hexameter (line with twelve Christ's Nativity' and I
syllables altemately stressed). The iambic is probably the foot closest to human 'Lycidas'
speech patteills. The inconsistency of the rhyne and meter, rather than reducing, add
I
to a nlusicality that is already evident in this poem, and thal emerges with greater
clarity and power in the later poems. This musicality does not, as in Pope's verses for
instance, derive from the strict adherence to rhyne and meter. Rather, the rhythms ,
that Milton achieves have a more integral relation to the words themselves, as for
instance in the following lines (64-8) froill stanza V of the 'Hymn':

The Windes, with wonder whist,

Smoothly the waters kist,
Whispering new joyes to the milde Ocean,
Who now hat11 quite forgot to rave,
While Birds of Calin sit brooding on the chamled wave.

The alliterative first line with its line-up of aspirative roundings - 'windes', 'wonder',
'whist' - followed by the sibilant 'smoothly' and 'kist', aspire to aurally and tonally
connote the sense of quiet wonder that the lines themselves denote. It nlust be noted
that the poem itself is substantially about sound and music, with stanzas IX through
to XIV specifically about tile rapturous celestial music that heralds Christ's birth. The
swinging, varying lengths of the lines further serve to 'perfonn' this inusic in the
reading of the poem itself.

Yet, Milton's thematic intent, it might be said, demanded a discursivity of tone

approaching prose, in allnost all his poetic works. I-Ience the struggle evident in his
shorter poems to follow the dictates of rhyme and meter together, The rhynle scheme
of the four introductory stanzas, with their longer lines, and alternating rhyme
scheme, suggest the need to make extended statements that may not be contained by
the sanle rhyme. The hymn that follows, because of its afinity to inusic and its more
descriptive and nairative intent, attempts more successfillly to perfonn a more
complex rllynle scheme. Yet even here, the last alexandrine (iambic hexameter) of
each stanza reverts to the discursive tone that Milton appears inore comfoi-table with.
The success of the 'Nativity' poem in embodying the music of its content was not to
be recaptured in those later short poems which were weightier in their subject matter.
It is only in the writing of the epic later that Milton hit upon the fonn of the blank
verse as the ideal vehicle for a heavily musical and sonorous style that nevertheless
remained discursive in its intent.

The Hymn that follows the introductory stanzas and takes up the remaining 23,
differs marginally from them in its stanzaic structure. Where the introductory stanzas
are composed of seven lines each, following an a-b-a-b-b-c-c rhyme scheme, the
remaining stanzas are of eight lines each, using the rhyme scbe~nea-a-b-c-c-b-d-d.
Further, while the foot (or the combination of stressed and unstressed syllables)
remains more or less the iambic through the entire poem, the meterscheme in the
first four stanzas differs from that in the hymn. The first four stanzas use the
tetrameter (or four stresses) for the first six lines, with tbe concluding seventh line of
each stanza using six st~essesor the hexameter; in contrast, the meter scheme in the
hymn is more complex. There the lines a-a and c-c use the terse trimeter, the b-b lines
use the longer pentameter, while the last d-d lines move from the tetrameter in the
first line to the even longer hexameter, 'The effect is remarkable. The first four stanzas
being introductory and therefore inore discursive, the terse but consistent tetrameter
serves the purpose well, ofprojecting a solemn yet speech-like, almost oratorical
effect - as if the voice were discoursing rather than singing. In contrast, the meter and
rhyme scheme of the hymn achieves a more complex effect: that of the chant or the
song. The lines swing between short, terse stresses and extended statements, with the
concluding couplet in particular concentrating the al~nostpendulating effect of the
preceding lines in its large swing from the tetrameter to the hexameter of the closing
alexandrine, The final result is a lyrical, song-like quality that attempts to measure up
Studjlittg Milrorr to both the poem's claim to be a hymn and to the celebratory nature of the subject of
the poem. It is fairly safe to say, however, that the hymn in the poem is, for all its
musicality, easier to read than to sing.

The first four stanzas introduce the poem's topic, the bii-th of Christ, and offer it as a
song in celebration of this event. The third stanza characteristically invokes the
'Heav'nly Muse', in alinost epic style, elevating the tone of the poern lo suggest an
event of epic proportions. The epic that Milton eventually wrote, Parczdisr Lost,
discarded this event to focus on the prior event of 'Man's First Fall' fiom Divine
Grace. Yet this earlier poem bears within it many of the elements of that monumental
work. The sweep of the poem, covering the moment of Creation, leading on to and
through the 'pagan' civilisations of the past and loolciilg forward to the Day of
Judgement, the invocation of the Heavenly Muse, the celebration of Christ as a hero
of epic proportioils who will defeat Satan, the classical and Biblical allusions and
references - these are all important dimensions of Parudise Lost as well. I11
particular, the tllerrie of the old, classical gods being displaced and routed by Christ,
so extensively featured in Book I of Paradise Lost, is prefigured in this poem, as for
instance in stanza 22:
Peor, and Baalirn,
Forsake their Tenlples dim,
With that twice-batter'd god of Palestine
In this sense, one may see in the 'Nativity' poem a kind of preliininary sketch of the
later epic..Certainly the poem bears the intent of announcing the superiority of
Christianity to classical legends and beliefs - indeed, of condemning the latter -
which is shared and extended by the later epic.

