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He hath with a piteous eye
Beheld us in our misery;

For his, etc.

And freed us from the slavery

Of the invading enemy;

For his, etc.

All living creatures he doth feed,
And with full hand supplies their need;
For his, etc.

Let us therefore warble forth
His mighty majesty and worth;
For his, etc.

That his mansion hath on high,
Above the reach of mortal eye;

For his mercies aye endure,
Ever faithful, ever sure.

ANNO ÆTATIS XVII. (1625.)

ON THE DEATH OF A FAIR INFANT DYING OF A COUGH.-M.

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I.

O FAIREST flower, no sooner blown but blasted,
Soft silken primrose, fading timelessly,

Summer's chief honour, if thou hadst outlasted
Bleak Winter's force that made thy blossom dry;
For he, being amorous on that lovely dye

"Sweet rose, fair flower, untimely plucked, soon faded ;
Plucked in the bud, and faded in the spring!
Bright orient pearl, alack! too timely shaded;
Fair creature, killed too soon by Death's sharp sting!"
Shakespeare, Pass. Pilgrim, x.—
2. timelessly, i.e. untimely, before due time or season.
3. Summer's, etc., sc. who wouldst have been.

5. on, i.q. of. It is the more correct form.

-T.

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That did thy cheek envermeil, thought to kiss, But killed, alas! and then bewailed his fatal bliss.

11.

For, since grim Aquilo, his charioteer,

By boisterous rape the Athenian damsel got,
He thought it touched his deity full near,

If likewise he some fair one wedded not;
Thereby to wipe away the infamous blot
Of long-uncoupled bed and childless eld,

Which 'mongst the wanton Gods a foul reproach was held.

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So, mounting up in icy-pearled car,

Through middle empire of the freezing air
He wandered long, till thee he spied from far;
There ended was his quest, there ceased his care.
Down he descended from his snow-soft chair,
But all unwares, with his cold-kind embrace,
Unhoused thy virgin-soul from her fair biding-place.

IV.

Yet art thou not inglorious in thy fate;

For so Apollo, with unweeting hand,
Whilome did slay his dearly-loved mate,

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6. "He thought to kiss him and has killed him so." Shak. Ven. & Adon. 7. fatal bliss, i.e. his pleasure from the kiss which proved fatal to its object. 8. For since, etc. Alluding to the mythe of Boreas, carrying off Orithyia, daughter of the king of Attica. The making Boreas Winter's charioteer is a conception peculiar to the young poet.

12. infamous blot. "With foul infamous blot," F. Q. iii. 6, 13.-T. The elder poets thus frequently accented infamous, as the a is long in fama, infamis.

13. eld, i.e. old-age.

14. the wanton gods, sc. of Greece; on account of their numerous love-adventures.

15. icy-pearled, i.e. empearled with ice. Warton would read ice-ypearled ; but Todd observes that we meet in our poet with rosy-bosomed, flowery-kirtled, fiery-wheeled, so there is no need to change.

16. middle, i.e. between heaven and earth.

23. For so, etc. See our Mythology of Greece and Italy, p. 107, 3rd edit.

Young Hyacinth, born on Eurotas' strand, Young Hyacinth, the pride of Spartan land; But then transformed him to a purple flower. Alack! that so to change thee Winter had no power.

V.

Yet can I not persuade me thou art dead,

Or that thy corse corrupts in earth's dark womb,
Or that thy beauties lie in wormy bed,

Hid from the world in a low-delved tomb.
Could Heaven for pity thee so strictly doom?
Oh no! for something in thy face did shine
Above mortality, that shewed thou wast divine.

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VI.

Resolve me then, O Soul most surely blest
-If so it be that thou these plaints dost hear-
Tell me, bright Spirit, where'er thou hoverest;
Whether above that high first-moving sphere,
Or in the Elysian fields—if such there were—
Oh !' say me true if thou wert mortal wight,
And why from us so quickly thou didst take thy flight.

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VII.

Wert thou some star, which from the ruined roof

Of shaked Olympus by mischance didst fall,
Which careful Jove in nature's true behoof
Took up, and in fit place did reinstal?

