Sonnet XVIII (Masterplots II: Poetry, Revised Edition)
The Poem
John Milton’s Sonnet XVIII—sometimes known as “On the Late Massacre in Piedmont”—was written against a background of religious dissent and persecution. While serving in Oliver Cromwell’s Council of State as its secretary of foreign tongues, Milton received preliminary news of trouble between the French Catholic Duke of Savoy and a small, isolated sect of Protestants who lived in the French Alps. These Protestants were known as the Waldensians or Vaudois and were thought to have preserved a simple scriptural faith from earlier times.
The Waldensians...
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