by Bert Williams
An octalingual linguist and translator; an intellectual both respected and loathed by his contemporaries; the Secretary for Foreign Tongues for the English Republic of the Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell, John Milton lived one of the most controversial and influential lives of 17th century Britain. He was also a poet thought by many to be the equal of William Shakespeare.
Born just over 400 years ago, on December 9, 1608, Milton was the contemporary of the American Puritan Roger Williams whom he tutored in Hebrew in exchange for lessons in Dutch. He was acquainted with French intellectual Hugo Grotius whom he met in Paris in 1638, and with the Florentine astronomer Galileo Galilei whom he also visited in 1638. At the time, the great astronomer was old and blind and under house arrest in Florence for his subversive belief that the earth was not the center of the universe.
Unconventional Student
Before Milton traveled to Europe, he had for years been a diligent student in many disciplines. Admitted to Christ’s College, Cambridge to study for ministry in 1625, he did not fit in easily. He was suspended for a time following a heated dispute with a tutor (the term for professors in that era). He eventually was readmitted, but was not satisfied with the curriculum and had a tumultuous relationship with fellow students. Finally graduating cum laude with a masters degree in 1632, he was not accepted by the Church of England into ministry—probably because of his publicly stated views against church hierarchy.
Returning to London, Milton moved in with his parents, and determined to pursue further education on his own terms. His father was a scrivener, a profession that combined the functions of contract lawyer, notary, financial advisor, and banker. As a result, the family was well off and easily able to support a son with a scholarly bent.
The years of study were not a time of ease and relaxation for Milton. He drove himself, studying both ancient and current works of theology, philosophy, history, politics, literature, and science. By the end of this six-year period, he had become fluent in Latin, Greek, Hebrew, French, Spanish, Italian, Dutch, and English. His self-directed course of study can be traced in his personal log book, which is preserved in the British Library.
It was in early 1638 that Milton embarked on a 15-month tour of France and Italy. He spent time in Calais, Paris, Nice, Genoa, Livorno, Pisa, Florence, Rome, and Naples. However, news of civil war in England caused him to return home in the summer of 1639.
Defender of the Republic
Following the parliamentary victory in the civil war, Milton used his literary powers to support the new Commonwealth, defending republican government in a tract titled The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates. His growing reputation brought him the appointment as Secretary for Foreign Tongues for the Cromwell Government in 1649.
In 1652, perhaps because of eye strain caused by years of scholarly study, perhaps because of the onset of glaucoma—or both—Milton became totally blind. He continued in his government role for several years after the onset of blindness. However, Oliver Cromwell died in 1658, throwing the English Republic into chaos as military and political factions feuded.
When King Charles II restored the monarchy in 1660, a warrant was issued for Milton’s arrest because of his previous outspoken political activism and pamphleteering. Some of his writings were publicly burned and he was at one point threatened with execution. However, he eventually received a pardon and settled into private life in London. Milton survived an outbreak of bubonic plague in 1664—which took the lives of 75,000 Londoners—and the Great Fire of London in 1666. It was also during this decade that he completed the work that, of all his accomplishments, had the greatest impact on the English-speaking world.
Something in Common with Samson
Milton’s most famous work—his crowning literary masterpiece—is titled “Paradise Lost.” The epic poem was composed between 1658 and 1664. It was first published in 1667, with Milton’s own later revisions published in 1671 and 1674. All eleven thousand lines—that’s right, the poem is eleven thousand lines long—were composed by Milton in his head. He usually worked on the composition during the night, then dictated to aides by day.
We will take a sampling of “Paradise Lost” in pages to follow, but first: a glance at a shorter poem, “Samson Agonistes,” which was published in 1668, four years after the initial publication of “Paradise Lost.”
In “Samson Agonistes,” Milton portrays the inner thoughts of the Biblical character Samson after Samson had been captured, imprisoned, and blinded by his Philistine enemies. Of particular interest is how Milton portrays Samson contemplating the sudden blindness that has befallen him:
O loss of sight, of thee I most complain!
Blind among enemies! O worse than chains,
Dungeon, or beggary, or decrepit age!
Light, the prime work of God, to me extinct,
And all her various objects of delight
Annulled, which might in part my grief have eased.
Inferior to the vilest now become
Of man or worm, the vilest here excel me:
They creep, yet see; I dark in light, exposed
To daily fraud, contempt, abuse, and wrong,
Within doors or without, still as a fool,
In power of others, never in my own—
Scarce half I seem to live, dead more than half.
O dark, dark, dark, amid the blaze of noon,
Irrecoverably dark, total eclipse
Without all hope of day!
Since Milton, himself, had been totally blind for more than 15 years when he wrote these lines, it seems he must have been placing some of his thoughts about blindness into the mind of Samson. But that is certainly not the whole story. Milton also said this: “It is not miserable to be blind; it is miserable to be incapable of enduring blindness.”
In the 17th century, blindness carried a much greater stigma in society than it does today. In that pre-enlightenment age, many viewed such a disability with superstition, suspecting it was a judgment from God. Now, in the 21st century, though many still ignorantly view people with disabilities as less than fully human, ever increasing numbers understand that people who are blind retain their other abilities, and many are able to be fully as productive as their sighted peers. Samson’s attitude in the poem—whether or not it was actually Milton’s personal view—certainly should not be considered valid today, but it provides a fascinating window through which to glimpse something of Milton’s own mind.
Most Productive Years
The undeniable reality of Milton’s life is that he was at his most productive during the years following his loss of sight. Who remembers Milton for his devotion to Oliver Cromwell’s cause? Almost no one. But who in the English-speaking world has not heard of “Milton’s Paradise Lost”?
Milton wrote “Paradise Lost” in the aftermath of Cromwell’s failed revolution, and the poem reflects his personal despair about the downfall of the mission to which he had devoted so much of his life. But though that experience lurks in the background, the poem was not an overtly political statement. Rather, it offers a vivid, detailed realization—mediated through Milton’s mind—of how Satan, his angels, and the first humans fell into temptation and sin. It also suggests, in embryonic form, God’s plan to rescue the human race. Milton later took on this story in great detail with “Paradise Regained.” Milton blends the trials of Job with Jesus’ temptations in the wilderness, and in “Paradise Regained” Satan fails.
Milton’s personal religious views evolved during the course of his life. In some of his writing he promoted Scottish Presbyterianism to replace the Episcopal hierarchy of the Church of England. Later, however, he came to realize that the Presbyterians could be just as doctrinaire and inflexible as the Anglicans. Ultimately he stuck to the Protestant view that Scripture and individual conscience must be the believer’s guide.
Milton was married three times. His marriage to his first wife, Mary Powell, took place in 1642. John was 34 and Mary was 17. The marriage was sometimes stormy, but it lasted 10 years. John and Mary had four children, and Mary died as a result of complications following the birth of the fourth. Two daughters from this marriage survived to adulthood. In 1656, Milton married Katherine Woodcock. They had been married less than two years when Katherine died while giving birth to a child who also died. In 1663, Milton was married a third time. He was 55. His bride, Elizabeth Minshull, was 24. This marriage apparently endured throughout the remainder of Milton’s life.
He lived his final years quietly and productively, publishing a number of tracts and books. Milton died of apparent kidney failure in November 1674, shortly after the publication of his final revision of “Paradise Lost.”
Read the next article in this series on John Milton, called Paradise Lost: Surveying John Milton’s Landscape, for a taste of Milton’s epic work.