20.3 'LUCIDAS'

This poem first appeared in a 1638 collection of elegies entitled Jtlsla Edouardo Ki~ig
Naufrago, commemorating the death of Edward King, a college-mate of Milton's at
Cambridge who drowned in a shipwreck in 1637. Milton, who had not been very
close to King, volunteered or was asked to make a contribution to the collection, and
used the occasion to reflect on his own current elnotional conflicts, specifically about
poetry. King, who like Milton, had apparently devoted his short life to poetry,
becomes the basis for Milton's searching questions on the woi-th of such a life, in the
face of the unpredictability of death. The two poets are imagined as shepherds in the
poem, following the conventions of the classical pastoral, tending the arts of poetry,
and Milton's lament is that such a profession is futile if the inuses ofpoetry cannot
guard their shcpherds.
What boots it wit11 uncessant care
To tend the homely slighted Shepherds trade,
And strictly meditate the thankles Muse,
Were it not better don as others use,
To sport with Amaryllis in the shade,
Or with the tangles of Neaera's hair? (11. 64-9)
This lament goes on to line 76, when Phoebus inten-~iptsthe lament to console tlie
poet, that fame achieved through poet-ry lingers beyond the mortal life of the poet.

Phoebus repli'd, and toucll'd my trembling ears;

Faine is no plant that grows on mortal soil,
Nor in the glistering foil
Set off to th' world, nor in broad rumour lies,
But lives and spreds aloft by those pure eyes,
And perfel witnes of all judging Jove;
 As he pronounces lastly on each deed, 'On the Morning of
Of so much fame in Ileav'n expect thy meed. (11. 77-84) CLrist's Nativity' and
'Lycidas'
This then becbmes the basis for co~lsolation,which ends with the poet's celebration
of Lycidas' life and fame. What is significant about the consolation is that it shifts
registers, from classical allusions to Cluistian inythology - as if Milton deliberately
used the former in the preceding pait of the poem to discuss the death and the sorrow
that it brings, but finds life only in the latter:
Weep no more, woful Shepherds weep no more,
For Lycidas your sorrow is not dead,
Sunk though he be beneath the watry floar,
So sinks the day-star in the Ocean bed,
And yet anon repairs his drooping head,
And tricks his beams, and with new spangled Ore,
Flalnes in the forehead of the morning sky:
So Lycidas sunk low, but mounted high,
Tluough the dear might of him that walk'd the waves... (11. 165-73)
The last line here is of course an allusion to the Biblical sto~yof the miracle of Jesus
walking on water. The poein goes on to describe the heavenly bliss that is Lycidas'
fortune after death. Again here we see how Milton is clearly turning to Christianity as
the superior and more convincing foml ofbelief, for the rewards of the afrer life, Yet
even this turn to Christianity is tightly inte~wovenwith classical elenlents and
allusions. It is important that the illo~neiltof genuine consolation comes only when St.
Peter ('The Pilot' of 1. 109) speaks in wrath at the indulge~ltways of those who live
life without either religion or poetry. Milton is here drawing on two traditions of
allegorisation of the shepherd: the classical, in wllich shepherds are poets, and the
Christian, in which shepherds are spiritual and religious leaders. llle shepherds in the
poenl thus represent both poets and religious guicles, and it is in envisioning the poet
as a combination of these roles that Milton is 1i1ost con~fortable,There is newx-theless
a tensio~~ between the two allegorical franes, arising from their different discursive
and cultural histories. Milton uses this tension between the two cultures very
fruitfidly, as ail index of the tension between worldly, sensual life ai~da spiritual
after-life in the poem, contrasting the values of a transient worldly existence with that
of the immortality and fame achieved through poetry.
Milton's old preoccupation with fa111e and the rewards of a poetic vocation are
evident here. This must be understood as a concern, even a struggle, with the
possibilities of a poetic vocation itself, even as it signals Milton's intensifying
ainbitions. The poem tllus weaves several theines together: mortality as inevitable,
the filtility of poetic ainbitions and the transience of worldly pleasures in the face of
inoitality, the guarantee of spiritual i~n~nortalitywithin Christianity, and the need to
pronlote this as a superior foml of i~nmortalityto that offered by classical thought and
literature; and yet the persistent impulse in the poem is to many the two traditions, as
if Milton's struggle between the attractions of each was a perpetually unfinished one.
This tension is manifest formally as well, and helps explain the layered and complex
narrative style of the poem.
The complex themes and narrative Inovenlent of the poem render its structure
somewhat mysterious. There are two ways of understanding the movements in the
poem: one, as being comprised of two movements with six sections each that seem to
mirror each other; and two, as composed of three movements that run parallel in
pattern. We inust remember however that in neither way do we see any clear
separation of the Christian and classical. Their elements are too intertwined to be
distinguished as individual structures or even structural movements in the poem. Yet,
some discernible distinctiveness is evident. Each movement begins with an
invocation, then explores the conventions of the classical pastoral, and ends with a
more or less comprehensively Christian conclusion to the emotional problem that
Milton negotiates in the poem.
 Milton's epigram labels Lj~ciciasa 'monody': a lyrical lament for one voice. But the
poem has several voices or personae, including the 'uncouth swain' (the main
narrator), who is 'interrupted' first by Phoebus (Apollo), then Calnus (the river Cam,
or Cambridge University personified), and the 'Pilot of the Galilean lake' (St. Peter).
Finally, a second narrator appears for only the last eight lines to bring a collclusioil in
ottava rinza (a sestet + a couplet). The poem till this point is almost in free verse: the
lengths of the lines vary, the rhymes follow no fixed order, indeed the poem seems to
rely Ileavily on internal rhymes within the same line or set of lines, as for instance in
the repetition of the '-ier' (or '-ear ) sound in the first few lines of the poem.
J

Additionally, there are neither couplets nor stanzas. In other words, the poem
contains the iiregular rhyme and meter characteristic of the Italian canzone forin.
Canzone is essentially a polyphonic lyrical form, hence creating a serious conflict
with the 'monody'. Yet, this fornlal conflict does not detract fiom the poem; rather, it
enhances the complex elaboration of its equally coinplex themes. Further, the sense
of sorrow and bewildemlent is intensified by the lines' rehsal to be confined to
consistent lengths and specific rhyne patterns. By referring to the poem as monodic
then, Milton may have meant that the poem should be regarded more as a story told
con~pletelyby one person as opposed to a chonls. This person would presun~ablybe
the final narrator, who llad apparently masked himself as the "uncouth swain" in the
poein. 'This coilcept of stoiy-telling ties Lycidus closer to the genre of pastoral elegy.

