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Lives of the Poets, Vol. 1 by Samuel Johnson

S >> Samuel Johnson >> Lives of the Poets, Vol. 1




Being now forty-seven years old, and seeing himself disencumbered
from external interruptions, he seems to have recollected his former
purposes, and to have resumed three great works, which he had planned
for his future employment; an epick poem, the history of his country,
and a dictionary of the Latin tongue.

To collect a dictionary, seems a work of all others least practicable
in a state of blindness, because it depends upon perpetual and minute
inspection and collation. Nor would Milton probably have begun it, after
he had lost his eyes; but, having had it always before him, he continued
it, says Philips, "almost to his dying-day; but the papers were so
discomposed and deficient, that they could not be fitted for the press."
The compilers of the Latin dictionary, printed at Cambridge, had the use
of those collections in three folios; but what was their fate afterwards
is not known[39].

To compile a history from various authors, when they can only be
consulted by other eyes, is not easy, nor possible, but with more
skilful and attentive help than can be commonly obtained; and it was
probably the difficulty of consulting and comparing that stopped
Milton's narrative at the conquest; a period at which affairs were not
yet very intricate, nor authors very numerous.

For the subject of his epick poem, after much deliberation, long
choosing, and beginning late, he fixed upon Paradise Lost; a design so
comprehensive, that it could be justified only by success. He had once
designed to celebrate king Arthur, as he hints in his verses to Mansus;
but "Arthur was reserved," says Fenton, "to another destiny[40]."

It appears, by some sketches of poetical projects left in manuscript,
and to be seen in a library[41] at Cambridge, that he had digested his
thoughts on this subject into one of those wild dramas which were
anciently called Mysteries[42]; and Philips had seen what he terms part
of a tragedy, beginning with the first ten lines of Satan's address to
the sun. These mysteries consist of allegorical persons; such as
Justice, Mercy, Faith. Of the tragedy or mystery of Paradise Lost,
there are two plans:

The Persons.

Michael.
Chorus of Angels.
Heavenly Love.
Lucifer.
Adam, }
Eve, } with the Serpent.
Conscience.
Death.
Labour, }
Sickness, }
Discontent, } Mutes.
Ignorance, }
with others; }
Faith.
Hope.
Charity.

The Persons.

Moses.
Divine Justice, Wisdom, Heavenly Love.
The Evening Star, Hesperus.
Chorus of Angels.
Lucifer.
Adam.

Eve.
Conscience.
Labour, }
Sickness, }
Discontent, } Mutes.
Ignorance, }
Fear, }
Death, }
Faith.
Hope.
Charity.

PARADISE LOST.

The Persons.

Moses [Greek: prologizei], recounting how he assumed his true body; that
it corrupts not, because it is with God in the mount: declares the like
of Enoch and Elijah; besides the purity of the place, that certain pure
winds, dews, and clouds, preserve it from corruption; whence exhorts to
the sight of God; tells they cannot see Adam in the state of innocence,
by reason of their sin.

Justice, } debating what should become of man, if he fall.
Mercy, }
Wisdom, }

Chorus of angels singing a hymn of the creation.

ACT II.

Heavenly Love.

Evening Star.

Chorus sings the marriage song, and describes Paradise.

ACT III.

Lucifer contriving Adam's ruin.

Chorus fears for Adam, and relates Lucifer's rebellion and fall.

ACT IV.

Adam, } fallen.
Eve, }

Conscience cites them to God's examination.

Chorus bewails, and tells the good Adam has lost.

ACT V.

Adam and Eve driven out of Paradise.
------presented by an angel with
Labour, Grief, Hatred, Envy, War, Famine, }
Pestilence, Sickness, Discontent, Ignorance, } Mutes.
Fear, Death, }
To whom he gives their names. Likewise Winter, Heat,
Tempest, &c.
Faith, }
Hope, }comfort him, and instruct him.
Charity, }
Chorus briefly concludes.

