by John Milton
In Stygian Cave forlorn
’Mongst horrid shapes, and shreiks, and sights unholy.
5
Find out som uncouth3 cell,
Wher brooding darknes spreads his jealous wings,
And the night-Raven sings;
There under Ebon shades, and low-brow’d Rocks,
As ragged as thy Locks,
10
In dark Cimmerian desert ever dwell.
But com thou Goddes fair and free,
In Heav’n yclept4 Euphrosyne,
And by men, heart-easing Mirth,
Whom lovely Venus at a birth
15
With two sister Graces more
To Ivy-crowned Bacchus bore;
Or whether (as som Sager5 sing)
The frolick Wind that breathes the Spring,
Zephir with Aurora playing,
20
As he met her once a-Maying,
There on Beds of Violets blew,
And fresh-blown Roses washt in dew,
Fill’d her with thee a daughter fair,
So bucksom, blith, and debonair.
25
Haste thee nymph, and bring with thee
Jest and youthful Jollity,
Quips and Cranks, and wanton Wiles,
Nods, and Becks, and Wreathed Smiles,
Such as hang on Hebe’s6 cheek,
30
And love to live in dimple sleek;
Sport that wrincled Care derides,
And Laughter holding both his sides.
Com, and trip it as ye go
On the light fantastick toe,
35
And in thy right hand lead with thee
The Mountain Nymph, sweet Liberty;
And if I give thee honour due,
Mirth, admit me of thy crew
To live with her, and live with thee,
40
In unreproved pleasures free;
To hear the Lark begin his flight,
And singing startle the dull night,
From his watch-towr in the skies,
Till the dappled dawn doth rise;
45
Then to com in spight of sorrow,
And at my window bid good morrow
Through the Sweet-Briar, or the Vine,
Or the twisted Eglantine.
While the Cock with lively din
50
Scatters the rear of darknes thin,
And to the stack, or the Barn dore,
Stoutly struts his Dames before,
Oft list’ning how the Hounds and horn,
Chearly rouse the slumbring morn,
55
From the side of som Hoar7 Hill,
Through the high wood echoing shrill.
Som time walking not unseen8
By Hedge-row Elms, or Hillocks green,
Right against the Eastern gate,
60
Wher the great Sun begins his state,9
Rob’d in flames, and Amber light,
The clouds in thousand Liveries dight,
While the Plowman neer at hand
Whistles o’re the Furrow’d Land,
65
And the Milkmaid singeth blithe,
And the Mower whets his sithe,
And every Shepherd tells his tale
Under the Hawthorn in the dale.
Streit mine eye hath caught new pleasures
70
Whilst the Lantskip round it measures
Russet Lawns, and Fallows gray,
Where the nibling flocks do stray,
Mountains on whose barren brest
The labouring clouds do often rest:
75
Meadows trim with Daisies pide,10
Shallow Brooks, and Rivers wide.
Towers, and Battlements it sees
Boosom’d high in tufted Trees,
Wher perhaps som beauty lies,
80
The Cynosure of neighbouring eyes.
Hard by, a Cottage chimney smokes,
From betwixt two aged Oaks,
Where Corydon and Thyrsis11 met
Are at their savory dinner set
85
Of Hearbs, and other Country Messes,
Which the neat-handed Phillis dresses;
And then in haste her Bowr she leaves,
With Thestylis to bind the Sheaves;
Or if the earlier season lead
90
To the tann’d Haycock in the Mead,
Som times with secure12 delight
The up-land Hamlets will invite,
When the merry Bells ring round,
And the jocond rebecks sound
95
To many a youth, and many a maid,
Dancing in the Chequer’d shade;
And young and old com forth to play
On a Sunshine Holyday,
Till the live-long day-light fail,
100
Then to the Spicy Nut-brown Ale,
With stories told of many a feat,
How Faery Mab the junkets eat;
She13 was pincht, and pull’d she sed,
And he by Friars Lanthorn14 led
105
Tells how the drudging Goblin swet,
To earn his Cream-bowl duly set,
When in one night, ere glimps of morn,
His shadowy Flail hath thresh’d the Corn
That ten day-labourers could not end,
110
Then lies him down the Lubbar Fend,
And stretch’d out all the Chimney’s length,
Basks at the fire his hairy strength;
And Crop-full out of dores he flings,
Ere the first Cock his Mattin rings.
115
Thus don the Tales, to bed they creep,
By whispering Winds soon lull’d asleep.
Towred Cities please us then,
And the busie humm of men,
Where throngs of Knights and Barons bold,
120
In weeds of Peace high triumphs15 hold,
With store of Ladies, whose bright eies
Rain influence, and judge the prise
Of Wit, or Arms, while both contend
To win her Grace, whom all commend.
