“Weep no more, woful Shepherds weep no more” : Milton’s Lycidas and the Moment of Moriens

The purpose of this study is to read John Milton’s pastoral elegy, Lycidas in light of the early modern belief in the moment of moriens. The moment of moriens, or the final moment before death was believed to determine of the salvation of one’s soul, a belief shared by Protestants and Catholics alike (Wunderli and Bruce, 259). Previous scholarship has identified Lycidas as an exercise of grief with parallels “in the ritual and ceremony of funeral,” (Wittreich, 68). This study will take that concept a step farther, demonstrating Lycidas to not only be a cathartic funeral ceremony, but an invocation of Lycidas’ moriens in an attempt to save his soul. We will discuss the particulars of Edward King’s relationship with Milton and the particulars of King’s death that Milton would have certainly known. We will look at the pastoral framework in relationship to the final moment of death, as well as key terms that point to the moriens in the text. Most importantly, we will examine the interruptions of Apollo, Camus and St. Peter as asseverating spirits vying for the soul of Lycidas.

When imagining Renaissance perceptions of the final moment of death, it is helpful, as Wunderli and Broce demonstrate, to think of Hamlet, III.3(260). Wunderli and Broce draw our attention to the moment when Hamlet is about to kill his uncle, yet decides against it given that it is “when he comes upon his uncle kneeling at prayer,” (259). Wunderli and Broce state the following about Hamlet’s decision and Shakespeare’s depiction of this moment:

 “Shakespeare was expressing a sixteenth-century leitmotif concerning death and the salvation that would have been well known to his audience: the ‘final moment’ before death, that is, the belief that one’s state of mind at the final instant of life eternally committed one’s soul to salvation or damnation.” (260)

The term “moriens” becomes synonymous for the final moment of death and for the “soul of the moriens [human being] when it floats out of his mouth at death,” (Wunderli and Broce, 261).  The moriens must fight for eternal salvation against the “deadly struggle of angels and demons” vying for the soul of the moriens in the moment of this “deathbed drama,” (Wunderli and Broce, 260). Wunderli and Broce trace the moment of moriens to popular woodcut prints and a “proliferation” of books in the “fifteenth and sixteenth century” that depict the “’art of dying,’” (260). There are accounts of the belief of the moment of moriens extending well into the seventeenth century, and certainly to the time when Milton wrote about the death of Edward King in Lycidas.[1]

Wunderli and Broce state that the final moment of death should be considered in two parts, the first the “mental attitude of moriens at the final moment of life, which determines his salvation or damnation,” and secondly, “the deathbed struggle between angels and devils vying for the soul of the deceased,” (262). According to Wunderli and Broce, “attempts to control the moriens’ final moment also were seen as a communal affair in which neighbors, lawyers, and family help him avoid the temptations of despair, vainglory, and infidelity,” (264). In essence, it was the duty of the friends of the dying to be at his or her bedside in the final moments of life, to help the friend’s moriens safely cross over into Heaven. Because of the moment of moriens’ emphasis on the temporal particulars of its surroundings, it is imperative we examine the particulars of King’s death through the facts that Milton would have known. It is this moment of death that Milton is depicting as his version of King, Lycidas fights for his soul’s final destination. Thus the “mental attitude” of King and his “deathbed struggle” become essential pieces in an interpretive analysis of Milton’s pastoral elegy.