Such was his first design, which could have produced only an allegory,
or mystery. The following sketch seems to have attained more maturity.

Adam unparadised:

The angel Gabriel, either descending or entering; showing, since
this globe was created, his frequency as much on earth as in heaven;
describes Paradise. Next, the chorus, showing the reason of his coming
to keep his watch in Paradise, after Lucifer's rebellion, by command
from God; and withal expressing his desire to see and know more
concerning this excellent new creature, man. The angel Gabriel, as by
his name signifying a prince of power, tracing Paradise with, a more
free office, passes by the station of the chorus, and, desired by them,
relates what he knew of man; as the creation of Eve, with their love
and marriage. After this, Lucifer appears; after his overthrow, bemoans
himself, seeks revenge on man. The chorus prepares resistance at his
first approach. At last, after discourse of enmity on either side, he
departs: whereat the chorus sings of the battle and victory in heaven,
against him and his accomplices: as before, after the first act, was
sung a hymn of the creation. Here again may appear Lucifer, relating and
exulting in what he had done to the destruction of man. Man next, and
Eve, having by this time been seduced by the serpent, appears confusedly
covered with leaves. Conscience, in a shape, accuses him; justice cites
him to the place whither Jehovah called for him. In the mean while, the
chorus entertains the stage, and is informed by some angel the manner of
the fall. Here the chorus bewails Adam's fall; Adam then and Eve return;
accuse one another; but especially Adam lays the blame to his wife; is
stubborn in his offence. Justice appears, reasons with him, convinces
him. The chorus admonisheth Adam, and bids him beware Lucifer's example
of impenitence. The angel is sent to banish them out of Paradise; but
before, causes to pass before his eyes, in shapes, a mask of all the
evils of this life and world. He is humbled, relents, despairs; at last
appears Mercy, comforts him, promises the Messiah; then calls in Faith,
Hope, and Charity; instructs him; he repents, gives God the glory,
submits to his penalty. The chorus briefly concludes. Compare this with
the former draught.

These are very imperfect rudiments of Paradise Lost; but it is pleasant
to see great works in their seminal state, pregnant with latent
possibilities of excellence; nor could there be any more delightful
entertainment than to trace their gradual growth and expansion, and to
observe how they are sometimes suddenly advanced by accidental hints,
and sometimes slowly improved by steady meditation.

Invention is almost the only literary labour which blindness cannot
obstruct, and, therefore, he naturally solaced his solitude by the
indulgence of his fancy, and the melody of his numbers. He had done what
he knew to be necessary previous to poetical excellence; he had made
himself acquainted with "seemly arts and affairs;" his comprehension was
extended by various knowledge, and his memory stored with intellectual
treasures. He was skilful in many languages, and had, by reading and
composition, attained the full mastery of his own. He would have wanted
little help from books, had he retained the power of perusing them.

But while his greater designs were advancing, having now, like many
other authors, caught the love of publication, he amused himself, as he
could, with little productions. He sent to the press, 1658, a manuscript
of Raleigh, called, the Cabinet Council; and next year gratified
his malevolence to the clergy, by a Treatise of Civil Power in
Ecclesiastical Cases, and the Means of removing Hirelings out of the
Church.

Oliver was now dead; Richard was constrained to resign: the system of
extemporary government, which had been held together only by force,
naturally fell into fragments, when that force was taken away; and
Milton saw himself and his cause in equal danger. But he had still hope
of doing something. He wrote letters, which Toland has published, to
such men as he thought friends to the new commonwealth; and, even in the
year of the restoration, he "bated no jot of heart or hope," but was
fantastical enough to think that the nation, agitated as it was, might
be settled by a pamphlet, called, a ready and easy Way to establish a
free Commonwealth: which was, however, enough considered to be both
seriously and ludicrously answered.

