Citations

Question 1

Yet art thou not inglorious in thy fate;
For so Apollo, with unweeting hand
Whilome did slay his dearly-loved mate
Young Hyacinth born on Eurotas strand, [ 25 ]
Young Hyacinth the pride of Spartan land;
But then transform’d him to a purple flower
Alack that so to change thee winter had no power.

Answer 1

On the Death of a Fair Infant Dying of a Cough

Appollo, God of the Sun, of Poetry

Making beauty (the flower/the poem) from grief

Question 2

Hence loathed Melancholy,
Of Cerberus, and blackest Midnight born,
In Stygian cave forlorn,
‘Mongst horrid shapes, and shrieks, and sights unholy;
Find out some uncouth cell,
Where brooding Darkness spreads his jealous wings,
And the night-raven sings;
There under ebon shades, and low-brow’d rocks,
As ragged as thy locks,
In dark Cimmerian desert ever dwell

Answer 2

L’Allegro (beginning)

Uneven line lenght: chaotic world before the coming of l’Allegro

Question 3

Go home unfed, my lambs, your troubled master is not free to tend you. These rewards for you remain certain, Damon; they shall be yours. But what will become of me; what faithful friend will stay close by my side as you were wont to do in bitter cold through places rough with frost, or under the fierce sun with the grasses dying from drought, whether the task were to go within spear’s throw of great lions or to frighten the ravenous wolves from the high sheepfolds? Who will now lull my day to rest with talk and song?

Answer 3

Epitathium Damonis

Question 4

Dear son of Memory, great heir of fame,
What need’st thou such weak witness of thy name?
Thou in our wonder and astonishment
Hast built thyself a live-long monument.

Answer 4

On Shakespear

Shakespeare as a son of memory
He makes Shakespeare a son vs. Jonson who makes Shakespeare a father
Being a son-> less intimidating, subordinate figure; but Milton chooses to identify with him
->Other Children of Memory= the Muses-> Shakespeare being transformed into a Muse -> source of inspiration

Question 5

But peacefull was the night
Wherin the Prince of light
His raign of peace upon the earth began:
The Windes, with wonder whist,
Smoothly the waters kist, [ 65 ]
Whispering new joyes to the milde Ocean,
Who now hath quite forgot to rave,
While Birds of Calm sit brooding on the charmed wave.

Answer 5

On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity

Creation of the world: God’s spirit moves over the water. In later Christian iconography, the spirit of God is represented as a dove
Analogy: Christ is re-shaping the world

Question 6

And the mute Silence hist along, [ 55 ]
'Less Philomel will daign a Song,
In her sweetest, saddest plight,
Smoothing the rugged brow of night,
While Cynthia checks her Dragon yoke,
Gently o're th' accustom'd Oke; [ 60 ]
Sweet Bird that shunn'st the noise of folly,
Most musicall, most melancholy!

Answer 6

Il Penseroso
Introduction of Philomel, myth of poetry
Cynthia= Diana

Question 7

Go home unfed, my lambs, your troubled master is not free to tend you. Ah, what wandering fancy lured me to traverse lofty cliffs and snowy Alps to unknown shores! Was there any such need to see buried Rome — even had it been what it was when Tityrus left his sheep and his pastures to see it — that I could part with so charming a companion, that I could put between us so many deep seas, so many mountains, forests, rocks, and roaring streams? Surely had I stayed I might at the last have touched the hand, and closed the eyes, of him who was peacefully dying, might have said, ‘Farewell, remember me when you go to the stars.’

Answer 7

Epitathium Damonis

Question 8

Or call up him that left half told
The story of Cambuscan bold, [ 110 ]
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,
On which the Tartar King did ride; [ 115 ]
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,
Where more is meant then meets the ear.

Answer 8

Il Penseroso

Reference to Chaucer and Shakespeare, anxiety of coming after the Greats

Question 9

Peor, and Baalim,
Forsake their Temples dim,
With that twise-batter’d god of Palestine,
And mooned Ashtaroth, [ 200 ]
Heav’ns Queen and Mother both,
Now sits not girt with Tapers holy shine,
The Libyc Hammon shrinks his horn,
In vain the Tyrian Maids their wounded Thamuz mourn.

