No Access From Highway!​

‘On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity.’

Johm Milton 1608-1674​

No Access From Highway!

​​One of my favorite poet's. Milton's ode is one of the earliest poems by John Milton (1608-1674), written while he was a 21-year-old at Christ’s College, Cambridge. Although Milton wrote this nativity ode in 1629, it was not published until 1645, when it appeared as the first poem in 1645 in the Poems of Mr John Milton.

Milton wrote at a time of religious flux and political upheaval. He is best known for his epic poem Paradise Lost, which earned him an international reputation in his own lifetime. William Hayley has called Milton the “greatest English author.” His poetry and his prose reflect deep convictions and they address religious and contemporary political issues, including censorship, religious freedom and divorce. Milton wrote this ode in December 1629, having celebrated his 21st birthday a few days earlier. Earlier that year, Milton had graduated BA at Cambridge, where he had been an undergraduate at Christ’s College, Cambridge.

Pill Bottle at base of post. 

At the time Milton wrote ‘On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity’ in Cambridge, his Puritan contemporaries were stepping up their opposition to the celebration of Christmas Day. But, with Christmas Day approaching in December 1629, and conscious of both his own birthday and his birth, Milton, who was still at Christ’s College, was moved to write this ode about Christ’s birth .

By the mid-1650s, Milton was blind, yet he married a second and a third time. At the restoration of the monarchy in 1660, he went into hiding. A warrant was issued for his arrest and his writings were burnt. He was arrested and jailed briefly, and subsequently lived out his days in London and in ‘Milton’s Cottage’ in Chalfont St Giles.

In his later years, he never went to any religious services and responded with sarcasm to accounts of sermons from Nonconformist chapels. He died in 1674 and was buried at Saint Giles in Cripplegate.

I will only provide a link to this poem if you want to use it. 

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44735/on-the-morning-of-christs-nativity