John Milton
John Milton
John Miltonwas an English poet, polemicist, and man of letters, and a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England under Oliver Cromwell. He wrote at a time of religious flux and political upheaval, and is best known for his epic poem Paradise Lost, written in blank verse...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth9 December 1608
memories men names
A thousand fantasies Begin to throng into my memory, Of calling shapes, and beckoning shadows dire, And airy tongues that syllable men's names On sands and shores and desert wildernesses
stars memories son
What needs my Shakespeare for his honour'd bones,- The labour of an age in piled stones? Or that his hallow'd relics should be hid Under a star-y-pointing pyramid? Dear son of memory, great heir of fame, What need'st thou such weak witness of thy name?
memories despair slumber
Now conscience wakes despair That slumber'd,-wakes the bitter memory Of what he was, what is, and what must be Worse.
spiritual memories law
If the will, which in the law of our nature, were withdrawn from our memory, fancy, understanding, and reason, no other hell could equal, for a spiritual being, what we should then feel from the anarchy of our powers. It would be conscious madness,--a horrid thought!
change dim disastrous eclipse fear half twilight
In dim eclipse disastrous twilight sheds / On half the nations, and with fear of change / Perplexes monarchs.
cannot knows people talk
Everyone knows that you cannot talk about people by name,
bloody infant mother
The bloody Piedmontese that rolled / Mother with infant down the rocks.
audience fit govern thou though
Still govern thou my song, / Urania, and fit audience find, though few.
against apology best deeds dishonest false honest silence words
The best apology against false accusers is silence and sufferance, and honest deeds set against dishonest words
highest middle sat tree
Thence up he flew, and on the Tree of Life,/ The middle tree and highest there that grew, / Sat like a cormorant.
best gentle modest reluctant required sway sweet
Implied / Subjection, but required with gentle sway / And by her yielded, by him best received; / Yielded with coy submission, modest pride, / And sweet reluctant amorous delay.
freedom good hath heartily license love none rest scope tyrants
None can love freedom heartily but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license which never hath more scope than under tyrants
death knock quiet
Nothing is here for tears, nothing to wail / Or knock the breast, no weakness, no contempt,/ Dispraise, or blame; nothing but well and fair,/ And what may quiet us in a death so noble.
bird coming evening fair gems grateful night silent solemn starry sweet
Sweet the coming on / Of grateful evening mild; then silent night / With this her solemn bird and this fair moon, / And these the gems of heaven, her starry train.