to nature. But a poet is not of necessity a naturalist. Poets differ greatly in their manner of looking at nature. Milton saw nature closely enough for his purposes and for our enjoyment. We think there can be no question that in going to literature for his preparation, he chose the best education for himself. Had he not done so, we might have lost the most perfect of English literary artists without gaining a great poet of nature and the world. His chief strength did not lie in the portraiture of the visible world, whether of nature or humanity. We have seen his manner of regarding nature; at man he looked rather with the disposition of the priest than of the dramatic or epic poet. He had not the variety and humor, the play of mind, the pliant and many-sided sympathies, of that English poet in whose pages nature and the world were already mirrored. Milton's prose has the greatness of his verse,- the same greatness both of style and mind. The style often has a splendid way of advancing; the reader having the same sense of buoyant and powerful movement which he feels when he commits himself to the full tide and river of the verse. It is true that the prose has not the exquisite care of the verse. The language is frequently difficult. The sentence sometimes runs down a good part of the page; and if you would understand it, you must first go through the labor of finding subject and predicate, and correctly distinguishing principal and subordinate clauses. It does not often happen, however, that this is necessary; and even when it is necessary, the result is of course well worth the labor. That "cloth of gold," as Macaulay termed it, is thick with imagery, passion, thought, and splendid phrases. As one reads, one gets very near to the greatness of the man's intellect and nature, to his heroic ardor, - and very near to some qualities which whether great or not, are surely not to be applauded. We see also much of him in one character in which he less often appears in verse, that of the satirist. There was in Milton the making of a satirist like Juvenal or Swift; for he had that insight into mind which is a chief condition of satire. The writer of this paper was once taken to task for having expressed the opinion that Byron had not the insight or weight of mind for satire,- that his greatness lay elsewhere than in the intellect. Now Milton, to my thinking, had the constitution of mind fitted to write satire. He could see a state of mind, seize it, and hold it in his strong imagination as in a vise. It is for this reason that his phrases cut to the bone as they do. The point of the blade is infinitely fine and sharp, but there is in the implement immense weight and force. Another characteristic of Milton's prose is that the thought is frequently more novel than that of his verse, which tends rather to the expression with unequal perfection of truths that are universal and important, and for that reason have been often uttered. From the time of the publication of 'Paradise Lost' till his death in 1674, Milton seemed to enjoy, so far as his afflictions and the public prejudice against him would permit, a kind of Indian summer, such as sometimes comes at the close of the lives of celebrated men. The astonishment produced by the work was very great; although one would think that anything might have been expected from the author of the earlier poems, of which an edition had been published in 1645. The accounts we have of the personal appearance, manners, habits, etc., of Milton date mostly from this time. We know from the touching vanity of the allusion to the subject in his Second Defense that his eyes were "externally uninjured"; his answer to the indecent taunts of his antagonists being:-"They shine with an unclouded light, like the eyes of one whose vision is perfect." That insults could pass between men of education upon such a subject, seems to indicate that men's hearts and manners have got gentler with the spread and advance of that democratic civilization of which Milton was one of the chief friends and leaders. The accounts of the time, given by Mr. Masson, describe him as led about the street near his Bunhill house, a slender man, slightly under middle height, dressed in a gray cloak and wearing sometimes a small silver-hilted sword; looking in feeble health, but with his fair complexion and lightish hair, younger than he was. He was to be seen sitting in his garden near the door in warm weather, wearing a gray overcoat. Within doors his dress was neat black. He rose very early, giving his mornings to study and writing. Music was his chief afternoon and evening relaxation. "His manner with friends and visitors,» says Mr. Masson, "was extremely courteous and affable, with just a shade of stateliness." Nevertheless there was a marked tendency in his talk to be sarcastic and satirical. He had a habit of pronouncing hard the letter r, the litera canina of the Romans, a characteristic which Dryden thought "a sure sign of a satirical disposition." In these days his house was frequented by persons of learning and rank, it is said, "much more than he did desire." Up to the time of his death he was a diligent student and writer. It is scarcely necessary to enumerate the prose writings with which Milton occupied himself in the years just previous to his death. An incident of the last year of his life, 1674, was the rearrangement of Paradise Lost' into twelve books, in the place of the original ten in which it was first published. He died on November 8th of that year, which was a Sunday, and was buried in the church of St. Giles, Cripplegate, by the side of his father. E. S. Nadal |