The obstinate enthusiasm of the commonwealth-men was very remarkable.
When the king was apparently returning, Harrington, with a few
associates as fanatical as himself, used to meet, with all the gravity
of political importance, to settle an equal government by rotation; and
Milton, kicking when he could strike no longer, was foolish enough
to publish, a few weeks before the restoration, notes upon a sermon
preached by one Griffiths, entitled, the Fear of God and the King.
To these notes an answer was written by L'Estrange, in a pamphlet,
petulantly called, No Blind Guides.

But whatever Milton could write, or men of greater activity could do,
the king was now about to be restored with the irresistible approbation
of the people. He was, therefore, no longer secretary, and was,
consequently, obliged to quit the house which he held by his office;
and, proportioning his sense of danger to his opinion of the importance
of his writings, thought it convenient to seek some shelter, and hid
himself, for a time, in Bartholomew close, by West Smithfield.

I cannot but remark a kind of respect, perhaps unconsciously, paid to
this great man by his biographers: every house in which he resided is
historically mentioned, as if it were an injury to neglect naming any
place that he honoured by his presence.

The king, with lenity of which the world has had, perhaps, no other
example, declined to be the judge or avenger of his own or his father's
wrongs; and promised to admit into the act of oblivion all, except those
whom the parliament should except; and the parliament doomed none to
capital punishment, but the wretches who had immediately cooperated in
the murder of the king. Milton was certainly not one of them; he had
only justified what they had done.

This justification was, indeed, sufficiently offensive; and, June 16, an
order was issued to seize Milton's Defence, and Goodwin's Obstructers of
Justice, another book of the same tendency, and burn them by the common
hangman. The attorney-general was ordered to prosecute the authors; but
Milton was not seized, nor, perhaps, very diligently pursued.

Not long after, August 19, the flutter of innumerable bosoms was stilled
by an act, which the king, that his mercy might want no recommendation
of elegance, rather called an act of oblivion, than of grace. Goodwin
was named, with nineteen more, as incapacitated for any publick trust;
but of Milton there was no exception[43].

Of this tenderness shown to Milton, the curiosity of mankind has not
forborne to inquire the reason. Burnet thinks he was forgotten; but this
is another instance which may confirm Dalrymple's observation, who
says, "that whenever Burnet's narrations are examined, he appears to be
mistaken."

Forgotten he was not; for his prosecution was ordered; it must be,
therefore, by design that he was included in the general oblivion. He is
said to have had friends in the house, such as Marvel, Morrice, and
sir Thomas Clarges: and, undoubtedly, a man like him must have
had influence. A very particular story of his escape is told by
Richardson[44] in his Memoirs, which he received from Pope, as delivered
by Betterton, who might have heard it from Davenant. In the war between
the king and parliament, Davenant was made prisoner and condemned to
die; but was spared at the request of Milton. When the turn of success
brought Milton into the like danger, Davenant repayed the benefit by
appearing in his favour. Here is a reciprocation of generosity and
gratitude so pleasing, that the tale makes its own way to credit. But,
if help were wanted, I know not where to find it. The danger of Davenant
is certain, from his own relation; but of his escape there is no
account[45]. Betterton's narration can be traced no higher; it is
not known that he had it from Davenant. We are told that the benefit
exchanged was life for life; but it seems not certain that Milton's life
ever was in danger. Goodwin, who had committed the same kind of crime,
escaped with incapacitation; and, as exclusion from publick trust is a
punishment which the power of government can commonly inflict, without
the help of a particular law, it required no great interest to exempt
Milton from a censure little more than verbal. Something may be
reasonably ascribed to veneration and compassion; to veneration of his
abilities, and compassion for his distresses, which made it fit to
forgive his malice for his learning. He was now poor and blind; and who
would pursue with violence an illustrious enemy, depressed by fortune,
and disarmed by nature[46]?

