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or more, Milton retraced his former route through France, and arrived in England early in August, 1639, after an absence of one year and three months.

It is perhaps proper to close this chapter by appending the sentence with which Milton himself concludes his account of his Continental tour: "I again take God to witness, that in all those places where so many things are considered lawful, I lived sound and untouched from all profligacy and vice; having this thought perpetually with me, that though I might escape the eyes of men, I certainly could not the eyes of God."

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* Def. Sec., Works VI., p. 289.

CHAPTER VI.

UPON touching once more his native shore, Milton found chaos everywhere. Anarchy in the streets, bitter dissension in the church, the general dissolution of old institutions, "grimvisaged war" lowering with "its wrinkled front," effectually routed all idea of continuing that peaceful and secluded existence to which he had hitherto been wedded.

The opening acts in the drama of the great rebellion were already being enacted. King Charles, bent upon enforcing the dogma of conformity with the English ritual, had even invaded Scotland at the head of an army, for the purpose of compelling the Scotch, who had been Calvinized or Presbyterianized under the exhortations of stout John Knox, to whose teachings they remained enthusiastically true, to desert their creed, and accept in its place the Episcopal polity.

When the "Service-book," as the bishops had named the new Scottish Liturgy, was cir

culated and ordered to be used by all parish ministers on pain of outlawry, the rage which swept through Scotland was portentous. The refusal to comply with the conformity laws was universal and indignant. A riot at Edinburgh, when the Service-book ritual was attempted to be read, summoned all Scotland to arms. "Posts running thick betwixt the court in London and the Scottish council," says Baillie, "spread the news of the insurrection far and near." Charles, in an unhappy hour, determined to coerce "these Scottish men who had the presumption to think independently in religious matters."* One expedition, dispatched into Scotland during Milton's absence upon the Continent, had proved futile; in 1639, about the time of his return, Charles equipped a second expedition, and this also had been compelled by Leslie to retreat.

Meantime the "Scottish men," as Clarendon calls them, flocked to Edinburgh from all quarters, and at a meeting held in the Grayfriars' church in that ancient capital, "signed a solemn covenant" never to submit to the

* Clarendon.

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abolition of the religious forms they loved, and never to accept the innovations of the prelates. Thus originated the famous "Covenanters." The signing continued for many weeks both at Edinburgh and throughout Scotland, until nine-tenths of the whole lowland population had sworn themselves members of the league

Such was the posture of affairs in Scotland.

In England, though the Puritans were at the outset less stubborn, as they were less numerous and more loosely organized than on the north of the Tweed, the hubbub grew apace; and joining the chorus of religious protest, the new Parliament, which the unsettled state of the nation had obliged the unwilling king to convoke, gave additional emphasis to the popular demand that the tyrannical action of the prelates should be curbed in ecclesiastical matters, and that in the civil domain the arbitrary prerogatives of the crown should be definitely surrendered, as alien to the spirit of the British Constitution, and as outraging the liberty wrung from despotism by Magna Charta.

The Parliament of April, 1640, instead of proving more compliant than its predecessors, was the boldest yet convoked. It refused to grant the king all supplies, until he acceded to their just demands. Charles, with an empty exchequer, greatly indebted, and with an army on his hands drawn together with much difficulty, to whom the state had fallen into arrears, had the still further mortification of learning that the eleven years' intermission between the present Parliament and the prior one, had 'made his subjects no more submissive to his usurpations, nor did he find them any the less tenaciously wedded to popular rights. Enraged at his disappointment, he dissolved the Parliament.

The dark cloud grew blacker every day. The Scottish army, zealous and triumphant, were already marching for the borders of England. The discontent of the English people became more and more demonstrative. The court having begged, borrowed, and plundered money from friend and foe, Jew and Gentile, was at length bankrupt.

Charles, appalled by the gathering storm,

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