Edward King’s interiority or state of mind is important to note when considering Lycidas and the final moment of death. It is important that we read the poem in the light of what Milton would have known about the particulars of King’s death, especially in their final moments.  There is some scholarly debate about the nature of Milton’s relationship with King and whether or not they were actually friends, as Milton claims in the headnote to the poem (Postlethwaite and Campbell, 80). However, it seems highly unlikely in the relatively small community of Christ’s College, Cambridge that Milton and King would have been unacquainted. Christ’s College was a family affair for the Kings, Edward having four brothers also admitted: John, Rodger, Henry and Adam (Postlewaithe and Campbell, 78). Furthermore, Rodger and Edward King were “assigned to William Chappell,” Milton’s former tutor, and were “admitted as lesser pensioners, as Milton had been the previous year,” (Postlewaithe and Campbell, 78). Postlewaithe and Campbell discuss the possibility that the King brothers may have held parts in “an undergraduate play” fragment at the end of Milton’s poem which he recited at Christ’s College, “At a Vacation Exercise,” (80). It is possible that King’s brothers or even Edward himself was involved in the production. However, we cannot know this with certainty. What we can know is that Milton knew Edward King, would have been familiar with his family, and would have likely been friends with some or all of them. In conclusion, there is simply no reason that we should not take Milton at his word in the headnote to Lycidas, in belief that Milton and King truly were friends.

As a friend to Edward King, Milton, with his Puritan leaning Christian beliefs, would have been deeply concerned with the fate of King’s soul after his death. Because the final moment of death determines the fate of the soul, Milton would have been very interested in the particulars of King’s death. These particulars find their way into Milton’s portrayal and invocation of King’s death in Lycidas. King’s journey was fraught with death at all turns, and Milton would have known this. King was likely travelling to Ireland to visit the grave of his father, Sir John King who had died on January 4, 1637 (Postlewaithe and Campbell, 81). Sir John King was buried at Boyle Abbey on March 30^th (Postlewaithe and Campbell, 81). King’s Dance Macabre was a pilgrimage to visit the grave of his father, a journey which would ironically, turn fatal for King himself. His pilgrimage had peril at every turn. Postlewaithe and Campbell document the dangers thusly:

“Traveling was always a hazardous business, and travel to Ireland particularly hazardous, as the usual perils of weather were compounded by piracy (in 1631, for example, 150 passengers and crew on a ship near the coast of North Wales had been abducted as slaves for North Africa) and the hostility of the residents of the North Wales coast, who were said to be more likely to rob than assist any survivors of shipwrecks. (81)

These are all facts that Milton would have been well aware of himself. Postlewaithe and Campbell add that, “On 30 July King prudently drafted a will, and two days later added a codicil,” (81). Franson details the dangers of sailing along the coast of North Wales, the passage between Chester and Dublin where King travelled, stating, “King’s depositing a will prior to his departure probably was a common practice among long-distance travelers, particularly those journeying through so hazardous a region,” (51). For this reason we can safely deduce that Milton would have been aware that King would have drafted a will before his journey and that Milton would have been aware of the dangerous stretch of coastline where King sailed. We know that King’s body was lost at sea and “never recovered,” a fact that Milton was aware of also (Postlewaithe and Campbell, 81).

There is more unknown than known about King’s journey and death. Franson reports that records of King’s journey are “shrouded in obscurity,” there being no substantial evidence to provide details of the ship’s passage (43).[2] It is Franson’s thinking that, “the anonymous Latin prose panegyric that opens the volume, entitled, ‘P.M.S.’” is an account of a possible shipwreck survivor (43). This is far too speculative given that we have no real way to decipher the information in “P.M.S” as factual or imaginative. The poems of William More and Issac Oliver apparently lent weight to the theory that there was a survivor. However, this theory seems to derive from their description of King kneeling in prayer “while other passengers panicked,” (Postlewaithe and Campbell, 81). Apparently, John Pullen’s poem also reports that King “died with a Bible in his hand,” (Postlewaithe and Campbell, 81). What these descriptions more likely reveal is that other poets were interested in depicting the moment of moriens, and like Milton, were invested in the idea that King died a Christian death. Though Franson has detailed an impressive recreation of King’s journey using modern technology, we should be hesitant to read Lycidas in light of all of Franson’s information. We cannot know with certainty how many of those details that Milton  actually knew. Beyond King’s route of travel and his probable destination based on this route, we should not assume that Milton knew anything else. Franson points to Coal Rock as the likely “hazard” that sunk King’s ship “two miles north-east Carmel Head,” (57). We can responsibly accept this as King’s point of death in relationship to the text of Lycidas. Franson states, “but victims in the water or floating on ballast would be carried east by the strong tidal stream farther and farther from land, and eventually into the north Channel to the Hebrides as Milton envisions happens to King’s body,” (57). For these reasons, we can see that Milton would have imagined King’s final moments before death as harrowing ones at best, ones surrounded by perilous waters and possibly entirely alone. However, death would have been a scenario King would have been somewhat prepared for, given the nature of his trepidatious sea voyage.

