Sonnet XI
by John Milton
English poet, also a historian, scholar and pamphleteer. His best known work is probably Paradise Lost (1667) which was followed by Paradise Regained and Samson Agonistes (1671). He is also well known for On the Morning of Christ's Nativity (1629), the twin poems L'Allegro and Il Penseroso (1631), Lycidas and the masque Comus (1637).
Sonnet XI
by John Milton
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On the Detraction which followed
upon My Writing Certain Treatises A book was writ of late called Tetrachordon,
And woven close, both matter, form, and style;
The subject new: it walked the town a while,
Numb'ring good intellects; now seldom pored on.
Cries the stall-reader, "Bless us! what a word on
A title-page is this!"; and some in file
Stand spelling false, while one might walk to Mile
End Green. Why, is it harder, Sirs, than Gordon,
Colkitto, or Macdonnel, or Galasp?
Those rugged names to our like mouths grow sleek,
That would have made Quintilian stare and gasp.
Thy age, like ours, O Soul of Sir John Cheek,
Hated not learning worse than toad or asp,
When thou taught'st Cambridge, and King Edward, Greek.
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