125
There let Hymen16 oft appear
In Saffron robe, with Taper clear,
And pomp, and feast, and revelry,
With mask, and antique Pageantry,
Such sights as youthfull Poets dream
130
On Summer eeves by haunted stream.
Then to the well-trod stage anon,
If Jonsons learned Sock17 be on,
Or sweetest Shakespear fancies18 child,
Warble his native Wood-notes wild,
135
And ever against eating Cares,
Lap me in soft Lydian Aires,
Married to immortal verse
Such as the meeting soul may pierce
In notes, with many a winding bout
140
Of linked sweetnes long drawn out,
With wanton heed, and giddy cunning,
The melting voice through mazes running;
Untwisting all the chains that tie
The hidden soul of harmony.
145
That Orpheus19 self may heave his head
From golden slumber on a bed
Of heapt Elysian flowrs, and hear
Such streins as would have won the ear
Of Pluto, to have quite set free
150
His half-regain’d Eurydice.
These delights, if thou canst give,
Mirth with thee I mean to live.20
(1631 ?)
* * *
1 “The joyful man” delights in the pleasures of day and light, and in those happy activities of night which are enjoyed with others. Its companion and structurally parallel poem, Il Penseroso, “the contemplative man,” presents images o
f pensiveness and darkness, and thus of aloneness and primarily night. Notable is the strong Platonic element.
The contrasting first ten lines of each poem have been traced to a number of literary sources for metrics and subject matter. The antithetic subjects of the twin poems were probably conceived as a kind of scholastic exercise such as produced the first and seventh prolusions, “Whether Day or Night Is the More Excellent” and “Learning Makes Men Happier than Ignorance.”
2 the watchdog of Hades; “Stygian,” l. 3, refers to one of the rivers flowing through Hell.
3 unfamiliar.
4 called. The sister Graces (l. 15) are Aglaia (Brilliance) and Thalia (Bloom).
5 probably meaning “some who are Sager.”
6 goddess of youth.
7 light gray (at dawn).
8 out in the open.
9 stately progress.
10 spotted.
11 commonplace rustic names as are “Phillis” (l. 86) and “Thestylis” (l. 88).
12 free from care.
13 one of the tellers of tales, as is “he,” l. 104.
14 ignis fatuus, a misleading light; probably the Friar is identical with the “Goblin,” l. 105, and “Lubbar Fend,” l. 110 (Robin Goodfellow).
15 festivals.
16 god of marriage, a frequent character in court masques.
17 low-heeled slippers worn by actors in comedy; hence, when one of Jonson’s comedies is being played.
18 imagination’s.
19 Orpheus sought to recover his wife Eurydice from Pluto’s realm of death; his wondrous music gained his wish for him on the condition that he not look back as she followed. But he failed as they neared the upper world and Eurydice vanished.
20 Compare Marlowe’s: “If these delights thy mind may move, Then live with me, and be my love.”
Il Penseroso
Hence vain deluding joyes,
The brood of folly without father bred,
How little you bested,
Or fill the fixed mind with all your toyes;
5
Dwell in som idle brain,
And fancies fond1 with gaudy shapes possess,
As thick and numberless
As the gay motes that people the Sun Beams,
Or likest hovering dreams
10
The fickle Pensioners of Morpheus train.2
But hail thou Goddes, sage and holy,
Hail divinest Melancholy,
Whose Saintly visage is too bright
To hit the Sense of human sight;
15
And therfore to our weaker view,
O’re laid with black staid Wisdoms hue.
Black, but such as in esteem,
Prince Memnons3 sister might beseem,
Or that Starr’d Ethiope Queen4 that strove
20
To set her beauties praise above
The Sea Nymphs, and their powers offended.
Yet thou art higher far descended,
Thee bright-hair’d Vesta5 long of yore,
To solitary Saturn bore;
25
His daughter she (in Saturns raign,
Such mixture was not held a stain)
Oft in glimmering Bowrs, and glades
He met her, and in secret shades
Of woody Ida’s inmost grove,
30
While yet there was no fear of Jove.6
Com pensive Nun, devout and pure,
Sober, stedfast, and demure,
All in a robe of darkest grain,
Flowing with majestick train,
35
And sable stole of Cipres Lawn,7
Over thy decent shoulders drawn.
Com, but keep thy wonted state,
With eev’n step, and musing gate,
And looks commercing with the skies,
40
Thy rapt soul sitting in thine eyes:
There held in holy passion still,
Forget thy self to Marble, till
With a sad8 Leaden downward cast,
Thou fix them on the earth as fast.
