demonian, disallied, disglorified, disordinate, dispatchful, displode, duelled, enterprise (v.), etherous, exulcerate, far-fet (P. R., II. 401), feastful, feverous, fledge (adj.), frore (frozen, P. L., II. 595), frounced, fuelled, giantship, glibbed, glister, gloze, gonfalon, guiding, grisamber, grunsel, gulphy, gurge (whirlpool, P. L., XII. 41), gymnic, hale (to haul, P. L., II. 596), haut (haughty, Psalm LXXX. 35), heroically, huddled, hutched, hyaline, idolism, idolist, illaudable, imbathe, immanacled, immedicable, imp (v. to mend), imparadised, impregn, inabstinence, increate, inly, innumerous, intelligential, interlunar, intervolved, jaculation, kerchieft, laver, limitary, lucent, madding (maddening), magnific, margent (margin), marish (marsh), meath (mead), meteorous, misdeem, misthought, moory, myrrhine, nard, natheless, nectarous, nocent, nulled, oary (P. L., VII. 460), obdured, omnific, oracle (v.), oraculous, overcloy, paranymph, petrific, plenipotent, pontifice (a bridge, P. L., X. 348), propense, ramp (v. to move or bound vehemently, P.L., IV. 343, and S. A. 139), rathe, ravin, rebeck, remediless, rined (adj. skinned, P. L., V. 342), robustious, sciential, scrannel (Lyc. 124), serenate (serenade), spet (spit, flood, Comus, 132), sphery, spume, statists, stubs, swage, surcease, swinked, tedded, terrene, tiar, tine (to kindle, P. L., X. 1075), trine, uncreate, unfumed, un-hidebound, unrazored, unvoyageable, unwithdrawing, vant-brass (S. A. 1121), villatic, volant, volúbil, yeanling. Here we have upwards of 150 words which are more or less out of common use now. A good many of them, however, have been used by recent poets; and there is no poet of the present day who would not use some of the others if they occurred to him, or who would not feel himself at liberty to invent similarly unusual words for himself. The indisputably obsolete words of the list are few; and of these some were, doubtless, inventions of Milton's ear for the moment, not intended to last.
II. SPELLING AND PRONUNCIATION.
Before we discuss this subject it will be proper to present to the reader's own eye (1) Some Specimens of the Spelling, &c., in the original printed editions of the Poems, and (2) Some Specimens of the preserved Manuscript Drafts of a considerable portion of them.
The following are passages from the Poems as they were printed in the original editions. For the orthography, &c., of the passages from the First edition of the Minor Poems (1645) Milton is directly responsible; but for all the rest he is only indirectly responsible, the care of the press having devolved, in consequence of his blindness, on the printers, or on such friends as could take his instructions.
From the First (1645) Edition of the Minor Poems.
SONNET II. (There numbered "VII.")
How soon hath Time the suttle theef of youth,
Stoln on his wing my three and twentith yeer!
My hasting dayes flie on with full career,
But my late spring no bud or blossom shew'th.
Perhaps my semblance might deceive the truth,
That I to manhood am arriv'd so near,
And inward ripenes doth much less appear,
That som more timely-happy spirits indu'th.
Yet be it less or more, or soon or slow,
It shall be still in strictest measure eev'n,
To that same lot, however mean, or high,
Toward which Time leads me, and the will of Heav'n;
All is, if I have grace to use it so,
As ever in my great task Masters eye.
This way the noise was, if mine ear be true,
My best guide now, me thought it was the sound
Of Riot, and ill manag'd Merriment,
Such as the jocond Flute, or gamesom Pipe
Stirs up among the loose unleter'd Hinds,
When for their teeming Flocks, and granges full
In wanton dance they praise the bounteous Pan,
And thank the gods amiss. I should be loath
To meet the rudenesse, and swill'd insolence
Of such late Wassailers; yet O where els
Shall I inform my unacquainted feet
In the blind mazes of this tangl'd Wood?
My Brothers when they saw me wearied out
With this long way, resolving here to lodge.
Under the spreading favour of these Pines,
Stept as they se'd to the next Thicket side
To bring me Berries, or such cooling fruit
As the kind hospitable Woods provide.
They left me then, when the gray-hooded Eev'n
Like a sad Votarist in Palmers weed
Rose from the hindmost wheels of Phobus wain.
But where they are, and why they came not back,
Is now the labour of my thoughts, 'tis likeliest
They had ingag'd their wandring steps too far,
And envious darknes, e're they could return,
Had stole them from me, els O theevish Night
Why shouldst thou, but for som fellonious end,
In thy dark lantern thus close up the Stars,
That nature hung in Heav'n, and fill'd their Lamps
With everlasting oil, to give due light
To the misled and lonely Travailer?
This is the place, as well as I may guess,
Whence eev'n now the tumult of loud Mirth
Was rife, and perfet in my list'ning ear,
Yet nought but single darknes do I find.
What might this be? A thousand fantasies
Begin to throng into my memory
Of calling shapes, and beckning shadows dire,
And airy tongues, that syllable mens names
On Sands, and Shoars, and desert Wildernesses.
