the king, yet his confidering the king's use of it as an offence against heaven, is a pitiable abfurdity; an abfurdity as glaring as it would be to affirm, that the divine poet is himfelf profane in affigning to a speech of the Almighty, in his poem, the two following verses:

Son of my bofom, fon who art alone

My word, my wisdom, and effectual might

Because they are partly borrowed from a line in Virgil, addreffed by a heathen goddess to her child :

"Nate, meæ vires, mea magna potentia folus.”

The heat of political animofity could thus throw a mist over the bright intellects of Milton; yet his Iconoclaftes, taken all together, is a noble effort of manly reafon; it uncanonized a fictitious faint, who affuredly had no pretenfion to the title.

Having thus fignalized himself as the literary antagonist of Charles, when the celebrated Salmafius was hired to arraign the proceedings of England against him, every member of the English council turned his eyes upon Milton as the man from whose spirit and eloquence his country might expect the most able vindication. In 1651, he published his defence of the people, the moft elaborate of all his Latin compofitions; the merits and defects of this fignal performance might be most properly discuffed in a preliminary difcourse to the prose works of Milton; here I fhall only remark, that in the composition of it he gave the most singu

lar

lar proof of genuine public spirit that ever patriot had occafion to display; fince, at the time of his engaging in this work, the infirmity in his eyes was fo alarming, that his phyficians affured him he must inevitably lose them if he perfifted in his labour. "On this occafion," (fays Milton to a favage antagonist, who had reproached him with blindness) "* I reflected that many had purchased with a fupe"rior evil a lighter good, glory with death; to me, on the contrary, greater good was proposed with an inferior evil; "so that, by incurring blindness alone, I might fulfil the "moft honourable of all duties, which, as it is a more folid

re

advantage than glory itself, ought to be more eligible in "the estimation of every man; I refolved therefore to make "what short ufe I might yet have of my eyes as conducive

as poffible to public utility: you fee what I preferred, and "what I loft, with the principle on which I acted; let flan"derers therefore cease to talk irreverently on the judgment "of God, and to make me the fubject of their fictions; let them know that I am far from confidering my lot with

Hac

Unde fic mecum reputabam, multos graviore malo minus bonum, morte gloriam, redemiffe; mihi contra majus bonum minore cum malo proponi; ut poffem cum cæcitate fola vel honeftiffimum officii munus implere quod ut ipfa gloria per fe eft folidius, ita cuique optatius atque antiquius debet effe. igitur tam brevi luminum ufurâ, quanta maxima quivi cum utilitate publica, quoad liceret, fruendum effe ftatui. Videtis quid prætulerim, quid amiferim, quà inductus ratione : definant ergo judiciorum Dei calumniatores maledicere, deque me fomnia fibi fingere: fic denique habento me fortis meæ neque pigere

1

"forrow or repentance; that I perfist immovable in my “fentiment; that I neither fancy nor feel the anger of "God, but, on the contrary, experience and acknowledge "his paternal clemency and kindness in my most import"ant concerns, in this especially, that, by the comfort and "confirmation which he himself infufes into my spirit, I acquicfce in his divine pleasure, continually confidering rather "what he has bestowed upon me, than what he has denied. Finally, that I would not exchange the consciousness of my own conduct for their merit, whatever it may be, "or part with a remembrance, which is to my own mind a perpetual source of tranquillity and fatisfaction."

Whenever he is induced to mention himself, the purity and vigour of Milton's mind appear in full luftre, whether he speaks in verse or in profe: the preceding paffage from his Second Defence is confonant to the fonnet on his blindnefs, addressed to Syriac Skinner, which, though different critics have denied the author to excel in this minute fpecies of composition, has hardly been furpaffed; it deferves double praise for energy of expreffion and heroifm of fenti

ment.

Cyriac, this three-years day thefe eyes, tho' clear
To outward view of blemish or of spot,

Bereft of fight their feeing have forgot,

Nor to their idle orbs does day appear,

Or fun, or moon, or ftar, throughout the year,
Or man or woman; yet I argue not

Against Heav'n's hand or will, nor bate one jot,

Of

Of heart or hope, but ftill bear up and steer

Right onward. What fupports me dost thou ask?

The confcience, friend, to have loft them over-ply'd

In liberty's defence, my noble task,

Of which all Europe talks from fide to fide:

This thought might lead me thro' the world's vain mask
Content, tho' blind, had I no better guide."

:

The ambition of Milton was as pure as his genius was fublime; his first object on every occafion was to merit the approbation of his confcience and his God; when this most important point was fecured, he seems to have indulged the predominant paffion of great minds, and to have exulted, with a triumph proportioned to his toil, in the celebrity he acquired he must have been infenfible indeed to public applause, had he not felt elated by the fignal honours which were paid to his name in various countries, as the eloquent defender of the English nation. "* This I can truly affirm," (fays Milton, in mentioning the reception of his great political performance) "that as foon as my defence of the people was published, and read with avidity, there was not, in our metropolis, any ambaffador from any ftate or "fovereign, who did not either congratulate me if we met "by chance, or express a defire to receive me at his houfe, or vifit me at mine."

*Hoc etiam vere poffum dicere, quo primùm tempore noftra defenfio eft edita, et legentium ftudia incaluere, nullum vel principis vel civitatis legatum in urbe tum fuiffe,

P 2

qui non vel fortè obvio mihi gratuleretur, vel conventum apud fe cuperet vel domi inviferet.-Profe Works, vol. 2. p. 394.

Toland

Toland relates, that he received from the parliament a prefent of a thousand pounds for the defence. The author does not include this circumftance among the many particulars he mentions of himfelf; and if fuch a reward was ever bestowed upon him, it must have been after the publication of his Second Defence, in which he affirms, that he was content with having discharged what he confidered as an honourable public duty, without aiming at a pecuniary recompence; and that inftead of having acquired the ориlence with which his adverfary reproached him, he received not the slightest gratuity for that production *. Yet he appears to have been perfectly fatisfied with the kindness of his associates; for, in speaking of his blindness, he says, that "far from being neglected on this account by the highest characters in the republic, they constantly re

garded him with indulgence and favour, not feeking to "deprive him either of diftinction or emolument, though "his powers of being useful were diminished;" hence he compares himself to an ancient Athenian, fupported by a decree of honour at the expence of the public +. Among the foreign compliments he received, the applause of

* Contentus quæ honefta factu funt, ea propter fe folum appetiffe, et gratis perfequi : id alii viderint tuque fcito me illas "opimi"tates," atque "opes," quas mihi exprobas, non attigiffe neque eo nomine quo maxime. accufas obolo factum ditiorem.-Profe Works, vol. ii. p. 378.

+ Quin et fummi quoque in republica viri quandoquidem non otio torpentem me, fed impigrum et fumma difcrimina pro libertate inter primos adeuntem oculi deferuerunt, ipfi 6

non deferunt; verum humana qualia fint fecum reputantes, tanquam emerito favent, indulgent vacationem atque otium faciles concedunt; fi quid publici muneris, non adimunt; fi quid ex ea re commodi, non minuunt ; et quamvis non æquè nunc utili præbendum nihilo minus benignè cenfent; eodem plane honore, ac fi, ut olim Athenienfibus mos erat, in Prytanéo alendum decreviffent.Profe Works, vol. ii. p. 376.

Chriftina