45
And joyn with thee calm Peace, and Quiet,
Spare Fast, that oft with gods doth diet,
And hears the Muses in a ring,
Ay round about Joves Altar sing.
And add to these retired leasure,
50
That in trim Gardens takes his pleasure;
But first, and chiefest, with thee bring
Him that yon soars on golden wing,
Guiding the fiery-wheeled throne,9
The Cherub Contemplation,10
55
And the mute Silence hist along,
’Less Philomel11 will daign a Song,
In her sweetest, saddest plight,
Smoothing the rugged brow of night,
While Cynthia checks her Dragon yoke,12
60
Gently o’re th’ accustom’d Oak;
Sweet Bird that shunn’st the noise of folly,
Most musicall, most melancholy!
Thee Chauntress oft the Woods among,
I woo to hear thy eeven Song;
65
And missing thee, I walk unseen
On the dry smooth-shaven Green,
To behold the wandring Moon,
Riding neer her highest noon,
Like one that had bin led astray
70
Through the Heav’ns wide pathles way;
And oft, as if her head she bow’d,
Stooping through a fleecy cloud.
Oft on a Plat of rising ground,
I hear the far-off Curfew sound,
75
Over som wide-water’d shoar,
Swinging slow with sullen roar;
Or if the Ayr will not permit,
Som still removed place will fit,
Where glowing Embers through the room
80
Teach light to counterfeit a gloom,
Far from all resort of mirth,
Save the Cricket on the hearth,
Or the Belmans13 drousie charm,
To bless the dores from nightly harm:
85
Or let my Lamp at midnight hour,
Be seen in som high lonely Towr,
Where I may oft out-watch the Bear,14
With thrice great Hermes, or unsphear
The spirit of Plato to unfold
90
What Worlds, or what vast Regions hold
Th’ immortal mind that hath forsook
Her mansion in this fleshly nook:
And of those Dæmons15 that are found
In fire, air, flood, or under ground,
95
Whose power hath a true consent
With Planet, or with Element.
Som time let Gorgeous Tragedy
In Scepter’d Pall com sweeping by,
Presenting Thebes, or Pelops line,
100
Or the tale of Troy divine,16
Or what (though rare) of later age,
Ennobled hath the Buskind stage.
But, O sad Virgin, that thy power
Might raise Musæus17 from his bower,
105
Or bid the soul of Orpheus sing
Such notes as warbled to the string,
Drew Iron tears down Pluto’s cheek,
And made Hell grant what Love did seek.18
Or call up him19 that left half told
110
The story of Cambuscan bold,
Of Camball, and of Algarsife,
And who had Canace to wife,
That own’d the vertuous Ring and Glass,
And of the wondrous Hors of Brass,
115
On which the Tartar King did ride;
And if ought els, great Bards beside,
In sage and solemn tunes have sung,
Of Turneys and of Trophies hung;
Of Forests, and inchantments drear,
&nbs
p; 120
Where more is meant then meets the ear.
Thus night oft see me in thy pale career,20
Till civil-suited21 Morn appeer,
Not trickt and frounc’t as she was wont,
With the Attick Boy22 to hunt,
125
But Cherchef’t in a comly Cloud,
While rocking Winds are Piping loud,
Or usher’d with a shower still,
When the gust hath blown his fill,
Ending on the russling Leaves,
130
With minute drops from off the Eaves.
And when the Sun begins to fling
His flaring beams, me Goddes bring
To arched walks of twilight groves,
And shadows brown that Sylvan23 loves
135
Of Pine, or monumental Oak,
Where the rude Ax with heaved stroke,
Was never heard the Nymphs to daunt,
Or fright them from their hallow’d haunt.
There in close covert by som Brook,
140
Where no profaner eye may look,
Hide me from Day’s garish eie,
While the Bee with Honied thigh,
That at her flowry work doth sing,
And the Waters murmuring
145
With such consort24 as they keep,
Entice the dewy-feather’d Sleep;
And let som strange mysterious dream
Wave at his Wings in Airy stream,
Of lively protrature display’d,
150
Softly on my eye-lids laid.
And as I wake, sweet musick breath
Above, about, or underneath,
Sent by som spirit to mortals good,
Or th’ unseen Genius of the Wood.
155
But let my due feet never fail
To walk the studious Cloysters pale,25
And love the high embowed Roof,
With antick Pillars massy proof,26
And storied Windows richly dight,
160
Casting a dimm religious light.
There let the pealing Organ blow
To the full voic’d Quire below,