These thoughts may startle well, but not astound
The vertuous mind, that ever walks attended
By a strong siding champion Conscience.
O welcom pure ey'd Faith, white-handed Hope,
Thou hovering Angel girt with golden wings,
And thou unblemish't form of Chastity,
I see ye visibly, and now beleeve
That he, the Supreme good, t'whom all things ill
Are but as slavish officers of vengeance,
Would send a glistring Guardian if need were
To keep my life and honour unassail'd.
Was I deceiv'd, or did a sable cloud
Turn forth her silver lining on the night?
I did not err, there does a sable cloud
Turn forth her silver lining on the night,
And casts a gleam over this tufted Grove.
I cannot hallow to my Brothers, but
Such noise as I can make to be heard farthest
Ile venter, for my new enliv'nd spirits
Prompt me; and they perhaps are not far off.
Sweet Echo, sweetest Nymph that liv'st unseen
Within thy airy shell
By slow Meander's margent green,
And in the violet-imbroider'd vale
Where the love-lorn Nightingale
Nightly to thee her sad Song mourneth well.
Canst thou not tell me of a gentle Pair
That likest thy Narcissus are?
O if thou have
Hid them in som flowry Cave,
Tell me but where
Sweet Queen of Parly, Daughter of the Sphear,
So maist thou be translated to the skies,
And give resounding grace to all Heav'ns Harmonies.
"LYCIDAS:" LINES 112-151.
He shook his Miter'd locks, and stern bespake,
How well could I have spar'd for thee young swain.
Anow of such as for their bellies sake,
Creep and intrude, and climb into the fold?
Of other care they little reck'ning make,
Then how to scramble at the shearers feast,
And shove away the worthy bidden guest.
Blind mouthes! that scarce themselves know how to hold
A Sheep-hook, or have learn'd ought els the least
That to the faithfull Herdmans art belongs!
What recks it them? What need they? They are sped;
And when they list, their lean and flashy songs
Grate on their scrannel Pipes of wretched straw,
The hungry Sheep look up, and are not fed,
But swoln with wind, and the rank mist they draw,
Rot inwardly, and foul contagion spread :
Besides what the grim Woolf with privy paw
Daily devours apace, and nothing sed,
But that two-handed engine at the door,
Stands ready to smite once, and smite no more.
Return Alpheus, the dread voice is past,
That shrunk thy streams; Return Sicilian Muse,
And call the Vales, and bid them hither cast
Their Bels, and Flourets of a thousand hues.
Ye valleys low where the milde whispers use,
Of shades and wanton winds, and gushing brooks,
On whose fresh lap the swart Star sparely looks,
Throw hither all your quaint enameld eyes,
'That on the green terf suck the honied showres,
And purple all the ground with vernal flowres.
Bring the rathe Primrose that forsaken dies.
The tufted Crow-toe, and Pale Gessamine,
The white Pink, and the Pansie freakt with jeat,
The glowing Violet.
The Musk-rose, and the well attir'd Woodbine,
With Cowslips wan that hang the pensive hed,
And every flower that sad embroidery wears :
Bid Amaranthus all his beauty shed,
And Daffadillies fill their cups with tears,
To strew the Laureat Herse where Lycid lies.
From the First (1667) Edition of "Paradise Lost."
BOOK I. LINES 1-74.
Of Mans First Disobedience, and the Fruit
Of that Forbidden Tree, whose mortal tast
Brought Death into the World, and all our woe,
With loss of Eden, till one greater Man
Restore us, and regain the blissful Seat,
Sing Heav'nly Muse, that on the secret top
Of Oreb, or of Sinai, didst inspire
That Shepherd, who first taught the chosen Seed,
In the Beginning how the Heav'ns and Earth
Rose out of Chaos: Or if Sion Hill
Delight thee more, and Siloa's Brook that flow'd
Fast by the Oracle of God; I thence
Invoke thy aid to my adventrous Song,
That with no middle flight intends to soar
Above th' Aonian Mount, while it pursues
Things unattempted yet in Prose or Rhime.
And chiefly Thou O Spirit, that dost prefer
Before all Temples th' upright heart and pure,
Instruct me, for Thou know'st; Thou from the first
Wast present, and with mighty wings outspread
Dove-like satst brooding on the vast Abyss
And mad'st it pregnant: What in me is dark
Illumine, what is low raise and support;
That to the highth of this great Argument
I may assert th' Eternal Providence, 1
And justifie the wayes of God to men.
Say first, for HEAV'N hides nothing from thy view
Nor the deep Tract of Hell, say first what cause
Mov'd our Grand Parents in that happy State,
Favour'd of Heav'n so highly, to fall off
From their Creator, and transgress his Will
For one restraint, Lords of the World besides ?
Who first seduc'd them to that fowl revolt?
Th' infernal Serpent; he it was, whose guile
1 Among the ERRATA prefixed to the volume is this direction: "Lib. I. Vers 25, for th' Eternal, Read Eternal."
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