Answer 9

On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity

Question 10

O Fairest flower no sooner blown but blasted,
Soft silken Primrose fading timelesslie,
Summers chief honour if thou hadst out-lasted
Bleak winters force that made thy blossome drie;
For he being amorous on that lovely die [ 5 ]
That did thy cheek envermeil, thought to kiss
But kill’d alas, and then bewayl’d his fatal bliss.

Answer 10

On the Death of a Fair Infant Dying of a Cough

Question 11

Tower'd cities please us then, 
And the busy hum of men, 
Where throngs of knights and barons bold, 
In weeds of peace high triumphs hold, 
With store of ladies, whose bright eyes 
Rain influence, and judge the prize 
Of wit, or arms, while both contend 
To win her grace, whom all commend.

Answer 11

L’allegro (towards the end)
Though the poem is set in an idyllic pastoral world, the city does not appear as negative in contrast
elargissement du monde, introduction of the world of the city (the buzzy hum of men

Question 12

Wert thou some Starr which from the ruin’d roof
Of shak’t Olympus by mischance didst fall;
Which carefull Jove in natures true behoofe [ 45 ]
Took up, and in fit place did reinstall?
Or did of late earths Sonnes besiege the wall
Of sheenie Heav’n, and thou some goddess fled
Amongst us here below to hide thy nectar’d head

Answer 12

On the Death of a Fair Infant Dying of a Cough

Question 13

Then thou the mother of so sweet a child
Her false imagin’d 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; [ 75 ]
This if thou do, he will an off-spring give
That till the worlds last end shall make thy name to live.

Answer 13

On The Death of a Fair Infant Dying of a Cough

Failure at consoling

Question 14

It was the Winter wilde,
While the Heav'n-born-childe, [ 30 ]
All meanly wrapt in the rude manger lies;
Nature in aw to him
Had doff't her gawdy trim,
With her great Master so to sympathize:
It was no season then for her [ 35 ]
To wanton with the Sun her lusty Paramour.

Answer 14

On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity

Winter
Nature

Question 15

And though the shady gloom
Had given day her room,
The Sun himself with-held his wonted speed,
And hid his head for shame, [ 80 ]
As his inferiour flame,
The new-enlightn’d world no more should need;
He saw a greater Sun appear
Then his bright Throne, or burning Axletree could bear.

Answer 15

On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity

Question 16

The Shepherds on the Lawn, [ 85 ]
Or ere the point of dawn,
Sate simply chatting in a rustick row;
Full little thought they than,
That the mighty Pan
Was kindly com to live with them below; [ 90 ]
Perhaps their loves, or els their sheep,
Was all that did their silly thoughts so busie keep.

Answer 16

On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity

Question 17

But hail thou Goddes, sage and holy,
Hail divinest Melancholy,
Whose Saintly visage is too bright
To hit the Sense of human sight;
And therfore to our weaker view, [ 15 ]
Ore laid with black staid Wisdoms hue.

Answer 17

Il Penseroso

Introduction of Melancholy (vs. l’Allegro)
Serious poetry vs carefree, Milton vs Shakespeare

Question 18

But wisest Fate sayes no,
This must not yet be so, [ 150 ]
The Babe lies yet in smiling Infancy,
That on the bitter cross
Must redeem our loss;
So both himself and us to glorifie:
Yet first to those ychain'd in sleep, [ 155 ]
The wakefull trump of doom must thunder through the deep,

Answer 18

On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity

Restraint

Question 19

In fact, the light elegy is in the care of many of the gods, and she calls
whomever pleases her to her lines. With Elegy stand Liber, Erato, Ceres, and
Venus, and, next to his rosy mother is tender Love. For good dinner companions
are valued by such poets, and very often old wine is ordered. But he who
represents wars and heaven beneath a mature Jupiter and pious heroes and
semi-divine rulers now sings the best in the sacred council of the gods, and now
the infernal realm holding the howling dogs, let him live sparingly in the manner
of the Samian teacher, and let herbs furnish his innocuous meals

Answer 19

Elegy 6

Question 20

Because a rosy blush, and a youth without stain were dear to you, because you never tasted the pleasure of marriage, lo! for you are reserved a virgin’s honours. Your noble head bound with a glittering wreath, in your hands the glad branches of the leafy palm, you shall for ever act and act again the immortal nuptials, where song and the lyre, mingled with the blessed dances, wax rapturous, and the joyous revels rage under the thyrsus of Zion.”

