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arguments inconclusive, may yet admire the powers and the probity of the advocate. His view of the question is as extensive and liberal as his intention was pure and benevolent: if a few words of our Saviour, in their literal sense, are against him, the spirit of the gospel may be thought, by sincere Christians, to allow him all the latitude for which he contends; the most rigid opponent of his doctrine may be frequently charmed with his rich vein of fervid eloquence and christian philanthropy.

His three publications on divorce were followed by Colasterion, a reply to a nameless answer against his doctrine. This work is an angry invective, in which he endeavours, but not happily, to overwhelm his antagonist with ridicule.

In the account which he gives of his own compositions, in his Second Defence, he speaks of his treatise on divorce, as forming a part of his progressive labour to vindicate liberty in various points of view; he considered it in three different shapes, ecclesiastical, domestic, and civil; he thought

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it of high moment to establish a mor larged system of domestic liberty, at a when connubial discord was so comm consequence of civil dissension; wh use his own forcible expression, alludin bably to his particular situation, "th might be found in the camp of the e threatening ruin and slaughter to he band." He seems to exult in saying his doctrine of divorce was most abund demonstrated, about two years afte publication, by the illustrious Selden, Uxor Hebræa.*

* Cum itaque tres omnino animadverterem tis esse species, quæ nisi adsint, vita ulla transi modè vix possit, ecclesiasticam, domesticam, seu tam, atque civilem, deque primâ jam scripsissem tertia magistratum sedulò agere viderem, quæ secunda erat, domesticam mihi desumpsi; ea tripartita, cum videretur esse, si res conjugalis, rorum institutio recte se haberet, si denique lib losophandi potestas esset, de conjugio non sol contrahendo, verum etiam, si necesse esset, diss quid sentirem explicui; idque ex divinâ lege Christus non sustulit, nedum aliam, tota lege graviorem civiliter sanxit: quid item de except

Those who love not Milton, affect to speak scornfully of his writings on this subject, and intimate, that they were received at first with universal contempt; but this was far from being the case; they were applauded by many, on whose judgment the author set the highest value, though they were made a source of indecent mirth by the vulgar; and we may reasonably conclude it was this circumstance that induced him to wish he had written them in Latin. To the low ribaldry, with which they were attacked, he alludes in the sonnet, celebrated for the following admirable lines on the hypocritical or intemperate assertors of liberty,

fornicatione sentiendum sit, et meam aliorumque sententiam expromsi, et clarissimus vir Seldenus noster, in Uxore Hebræâ plús minús biennio póst editâ, uberius demonstravit. Frustrà enim libertatem in comitiis et foro crepat, qui domi servitutem viro indignissimam, inferiori etiam servit; eâ igitur de re aliquot libros edidi; eo præsertim tempore cúm vir sæpe et conjux, hostes inter se acerrimi, hic domi cum liberis, illa in castris hostium materfamilias versaretur, viro cædem atque perniciem minitans.-Prose Works, vol. 2. p. 385. quarto.

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That bawl for freedom in their senseless mood, And still revolt, when truth would set them free; Licence they mean, when they cry liberty,

For who loves that, must first be wise and good.

This noble sentiment he has inculcated more than once in prose; and as his life was in harmony with his precept, it might have taught his enemies to avoid the gross absurdity of representing him as the lover of anarchy and confusion. Never was a mind better constituted, than Milton's, to set a just value on the prime blessings of peace and order; if he ran into political errors, they arose not from any fondness for scenes of turbulence, but rather from his generous credulity respecting the virtue of mankind; from beJieving that many hypocrites, who affected a wish to establish peace and order in his country, on what he esteemed the surest foundation, were as sincere and disinterested as himself.

"From this time (says Johnson) it is observed, that he became an enemy to the Presbyterians, whom he had favored before.

He that changes his party by his humour is not much more virtuous than he that changes it by his interest; he loves himself rather than truth." Notwithstanding the air of morality in this remark, it may be questioned if ever an observation was made on any great character more invidious, or more unjust. When the Presbyterians were favored by Milton, they spake the language of the oppressed; on their being invested with power, they forgot their own pleas for liberty of conscience, and became, in their turn, persecutors; it was the consistency of virtue, therefore, in Milton, that made him at one time their advocate, and at another their opponent: so far from loving himself better than truth, he was perhaps of all mortals the least selfish. He contended for religion without seeking emoluments from the church; he contended for the state without aiming at any civil or military employment; truth and justice were the idols of his heart, and the study of his life; if he sometimes failed of attaining them, it was not because he loved any thing better, but

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