Soon after the completion of Paradise Lost, Thomas Ellwood, a friend of Milton, asked one day after reading the Paradise manuscript, “But what hast thou to say of Paradise Found?” It was in response to this suggestion that Milton wrote the second part of the great epic, known to us as Paradise Regained.  The first tells how mankind, in the person of Adam, fell at the first temptation by Satan and became an outcast from Paradise and from divine grace; the second shows how mankind, in the person of Christ, withstands the tempter and is established once more in the divine favor.  Christ’s temptation in the wilderness is the theme, and Milton follows the account in the fourth chapter of Matthew’s gospel.  Though Paradise Regained was Milton’s favorite, and though it has many passages of noble thought and splendid imagery equal to the best of Paradise Lost, the poem as a whole falls below the level of the first, and is less interesting to read.

In Samson Agonistes Milton turns to a more vital and personal theme, and his genius transfigures the story of Samson, the mighty champion of Israel, now blind and scorned, working as a slave among the Philistines.  The poet’s aim was to present in English a pure tragedy, with all the passion and restraint which marked the old Greek dramas.  That he succeeded where others failed is due to two causes:  first, Milton himself suggests the hero of one of the Greek tragedies,—­his sorrow and affliction give to his noble nature that touch of melancholy and calm dignity which is in perfect keeping with his subject.  Second, Milton is telling his own story.  Like Samson he had struggled mightily against the enemies of his race; he had taken a wife from the Philistines and had paid the penalty; he was blind, alone, scorned by his vain and thoughtless masters.  To the essential action of the tragedy Milton could add, therefore, that touch of intense yet restrained personal feeling which carries more conviction than any argument. Samson is in many respects the most convincing of his works.  Entirely apart from the interest of its subject and treatment, one may obtain from it a better idea of what great tragedy was among the Greeks than from any other work in our language.

    Nothing is here for tears, nothing to wail
    Or knock the breast, no weakness, no contempt,
    Dispraise or blame,—­nothing but well and fair,
    And what may quiet us in a death so noble.

III.  PROSE WRITERS OF THE PURITAN PERIOD

JOHN BUNYAN (1628-1688)