Before entering on any criticism, it will be convenient to state the originating circumstances of each piece.
"Arcades" and "Comus" both owe their existence to the musician Henry Lawes, unless the elder Milton's tenancy of his house from the Earl of Bridgewater can be accepted as a fact.

Both were written for the Bridgewater family, and if Milton felt no special devotion to this house, his only motive could have been to aid the musical performance of his friend Henry Lawes, whose music is discommended by Burney, but who, Milton declares: "First taught our English music how to span Words with just note and accent." Masques were then the order of the day, especially after the splendid exhibition of the Inns of Court in honour of the King and Queen, February, 1634.

Lawes, as a Court musician, took a leading part in this representation, and became in request on similar occasions.

The person intended to be honoured by the "Arcades" was the dowager Countess of Derby, mother-in-law of the Earl of Bridgewater, whose father, Lord Keeper Egerton, she had married in 1600.

The aged lady, to whom more than forty years before Spenser had dedicated his "Teares of the Muses," and who had ever since been an object of poetic flattery and homage, lived at Harefield, about four miles from Uxbridge; and there the "Arcades" were exhibited, probably in 1634.