The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1903-08-30

word or HIS purpose TO save. Inc IN
stances in Nova Solyma would seem, how
ever, to push this doctrine to its utmost
| limit. Cromwell and other noted char
acters of the period had those severe
trials, so graphically portrayed in the
last volume of Nova Solyma. Many illus
trious and pious people have had what
is called the Vision OF Adonai. In II
Penseroso. occurs this cOuplet.
dissolve me into ecstasies
And bring all Heaven before my eyes"
2. But it is not so much Milton the re-
lgious teacher and pamphleteer as Mil
ton the poet we need to consider with
greatest attention in examining a new
work which bears some if not most of his
positive ear-marks. l am one of these,
like the late Daniel r. Goodloe, of excel
lent repute here and in North Carolina,
who differ meekly but firmly, as men may
in America, with Matthew Arnold and
those continental critics who of late have
shown a disposition to depress the poetic
fame of Milton in order to elevate that
of Shakespeare and Dante. Neither Mr..
G. nor myself ever claimed any acumen
in literary criticism. l certainly would
II
to lift my pen against a dctum of such
a critic as DIR. Kingsbury. He, by the
way has a great admiration for Milton
and l think ranks him next to Shakes
peare. But l was surprised to find, even
after peruslng years ago his admirable
papers on the late Poet Laureate, that
he classed Tennyson among our poets af-
tel two or three of the very highest.
II e
opinions-of poets as we'll as others. My
own knowledge of prosody, Latin and
English, is dim with the distance from
may all-too short school days. As to the
technique of such apparently flowing and
noble productions as grace the poetIcal
parts of Nova Solyma l may not, dare
not, judge. Of their literary spirit and
beauty and power l claim with confidence
that they point to a Miltonic origin. Mil
ton is not the most original IN every
sense of English poets; he Is the most
Characteristic, however. On page 215 of
the End volume of Nova Solyma there is
a sublime canticle or slogan or whatever
you may term Engenius' Arch-angels
Call to the Dead, which makes the hair
stand on the head like the. fretful porcu-
pines quilts. Bodies at the
resurrection are called out from
the carcases of cannibals and
great fishes and other prodigious things
are recited as part of the mighty pro-
gram at the end of the world. Earlier in
the same volume there are some splendid
Mltonic images in Joseph's Hymn to the
Deity But the most splendid display of
poetic power is that in the 18th and last
chapter of the With and last book of the
romance. 1t is THE Bridal Song OF
Heavenly Love" This sponsal song of
Christ and his Church is equaled in
beauty only by the sponsal songs of
Spenser and by his rarely sweet and two
little talked about Hymn of Heavenly
Beauty. ALI of Edward Sponsors minor
poems, as his great epic or ballad, The
Faerie Queene, are nobly eminent in
English and indeed in modern literature;
but best of all like these songs or. as he
calls them, hymns The one l have
noted is perhaps the finest of all. BY
the way, / do not doubt that Spenser is
next to Milton the greatest English poet
not dramatist, and next to Shakespeare
and Milton the greatest English writer of
imaginative literature, Scott coming
fourth chiefly on account of his ro-
mances. In this Bridal Song in Nova
Solyma Milton or the Unknown has
caught from the Psalms and Solomons
Song, the glorious inspiration of the old
Hebrew Kings which the knowledge of
the fulfllment of prophecy enables the
modern poet to supplement in lines of
magnificent imagery and deepest pathos
and grandeur. l have read few finer
things. What a pity it was not original
ly written in English! 1 have left my
self space for only one extract from this
song:
where Night eternal reigns and cruel
grief;
Where fortunes fail not through amending
years.
My transcript of third and more pow
erful line was so bad l am unable in the
absence of the book itself to give the
reader the benefit of it. 1t is personid-
cation OF Horror. d favorite one of Mil
tons, who is said to beat his iron
wings These lines are on page 232 of
the second volume of the edition OF Nova
solyma (19O2). imported from England by
the Scribners.
3. 1t only remains to speak all too
briefly of a glorious pageant of the
Milton or the Unknown was an ardent
republican he was believer in the eff
feet on the people of solemn pomp,
rich and ornate dress and equlpage and
total of pageantry far-removed from
our American ideas OF democratic sim
plicity. The real democrats In those
times were Sir Henry Vane and Algernon
Sydney. Cromwell and Milton were not
democrats, not even republicans OF the
modern sort. They overthrow the mon
aTchy and set up the protecto-
rate Nevertheless they deserved
we'll of posterity. Without them there
would have been no glorious revolution
OF 'SS, no American independence. no
French republic, no constitutional mon
archy In England.
Nova Solyma teaches what the modern
advocates of the theory of authority as
the basis of government rather than COM
pact or consent, such writers as Sir Henry
Sumner Maine, for example. lay down as
a principle, that kingly power is to be
sought for in the patriarchal family life.
Sir Henry, it is true, relies more on the
DOtpsfaS of fhp RoTnans that