Answer 20

Epitathium Damonis`

Question 21

Go home unfed, my lambs, your troubled master is not free to tend you. Ah me! what deities shall I name in earth or heaven, now that they have torn you away, Damon, by inexorable death? Do you leave me thus, and is your virtue to go without a name and be merged with the obscure shades? But nay, let him who with his golden wand marshals the souls will it otherwise, and may he lead you into a company that is worthy of you, and keep far off the whole base herd of the silent dead.

Answer 21

Epitathium Damonis
Theocritus’s Thyrsis also punctuatates his lament in Idyll 1 with a persistent refrain, as do Bion and Moschus in the Lament for Adonis and the Lament for Bion respectively. Milton’s refrain is often supposed to echo Virgil’s Eclogues 7, in which the Virgilian Thyrsis speaks the line, “Ite domum pasti, si quis pudor, ite iuvenci” (44): “Go home, my cattle, from your grazing go!” This eclogue is a singing contest between Thyrsis and Corydon, giving the allusion resonance when Milton’s Thyrsis later describes the singing contest he joined in Florence.

Question 22

Tells how the drudging Goblin swet [ 105 ]
To ern his Cream-bowle duly set,
When in one night, ere glimps of morn,
His shadowy Flale hath thresh’d the Corn
That ten day-labourers could not end,
Then lies him down the Lubbar Fend. [ 110 ]
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.

Answer 22

l’Allegro

Question 23

“Go home unfed, my lambs, your troubled master is not free to tend you. Now I wander in the fields alone, alone through the pastures; wherever the shady branches grow thick in the valleys, there I await the evening, while overhead rain and the south-east wind sadly moan, and the twilight of the forest is broken with gleams of light.

Answer 23

Epitathium Damonis

Question 24

But let my due feet never fail, [ 155 ]
To walk the studious Cloysters pale,
And love the high embowed Roof,
With antick Pillars massy proof,
And storied Windows richly dight,
Casting a dimm religious light. [ 160 ]
There let the pealing Organ blow,
To the full voic'd Quire below,
In Service high, and Anthems cleer,
As may with sweetnes, through mine ear,
Dissolve me into extasies, [ 165 ]
And bring all Heav'n before mine eyes.
And may at last my weary age
Find out the peacefull hermitage,
The Hairy Gown and Mossy Cell,
Where I may sit and rightly spell,

Answer 24

Il Penseroso

Mention of the cell and the cloysters,
religious life

Question 25

Ring out ye Crystall sphears, [ 125 ]
Once bless our human ears,
(If ye have power to touch our senses so)
And let your silver chime
Move in melodious time;
And let the Base of Heav’ns deep Organ blow, [ 130 ]
And with your ninefold harmony
Make up full consort to th’ Angelike symphony

Answer 25

On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity

Classical allusion: Pythagorean spheres

Question 26

Ennobled hath the Buskind stage.
But, O sad Virgin, that thy power
Might raise Musæus from his bower,
Or bid the soul of Orpheus sing [ 105 ]
Such notes as warbled to the string,
Drew Iron tears down Pluto's cheek,
And made Hell grant what Love did seek.

Answer 26

Il Penseroso

Introduction of Orpheus, achieve what he couldn’t

Question 27

Or sweetest Shakespear fancies childe,

Warble his native Wood-notes wilde,

Answer 27

L’Allegro

Differentiating Milton and Shakespeare
They came to represent two different ways of poetry
Shakespeare represents nature, effortless writing
Milton represent the kind of poet whose poetry doesn’t come from fancy imagination but from learning
Milton identifies Shakespeare as the poet whose writing corresponds to the world of l’Allegro
Represented as a carefree poet of comedies here
+Many references to AMND in the poem

