ABSTRACT
It would be a task worthy of a volume, and requiring that space in order to be creditably performed, to show how war affects literature, at what points they meet, where they are at variance, if any wars stimulate, and what kinds depress the intellectual life of nations. A different period culminated in the genius of John Milton, whose roots were in that golden age when England was flowering into popular freedom. He finally spoke for the true England, and expressed the vigorous thoughts which a bloody epoch cannot quench. The protesting ideas for which they fought drew fresh tenacity from the soil, wet with blood and tears, into which generous passion and resolution sank with every death. A war must be the last resort of truly noble and popular ideas, if it would do more than stimulate the intelligence of a few men, who write best with draughts of glory and success.
