to gigantic dimensions, and veiled in mysteri- | their readers. They have nothing in common ous gloom. with those modern beggars for fame, who ex

The character of Milton was peculiarly distinguished by loftiness of spirit; that of Dante by intensity of feeling. In every line of the Divine Comedy we discern the asperity which is produced by pride struggling with misery. There is perhaps no work in the world so deeply and uniformly sorrowful. The melancholy of Dante was no fantastic caprice. It was not, as far as at this distance of time can be judged, the effect of external circumstances. It was from within. Neither love nor glory, neither the conflicts of earth nor the hope of heaven could dispel it. It turned every consolation and every pleasure into its own nature. It resembled that noxious Sardinian soil of which the intense bitterness is said to have been perceptible even in its honey. His mind was, in the noble language of the Hebrew poet, "a land of darkness as darkness itself, and where the light was as darkness.” The gloom of his characters discolors all the passions of men, and all the face of nature, and tinges with its own livid hue the flowers of Paradise and the glories of the eternal throne. All the portraits of him are singularly charac

Perhaps the gods and dæmons of Eschylus torts a pittance from the compassion of the may best bear a comparison with the angels inexperienced by exposing the nakedness and and devils of Milton. The style of the Athe- sores of their minds. Yet it would be difficult nian had, as we have remarked, something of to name two writers whose works have been the Oriental character; and the same peculi- more completely, though undesignedly, colarity may be traced in his mythology. It has ored by their personal feelings. nothing of the amenity and elegance which we generally find in the superstitions of Greece. All is rugged, barbaric, and colossal. The legends of Eschylus seem to harmonize less with the fragrant groves and graceful porticoes in which his countrymen paid their vows to the God of Light and Goddess of Desire, than with those huge and grotesque labyrinths of eternal granite in which Egypt enshrined her mystic Osiris, or in which Hindostan still bows down to her seven-headed idols. His favorite gods are those of the elder generation, the sons of heaven and earth, compared with whom Jupiter himself was a stripling and an upstart, the gigantic Titans, and the inexorable Furies. Foremost among his creations of this class stands Prometheus, half fiend, half redeemer, the friend of man, the sullen and implacable enemy of heaven. Prometheus bears undoubtedly a considerable resemblance to the Satan of Milton. In both we find the same impatience of control, the some ferocity, the same unconquerable pride. In both characters also are mingled, though in very different proportions, some kind and generous feelings. Prometheus, however, is hardly super-teristic. No person can look on the features, human enough. He talks too much of his chains and his uneasy posture: he is rather too much depressed and agitated. His resolution seems to depend on the knowledge which he possesses that he holds the fate of his torturer in his hands, and that the hour of his release will surely come. But Satan is a creature of another sphere. The might of his intellectual nature is victorious over the extremity of pain. Amidst agonies which cannot be conceived without horror, he deliberates, resolves, and even exults. Against the sword of Michael, against the thunder of Jehovah, against the flaming lake, and the marl burning with solid fire, against the prospect of an eternity of unintermitted misery, his spirit bears up unbroken, resting on its own innate energies, requiring no support from anything external, nor even from hope itself.

noble even to ruggedness, the dark furrows of the cheek, the haggard and woful stare of the eye, the sullen and contemptuous curve of the lip, and doubt that they belong to a man too proud and too sensitive to be happy.

Milton was, like Dante, a statesman and a lover; and, like Dante, he had been unfortunate in ambition and in love. He had survived his health and his sight, the comforts of his home, and the prosperity of his party. Of the great men by whom he had been distinguished at his entrance into life, some had been taken away from the evil to come; some had carried into foreign climates their unconquerable hatred of oppression; some were pining in dungeons; and some had poured forth their blood on scaffolds. Venal and licentious scribblers, with just sufficient talent to clothe the thoughts of a pandar in To return for a moment to the parallel the style of a bellman, were now the favorite which we have been attempting to draw be- writers of the Sovereign and of the public. tween Milton and Dante, we would add that It was a loathsome herd, which could be comthe poetry of these great men has in a con-pared to nothing so fitly as to the rabble of siderable degree taken its character from Comus, grotesque monsters, half bestial, half their moral qualities. They are not egotists. human, dropping with wine, bloated with They rarely obtrude their idiosyncrasies on gluttony, and reeling in obscene dances.