The pastoral elegy is a genre initiated by Theocritus, also put to famous use by Virgil
and Spenser. It einploys the irregular rhyme and meter of an Italian canzone. Lj~cicltrs
also exhibits the influence of Pindaric odes, especially in its allusions to Oipheus,
Alpheus, and Arethusa. The poem's alrangeinent in verse paragraphs and its
introduction of vaiious voices and personae are also features that anticipate epic
structures. Like the fonn, structure, and voice of Lyciclu.~,its genre is deeply coillplex.

20.4 LET'S SUM UP

A question that must occur aRer we have examined both the poems and their
iinplications is, why is Milton so intent on maintaining the superiority of the
Christian over the classical? The obvious answer is that he was a deeply Chiistian
illan, and living as he did in tiines of politico-religious controversy and conflict,
perhaps it was inevitable that he would espouse his own vision of Christianity in his
writings. However, this answer has to be supplemented by another set of factors. For
Milton, it was not sufficient to just einphasize the Christian over the classical;
paradoxically lle wanted to also celebrate the classical heritage as a powerfully
influential and attractive cultural discourse, extremely accomplisl~edin its poetic and
literary achievements. Milton negotiated these dual and divergent iinpulses by
inventing a poetic style that was rich with classical allusions, tropes and forinal and
generic elements, yet fuildainentallyEnglish and Christian in sensibility. He cast the
language in a sonorous musicality that was appropriate to his weighty themes,
deliberate and measured in its cadences, and iich with the imagery of rural England.
The effect is poetry that measures itself against the classical greats, with an eye to
transcending them in both quality of foml and scale of content. Evidently Milton was
writing, even in his shorter literary works, in the nationalistic shadow of Spenser.

-
20.5 REVISION OUESTIONS

1 In the 'Nativity Ode', the effect of Milton's use of classical and pagan
mythology is more distracting than enhancing of the poem's themes. Do you
agree? Discuss with reference to the poem.
 2. The 'Nativity Ode' is less about the celebration of Christ and more about the 'On tlie Morning of
superiority of a Protestant English spirit. Analyse the poem in the light of this Christ's Nativity' a~id
statement. 'Lycidas'
3. What in your opinion is explored in 'Lycidas', a psycl~ologicalconflict about
the vocation of poetry or a personal lanlent for a dead fsiend? Give reasons
for your answer.
4. Analyse with reference to the poelll some of the personifications the poet
e~nploysin 'Lycidas'. Do they add to the sense of lament or serve another
puvose altogether?
5. Both the 'Nativity Ode' and 'Lycidas' are poems that struggle to reconcile
themes that are posed as il~econcilable.Identify some of these in each. Which
poem is more successful in its attempts to do so?

Abrams, M.1-I. "Five Types of Lycidas." in Milton's Lycidlu: The Tradition

arld die Poenz. Ed. C. A. Patrides. Columbia: University of Missouri Press,
1983: 216-235.
Corns, Thomas N. "Milton Before 'Lycidas'." Gl.allc7111 Pariy and Joad
Raymond. eds. Miltori nrid Ille Tei.r-nt,sqf'Lihcrfj~. Caillbridge: Brewer, 2002.
Corns, Thomas N. Ilfiltorr!~Langrt(lge. Oxford: Blackwell, 1990.
Creaser, John. "Prosody and Liberty in Milton and Maivell." Grallam Parry
and Joad Raymond, eds. Miltort cirir/ flit Tcrrrrs ofliberfy, Cambridge:
Brewer, 2002.
Guillory, John. "Milbn, Narcissisnl, Gender: 011 the Genealoby of Male
Self-Esteern." Criticril Esscqa orz Jolirr Miltorz. Edited by Christopher
Kendrick. New York: G.I<. Hall, 1995, 165-193.
1-Iubbard, l l ~ o t n a sK. The Pipes ofpan: Irzfsrtextuulityarzd Lifernqj Filintion
1i7 [ I I P(rslora1
~ 7i.aditiori.fiom Tlieocrifus to Miltort. Ann Arbor: University
of Micligan Press, 1998.
Lewalski, Barbara Kiefcr. Protcstnrzt Poetics and the Seventeenth-cerlturyry
He1igio~i.sLjrric. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1979.
Patrides, C, A. Ed. Miltori's.Lj)ci(ius: Tlic Trcl~lifionarzd the Poem. Columbia:
University of Missoiiri Press, 1983.
Robertson, David. "Soliloquy and Self in Milton's Major Poems." Ofpoetry
nrrd Politics: New Essajj,r on Milton ond His World. Ed. P.G. Stanwood.
I Binghamton, NY: Medieval & Renaissance Texts & Studies, 1995: 59-77s
 UNIT 21 'L9ALLEGR09,'IL PENSEROS0 9 AND
THE SONNETS
Structure

Objectiv~s
Introduction
'L' Alleg-o'
'I1 Penseroso'
Coinparative Discussion
Sonnets 19 and 23
Some Additional Reinarks
Let's Suin Up
Revision Questions
Additional Reading

21.0 OBJECTIVES

In this block, you will study sonle of the major poeins and sonnels of Milton.

