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his glory and his affliction. We image to ourselves the breathless silence in which we should listen to his slightest word, the passionate veneration with which we should kneel to kiss his hand and weep upon it, the earnestness with which we should endeavor to console him, if indeed such a spirit could need consolation, for the neglect of an age unworthy of his talents and his virtues, the eagerness with which we should contest with his daughters, or with his Quaker friend Elwood,° the privilege of reading Homer to 10 him, or of taking down the immortal accents which flowed from his lips.

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These are perhaps foolish feelings. Yet we cannot be ashamed of them; nor shall we be sorry if what we have written shall in any degree excite them in other minds. We are not much in the habit of idolizing either the living or the dead. And we think that there is no more certain indication of a weak and illregulated intellect than that propensity which, for want of a better name, we will venture to christen 20 Boswellism. But there are a few characters which have stood the closest scrutiny and the severest tests, which have been tried in the furnace and have proved pure, which have been weighed in the balance and have not been found wanting, which have been de

prize; and of these was books, the sound of his His thoughts resemble

clared sterling by the general consent of mankind, and which are visibly stamped with the image and superscription of the Most High. These great men we trust that we know how to Milton. The sight of his name, are pleasant to us. those celestial fruits and flowers which the Virgin Martyr of Massinger sent down from the gardens of Paradise to the earth, and which were distinguished 1 from the productions of other soils, not only by superior bloom and sweetness, but by miraculous efficacy to invigorate and to heal. They are powerful, not only to delight, but to elevate and purify. Nor do we envy the man who can study either the life or the writings of the great poet and patriot, without aspiring to emulate, not indeed the sublime works with which his genius has enriched our literature, but the zeal with which he labored for the public good, the fortitude with which he endured every private ca20 lamity, the lofty disdain with which he looked down on temptations and dangers, the deadly hatred which he bore to bigots and tyrants, and the faith which he so sternly kept with his country and with his fame.

NOTES

THIS essay was published in the Edinburgh Review, in August, 1825, and was the first of the brilliant series of essays and reviews which Macaulay contributed to that magazine. It contains much to which modern criticism objects. Indeed, Macaulay himself says of it in the preface to the first authorized edition of his essays: "No attempt has been made to remodel any of the pieces which are contained in these volumes. Even the criticism on Milton, which was written when the author was fresh from college, and which contains scarcely a paragraph such as his matured judgment approves, still remains overloaded with gaudy and ungraceful ornament." Yet notwithstanding this the essay will abundantly repay the most careful study. It treats of one of the most interesting periods of English literature; and it is written with an earnestness and fresh enthusiasm which must both invigorate the student and inspire him to a closer study and a more judicious criticism of the works of the world's greatest epic poet than would otherwise be possible. Few of Macaulay's statements are to be accepted without scrutiny, yet there are few passages in the whole essay which are not suggestive and fruitful of thought, and in this, perhaps, lies its greatest value.

The allusions are annotated in the ensuing pages with sufficient fulness to enable the student who is not supplied with

reference books to understand the text. But those who have access to encyclopædias and dictionaries should not rely upon the notes alone. The essays of Macaulay form a rich mine of suggestions and allusions, and if it is carefully worked, and each allusion and suggestion followed to its source, the student will acquire a great treasure both of information and of discipline.

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Page 1, line 1. Mr. Lemon. During the first part of the present century this gentleman arranged and classified a great mass of state papers relating to the Commonwealth, and among them a complete series of the orders of state which were issued during this period. In the course of his investigations he found an order, dated April 17, 1655, which retired Milton from his duties as Latin Secretary upon a pension of £150. It is also known that Milton entered at this time upon the composition of three great works — Paradise Lost, a Latin Thesaurus, and a body of Divinity, compiled from the Holy Scriptures, all of which he completed. The first two were published, but the last was lost and was not recovered until 1823, when it was accidentally discovered in the manner related in the text. The full title of the work is "Joannis Miltoni Angli de Doctrina Christiana, ex sacris dumtaxat Libris petita. Disquisitionum Libri Duo Posthumi." It is evident from the closing words of this title that Milton intended it for posthumous publication. Mr. Lemon after a long investigation has concluded that in some way Mr. Skinner became implicated in a plot against the government and that his papers were confiscated, and thus the treatise found a place among the government archives.

1. 6. Secretary. Milton was appointed Latin Secretary in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs by Cromwell in 1649, which position he held until the Restoration in 1660.

1. 7. The Popish Trials. In 1678 Titus Oates, a notorious renegade, accused a number of the Catholic nobility and gentry of conspiring against Protestantism in England. He gave a circumstantial account of various outrages which they contemplated, such as the burning of London, the butchery of leading Protestants, the landing of a French army to carry out their designs by force, etc. Public sentiment was aroused against the Catholics and several were tried, condemned, and executed. A revulsion of feeling soon followed, and the testimony of Oates was entirely discredited.

1. 8. The Rye-house Plot was a scheme devised by some English Whigs to murder Charles II., and call the Duke of Monmouth to the throne.

1. 9. Mr. Skinner, Merchant. Cyriac Skinner was Milton's favorite pupil and later his familiar friend. Milton dedicated two of his sonnets to him, the twenty-first and twenty-second. The latter is the beautiful and pathetic one composed on the loss of his sight.

1. 12. Wood and Toland. Anthony Wood, (1632-1695), was born in Oxford, England, and devoted his life chiefly to recording the history of the edifices and the scholars of his native city. He gave a sketch of Milton in his Athenae Oxonienses. John Toland, (1669-1722), was a noted Pantheist and enemy to revealed religion. He wrote a life of Milton in 1698, which was prefixed to an edition of his Prose Works.

Page 2, line 4. The terms Whig and Tory, as political appellations, were first used in 1680, being inspired by the exceedingly bitter factional strife which was raging at that time. For a definition of these terms see Hume's History of England, Ch. 68, also Macaulay's History of England, Ch. 2.

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