Amidst these that fair Muse was placed, like | victory, an expected attack upon the city, a the chaste lady of the Masque, lofty, spotless, momentary fit of depression or exultation, a and serene, to be chattered at, and pointed at, jest thrown out against one of his books, a and grinned at, by the whole rout of Satyrs dream which for a short time restored to and Goblins. If ever despondency and as him that beautiful face over which the grave perity could be excused in any man, they had closed forever, led him to musings, might have been excused in Milton. But the which, without effort, shaped themselves into strength of his mind overcame every calamity. verse. The unity of sentiment and severity Neither blindness, nor gout, nor age, nor of style which characterize these little pieces penury, nor domestic afflictions, nor political remind us of the Greek Anthology, or perdisappointments, nor abuse, nor proscription, haps still more of the Collects of the English nor neglect, had power to disturb his sedate Liturgy. The noble poem on the Massacres and majestic patience. His spirits do not of Piedmont is strictly a Collect in verse. seem to have been high, but they were singularly equable. His temper was serious, perhaps stern; but it was a temper which no sufferings could render sullen or fretful. Such as it was when, on the eve of great events, he returned from his travels, in the prime of health and manly beauty, loaded with literary distinctions, and glowing with patriotic hopes, such it continued to be when, after having experienced every calamity which is incident to our nature, old, poor, sightless and disgraced, he retired to his hovel to die.

The Sonnets are more or less striking according as the occasions which gave birth to them are more or less interesting. But they are, almost without exception, dignified by a sobriety and greatness of mind to which we know not where to look for a parallel. It would, indeed, be scarcely safe to draw any decided inferences as to the character of a writer from passages directly egotistical. But the qualities which we have ascribed to Milton, though perhaps most strongly marked in those parts of his works which treat of his personal feelings, are distinguishable in every page, and impart to all his writings, prose and poetry, English, Latin, and Italian, a strong family likeness.

Hence it was that, though he wrote the Paradise Lost at a time of life when images of beauty and tenderness are in general beginning to fade, even from those minds in which they have not been effaced by anxiety and His public conduct was such as was to be disappointment, he adorned it with all that is expected from a man of a spirit so high and most lovely and delightful in the physical and of an intellect so powerful. He lived at one in the moral world. Neither Theocritus nor of the most memorable eras in the history of Ariosto had a finer or a more healthful sense mankind, at the very crisis of the great conof the pleasantness of external objects, or flict between Oromasdes and Arimanes, libloved better to luxuriate amidst sunbeams erty and despotism, reason and prejudice. and flowers, the songs of nightingales, the That great battle was fought for no single juice of summer fruits, and the coolness of generation, for no single land. The destishady fountains. His conception of love nies of the human race were staked on unite all the voluptuousness of the Oriental the same cast with the freedom of the Engharem, and all the gallantry of the chivalric lish people. Then were first proclaimed tournament, with all the pure and quiet affec- those mighty principles which have since tion of an English fireside. His poetry re-worked their way into the depths of the minds us of the miracles of Alpine scenery. American forests, which have roused Greece Nooks and dells, beautiful as fairy land, are embosomed in its most rugged and gigantic elevations. The roses and myrtles bloom unchilled on the verge of the avalanche.

from the slavery and degradation of two thousand years, and which, from one end of Europe to the other, have kindled an unquenchable fire in the hearts of the oppressed, and loosed the knees of the oppressors with an unwonted fear.

