The poetical works of John Milton, with a memoir by J. Montgomery, Volume 1

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Page 118 - Now came still evening on, and twilight gray Had in her sober livery all things clad ; Silence accompanied ; for beast and bird, They to their grassy couch, these to their nests, Were slunk, all but the wakeful nightingale, She all night long her amorous descant sung...
Page 73 - Or sight of vernal bloom, or summer's rose, Or flocks, or herds, or human face divine ; But cloud instead, and everduring dark Surrounds me, from the cheerful ways of men Cut off, and for the book of knowledge fair Presented with a universal blank Of nature's works, to me expunged and rased, And wisdom at one entrance quite shut out.
Page 144 - These are thy glorious works, Parent of good, Almighty! thine this universal frame, Thus wondrous fair : thyself how wondrous then, Unspeakable ! who sitt'st above these heavens To us invisible, or dimly seen In these thy lowest works ; yet these declare Thy goodness beyond thought, and power divine.
Page xxiii - And yet anon repairs his drooping head, And tricks his beams, and with new-spangled ore Flames in the forehead of the morning sky: So Lycidas sunk low, but mounted high...
Page 71 - Eternal coeternal beam, May I express thee unblamed? since God is light, And never but in unapproached light Dwelt from eternity, dwelt then in thee, Bright effluence of bright essence increate ! Or hear'st thou rather, pure ethereal stream, Whose fountain who shall tell ? Before the sun, Before the heavens thou wert, and at the voice Of God, as with a mantle, didst invest The rising world of waters dark and deep, Won from the void and formless infinite.
Page 64 - O'er bog, or steep, through strait, rough, dense, or rare, With head, hands, wings, or feet, pursues his way, And swims, or sinks, or wades, or creeps, or flies.
Page xxv - Or the unseen genius of the wood. But let my due feet never fail To walk the Studious cloister's pale, And love the high embowed roof, With antique pillars massy proof, And storied windows richly dight, Casting a dim, religious light. There let the pealing organ blow To the full-voiced quire below, In service high and anthems clear, As may with sweetness, through mine ear, Dissolve me into ecstasies, And bring all heaven before mine eyes.
Page 119 - Unargued I obey : so God ordains ; God is thy law, thou mine : to know no more Is woman's happiest knowledge, and her praise.
Page 230 - Rather admire ; or, if they list to try Conjecture, he his fabric of the heavens Hath left to their disputes; perhaps to move His laughter at their quaint opinions wide Hereafter ; when they come to model heaven, And calculate the stars ; how they will wield The mighty frame ; how build, unbuild, contrive, To save appearances ; how gird the sphere With centric and eccentric scribbled o'er, Cycle and epicycle, orb in orb.
Page xvii - I know they are as lively, and as vigorously productive, as those fabulous dragon's teeth ; and being sown up and down, may chance to spring up armed men. And yet, on the other hand, unless wariness be used, as good almost kill a man as kill a good book. Who kills a man kills a reasonable creature, God's image ; but he who destroys a good book, kills reason itself, kills the image of God, as it were in the eye.

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