Yet a while longer his harp was left in the hands of the guardian Muse. The strings were now occasionally, and never more harmoniously, touched by him. These sonnets show that his right hand had lost none of its cunning, and may be introduced here. ON HIS BLINDNESS When I consider how my light is spent Ere half my days, in this dark world and wide, My true account, lest he, returning, chide; Either man's work, or his own gifts; who best Is kingly; thousands at his bidding speed, And post o'er land and ocean without rest; TO CYRIAC SKINNER. Cyriac, this three-years-day these eyes, tho' clear, Nor to their idle orbs doth sight appear Of sun, or moon, or star, throughout the year, The conscience, friend, to have lost them overplied In Liberty's defence, my noble task, Of which all Europe rings from side to side. This thought might lead me thro' the world's vain mask, Content, tho' blind, had I no better guide. The first reply to the Defensio Populi appeared in 1651, and was ascribed to Bishop Bramhall, and by some to Jane, an obscure lawyer of Gray's Inn. Mr. Todd has made the important discovery that its real author was one John Rowland. The anonymous pamphlet was entitled, "Apologia pro Rege et Populo Anglicano, contra Johannis Polypragmatici (alias Miltoni Anglo) Defensionem destructivam regis et populi." Philips, Milton's nephew, answered this barbarous production, in a piece which appeared in 1652, under the title of "Johannis Philippi Angli Responsio ad Apologiam anonymi cujusdam Tenebrionis pro Rege et Populo Anglicano infantissimam :" An Answer to a most puerile Apology for the King and People of England, by some anonymous Lurker, by John Philips, an Englishman. Milton was reserving himself for the rumoured retort of Salmasius. His nephew, when he undertook this reply to a work so far beneath his own notice, had not attained his majority; and as, from internal evidence, there can be little doubt that it was written under his superintendence, it has been always classed among his Prose Works. Its style, energy, latinity, withering sarcasm, are worthy of its real parentage. It bears the name, but the Philippic was beyond the unassisted powers of the minor. With little that is new in argument, (for what could Rowland do after Salmasius?) we have the same arguments often newly, powerfully, and even splendidly stated. In personal abuse it surpasses all his other pieces-and directed as it is entirely against an imaginary foe, it is far more ingenious than excusable. The work replied to is excessively offensive in this particular. The Preface to the Responsio states the motives which might have induced Milton to shun, and Philips to undertake, an answer to so contemptible an adver sary. "Such being the character of the man, (the anonymous Lurker,) he was by Milton him self deservedly neglected and despised: since it was thought by all, unbecoming the dignity and choice eloquence of that polished and learned author, to stoop to clear away the ordure, (aderuenda sterquilinia,) to refute the furious gabbling of a miscreant of such uncurbed insolence, and egregious folly (rabidamque loquacitatem tam effrænis atque stulti blateronis refutandam). Lest, however, this empty blusterer should vaunt himself among his own runaways, and imagine that he has written something great, or even that is worth a scanty dinner; led also by devotion to my country, and by the love of liberty so lately revived amongst us; bound likewise by many obligations to the man whom he persecutes, and who will ever be held in reverence by me-I could not refrain, though unsolicited, from undertaking to repress the petulance of this senseless fellow. And as the Roman recruits of old were accustomed first to exercise themselves with swords and spears against a wooden man, so I, laying aside the rudiments of a wit as yet scarcely bearded, have the confidence that it may be no difficult matter to sharpen my style against this block: for with an adversary so insipid and ordinary, any one, at the least with a small portion of ability, and a scantling only of erudition, may safely engage without premeditation." (Burnett's Translation.) After this, what becomes of a late remark, "that the nameless opponent was exhibited as a man of the most distinguished talents." How dull soever, or how beaten soever, may be both the adversary or the tract of argument, the wit vouchsafed by Milton to his nephew in this pamphlet, is never weary, and the stores of his learning appear inexhaustible. The triumph is never more decisive than when battle is given on the field of former victory. Milton took no notice of Sir Robert Filmer's "Animadversions" on the First Defence; and Hobbes's "Leviathan," the hugest metaphysical monster ever chased through the waters of controversy, he left to perish unscathed in the maelstroom of public abhorrence. These, and scores of other works, were doomed to be dealt with by other hands. But in the same year, 1652, in which they were published, an Answer to the Defence appeared, which, as it abounded in the most atrocious calumnies, and the most unfeeling insolence, the 'Hpwwv kλeos, was compelled to reassert his country's honour, and to maintain his own. The ignoble libeller, a real compound of the monkey and tiger, was a Frenchman of the name of Du Moulin. His ribald work was written in Latin, printed at the Hague, and entitled, “Regii Sanguinis Clamor ad Cælum adversus Parricidas Anglicanos:" The Cry of the Royal Blood to Heaven against the English Parricides. This piece of service was ultimately rewarded with a prebendal stall at Canterbury. Such was the scandalous and scurrilous tendency of this work, that its author was afraid to publish it in this country. For this purpose, therefore, he sent it to Salmasius, and this omnivorous pedagogue having gorged its nauseous flattery of himself, (the author even wrote him a grand thanksgiving ode, entitled, "Magno Salmasio pro Defensione Regia Ode Eucharistica,") placed the MS. in the hands of his protege, one Morus or More, a migratory Scotchman, then settled in