Traces, indeed, of the peculiar character of Milton may be found in all his works; but it is most strongly displayed in the Sonnets. Of those principles, then struggling for Those remarkable poems have been under- their infant existence, Milton was the most valued by critics who have not understood devoted and eloquent literary champion. their nature. They have no epigrammatic We need not say how much we admire his point. There is none of the ingenuity of Filicaja in the thought, none of the hard and brilliant enamel of Petrarch in the style. They are simple but majestic records of the feelings of the poet; as little tricked out for the public eye as his diary would have been. A

public conduct. But we cannot disguise from ourselves that a large portion of his countrymen still think it unjustifiable. The civil war, indeed, has been more discussed, and is less understood, than any event in English history. The friends of liberty la

bored under the disadvantage of which the He was not, in name and profession, a Papist: lion in the fable complained so bitterly. we say in name and profession, because both Though they were the conquerors, their ene- Charles himself and his creature Laud, while mies were the painters. As a body, the they abjured the innocent badges of Popery, Roundheads had done their utmost to decry retained all its worst vices, a complete subjecand ruin literature; and literature was even tion of reason to authority, a weak preferwith them, as, in the long run, it always is ence of form to substance, a childish passion with its enemies. The best book on their for mummeries, an idolatrous veneration for side of the question is the charming narrative the priestly character, and, above all, a merof Mrs. Hutchinson. May's History of the ciless intolerance. This, however, we waive. Parliament is good; but it breaks off at the We will concede that Charles was a good most interesting crisis of the struggle. The Protestant; but we say that his Protestantism performance of Ludlow is foolish and violent: does not make the slightest distinction beand most of the later writers who have es-tween his case and that of James. poused the same cause, Oldmixon for in- The principles of the Revolution have often stance, and Catherine Macaulay, have, to been grossly misrepresented, and never more say the least, been more distinguished by than in the course of the present year. zeal than either by candor or by skill. On There is a certain class of men, who, while the other side are the most authoritative and they profess to hold in reverence the great the most popular historical works in our lan-names and great actions of former times, guage, that of Clarendon, and that of Hume. The former is not only ably written and full of valuable information, but has also an air of dignity and sincerity which makes even the prejudices and errors with which it abounds respectable. Hume, from whose fascinating narrative the great mass of the reading public are still contented to take their opinions, hated religion so much that he hated liberty for having been allied with religion, and has pleaded the cause of tyranny with the dexterity of an advocate while affecting the impartiality of a judge.

never look at them for any other purpose than in order to find in them some excuse for existing abuses. In every venerable precedent they pass by what is essential, and take only what is accidental: they keep out of sight what is beneficial, and hold up to public imitation all that is defective. If, in any part of any great example, there be anything unsound, these flesh flies detect it with an unerring instinct, and dart upon it with a ravenous delight. If some good end has been attained in spite of them, they feel, with their prototype, that

The public conduct of Milton must be ap- "Their labor must be to pervert that end, proved or condemned according as the resistAnd out of good still to find means of evil.” ance of the people to Charles the First shall To the blessings which England has derived appear to be justifiable or criminal. We from the Revolution these people are utterly shall therefore make no apology for dedicat-insensible. The expulsion of a tyrant, the ing a few pages to the discussion of that in- solemn recognition of popular rights, liberty. teresting and most important question. We security, toleration, all go for nothing with shall not argue it on general grounds. We them. One sect there was, which, from unshall not recur to those primary principles fortunate temporary causes, it was thought from which the claim of any government to necessary to keep under close restraint. One the obedience of its subjects is to be deduced. part of the empire there was so unhappily We are entitled to that vantage ground; but circumstanced, that at that time its misery we will relinquish it. We are, on this point, was necessary to our happiness, and its slavso confident of superiority, that we are not ery to our freedom. These are the parts of unwilling to imitate the ostentatious generos- the Revolution which the politicians of whom ity of those ancient knights, who vowed to we speak, love to contemplate, and, which joust without helmet or shield against all en- seem to them not indeed to vindicate, but in emies, and to give their antagonists the ad- some degree to palliate, the good which it has vantage of sun and wind. We will take the produced. Talk to them of Naples, of Spain, naked constitutional question. We confi- or of South America. They stand forth zealdently affirm, that every reason which can ots for the doctrine of Divine Right which be urged in favor of the Revolution of 1688 has now come back to us, like a thief from may be urged with at least equal force in fa- transportation, under the alias of Legitimacy. vor of what is called the Great Rebellion. But mention the miseries of Ireland. Then William is a hero. Then Somers and Shrews bury are great men. Then the Revolution is a glorious era. The very same persons

