The Reason of Church-Government Urged against Prelaty
The Reason of Church-Government Urged against Prelaty is an essay by English poet
Background
Milton published The Reason for Church-Government Urged against Prelaty in January/February 1642. The tract was the fourth of his five antiprelatical tracts and was produced 6 months after Animadversions. The work is a response to an attack on his previous works which was titled Certain Briefe Treatises, Written by Diverse Learned Men, Concerning the Ancient and Moderne Government of the Church. Unlike Milton's previous three, he included his name upon the tract and he emphasised himself within the text.[1]
Tract
Milton begins his tract with a discussion on language. In particular, Milton discusses the form of truth and the nature of forms:[1]
if any visible shape can be given to divine things, the very visible shape and image of vertue, whereby she is not only seen in the regular gestures and motions of her heavenly paces as she walkes, but also makes the harmony of her voice audible to mortal eares.[2]
Milton emphasises the need for an open dialogue on these matters, and claims that
Milton attacks those who ignore
But let them chaunt while they will of prerogatives, we shall tell them of Scripture; of custom, we of Scripture; of Acts and Statutes, stil of Scripture, til the quick and the pearcing word enter to the dividing of their soules, & the mighty weaknes of the Gospel throw down the weak mightnes of mans reasoning.[5]
Milton believed that
In the preface of Book II, Milton gives many of his views about literature and genres:[10]
Time servs not now, and perhaps I might seem to profuse to give any certain account of what the mind at home in the spacious circuits of her musing hath liberty to propose to her self, though of highest hope, and hardest attempting, whether that Epick form whereof the two poems of
Pindarus and Callimachus are in most things worthy, some others in their frame judicious, in their matter most an end faulty: But those frequent songs throughout the law and prophets beyond all these, not in their divine argument alone, but in the very critical art of composition may be easily made appear over all the kinds of Lyrick poesy, to be incomparable.[11]
Themes
Milton's views on forms and the nature of truth and virtue were developed later in his Areopagitica.[1] Also, his views on poetry and art, contained within the preface of Book II, served as a basis for his later poetry.[12] Milton agreed with those like Philip Sidney and Ben Jonson that literature required an ethical function, but he believed that their views were corrupted by their support of traditional power structures.[13]
Notes
References
- Brown, Cedric. "The Legacy of the Late Jacobean Period" in A Companion to Milton. Ed. Thomas Corns. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2003.
- Guibbory, Achsah. "Milton and English Poetry" in A Companion to Milton. Ed. Thomas Corns. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2003.
- Keeble, N. H. "Milton and Puritanism" in A Companion to Milton. Ed. Thomas Corns. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2003.
- Lewalski, Barbara. "Genre" in A Companion to Milton. Ed. Thomas Corns. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2003.
- Milton, John. Complete Prose Works of John Milton Vol I ed. Don Wolfe. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1953.
- Schwartz, Regina. "Milton on the Bible" in A Companion to Milton. Ed. Thomas Corns. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2003.