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so si c pe p r t a n n N u: ce ' } COLLEGE STATION, TEXAS DECEMBER 15,1894. <; Vol. 2, No. a
JVIilton’s Oenias as a Poet.
As a poet he singularlj links the age
of Spenser and Shakespeare with the
age of Cowper; for, while his genius has
the seriousness of both and, in his earlier
works, the air of romance and the rich
diction characteristic of the former, his
spirit is worlds away from the frivolous
vein and the prosaic outlook of the lit
erary generation that was contemporary
with his closing years.
As much as Spenser or Shakspeare, he
is a child of the great Revival of Letters.
As much as Bunyan or Cromwell, he is
a child of the intenser spirit of that Re
vival of Christianity which we call the
Reformation. Seldom has a great gen
ius been better equipped in all the
harness of culture, and at the same time
in the defensive armor of personal pur-
ity, lofty enthusiasm, and noble pur
pose. He had, too, a two-edged sword
of style, for he wrote Latin and English
in either prose or verse with equal vigor,
and to reach the ear of Europe in that
age Latin was essential. Two gifts alone
were not his: the genial nature and the
sense of humor; and the absence of
these accounts fully for all that is faulty
in his life or his works.
Among the poems, the Comus is my
choice for perfect beauty in thought and
in workmanship. As Saintsbury says:
u It is impossible to single out passages,
for the whole is golden.”
The Hymn on the Nativity is remark
able, aside from its intrinsic merits, as
being the first sustained lyric strain in
the language.
Lycidas and Arcades have the same
charms of noble thought and exquisite
diction which give imperishable grace to
all his earlier song. The two delicious
companion pieces, L’Allegro and II
Penseroso, have almost passed into the
inner tissue of the English language, for
almost every line of each has become a
piquant quotation in social life.
The Sonnets are unique of their kind,
few in any age or tongue being so evi
dently autobiographic.
As to tne Paradise Lost and its se-