himself to be informed in what he writes, as well as any that writ before him; if in this, the most consummate act of his fidelity and ripeness, no years, no industry, no former proof of his abilities can bring him to that state of maturity, as not to be still mistrusted and suspected, unless he carry all his considerate diligence, all his midnight watchings, and expense of Palladian oil, to the hasty view of an unleisured licenser, perhaps much his younger, perhaps far his inferior in judgment, perhaps one who never knew the labour of book-writing; and if he be not repulsed, or slighted, must appear in print like a puny with his guardian, and his tensor's hand on the back of his title, to be his bail and surety that he is no idiot or seducer; it cannot be but a dishonour and derogation to the author, to the book, to the privilege and dignity of learning. .. And how can a man teach with authority, which is the life of teaching; how can he be a doctor in his book, as he ought to be, or else had better be silent, whenas all he teaches, all he delivers, is but under the tuition, under the correction of his patriarchal licenser, to blot or alter what precisely accords not with the hide-bound humour which he call is judgment? When every acute reader, upon the first sight of a pedantic license, will be ready with these like words to ding the book a quoit's distance from him, I hate a pupil teacher, I endure not an instructor that comes to me under the worship of an overseeing fist.. "And lest some should persuade ye, Lords and Commons, that these arguments of learned men's discouragement at this your order are mere flourishes, and not real, I could recount what I have seen and heard in other countries, where this kind of inquisition tyrannizes; when I have sat among their learned men (for that honour I had), and been counted happy to be born in such a place of philosophic freedom, as they supposed England was, while themselves did nothing but bemoan the servile condition into which learning amongst them was brought; that this was it which had damped the glory of Italian wits; that nothing had been there written now these many years but flattery and fustian. There it was that I found and visited the famous Galileo, grown old, a prisoner to the inquisition, for thinking in astronomy otherwise than the Franciscan and Dominican licensers thought. And though I knew that England then was groaning loudest under the prelatical yoke, nevertheless I took it as a pledge of future happiness that other nations were so persuaded of her liberty. Yet it was beyond my hope that those worthies were then breathing in her air, who should never be forgotten by any revolution of time that this world hath to finish. "Lords and Commons of England! consider what nation it is whereof ye are, and whereof ye are the governors; a nation not slow and dull, but of a quick, ingenious, and piercing spirit; acute to invent, subtile and sinewy to discourse, not beneath the reach of any point that human capacity can soar to.. “Methinks I see in my mind a noble and puissant nation rousing herself like a strong man after sleep, and shaking her invincible locks; methinks I see her as an eagle mewing her mighty youth, and kindling her undazzled eyes at the full mid-day beam; purging and unscaling her long-abused sight at the fountain itself of heavenly radiance; while the whole noise of timorous and flocking birds, with those also that love the twilight, flutter about, amazed at what she means. Though all the winds of doctrine were let loose to play upon the earth, so Truth be in the field, we do injuriously, by licensing and prohibiting, to misdoubt her strength. Let her and falsehood grapple; who ever knew Truth put to the worse in a free and open encounter? Her confuting is the best and surest suppressing. He who hears what praying there is for light and clear knowledge to be sent down among us, would think of other matters to be constituted beyond the discipline of Geneva, framed and fabricked already to our hands. Yet when the new light which we beg for shines in upon us, there be who envy and oppose, if it comes not first in at their casements. What a collusion is this, when as we are exhorted by the wise man to use diligence, 'to seek for wisdom as for hidden treasures,' early and late, that another order shall enjoin us to know nothing but by statute! When a man hath been labouring the hardest labour in the deep mines of knowledge, hath furnished out his findings in all their equipage, drawn forth his reasons, as it were a battle ranged, scattered and defeated all objections in his way, calls out his adversary into the plain, offers him the advantage of wind and sun, if he please, only that he may try the matter by dint of argument; for his opponents then to skulk, to lay ambushments, to keep a narrow bridge of censing where the challenger should pass, though it be valour enough in soldiership, is but weakness and cowardice in the wars of Truth. For who knows not that Truth is strong, next to the Almighty? She needs no policies, nor stratagems, nor licensings, to make her victorious; those are the shifts and the defences that error used against her power; give her but room, and do not bind her wher she sleeps." This appeal of Milton was unsuccessful, and it was not till 1694 that England was set free from the censors of the press. Milton received from Dryden an eulogium, so well known that we forbear to repeat it. Other poets have re-echoed the strain; and now, at the close of two hundred and sixty-four years, he occupies his niche of fame beside Shakespeare and the great poets of antiquity; his faults, his mistakes, and his controversial writings buried in a merciful oblivion, while the good he did "Lives after him," rejoicing, for all times, the nation which holds as one of its titles to honour the name of JOHN MILTON, Early Poems. ANNO ETATIS 17. ON THE DEATH OF A FAIR INFANT,' DYING OF A COUGH. I. O FAIREST flower, no sooner blown but blasted, That did thy cheek envermeil, thought to kiss, 1625 II. For since grim Aquilo2 his charioteer By boisterous rape th' Athenian damsel3 got, Of long-uncoupled bed, and childless eld, Which 'mongst the wanton Gods a foul reproach was held. The Poet's infant niece, daughter of his sister, Mrs. Philips. 2 Boreas, or the North Wind. III. So mounting up in icy-pearlèd car, Through middle empire of the freezing air IV. Yet art thou not inglorious in thy fate; V. Yet can I not persuade me thou art dead, VI. Resolve me then, oh Soul most surely blest, Oh say me true, if thou wert mortal wight, A prince of Sparta, said to have been accidentally slain by Apollo. Festivals to his honour were held annually by the Greeks at Amycle, a city of Laconia. |