France, and a celebrated protestant preacher of the day, to conduct through the press. More entered heartily into the honourable task, wrote the dedication to the exiled Charles, under the name of Adrian Ulac, (Latinè, Vlaccus,) the printer, and became so mixed up with the work, as to be generally considered as its author. He was the victim of the conspiracy against our countrymen-and for a very brief reputation, (of which he certainly made the most while it lasted,) his life was embittered, and his memory covered with infamy. A considerable period elapsed between the aggression and the castigation. The friends of Salmasius reported that he was busy at the anvil of fabrication, and Milton was determined to reserve himself for the more potent adversary. The death of the greater champion, however, making the work which More had published of somewhat more importance, Milton was compelled to engage with the inferior author, and in 1654 he produced, in reply, his famous Second Defence-" Defensio Secunda pro Populo Anglicano, contra infamem Libellum anonymum, cui litulus, Regii Clamor, &c." The Second Defence of the People of England against the anonymous Libel, entitled, &c. The translation by Robert Fellowes, A. M. Oxon, is a successful performance-though it is not sufficiently close and idiomatic to entitle it to the character of a perfect one. The phraseology is perhaps just as over sonorous, as Walsingham's in the First Defence is flippant and skippish. We certainly want a new version of both. To exaggerate the merits of the original would be impossible. Considering the contemptible character of the opponent's work, the exhaustion of the general subject, and the melancholy catastrophe which had befallen our author, we might almost have augured its inferiority to the reply to Salmasius. It is more sober, but not one jot less powerful, than the First Defence. It is certainly much more entertaining. Its prodigious vehemence is tempered with consummate elegance; and abounding equally in wise and noble sentiments, simply and energetically expressed, it not unfrequently reminds the reader of the Philippics of the mighty Athenian. Being, with all its successors, the production of a blind man, it may be judged of by the rules of the oratorical art, of which its author was so passionately fond, and his successful cultivation of which, in all its branches, is demonstrated by this, as well as by each of his other works. It was in personal defence against unmerited calumnies, more than in mere political altercation, that the orators of antiquity most successfully distinguished themselves. Milton had now not merely his beloved country for a client, with all the warriors and statesmen who had redeemed her from bondage, but he himself was charged with immoralities and heinous crimes, before the tribunal of the civilized world. The cause of liberty, and the character of her chosen advocate, rise triumphantly from the encounter, and vengeance recoils upon the enemies of the one, and the adversary of the other, with all the majesty which insulted justice could inflict in all the weight of overwhelming eloquence. There is a terrible moral in all this exposure of sacerdotal depravity in More: and, doubtless, many a heart has beaten, and many a face has blushed, under the influence of various emotions, while that indignant page has been read, in which Milton has tracked this clerical debauchee through the paths and into the haunts of depravity; and then thrown the glare of retributive daylight into their recesses. The justifiable personalities of this, and of the next works, have all the coherence of personification about them. More becomes a formal dramatic character-the type and representative of a species always numerous in religiopolitical establishments. The Morus of 1654 is the exact portraiture of one half of those who have been, and in this nineteenth century are, candidates for office in a church which shall be nameless, a corporeal spirituality under which the land and religion yet groan; -and the mitred successors of the lowly apostles who are so busily occupied within its hallowed enclosure, not being invested with the power of discerning spirits, can never prevent such men from obtaining their holy orders for admission into that spiritual and temporal vineyard. While the eye of the bishop cannot detect hypocrisy, the palm of his hand possesses the touch of indelibility, and the wand of discipline is broken against the silver crozier. The character of our defender was unassailable and unsullied. His heart was as pure as his intellect, and harmoniously did all their powers and passions unite to make up the perfect homogeneousness of this exalted specimen of humanity. All his works illustrate this wonderful permeability, so to speak, of his whole nature-this fine but thorough articulation of his mental and moral energies-this sublime and perpetual reciprocity and sympathy between all the stores and functions of his soul. The kingdom of his spirit was not divided against itself, and with the strictest internal independence, the league of all the provinces, for resistance or conquest, was unbroken, federal, and complete. The Second Defence has furnished life-writers with more materials than all his other works put together; and it has been well gleaned. We have availed ourselves of it, as far as we could, for explanatory, not biographical, purposes; and we would urge all who are not acquainted with it as a whole, and those who may have imbibed prejudices against the author or his party, to peruse, and pause, and ponder over it as the most ingenuous and interesting of memorials, furnished by one of the greatest and best of men ;-the rock and the quarry, at once furnishing the materials to form, and the munition to protect, the edifice of his beautiful character. We pass by the exordium, wherein he recounts in the most impassioned style and with fervent gratitude, his own and the labours of others on behalf of liberty, and in which with prophetic exultation he throws her sacred fires into the heart