The poet Milton, according to this conception, has best expressed the nobility of the English mind, and in doing a work quite different from any of his peers has marked a sort of standard from which the ideal of English letters does not depart.
Two things are remarkable4 with regard to English literature, first that it came late into the field of European culture, and secondly5 that it has proved extraordinarily6 diversified7. The first point is [Pg 143]immaterial to my subject; the second is material to it; for it might be superficially imagined that such bewildering complexity8 and, as it were, lawless exuberance9 of method and of matter would never find a pole, nor ever be symbolised by but one aspect of it. Yet Milton has found that pole, and Milton's work has afforded that symbol.
In any one moment of English literary history you may contrast two wholly different masterpieces from the end of the Fourteenth to the end of the Eighteenth Centuries. After the first third of the Nineteenth, indeed, first-rate work falls into much more commonplace groove10, and it is perceptible that the best verse and the best prose written in English are narrowing in their vocabulary, and, in what is far more important, their way of looking at life. The newspapers have levelled the writers down as with a trowel; you have not side by side the coarse and the refined, the amazing and the steadfast11, the grotesque12 and the terrible; but in all those earlier centuries you had side by side manner and thought so varied13 that a remote posterity14 will wonder how such a wealth could have arisen upon so small an area of national soil. Piers15 Plowman and the Canterbury Tales are two worlds, and a third world separate from each is the world of those lovely lyrics16 which are now so nearly forgotten, but which the populace, spontaneously engendered17 and sang throughout the close of the Middle Ages. The Sixteenth Century was perhaps less modulated18, and flowed, especially[Pg 144] towards its end, in one simpler stream, but in the Seventeenth what a growth of variety from the Jacobean translation of the Bible to Swift. The very decade in which Paradise Lost was published corresponded with the first riot of the Restoration.
If we look closely into all this diversity we can find two common qualities which mark out all English work in a particular manner from the work of other nations. To qualities of this kind, which are like colours rather than like measurable things, it is difficult to give a title; I will hazard, however, these two words, "Adventure" and "Mystery." There is no English work of any period, especially is there no English work of any period later than the middle of the Sixteenth Century, which has not got in it all those emotions which proceed from the love of Adventure. How notable it is, for instance, that Landscape appears and reappears in every diverse form of English verse. Even in Shakespeare you have it now and then as vivid as a little snapshot, and it runs unceasingly through every current of the stream; it glows in Gray's Elegy19, and it is the binding20 element of In Memoriam. It saves the earlier work of Wordsworth, it permeates21 the large effect of Byron, and those two poems, which to-day no one reads, Thalaba and The Curse of Kehama, are alive with it. It is the very inspiration of Keats and of Coleridge. Now this hunger for Landscape and this vivid sense of it are but aspects of Adventure; for the men who thus feel and[Pg 145] speak are the men who, desiring to travel to unknown places, are in a mood for sudden revelations of sea and land. So a living poet has written—
When all the holy primal22 part of me
Arises up within me to salute23
The glorious vision of the earth and sea
That are the kindred of the destitute24....
The note of those four lines is the note of Landscape in English letters, and that note is the best proof and effect of Adventure. If any man is too poor to travel (though I cannot imagine any man so poor), or if he is constrained25 from travel by the unhappy necessities of a slavish life, he can always escape through the door of English letters. Let such a one read the third and fourth books of Paradise Lost before he falls asleep and he will find next morning that he has gone on a great journey. Milton by his perpetual and ecstatic delight in these visions of the world was the normal and the central example of an English poet.
As when far off at sea a fleet descri'd
Hangs in the clouds....
or, again,
.... Hesperus, that led
The Starry26 Host, rode brightest 'til the Moon,
Rising in cloudy majesty27, at length
Apparent Queen, unveiled....
He everywhere, and in a profusion28 that is, as it were, rebellious29 against his strict discipline of words, sees and expresses the picture of this world.