In one respect, only, we think, can the warmest admirers of Charles venture to say that he was a better sovereign than his son.

who, in this country, never omit an oppor- | fingers on a single article in the Declaration tunity of reviving every wretched Jacobite of Right, presented by the two Houses to slander respecting the Whigs of that period, William and Mary, which Charles is not achave no sooner crossed St. George's Channel | knowledged to have violated. He had, acthan they begin to fill their bumpers to the cording to the testimony of his own friends, glorious and immortal memory. They may usurped the functions of the legislature, truly boast that they look not at men, but at raised taxes without the consent of parliameasures. So that evil be done, they care ment, and quartered troops on the people in not who does it; the arbitrary Charles, or the the most illegal and vexatious manner. Not liberal William, Ferdinand the Catholic, or a single session of parliament had passed Frederic the Protestant. On such occasions without some unconstitutional attack on the their deadliest opponents may reckon upon | freedom of debate; the right of petition was their candid construction. The bold asser- grossly violated; arbitrary judgments, exortions of these people have of late impressed bitant fines, and unwarranted imprisonments a large portion of the public with an opinion were grievances of daily occurrence. If these that James the Second was expelled simply things do not justify resistance, the Revolubecause he was a Catholic, and that the Revo- tion was treason; if they do, the Great Rebelllution was essentially a Protestant Revolution. ion was laudable.

But this certainly was not the case; nor But, it is said, why not adopt milder meascan any person who has acquired more knowl-ures? Why, after the King had consented to edge of the history of those times than is to so many reforms, and renounced so many be found in Goldsmith's Abridgment believe oppressive prerogatives, did the parliament that, if James had held his own religious continue to rise in their demands at the risk opinions without wishing to make proselytes, of provoking a civil war? The ship-money or if, wishing even to make proselytes, he had been given up. The Star Chamber had had contented himself with exerting only his been abolished. Provision had been made for constitutional influence for that purpose, the the frequent convocation and secure deliberaPrince of Orange would ever have been in- tion of parliaments. Why not pursue an end vited over. Our ancestors, we suppose, knew confessedly good by peaceable and regular their own meaning; and, if we may believe means? We recur again to the analogy of the them, their hostility was primarily not to Revolution. Why was James driven from popery, but to tyranny. They did not drive the throne? Why was he not retained upon out a tyrant because he was a Catholic; but conditions? He too had offered to call a free they excluded Catholics from the crown, be- parliament and to submit to its decision all cause they thought them likely to be tyrants. the matters in dispute. Yet we are in the The ground on which they, in their famous habit of praising our forefathers, who preresolution, declared the throne vacant, was ferred a revolution, a disputed succession, a this," that James had broken the fundament-dynasty of strangers, twenty years of foreign al lavas of the kingdom." Every man, there- and intestine war, a standing army, and a fore, who approves of the Revolution of 1688 | national debt, to the rule, however restricted, must hold that the breach of fundamental of a tried and proved tyrant. The Long Parlaws on the part of the sovereign justifies liament acted on the same principle and is resistance. The question, then, is this: Had entitled to the same praise. They could not Charles the First broken the fundamental trust the King. He had no doubt passed salulaws of England? tary laws; but what assurance was there that he would not break them? He had renounced oppressive prerogatives; but where was the security that he would not resume them? The nation had to deal with a man whom no tie could bind, a man who made and broke promises with equal facility, a man whose honor had been a hundred times pawned, and never redeemed.

No person can answer in the negative, unless he refuses credit, not merely to all the accusations brought against Charles by his opponents, but to the narratives of the warmest Royalists, and to the confessions of the King himself. If there be any truth in any historian of any party who has related the events of that reign, the conduct of Charles, from his accession to the meeting of the Long Parliament, had been a continued course of oppression and treachery. Let those who applaud the Revolution, and condemn the Rebellion, mention one act of James the Second to which a parallel is not to be found in the history of his father. Let them lay their

Here, indeed, the Long Parliament stands on still stronger ground than the Convention of 1688. No action of James can be compared to the conduct of Charles with respect to the Petition of Right. The Lords and Commons present him with a bill in which the constitutional limits of his power are marked out.

