Minor Poems by Milton Part 11

The exquisite poems to which Milton gave the Italian t.i.tles L'Allegro,--the mirthful, or jovial, man,--and Il Penseroso,--the melancholy, or saturnine, man,--should be regarded each as the pendant and complement of the other, and should be read as a single whole. The poet knew both moods, and takes both standpoints with equal grace and heartiness. The essential idea of thus contrasting the mirthful and the melancholy temperament he found ready to his hand. Robert Burton had prefaced his _Anatomy of Melancholy_, published in 1621, with a series of not unpleasing, though by no means graceful, amoebean stanzas, in which two speakers alternately represent Melancholy, one as sweet and divine, and the other as harsh, sour, and d.a.m.ned. Undoubtedly Milton knew his Burton. But if he got his main idea from this source, he made his poems thoroughly Miltonic by his art of visualizing in delicious pictures the various phases of his abstract theme. The poems are wholly poetical, equally free from obscurity of thought and from obscurity of expression.

Each poem is prefaced with a vigorous exorcism of the spirit to which it is hostile. This is couched in alternate three and five accent iambics, preparing a delicious rhythmic effect when the metre changes, in the invocation, to the octosyllable, with or without anacrusis.

In L'Allegro we accompany the mirthful man through an entire day of his pleasures, from early morning to late evening. The melancholy man moves through a programme less definitely and regularly planned. The scenes of his delights are mostly in the hours of the night: when the sun is up, he hides himself from day's garish eye.

L'Allegro.

2. Of Cerberus and blackest Midnight born. Milton follows the example of the ancient poets in announcing the parentage of the princ.i.p.al beings whom he brings upon his stage. Moreover, he uses the ancient freedom in a.s.signing mythical pedigrees, not only adopting no authority as a canon, but allowing his own fancy to invent origins as suits his purpose. He knew the Greek and Latin poets, and a.s.sumed for himself the privilege which they exercised of shaping the myths as they pleased. We are not therefore to seek in Milton a reproduction of any system of mythology.

_Cerberus_ was the terrible three-headed dog of Pluto. His station was at the entrance to the lower world, or the _Stygian cave_.

3. The Stygian cave is so called from the Styx, the infernal river, "the flood of deadly hate."

5. some uncouth cell. _Uncouth_ may be used here in its original sense of _unknown_, as in Par. Lost VIII 230.

10. In dark Cimmerian desert. The Cimmerians were a people fabled by the ancients to live in perpetual darkness.

12. yclept is the participle of the obsolete verb _clepe_, with the ancient prefix _y_, as in ychained, Hymn on the Nativity 155.

15. two sister Graces more. Hesiod names, as the three Graces, Euphrosyne, Aglaia, and Thalia, but he makes them the daughters of Zeus and Eurynome.

18. The frolic wind. See _frolic_ again as an adjective, Comus 59.

24. So buxom, blithe, and debonair. See Shakespeare's Pericles, I Gower 23. All these words are interesting to look up for etymologies and changes of meaning.

25-36. We readily accept and understand the personification of Jest, Jollity, Sport, Laughter, and Liberty, but the plurals, Quips, Cranks, Wiles, Nods, Becks, Smiles, we do not manage quite so easily, especially in view of the couplet 29-30.

28. Smiles may be said to be wreathed because they inwreathe the face.

See Par. Lost III 361.

33. trip it, as you go. So in Shakespeare, "I'll queen it no inch further; Rather than fool it so; I'll go brave it at the court, lording it in London streets."

41. With this line begins a series of ill.u.s.trations of the _unreproved pleasures_ which L'Allegro is going to enjoy during a day of leisure. At first the specified pleasures or occupations are introduced by infinitives, _to hear, to come_; but the construction soon changes, as we shall see. The first pleasure is To hear the lark, etc. 41-44. L'Allegro begins his day with early morning. Here we must imagine him as having risen and gone forth where he can see the sky and can look about him to see what is going on in the farm-yard.

45-46. Then to come, in spite of sorrow, And at my window bid good-morrow.

