" His poems he wished laid up
in the Bodleian Library, "where the jabber of common people cannot
penetrate, and whence the base throng of readers keep aloof" (_Ode
to Rouse_). If Milton resembled a Roman republican in the severe and
stoic elevation of his character, he also shared the aristocratic
intellectualism of the classical type. He is in marked contrast to the
levelling hatred of excellence, the Christian trades-unionism of the
model Catholic of the mould of S. Francois de Sales whose maxim
of life is "marchons avec la troupe de nos freres et compagnons,
doucement, paisiblement, et amiablement." To Milton the people are--
But a herd confus'd,
A miscellaneous rabble, who extol
Things vulgar.
_Paradise Regained_, iii. 49.
At times his indignation carries him past the courtesies of
equal speech, to pour out the vials of prophetic rebuke, when he
contemplates the hopeless struggle of those who are the salt of the
earth, "amidst the throng and noises of vulgar and irrational men"
(_Tenure of Kings_), and he rates them to their face as "owls and
cuckoos, asses, apes, and dogs" (_Sonnet_ xii.
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