CONTENTS
Complimentary Pieces Addressed to the Author.
1. Elegies
Elegy I -To Charles Diodati.
Elegy II -On the Death of the University Beadle at
Cambridge.
Elegy III-On the Death of the Bishop of Winchester.
Elegy IV -To My Tutor, Thomas Young.
Elegy V -On the Approach of Spring.
Elegy VI -To Charles Diodati.
Elegy VII
On the Gunpowder Plot.
Another on the Same.
Another on the Same.
Another on the Same.
On the Invention of Gunpowder.
To Leonora, Singing in Rome.
Another to the Same.
Another to the Same.
The Fable of the Peasant and his Landlord.
2. Poems in Various Metres.
On the Death of the Vice-Chancellor, a Physician.
On the Fifth of November.
On the Death of the Bishop of Ely.
That Nature is Not Subject to Decay.
On the Platonic Ideal as Understood by Aristotle.
To My Father.
Psalm CXIV.
The Philosopher and the King.
On the Engraver of his Portrait.
To Giovanni Salzilli.
To Giovanni Battista Manso.
The Death of Damon.
To John Rouse.
3. Translations of the Italian Poems.
Appendix: To Christina, Queen of Sweden.
Appendix: Translations of Poems in the Latin Prose Works.
Appendix: Translation of a Latin Letter.
Appendix: Translations of the Italian Poems by George
MacDonald (I876).
Complimentary Pieces Addressed to the Author.
1Well as the author knows that the following testimonies are not so much about as above him, and that men of great ingenuity, as well as our friends, are apt, through abundant zeal, so to praise us as rather to draw their own likeness than ours, he was yet unwilling that the world should remain always ignorant of compositions that do him so much honour; and especially because he has other friends, who have, with much importunity, solicited their publication. Aware that excessive commendation awakens envy, he would with both hands thrust it from him, preferring just so much of that dangerous tribute as may of right belong to him; but at the same time he cannot deny that he sets the highest value on the suffrages of judicious and distinguished persons.
1 Milton's Preface, Translated.
1 These complimentary pieces have been sufficiently censured by a great authority, but no very candid judge either of Milton or his panegyrists. He, however, must have a heart sadly indifferent to the glory of his country, who is not gratified by the thought that she may exult in a son whom, young as he was, the Learned of Italy thus contended to honour.—W.C.
The Neapolitan, Giovanni Battista Manso, Marquis of Villa,
to the Englishman, John Milton.
What features, form, mien, manners, with a mind
Oh how intelligent, and how refined!
Were but thy piety from fault as free,
Thou wouldst no Angle1 but an Angel be.
1 The reader will perceive that the word "Angle" (i.e. Anglo- Saxon) is essential, because the epigram turns upon it.—W.C.
An Epigram Addressed to the Englishman, John Milton, a Poet
Worthy of the Three Laurels of Poesy, the Grecian, Latin, and
Etruscan, by Giovanni Salzilli of Rome
Meles1 and Mincio both your urns depress!
Sebetus, boast henceforth thy Tasso less!
But let the Thames o'erpeer all floods, since he,
For Milton famed, shall, single, match the three.
1 Meles is a river of Ionia, in the neighborhood of Smyrna, whence
Homer is called Melesigenes.
The Mincio watered the city of Mantua famous as the birthplace
of Virgil.
Sebetus is now called the Fiume della Maddalena—it runs through
Naples.—W.C.
To John Milton.
Greece sound thy Homer's, Rome thy Virgil's name,
But England's Milton equals both in fame.
—Selvaggi.
To John Milton, English Gentleman.
An Ode.
Exalt Me, Clio,1 to the skies,
That I may form a starry crown,
Beyond what Helicon supplies
In laureate garlands of renown;
To nobler worth be brighter glory given,
And to a heavenly mind a recompense from heaven.
Time's wasteful hunger cannot prey
On everlasting high desert,
Nor can Oblivion steal away
Its record graven on the heart;
Lodge but an arrow, Virtue, on the bow
That binds my lyre, and death shall be a vanquished foe.
In Ocean's blazing flood enshrined.
Whose vassal tide around her swells,
Albion. from other realms disjoined,
The prowess of the world excels;
She teems with heroes that to glory rise,
With more than human force in our astonished eyes.
To Virtue, driven from other lands,
Their bosoms yield a safe retreat;
Her law alone their deed commands,
Her smiles they feel divinely sweet;
Confirm my record, Milton, generous youth!
And by true virtue prove thy virtue's praise a truth.
Zeuxis, all energy and flaine,
Set ardent forth in his career,
Urged to his task by Helen's fame,
Resounding ever in his ear;
To make his image to her beauty true,
From the collected fair each sovereign charm he drew.2
The bee, with subtlest skill endued,
Thus toils to earn her precious juice,
From all the flowery myriads strewed
O'er meadow and parterre profuse;
Confederate voices one sweet air compound,
And various chords consent in one harmonious sound.
An artist of celestial aim,
Thy genius, caught by moral grace,
With ardent emulation's flame
The steps of Virtue toiled to trace,
Observed in everv land who brightest shone,
And blending all their best, make perfect good thy own.
