Milton was made Latin secretary to the council of state, which was to supply the office of Royalty.

In 1652, Milton had lost his eyesight, yet he still clung to polemic and political life, and was a gladiator on the arena until after his friend Oliver Cromwell's death, and the restoration of Charles II, when he gave it up. When the storm had blown over, Milton retired to contemplate his immortal work-" Paradise Lost." Johnson says that "he fixed upon this subject, a design so comprehensive, that it could only be justified by its success." More than this can be said; it was a design so vast, and one which entered so far into eternity, and the destinies of man, connected with a machinery so weighty and awful, that no one who was not armed with the panoply of that deep religious feeling that is ready to venture on martyrdom, and felt the possession of a genius that gained strength by every obstacle, would have ventured upon. To any other man it would have been not only a failure, but his destruction. If he had not been prepared by faith to pass the burning ploughshare, the attempt would have been considered as allied to blasphemy. But Milton scaled the battlements of Heaven by privilege, and was allowed to take with him all his human knowledge. In this poem is to be found all the learning of the ancients, strained and purified for the occasion. The seraphim he mentions seems to have touched the heathen Apollo, and to have changed his lyre to a burning harp of eternal praise; and the god of taste and wisdom to a ministering angel of revelation.

FROM THE MASK OF COMUS.

The Lady enters.

This way the noise was, if mine ear be true,
My best guide now; methought it was the sound
Of riot and ill-managed merriment,

Such as the jocund flute, or gamesome pipe,
Stirs up among the loose unletter'd hinds,
When for their teeming flocks, and granges full,
In wanton dance they praise the bounteous Pan,
And thank the Gods amiss. I should be loth
To meet the rudeness and swill'd insolence
Of such late wassailers; yet oh, where else
Shall I inform my unacquainted feet
In the blind mazes of this tangled wood?
My brothers, when they saw me wearied out
With this long way, resolving here to lodge
Under the spreading favour of these pines,
Stept, as they said, to the next thicket side
To bring me berries, or such cooling fruit
As the kind hospitable woods provide.

They left me then, when the grey hooded even,
Like a sad votarist in palmer's weed,

Rose from the hindmost wheels of Phoebus' wain.
But where they are, and why they came not back,
Is now the labor of my thought; 'tis likeliest
They had engag'd their wand'ring steps too far,
And envious darkness, ere they could return,
Had stole them from me; else, O thievish night,
Why wouldst thou, but for some felonious end,
In thy dark lantern thus close up the stars,

That nature hung in Heav'n, and fill'd their lamps
With everlasting oil, to give due light

To the misled and lonely traveller ?
This is the place, as well as I may guess,
Whence even now the tumult of loud mirth
Was rife and perfect in my list'ning ear;
Yet nought but single darkness do I find.
What might this be? A thousand fantasies
Begin to throng into my memory,

Of calling shapes, and beck'ning shadows dire,
And airy tongues, that syllable men's names
On sands, and shores, and desert wildernesses.
These thoughts may startle well, but not astound
The virtuous mind, that ever walks attended
By a strong siding champion, Conscience.
O welcome pure-ey'd faith, white-handed hope,
Thou hovering angel, girt with golden wings,
And thou, unblemished form of chastity!
I see ye visibly, and now believe

That he, the Supreme Good, t' whom all things ill
Are but as slavish officers of vengeance,
Would send a glist'ring guardian, if need were,
To keep my life and honor unassail'd.

Was I deceived, or did a sable cloud

Turn forth her silver lining on the night?

I did not err; there does a sable cloud
Turn forth her silver lining on the night,
And casts a gleam over this tufted grove.
I cannot halloo to my brothers, but
Such noise as I can make to be heard farthest
I'll venture; for my new enliven'd spirits
Prompt me; and they perhaps are not far off.

SONG.

Sweet Echo, sweetest nymph, that liv'st unseen
Within thy airy shell,

By slow Meander's margent green,

And in the violet embroider'd vale,

Where the love-lorn nightingale

Nightly to thee her sad song mourneth well;
Canst thou not tell me of a gentle pair

That likest thy Narcissus are?

O, if thou have

Hid them in some flow'ry cave,
Tell me but where,

Sweet queen of Parley, daughter of the sphere!
So may'st thou be translated to the skies,
And give resounding grace to all Heav'n's harmonies.

Comus. Can any mortal mixture of earth's mould
Breathe such divine enchanting ravishment?
Sure something holy lodges in that breast,
And with these raptures moves the vocal air
To testify his hidden residence:

How sweetly did they float upon the wings
Of silence, through the empty vaulted night,
At every fall smoothing the raven down

Of darkness till it smil'd! I have oft heard
My mother Circe, with the Sirens three,
Amidst the flow'ry-kirtled Naiades

Culling their potent herbs, and baleful drugs,

Who, as they sung, would take the prison'd soul,

And lap it in Elysium; Scylla wept,

And chid her barking waves into attention,

And fell Charybdis murmur'd soft applause:

Yet they in pleasing slumber lull'd the sense,
And in sweet madness robb'd it of itself;
But such a sacred and home-felt delight,
Such sober certainty of waking bliss,

I never heard till now. I'll speak to her,

And she shall be my queen. Hail, foreign wonder!
Whom certain these rough shades did never breed,
Unless the Goddess that in rural shrine

Dwell'st here with Pan, or Sylvan, by blest song
Forbidding every bleak unkindly fog

To touch the prosp'rous growth of this tall wood.
Lady. Nay, gentle shepherd, ill is lost that praise
That is address'd to unattending ears;

Not any boast of skill, but extreme shift
How to regain my sever'd company,
Compell'd me to awake the courteous echo
To give me answer from her mossy couch.

[thus?

Comus. What chance, good lady, hath bereft you
Lady, Dim darkness and this leafy labyrinth.
Comus. Could that divide you from near-ushering
guides ?

Lady. They left me weary on a grassy turf.
Comus. By falsehood, or discourtesy, or why?
Lady. To seek i' th' valley some cool friendly spring.
Comus. And left your fair side all unguarded, lady?
Lady. They were but twain, and purpos'd quick re-

turn.

Comus. Perhaps forestalling night prevented them. Lady. How easy my misfortune is to hit!

Comus. Imports their loss, besides the present need? Lady. No less than if I should my brothers lose. Comus. Were they of manly prime, or youthful bloom?