Question 28

This Nymph that gaz’d upon his clustring locks,
With Ivy berries wreath’d, and his blithe youth, [ 55 ]
Had by him, ere he parted thence, a Son
Much like his Father, but his Mother more,
Whom therfore she brought up and Comus nam’d,
Who ripe, and frolick of his full grown age,
Roaving the Celtick, and Iberian fields, [ 60 ]
At last betakes him to this ominous Wood,
And in thick shelter of black shades imbowr’d,
Excells his Mother at her mighty Art,
Offring to every weary Travailer,
His orient liquor in a Crystal Glasse, [ 65 ]

Answer 28

Comus: The Angel speaking, origin of comus

Question 29

Yet once more, O ye laurels, and once more
Ye myrtles brown, with ivy never sere,
I come to pluck your berries harsh and crude,
And with forc’d fingers rude
Shatter your leaves before the mellowing year.
Bitter constraint and sad occasion dear
Compels me to disturb your season due;
For Lycidas is dead, dead ere his prime,
Young Lycidas, and hath not left his peer.
Who would not sing for Lycidas? he knew
Himself to sing, and build the lofty rhyme.

Answer 29

Lycidas

Question 30

. Thyrsis? Whose artful strains have oft delaid
The huddling brook to hear his madrigal, [ 495 ]
And sweeten’d every muskrose of the dale,
How cam’st thou here good Swain? hath any ram
Slip’t from the fold, or young Kid lost his dam,
Or straggling weather the pen’t flock forsook?
How couldst thou find this dark sequester’d nook?

Answer 30

Comus

Question 31

I mean that too, but yet a hidden strength
Which if Heav’n gave it, may be term’d her own:
‘Tis chastity, my brother, chastity: [ 420 ]
She that has that, is clad in compleat steel,
And like a quiver’d Nymph with Arrows keen
May trace huge Forests, and unharbour’d Heaths,
Infamous Hills, and sandy perilous wildes,
Where through the sacred rayes of Chastity, [ 425 ]
No savage fierce, Bandite, or mountaneer
Will dare to soyl her Virgin purity,
Yea there, where very desolation dwels
By grots, and caverns shag’d with horrid shades,
She may pass on with unblench’t majesty, [ 430 ]
Be it not don in pride, or in presumption.
Som say no evil thing that walks by night
In fog, or fire, by lake, or moorish fen,
Blew meager Hag, or stubborn unlaid ghost,
That breaks his magick chains at curfeu time

Answer 31

Comus

Question 32

La. Fool do not boast,
Thou canst not touch the freedom of my minde
With all thy charms, although this corporal rinde
Thou haste immanacl’d, while Heav’n sees good.

Answer 32

Comus

Question 33

Even now that fiery spirit himself who encircles the swift orbs sings with the starry choirs in an immmortal melody, an ineffable song, while the glittering serpent checks his angry hissing, and fierce Orion with lowered sword grows gentle, and Maurusian Atlas no longer feels the burden of the stars.

Answer 33

Ad Patrem
he glittering serpent. According to Ovid’s Metamorphoses 2.173-75, Apollo’s Son, Phaeton, was threatened by the Serpent, the constellation Serpens, which appears between the two bears, Ursa Major and Ursa Minor.

Question 34

Sabrina is her name, a Virgin pure,
Whilom she was the daughter of Locrine,
That had the Scepter from his father Brute.
The guiltless damsell flying the mad pursuit
Of her enraged stepdam Guendolen, [ 830 ]
Commended her innocence to the flood
That stay’d her flight with his cross-flowing course,
The water Nymphs that in the bottom plaid,
Held up their pearled wrists and took her in,
Bearing her straight to aged Nereus Hall, [ 835 ]
Who piteous of her woes, rear’d her lank head,
And gave her to his daughters to imbathe
In nectar’d lavers strew’d with Asphodil,
And through the porch and inlet of each sense
Dropt in Ambrosial Oils till she reviv’d, [ 840 ]
And underwent a quick immortal change
Made Goddess of the River; still she retains
Her maid’n gentlenes, and oft at Eeve
Visits the herds along the twilight meadows,
Helping all urchin blasts, and ill luck signes [ 845 ]
That the shrewd medling Elf delights to make,
Which she with pretious viold liquors heals.

