ADDRESSED TO THE ILLUSTRIOUS ENGLISHMAN, MR. JOHN MILTON,
BY SIGNOR ANTONIO FRANCINI, GENTLEMAN OF FLORENCE
EXALT me, Clio, to the skies,
That I may form a starry crown
Beyond what Helicon supplies
In laureate garlands of renown:
To nobler worth be brighter glory given,
And to a heavenly mind a recompense from heaven.
Time's wasteful hunger cannot prey
On everlasting high desert,
Nor can oblivion steal away
Its record graven in the heart;
Lodge but an arrow, virtue, on the bow
That binds my lyre, and death shall be a vanquished foe.
In Ocean's blazing flood enshrined,
Whose vassal tide around her swells,
Albion, from other climes disjoined,
The prowess of the world excels;
She teems with heroes that to glory rise
With more than human force in our astonished eyes.
To virtue driven from other lands
Their bosoms yield a safe retreat;
Her law alone their deed commands,
Her smiles they feel divinely sweet.
Confirm this record, Milton, generous youth!
And by true virtue prove thy virtues' praise a truth.
Zeuxis, all energy and flame,
Set ardent forth in his career;
Urged to his task by Helen's fame
Resounding ever in his ear;
To make his image to her beauty true
From the collected fair each sovereign charm he drew.
The bee, with subtlest skill endued,
Thus toils to earn her precious juice
From all the flowery myriads strewed
O'er meadow and parterre profuse;
Confederate voices one sweet air compound,
And various chords consent in one harmonious sound.
An artist of celestial aim,
Thy genius, caught by moral grace,
With ardent emulation's flame
The steps of virtue toiled to trace,
Observed in every land who brightest shone,
And, blending all their best, made perfect good thy own.
From all in Florence born, or taught
Our country's sweetest accent there,
Whose works, with learned labour wrought,
Immortal honours justly share,
Thou hast such treasure drawn of purest ore,
That not even Tuscan bards can boast a richer store.
Babel confused, and with her towers
Unfinished spreading wide the plain,
Has served but to evince thy powers
With all her tongues confused in vain,
Since not alone thy England's purest phrase
But every polished realm's thy various speech displays.
The secret things of heaven and earth,
By nature, too reserved, concealed
From other minds of highest worth,
To thee are copiously revealed;
Thou knowest them clearly, and thy views attain
The utmost bounds prescribed to moral truth's domain.
Let time no more his wing display
And boast his ruinous career,
For virtue, rescued from his sway,
His injuries may cease to fear;
Since all events that claim remembrance find
A chronicle exact in thy capacious mind.
Give me, that I may praise thy song,
Thy lyre, by which alone I can,
Which, placing thee the stars among,
Already proves thee more than man;
And Thames shall seem Permessus, while his stream,
Graced with a swan like thee, shall be my favourite theme.
I who beside the Arno strain
To match thy merit with my lays,
Learn, after many an effort vain,
To admire thee rather than to praise,
And that by mute astonishment alone,
Not by the faltering tongue, thy worth may best be shown.
THE LATIN POEMS OF MILTON
At length, my friend, the far-sent letters come,
Charged with thy kindness, to their destined home;
They come, at length, from Deva's western side,
Where prone she seeks the salt Vergivian tide.
Trust me, my joy is great that thou shouldst be,
Though born of foreign race, yet born for me,
And that my sprightly friend, now free to roam,
Must seek again so soon his wonted home.
I well content, where Thames with refluent tide
My native city laves, meantime reside,
Nor zeal nor duty now my steps impel
To reedy Cam, and my forbidden cell,
Nor aught of pleasure in those fields have I,
That, to the musing bard, all shade deny.
'Tis time that I a pedant's threats disdain,
And fly from wrongs my soul will ne'er sustain.
If peaceful days, in lettered leisure spent
Beneath my father's roof, be banishment,
Then call me banished, I will ne'er refuse
A name expressive of the lot I choose.
I would that, exiled to the Pontic shore,
Rome's hapless bard had suffered nothing more;
He then had equalled even Homer's lays,
And Virgil! thou hadst won but second praise.