If Landscape be the best test of this quality of[Pg 146] adventure in English poets and the Milton as their standard, so the mystic character of English verse appears in them and in him. No period could be so formal as to stifle30 or even to hide this demand of English writers for Mystery and for emotions communicable only by an art allied31 to music. The passion is so strong that many ill-acquainted with foreign literature will deny such literature any poetic32 quality because they do not find in it the unmistakable thrill which the English reader demands of a poet as he demands it of a musician. As Landscape might be taken for the best test of Adventure, so of this appetite for the Mysterious the best measurable test is rhythm. Highly accentuated34 rhythm and emphasis are the marks and the concomitants of that spirit. As powerful a line as any in the language for suddenly evoking35 intense feeling by no perceptible artifice36 is that line in Lycidas—
Smooth-sliding Mincius, crowned with vocal37 reeds.
I confess I can never read that line but I remember a certain river of twenty years ago, nor does revisiting that stream and seeing it again with my eyes so powerfully recall what once it was to those who loved it as does this deathless line. It seems as though the magical power of the poet escaped the effect of time in a way that the senses cannot, and a man curious in such matters might find the existence of such gifts to be a proof of human immortality38. The pace at which Milton rides his verse,[Pg 147] the strong constraint39 within which he binds40 it, deeply accentuate33 this power of rhythm and the mystical effect it bears. Now you would say a trumpet41, now a chorus of human voices, now a flute42, now a single distant song. From the fortieth to the fifty-fifth line of the third book Paradise Lost has all the power and nature of a solemn chant; the large complaint in it is the complaint of an organ, and one may say indeed in this connection that only one thing is lacking in all the tones Milton commanded; he disdained44 intensity45 of grief as most artists will disdain43 intensity of terror. But whereas intensity of terror is no fit subject for man's pen, and has appealed only to the dirtier of our little modern fellows, intense grief has been from the very beginning thought a just subject for verse.
Τἡλε δ' ἁπὁ κρατὁς χἑε δἑσματα σιγαλὁεντα
Αμπυκα κεκρὑφαλὁν τ', ἡδἑ πλεκτἡν ἁναδἑσμην
Κρἡδεμνὁν Θ', δ ῥἁ οἱ δὡκε χρυσἑη 'Αφροδἱτη
Ηματι τὩ, ὁτε μιν κορυθαἱολος ἡγἁγεθ' Εκτωρ
'Εκ δὁμου 'Ηετἱωνος, ἑπεἱ πὁρε μυρἱα ἑδνα.
[Greek: Têle d' apo kratos chee desmata sigaloenta
Ampyka kekryphalon t', êde plektên anadesmên
Krêdemnon th', ho rha hoi dôke chryseê Aphroditê
Hêmati tôi, hote min korythaiolos êgageth' Hektôr
Ek domou Êetiônos, epei pore myria hedna.]
Milton will have none of it. It is the absence of that note which has made so many hesitate before the glorious achievement of Lycidas, and in this passage which I quote, where Milton comes nearest to the cry of sorrow, it is still no more than what I have called it, a solemn chant.
.... Thus with the year
Seasons return; but not to me returns
Day, or the sweet approach of Ev'n or Morn,
[Pg 148]Or sign of vernal bloom, or Summer's Rose,
Or flocks, or herds46, or human face divine;
But cloud instead, and ever-during dark
Surrounds me, from the chearful waies of men
Cut off, and, for the Book of knowledge fair,
Presented with a Universal blanc
Of Nature's works, to mee expung'd and ras'd,
And wisdome at one entrance quite shut out.
So much the rather thou, Celestial47 light,
Shine inward, and the mind through all her powers
Irradiate; there plant eyes, all mist from thence
Purge48 and disperse49, that I may see and tell
Of things invisible to mortal sight.
There is one other character in Milton wherein he stands not so much for English Letters as for a feature in English nature as a whole, which is a sort of standing50 apart of the individual. Where this may be good and where evil it is not for a short appreciation51 to discuss. It is profoundly national and nowhere will you see it more powerfully than in the verse of this man. Of his life we all know it to be true, but I say it appears even in his verse. There is a sort of noli me tangere in it all as though he desired but little friendship and was not broken by one broken love, and contemplated52 God and the fate of his own soul in a lonely manner; of all the things he drew the thing he could never draw was a collectivity.