The publication of the act of oblivion put him in the same condition
with his fellow subjects. He was, however, upon some pretence, not now
known, in the custody of the serjeant, in December; and when he was
released, upon his refusal of the fees demanded, he and the serjeant
were called before the house. He was now safe within the shade of
oblivion, and knew himself to be as much out of the power of a griping
officer, as any other man. How the question was determined is not known.
Milton would hardly have contended, but that he knew himself to have
right on his side.

He then removed to Jewin street, near Aldersgate street; and being
blind, and by no means wealthy, wanted a domestick companion and
attendant; and, therefore, by the recommendation of Dr. Paget, married
Elizabeth Minshul, of a gentleman's family in Cheshire, probably without
a fortune. All his wives were virgins; for he has declared that he
thought it gross and indelicate to be a second husband: upon what
other principles his choice was made cannot now be known; but marriage
afforded not much of his happiness. The first wife left him in disgust,
and was brought back only by terrour; the second, indeed, seems to have
been more a favourite, but her life was short. The third, as Philips
relates, oppressed his children in his lifetime, and cheated them at his
death.

Soon after his marriage, according to an obscure story, he was offered
the continuance of his employment, and, being pressed by his wife to
accept it, answered: "You, like other women, want to ride in your coach;
my wish is to live and die an honest man." If he considered the Latin
secretary as exercising any of the powers of government, he that had
shared authority, either with the parliament or Cromwell, might have
forborne to talk very loudly of his honesty; and, if he thought the
office purely ministerial, he certainly might have honestly retained
it under the king. But this tale has too little evidence to deserve a
disquisition; large offers and sturdy rejections are among the most
common topicks of falsehood.

He had so much either of prudence or gratitude, that he forbore to
disturb the new settlement with any of his political or ecclesiastical
opinions, and, from this time, devoted himself to poetry and literature.
Of his zeal for learning, in all its parts, he gave a proof by
publishing, the next year, 1661, Accidence commenced Grammar; a little
book, which has nothing remarkable, but that its author, who had been
lately defending the supreme powers of his country, and was then writing
Paradise Lost, could descend from his elevation to rescue children from
the perplexity of grammatical confusion, and the trouble of lessons
unnecessarily repeated[47].

About this time Elwood, the quaker, being recommended to him, as one who
would read Latin to him for the advantage of his conversation, attended
him every afternoon, except on Sundays. Milton, who, in his letter to
Hartlib, had declared, that "to read Latin with an English mouth is as
ill a hearing as law French," required that Elwood should learn and
practise the Italian pronunciation, which, he said, was necessary, if he
would talk with foreigners. This seems to have been a task troublesome
without use. There is little reason for preferring the Italian
pronunciation to our own, except that it is more general; and to teach
it to an Englishman is only to make him a foreigner at home. He who
travels, if he speaks Latin, may so soon learn the sounds which every
native gives it, that he need make no provision before his journey; and
if strangers visit us, it is their business to practise such conformity
to our modes as they expect from us in their own countries. Elwood
complied with the directions, and improved himself by his attendance;
for he relates, that Milton, having a curious ear, knew, by his voice,
when he read what he did not understand, and would stop him, and "open
the most difficult passages."

In a short time he took a house in the Artillery walk, leading to
Bunhill fields; the mention of which concludes the register of Milton's
removals and habitations. He lived longer in this place than in any
other.

He was now busied by Paradise Lost. Whence he drew the original design
has been variously conjectured, by men who cannot bear to think
themselves ignorant of that which, at last, neither diligence nor
sagacity can discover. Some find the hint in an Italian tragedy.
Voltaire tells a wild and unauthorized story of a farce seen by Milton,
in Italy, which opened thus: "Let the rainbow be the fiddlestick of
the fiddle of heaven[48]." It has been already shown, that the first
conception was of a tragedy or mystery, not of a narrative, but a
dramatick work, which he is supposed to have begun to reduce to its
present form about the time (1655) when he finished his dispute with the
defenders of the king.