And here I woo the Muse, with no control;
And here my books-my life-absorb me whole.
Here too I visit, or to smile or weep,
The winding theatre's majestic sweep;
The grave or gay colloquial scene recruits
My spirits, spent in learning's long pursuits,
Whether some senior shrewd, or spendthrift heir,
Suitor, or soldier now unarmed, be there;
Or some coifed brooder o'er a ten years' cause
Thunder the Norman gibberish of the laws.
The lacquey there oft dupes the wary sire,
And artful speeds the enamoured son's desire.
There virgins oft, unconscious what they prove,
What love is know not, yet, unknowing, love.
Or if impassioned Tragedy wield high
The bloody sceptre, give her locks to fly
Wild as the winds, and roll her haggard eye,
I gaze, and grieve, still cherishing my grief.
At times even bitter tears yield sweet relief:
As when, from bliss untasted torn away,
Some youth dies, hapless, on his bridal day ;—–
Or when the ghost, sent back from shades below,
Fills the assassin's heart with vengeful woe,
When Troy, or Argos, the dire scene affords,
Or Creon's hall laments its guilty lords.
Nor always city-pent, or pent at home,
I dwell; but when spring calls me forth to roam,
Expatiate in our proud suburban shades
Of branching elm that never sun pervades.
Here many a virgin troop I may descry,
Like stars of mildest influence, gliding by.
Oh forms divine! Oh looks that might inspire
Even Jove himself, grown old, with young desire !
Oft have I gazed on gem-surpassing eyes,
Outsparkling every star that gilds the skies,
Necks whiter than the ivory arm bestowed
By Jove on Pelops, or the Milky Road!
Bright locks, Love's golden snare! these falling low,
Those playing wanton o'er the graceful brow!
Cheeks too, more winning sweet than after shower
Adonis turned to Flora's favourite flower!
Yield, heroines, yield, and ye who shared the embrace
Of Jupiter in ancient times, give place!
Give place, ye turbaned fair of Persia's coast!
And ye, not less renowned, Assyria's boast!
Submit, ye nymphs of Greece! ye, once the bloom
Of Ilion! and all ye of haughty Rome
Who swept, of old, her theatres with trains
Redundant, and still live in classic strains!
To British damsels beauty's palm is due;
Aliens! to follow them is fame for you.
O city, founded by Dardanian hands,
Whose towering front the circling realms commands,
Too blest abode! no loveliness we see
In all the earth but it abounds in thee.
The virgin multitude that daily meets,
Radiant with gold and beauty, in thy streets
Outnumbers all her train of starry fires
With which Diana gilds thy lofty spires.
Fame says that wafted hither by her doves,
With all her host of quiver-bearing loves,
Venus, preferring Paphian scenes no more,
Has fixed her empire on thy nobler shore.
But, lest the sightless boy inforce my stay,
I leave these happy walls while yet I may.
Immortal moly shall secure my heart
From all the sorcery of Circæan art,
And I will e'en repass Cam's reedy pools
To face once more the warfare of the schools.
Meanwhile accept this trifle ! rhymes though few,
Yet such as prove thy Friend's remembrance true!
ON THE DEATH OF THE UNIVERSITY BEDEL AT CAMBRIDGE
COMPOSED BY MILTON IN THE SEVENTEENTH YEAR OF HIS AGE
THEE, whose refulgent staff and summons clear
Minerva's flock long time was wont to obey,
Although thyself a herald famous here,
The last of heralds, Death, has snatched away.
He calls on all alike, nor even deigns
To spare the office that himself sustains.
Thy locks were whiter than the plumes displayed
By Leda's paramour in ancient time,
But thou wast worthy ne'er to have decayed,
Or Æson-like to know a second prime,
Worthy, for whom some goddess should have won
New life, oft kneeling to Apollo's son.
Commissioned to convene with hasty call
The gowned tribes, how graceful wouldst thou stand!
So stood Cyllenius erst in Priam's hall,
Wing-footed messenger of Jove's command;
And so Eurybates, when he addressed
To Peleus' son Atrides' proud behest.
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