against him, the spirit of the gospel may be thought, by fincere Chriftians, to allow him all the latitude for which he contends; the moft 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 Colafterion, 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 compofitions, in his Second Defence, he speaks of his treatise on divorce, as forming a part of his progreffive labour to vindicate liberty in various points of view; he confidered it in three different shapes, ecclefiaftical, domestic, and civil; he thought it of high moment to establish a more enlarged system of domestic liberty, at a time when connubial discord was fo common, in confequence of civil diffenfion; when, to use his own forcible expression, alluding probably to his particular fituation, "the wife might be found in the camp "of the enemy, threatening ruin and flaughter to her hus“band.” He seems to exult in saying, that his doctrine of divorce was more abundantly demonftrated, about two years after his publication, by the illuftrious Selden, in his Uxor Hebræa • Cum itaque tres omnino animadverterem libertatis effe fpecies, quæ nifi adfint, vita ulla tranfigi commodè vix poffit, ecclefiafticam, domefticam, feu privatam, atque civilem, Thofe deque prima jam fcripfiffem, déque tertia magiftratum fedulò agere viderem, quæ reliqua fecunda erat, domefticam mihi defumpfi; ea quoque tripartita, cum videretur effe, fi res Those who love not Milton, affect to speak scornfully of his writings on this fubject, and intimate, that they were received at firft with univerfal contempt; but this was far from being the cafe; they were applauded by many, on whose judgment the author set the highest value, though they were made a fource of indecent mirth by the vulgar; and we may reasonably conclude, it was this circumftance that induced him to wifh he had written them in Latin. To the low ribaldry, with which they were attacked, he alludes in the fonnet, celebrated for the following admirable lines on the hypocritical or intemperate affertors of liberty, That bawl for freedom in their fenfeless mood, For who loves that, must first be wife and good. This noble fentiment he has inculcated more than once in profe; and as his life was in harmony with his precept, it might have taught his enemies to avoid the grofs abfurdity of representing him as the lover of anarchy and confu res conjugalis, fi liberorum inftitutio rectè fe haberet, fi denique liberè philofophandi poteftas effet, de conjugio non folum rite contrahendo, verum etiam, fi neceffe effet, dif folvendo, quid fentirem explicui; idque ex divina lege, quam Chriftus non sustulit, nedum aliam, tota lege Molaïca graviorem ciyiliter fanxit; quid item de excepta folùm fornicatione fentiendum fit, et meam aliorumque fententiam exprompfi, et clariffimus vir Seldenus nofter, in Uxore Hebræâ plùs mi 9 nùs biennio pòft edita, uberius demonftravit. Fruftrà enim, libertatem in comitiis et foro, crepat, qui domi fervitutem viro indigniffimam, inferiori etiam fervit; ea igitur de re aliquot libros edidi; eo præfertim tempore cùm vir fæpe et conjux hoftes inter-fe-acerrimi, hic domi cum liberis, illa in caftris hoftium materfamilias verfaretur, viro cædem atque perniciem minitans.-Profe Works, vol. 2. p. 385. folio Edit. London, 1738. vol. 2. p. 333. fion. fion. Never was a mind better constituted, than Milton's, to set a juft value on the prime bleffings of peace and order ; if he ran into political errors, they arofe not from any fondnefs for fcenes of turbulence, but rather from his generous credulity refpecting the virtue of mankind; from believing that many hypocrites, who affected a wifh to establish peace and order in his country, on what he esteemed the fureft foundation, were as fincere and difinterested as himself. "From this time (fays Johnson) it is observed, that he "became an enemy to the Presbyterians, whom he had fa"voured before. He, that changes his party by his hu mour is not much more virtuous than he that changes "it by his intereft; he loves himself rather than truth.” Notwithstanding the air of morality in this remark, it may be queftioned, if ever an observation was made on any great character more invidious or more unjuft. When the Prefbyterians were favoured by Milton, they fpake the language of the oppreffed; on their being invefted with power, they forgot their own pleas for liberty of conscience, and became, in their turn, perfecutors; it was the consistency of virtue, therefore, in Milton, that made him at one time their advocate, and at another their opponent: fo far from loving himself better than truth, he was perhaps of all mortals the leaft felfish. He contended for religion without feeking' 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 ftudy of his life; if he sometimes failed of attaining them, it was not because he loved any thing better; it was becaufe he over fhot 1 fhot the object of his fincere affection from the fondness and ardour of his pursuit. His wife ftill persisted in her desertion, but he amused his mind under the mortification her conduct had occafioned by frequent vifits to the Lady Margaret Ley, whose manners and conversation were peculiarly engaging. Her father, the Earl of Marlborough, had held the highest offices in a former reign, and of his virtues fhe used to speak with fuch filial eloquence as infpired Milton with a fonnet in her praise. He continued alfo to manifeft his firm affection to the public good, by two compofitions 'intended to promote it ; the little tractate on education, addreffed to Mr. Hartlib, who had requested his thoughts upon that interesting subject, and his Areopagitica, a speech for the liberty of unlicenced printing. The latter has been re-printed, with a fpirited preface by Thomson, a poet whom a passion for freedom, united to genius, had highly qualified as an editor and eulogift of Milton. Had the author of the Paradife Loft left us no compofition but his Areopagitica, he would be ftill entitled to the affectionate veneration of every Englishman, who exults in that intellectual light, which is the nobleft characteristic of his country, and for which England is chiefly indebted to the liberty of the prefs. Our conftant advocate for freedom, in every department of life, vindicated this most important privilege with a mind fully fenfible of its value; he poured all his heart into this vindication, and, to speak of his work in his own energetic language, we may juftly call call it, what he has defined a good book to be, "the pre"cious life-blood of a master spirit, embalmed and treasured up on purpose to a life beyond life." His late biographer, instead of praising Milton for a service fo honourably rendered to literature, feems rather defirous of annihilating its merit, by directing his sarcastic animofity against the liberty of the prefs. "It seems not more rea fonable," fays Johnson, to leave the right of printing “unrestrained, because writers may be afterwards cenfured, "than it would be to fleep with doors unbolted, because by our laws we can hang a thief." This is servile sophistry; the author's illustration of a thief may be turned against himself. To fuffer no book to be published without a licence, is tyranny as absurd as it would be to fuffer no traveller to pass along the highway without producing a certificate that he is not a robber. Even bad books may have their use, as Milton observes ; and I mention this obfervation, chiefly to fhew how liberally he introduces a just compliment to a great author of his own time, in fupport of this idea. "What better witness," fays the advocate for unlicenced printing, << can ye expect I "should produce, than one of your own, now fitting in parliament, the chief of learned men reputed in this land, "Mr. Selden, whofe volume of natural and national laws proves, not only by great authorities brought together, "but by exquifite reasons and theorems almoft mathematically demonstrative, that all opinions, yea errors, known, "read, and collated, are of main fervice and assistance to"wards the speedy attainment of what is trueft." This |