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FLY envious Time, till thou run out thy race,Call on the lazy
leaden-stepping hours,Whose speed is but the heavy Plummets
pace;
nd glut thy sel! "ith "hat thy "omb devours,Which is no more
then "hat is !alse and vain, 5
nd meerly mortal dross;#o little is our loss,#o little is thy
gain$For "hen as each thing bad thou hast entomb%d,
nd last o! all, thy greedy sel! consum%d, 10Then long
&ternity shall greet our blissWith an individual 'iss;
nd (oy shall overta'e us as a !lood,When every thing that is
sincerely good
nd per!ectly divine, 15With Truth, and Peace, and Love shall
ever shine
bout the supreme Throne)! him, t%"hose happy-ma'ing sight
alone,When once our heav%nly-guided soul shall clime,Then all this
&arthy grosnes *uit, 20
ttir%d "ith #tars, "e shall !or ever sit,Triumphing over +eath,
and Chance, and thee ) Time$
This short poem, On Time ., "as "ritten by (ohn /ilton sometime
in the early 0123%s$ t the
margin o! the manuscript page that contains these verses, the
poet noted4 To be set on a cloc'
case.$$$ giving us a clue about the use he "as imagining !or
this composition$ 5ut more generally,
this poem is meant to be a consolation !or the passing o! Time
and a prevision o! !uture &ternity,
and it is dedicated to all human'ind$ )ur /ilton poem achieves
this e!!ect by setting out an
allegory o! Time$ 6ere he observes that its e!!orts to overcome
us, on one hand, and all ourconcerns about Time running too !ast on
the other "ill be useless in the end$ 6e argues, in !act, that
also Time must end, along "ith the things that 'eep him present,
that are human a!!airs and earthly
needs$
7n the verses !rom one to si8, /ilton sets the usual
personification o! Time as 9ronos or #aturn
using a regular !ree-verse scheme o! alternating rhymes$ 5eing
one o! the most !re*uented topoi o!
classical literature, he represents him as a "inged man,
devouring the many "orries "e bear in our
lives as a conse*uence o! our mortal dross.4 that o! Time % edax
rerum' is a !eature that goes bac' to
)vid, passing through Petrarch%s Triumpus Temporis .$ 6e is
accompanied by the 6ours, "hose
slo"ness strongly opposes the rushing nature o! their master$
Their slo" progression is emphasized
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through the similitude bet"een their pace and the one o! the
lead dragged do"n by gravity$ /ilton
addresses Time directly, e8horting, or rather allo"ing him to do
"hatever he li'es, since he can only
nourish himsel! "ith transitory things$
5ut, as he claims in the t"o !ollo"ing verses, its destruction
is not a great loss !or us, nor a great
gain !or him$ These t"o verses represent the e8position o! the
"riter%s main argument , and they arein !act mar'ed by a rapid
metric acceleration$
/ilton discuss his point o! vie" using a t"o!old narration,
describing the e8act moment in "hich
Time "ill end$ This is conducted through the anaphora o! the
adverbs %when... then %, and rein!orced
by the use o! % shall %, t"ice !or each instant$ From the metric
point o! vie" "e have no" rhyming
couplets$ The !irst instance is then dedicated to Time%s
gluttony4 once his hunger !or human
activities had consumed us, and he had e8hausted all o! the bad
things, then "e "ill be delivered by
pain through (oy and 'issed individually by &ternity$ The
second instance is rather a conse*uence o!the e8tinction o! every
temporal a!!ection$ &ternal things such as Truth, Love and
Peace "ill re-
emerge and gather around the throne o! :od educing melancholy
through beauti!ul sounds and visions is one o! the miraculous
po"ers o!
poetry$ /ilton tries to escape the clutches o! Time in the
speech and to diminish his importance, in
the mind o! his hearers, leaving us in a delivered, ecstatic
state o! mind$
