For whatever reason, Milton said that it had come about that some
of the stories that seemed to be the oldest were in his day regarded as
fables; but that he did not intend to pass them over, because that
which one antiquary admitted as true history, another exploded as mere
fiction, and narratives that had been once called fables were afterward
found to "contain in them many footsteps and reliques of something
true," as what might be read in poets "of the flood and giants, little
believed, till undoubted witnesses taught us that all was not feigned."
For such reasons Milton determined to tell over the old stories, if for
no other purpose than that they might be of service to the poets and
romancers who knew how to use them judiciously. He said that he did not
intend even to stop to argue and debate disputed questions, but,
"imploring divine assistance," to relate, "with plain and lightsome
brevity," those things worth noting.
After all this preparation Milton began his history of England at the
Flood, hastily recounted the facts to the time of the great Trojan war,
and then said that he had arrived at a period when the narrative could
not be so hurriedly dispatched. He showed how the old historians had
gone back to Troy for the beginnings of the English race, and had
chosen a great-grandson of ?neas, named Brutus, as the one by whom it
should be attached to the right royal heroes of Homer's poem.
Pages:
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27