No More Learning

FOOTNOTES:

[AB] The origin of "Paradise Regained" has been told
authentically. It was suggested in 1665 by Ellwood the Quaker, who
sometimes acted as Milton's amanuensis, and it was finished and shown
to Ellwood in 1666, though not published till 1671. Neither in majesty
of conception or in charm of style can it compare with "Paradise
Lost," to which it is, as has been said, a codicil and not a sequel.
The Temptation, the reader feels, was but an incident in the life of
Christ and in the drama of the "ways of God to man," which "Paradise
Lost" introduced with such stupendous imaginative power. Much of the
poem is but a somewhat ambling paraphrase and expansion of Scriptural
narratives; but there are passages where Milton resumes his perfect
mastery of poetic form, under the inspiration that places him among the
selectest band of immortal singers.




Samson Agonistes[AC]


_Persons in the Drama_

SAMSON
MANOA, _the father of Samson_
DALILA, _his wife_
HURAPHA, _of Gath_
PUBLIC OFFICER
MESSENGER
_Chorus of Danites_

_The scene is placed before the prison in Gaza_.


SAMSON: A little onward send thy guiding hand
To these dark steps, a little further on;
For yonder bank hath choice of sun or shade.
There I am wont to sit, when any chance
Relieves me from my task of servile toil.
Daily in the common prison else enjoined me,
Where I, a prisoner chained, scarce freely draw
The air, imprisoned also, close and damp,
Unwholesome draught. But here I feel amends
The breath of Heaven fresh blowing, pure and sweet,
With day-spring born; here leave me to respire.
This day a solemn feast the people hold
To Dagon, their sea-idol, and forbid
Laborious works. Hence, with leave
Retiring from the popular noise, I seek
This unfrequented place to find some ease--
Oh, wherefore was my birth from Heaven foretold
Twice by an angel, if I must die
Betrayed, captive, and both my eyes put out,
Made of my enemies the scorn and gaze?
O worse than chains,
Dungeon, or beggary, or decrepit age!
Light, the prime work of God, to me is extinct,
And all her various objects of delight
Annulled, which might in part my grief have eased.
O dark, dark, dark, amid the blaze of noon,
Irrevocably dark, total eclipse
Without all hope of day!
O first created beam, and thou great Word,
"Let there be light, and light was over all,"
Why am I thus bereaved thy prime decree?
The Sun to me is dark
And silent as the Moon,
When she deserts the night,
Hid in her vacant inter-lunar cave.

CHORUS: This, this is he; softly a while;
Let us not break in upon him.
O change beyond report, thought, or belief!
See how he lies at random, carelessly diffused,
With languished head unpropt,
As one past hope, abandoned.
Which shall I fast bewail--
Thy bondage or lost sight,
Prison within prison
Inseparably dark?
Thou art become (O worst imprisonment! )
The dungeon of thyself;
To lowest pitch of abject fortune thou are fallen.

SAMSON: I hear the sound of words; their sense the air
Dissolves unjointed ere it reach my ear.

CHORUS: He speaks; let us draw nigh. Matchless in might,
The glory late of Israel, now the grief!
We come, thy friends and neighbours not unknown,
From Eshtaol and Zora's fruitful vale,
To visit or bewail thee.

SAMSON: Your coming, friends, revives me.
Tell me, friends,
Am I not sung and proverbed for a fool
In every street?

CHORUS: Wisest men
Have erred, and by bad women been deceived;
And shall again, pretend they ne'er so wise.
In seeking just occasion to provoke
The Philistine, thy country's enemy,
Thou never wast remiss, I bear thee witness.