He, long before, had promised to adorn his native country by some great
performance, while he had yet, perhaps, no settled design, and was
stimulated only by such expectations as naturally arose from the survey
of his attainments, and the consciousness of his powers. What he should
undertake, it was difficult to determine. He was "long choosing, and
began late."

While he was obliged to divide his time between his private studies and
affairs of state, his poetical labour must have been often interrupted;
and, perhaps, he did little more in that busy time than construct the
narrative, adjust the episodes, proportion the parts, accumulate images
and sentiments, and treasure in his memory, or preserve in writing, such
hints as books or meditation would supply. Nothing particular is known
of his intellectual operations while he was a statesman; for, having
every help and accommodation at hand, he had no need of uncommon
expedients.

Being driven from all publick stations, he is yet too great not to be
traced by curiosity to his retirement; where he has been found, by Mr.
Richardson, the fondest of his admirers, sitting "before his door in a
grey coat of coarse cloth, in warm sultry weather, to enjoy the fresh
air; and so, as well as in his own room, receiving the visits of the
people of distinguished parts, as well as quality." His visiters of
high quality must now be imagined to be few; but men of parts might
reasonably court the conversation of a man so generally illustrious,
that foreigners are reported, by Wood, to have visited the house in
Bread street, where he was born.

According to another account, he was seen in a small house, "neatly
enough dressed in black clothes, sitting in a room hung with rusty
green; pale but not cadaverous, with chalkstones in his hand. He said,
that, if it were not for the gout, his blindness would be tolerable."

In the intervals of his pain, being made unable to use the common
exercises, he used to swing in a chair, and sometimes played upon an
organ.

He was now confessedly and visibly employed upon his poem, of which the
progress might be noted by those with whom he was familiar; for he
was obliged, when he had composed as many lines as his memory would
conveniently retain, to employ some friend in writing them, having, at
least for part of the time, no regular attendant. This gave opportunity
to observations and reports.

Mr. Philips observes, that there was a very remarkable circumstance in
the composure of Paradise Lost, "which I have a particular reason," says
he, "to remember; for whereas I had the perusal of it from the very
beginning, for some years, as I went from time to time to visit him, in
parcels of ten, twenty, or thirty verses at a time, which, being written
by whatever hand came next, might possibly want correction, as to the
orthography and pointing; having, as the summer came on, not been showed
any for a considerable while, and desiring the reason thereof, was
answered, that his vein never happily flowed but from the autumnal
equinox to the vernal; and that whatever he attempted at other times was
never to his satisfaction, though he courted his fancy never so much; so
that, in all the years he was about this poem, he may be said to have
spent half his time therein."

Upon this relation Toland remarks, that in his opinion, Philips has
mistaken the time of the year; for Milton, in his elegies, declares,
that with the advance of the spring he feels the increase of his
poetical force, "redeunt in carmina vires." To this it is answered, that
Philips could hardly mistake time so well marked; and it may be added,
that Milton might find different times of the year favourable to
different parts of life. Mr. Richardson conceives it impossible that
"such a work should be suspended for six months, or for one. It may
go on faster or slower, but it must go on." By what necessity it must
continually go on, or why it might not be laid aside and resumed, it is
not easy to discover.

This dependance of the soul upon the seasons, those temporary and
periodical ebbs and flows of intellect, may, I suppose, justly be
derided, as the fumes of vain imagination: "Sapiens dominabitur astris."
The author that thinks himself weather-bound will find, with a little
help from hellebore, that he is only idle or exhausted. But while this
notion has possession of the head, it produces the inability which it
supposes. Our powers owe much of their energy to our hopes: "possunt
quia posse videutur." When success seems attainable, diligence is
enforced; but when it is admitted that the faculties are suppressed by a
cross wind, or a cloudy sky, the day is given up without resistance; for
who can contend with the course of nature?

