John Milton, born in London, spent six years after graduating from Cambridge at his father’s country home reading the classics and writing poetry. Ardent about morals and politics, he wrote progressive tracts on divorce and freedom of the press, as well as pamphlets in support of Oliver Cromwell during England’s Civil War. Milton wrote Paradise Lost, one of the greatest epic poems in English, after he had gone completely blind.
By John Milton
Methought I saw my late espoused saint
Brought to me, like Alcestis, from the grave,
Whom Jove's great son to her glad husband gave,
Rescu'd from death by force, though pale and faint.
Mine, as whom wash'd from spot of child-bed...
By John Milton
When I consider how my light is spent,
Ere half my days, in this dark world and wide,
And that one Talent which is death to hide
Lodged with me useless, though my Soul more bent
To serve therewith my...
By John Milton
What needs my Shakespeare for his honoured bones,
The labor of an age in pilèd stones,
Or that his hallowed relics should be hid
Under a star-ypointing pyramid?
Dear son of Memory, great heir of fame,
What need’st thou such weak witness of...
