.. in
every nation, and are of power, beside the office of a pulpit, to
imbreed and cherish in a great people the seeds of virtue and
public civility, to allay the perturbation of the mind, and set the
affections in right tune; to celebrate in glorious and lofty hymns the
throne and equipage of God's almightiness, and what he works, and what
he suffers to be wrought with high providence in his church; to sing
victorious agonies of martyrs and saints, the deeds and triumphs of
just and pious nations, doing valiantly through faith against the
enemies of Christ; to deplore the general relapses of kingdoms and
states from justice and God's true worship."
* * * * *
So he had written in 1642, and this lofty faith in his calling
supported him twenty years later, in the arduous labour of his attempt
to realise his own ideal. In setting himself down to compose _Paradise
Lost_ and _Regained_, he regarded himself not as an author, but as a
medium, the mouthpiece of "that eternal Spirit who can enrich with
all utterance and all knowledge: Urania, heavenly muse," visits him
nightly,
And dictates to me Blumb'ring, or inspires
Easy my unpremeditated verse.
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