It is i~npossibleto fully understand and appreciate John Milton's 'T,'Allegro' wilhout

also reading its companion piece, 'I1 Penseroso'. 'L'Allegro' gives an account of 'the
happy person', imagined in the poein as spending an idyllic day in the country,
followed by a gay evening in the city. 'I1 Penseroso' repeats this but For 'tho
meditative person' whose hours are passed in meditative, solipsistic walking in the
woods and st~idyingin a 'lonely Towr'. First published in 1645, the two poems are
thus deliberately posed as dialectical opposites with a strong complementarity of
structlire and images. When reading them, the sense of dual inlpulses, of n poet being
drawn in two opposing directions simultaneously, is very strong. We may even read
them as explicitly posing the two attitudes to the vocation of poetiy that so l~aunt
Milton, and that we have seen him striving to reconcile in our studies of the
preceding units. Here again, the poems do not individually enlbody any one strain
alone, of either the classical or the Christian, but weave the two together 'kom two
different standpoints. Let us now examine the poems in some detail.

The poem opens with an address to Melancholy, rather than Mirth, which takes the
first ten lines. Followii~gthis the poein changes rhythm. The first ten lines are of
alternating length, sm itching froin the iambic pentameter to the trimeter. 'I'hc staccato
effect of this reinforces the sense of anger and revulsion towards Melancholy tlitit the
poem wishes to communicate. The switch to the inore relaxed nrld consistent nleasure
of the tetrameter for the rest of the poeln announces the poet's fixity ufiittcntion in
dealing with the theme.

The poeln essentially outlines the events of one day, spent for tho 111ostpart in the
countiyside, where the pleasures of the country and the beauty of tlltt rural landscape
are explored. Like with Inany of Milton's poems, there is a slrong yct subdued
element of sensuality in his descriptions of the rural scenes. In this particular poein, 'LYAllegro','I1
the sensuality is enhanced by the trope of the union or coupling that haunts the poein. Penserosoyand the :I
'I
Sonnets
Mountains on whose bairen brest
The labouring clouds do often rest:
Meadows trim with Daisies pide,
Shallow Brooks, and Rivers wide.
Towers, and Battlements it sees
Boosom'd high in tufted Trees,
Wher perllaps som beauty lies,
The Cynosure of neighbouring eyes. [I!. 73-80]
Here the mouiltains and clouds are a pair, while the battlements 'boosoin'd' with
tufted trees lead easily onto the figure of the beauty lying in wait within - almost as if
the battlements were the external manifestation of Lhe beauly inside. This subtle
emphasis on sensuality and sexual union is never elal>oratedirito a full-fledged theme
but reinains a condition of the possibility of Mirth. We must also keep in mind that
sensuality and sexuality were and are conventionally a11 integral pait of celebrations
of Mirth or gaiety, part of the discourse of the comic and ludic that Milton inherits
from the classicals. While Milton's own poeill nevcr itself becotnes comic, it
celebrates colnedy as inherent to Mirth or the condition of joy. One o f the most
striking images ill the poem is that of the conlpanions of Mirth:
Haste thee nymph, and bring with tl~ec
Jest and youll~fulJollity,
Quips and Cranks, and wanton Wiles,
~ o d sand
; Becks, and Wrcalhctl Smilcs,
Such as hang on Hebe's cheek,
And love to live in dimplc sleek;
Sport that wrincled Care deridcs.
And Laughter holding both liis siclr:~.[11.25-321
The comic dimension to the poem, like its sensualily, is nevcr allowed to grow into a
full theme. Rather, along with the seiisualily, il serves to dignify Mirth, to give it
credibility and honour as an attitude lit for t.11~vc?cation ofpoctty. It thus leads on to
become part of Milton's favourite concern, that o l 1?1)1~11.!r~ndits velat ti on to the
attitude of the poet. After the rural scenes, with the clost: of day, the pocm shifts to
the city, and dwells, on the pleasures and joys of' night in the city, focusing on the
court, its masques and music, and the pleasu~~~!; 01' the spcctacular.
And ever against eating C'arcs,
Lap me in soft Lydian Airc:.,
Married to inmmortal vet s r
Such as the meeting soill il.lay pic:rce
In notes, with many n \vii~diiig11011!
Of lincked sweelncs long d l ' : i ~ out,
~i
With wanton heed, and giddy cunning.... [II. 135-1411
I1 is telling that the poeill eventually locales the happening, the occurrence of poetry,
only in the city. The counLryside in this sense figures as an inchoate inass uf
sensuality that is given delinition and substance in the iuorc cultured practices of thc:
artist in the city.

Like its companion poem, 'I1 Penseroso' begins with a staccato derision of Mirth, and
following the same metrical pattern, swilches lo the more consistent tetrameter
couplet in the subsecluent illvocation oEMelancl~oly.
 But hail thou Goddes, sage and holy,
Hail divinest Melancholy,
Whose Saintly visage is too bright '

To hit the Sense of human sight;

And therfore to our weaker view, [ 15 ]
Ore laid with black staid Wisdoms hue.

It nlay be immediately noticed that the poet rejects the sensuality of the earlier poem,
at least thematically. Melancholy is perceived to be beyond the human senses, and
therefore associated with the colour black. This denuding of the senses becomes the
precondition for the development of wisdom. Again in contrast to the enlphasis on
coupling and union in the earlier poem, this poem dwells on the pleasures of solitude
and reilunciation of the world. Consequently, it is not surprising that Melancholy is
hailed as a nun:

Com pensive Nun, devout and pure,

Sober, stedfast, and demure,
All in a robe of darkest grain,
Flowing with nlajestick train,
And sable stole of Cipres Lawn, [ 35 ]
Over thy decent shoulders drawn.