A framework of the pastoral allows Milton to skillfully imagine and import the details of King’s death into his poem, Lycidas. Furthermore, the application of the pastoral “grounded in scripture,” gives Milton the paradigm necessary to hold a ceremony for the death of Lycidas, a ceremony in which Lycidas’ moriens will be invoked from afar such that the swain may attempt to save his friend’s soul (Wittreich, 60). The funeral ceremony is held on land. However, Lycidas and King both die in water. Thus, Milton as poet-prophet must join land and water in his poem in order to bring the moriens to the place of his friend, the “uncouth swain,” (l.186). Through this land and water dichotomy or as Nohrnberg calls it, “marine/terrene,” Milton begins to construct a discourse about good and evil. There is good water in Lycidas, in the form of the “melodious tear” in line fourteen, and in “Fountain Arethuse,” and “Alpheus” in lines eighty-five and one-thirty-two. There is malignant water in Lycidas: the water under the “watery bear,” (l.12), the “rank mist,” (l.126), and the River “Camus,” (l.103). There are good pagan muses invoked, as the “Sisters of the sacred well,” (l.15). There are evil pagan gods vying for the soul of Lycidas: Apollo and Camus. There are good Christian saints helping Lycidas’ moriens to Heaven: the allusion to Christ (l.175), and the “Saints above,” (l.178). Antithetically, there are also evil Catholic demons vying for Lycidas’ moriens in the form of St. Peter, the “Pilot of the Galilean lake,” (l.109) bearing Catholic symbols in the form of “Keyes,” (l.110). This dichotomy of good and evil makes Lycidas a highly complex, and at times difficult poem to read. However, these complexities allow Milton to adequately demonstrate the complexities and confusions of the moment of moriens and the challenges in the final moments of death.

The pastoral framework also allows Milton to posit Christianity above other types of wisdom in Lycidas, thus enabling the swain to save the soul of his friend. Nohrnberg makes vital connections between the salvation of Christians in Christ, between the literal body and the spiritual (46-7). Nohrnberg also aptly details the juxtaposition of Catholic and Protestant beliefs surrounding death and their implications within the framework of Milton’s syncretic classical allusions. However, Nohrnberg’s account fails to discuss the moment of moriens and its application to both Protestant and Catholic sects. Milton aligns the “uncouth swain” and his shepherd friend, Lycidas with Christ the shepherd. As Milton Christianizes the pastoral form, he is able to invoke the moriens and as Wittreich writes, “the pastoral elegy becomes not only a lament for death, but the herald of a new life in paradise,” (66). It is in the pastoral framework that Milton is able to extrapolate the very best of each each genre within the genre, “assimilating to itself various lyric forms like elegy, canzone, and madrigal, and various dramatic perspectives  like tragedy, comedy, and satire, achieving dimensions that are epical and strains that are prophetic,” (Wittreich, 64). A framework this syncretic is needed to save the moriens of Lycidas from his violent and watery death, with Christ and the pastoral conventions superseding and subverting all others.

