The Complete Poetry of John Milton (53 page)
Read The Complete Poetry of John Milton Online
Authors: John Milton
Tags: #English; Irish; Scottish; Welsh, #Poetry, #European
20
High God shall fix her fast.
6
The Lord shall write it in a Scrowl
That ne’re shall be out-worn
When he the Nations doth enrowl
That this man there was born.
25
7
Both they who sing, and they who dance
With sacred Songs are there
,
In thee
fresh brooks, and sop streams glance
And
all my fountains
clear.
(
Apr. 1648
)
1
Lord God that dost me save and keep,
All day to thee I cry;
And all night long before thee
weep
,
Before thee
prostrate lie.
5
2
Into thy presence let my praier
With sighs devout ascend
,
And to my cries, that
ceaseless are
,
Thine ear with favour bend.
3
For cloy’d with woes and trouble store
10
Surcharg’d my Soul doth lie,
My life
at deaths uncherful dore
Unto the grave draws nigh.
4
Reck’n’d I am with them that pass
Down to the
dismal
pit;
15
I am a
a
man, but weak alas
And for that name unfit.
5
From life discharg’d and parted quite
Among the dead
to sleep
,
And like the slain
in bloody fight
20
That in the grave lie
deep
,
Whom thou rememberest no more,
Dost never more regard;
Them from thy hand deliver’d o’re
Deaths hideous house hath barrd.
25
6
Thou in the lowest pit
profound
Hast set me
all forlorn
,
Where thickest darkness
hovers round
,
In horrid deeps
to mourn.
7
Thy wrath
from which no shelter saves
30
Full sore doth press on me;
b
Thou break’st upon me all thy waves,
b
And all thy waves break me.
8
Thou dost my friends from me estrange,
And mak’st me odious,
35
Me to them odious,
for they change
,
And I here pent up thus.
9
Through sorrow, and affliction great
Mine eye grows dim and dead,
Lord all the day I thee entreat,
40
My hands to thee I spread.
10
Wilt thou do wonders on the dead,
Shall the deceas’d arise
And praise thee
from their loathsom bed
With pale and hollow eyes?
45
11
Shall they thy loving kindness tell
On whom the grave
hath hold
,
Or they
who
in perdition
dwell
Thy faithfulness
unfold?
12
In darkness can thy mighty
hand
50
Or
wondrous acts be known,
Thy justice in the
gloomy
land
Of
dark
oblivion?
13
But I to thee O Lord do cry
E’re yet my life be spent
,
55
And
up to thee
my praier
doth hie
Each morn, and thee prevent.
14
Why wilt thou Lord my soul forsake,
And hide thy face from me,
15
That am already bruis’d, and
c
shake
60
With terror sent from thee;
Bruz’d, and afflicted and
so low
As ready to expire,
While I thy terrors undergo
Astonish’d with thine ire.
65
16
Thy fierce wrath over me doth flow
Thy threatnings cut me through.
17
All day they round about me go,
Like waves they me persue.
18
Lover and friend thou hast remov’d
70
And sever’d from me far.
They
fly me now
whom I have lov’d,
And as in darkness are.
(
Apr. 1648
)
1
That is, both l. 31 and l. 32.
a
Heb.
A man without manly strength.
c
Heb.
Præ Concussione.
60
Fairfax
,
1
whose name in armes through
Europe
rings,
Filling each mouth with envy, or with praise,
And all her jealous monarchs with amaze,
And rumors loud, that daunt remotest kings,
5
Thy firm unshak’n vertue ever brings
Victory home, though new rebellions raise
Thir Hydra heads, and the fals
North
2
displaies
Her brok’n league, to imp her serpent wings,
O yet a nobler task awaits thy hand;
3
10
For what can Warrs
4
but endless warr still breed,
Till Truth, and Right from Violence be freed,
And Public Faith cleard from the shamefull brand
Of Public Fraud. In vain doth Valour bleed
While Avarice, and Rapine share the land.
(
Aug. 1648
)
1
Sir Thomas Fairfax (1612-1671), commander in chief of the Parliamentarian army, who, amongst other victories, captured Colchester on August 27, 1648, after a seventy-five day siege, at the end of the Second Civil War.
2
Scotland. After having entered into the Solemn League and Covenant with Parliament on Sept. 25, 1643, the Scots broke the League by invading England in August under James, Duke of Hamilton. Since joining the Parliamentarians had impaired her usually serpentine wings, Milton is saying, Scotland has now imped them (repaired them by inserting new feathers) through a return to treacherous action.
3
However, Fairfax resigned his military command in June 1650 because of unwillingness to attack Scotland unless provoked by invasion.
4
that is, specifically, the current Civil Wars.
Pro Populo Anglicano defensio
Quis expedivit
Salmasio
1
suam Hundredam,
2
Picámque
docuit nostra verba conari?
Magister artis venter
, et Jacobæi
3
Centum, exulantis viscera marsupii regis.
5
Quòd si dolosi spes refulserit nummi
,
Ipse Antichristi qui modò primatum Papæ
4
Minatus uno est dissipare sufflatu,
Cantabit
ultrò Cardinalitium
5
melos.
Pro Populo Anglicano defensio
Who released to Salmasius
1
his “hundred”
2
/ and taught the magpie to presume our words? / Master of art, the belly, and the hundred / Jacobuses,
3
the inwards of the purse of the exiled king, led him. / Because if a hope of deceitful coin glistened, [5] / this fellow, who lately threatened to demolish the supremacy / of the Pope,
4
the Antichrist, with a single puff, / would gratuitously sing the song of the Cardinals.
5
(
1650
)
1
Claude de Saumaise (1588-1653), who condemned the English regicides in
Defensio regia pro Carolo I ad Serenissimum Magnæ Britanniæ regem Carolum II
(1649);
Pro Populo Anglicano defensio
was written as a reply.
2
a subdivision of an English shire. Salmasius attempted to turn English terms into Latin (here “Hundreda”); Milton is ridiculing his spurious knowledge of English law.
3
The Jacobus, named for James I, was a gold coin worth about twenty-two shillings. Salmasius was reputed to be persuaded to write
Defensio regia
for a hundred Jacobuses; this is denied in
Claudii Salmasii Ad Johannem Miltonum Responsio
(1660), p. 270.
4
Salmasius had attacked the supremacy of the Pope in
De primatu papæ
(1645).
5
the ecclesiastical officers.
Cromwell
, our cheif of men, who through a cloud
Not of warr onely, but detractions rude,
Guided by faith and matchless Fortitude
To peace and truth thy glorious way hast plough’d,
1
5
And on the neck of crowned Fortune proud
Hast reard Gods Trophies and his work pursu’d,
While
Darwen
stream with blood of Scots imbru’d,
And
Dunbarr
feild resounds thy praises loud,
And
Worcesters
laureat wreath;
2
yet much remains