Answer 34

Comus

Question 35

Virgin, daughter of Locrine
Sprung of old Anchises line,
May thy brimmed waves for this
Their full tribute never miss [ 925 ]
From a thousand petty rills,
That tumble down the snowy hills:
Summer drouth, or singed air
Never scorch thy tresses fair,
Nor wet Octobers torrent flood

Answer 35

Comus, The Ascendant spirit speaking in rhyming couplets

Question 36

There I suck the liquid ayr [ 980 ]
All amidst the Gardens fair
Of Hesperus, and his daughters three
That sing about the golden tree:
Along the crisped shades and bowres
Revels the spruce and jocond Spring, [ 985 ]
The Graces, and the rosie-boosom'd Howres,
Thither all their bounties bring,
That there eternal Summer dwels,
And West winds with musky wing
About the cedar'n alleys fling [ 990 ]
Nard, and Cassia's balmy smels.
Iris there with humid bow,
Waters the odorous banks that blow
Flowers of more mingled hew
Then her purfl'd scarf can shew, [ 995 ]
And drenches with Elysian dew
(List mortals, if your ears be true)
Beds of Hyacinth and roses
Where young Adonis oft reposes,
Waxing well of his deep wound [ 1000 ]
In slumber soft, and on the ground
Sadly sits th' Assyrian Queen;

Answer 36

Comus

Question 37

How soon hath Time, the subtle thief of youth,
Stol’n on his wing my three-and-twentieth year!
My hasting days fly on with full career,
But my late spring no bud or blossom shew’th.
Perhaps my semblance might deceive the truth
That I to manhood am arriv’d so near;
And inward ripeness doth much less appear,
That some more timely-happy spirits endu’th.

Answer 37

Sonnet VII

Question 38

The Oracles are dumm,
No voice or hideous humm
Runs through the arched roof in words deceiving. [ 175 ]
Apollo from his shrine
Can no more divine,
With hollow shreik the steep of Delphos leaving.
No nightly trance, or breathed spell,
Inspire’s the pale-ey’d Priest from the prophetic cell. [

Answer 38

On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity

Question 39

I know not, dearest father, how this trifling song that I am meditating will please you, yet I know not what offerings from me can better repay your gifts, though not even the greatest can repay them, nor can any gratitude expressed by the vain return of empty words be equal to the obligation. Nevertheless this page displays my resources, and all my wealth is set forth on this paper; but I have nothing save what golden Clio has given me, what dreams have brought me in the distant caves of sleep, and what the laurel copses of the sacred wood and the shades of Parnassus bestowed.

Answer 39

Ad Patrem

Question 40

Beauty is nature’s coyn, must not be hoorded,
But must be currant, and the good thereof [ 740 ]
Consists in mutual and partak’n bliss,
Unsavoury in th’ injoyment of it self.
If you let slip time, like a neglected rose
It withers on the stalk with languish’t head.
Beauty is natures brag, and must be shown [ 745 ]
In courts, at feasts, and high solemnities
Where most may wonder at the workmanship

Answer 40

Comus

Question 41

Yet be it less or more, or soon or slow,
It shall be still in strictest measure ev’n
To that same lot, however mean or high,
Toward which Time leads me, and the will of Heav’n:
All is, if I have grace to use it so
As ever in my great Task-Master’s eye.

Answer 41

Sonnet VII

Question 42

Scorn not the poet’s song, a work divine, which more than anything else reveals our ethereal origin and heavenly race. Nothing so dignifies the human mind as its origin, and it possesses yet some sacred traces of Promethean fire.

Answer 42

Ad Patrem

Question 43

What could the Muse herself that Orpheus bore,
The Muse herself, for her enchanting son,
Whom universal nature did lament,
When by the rout that made the hideous roar
His gory visage down the stream was sent,
Down the swift Hebrus to the Lesbian shore?

Answer 43

Lycidas

Question 44

Now also for you a splendid and plentiful table is prepared; it feeds your mind
and warms your genius. Massic cups skim the fruitful vein and you pour out
sweet verses from the cup itself. To those let us add the arts and great Phoebus
to your inmost heart. Bacchus, Apollo, and Ceres are inclined towards one,
alone. No wonder then that your songs are so sweet, brought forth by the three
gods united.