The last line above also indicates the asexuality that Milton wished to endow
Melancholy with. Much of the early part of the poem takes place in the night, but the
experience of the night is a solitary one, dominated by a sense of distance fiom
humanity and by the presence of philosophy and literature. The pleasures of
Melancholy are thus revealed to be essentially of the mind and soul rather than the
body. The paradox is of course that il~uchof the poem remains replete with the
lailguage of sensuality, even as that sensuality is rejected in favour of inore cerebral
and spirihral pleasures:

But, 0 sad Virgin, that thy power

Might raise Muszus froin his bower,
Or bid the soul of Orpheus sing [ 105 ]
Such notes as warbled to the string,
Drew Iron tears down Pluto's cheek,
And made Hell grant what Love did seek. [11.103-1081

We will return to coinment on this paradox when we discuss the two poems
comparatively in the next section; for now we must note that the affinity for
Melancholy in the poem returns the poet to the themes of art and literature - to the
ideal attitude for the vocation of poetry.
II
?[.I The dawn of day signzls the time to retire and sleep, This inversion of routines is also
an inversion of the temporal sequence of the companion poem, suggesting that
i
iIt
'L' Allegro' is a poem that addresses the everyday circumstances of life, while 'I1
Penseroso' works on the principle of distance from these.

Hide me fiom Day's garish eie,

While the Bee with Honied thie,
That at her flowry work doth sing,
And the Waters murmuring
With such consort as they keep,
Entice the dewy-feather'd Sleep;
And let som strange mysterious dream,
Wave at his Wings in Airy stream,
Of lively portrature display'd,
Softly on my eye-lids laid. [ll. 141-1501
The contrast with the bee that works busily through the day is not accidental, but 'L'Allegro', '11
emphasizes the distance that the poet - or rather his persona in the poem - seeks from Penseroso' and t l ~ r
the activities of the day. Eventually, this persona turns to the cloister and 'the Hairy Sonnets
Gown and Mossy Cell' as the final site of solitude and peace, as the true location of
Melancholy.

21.4 COMPARATIVE DISCUSSION

The pair of poems we have examined could represenl one or all of a series of tensions
and oppositions: between Day and Night; between Mirth and Melancholy; or between
opposing courses to follow (or sensuality and sludy) in the pursuit of transcendence
and union with God; or yet, Milton's old personal struggle between the classical and
the Christian traditions. Setting aside his practiced Latin poetic hand, Milton chose to
write these illirrored poems in English, even as he retained Latinate titles for them.
Further, as with the pocms examined in the previous unit, here too the poems ,.r.*ea
highly complex and subtle iilterweaviilg of classical and English folklore, as well as
imagery. The poeins should be read aloud in order hlly to appreciate their
conlplementary sounds; 'L'Allegro's' lilting pitch and images of crowing roosters and
singing larks deeply conlrasts with 'I1 Penseroso's' somber tone and the 'Lamp at
midnight hour'.

Many critics have speculated that Milloil prefers the pensive ~nelancholycelebrated
in 'I1 Penseroso' because it represents the ascetic life of study, as opposed to
'L'Allegro's' which emphasizes a Dionysian, pleasure-seeking lifestyle. Milton
appears to nlake this preference explicit in his sixth Eleby, written to Charles Diodati,
when he tells his friend Illat Apollo, 'Bacchus, Ceres, and Venus all approve' of 'light
Elegy' and assist poets in such co~~~positions, but poets whose ambitions reach higher
to tile epic and hcroic ~uodesmust eschew the dionysiac lifestyle for a more ascetic
practice:

But they who Demigods and Heroes praise

And feats perfonn'd in Jovc's more youll~fuldays,
Who now the counsels of high hcav'n explore,
Now shades, that echo the Cerberean roar,
Sinlply let these, like him of Satnos live
Let herbs to thcm n bloodless banquet give;
In beechen goblets lcl their bev'rage shine,
Cool from 111e chrystal spring, their sober wine!
'I'heir youth should pass, in innocence, secure
From slain licentious, and in manners pure,
Pure as the priest's, when robed in while he stands
Thc fresh lustration ready in his hands. ('Elegy 6', 55-66)

The poet who seeks lo attain the highest level of creative expression must embrace
the divine, which can only be accornplisbcd by following the path set out in 'I1
Penseroso'.

Milton's invocalion of the goddess Melancholy reminds one of his salutation to Mirth
in 'L'Allegro', and sets up the parallel structure of the two poems. It also suggests a
very specific body of sources, such as Robert Burtorl's comprehensive Anatomy of
Meluncholy, John I;letcherts song 'Melancholy', and Shakespeare's Hamlet Act 2, sc.
2. line 309. The concept of 'melancholia', however, has its origins in ancient Greece
with I-Iippocrntes and his 'l~umourstheory' of thc body, which was later revised by
Aristotle and Galen. Milton's choice of 'Penseroso' in the title, over 'Melancolico' or
'Afflitto' , indicates his en~pl~asis
on the positive and spiritual aspects of Melancholy,
While some critics argue that the two poems refer'equally to Milton, others believe
that 'L'Alleg-o' was about his friend, Charles Diodati, while 'I1 Penseroso' was
autobiographical in nature.

