Mal. Ad. Oh, stay thee, Saladin! Cries loudly for the blood of Malek Adhel. Pleased by my fate to add one other leaf Sal. [Enter ATTENDANT. Atten. My lord, the troops assembled by your order Tumultuous throng the courts. The prince's death Not one of them but vows he will not suffer. The mutes have fled; the very guards rebel. Nor think I, in this city's spacious round, Can e'er be found a hand to do the office. Mal. Ad. O faithful friends! [To Atten.] Thine shalt The other first shall lop it from the body. Sal. They teach the Emperor his duty well. Tell them he thanks them for it. Tell them, too, Atten. O joyful news! I haste to gladden many a gallant heart, Sal. These men, the meanest in society, Call back one danger which thou hast not shared, Which thy resistless kindness hath not soothed, When death seem'd certain, only utter'd "BROTHER!" Mal. Ad. By these tears, I can! O brother! from this very hour, a new, My heart, my soul, my sword, are thine forever. NEW MONTHLY MAGAZINE. 190. MILTON. E venture to say, paradoxical' as the remark may appear, WE that no poët has ever had to struggle with more unfavorable circumstances than Milton. He doubted, as he has himself owned, whether he had not been born "an age too late." For this notion Johnson' has thought fit to make him the butt of his clumsy ridicule. The poet, we believe, understood the nature of his art better than the critic. He knew that his poëtical genius derived no advantage from the civilization which surrounded him, or from the learning which he had acquired; and he looked back with something like regret to the ruder age of simple words and vivid impressions. 2. We think that as civilization advances, poëtry almost nec 'Par a dox' i cal, seemingly absurd; inclined to tenets contrary to re ceived opinions.- JOHNSON, see Biographical Sketch, p. 230. essarily declines. Therefore, though we admire those great works of imagination which have appeared in dark ages, we do not admire them the more because they have appeared in dark ages. On the contrary, we hold that the most wonderful and splendid proof of genius is a great poem produced in a civilized age. We can not understand why those who believe in that most orthodox article of literary faith, that the earliest poets are generally the best, should wonder at the rule as if it were the exception. Surely the uniformity of the phenomenon indicates a corresponding uniformity in the cause. 3. He who, in an enlightened and literary society, aspires to be a great poët, must first become a little child. He must take to pieces the whole web of his mind. He must unlearn much of that knowledge which has, perhaps, constituted hitherto his chief title of superiority. His very talents will be a hinderance to him. His difficulties will be proportioned to his proficiency in the pursuits which are fashionable among his contemporaries; and that proficiency will in general be proportioned to the vigor and activity of his mind. And it is well, if, after all his săcrifices and exertions, his works do not resemble a lisping man or a modern ruin. We have seen, in our own time, great talents, intense labor, and long meditation employed in this struggle against the spirit of the age; and employed, we will not say absolutely in vain, but with dubious success and feeble applause. 4. If these reasonings be just, no poët has ever triumphed over greater difficulties than Milton. He received a learned education. He was a profound and elegant classical scholar: he had studied all the mysteries of Rabbinical' literature: he was intimately acquainted with every language of modern Europe, from which either pleasure or information was then to be derived. He was, perhaps, the only great poet of later times who has been distinguished by the excellence of his Latin verse. 5. It is not our intention to attempt any thing like a complete examination of the poëtry of Milton. The public has long been agreed as to the merit of the most remarkable passages, the incom'parable harmony of the numbers, and the excellence of that 'Rab bin' ical, pertaining to Rabbins, or Jewish doctors, and their tenets. style which no rival has been able to equal, and no parodist to degrade; which displays in their highest perfection the idiomatic' powers of the English tongue, and to which every ancient and every modern language has contributed something of grace, of energy, or of music. In the vast field of criticism in which we are entering, innumerable reapers have already put their sickles. Yet the harvest is so abundant that the negligent search of a straggling gleaner may be rewarded with a sheaf. 6. The most striking characteristic of the poëtry of Milton is the extreme remoteness of the associations by means of which it acts on the reader. Its effect is produced, not so much by what it expresses as by what it suggests; not so much by the ideas which it directly conveys, as by other ideas which are connected with them. He electrifies the mind through conductors. The most unimaginative man must understand the "Iliad." Homer gives him no choice, and requires from him no exertion; but takes the whole upon himself, and sets his images in so clear a light that it is impossible to be blind to them. The works of Milton can not be comprehended or enjoyed, unless the mind of the reader cooperate with that of the writer. He does not paint a finished picture, or play for a mere passive listener. He sketches, and leaves others to fill up the outline. He strikes the key-note, and expects his hearer to make out the melody. 7. We often hear of the magical influence of poëtry. The expression in general means nothing; but, applied to the writings of Milton, it is most appropriate. His poetry acts like an incantation. Its merit lies less in its obvious meaning than in its occult power. There would seem, at first sight, to be no more in his words than in other words. But they are words of enchantment; no sooner are they pronounced than the past is present, and the distant near. New forms of beauty start at once into existence, and all the burial-places of the memory give up their dead. Change the structure of the sentence, substitute one synonym for another, and the whole effect is destroyed. The spell loses its power; and he who should then hope to con 'Pår' o dist, one who makes a burlesque alteration, by which poetry written on one subject is applied to another. -- Idiomåt'ic, peculiar to a language, HOMER, See p. 215, note 1. Oc cult', invisible; con cealed from the eye or understanding, jure with it would find himself as much mistaken as Cassim ir the Arabian tale, when he stood crying "Open Wheat," "Open Barley," to the door which obeyed no sound but "Open Sĕsame!" The miserable failure of Dryden, in his attempt to rewrite some parts of the "Paradise Lost," is a remarkable instance of this. 191. MILTON-CONCLUDED. HE character of Milton was peculiarly distinguished by lofti of thought. his sights the comforts of his home and the prosperity of his party. Of the great men by whom he had been distinguished at his entrance into life, some had been taken away from the evil to come; some had carried into foreign climates their unconquerable hatred of oppression; some were pining in dungeons; and some had poured forth their blood on scaffolds. That hateful proscription, facetiously termed the Act of Indemnity and Oblivion, had set a mark on the poor, blind, deserted poet, and held him up by name to the hatred of a profligate court and an inconstant people! 2. Venal and licentious scribblers, with just sufficient talent to clothe the thoughts of a pander in the style of a bellman, were now the favorite writers of the sovereign and the public. It was a loathsome herd, which could be compared to nothing so fitly as to the rabble of Comus,-grotesque' monsters, half-bestial, half-human, dropping with wine, bloated with gluttony, and reeling in obscene dances. Amidst these his Muse was placed. like the chaste lady of the Masque, lofty, spotless, and sereneto be chatted at, and pointed at, and grinned at by the whole rabble of Satyrs and Goblins. 3. If ever despondency and asperity could be excused in any man, it might have been excused in Milton. But the strength of his mind overcame every calamity. Neither blindness, nor gout, nor age, nor penury, nor domestic afflictions, nor political disappointments, nor abuse, nor proscription, nor neglect, had power to disturb his sedate and majestic patience. His 'Sos' a me, an oily grain; a plant from which oil is expressed ed.'DRYDEN, see Biographical Sketch, p. 497. |