Answer 44

Elegy 6

Question 45

That song will do for the sylvan choirs, but not for Orpheus, who with song and not with lute held back the rivers, and gave ears to the oaks, and moved the shades of the dead to tears; these praises he has from song.

Answer 45

Ad Patrem

Question 46

By her own radiant light, though Sun and Moon
Were in the flat Sea sunk. And Wisdoms self [ 375 ]
Oft seeks to sweet retired Solitude,
Where with her best nurse Contemplation
She plumes her feathers, and lets grow her wings
That in the various bussle of resort
Were all to ruffl’d, and somtimes impair’d. [ 380 ]
He that has light within his own cleer brest
May sit i’th center, and enjoy bright day,
But he that hides a dark soul, and foul thoughts
Benighted walks under the mid-day Sun;
Himself is his own dungeon. [ 385 ]

Answer 46

Comus

Question 47

. Therefore, since I am one, though the humblest, of the learned company, I shall sit among the victor’s ivy and laurels, and no longer obscurely mingle with the dull rabble; my footsteps will avoid the gaze of profane eyes.

Answer 47

Ad Patrem

Question 48

In solemn troops, and sweet societies,
That sing, and singing in their glory move,
And wipe the tears for ever from his eyes.
Now, Lycidas, the shepherds weep no more:
Henceforth thou art the Genius of the shore,
In thy large recompense, and shalt be good
To all that wander in that perilous flood.

Answer 48

Lycidas

Question 49

But as for you, dear father, since it is not granted me to make a just return for your deserts, nor to recompense your gifts with my deeds, let it suffice that I remember, and with gratitude count over, your repeated gifts, and treasure them in a faithful mind.

Answer 49

Ad Patrem

Question 50

But if you will know what I am up to (if you, at least by custom, consider what I
do of such importance to know), I sing to the peace-bringing God descended
from heaven, and the blessed generations covenanted in the sacred books, the
cries of the infant God who, stabled under a poor roof, dwells in the heavens with
his father. I sing the starry axis and the singing hosts in the sky, and of the gods
suddenly destroyed in their own shrines. We assuredly owe these gifts to Christ
on his birthday, gifts which the first light before the dawn brought to me. For you
also these reflective strains remain on my native pipes which, having been
recited, you shall be my judge.

Answer 50

Elegy 6

Question 51

He, sovran priest, stooping his regal head,
That dropt with odorous oil down his fair eyes,
Poor fleshly tabernacle entered,
His starry front low-rooft beneath the skies:
O, what a mask was there, what a disguise!
Yet more; the stroke of death he must abide,
Then lies him meekly down fast by his brethrens’ side.

Answer 51

The Passion

Question 52

That murmur, soon replies, God doth not need
Either man’s work or his own gifts, who best
Bear his milde yoak, they serve him best, his State
Is Kingly. Thousands at his bidding speed
And post o’re Land and Ocean without rest:
They also serve who only stand and waite.

Answer 52

Sonnet XVI

Question 53

Mine eye hath found that sad sepulchral rock
That was the casket of Heaven’s richest store,
And here through grief my feeble hands up lock,
Yet on the soften’d quarry would I score
My plaining verse as lively as before;
For sure so well instructed are my tears,
That they would fitly fall in order’d characters.

Answer 53

The Passion

The moment of the Crucifixion passes as the poet focuses on himself, and the poem transitions discussing to Christ’s sepulchral in Stanza VIII:

Question 54

My spirit some transporting cherub feels,
To bear me where the towers of Salem stood
…
There doth my soul in holy vision sit
In pensive trance, and anguish, and ecstatic fit.

Answer 54

The Passion

The emphasis on poetry is dropped for an emphasis on the soul of the narrator in Stanza VI

Question 55

Or Should I thence, hurried on viewless wing,
Take up a weeping on the mountains wild,
The gentle neighbourhood of grove and spring
Would soon unbosom all their echoes mild
And I (for grief is easily beguiled)
Might think th’ infection of my sorrows loud
Had got a race of mourners on some pregnant cloud.

Answer 55

The Passion

The final stanza ends with the poet focusing on his own sorrow