enrich with all utterance and know"ledge, and fends out his Seraphim

"with the hallowed fire of his altar, to "touch and purify the lips of whom "he pleases. To this must be added,' ❝industrious and felect reading, fteady "obfervation, and infight into all feem"ty and generous arts and affairs; till: "which in fome measure be compaft, I "refuse not to fuftain this expectation." From a promise like this, at once fervid, pious, and rational, might be expected the Paradife Loft.

He published the fame year two more › pamphlets, upon the fame question. To one of his antagonists, who affirms that he was vomited out of the univer fity, he answers, in general terms d 2 "The

"The Fellows of the College wherein I fpent fome years, at my parting, after "I had taken two degrees, as the man"ner is, fignified many times how much "better it would content them that I

fhould stay.As for the common ap"probation or diflike of that place, as "now it is, that I fhould efteem or dif"efteem myself the more for that, too "fimple is the answerer, if he think to "obtain with me. Of fmall practice "were the phyfician who could not 66 judge, by what the and her fifter have "of long time vomited, that the worfer "ftuff the strongly keeps in her ftomach, "but the better fhe is ever kecking at,

and is queafy the vomits now out of "fickness; but before it be well with "her,

her, the must vomit by ftrong phyfick. <The univerfity, in the time of her "better health, and my younger judge**ment, I never greatly admired, but now much lefs."

This is furely the language of a man who thinks that he has been injured. He proceeds to defcribe the course of his conduct, and the train of his thoughts; and, because he has been fufpected of incontinence, gives an account of his own purity: "That if I be justly charged," fays he," with this crime, it may come upon me with tenfold fhame."

The ftile of his piece is rough, and fuch perhaps was that of his antagonist. This roughness he juftifies, by great ex

amples, in a long digreffion. Sometimes he tries to be humorous: "Left I fhould "take him for fome chaplain in hand, "fome fquire of the body to his prelate, one who ferves not at the altar only but at the Court-cupboard, he will beftow on us a pretty model of himfelf; and fets me out half a dozen ptifical mottos, wherever he had them, hopping fhort in the measure of convulfion fits; in which labour the of his wit having fcaped naragony

rowly, instead of well-fized periods, he greets us with a quantity of thumbring pofics.--And thus ends this 9fection, or rather diffection of him1 felf." Such is the controverfial merriment of Milton: his gloomy ferious

nefs

nefs is yet more offenfive. Such is his malignity, that hell grows darker at his frown. Daument

His father, after Reading was taken by Effex, came to refide in his houfe; and his fchool increased. At Whitfuntide, in his thirty-fifth year,, he married Mary, the daughter of Mr. Powel, a juftice of the peace in Oxfordshire. He brought her to town with him, and expected all the advantages of a conjugal life. The lady, however, feems not much to have delighted in the pleafures of fpare diet and hard ftudy; for, as Philips relates," having for a month led

a philofophical life, after having been

fufed at home to a great houfe, and

much company and joviality, her

d4

"friends,