Key terms within the pastoral elegiac framework of Lycidas point to Milton’s demonstration of the moment of moriens. “More” is a word found repetitiously within the text of the poem to remind the reader of that the point of the “Dorick lay” is an invocation of the moriens (l.189). Consider the poem’s opening lines as the uncouth swain begins his funeral preparations, “Yet once more, O ye Laurels, and once more / Ye Myrtles brown, with Ivy never-sear,” (ll.1-2). These lines are echoed in stanza four’s, “Shall now no more be seen,” (l.43), stanza nine’s, “Stands ready to smite once, and smite no more,” (l.131), stanza eleven’s, “Weep no more, woful Shepherds weep no more,” (l.165), and “Now Lycidas the Shepherds weep no more,” (l.182). We may also consider the repetition of “mourn” (ll.26,41,187).  “Morning” is also found in line one-seventy-one as well. Certainly line one must allude to the death of Milton’s mother who also died in 1637, like King. The line perhaps also alludes to the death of King’s father who had also just died, as we have already noted. However, the punning on “more,” “mourning,” “morning” and moriens is the dominant motif presented, both in reading the words visually on the page and in the sounds they produce when read aloud or sung.

Repetition of “more” as a sound produced in all of these words is performative speech indicating that the uncouth swain is invoking the moriens through the sound of his song. If we consider line seventeen, the swain is aware of the fact that his song needs to travel quite a distance to reach Lycidas’ moriens, perhaps still out at sea at his place of death along the River Dee. As the swain invokes the “Sisters of the sacred well,” (l.15) he implores them to “Begin, and somwhat loudly sweep the string,” (l.17). The emphasis on “loudly” lets us know that the song must travel quite a distance. Also, if we take careful note of line twenty’s “my destin’d Urn,” we become aware of the fact that the song has a specific destination: the location of Lycidas’ moriens far away. A consideration of the multiple meanings of “urn” is also helpful as we examine its relationship to the moment of moriens. The most obvious definition for Milton’s usage here is the following, “An earthenware or metal vessel or vase of rounded or ovaloid form and with a circular vase, used by various peoples, esp. in former times (notably by the Romans and Greeks) to preserve the ashes of the dead,” (OED, “urn,” n.1). This definition makes sense in a stanza that begins by invoking classical muses. Another applicable and perhaps more helpful definition regarding the moriens is the following, “A vessel for holding voting-tablets, lots, or balls, in casting lots, voting, etc. Chiefly Roman History,” (OED, “urn,” n.2a). If we see Milton’s urn as a vessel where lots are cast for the moriens of Lycidas, the word takes on a double meaning. Furthermore, a third definition for “urn” is this: “in the urn, not yet discovered, unknown,” (OED, “urn,” n.2b). Not only is the urn a place for casting lots for the soul of the moriens, it is also a liminal space where the destination for the soul is undetermined at the opening of Milton’s lament.

The swain’s invocation of the moriens is interrupted by spirits, both good and evil vying for the soul of young Lycidas.[3] The swain begins the invocation by creating a mock-funeral ceremony for an absent friend. He collects the necessary funeral items from nature in stanza one’s depiction of the “Laurels,” “Myrtles,” and “Ivy,” (ll.1-2). In stanza two he invokes the muses “of the sacred well,” to sing, attending to all the things needed to begin the rites (l.15). In lines twenty-one and twenty-two, the swain asks the muses to catch Lycidas’ moriens and tell the moriens of his mission, “And as he [Lycidas’ moriens] passes turn, / And bid fair peace be to my sable shrowd.” This indicates that the uncouth swain is unsure if the moriens, possibly in distress will remember or recognize his friend. Stanza’s four and five demonstrate a remembering and repeating discipline for the funeral invocation, detailing the memories that the swain has of he and Lycidas as shepherds. The swain is, at this point, trying to get the moriens to remember who he really is and to recall their time together so that he can help usher his soul towards Christ.

