PAGE NO. 26 42 43 Crooked eclipses: as coming athwart the Sun's apparent course. Wordsworth, thinking probably of the 'Venus' and the 'Lucrece,' said finely of Shakespeare: 'Shakespeare could not have written an Epic; he would have died of plethora of thought.' This prodigality of nature is exemplified equally in his Sonnets. The copious selection here given (which from the wealth of the material, required greater consideration than any other portion of the Editor's task),-contains many that will not be fully felt and understood without some earnestness of thought on the reader's part. But he is not likely to regret the labour. upon misprision growing either, granted in error, or, on the growth of contempt. With the tone of this Sonnet compare Hamlet's 'Give me that man That is not passion's slave' &c. Shakespeare's writings show the deepest sensitiveness to passion:-hence the attraction he felt in the contrasting effects of apathy. 26 44 grame: sorrow. Renaissance influences long impeded the return of English poets to the charming realism of this and a few other poems by Wyat. 28 45 Pandion in the ancient fable was father to Philomela. 29 47 In the old legend it is now Philomela, now Procne (the swallow) who suffers violence from Tereus. This song has a fascination in its calm intensity of passion; that 'sad earnestness and vivid exactness' which Cardinal Newman ascribes to the master-pieces of ancient poetry. འཱུ|| 50 proved: approved. 51 censures: judges. 52 Exquisite in its equably-balanced metrical flow. 32 53 Judging by its style, this beautiful example of old simplicity and feeling may, perhaps, be referred to the earlier years of Elizabeth. Late forgot: lately. 35 57 Printed in a little Anthology by Nicholas Breton, 1597. It is, however, a stronger and finer piece of work than any known to be his.-St. 1 silly: simple; dole grief; chief: chiefly. St. 3 If there be...: obscure: Perhaps, if there be any who speak harshly of thee, thy pain may plead for pity from Fate. This poem, with 60 and 143, are each graceful variations of a long popular theme. 36 58 That busy archer: Cupid. Descries: used actively; points out. The last line of this poem is a little obscured by transposition. He means, Do they call ungratefulness there a virtue ?' (C. Lamb). 37 59 White Iope: suggested, Mr. Bullen notes, by a passage in Propertius (iii, 20) describing Spirits in the lower world: Vobiscum est Iope, vobiscum candida Tyro. PAGE NO. 38 62 cypres or cyprus,-used by the old writers for crape: whether from the French crespe or from the Island whence it was imported. Its accidental similarity in spelling to cypress has, here and in Milton's Penseroso, probably confused readers. ramage: confused noise. 39 63 41 66 'I never saw anything like this funeral dirge,' says Charles Lamb, 'except the ditty which reminds Ferdinand of his drowned father in the Tempest. As that is of the water, watery; so this is of the earth, earthy. Both have that intenseness of feeling, which seems to resolve itself into the element which it contemplates.' 43 70 Paraphrased from an Italian madrigal 44 72 45 73 46 48 49 50 . . Non so conoscer poi Se voi le rose, o sian le rose in voi. crystal: fairness. stare: starling. 74 This 'Spousal Verse' was written in honour of the entrailed: twisted. Feateously: elegantly. a noble peer: Robert Devereux, second Lord Essex, twins of Jove the stars Castor and Pollux: baldric, 52 79 This lyric may with very high probability be assigned to Campion, in whose first Book of Airs it appeared (1601). The evidence sometimes quoted ascribing it to Lord Bacon appears to be valueless. Summary of Book Second. THIS division, embracing generally the latter eighty years of the Seventeenth century, contains the close of our Early poetical style and the commencement of the Modern. In Dryden we see the first master of the new in Milton, whose genius dominates here as Shakespeare's in the former book,— the crown and consummation of the early period. Their splénA A did Odes are far in advance of any prior attempts, Spenser's excepted: they exhibit that wider and grander range which years and experience and the struggles of the time conferred on Poetry. Our Muses now give expression to political feeling, to religious thought, to a high philosophic statesmanship in writers such as Marvell, Herbert, and Wotton: whilst in Marvell and Milton, again, we find noble attempts, hitherto rare in our literature, at pure description of nature, destined in our own age to be continued and equalled. Meanwhile the poetry of simple passion, although before 1660 often deformed by verbal fancies and conceits of thought, and afterwards by levity and an artificial tone,-produced in Herrick and Waller some charming pieces of more finished art than the Elizabethan : until in the courtly compliments of Sedley it seems to exhaust itself, and lie almost dormant for the hundred years between the days of Wither and Suckling and the days of Burns and Cowper. That the change from our early style to the modern brought with it at first a loss of nature and simplicity is undeniable yet the bolder and wider scope which Poetry took between 1620 and 1700, and the successful efforts then made to gain greater clearness in expression, in their results have been no slight compensation. 1.8 whist: hushed. 1. 32 than: obsolete for then: Pan: used here for the Lord of all. 1. 38 consort: Milton's spelling of this word, here and elsewhere, has been followed, as it is uncertain whether he used it in the sense of accompanying, or simply for concert. 1. 21 Lars and Lemures: household gods and spirits of relations dead. Flamens (1. 24) Roman priests. That twice-batter'd god (1. 29) Dagon. 1. 