BOOKS.

HEleHTLEY'S MILTON.*

Twig new edition of Milton's Life, and especially of his English poems, is welcome : it is handsomely " got up," sufficiently com- pact, and abundantly illustrated with notes, to the thorough elu- cidation of the text. Milton himself has long been out of the reviewer's hands and it is altogether too late to enter into a critical examination of his works, even on the provocative of a new edition. If we were forced upon that onerous duty, after it has been performed by all the ablest writers on the English Parnassus, —and it might be said by the whole body of the English people, —we should be almost inclined to evade the embarrassing task by repeating Dr. Coplestone's splendid and well-known criticism on the Allegro. That, indeed, is criticism worth reviving. Who can forget what the right reverend Reviewer says about the lady who comes before the reader with an " alias " ?

" • In heaven yclep'd Euphrosyne,

And by man, heart-easing Mirth.'

"Judging indeed from the light and easy deportment of this gay nymph, one might guess there were good reasons for a change of name as she changed her residence.

• 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's cheek, And love to live in dimple sleek ; Sport, that wrinkle Care derides, And Laughter, holding both his sides.'

" The author, to prove himself worthy of being admitted of the crew, skips and capers about upon the light fantastic toe,' that there is no following him. He scampers through all the categories, in search of his imaginary beings, from substance to quality, and back again ; from thence to Action, Passion, Habit, &c., with wonderful celerity. Who, for instance, would have expected cranks, nods, becks, and wreathed smiles, as part of a group, in which jest, jollity, sport, and laughter figure away as full formed entire personages ? . . . But how are we to understand the stage directions ?

' Come, and trip it as you go.' "Are the words used, synonymously ? Or is it meant that this airy gentry shall come in at a minuet step and go off in a jig ? The phenomenon of a tripping crank is indeed novel, and would doubtless attract numerous spectators.

' And in thy right hand lead with thee The mountain nymph, sweet Liberty.' " No sooner is the fair damsel introduced than Mr. Milton, with most un- becoming levity, falls in love with her, and makes a request of her com- panion, which is rather greedy, that he may live with both of them. ' To live with her and live with thee.'

"Even the gay libertine who sung, 'How happy could I be with Silber,' did not go so far as this. But we have already had occasion to remark on the laxity of Mr. Milton's amatory notions.. . .' Upon the whole, Mr. Milton seems to bepossesaed of some fancy and talent for rhyming ; two most dangerous endowments, which often unfit men for acting an useful part in life, without qualifying them for that which is great and brilliant. If it be true, as we have heard, that he has declined advantageous pros- pects in business, for the sake of indulging his poetical humour, we hope it is not yet too late to prevail upon him to retract his resolution. With the help of a Cocker and common industry he may become a respectable sonvener ; but it is not all-the Zephyrs, and Auroras, and Corydons, and Thyrsises, aye, nor his junketing Queen Mab, and drudging goblins, that will ever make him a poet."

Amid the endless criticisms on Milton, this playful show up of the Old Quarterly Reviewer style, has, besides the merit of variety, the attraction of Dr. Coplestone's wit. Ludicrous as it is, it can scarcely be considered a caricature ; for we have at least a parallel passage in a justly esteemed classic, who was not a great critic, though he was popularly accredited in that office. We speak of Dr. Johnson, who, either from a spirit of contradiction or a total want of imagination, stigmatized the beautiful poem of Lycidas, as "easy, vulgar, and therefore disgusting." But independently of critics and commentators, it is easy to see why Milton's fame is so wide and just, and why his works "with grace divine imbued, bring to their sweetness no satiety." His devoted admirer, Dr. Todd, declares that it is impossible for the imagination of man to distend itself with greater ideas than are contained in Paradise Lost. Born before, his time, it is only now that the world has grown up to a proper and full appreciation of Milton's genius : he is at once a popular poet, and a poet fit for the highest imagi- nations to feed upon. At the same time, every one must be struck with the fact, that his greatest poem appeals in an equal

degree to the vulgar mind, and wins its way by a certain di- dactic sublimity. The religious nature of the poem has contri- buted largely to its success, and some writers believe, that the Current theology of the day has been shaped quite as much by the ingenious machinery of Paradise Lost as by the Scriptures. i

Milton's latest editor is of opinion, that the poet may have thought himself describing and relating realities under the secret influence of the Holy Spirit, and we are are told, that if we would attain to the fall enjoyment of this wonderful poem, " we must, as far as possible, endeavour to produce in ourselves a similar frame of mind." Perhaps, speakinggenerally, this " similar frame of mind" has now attained its maximum in the society of Milton's native country. If we may trust the signs of the times, the spirit of "Nonconformity" is now as widely extended as it is likely to be in association with any form of didactic dogmatism ; and it is a question for the future to settle how far, having grown up to the popular admiration of Milton, English society will always con- tinue the same special appreciation.

• The Poems of Alin Milton. With Notes. By Thomas Keightley. In two volumes.

The Life, Opinions, and Writings of Tohn Milton. With an Introduction to Paradise Lost. By Thomas Keightley. Published by Chapman and Hall. As it is an understood thing that every man who owns a book- shelf must provide himself with a Milton, it becomes an important question to know whose edition to buy. Patrick Hume, the first annotator, published his luenbrations in 1695, about twenty-one years after the poet's death, and since that time an accumulating mass of materials has been turned over and over again, by Bent- ley, Pearce, Richardson, Newton, Warton, and a host of others, and in 1801 came Todd, who wandered over the well-trodden ground of his predecessors, " studious of gathering sweets wher- ever he could find them." Todd's Life of Milton has kept its ground, and settled down into a standard ; but it has now in the edition before us by Mr. Keightley to compete with a new and powerful rival, whose aim it is to make Milton perfectly intelli- gible to readers of every degree of culture. Mr. Keightley says, that excepting the Divine Commedia of Dante, there is no modern poem which stands so much in need of a commentary as Paradise Lost, and the reading of that poem for the first time should form an sera in the life of every one pos- sessed of taste and poetic feeling. It is clear that the writer speaks out of the fulness of his heart.

