His prose satires "The Rehearsal Transprosed" and others (1672-1678) were inspired by that terror of a restoration of Catholicism, which flamed up in the cowardly ferocities of Titus Oates's "Popish Plot". Though a Catholic in sympathy, Charles II knew well that if he announced his change of religion he would be "sent off on his travels" again; and to travel he was not inclined. The satires of Marvell in verse "we still read," says Swift, who speaks of the author's "genius". It had none of the majesty of Dryden's nor of Pope's polish, and Marvell is best known for what is best in his poetry: "The Nymph complaining for her Fawn"; "The Garden," which has much of the merit of Milton's "L'Allegro" and "Il Penseroso"; "The Mower to the Glowworms," "Bermudas," "To His Coy Mistress," with its charming humour; and "The Definition of Love," which scarcely maintains the level of its first noble stanza. Such poems on divine subjects as "The Coronet" are reminiscent of Herbert, but less conceited, retaining Marvell's grace of flowers and gardens. Milton. John Milton, son of a "money-scrivener," was born in Bread Street, London, on 9 December, 1608. His father, though a Puritan, was in sympathy with literature, and his wealth permitted his son to devote himself, as long as he pleased, to studies of many kinds, and to train himself sedulously for the great poetic task which he deemed himself "born to do". Milton was thus one of the first of our strictly professional non-dramatic poets,--like Shelley, Tennyson, Browning, and Wordsworth[1]--who were able to devote themselves deliberately to the cultivation of their genius. Milton never wrote for his livelihood, and, except when he gave himself up to political and theological controversy, he was always preparing himself for the great poem which he was determined to make. He entered at St. Paul's School in 1620, and thence went to Christ's College, Cambridge, where his beauty and refined morals won for him the name of the Lady of Christ's. He put on his Master's gown in 1632, and then for six years resided at his father's place, Horton, in Buckinghamshire, the county of John Hampden. A man's best poems are usually written before he is 30. Milton was 21 when (1629) he produced the ode "On the Morning of Christ's Nativity". In this splendid and immortal piece he invokes, as always, "the heavenly Muse," and, in addition to the beautiful measure of the Hymn, in harmony rivalling Spenser's, he already strikes his own sonorous note, as in "The trumpet spoke not to the armed throng," a glorious combination and harmony of sounds. Here advance The helmed cherubim And sworded seraphim, who are, in "Paradise Lost," to make the floor of heaven Ring to the roar of an angel onset.