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Or did of late Earth's sons besiege the wall

31. Already to their wormy beds are gone." Mids. N. Dr. iii. 2.—W. 33. for pity, i.e. unrestrained by, in spite of, pity.

39. Whether, etc., i.e. in the Empyrean; see Life of Milton, p. 549.

40. were. Hurd says it should be are; rather be. But Milton may have had

his mind on past times.

41. say me true, i.e. say truly to me.

43. ruined, i.e. thrown down, ruinatus.-shaked, i.q. shaken. Our old writers were very irregular in the use of participles.

45. true behoof, i.e. a just regard to the interests of.

47. Earth's sons, i.e. the Giants.

Of sheeny Heaven, and thou some goddess fled Amongst us here below to hide thy nectared head?

VIII.

Or wert thou that just Maid, who once before
Forsook the hated earth, oh! tell me sooth,
And camest again to visit us once more?

Or wert thou Mercy, that sweet smiling Youth?
Or that crowned matron, sage,white-robed Truth?

Or any other of that heavenly brood

Let down in cloudy throne to do the world some good?

IX.

Or wert thou of the golden-winged host?
Who, having clad thyself in human weed,
To earth from thy prefixed seat didst post,
And after short abode fly back with speed,

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As if to shew what creatures heaven doth breed;

Thereby to set the hearts of men on fire

To scorn the sordid world, and unto heaven aspire.

X.

But oh! why didst thou not stay here below,

To bless us with thy heaven-loved innocence, To slake his wrath whom sin hath made our foe, To turn swift-rushing black perdition hence, Or drive away the slaughtering pestilence, To stand 'twixt us and our deserved smart?— But thou canst best perform that office where thou art. 70

48. sheeny, i.e. bright.-thou, sc. wert.

50. that just maid, i.e. Astræa or Justice.

53. Or wert, etc. See Life of Milton, p. 253.

55. that heavenly brood, i.e. the personified Virtues. He distinguishes them, we may observe, from the angels in the next stanza.

56.

"Nube candentes humeros amictus,

Augur Apollo." Hor. Carm. i. 2, 31.-K.

58. human weed, i.e. put on a human form, clad thyself in the garment of man. 59. prefixed, i.e. originally assigned.

66 seq. "And he stood between the dead and the living, and the plague was stayed," Numb. xvi. 48.-K. The plague, Warton says, was at this time raging in the kingdom.

XI.

Then thou, the mother of so sweet a child,
Her false-imagined loss cease to lament,
And wisely learn to curb thy sorrows wild.
Think what a present thou to God hast sent,
And render him with patience what he lent.
This if thou do, he will an offspring give,

That till the world's last end shall make thy name to live.

ANNO ÆTATIS XIX. (1628.)

AT A VACATION EXERCISE IN THE COLLEGE, PART LATIN, PART ENGLISH.-M.

The Latin speeches ended, the English thus began.

HAIL, native language, that by sinews weak
Didst move my first endeavouring tongue to speak,
And madest imperfect words with childish trips,
Half-unpronounced, slide through my infant lips,
Driving dumb Silence from the portal-door,
Where he had mutely sat two years before
Here I salute thee, and thy pardon ask,
That now I use thee in my latter task.

Small loss it is that thence can come unto thee,
I know my tongue but little grace can do thee;
Thou needest not be ambitious to be first,
Believe me I have thither packed the worst ;

72. Her. This proves that the subject was a female.

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74. Think, etc. There is apparently some slight confusion here, for what is called a present is said to be lent; but by present he meant, what was presented. The words of Hannah (1 Sam. i. 28) were probably in his mind.

4. slide, i.q. glide. These words were used indifferently, the former most frequently. Even Addison (Spect. No. 420) has "sliding round their axles" of the planets. Glide and slide are both of Anglo-Saxon origin.

6. Where, etc. It would seem from this that Milton did not speak articulately till he was two years old.

12. Believe, etc. Intimating that the Latin part, which was probably prose, was inferior to the English.

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