"To my own mind that time is ever present. It was just as I was emerging from mere boyhood ; the season was summer ; the scene a residence amid wood and water, at the foot of mountains, over which I beheld each morning the sun rising, invested with all his glories. The companion of Paradise Lost was the Jerusalem Delivered, in Hoole's tame version 'tis true, but perhaps at that age the couplet was more grateful to my ear than the stanza. The two poems combined to hold me in an ecstasy of delight. Alas ! that such happy days can never return, not even in imagination!

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Some time after—for in those days books were not plentiful with me—I pro- cured the whole of Milton's poetry. I was naturally enchanted with Comas, and even then I could discern and admire the chaste, severe, and classic beauties of Paradise Regained and Samson Agonistes. Ever since, the poetry of Milton has formed my constant study,—a source of delight in prosperity, of strength and consolation in adversity."

It is now upwards of a quarter of a century since Mr. Keight- ley first conceived the idea of writing the life and editing the works of the " poet blind yet bold." His sympathy with genius, his idolatry of Milton, his liberal ideas, and his mythological and classical acquirements, render him peculiarly fit for the task he has undertaken. He is familiar with the labours of his prede- cessors ; but he prefers to stand on independent ground, and the greater part of his notes and parallel passages are the results of original observation. His style is succinct, thoughtful, and sug- gestive, and his enthusiasm rouses the mind of the reader to activity. He keeps close to facts, except on a few occasions, when his love and admiration lead him to hazard conjectures favourable to the memory of his hero.

The edition before us may be said to consist of three volumes, though the two volumes of the Poems and the 7:ife may be had separately. Todd was persuaded by his friends to put Paradise Lost at the beginning, but Mr. Keightley prefers a chronological arrangement, which, he says, is " both natural and philosophical "; and it also enables the student to trace the changes in the ideas and language of the poet, from the time when he began to versify at St. Paul's school, until his mind conceived its greatest and most continuous effort. The orthography is modernized, with the ex- ception of a few words, such as sovran and highth ; and the editor is justly proud of his eforts to improve the punctuation. The ex- planition of particular words and passages is given in foot notes ; but the author shrinks from sitting in judgment on the merits and demerits of pieces which have earned the admiration of all the world. He only offers his own opinions where they are necessary for the proper understanding of the text, and he gives of doubtful passages the newest readings. " For our own part, we frankly declare that, conscious of our immense inferiority to the poet in mental powerl we would not presume to sit in judgment on what bears the stamp of his own approval ; for it should al- ways be remembered, that these poems were not—as is but too much the ease nowadays—given to the world immediately after they had been com- posed, but were, for the most part, retained in the poet's desk for many years, and were not published till the time when his judgment was in its full maturity and vigour. In our eyes they are, we may say, all beauty and perfection, bating that compliance with the false taste of the age, to be dis- cerned in some of the earlier pieces, but from which he speedily emanci- pated himself. The other apparent faults all vanish when we obey that primary but too often neglected law of criticism of placing ourselves, as far as is possible, in the position of the poet, and bring to our mind the opinions that prevailed, and the meaning that words bore in his time."

The Biography serves as an introduction to the Poems. It is divided into three parts. The first contains an account of the life, manners, pursuits, and occupations of Milton, and indeed all the personal particulars that have been transmitted to our times. The poet's character is bravely defended against the few petty charges that have been brought against it ; but, after doing generous battle, Mr. Keightley comes to the conclusion, though he does not assert it of Milton, that " it is better for the fame of great writers that their history should be involved in a kind of mythic envelope, and that thus, like superior beings, they should be known to the after-world only by the products of their creative genius." Notices of Milton's family and friends conclude the first section, and then we come to a consideration of Milton's opin- ions on all the great and important subjects of his day. Since the discovery of the work on Christian Doctrine, it has become a. comparatively easy task to trace the workings of the poet's mind on the subject of religion, and the present editor enters with great earnestness into the intricacies, of the question. Part three of this thoughtful volume contains the history of the poems in the order of their production, and concludes with a section that gives the reader some knowledge of the prose works. A few of the most striking passages from treatises that are now seldom read as a whole, are selected as specimens of Milton's style both of composition and of thought, and these, under the title of an Anthology, fill some fifty pages. Mr. Keightley's purpose is to bring Milton within the comprehension of the most average understanding, and his conscientious labours deserve the highest consideration. We are glad to find that this edition does not clash with the Life and Times of Milton, so recently begun by Mr. Masson. The authors have different objects in view, al- though they both are anxious to increase the poet's circle of ad- mirers. Curiously enough, Mr. Keightley, with all his sympathy for Milton, takes exception to his Latin productions, and he moreover affirms, that no poet whatever has obtained perma- nent fame by Latin verses.

" In fact, modern Latin poetry is an exotic, a mere hot-house plant, which evermore reminds us that it does not spring from the soil. . . . Look at Milton's lines on the deaths of the Bishops of Winchester and Ely, and compare them with those on the Marchioness of Winchester, written about the same time, and the difference between compositions in a living and in a dead language will be apparent. How fortunate was it that he did not write his Ode on the Nativity in Latin i the same ideas and sentiments might no doubt have been there, but how differently expressed ! Beautiful as Milton's Latin poetry must be confessed to be, it probably does not find, even among those familiar with the language, one reader for fifty readers of his English poetry, and few perhaps ever read his Latin poems without a secret wish that he had written them in English."