We must remember that the moment of moriens involves the moriens as well, thus it is essential that the moriens also speaks and fights for his or her soul in the final moments of death. It is in stanza six that Lycidas as the moriens speaks, in the the exact center of the poem, stating, “Alas! What boots it with uncessant care / To tend the homely Shepherd’s trade,” (ll.64-5). In this stanza, we see Lycidas’ moriens in distress and in lament for a “thin spun life,” (l.76). Lycidas’ moriens is being tempted by the personified “Fame” which Milton describes as “(That last infirmity of Noble mind),” (ll.70-1). We must take careful note of the first person usage of “my” in line seventy-seven, as Milton writes of Apollo’s interruption, “But not the praise, / Phoebus repli’d, and touch’d my trembling ears;” (ll.76-7). It would be the ears of the moriens or of the dying body of Lycidas that Phoebus/Apollo would be interested in, not the ears of the uncouth swain, though perhaps the uncouth swain is hearing the discourse between the moriens and Apollo. However, it is the moriens of Lycidas that Apollo tempts with fame if he goes to the heaven of the pagan god, “all judging Jove,” (l.82). Stanza seven begins with the uncouth swain attempting to get the ceremony back on track towards Christianity as he invokes “Arethuse” to try to Christianize the pagan, and remind the moriens of the actual details of his death in the description of the “perfidious Bark,” (l.100).

The swain’s invocation of “Arethuse” works to banish Apollo. However, another interruption in the form of the personified river, “Camus” demonstrates another pagan god vying for the soul of Lycidas. The river Camus says in line one-hundred and seven, “Ah! Who hath reft (quoth he) my dearest pledge?” It is at this point that we know that the swain has successfully been able to retrieve the moriens from the water. Camus is upset that the swain has stolen the soul of the moriens from. A definition of “reft” is helpful here, “To take or carry away (a person, also occasionally a soul); spec. to carry off to heaven,” (OED, “reave,” verb, 5a). St. Peter as “The Pilot of the Galilean lake,” interrupts Camus and symbolizes the demonic “Wolf” that Milton saw as the Catholic church (ll.109,128). True to the syncretic form that Milton has constructed of pastoral elegiac, subverted epic and tragedy, Lycidas’ moriens must navigate the waters of pagan and demonic gods before arriving at unity with Christ. Stanza ten begins as the uncouth swain invokes “Alpehus,” the counterpart to “Arethuse” invoked in stanza seven to guide the moriens back towards Christ.[4] A powerful turn towards Christianity is seen at the end of stanza ten, “Look homeward, Angel now, and melt with ruth,” for Lycidas’ moriens is now appropriately guided towards the “guarded Mount” of St. Michael.[5]

Stanza eleven is a demonstration of Lycidas’ moriens effectively aligned with Christ and the saints in heaven. Recall the opening lines, “Weep no more, woful Shepherds, weep no more / for Lycidas your sorrow is not dead,” (ll.165-6). This is a direct reversal or inversion of stanza one’s “Yet once more, O ye Laurels, and once more,” (l.1), “For Lycidas is dead, dead ere his prime,” (l.8). The double death of Lycidas’ body and soul in line eight is reversed as he unites with Christ, “Through the might of him that walked the waves,” (l.173). Like the “day-star” or sun (pun on Christ, the Son of God), Lycidas’ moriens has risen and is now entertained by “all the Saints above,” (ll.168,178).

Stanza twelve where Milton as poet/prophet leaves us, demonstrates the need for faith.  The swain is “uncouth” and thus “uncertain,” (OED, “uncouth,” n.1a).[6]  Milton’s emphasis here demonstrates that the uncouth swain must trust in his faith of Christ that the invocation has been successful. Through the moment of moriens, we are able to see with greater clarity Milton’s invocation for Lycidas’ soul, his views of the death of his friend Edward King.  We are able to see Milton’s creative genius at work as he synthesizes the narrative for both King and Lycidas in their final moments of life and death within the context of the pastoral elegiac.

Notes

 [1] See Wunderli and Broce’s accounts of the final moments of death in relationship to seventeenth century executions and “dying speeches,” (270-4).