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1
tribal
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| adj.部族的，种族的 | |
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2
fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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3
ambiguity
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| n.模棱两可；意义不明确 | |
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4
remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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5
secondly
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| adv.第二，其次 | |
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6
extraordinarily
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| adv.格外地；极端地 | |
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7
diversified
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| adj.多样化的，多种经营的v.使多样化，多样化( diversify的过去式和过去分词 )；进入新的商业领域 | |
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8
complexity
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| n.复杂(性)，复杂的事物 | |
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9
exuberance
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| n.丰富；繁荣 | |
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10
groove
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| n.沟，槽；凹线，（刻出的）线条，习惯 | |
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11
steadfast
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| adj.固定的，不变的，不动摇的；忠实的；坚贞不移的 | |
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12
grotesque
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| adj.怪诞的，丑陋的；n.怪诞的图案，怪人（物） | |
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13
varied
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| adj.多样的，多变化的 | |
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14
posterity
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| n.后裔，子孙，后代 | |
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15
piers
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| n.水上平台( pier的名词复数 )；（常设有娱乐场所的）突堤；柱子；墙墩 | |
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16
lyrics
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| n.歌词 | |
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17
engendered
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| v.产生（某形势或状况），造成，引起( engender的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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18
modulated
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| 已调整[制]的，被调的 | |
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19
elegy
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| n.哀歌，挽歌 | |
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20
binding
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| 有约束力的，有效的，应遵守的 | |
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21
permeates
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| 弥漫( permeate的第三人称单数 )； 遍布； 渗入； 渗透 | |
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22
primal
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| adj.原始的；最重要的 | |
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23
salute
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| vi.行礼，致意，问候，放礼炮；vt.向…致意，迎接，赞扬；n.招呼，敬礼，礼炮 | |
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24
destitute
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| adj.缺乏的；穷困的 | |
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25
constrained
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| adj.束缚的,节制的 | |
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26
starry
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| adj.星光照耀的, 闪亮的 | |
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27
majesty
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| n.雄伟，壮丽，庄严，威严；最高权威，王权 | |
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28
profusion
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| n.挥霍；丰富 | |
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29
rebellious
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| adj.造反的，反抗的，难控制的 | |
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30
stifle
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| vt.使窒息；闷死；扼杀；抑止，阻止 | |
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31
allied
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| adj.协约国的；同盟国的 | |
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32
poetic
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| adj.富有诗意的，有诗人气质的，善于抒情的 | |
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33
accentuate
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| v.着重，强调 | |
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34
accentuated
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| v.重读( accentuate的过去式和过去分词 )；使突出；使恶化；加重音符号于 | |
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35
evoking
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| 产生，引起，唤起( evoke的现在分词 ) | |
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36
artifice
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| n.妙计，高明的手段；狡诈，诡计 | |
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37
vocal
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| adj.直言不讳的；嗓音的；n.[pl.]声乐节目 | |
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38
immortality
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| n.不死，不朽 | |
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39
constraint
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| n.(on)约束，限制；限制(或约束)性的事物 | |
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40
binds
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| v.约束( bind的第三人称单数 )；装订；捆绑；（用长布条）缠绕 | |
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41
trumpet
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| n.喇叭，喇叭声；v.吹喇叭，吹嘘 | |
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42
flute
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| n.长笛；v.吹笛 | |
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43
disdain
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| n.鄙视，轻视；v.轻视，鄙视，不屑 | |
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44
disdained
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| 鄙视( disdain的过去式和过去分词 )； 不屑于做，不愿意做 | |
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45
intensity
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| n.强烈，剧烈；强度；烈度 | |
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46
herds
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| 兽群( herd的名词复数 )； 牧群； 人群； 群众 | |
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47
celestial
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| adj.天体的；天上的 | |
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48
purge
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| n.整肃，清除，泻药，净化；vt.净化，清除，摆脱；vi.清除，通便，腹泻，变得清洁 | |
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49
disperse
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| vi.使分散；使消失；vt.分散；驱散 | |
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50
standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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51
appreciation
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| n.评价；欣赏；感谢；领会，理解；价格上涨 | |
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52
contemplated
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| adj. 预期的 动词contemplate的过去分词形式 | |
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