On the Morning of Christ's Nativity is a nativity ode written by John Milton

John Milton

John Milton was an English poet, polemicist, a scholarly man of letters, and a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England under Oliver Cromwell...

 in 1629 and published in his Poems of Mr. John Milton (1645)

Milton's 1645 Poems

Milton's 1645 Poems is a collection, divided into separate English and Latin sections, of the poet's youthful poetry in a variety of genres, including such notable works as An Ode on the Morning of Christ's Nativity, Comus, and Lycidas. Appearing in late 1645 or 1646 , the octavo volume, whose...

. The poem describes Christ's Incarnation

Annunciation

The Annunciation, also referred to as the Annunciation to the Blessed Virgin Mary or Annunciation of the Lord, is the Christian celebration of the announcement by the angel Gabriel to Virgin Mary, that she would conceive and become the mother of Jesus the Son of God. Gabriel told Mary to name her...

 and his overthrow of earthly and pagan powers. The poem also connects the Incarnation with Christ's Crucifixion

Crucifixion of Jesus

The crucifixion of Jesus and his ensuing death is an event that occurred during the 1st century AD. Jesus, who Christians believe is the Son of God as well as the Messiah, was arrested, tried, and sentenced by Pontius Pilate to be scourged, and finally executed on a cross...

.

Background

Milton composed On the Morning of Christ's Nativity in December 1629, after celebrating reaching the age of maturity in England, in commemoration of Christ's birth. It was written while Charles Diodati, Milton's friend, was composing his own poem, and the poem reflects his sober, contemplative lifestyle in comparison to Diodati's extravagant way of living. The ode was composed during a time in Milton's life that he based his understanding of religion on Scripture, but he was still influenced by myth.

Although the ode was the first poem of Milton's 1645 collection, it was not the first poem that he wrote; many of the Latin and Greek poems included in the 1645 collection were composed during an earlier time. According to Thomas Corns, "Quite probably, its location indicates the poet's assessment of its quality"; this consideration is significant because Humphrey Moseley

Humphrey Moseley

Humphrey Moseley was a prominent London publisher and bookseller in the middle seventeenth century.Possibly a son of publisher Samuel Moseley, Humphrey Moseley became a "freeman" of the Stationers Company, the guild of London booksellers, on 7 May 1627; he was selected a Warden of the Company on...

, an important bookseller, was the publisher of the volume and the ode serves as an introduction to Milton's poetry.

Poem

By Stanza VII, nature stands back, and Christ's birth causes the sun to refuse to take its place:

And though the shady gloom

Had given day her room,

The Sun himself withheld his wonted speed

And hid his head for shame,

As his inferior flame;

He saw a greater sun appear

Than his bright throne, or burning axle-tree could bear (lines 77–84)

The poem transitions into The Hymn for a new set of stanzas. Christ's role, even as a baby, is apparent and made clear within Stanzas XV and XVI:

Yea Truth and Justice then

Will down return to men

...

And Heav'n as at some festival,

Will open wide the gates of her high palace hall.

But wisest Fate says no,

This must not yet be so,

The babe lies yet in smiling infancy,

That on the bitter cross

Must redeem our loss;

So both himself and us to glorify; (lines 141–142, 147–154)

Themes

The ode with The Passion and Upon the Circumcision form a set of poems that celebrates important Christian events: Christ's birth, the feast of the Circumcision, and Good Friday. The topic of these poems places them within a genre of Christian literature popular during the 17th century and places Milton alongside of poets like John Donne

John Donne

John Donne 31 March 1631), English poet, satirist, lawyer, and priest, is now considered the preeminent representative of the metaphysical poets. His works are notable for their strong and sensual style and include sonnets, love poetry, religious poems, Latin translations, epigrams, elegies, songs,...

, Richard Crashaw

Richard Crashaw

Richard Crashaw , English poet, styled "the divine," was part of the Seventeenth-century Metaphysical School of poets.-Life:...

, and George Herbert

George Herbert

George Herbert was a Welsh born English poet, orator and Anglican priest.Being born into an artistic and wealthy family, he received a good education that led to his holding prominent positions at Cambridge University and Parliament. As a student at Trinity College, Cambridge, Herbert excelled in...

. However, Milton's poetry reflects the origins of his anti-William Laud

William Laud

William Laud was Archbishop of Canterbury from 1633 to 1645. One of the High Church Caroline divines, he opposed radical forms of Puritanism...

 and anti-Church of England based religious beliefs.

The poem deals with both the Nativity and the Incarnation of Christ and Milton believed that the two were connected. The Nativity and the Crucifixion represent Christ's purpose as Christ in Milton's poetry, and contemporary poem, because Christ becomes human-like in the Nativity to redeem fallen man and humanity is redeemed when Christ sacrifices himself during the Crucifixion. Milton's reliance on the connection is traditional, and Milton further connects the Nativity with the creation of the world, a theme that is expanded upon later in Book VII of Paradise Lost. Like the other two poems of the set and like other poems at the time, the ode describes a narrator within the poem and experiencing the Nativity.

Critical response

The ode has, according to Thomas Corns, "generally been recognized as Milton's first manifestation of poetic genius and, qualitatively, a poem to be set alongside 'Lycidas

Lycidas

"Lycidas" is a poem by John Milton, written in 1637 as a pastoral elegy. It first appeared in a 1638 collection of elegies, entitled Justa Edouardo King Naufrago, dedicated to the memory of Edward King, a collegemate of Milton's at Cambridge who drowned when his ship sank in the Irish Sea off the...

' and A Masque presented at Ludlow Castle, 1634

Comus (John Milton)

Comus is a masque in honour of chastity, written by John Milton. It was first presented on Michaelmas, 1634, before John Egerton, 1st Earl of Bridgewater at Ludlow Castle in celebration of the Earl's new post as Lord President of Wales.Known colloquially as Comus, the mask's actual full title is A...

as his most significant poetic works before Paradise Lost. He further claims that the ode "rises in many ways above the rather commonplace achievements of Milton's other devotional poems and stands out from the mass of other early Stuart poems about Christmas."

In music

• In 1928 the first complete setting of Milton's Ode was undertaken by the Cambridge composer Cyril Rootham
  Cyril Rootham
  Cyril Bradley Rootham was an English composer, educator, organist and important figure in Cambridge music life.-Biography:...
  
  . The work is set for soli, chorus, semi-chorus and orchestra.
• Portions of the ode are set as part of the text of Ralph Vaughan Williams
  Ralph Vaughan Williams
  Ralph Vaughan Williams OM was an English composer of symphonies, chamber music, opera, choral music, and film scores. He was also a collector of English folk music and song: this activity both influenced his editorial approach to the English Hymnal, beginning in 1904, in which he included many...
  
  ' Christmas cantata, Hodie
  Hodie
  Hodie is a cantata by Ralph Vaughan Williams. Composed between 1953 and 1954, it is the composer's last major choral-orchestral composition, and was premiered under his baton at Worcester Cathedral, as part of the Three Choirs Festival, on September 8, 1954. The piece is dedicated to Herbert...
  
  (1954).
• Stanza XIII of the Hymn portion of this poem was set by Stephen Paulus in the second movement - "Ring Out! Ye Crystal Spheres" - of his 1990 work "Canticum Novum".