 [2] Franson reports the following: “Yet I have been unable to locate any reference to the disaster in correspondence by the elegists or by members of King’s immediate family, nor has the shipwreck been described by any chronicler of English sea disasters. We would expect the vessel to be noticed in the British Exchequer port books, but unfortunately, these records for the are of King’s embarkation, Chester and its outports, are missing for 1637. No inquiry appears to have been made into the disaster, nor has any new information surfaced, leaving King’s death as mysterious as Milton and others claim it was,” (43).

 [3] Though he does not write about the interruptions with specificity regarding the final moment of death, Nohrnberg’s commentary about the voices is helpful here: “The Muse in Apollo’s voice is the first of three patrons or patron saints called upon in Lycidas’ behalf to interrupt the singer’s ‘monody’ (Headnote, p.100) or to rescue Lycidas from death. The disruptions and the rhythm of repair of course suggest the subject’s shortened life might restart on another plane or under a different head,” (49). I would argue that the Muse is not in Apollo’s voice though, given that the Muse is being invoked for Christian purposes and Apollo is vying for the soul of Lycidas’ moriens for Jove.

[4] See The John Milton Reading Room notes on Arethuse and Alpheus: “Alpheus. Personification of a river in Greece and also the god who fell in love with Arethusa and pursued her until she was turned into a fountain. See Ovid’s Metamorphoses 5.865-875.” https://www.dartmouth.edu/~milton/reading_room/lycidas/text.shtml

[5] See The John Milton Reading Room. “[guarded Mount. Mount St. Michael’s, near Land’s End on the Cornish coast, across the Channel from Mont St. Michel. Milton imagines the patron saint of England looking out from here to guard England from overseas (Catholic) religion. Namancos is in Spain and Bayona a fortress near Cape Finisterre.” https://www.dartmouth.edu/~milton/reading_room/lycidas/text.shtml

[6] If we compare this use of “uncouth” to Milton’s usage in Paradise Lost there are marked similarities. See Paradise Lost “Book 10,” “Of horrible confusion, over which / By Sin and Death a broad way is now pav’d / To expedite your glorious march; but I / Toil’d out my uncouth passage, forc’t to ride / Th’ untractable Abysse…” See also The John Milton Reading Room note on “uncouth,” for these lines.

Works Cited

Franson, Karl J. “The Fatal Voyage of Edward King, Milton’s Lycidas.” Milton Studies,

            Vol. 25, 1989, pp. 43-67, Penn State UP, http://www.jstor.org/stable/26395611,

            Accessed 15 Nov. 2020.

Nohrnberg, James. “Milton’s Lycidas, or Edward King’s Two Bodies.” Immortality and The

            Body in the Age of Milton, edited by John Rumrich and Stephen M. Fallon,

            Cambridge UP, 2018, pp.39-59.

Oxford English Dictionary. Oxford UP, 2020, https://www.oed.com.  Accessed 15 Nov. 2020.

Postlethwaite, Norman, and Gordon Campbell. “Edward King, Milton’s ‘Lycidas’ : Poems

            and Documents.” Milton Quarterly, December, 1994, pp.77-84,  

https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1094-348X.1994.tb00830.x,  Accessed 15 Nov. 2020.

The John Milton Reading Room. The Trustees of Dartmouth College, 1997-2020,

https://www.dartmouth.edu/~milton/reading_room/contents/text.shtml.

            Accessed 15 Nov. 2020.

Wittreich, Joseph. “From Pastoral to Prophecy: The Genres of Lycidas.” Milton Studies XIII,

            edited by James D. Simmonds, Pittsburg UP, 1979, pp.59-80.  

Wunderli, Richard, and Gerald Broce. “The Final Moment before Death in Early Modern

            England.” The Sixteenth Century Journal, Vol. 20, No. 2, 1989, pp.259-75,

            https://www.jstor.org/stable/25400662, Accessed 15 Nov. 2020.

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