Both the poems open with brief introductory stanzas of ten lincs each, and in each
case, the ~ntroductionis through the denounceillent of the opposite emotion in the
countelpart poem, locking the two poems into a necessarily dialectical reading. In
both cases, the main bodies of the poems, after the introductoiy stanzas, follow the
same fixed line and meter: rhyming couplets in the iambic tetrameter. The opening
stanzas too, share an identical structure: a quatrain followed by a sestet. In both cases
the rhylne scheme of the opening stanzas is a-b-b-a, followed by c-d-d-e-e-c. Again,
the understanding we arrived at earlier for the 'Nativity' ode holds here too. The
problem that Milton encounters in introductory passages, where he has to offer a
somewhat discursive account of what will follow, is negotiated by alternating the
rhyming lines to accommodate more complex sentences. This is abjured in the rest of
the poem, for the terser rhyming couplet, sufficient to the demands of descriptive
praise, as for instance in these lines from 'I1 Penseroso':

Thee Chauntress of? the Woods among,

I woo to hear thy eeven-Song;
And missing thee, I walk unseen
On the dry smooth-shaven Green,
To bellold the wandring Moon,
Riding neer her highest noon,
Like one that had bin led astray
Tl~roughthe Heav'ns wide pathles way;
And oft, as if her head she bow'd,
Stooping through a fleecy cloud. (11. 63-72)

As importantly, the rhyming couplet maintains tlle sense of discipline necessary to

the themes ofthe two poems, even as it pei~llitsan energetic, staccato rhythm to flow
tl~rouglithe lines. While this adds to the sense of their being comnpanion poems, it
also indicates to us Milton's strong sense that both sensibilities - gaiety and
n~elancholia- possess the power to produce powerhl, passionate, yet controlled
poetry, and at least on this criterion, there is little to choose between the two. If, as
critics have suggested, Milton finally favouis Melancholia, it is more likely to be
because of his own poetic a ~ thenlatic
d inclinations than because the one sensibility
1s in some way innately superior to the other. In this light if we return to the paradox
we noted earlier while discussing 'I1 Penseroso', we see that it elmerges because the
two att~tudesare posed as oppositional, when in reality they are not, they are illerely
extensions within a continuum of human attitudes.

In terms of the similarities between the two poems, it is worth noting here that this is
one instance when Milton seems to have drawn as close as he possibly ever does to
the poetic fashions of his age. The poets we refer to as the Metaphysicals, like Donne
and Marvell, were particularly fond of writing poetly that used dialogic voices, as for
instance in Marvell's poem, 'A Dialogue between the Soul and the Body'. Just as in
that poem, the basic conflict expressed in Milton's twin poems is that between the
pleasures of the flesh and the pleasures of the mind or the spirit. T11e difference of
course lies in the fact that in Marvell's poem the schism betw~eribody and soul is
expressed internally, in the poem, as part of the same speaking voice, while the
schism in Milton's two poems is exleinal to the poem itself, and is perceptible only
when the poems are read jointly. It is here that we identify a central humanistic
concell1 emerging, in the treatment of the human spirit as tom between two equal
forces, the call of the sensual world and the seductions of the intellectual and spiritual
one. The difference in this regard between Marvell and Milton is as important as the
similarity: where 'Clilton is still able to externalise the schism, and present the voice
within the poem as 311 integrated whole, in Marvell's poem the schisiu is already
internalised and negotiated within the same poem, and the poetic voice itself splits in
two to acconunodate it. In this Milton evidently remains closer to h e older 'L'Allegro', '11
humanism. Penseroso' and the
Sonnets

21.5 SONNETS 19 AND 23 --

Dates ranging from 165 1 to 1655 have been suggested for bbth Sonnet 19 and 23, but
1652 appears to be the best estimate. Sonnet 19's second line has often led readers to
assume an earlier date because no one in the seventeenth century would express
confidence about living much past 70, if that. If he wrote this line in 1652, he would
be counting on 86 years. Milton's own father lived to be at least 84. Milton often
understated his age and predated several poems in the 1645 Poerns. He was anxious
about his age and his personal attractiveness. He was also a~utiousabout vocational
belatedness. By 1652 Milton was totally blind. He had spent years fulfilling his duties
to the Council of State. Now he was under ~naliciousattack for defending Cromwell's
gove~nmentto the world and for his own advocacy of divorce, and even ridiculed for
his blindness. He had always meant to write a great English epic, and now it must
have seemed impossible. This brilliant sonnet is proof enough that his talent has not
been rendered 'useless' by age and blindness.

Both sonnets follow the iambic pentalneler of conventional sonnet as well as the
octave-sestet pattern, and the octave in both ionnets follows the same kind of rhyme
scheme, which is a-b-b-a-a-b-b-a. The seslets in the two sonnets however, differ
slightly: where Sonnet 19 follows the scheme c-d-e-c-d-e, Sonnet 23 goes c-d-c-d-c-
d. We will discuss these patterns in a moment; for now it is important to note that
both sonnets deal with Milton's blindness. But the way in which the sense of
blindness is expcrienccd is diTIererlt in each poem. In Sonnet 19 the blindness comes
to represent for the poet n blindness oi'pu~posein life itself, since it suggests the
inability to practise his craft witliout which he feels he has

. . .one Talent which is death to hide,

Lodg'd with me useless, though my Soul more bent
To serve therewith my Maker, and present
My truc account... (11. 3-6)

But having stated the lament, he is iristructecl by 'patience' to 'bear his nlilde yoak'
patiently, for as thc fanions last line of the sonnet states, 'They also serve who only
stand and wa'ite.' ?Ile poet thus dcrivcs consolation from humility, the poem tlien
serving as a reminder to the poct and re-Tocusing his attention on the pulpose of his
poetry, which is not just the exercise of the talent Tor its own sake, but in the service
of God. Thc sonnet is in this sense finally a religious sonnet. To this end, the octave-
sestet scheme is adhered to in the progression of the poem itself, Tor the lament of the
poet takes up the octave, while the argument against the lainent follows in the sestet,
which Ihus selves as a countor-point to the octave.

