The most trifling performances of Milton are so fingular, that we may regret even the loss of the verses alluded to by Aubrey, as the offspring of his childhood. Perhaps no juvenile author ever displayed, with such early force, "The spirit of a youth Who means to be of note." His mind, even in his boyish days, seems to have glowed, like the fancy and furnace of an alchymift, with inceffant hope and preparation for astonishing productions. Such aufterity and moroseness have been falfely attributed to Milton, that a reader, acquainted with him only as he appears in the page of Johnfon, must suppose him little formed for love; but his poetry in general, and efpecially the compositions we are now speaking of, may convince us, that he felt, with the most exquifite fenfibility, the magic of beauty, and all the force of female attraction. His feventh Elegy exhibits a lively picture of his first passion; he reprefents himself as captivated by an unknown fair, who, though he faw her but for a moment, made a deep impreffion on his heart. Protinus infoliti fubierunt corda furores, Uror amans intus, flammaque totus eram. Ablata eft oculis non reditura meis. Aft ego progredior tacite querebundus, et excors, Et dubius volui fæpe referre pedem. Findor et hæc remanet: fequitur pars altera votum, Raptaque tam fubito gaudia flere juvat. A fever, A fever, new to me, of fierce defire I pause, I turn, proceed, yet wish to stay; With tears my foul's delight fo quickly flown. 3 The juvenile poet then addreffes himself to love, with a request that beautifully expreffes all the inquietude, and all the irrefolution, of hopeless attachment. Deme meos tandem, verum nec deme, furores; Remove, no, grant me ftill this raging woe; After having contemplated the youthful fancy of Milton under the influence of a fudden and vehement affection, let us furvey him in a different point of view, and admire the purity and vigour of mind, which he exerted at the age of twenty-three, in meditation on his past and his future days. To a friend, who had remonftrated with him on his delay to enter upon active life, he afcribes that delay to an intense defire of rendering himself more fit for it. "Yet (he fays) "that you may see that I am something fufpicious of myselfe, "and doe take notice of a certain belatedneffe in me, I am "the "the bolder to fend you fome of my night-ward thoughts, "fome while fince, because they come in not altogether unfitly, made up in a Petrarchian stanza, which I told you " of:" How foon hath time, the fubtle thief of youth, Stol'n on his wing my three and twentieth year! And inward ripeness doth much lefs appear, It shall be ftill in ftrictest measure even To that fame lot, however mean or high, All is, if I have grace to use it so, As ever in my great task master's eye. This fonnet may be regarded, perhaps, as a refutation of that injurious criticifm, which has afferted, "the best fonnets of Milton are entitled only to this negative commendation, that they are not bad;" but it has a fuperior value, which induced me to introduce it here, as it feems to reveal the ruling principle, which gave bias and energy to the mind and conduct of Milton; I mean the habit, which he fo early adopted, of confidering himself "As ever in his great task master's eye." It It was, perhaps, the force and permanency with which this perfuafion was impreffed on his heart, that enabled him to afcend the fublimeft heights, both of genius and of virtue. When Milton began his courfe of academical study, he had views of foon entering the church, to "whofe fervice," he says, “by the intentions of my parents and friends, I was “deftined of a child, and in mine own resolutions." It was a religious fcruple that prevented him from taking orders; and though his mode of thinking may be deemed erroneous, there is a refined and hallowed probity in his conduct on this occafion, that is entitled to the highest efteem; particularly when we confider, that although he declined the office of a minister, he devoted himself, with intense application, to what he confidered as the intereft of true religion. The fincerity and fervour with which he fpeaks on this topic must be applauded by every candid perfon, however differing from him on points that relate to our religious establish ment. "For me (fays this zealous and difinterested advocate for fimple christianity) I have determined to lay up, as the best "treasure and folace of a good old age, if God vouchsafe it me, the honest liberty of free speech from my youth, "where I fhall think it available in fo dear a concernment as the church's good." In the polemical writings of Milton there is a merit to which few polemics can pretend ; they were the pure dictates of confcience, and produced by the facrifice of his favourite pursuits: this he has stated in the following very forcible and interesting language : 4 "Con "Concerning therefore this wayward subject against pre"laty, the touching whereof is so distasteful and disquietous "to a number of men, as by what hath been faid I may "deferve of charitable readers to be credited, that neither તું envy nor gall hath entered me upon this controverfy, but "the enforcement of confcience only, and a preventive fear, " left the omitting of this duty should be against me, when "I would store up to myfelf the good provifion of peaceful "hours: fo left it should be ftill imputed to be, as I have "found it hath been, that some self pleasing humour of vain glory has incited me to contest with men of high estima“tion, now while green years are upon my head; from this "needless surmifal I fhall hope to diffuade the intelligent "and equal auditor, if I can but fay fuccessfully, that "which in this exigent behoves me, although I would be "heard, only if it might be, by the elegant and learned "reader, to whom principally for a while I fhall beg leave I (c may addrefs myself: to him it will be no new thing, "though I tell him, that if I hunted after praise by the "oftentation of wit and learning, I fhould not write thus "out of mine own feafon, when I have neither yet completed to my mind the full circle of my private ftudies (although I complain not of any infufficiency to the mat"ter in hand) or were I ready to my wishes, it were a folly to commit any thing elaborately compofed to the careless “and interrupted listening of these tumultuous times. Next, "if I were wife only to my own ends, I would certainly “take such a subject, as of itself might catch applause ; “whereas this has all the disadvantages on the contrary; " and |