John Milton

Not very long after the third marriage, probably in 1664, he removed to another house, with a garden, in "Artillery Walk, leading to Bunhill Fields." Here Paradise Lost was certainly finished bef ore July i665—Aubrey says in 1663—for when Milton and his family, to avoid the Great Plague of London, went into temporary country-quarters in a cottage in Chalfont St. Giles, Buckinghamshire (Milton's cottage here is still standing, and is open to visitors), the finished manuscript was taken with him. This we learn from Thomas Ellwood, who had taken the cottage for him, and was allowed to take a copy of the manuscript away with him for perusal, during Milton's stay at Chalfont (Life of Thomas Ellwood, 1714). On April 27, 1667 Milton concluded an agreement, still preserved in the British Museum, with Samuel Simmons, printer, of Aldersgate street, London, to dispose of the copyright for L5 down, the promise of another L5 after the sale of the first edition of 1,300 copies, and the further promise of two additional sums of L5 each after the sale of two more editions of the same size respectively. The poem was entered in the Sta tioners' Registers on Aug. 20 following, and shortly after that date it was out in London as a neatly printed small quarto, with the title Paradise Lost: A Poem written in Ten Books: By John Mil ton. The sale of an edition of 1,300 copies in 18 months proves that the poem found a wide circle of readers. "This man cuts us all out, and the ancients too," is the saying attributed to Dryden on the occasion; and it is the more remarkable because the one objec tion to the poem which at first, we are told, "stumbled many" must have "stumbled" Dryden most of all. Except in the drama, rhyme was then thought essential in anything professing to be a poem; blank verse was hardly regarded as verse at all; Dryden especially had been and was the champion of rhyme, contending for it even in the drama. That, notwithstanding this obvious blow struck by the poet at Dryden's pet literary theory, he should have welcomed the poem so enthusiastically and proClaimed its merits so emphatically, says much at once for his critical perception and for the generosity of his temper. According to Aubrey, Dryden requested Milton's leave to turn the poem into a rhymed drama, and was told he might "tag his verses if he pleased." The result is seen in Dryden's opera, The State of Innocence and the Fall of Man (1675). One consequence of Milton's renewed celebrity was that visitors of all ranks again sought him out for the honour of his society and conversation. His obscure house in Artillery Walk, Bunhill, we are told, became an attraction now, "much more than he did desire," for the learned notabilities of his time.

Last Years.

Accounts have come down to us of Milton's per sonal appearance and habits in his later life. They describe him as to be seen every other day led about in the streets in the vicinity of his Bunhill residence, a slender figure, of middle stature or a little less, generally dressed in a grey cloak or overcoat, and wearing sometimes a small silver-hilted sword, evidently in feeble health, but still looking younger than he was, with his lightish hair, and his fair, rather than aged or pale, complexion. He would sit in his garden at the door of his house, in warm weather, in the same kind of grey overcoat, "and so, as well as in his room, re ceived the visits of people of distinguished parts, as well as quality." Within doors he was usually dressed in neat black.

He was a very early riser, and very regular in the distribution of his day, spending the first part, to his midday dinner, always in his own room, amid his books, with an amanuensis to read for him and write to his dictation. Music was always a chief part of his afternoon and evening relaxation, alike when he was by himself or when friends were with him. His manner with friends and visitors was extremely courteous and affable, with just a shade of stateliness. In free conversation, either at the midday dinner, when a friend or two happened, by rare accident, to be present, or more habitually in the evening and at the light supper which concluded it, he was the life and soul of the com pany, from his "flow of subject" and his "unaffected cheerful ness and civility," though with a marked tendency to the satirical and sarcastic in his criticisms of men ane. things. This tendency to the sarcastic was connected by some of those who observed it with a peculiarity of his voice or pronunciation. "He pronounced the letter r very hard," Aubrey tells us, adding Dryden's note on the subject : "litera caning, the dog-letter, a certain sign of a satirical wit." He was extremely temperate in the use of wine or any strong liquors, at meals and at all other times; and when supper was over, about nine o'clock, "he smoked his pipe and drank a glass of water, and went to bed." He suffered much from gout, the effects of which had become apparent in a stiffening of his hands and finger-joints, and the recurring attacks of which in its acute form were very painful. His favourite poets among the Greeks were Homer and the Tragedians, especially Euripides; among the Latins, Virgil and Ovid ; among the English, Spenser and Shakespeare. Among his English contemporaries, he thought most highly of Cowley. He had ceased to attend any church, belonged to no religious communion, and had no religious ob servances in his family. His reasons for this were a matter f or curious surmise among his friends, because of the profoundly religious character of his own mind; but he does not seem ever to have furnished the explanation. The matter became of less interest perhaps after 1669, when his three daughters ceased to reside with him, having been sent out "to learn some curious and ingenious sorts of manufacture that are proper for women to learn, particularly embroideries in gold or silver." After that the household in Bunhill consisted only of Milton, his wife, a single maid-servant, and the "man" or amanuensis who came in for the day.

In 1669 he published Accedence commenced Grammar, and in 167o his History of Britain . . . to the Norman Conquest, and a Latin digest of Ramist logic, entitled Artis logicae plenior institutio. In 1671 there followed his Paradise Regained and Samson Agonistes, bound together in one small volume, and giv ing ample proof that his poetic genius had not exhausted itself in the preceding great epic. In 1673, Milton ventured on the dangerous experiment of one more political pamphlet, in which, under the title Of True Religion, he put forth, with a view to popular acceptance, as mild a version as possible of his former principles on the topics discussed. In the same year appeared the second edition of his Poems . . . both English and Latin, which included, with the exception of the Sonnets to Cromwell, Fairfax, Vane and the second address to Cyriack Skinner, all the minor poems.