He hesitates; he evades; at last he bargains | was accustomed to hear prayers at six o'clock to give his assent for five subsidies. The bill in the morning! It is to such considerations receives his solemn assent; the subsidies are as these, together with his Vandyke dress, his voted; but no sooner is the tyrant relieved, handsome face, and his peaked beard, that he than he returns at once to all the arbitrary owes, we verily believe, most of his popularity measures which he had bound himself to with the present generation. abandon, and violates all the clauses of the very Act which he had been paid to pass.

For ourselves, we own that we do not understand the common phrase, a good man, For more than ten years the people had but a bad king. We can as easily conceive a seen the rights which were theirs by a double good man and an unnatural father, or a good claim, by immemorial inheritance and by re-man and a treacherous friend. We cannot, cent purchase, infringed by the perfidious in estimating the character of an individual, king who had recognized them. At length leave out of our consideration his conduct in circumstances compelled Charles to sum- the most important of all human relations; mon another parliament: another chance was and if in that relation we find him to have given to our fathers: were they to throw it been selfish, cruel, and deceitful, we shall away as they had thrown away the former? take the liberty to call him a bad man, in Were they again to be cozened by le Roi le spite of all his temperance at table, and all veut? Were they again to advance their his regularity at chapel. money on pledges which had been forfeited over and over again? Were they to lay a second Petition of Right at the foot of the throne, to grant another lavish aid in exchange for another unmeaning ceremony, and then to take their departure, till, after ten years more of fraud and oppression, their prince should again require a supply, and fined. No act of oppression has ever been again repay it with a perjury? They were compelled to choose whether they would trust a tyrant or conquer him. We think that they chose wisely and nobly.

We cannot refrain from adding a few words respecting a topic on which the defenders of Charles are fond of dwelling. If, they say. he governed his people ill, he at least governed them after the example of his predecessors. If he violated their privileges, it was because those privileges had not been accurately de

imputed to him which has not a parallel in the annals of the Tudors. This point Hume has labored, with an art which is as discreditable in a historical work as it would be admirable in a forensic address. The answer is short, clear, and decisive. Charles had assented to the Petition of Right. He had renounced the oppressive powers said to have been exercised by his predecessors, and he had renounced them for money. He was not entitled to set up his antiquated claims against his own recent release.

The arguments are so obvious, that it may seem superfluous to dwell upon them. But those who have observed how much the events of that time are misrepresented and misunderstood will not blame us for stating the case simply. It is a case of which the simplest statement is the strongest.

The advocates of Charles, like the advocates of other malefactors against whom overwhelming evidence is produced, generally decline all controversy about the facts, and content themselves with calling testimony to character. He had so many private virtues! And had James the Second no private virtues? Was Oliver Cromwell, his bitterest enemies ⚫ themselves being judges, destitute of private virtues? And what, after all, are the virtues ascribed to Charles? A religious zeal, not more sincere than that of his son, and fully as weak and narrow-minded, and a few of the ordinary household decencies which half the tombstones in England claim for those who lie beneath them. A good father! A good The enemies of the Parliament, indeed, husband! Ample apologies indeed for fifteen rarely choose to take issue on the great points years of persecution, tyranny and falsehood! of the question. They content themselves We charge him with having broken his with exposing some of the crimes and follies coronation oath; and we are told that he kept to which public commotions necessarily give his marriage vow! We accuse him of having birth. They bewail the unmerited fate of given up his people to the merciless inflictions Strafford. They execrate the lawless violence of the most hot-headed and hard-hearted of of the army. They laugh at the Scriptural prelates; and the defence is, that he took his names of the preachers. Major-generals little son on his knee and kissed him! We fleecing their districts; soldiers revelling on censure him for having violated the articles the spoils of a ruined peasantry; upstarts, of the Petition of Right, after having, for enriched by the public plunder taking possesgood and valuable consideration, promised to sion of the hospitable firesides and hereditary observe them; and we are informed that he trees of the old gentry; boys smashing the