and of the other, Anne, we know nothing more than that she survived till the year 1694. JOHN MILTON, the illustrious subject of our immediate notice, was born, at his father's house in Bread Street, on the 9th and was baptized on the 20th of December, 1608. His promise of future excellence was made, as we are assured, at a very early period; and the advantages which he derived from the attentions of a father, so qualified as his to discover and to appreciate genius, must necessarily have been great. Every incitement to exertion and every mode of instruction, adapted to the disposition and the powers of the child, were unquestionably employed; and no means, as we may be certain, were ⚫ omitted to expand the intellectual Hercules of the nursery into the full dimensions of that mental amplitude for which he was intended. We know that a portrait of him, when he was only ten years of age, was painted by the celebrated Cornelius Janssen; and, if we had not been positively told, on the authority of Aubrey, that he was then a poet, we should h Aubrey, who is usually distinguished by the title of the Antiquarian, is the author of " Monumenta Britannica," and of a MS. Life of Milton, preserved in the Mus. Ash. Oxon. He was personally acquainted with our poet, and from him Wood professes to derive the materials of his account of Milton. It is but fair to state, that I owe my acquaintance with Aubrey prin have inferred that the son, who was made the object of so flattering a distinction by a father, in competent indeed but by no means in affluent circumstances, could not have been a common child.i 66 My father destined me," (our author says,) when I was yet a little boy, to the study of elegant literature, and, so eagerly did I seize on it that, from my twelfth year, I seldom quitted my studies for my bed till the middle of the night. This proved the first cause of the ruin of my eyes; in addition to the natural weakness of which organs, I was afflicted with frequent pains in my head. When these maladies could not restrain my rage for learning, my father provided that I should be daily instructed in some school abroad, or cipally to Mr. Warton; who speaks of the "Monumenta Britannica," as a very solid and rational work, and vindicates its author from the charge of fantastical, except on the subjects of chemistry and ghosts. Aubrey however, on the whole, is a weak and old-womanish writer; whose authority, on the present subject at least, is to be received with caution, and only where no other can be obtained. "i Pater me puerulum humaniorum literarum studiis destinavit; quas ita avidè arripui, ut ab anno ætatis duodecimo vix unquam ante mediam noctem à lucubrationibus cubitum discederem; quæ prima oculorum pernicies fuit: quorum ad naturalem debilitatem accesserant et crebri capitis dolores; quæ omnia cum discendi impetum non retardarent, et in ludo literario, et sub aliis domi magistris erudiendum quotidie curavit." Defen. Secun, P. W. v. 230. by domestic tutors at home." How great are the obligations of Britain and of the world to such a father, engaged in the assiduous and well-directed cultivation of the mind of such a son! But the reward of the father was ample; and no one, but a parent of taste and sensibility under circumstances of some resemblance, can form any estimate of the gratification which he must have felt from his child's increasing progress, and from the prospects which it gradually opened. How exquisite must have been his sensations on receiving, in that admirable Latin poem which is addressed to him, the fullest evidence of the learning, genius, taste, piety and gratitude which had unfolded beneath his eye! How pleased must he have been to accept immortality from the hand which he had himself fostered-to be assured of visiting posterity as the benefactor of his illustrious offspring, and of being associated, as it were, with him in the procession and expanding pomp of his triumph! We may imagine with what pleasure a father would read the following elegant compliment to his own peculiar talent from the pen of his accomplished and poetic son: Nec tu perge, precor, sacras contemnere Musas; Nor you affect to scorn the Aonian quire, Bless'd by their smiles and glowing with their fire. A poet child should be by you begot. My kindred blood is warm with kindred flame; This must have been most acceptable; and yet, perhaps, more gratifying to the heart of a parent would be that effusion of filial affection with which the poem concludes. At tibi, chare pater, postquam non æqua merenti Et vos, O nostri, juvenilia carmina, lusus, But since, dear sire, my gratitude can find Since my large heart my bounded fortunes wrong,- O take the love, that strives to be express'd! How one could merit, and how one could praise!! Some part of our author's early education was committed to the care of Mr. Thomas Young, a puritan minister and a native, as Aubrey affirms, of Essex: but at what precise period this connexion began or ended is not now to be ascertained. It has been deemed probable that Young continued in his office till the time when, in consequence of his religious opinions, he was compelled to retire to the continent, where he obtained the appointment of minister to the British merchants at Hamburgh. Young's depar 1 The reader will find an entire translation of this poem at the end of the volume. E |