Poems by Milton: On Time; On Shakespear – Class 12 English Chapter 7 Notes & NCERT PDF

About the Poet: John Milton (1608–1674)

John Milton began writing poetry at the age of ten. After his formal education at Cambridge, he read almost everything available in Latin, Greek, Italian and English. He was appointed Latin Secretary, and he worked so hard that eyestrain from years of late-night reading made him totally blind at the age of forty-five. In the final years of his life he wrote — through dictation — Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained.

The chapter contains two poems: I. On Time and II. On Shakespear (1630).

Poem I: On Time — Meaning

Fly envious Time, till thou run out thy race,

Call on the lazy leaden-stepping hours,

Whose speed is but the heavy Plummets pace;

The poet addresses Time directly and challenges it: fly (run fast) until you finish your race. He calls Time envious — the note explains that in ancient mythology Cronos devoured each of his children at birth. The hours are lazy and leaden-stepping; their speed is only the heavy Plummets pace — a plummet is a lead weight whose slow movement drives a clock's ticking mechanism.

Let Time glut thy self with what thy womb devours — gorge on what it destroys. But what Time destroys is only what is false and vain, / And merely mortal dross (worthless earthly matter). So little is our loss, / So little is thy gain.

For when as each thing bad thou hast entomb'd,

And last of all, thy greedy self consum'd,

When Time has buried every bad thing and finally consumed itself, long Eternity will greet the blessed souls with an individual kiss. Joy shall overtake us as a flood, and everything sincerely good and divine — Truth, Peace and Love — will shine forever about the supreme Throne of God, t'whose happy-making sight alone the heaven-guided soul will climb.

Attir'd with Stars, we shall for ever sit,

Triumphing over Death, and Chance, and thee O Time.

Leaving this Earthy grossnes, dressed in stars, souls will sit forever, triumphing over Death, Chance and Time. The final winner in the race is the human soul in eternity, not Time.

Temporal vs eternal: the temporal is false, vain, mortal dross, earthy grossness; the eternal is Truth, Peace, Love, Joy, Eternity, the supreme Throne.

Poem II: On Shakespear (1630) — Meaning

What needs my Shakespear for his honour'd Bones,

The labour of an age in piled Stones,

Milton asks why Shakespeare should need a monument of piled stones, built over an age, or his hallow'd reliques (sacred remains) hidden under a Star-ypointing Pyramid (a pyramid pointing to the stars). He calls Shakespeare Dear son of memory, great heir of Fame and asks, What need'st thou such weak witness of thy name? — a stone monument is only a weak witness to his greatness.

Thou in our wonder and astonishment

Hast built thy self a live-long Monument.

Shakespeare has built his own lasting monument in the wonder and astonishment of readers. To the shame of slow endeavouring art (laboured writing), his easie numbers (verses) flow naturally, and every heart takes deep impression from his Delphic lines (inspired, prophetic lines — Delphi was the seat of Apollo's oracle) in his unvalu'd Book (priceless book).

Shakespeare's work so overwhelms our imagination (our fancy of it self bereaving) that it makes us Marble with too much conceaving — we are turned to stone by wonder. So he lies sepulcher'd in such pomp — buried in such splendour inside readers' hearts — That Kings for such a Tomb would wish to die.

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