In conbast Sonnet 23 is a more ambiguous. somewhat ~nysterioussonnet, the person

who is the object of which is not very clear. Apart from (but consistent with) the
thematic ambiguity, the imagery in the sonnet is striking in its employnlent of light
and dark, visibility and invisibility. 'l'he lady is presented to us as

. . .vailld, yet to my fancied sight,

Love, sweetness, goodness, in her person shin'd
So clcar, as in no face wit11 more delight. (11. 10-12)

This effect is hrtllercd arid intensified by the wraith-like quality of the figure which,
Milton informs us, is like Alccstis, 'Rescu'd from death by force though pale and
faint' (1. 4). Unlike the earlier sonnet which is fairly clcar even in its articulation of an
essentially religious doubt, this sonr~etis seemingly simpler in its topic, yet far more
 Miftotl
Stlm~)it~g richly ambiguous in its treatment. It is further different from tlle previous sonnet in
being closer to the metaphysical style that we have noted of the other poets of the
age, especially in its brilliant yoking together of night and day in the last line. This is
perhaps inevitable, given the poem's rather peculiarly metaphysical subject, which is
the fundamental connection between vision and notions of reality - or in other words,
the way in which transformations in perception can transform one's understanding of
reality itself. A final difference between the two sonnets lies in the thematic refusal to
adhere to the octave-sestet division, in Sonnet 23. The vision in the poem occupies
'almost all of it, and it is only in the final couplet that a reversal of perspective is
effected, and we realise that the poet is talking about a fantastic vision rather than an
actual one.

The difference in the rhyme schemes of the sestets between the two sonnets draws
our attention yet again to the difference in theme and treatment. While Sonnet 19's c-
d-e-c-d-e schenle serves well to articulate the longish argument which constitutes the
consolation to the blind poet, since it pennits the elaboration of extended sentences,
Sonnet 23's c-d-c-d-c-d pattern works to limit the length of the sentences and
statements, the pauses serving to enhance the sense of mystery. Further, in the latter
scheme, the repdition of the sanle rhymes also serves to draw together and integrate
the total experience of the poem as a singular one. In this sense at least, Milton's use
of the sonnet form, while conventional, even classical, in Sonnet 19, beconles slightly
unconventional with Sonnet 23.

21.6 SOME ADDITIONAL REMARKS

We have in this and the previous unit focused on Milton's evolution as a poet,
through a brief study of some of his more important short poems. We have seen how
he remains, in almost all his poetry, rooted in Biblical thought and imagery, which
may therefore be understood to be the single most important influence on his work. In
addition to this, however, we traced the influence of some earlier and classical poets,
like Virgil and Ovid, and Spenser among his immediate predecessors. We noted how
music plays an important role in Milton's poetry, both in theme and in folm. We also
noted how lhese early shorter works preiigure to a lesser or greater extent the themes,
conceins and styles of his later epic, Paradise Lost. We focused primarily on
understanding some of the stylistic and formal issues involved in the poems, in the
course of the study. This is not to suggest that the poems are to be interpreted or
studied only in this way. Milton's writing is no exception from the general rule-of-
thuinb that all literature has hndamental roots in its historical context, and may well
be studied in these ternls, alongside and integrating the more formal aspects of study.

This nlay appear a more difficult task with Milton than would normally be the case.
We have seen the extent to which his writing is steeped in classical allusions and
myths, and in the Bible. It can be deeply allegorical, as with the twin poems
'L'Allegro' and 'I1 Penseroso', or highly personal as with the sonnets. There seems
little in his shorter poetry that alludes to the great social and political events of his
age, at first glance, and they seem to constitute a universe of their own. This however,
should not discourage the student from exploring the poems for their contextual
affiliations. Some of these inay be found as oblique presences, in descriptive passage
in the poems, as for instance in these lines from 'L'AllegroY:

Towred Cities please us then,

And the busie l~umrnof men,
Where throngs of Knights and Barons bold,
In weeds of Peace high triumahs hold,
With store of Ladies, whose bright eies
Rain influence, and judge the prise
 Of Wit, or Arn~s,while both contend 'L'AHegroY,'11
To win her Grace, whom all comnend. Penseroso' and the
There let IL11men oft appear Sonnets
In Saffron robe, with Taper clear,
And pomp, and feast, and revelry,
With mask, and antique Pageantry,
Such sights as youthful1 Poets dreain
On Sumner eeves by haunted stream. [ll. 117-1301

While at first glance these lincs inay appear to be no more than part of the idyllic
setting that the poet paints for the gay speaker of the poem, a more thoughtful look
will suggest that what Milton is describing herc is the court of Charles I, in all its
polnp and pageantry. Certainly through the description of the cities as 'towred'
Milton is drawing up a host of associalions for his seventeenth century readcrs: that
the city is London, and is associated with the palace, the royalty and the nobility; this
is hrther associated with a moral and spiritual degeneracy that has an almost pagan
air to it; in implicit contrast is the country, and that invisible city of the commoners,
where such riches and polnp do not exist; which in turn would be associated by the
seventeenth cei~turyreader wit11 a more clearly Puritan, and therefore Christian air.
When we reed this poem then, as we must, with its coinpanion pocm, which we
might understand to emerge fi'onl precisely this latter social section, we realise that
the two poems actually enlbody - albeit in a coded and broad way - the values of the
two oppositional classes and political factions of the middle of the seventeenth
century.

