An Introduction to the Prose and Poetical Works of John Milton / Comprising All the Autobiographic Passages in His Works, the More Explicit Presentations of His Ideas of True Liberty.

John Milton

TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

MILTON'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY made up of all the more important

PASSAGES IN MILTON'S PROSE AND POETICAL WORKS IN WHICH HIS IDEA

COMUS

LYCIDAS

SAMSON AGONISTES

NOTES A Defence of the People of England

Greek words that may not display correctly in all browsers are transliterated in the text like this: βιβλος. Position your mouse over the line to see the transliteration. Some indented lines of poetry and hemistichs will not display properly unless the reader uses a mono-spaced font. Other notes follow the text.

AN INTRODUCTION TO THE PROSE
AND POETICAL WORKS OF
JOHN MILTON

John Milton

AN INTRODUCTION

TO THE

PROSE AND POETICAL WORKS

OF

JOHN MILTON

Comprising all the Autobiographic Passages in his Works, the more Explicit
Presentations of his Ideas of True Liberty

COMUS, LYCIDAS, and SAMSON AGONISTES

With Notes and Forewords

HIRAM CORSON, LL.D.

Professor of English Literature in the Cornell University

NEW YORK
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
LONDON: MACMILLAN & CO., Ltd.
1899

Norwood Press
J. S. Cushing & Co.—Berwick & Smith
Norwood Mass. U.S.A.

'Servant of God, well done! Well hast thou fought
The better fight, who single hast maintained
Against revolted multitudes the cause
Of truth, in word mightier than they in arms,
And for the testimony of truth hast borne
Universal reproach, far worse to bear
Than violence; for this was all thy care—
To stand approved in sight of God, though worlds
Judged thee perverse.'

—Paradise Lost, VI. 29-37.

'O mighty-mouthed inventor of harmonies,
O skilled to sing of Time or Eternity,
God-gifted organ-voice of England,
Milton, a name to resound for ages;
Whose Titan angels, Gabriel, Abdiel,
Starred from Jehovah's gorgeous armories,
Tower as the deep-domed empyrean
Rings to the roar of an angel onset—
Me rather all that bowery loneliness,
The brooks of Eden mazily murmuring,
And bloom profuse and cedar arches
Charm, as a wanderer out in ocean,
Where some refulgent sunset of India
Streams o'er a rich ambrosial ocean isle,
And crimson-hued the stately palmwoods
Whisper in odorous heights of even.'

—Tennyson.

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AN INTRODUCTION TO THE PROSE AND POETICAL WORKS OF JOHN MILTON

AN INTRODUCTION

TO THE

PROSE AND POETICAL WORKS

OF

JOHN MILTON