MILTON, JOHN

1. On his anointed eyes, God set his seal
   And gave him blindness—and the inward light,
   That he, repining not at lack of sight,
   Might see as never man saw.—R. R. BOWKER, Milton
   

2. Milton's the prince of poets—so we say;
   A little heavy, but no less divine;
   An independent being in his day—
   Learn'd, pious, temperate in love and wine.—BYRON, Don Juan
   

3. Three Poets, in three distant Ages born,
   Greece, Italy, and England did adorn.
   The first in loftiness of thought surpass'd,
   The next in majesty, in both the last;
   The force of nature could no farther go;
   To make the third she join'd the former two.—DRYDEN
   

4. There are no mute, inglorious Miltons, save in the hallucinations of poets. The one sound test of a Milton is that he function like a Milton.—H. L. MENCKEN, Prejudices

5. By labour and intent study (which I take to be my portion in this life), joined with the strong propensity of nature, I might perhaps leave something so written to after times as they should not willingly let it die.—MILTON, The Reason of Church Government
   

6. That mighty orb of song,
   The divine Milton.—WORDSWORTH, The Excursion
   

7. Milton! thou shouldst be living at this hour:
   England hath need of thee.—WORDSWORTH, Sonnet
   

8. Thy soul was like a Star, and dwelt apart:
   Thou hadst a voice whose sound was like the sea:
   Pure as the naked heavens, majestic, free,
   So didst thou travel on life's common way,
   In cheerful godliness: and yet thy heart
   The lowliest duties on herself did lay.—WORDSWORTH, Sonnet