The other pocms may be read in a similar vein. It is possible for instance, to read the
repeated invocation of the Muses in the different poems as epitonlising the relations
between the scxcs of' thc age - tlle mnsculinc voice retaining control and presence,
suinnloning t11c fcmininc voice lo fulfil its aims, even as it projects the latter as quasi-
divine. Even if Milton was among the first to argue for the equal slatus of women in
society, his figuring of femininity remains deeply bound by the imagination of his
age, which is, that the role of women is cssentially as support, instrument and silent
spectator (witness the figuring of Nature in the 'Nativity' ode) to the operations of
men. Tllesc are of course, very sketchy analyses, intended more as directions ior
exploration than as complctc statanents. Closer analyses will reveal more complex
relations between thc poetry and its social world, and especially to the colnplex and
multilaycred processes of gender relations. Such analyses will first denland that one
study the complcxitics of the age itsell', socially, politically and culturally. In this
sense, the above remarks ilrc o l'i'crcd as no inore than a very snlall window to a very
large prospcct.

21.7 LET'S SUM UP --

In this unit we examined four of Milton's shorter poems. We studied the relation
between the twin pocms 'L'Allego' and '11 Penseroso' as poems that deliberately
adopt oppositional attitudes to the vocation of poetry. Wc studied tl~cpoems
individually and in compclrison. In the course of doing so, we noted that this led to
certain paradoxes that were inherent to understanding the poems in this light. The two
sonnets that we chose for stucly are fro111Milton's later literary phase, and revealed
other din~ensioll.;to his writings like the preoccupation with blindness and its
implications, and with death. These are in this sense more personal poems than the
others we have studied so far. We then went on to discuss some aspects of the
relation bctween formal elements and the historical context in which the poems were
written. This we hope will serve as a preliminary guide to the analyses of poetry
through the location of its formal qualities within, rather than separated from, its
contexts of creation.
- -
21.8 REVISION QUESTIONS

1. In the twin poems, 'L'allegro' and 'I1 Penseroso', Milton seeks to offer not
just a vision of two moods but the two extreme sentiments of an extreme age.
Do you agree? Give a reasoned answer.
2. Which of the two poenls 'L'allegro' and 'I1 Penseroso', in your considered
opinion, would more accurately represent Milton's owl1 personal view?
Why?
3. In both the two sonnets in your course, Milton reflects on his blindness. Does
that make them identical? Give a reasoned answer.
4. Analyse the similarities and distinctions between Sonnets 19 & 23. Which of
the two, in your considered opinion, more effectively employs the sonnet
form?
5. Milton's poetry is transcendent, in themes as well as style, rather than
historically rooted. Would you agree? Why, or why not?

21.9 ADDITIONAL READING

1. Allen, Don Cameron. Mysteriously Meant: The Rediscovery of Pagan

Symbolism Allegorical Interpretation in the Renaissance. Baltimore: Johns
Hopluns Press, 1970.
2. Benet, Diana Trevino and Lieb, Michael, eds. Literary Milton: .Texf, Pretext,
Context. Pittsburgh: Duquesne UP, 1994.
3. Borris, Kenneth. Allegory a n d ' ~ p i cin English Renaissance Literalure:
Heroic Form in Sidney, Spenser, and Milton. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2000.
4. Corns, Thomas N. Milton's Language. Oxford: Blackwell, 1990.
5. Easthope, Antony. "Towards the Autonomous Subject in Poetry: Milton's 'On
His Blindness"' in Machin, Richard and Christopher Norris, eds. Post-
Structuralist Readings of English Poetry. Cambridge, England: Cambridge
UP, 1987.
6.' Fish, Stanley. "What It's Like to Read L'Allegro and I1 Penseroso." Is There a
Text in this Class? Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1980: 112-35
7. Robertson, David. "Sdiloquy and Self in Milton's Major Poems." Of Poetry
and Polifics: New Essays on Milton and His World. Ed. P.G. Stanwood.
Binghamton, NY: Medieval & Renaissance Texts & Studies, 1995: 59-77
8. Schiesari, Juliana. Tlie Gendering of Melancholia: Feminisnz,
Psychoanalysis, and fhe Sylnbolics of Loss in Renaissance Literalure. Ithaca:
Cornell University Press, 1992.
 APPENDICES

ON THE MORNING OP CHRIST'S NATIVITY

COMPOS'D 1629

I
his is the Month, and this the happy mom
Whereh the Son of Heav'ns eternal King,
Of wedded Maid, and Virgin Mother born,
Our great redemption from above did bring;
For so the holv sages once did sing, [ 5 ]
That he our deadly rorfeit should release,
And with his Father work us a perpetual peace.
11
That glorious Form, that Light unsufferable,
And that far-beaming blaze of Majesty,
Wherwith he wont at Heav'ns high Councel-Table, [ 10 ]
To sit the inidst of Trinal Unity,
He laid aside; and here with us Lo be,
Forsook the Courts of everlasting Day,
And chose with us a darksom House of mortal Clay.
111
Say Heav'nly Muse, slzall not thy sacred vein [ 15 ]
Afford a present to the Infant God?
Hast thou no vers, no hymn, or soleinn strein,
To welcom him to this his new abode,
Now while the Heav'n by the Suns team untrod,
Hat11 took no print of the approching light, [ 20 ]
And all the s~annledhost keep watch in squadrons bright?
IV
See how from far upon the Eastern rode
The Star-led Wisards haste with odours sweet:
0 run, prevent them with thy humble ode,
And lay it lowly at his blessed feet; [ 25 ]
Bave thou the honour first, thy Lord to greet
And joyn thy voice unto the Angel Quire,
From out his secret Altar toucht with hallow'd fire.
The Hymn
I
It was the Winter wilde,
Wllile the Heav'n-born-childe, [ 30 ]
All meanly wrapt in the rude manger lies;
Nature in aw to him
Had dofft her gawdy trim,
With her great Master so to sympathize:
It was no season then for her [ 35 ]
To wanton with the Sun her lusty Paramour.
II
Onely with speeches fair
She woo's the gentle Air
To hide her guilty front with innocent Snow,
And on her naked shame, [ 40 ]
Pollute with sinfull blame,