Linking verb with subject is sometimes a puzzling chore, as it is in reading Latin. His pronouns are often hard to track down to single antecedents. Perhaps, in some instances, ambiguity rather than clarity was the author’s intention. On the rhythmic side, many of the commas and semicolons that look superfluous by modern standards could well indicate the sound-patterns of his verse. But in poetry, as in good prose, sound-patterns are, above and beyond their inherent beauty, meaning-patterns. Countless works of literary criticism have demonstrated that sound effects in literary language contribute to meaning, and we see no reason to doubt these results. Milton, moreover, is widely judged to be a master of this aspect of literary craftsmanship.

Given these concerns, we have sought within a general framework of modernization to respect the punctuation schemes developed by Milton and his publishers. We remove a number of commas. Some are changed to semicolons and periods for the sake of readability. But in places where marking the rhythm seems paramount, we reproduce either closely or entirely the pointing of the early texts.

The addition of quotation marks at times restrains the growth of ambiguity in a reader’s mind, particularly in the case of “Lycidas,” where the various speeches reported in the course of the poem could be punctuated differently than they have been in our text of the poem. Some readers find these multiplying uncertainties both needless and overvalued. Some prefer being suspended in the free-form possibilities of the original pointing. But whatever benefits may stem from preserving this feature of Milton’s early texts are in our view outweighed by the crowning benefit of making this difficult author as readable as possible for modern students. Like all editions, ours is only a beginning. Old spelling texts with old-style punctuation are readily available, and should a reader become particularly fascinated with a specific passage or work, we strongly recommend that these versions be consulted.

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ENGLISH POEMS

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PSALM 114

The 1645 Poems informed its readers that “this and the following Psalm were done by the author at fifteen years old.” They could well have been school exercises, as is usually assumed, but Milton’s father’s combination of faith and musical skill expressed itself in a keen appreciation for the Psalter. Milton Sr. in fact contributed six settings to Thomas Ravenscroft’s The Whole Book of Psalms (1621). These translations are his son’s earliest surviving English compositions.

When the blest seed of Terah’s faithful son,1

After long toil their liberty had won,

And passed from Pharian fields to Canaan land,3

Led by the strength of the Almighty’s hand,

Jehovah’s wonders were in Israel shown,

His praise and glory was in Israel known.

That saw the troubled sea, and shivering fled,

And sought to hide his froth-becurlèd head

Low in the earth; Jordan’s clear streams recoil,

As a faint host that hath received the foil.10

The high, huge-bellied mountains skip like rams

Amongst their ewes, the little hills like lambs.

Why fled the ocean? And why skipped the mountains?

Why turnèd Jordan toward his crystal fountains?

Shake earth, and at the presence be aghast

Of him that ever was, and ay shall last,

That glassy floods from rugged rocks can crush,

And make soft rills from fiery flint-stones gush.

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Notes for PSALM 114

1. faithful son: Abraham.

3. Pharian: Egyptian.

10. foil: defeat.

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PSALM 136

Let us with a gladsome mind

Praise the Lord, for he is kind,

      For his mercies ay endure,

      Ever faithful, ever sure.

Let us blaze his name abroad,

For of gods he is the God;

      For, &c.

O let us his praises tell,

Who doth the wrathful tyrants quell.10

      For, &c.

Who with his miracles doth make

Amazèd heav’n and earth to shake.

      For, &c.

Who by his wisdom did create

The painted heav’ns so full of state.

      For, &c.

Who did the solid earth ordain

To rise above the wat’ry plain.

      For, &c.

Who by his all-commanding might,

Did fill the new-made world with light.

      For, &c.

And caused the golden-tressèd sun,

All the day long his course to run.

      For, &c.

The hornèd moon to shine by night,

Amongst her spangled sisters bright.

      For, &c.

He with his thunder-clasping hand,

Smote the first-born of Egypt land.

      For, &c.

And in despite of Pharaoh fell,

He brought from thence his Israel.

      For, &c.

The ruddy waves he cleft in twain,

Of the Erythraean main.46

      For, &c.

The floods stood still like walls of glass,

While the Hebrew bands did pass.

      For, &c.

But full soon they did devour

The tawny king with all his power.

      For, &c.

His chosen people he did bless

In the wasteful wilderness.

      For, &c.

In bloody battle he brought down

Kings of prowess and renown.

      For, &c.

He foiled bold Seon and his host,65

That ruled the Amorean coast.66

      For, &c.

And large-limbed Og he did subdue,69

With all his over-hardy crew.

      For, &c.

And to his servant Israel73

He gave their land therein to dwell.

      For, &c.

He hath with a piteous eye

Beheld us in our misery.

      For, &c.

And freed us from the slavery

Of the invading enemy.

      For, &c.

All living creatures he doth feed,

And with full hand supplies their need.

      For, &c.

Let us therefore warble forth

His mighty majesty and worth.

      For, &c.

That his mansion hath on high

Above the reach of mortal eye.

      For his mercies ay endure,

      Ever faithful, ever sure.

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Notes for PSALM 136

10. Who: 1673. 1645 has that here and in lines 13, 17, 21, and 25. In each case we follow 1673.

46. Erythraean: adjective from the Greek for “red,” applied by Herodotus 1.180; 2.8, 158 to the Red Sea.

65. Seon: Sihon, King of the Amorites (Num. 21.21–32).

66. Amorean: Amorite.

69. Og: giant King of Bashan, slain by Moses (Num. 21.33–35).

73. his servant Israel: Jacob.

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ON THE DEATH OF A FAIR INFANT DYING OF A COUGH

This work belongs to a group of English lyrics that first appeared in the 1673 Poems. Based on the testimony of Milton’s nephew Edward Phillips (Darbishire 1932, 62), the subject of the poem has generally been thought to have been Anne Phillips (b. January 1626 and d. January 1628), Milton’s niece, and the mother addressed in the last stanza his sister Anne Phillips. Carey argues against these identifications, primarily on the grounds that Milton was nineteen and could not have written the elegy, as he claims to have, Anno aetatis 17 (at the age of seventeen). The alternative is that Milton, whether unconsciously or not, backdated the poem (LeComte 7–8). Others of Carey’s arguments seem tendentious. He takes “Summer’s chief honor if thou hadst outlasted/Bleak Winter’s force that made thy blossom dry” to assert that the child did not outlive a single winter (and therefore could not have been little Anne Phillips, who lived two years), whereas in fact the lines declare that the child did not outlive the winter in which she contracted the cough “that made thy blossom dry,” and are therefore consistent with the Anne Phillips hypothesis.

In Stanza 5 the poem erupts with questions that always haunt tragic deaths. Why did God permit this infant to die? “Could Heav’n for pity thee so strictly doom?” These painful questions open up the large subject of theodicy, the justification of God’s ways to men, that will occupy the argumentative center of Paradise Lost.