Front all in Florence born, or taught
Our country's sweetest accent there,
Whose works, with learned labor wrought,
Immortal honors justly share,
Then hast such treasure drawn of purest ore,
That not even Tuscan bards can boast a richer store.
Babel, confused, and with her towers
Unfinished spreading wide and plain,
Has served but to evince thy powers,
With all hot, tongues confused in vain,
Since not alone thy England's purest phrase,
But every polished realm thy various speech displays.
The secret things of heaven and earth,
By nature, too reserved. concealed
From other minds of highest worth,
To thee ate copiously revealed;
Thou knowest them clearly, and thy views attain
The utmost bounds prescribed to moral truth's domain.
Let Time no snore his wing display,
And boast his ruinous career,
For Virtue, rescued front his sway.
His injuries may cease to fear;
Since all events that claim remembrance find
A chronicle exact in thy capacious mind.
Give me, that I may praise thy song,
Thy lyre, by which alone I can,
Which, placing thee the stars among,
Already proves thee more than man;
And Thames shall seem Permessus,3 while his stream
Graced with a swan like thee. shall be my favorite theme.
I, who beside the Arno, strain
To match thy merit with my lays,
Learn, after many an effort vain,
To admure thee rather than to praise;
And that by mute astonishment alone,
Not by the fathering tongue, thy worth may best be shown.
—Signor Antonio Francini, Gentleman, of Florence.
1 The muse of History.
2 The portrait of Helen was painted at the request of the people of Crotna, who sent to the artist all their lovliest girls for models. Zeuxis selected five, and united their separate beauties in his picture.
3 A river in Boeotia which took its rise in Helicon. See Virgil Ecl. vi.64
To Mr. John Milton of London
A youth eminent from his country and his virtues,
Who in his travels has made himself acquainted with many nations, and in his studies, with all, that, life another Ulysses, lie might learn all that all could teach him;
Skilful in many tongues, on whose lips languages now mute so live again, that the idioms of all are insufficient to his praise; happy acquisition by which he understands the universal admiration and applause his talents trace excited;
Whose endowments of mind and person move us to wonder, but at the same time fix us immovable: whose works prompt us to extol him, but by their beauty strike us mute;
In whose memory the whole world is treasured; in whose intellect, wisdom; in whose heart, the ardent desire for glory; and in whose mouth, eloquence. Who with Astronomy for his conductor, hears the music of the spheres; with Philosophy for the teacher, deciphers the hand-writing of God, in those wonders of creation which proclaim His greatness; and with the most unwearied literary industry for his associate, examines, restores, penetrates with case the obscurities of antiquity, the desolations of ages, and the labyrinths of learning;
"But wherefore toil to reach these arduous heights?"
To him, in short, whose virtues the mouths of Fame are too few to celebrate, and whom astonishment forbids us to praise a he deserves, this tribute due to his merits, and the offering of reverence and affection, is paid by Carlo Dati, a patrician Florentine. This great man's servant, and this good man's friend.
In Miltonum.1
Tres tria, sed longe distantia, saecula vates
Ostentant tribus e gentibus eximios.
Graecia sublimem, cum majestate disertum
Roma tulit, felix Anglia utrique parem.
Partubus ex binis Natura exhausta, coacta est,
Tertis ut fieret, consociare duos.
—Joannem Dridenum.
1 Translation of Dryden's Lines Printed Under the Engraved Portrait of Milton in Tonson's Folio Edition of "Paradise Lost," I688.
Stanzas on the Late Indecent Liberties Taken with the Remains of the Great Milton, by Wm. Cowper, Esq.1
Me too, perchance, in future days,
The sculptur'd stone shall show,
With Paphian myrtle, or with bays
Parnessian, on my brow.
But I, before that season come,
Escap'd from ev'ry care,
Shall reach my refuge in the tomb,
And sleep securely there.
So sang in Roman tone and style
The youthful bard, ere long
Ordain'd to grace his native isle
With her sublimest song.
Who then but must conceive disdain,
Hearing the deed unblest
Of wretches who have dar'd profane
His dread sepulchral rest?
Ill fare the hands that heav'd the stones
Where Milton's ashes lay!
That trembled not to grasp his bones.
And steal his dust away!
Oh! ill-requited bard! Neglect
Thy living worth repaid,
And blind idolatrous respect
As much affronts thee dead.
1 This shocking outrage took place in I790 whilst the Church of St. Giles, Cripplegate, was repairing. The overseers (for the sake of gain) opened a coffin supposed to be Milton's, found a body, extracted its teeth, cut off its hair, and left the remains to the grave-diggers, who exhibited them for money to the public.
Forsitan & nostros ducat de marmore vultus,
Nectens aut Paphia myrti aut Parnasside lauri
Fronde comas, at ego secura pace quiescam.
—Milton. "Mansus" ("Manso")
Cowper's translation :
To honour me, and with the graceful wreath
Or of Parnassus or the Paphian isle
Shall bind my brows—but I shall rest the while."