From such prepossessions Milton seems not to have been free. There
prevailed, in his time, an opinion, that the world was in its decay, and
that we have had the misfortune to be produced in the decrepitude of
nature. It was suspected, that the whole creation languished, that
neither trees nor animals had the height or bulk of their predecessors,
and that every thing was daily sinking by gradual diminution[49]. Milton
appears to suspect that souls partake of the general degeneracy, and is
not without some fear that his book is to be written in "an age too
late" for heroick poesy[50].

Another opinion wanders about the world, and sometimes finds reception
among wise men; an opinion that restrains the operations of the mind to
particular regions, and supposes that a luckless mortal may be born in a
degree of latitude too high or too low for wisdom or for wit. From this
fancy, wild as it is, he had not wholly cleared his head, when he
feared lest the climate of his country might be too cold for flights of
imagination.

Into a mind already occupied by such fancies, another not more
reasonable might easily find its way. He that could fear lest his
genius had fallen upon too old a world, or too chill a climate, might
consistently magnify to himself the influence of the seasons, and
believe his faculties to be vigorous only half the year.

His submission to the seasons was, at least, more reasonable than his
dread of decaying nature, or a frigid zone; for general causes must
operate uniformly in a general abatement of mental power; if less could
be performed by the writer, less, likewise, would content the judges of
his work. Among this lagging race of frosty grovellers he might still
have risen into eminence, by producing something, which "they should not
willingly let die." However inferiour to the heroes who were born in
better ages, he might still be great among his contemporaries, with the
hope of growing every day greater in the dwindle of posterity. He
might still be a giant among the pygmies, the one-eyed monarch of the
blind[51].

Of his artifices of study, or particular hours of composition, we have
little account, and there was, perhaps, little to be told. Richardson,
who seems to have been very diligent in his inquiries, but discovers
always a wish to find Milton discriminated from other men, relates, that
"he would sometimes lie awake whole nights, but not a verse could he
make; and on a sudden his poetical faculty would rush upon him with an
impetus or oestrum, and his daughter was immediately called to secure
what came. At other times he would dictate, perhaps, forty lines in a
breath, and then reduce them to half the number."

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We do not know the women's names, but their voices are quite distinct. All are pregnant. But while the first woman awaits the birth of her baby with a moon-like serenity, the other two are not so lucky. One, whose previous pregnancies have failed to go to term, is experiencing a heartbreaking late miscarriage; the other is a young student whose accidental pregnancy will end in her child being put up for adoption.

Sylvia Plath's only play was never intended for the stage, being broadcast instead on BBC radio in August 1962. Less than six months later, Plath killed herself, but not before the burst of astonishing creative energy that produced her extraordinary, terrifying Ariel poems.

Anyone who knows Plath's poetry will see the connection between Three Women and Plath's subsequent poems, particularly in the way she talks about the agony of childbirth, the rush of love for this tiny alien being, and both the wonder and wounded rawness of motherhood. It is a beautiful piece, full of startling imagery that draws you in through the sheer intensity of its femaleness, and because it so precisely articulates the emotions that are often thought but seldom voiced by women - certainly not in the early 1960s - about men, motherhood and our relationship to our bodies.

It's been 20 years since there has been an attempt at a professional stage version and - in a theatre world that happily accepts the poetic offerings of Sarah Kane and Debbie Tucker Green, or the staged possibilities of The Waves, one of Plath's own inspirations for the piece, I see no reason why it shouldn't be brought to life. Sadly, it doesn't breathe here, in a production by Robert Shaw that is clearly a labour of love, but which never finds a way to give the internal a physical reality. Plath's poetry, like most babies, is more robust than it appears - and won't break if treated with a little less reverence and considerably more grit.

Instead, what we are offered is tinkling piano music, mournful mood lighting, an innocuous pale setting, as well as three perfectly good but indisputably ladylike performances that capture none of the wounded redness of Plath's poetry, and do her the disservice of making her sound bleached and somewhat prissy. It's a pity. What might have been a wonder ends up a mere curiosity.

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