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Nay,
more; partisanship becomes very warlike, and we are reminded in this
controversy of the Italian gentleman, who fought three duels in
maintaining that Ariosto was a better poet than Tasso: in the third he was
mortally wounded, and he confessed before dying that he had never read a
line of either. A similar logomachy has marked the course of Milton's
champions; words like sharp swords have been wielded by ignorance, and
have injured the poet's true fame.
He now stands before the world, not only as the greatest English poet,
except Shakspeare, but also as the most remarkable example and
illustration of the theory we have adopted, that literature is a very
vivid and permanent interpreter of contemporary history. To those who ask
for a philosophic summary of the age of Charles I. and Cromwell, the
answer may be justly given: "Study the works of John Milton, and you will
find it."


CHAPTER XX.
COWLEY, BUTLER, AND WALTON.

Cowley and Milton. Cowley's Life and Works. His Fame. Butler's Career.


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