The Complete Poetical Works of John Milton

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Houghton, Mifflin, 1899 - Poetry - 417 pages

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Page 53 - Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise (That last infirmity of noble mind) To scorn delights and live laborious days; But the fair guerdon when we hope to find, And think to burst out into sudden blaze, Comes the blind Fury with the abhorred shears, And slits the thin-spun life. "But not the praise...
Page 146 - Fairest of stars, last in the train of night, If better thou belong not to the dawn, Sure pledge of day, that crown'st the smiling morn With thy bright circlet, praise him in thy sphere, While day arises, that sweet hour of prime.
Page 20 - 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. There let Hymen oft appear In saffron robe, with taper clear, And pomp, and feast, and revelry, With mask, and antique pageantry, Such sights as youthful poets dream On summer eves by haunted stream. Then to the well-trod stage anon, If Jonson's learned sock be on.
Page 130 - O thou that, with surpassing glory crowned, Look'st from thy sole dominion like the god Of this new World — at whose sight all the stars Hide their diminished heads — to thee I call, But with no friendly voice, and add thy name, 0 Sun, to tell thee how I hate thy beams, That bring to my remembrance from what state 1 fell, how glorious once above thy Sphere, Till pride and worse ambition threw me down, Warring in Heaven against Heaven's matchless King!
Page 19 - Straight mine eye hath caught new pleasures, Whilst the landscape round it measures ; Russet lawns, and fallows gray, Where the nibbling flocks do stray ; Mountains, on whose barren breast The labouring clouds do often rest ; Meadows trim, with daisies pied ; Shallow brooks, and rivers wide ; Towers and battlements it sees Bosomed high in tufted trees, Where perhaps some beauty lies, The cynosure of neighbouring eyes.
Page 19 - When in one night, ere glimpse of morn, His shadowy flail hath threshed the corn, That ten day-labourers could not end; Then lies him down, the lubber fiend, And, stretched out all the chimney's length, Basks at the fire his hairy strength; And crop-full out of doors he flings, Ere the first cock his matin rings.
Page 69 - Avenge, O Lord, thy slaughtered saints, whose bones Lie scattered on the Alpine mountains cold; Even them who kept thy truth so pure of old, When all our fathers...
Page 21 - And, when the Sun begins to fling His flaring beams, me, Goddess, bring To arched walks of twilight groves, And shadows brown, that Sylvan loves, Of Pine, or monumental Oak, Where the rude Axe with heaved stroke Was never heard the Nymphs to daunt, Or fright them from their hallowed haunt.
Page 70 - ... day these eyes, though clear, To outward view, of blemish or of spot, Bereft of light, their seeing have forgot; Nor to their idle orbs doth sight appear Of sun, or moon, or star, throughout the year, Or man, or woman. Yet I argue not Against Heaven's hand or will, nor bate a jot Of heart or hope, but still bear up and steer Right onward. What supports me, dost thou ask ? The conscience, friend, to have lost them overplied In Liberty's defence, my noble task, Of which all Europe rings from side...
Page xxxiv - The hooked chariot stood, Unstained with hostile blood; The trumpet spake not to the armed throng; And kings sat still with awful eye, As if they surely knew their sovran Lord was by.

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