6 Osiris, the Egyptian god of Agriculture (here, perhaps by confusion with Apis, figured as a Bull), was torn to pieces by Typho and embalmed after death in a sacred chest. This mythe, reproduced in Syria and Greece in the legends of Thammuz, Adonis, and perhaps Absyrtus, may have originally signified the annual death of the Sun or the Year under the influences of the winter darkness. Horus, the son of Osiris, as the New Year, in his turn overcomes Typho. L. 8 unshower'd grass: as watered by the Nile only. L. 33 youngest-teemed: last-born. Bright-harness'd (1. 37) armoured. 64 87 The Late Massacre: the Vaudois persecution, carried on in 1655 by the Duke of Savoy. No more mighty Sonnet than this collect in verse,' as it has been justly named, probably can be found in any language. Readers should observe that it is constructed on the original Italian or Provençal model. This form, in a PAGE NO. 355 language such as curs, not affluent in rhyme, presents great difficulties; the rhymes are apt to be forced, or the substance commonplace. But, when successfully handled, it has a unity and a beauty of effect which place the strict Sonnet above the less compact and less lyrical systems adopted by Shakespeare, Sidney, Spenser, and other Elizabethan poets. 65 88 Cromwell returned from Ireland in 1650, and Marvel! probably wrote his lines soon after, whilst living at Nunappleton in the Fairfax household. It is hence not surprising that (st. 21-24) he should have been deceived by Cromwell's professed submissiveness to the Parliament which, when it declined to register his decrees, he expelled by armed violence :-one despotism, by natural law, replacing another. The poet's insight has, however, truly prophesied that result in his last two lines. This Ode, beyond doubt one of the finest in our language, and more in Milton's style than has been reached by any other poet, is occasionally obscure from imitation of the condensed Latin syntax. The meaning of st. 5 is 'rivalry or hostility are the same to a lofty spirit, and limitation more hateful than opposition.' The allusion in st. 11 is to the old physical doctrines of the non-existence of a vacuum and the impenetrability of matter:-in st. 17 to the omen traditionally connected with the foundation of the Capitol at Rome:-forced, fated. The ancient belief that certain years in life complete natural periods and are hence peculiarly exposed to death, is introduced in st. 26 by the word climacteric. 68 89 Lycidas: The person here lamented is Milton's college contemporary, Edward King, drowned in 1637 whilst crossing from Chester to Ireland. Strict Pastoral Poetry was first written or perfected by the Dorian Greeks settled in Sicily: but the conventional use of it, exhibited more magnificently in Lycidas than in any other pastoral, is apparently of Roman origin. Milton, employing the noble freedom of a great artist, has here united ancient mythology, with what may be called the modern mythology of Camus and Saint Peter,-to direct Christian images. Yet the poem, if it gains in historical interest, suffers in poetry by the harsh intrusion of the writer's narrow and violent theological politics.The metrical structure of this glorious elegy is partly derived from Italian models. 1. 11 Sisters of the sacred well: the Muses, said to frequent the Pierian Spring at the foot of Mount Olympus. 1. 10 Mona: Anglesea, called by the Welsh poets, the Dark Island, from its dense forests. Deva (1. 11) the Dee a river which may have derived its magical AA 2 PAGE NO. character from Celtic traditions: it was long the boundary of Briton and English.-These places are introduced, as being near the scene of the shipwreck. Orpheus (1. 14) was torn to pieces by Thracian women. Amaryllis and Neaera (1. 24, 25) names used here for the love-idols of poets: as Damoetas previously for a shepherd. L. 31 the blind Fury: Atropos, fabled to cut the thread of life. 71 89 Arethuse (1. 1) and Mincius: Sicilian and Italian waters here alluded to as representing the pastoral poetry of Theocritus and Vergil. L. 4 oat: pipe, used here like Collins' oaten stop 1. 1, No. 186, for Song. L. 12 Hippotades: Aeolus, god of the Winds. Panope (1. 15) a Nereid. Certain names of local deities in the Hellenic mythology render some feature in the natural landscape, which the Greeks studied and analysed with their usual unequalled insight and feeling. Panope seems to express the boundlessness of the ocean-horizon when seen from a height, as compared with the limited sky-line of the land in hilly countries such as Greece or Asia Minor. Camus (1. 19) the Cam: put for King's University. The sanguine flower (1. 22) the Hyacinth of the ancients : probably our Iris. The Pilot (1. 25) Saint Peter, figuratively introduced as the head of the Church on earth, to foretell the ruin of our corrupted clergy,' as Milton regarded them, 'then in their heighth' under Laud's primacy. 1. 1 scrannel: screeching; apparently Milton's coinage (Masson). L. 5 the wolf: the Puritans of the time were excited to alarm and persecution by a few conversions to Roman Catholicisin which had recently occurred. Alpheus (1. 9) a stream in Southern Greece, supposed to flow underseas to join the Arethuse. Swart star (1. 15) the Dog-star, called swarthy because its heliacal rising in ancient times occurred soon after midsummer: 1. 19 rathe: early. L. 36 moist vows: either tearful prayers, or prayers for one at sea. Bellerus (1. 37) a giant, apparently created here by Milton to personify Belerium, the ancient title of the Land's End. The great Vision:-the story was that the Archangel Michael had appeared on the rock by Marazion in Mount's Bay which bears his name. Milton calls on him to turn his eyes from the south homeward, and to pity Lycidas, if his body_has drifted into the troubled waters off the Land's End. Finisterre being the land due south of Marazion, two places in that district (then through our trade with Corunna probably less unfamiliar to English ears), are named,-Namancos now Mujio in Galicia, Bayona north of the Minho, or perhaps a fortified rock (one of the Cies Islands) not unlike Saint Michael's Mount, at the entrance of Vigo Bay. |