LITERATI 111. 



301 



author was only twenty-one, yet nowhere does 

 he excel it in beauty of verse nor in dignity of 

 language. 



The second period of Milton's life may be 

 called the time of "storm and stress." Thick 

 darkness was upon him. For twenty years, 

 from 1640 to 1660, his life was filled with relig- 

 ious and political controversy. He was forced 

 to turn from poetry to prose, and lamenting it 

 he says: "I have the use, as I may account it, 

 but of my left hand." His prose works are 

 voluminous. They are upon varied subjects 

 but upon one theme, liberty. He struck heavy 

 blows for liberty in church and state and in all 

 the relations of life. He plead for more freedom 

 of speech and for more liberal ideas in educa- 

 tion. His greatest prose work is the "Areopa- 

 gitica: A Speech for the Liberty of the Press." 

 In 1652, at the age of forty-three, Milton be- 

 came totally blind; but even in his blindness 

 he served the Commonwealth as Secretary for 

 Foreign Tongues under Oliver Cromwell, the 

 Lord Protector, and continued to write hi- 

 burning pamphlets against the royalists who 

 were struggling to regain power. 



The third period is that which succeeds the 

 Restoration, in 1660. With the return of 

 Charles II., the leaders of the Commonwealth 

 had to flee for their lives. Milton's life was at 

 first endangered and he was concealed by 

 friends. Later, he preferred retirement where 

 he might have leisure to do the great work of 

 his life. Here he wrote "Paradise Lost," 

 "Paradise Regained," and "Samson Agonistes." 



The beauty of "Paradise Lost" has been 

 compared to that of a stately temple, the style 

 t he loftiest in the whole range of English poetry, 

 -cenes are laid in Heaven and Earth and 

 Hell, its characters are God and the holy angels, 

 Satan and his legions, and the newly created 

 race of man. It is almost inconceivable how 

 any human mind could have attempted it. 

 "Paradise Regained" and "Samson Agonistes" 

 show a decline of power, though standing alone 

 they would be great. In "Paradise Regained" 

 Christ is tempted in the wilderness and resists 

 Satan. In 'Samson Agonistes" we have a 

 choral drama modeled upon the form of the 

 Greek. In the greatness of his work, Milton 

 I >e compared only to the great classic writers, 

 Homer ami Virgil. 



The second jrn-at name in the Puritan age is 

 .John Bun van, the prince of prose writers for hi- 

 and the prince of story tellers for all 

 times. 'Pilgrims Progress" has been pro- 

 nounced the greatest of all allegories. Bunyan's 

 ninence is undoubted. It is not an ex- 

 aggeration to repeat this estimate of him: 

 "\\hnt Shakespere is to Knglish dramati-t-. 

 Milton is to English epic poets, that John 

 Bureau is to writers of English allegory." 

 'reme poverty an.l iirnorance and years 

 :ipri-onment in Bedford jail, he rose to the 



1 position of paator over a large ch' 

 biographer says of him. "The fame of his 

 tmus. his genius as a \\riier. his power as a 

 speaker, gave him unl>ounde<l influence among 

 the Baptists; while the beauty of his char* 

 and the catholic liberality of nil views secured 

 him universal esteem. His ministrations ex- 



tended over the whole region between Bedford 

 and London." 



Historically, one of the greatest prose works 

 of the century is Samuel Pepy's "Diary." It 

 is a gossipy record of nine years and gives a life- 

 like picture of the gay and profligate portion of 

 society which fell under his observation. The 

 reaction from Puritanism led to an extraordinary 

 state of society among the aristocracy, which 

 we would not like to picture to-day, "t he great 

 historical work of the age is the " History of the 

 Great Rebellion," by Edward Hyde, the first 

 Earl of Clarendon. A curious coincidence marks 

 the birth and death of Clarendon. Born in 

 1608 and died in 1674, his life is exactly co- 

 extensive with John Milton, his great opponent 

 in the great civil strife. Clarendon has been 

 called the "Cavalier-prince of historic portrait- 

 painters," and Milton the "Puritan-prince of 

 epic poets." 



Chaucer, Shakespere, Spenser, Milton, royal 

 names in English literature, are succeeded by a 

 meager school of artificial poets. Dryden and 

 Pope are the representatives of this school. 

 Dryden died in 1700, just three hundred years 

 after the death of Chaucer. The sweetness and 

 gay and kindly humor and tender sympathies 

 which so illumine Chaucer's poetry, is gone 

 from Dryden's didactic verse. His greatest 

 satire is "Absalom and Achitophel," a hitter 

 arraignment of those who opposed the succes- 

 sion of James, the brother of Charles II., to the 

 English throne. " MacFlecknoe," another satire 

 is directed against a Whig poet. " All for Love," 

 a drama, is m this same cold, critical vein. He 

 wrote long criticisms in argumentative 

 which are utterly lacking in the true spirit of 

 poetry. His "Hind and the Panther" and 

 " Religio Laici " are known to-day only as names. 

 The greatness of poetry cannot be expressed by t 

 the critical spirit. Dryden's one really admir- 

 able poem, "Ode to St. Cecilia's Day or Alex- 

 ander's Feast," will be remembered for its 

 lyric qualities. His prose writings are numer- 

 ous, and the English in which he wrote them 

 has become a standard of good style to all later 

 writers. 



The English Revolution of 1688 secured peace 

 for the realm and an opportunity for the devel- 

 opment of arts and sciences. The investiga- 

 tions of Newton and the development of phi- 

 losophy under Locke mark this period. 



Alexander Pope is the literary successor of 

 John Dryden. and the representative poet of 

 his time.' 1 le was a precocious boy whose body 

 was "one long disease." Before he was (\\el\e 

 years of age he had written an "Ode to Solitude." 

 iding was his passion. To understand 

 Pope one must remember his deformity and the 

 spirit of the time in \\hich he lived. The first 

 h ill of the Kiirhteenth Century is marked by a 

 low standard of morals. Political unrest and 

 political double dealing, coarse social life, dull, 

 unimaginative, brutal, these are the common 

 terms by which it is described. Drunk 

 was common and morality laughed at. Out of 

 such conditions Pope and Sum and Steel. 

 ered the material for their Nit ires. Addtson 

 alone of this distinguished group of writers kept 

 his genial nature and wrote what was gentle 