It must be L'Allegro himself who comes to the window, and as he is outside, he comes to look in through the shrubbery and bid good morning to the cottage inmates, who are now up and about their work. The pertinency of the phrase, _in spite of sorrow_, is not intelligible.

53. Oft listening how the hounds and horn. This "pleasure" and the next--_sometime walking_--are introduced with present participles. There is no interruption of grammatical consistency.

57. Sometime walking, not unseen. See the counterpart of this line, Penseroso 65. Todd quotes the note of Bishop Hurd,--"Happy men love witnesses of their joy: the splenetic love solitude."

59. against, _i.e._ toward.

62. The clouds in thousand liveries dight. _Dight_ is the participle of the verb _to dight_, meaning to adorn. It is still used as an archaism.

67. And every shepherd tells his tale. This undoubtedly means _counts the number_ of his flock. In Shakespeare we find, to _tell_ money, years, steps, a hundred. So _tale_ often means an enumeration, a number.

L'Allegro finds the shepherds in the morning counting their sheep, not telling stories.

68. With this line ends the long, loose sentence that began with line 37.

We now come to a full stop, and with line 69 begin a new sentence.

70. the landskip. A word of late origin in English, of unsettled spelling in Milton's day.

71. Russet lawns. In Milton, _lawn_ means field or pasture. See Lycidas 25.

77. In this line the subject, _mine eye_, is resumed.

80. The cynosure of neighboring eyes. In the constellation Cynosure, usually called the Lesser Bear, is the pole-star, to which very many eyes are directed.

81. A new "pleasure" is introduced, with a new grammatical subject.

83. Where Corydon and Thyrsis met. The proper names in lines 83-88 add to the poem a pleasing touch of pastoral simplicity and cheerfulness. They are taken from the common stock of names, which, originally devised by the Greek idyllists for their shepherds and shepherdesses, have by the pastoral poets of all subsequent ages been appropriated to their special use. Corydon and Thyrsis stand for farm-laborers, Phyllis and Thestylis for their wives or housekeepers. The day of L'Allegro has now advanced to dinner-time. Phyllis has been preparing the frugal meal, as we could surmise from the smoking chimney. As soon as the dinner is over the women go out to work with the men in the harvest field.

87. bower means simply _dwelling_.

90. In the tanned hayc.o.c.k we see the hay dried and browned by the sun.

91. The scene changes and brings yet another "pleasure." secure delight is delight without care, _sine cura_. See Samson Agonistes 55.

96. in the chequered shade. They danced under trees through whose foliage the sunlight filtered.

99. Evening comes on, and a new pleasure succeeds. Story-telling is now in order.

102. Sufficient information about Faery Mab can be got from Romeo and Juliet I 4 53-95.

103-104. She, _i.e._ one of the maids; And he,--one of the youths. The Friar's lantern is the ignis fatuus, or will-o'-the-wisp, fabled to lead men into dangerous marshes.

105. A connective is lacking to make the syntax sound: the subject of tells must be _he_. the drudging goblin. This is Robin Goodfellow, known to readers of fairy tales. Ben Jonson makes him a character in his Court Masque, Love Restored, where he is made to recount many of his pranks, and says, among other things, "I am the honest plain country spirit, and harmless, Robin Goodfellow, he that sweeps the hearth and the house clean, riddles for the country maids, and does all their other drudgery."

109. could not end. Dr. Murray gives this among other quotations as an instance of the verb _end_ meaning _to put into the barn, to get in._ So in Coriola.n.u.s V 6 87.

110. the lubber fiend. This goblin is loutish in shape and fiendish-looking, though so good to those who treat him well.

115. Thus done the tales. An absolute construction, imitating the Latin ablative absolute.

117. The country folk having gone early to bed, tired with their day's labor, L'Allegro hastes to the city, where the pleasures of life are prolonged further into the night.

120. In weeds of peace, high triumphs hold. This must mean such things as masques and revelries among the upper cla.s.ses.

122. Rain influence. See note on Hymn on the Nativity 71.

124. What is the antecedent of whom?

125. What ceremony is here introduced?

128. Do not misunderstand the word mask. Its meaning becomes plain from the context.