An Introduction to the Prose and Poetical Works of John Milton / Comprising All the Autobiographic Passages in His Works, the More Explicit Presentations of His Ideas of True Liberty.

by John Milton

One to hope all things, fits not! Prize sufficiently ample

Mine, and distinction great (unheard of ever thereafter

Though I should be, and inglorious, all through the world of the stranger),

If but yellow-haired Ouse shall read me, the drinker of Alan,

Humber, which whirls as it flows, and Trent's whole valley of orchards,

Thames, my own Thames, above all, and Tamar's western waters,

Tawny with ores, and where the white waves swinge the far Orkneys.'

From 'Of Reformation in England'

Oh, sir, I do now feel myself inwrapped on the sudden into those mazes and labyrinths of dreadful and hideous thoughts, that which way to get out, or which way to end, I know not, unless I turn mine eyes, and with your help lift up my hands to that eternal and propitious Throne, where nothing is readier than grace and refuge to the distresses of mortal suppliants: and it were a shame to leave these serious thoughts less piously than the heathen were wont to conclude their graver discourses.