Note 4 — TAINES ENGLISH LITERATURE.[1]

M. Taine mildly states Milton’s obligations to Cædmon in saying, “One would think he must have had some knowledge of Cædmon from the translation of Junius.” It would be easy to show that some of Milton’s finest descriptions of the fallen angels are taken from Cædmon. Sir F. Palgrave says that there are in Cædmon passages so like the Paradise Lost that some of Milton’s lines read like an almost literal translation.