...wrincl'd skin of corruption to outlive these pangs and wax young again, entring the glorious waies of Truth and prosperous vertue destin'd to become...great and honourable in these latter ages. Methinks 1 see in my mind a noble and puissant Nation rousing herself like a strong man after sleep, and shaking...

...culminates in a simultaneous awakening of the godly nation and her revolutionary historian: "Methinks I 4* see in my mind a noble and puissant Nation rousing herself like a strong man after sleep, and shaking her invincible locks" (n, 557-8). Like Samson, and like Milton himself, the rejuvenated...

...Samuel Willard's conviction that "there are better times coming on," while Milton thought he saw in his mind "a noble and puissant nation rousing herself like a strong man after sleep."52 When the Puritans defined the purpose of various activities or institutions, they thought...

...more shall we endeavour to do God service." 113 And Milton, who in his ecstatic vision saw England as "a noble and puissant Nation rousing herself like a strong man after sleep, and shaking her invincible locks," or as "an Eagle muing her mighty youth, and kindling her...

...sight of England as a messiah-nation achieving the full promise of her religious and political destiny: Methinks I see in my mind a noble and puissant Nation...sleep, and shaking her invincible locks: Methinks 1 see her as an Eagle muing her mighty youth, and kindling her undazl'd eyes at the full midday beam;...

...revolutionary, antinomian England (the way "Milton gives manly form to the abstraction of a state: 'Methinks I see in my mind a noble and puissant nation rousing herself like a strong man after sleep and shaking her invincible locks (the laws): methinks I see her as an eagle muing her mighty...

...during the Napoleonic wars, Wordsworth made a determined bid to revive the Miltonic notion of England as a ' noble and puissant nation rousing herself like a strong man after sleep'. But the continuity he hoped to cement was already broken: Milton! thou shouldst be living at...

...entering into the truth of prosperous virtue, destined to become great and honourable in these later ages. Methinks I see in my mind a noble and puissant nation rousing herself like a strong man after sleep and shaking her invincible locks. Wheeler-Bennett claimed these words for Britain. "I am confident,"...

...draw into question this optimism. "Methinks I see in my mind," writes Milton in the first of these, "a noble and puissant Nation rousing herself like a strong man after sleep, and shaking her invincible locks" (II, 557-58). The strong man is usually taken to be the Bible's...

...for many revolutionaries the way in which man " grows up to a noble strength and perfection." 74 As a "noble and puissant Nation rousing herself like a strong man after sleep, and shaking her invincible locks," revolutionary England approached the ideal commonwealth that...