of the benighted continent; we pass by the eulogium on the Queen of Sweden, in the lustre of which her crown becomes a bauble; we pass by the not less magnanimous than magnificent panegyrick upon Cromwell, in which with consummate art the glowing recital of his achievements is made subservient to the most noble and solemn advice, and the glory of the past gathered up in suspense until the revelation of the future; we pass by the concluding appeal to his countrymen, which the hearts of the illustrious Protector, and his Ironsides, must have felt, had they been harder than the mail which covered them: we pass by these topics, and others which complete the crown, and constitute the political charm, of the work :-for Milton himself is before us! and invective and eulogy, the revolutionary storm and the portentous calm, warriors and their prowess, priests and their craft, vanish with the whole. motley drama: the man-the patriot-the bard-the Christian-Milton is before us! The Second Defence will ever be considered as the most satisfactory refutation of those calumnies and reproaches, which have been so industriously heaped upon its writer, and the men with whom he acted. No one who knows any thing of the character of Milton, would presume to accuse him of profligacy of principle, either in serving the council, or Cromwell. They with whom he condescended to co-operate, did their utmost to place the government on a safe, liberal, and lasting basis; and though the issue of their endeavours was unfortunate, few, now-a-days, will question their abilities in the council and in the field, in peace and in war; or their sincere devotion to the glory and welfare of their country. The influence of the Second Defence upon public opinion was wonderful. Morus denied the authorship, and published his "Fides Publica;" to which Milton replied in that most tremendous of all castigations-" Authoris pro se Defensio contra Alexandrum Morum, Ecclesiasten:" The Author's Defence of himself against Alexander More, Ecclesiastic. It is almost a merciless retaliation on poor More; and perhaps the severest, acutest, wittiest specimen of retort or reply on record. Milton's detestation of vice is only equal to the dreadless majesty with which he exposes it. The Latin language, with all its mechanical stubbornness, is perfectly ductile to his will-it melts to his touch, and moulds itself into a fiery essence to do his bidding, and express, like an "airy servitor," the least or the greatest emotions. He was an incomparable reviewer. Nothing escapes him—and he avoids nothing; he always rushes into the midst of the combat, and he comes out of the hottest melée unscathed, and even unbreathed. More was compelled to another struggle; his answer was again briefly refuted by Milton in a piece entitled," Authoris ad Alexandri Mori Supplementum Responsio:" The Author's Answer to the Supplement of Alexander More: and so ended the controversy; and like the last of every thing, its end is affecting. These political writings, so distinguished by every grace and glory of rhetorick, carried the celebrity of their author's name and cause to the very bounds of classic Europe. The fights are over— the victories won-one adversary after another silenced-the Salmasian controversy concluded: that volcano, with its noisy craters, is extinct-the lava is as cold as the Arctic snows—and we have seen a mighty genius acting upon the sky-ward eruption, like the law of gravitation; and the higher the burning fragments of rage and vituperation may have been thrown, the more hideous falls on the earth-born head that ruin of which we have witnessed the recoil. The death of Cromwell took place on the 3rd of September, 1659: on that day, it is observable, he was born; on that day he fought the three great battles of Marston-Moor, Worcester, and Dunbar; and on that day he died, in the peaceable possession of the sovereign power. The uncorruptible patriotism of Milton led him to retain office under this usurper the greatest man that ever sat on an English throne. Hope that he would be able to reconstruct the commonwealth, fear that in case of his desertion the hateful dynasty would be restored, and a desire to maintain the honour of his country abroad, may have been the considerations which led our author, with all his republican predilections, to render the Protector his assistance and support. Grievously, however, must he have been disappointed; not more perhaps by some things which Cromwell did, than by what he left undone ;—but the conduct of the four factions hardly left him any leisure from curbing their insolence, and defeating their machinations. Milton was not the only distinguished servant of Cromwell-Hale served him as chief justice; Howe and Owen officiated as his chaplains; and Blake refused not to wield the truncheon of the navy under him. Milton's two next works are valuable additions to our ample stores of what may be termed the literature of ecclesiastical liberty. Devoted to the consideration of two opposite evils, by which the church has always been afflicted or corrupted, two potent words, FORCE and HIRE, comprise the scope of both of these sound and able pamphlets. The first treatise relates to the exercise of force against conscience; the last to the equally dangerous exercise of political power or patronage in favour of any religious system. By the former, “ A Treatise of Civil Power in Ecclesiastical Causes; shewing, that it is not lawful for any Power on Earth to compel in Matters of Religion;" and by the latter, "Considerations touching the likeliest Means to remove Hirelings out of the Church; wherein is also discoursed of Tythes, Church-fees, and Church-revenues; and whether any Maintenance of Ministers can be settled by Law;" we may consider the great political principle of absolute noninterference by the magistrate for or against Christianity (except on grounds of purely civil emergency, or expediency, or necessity) to be triumphantly settled and fundamentally established. They were both published, with an interval of a few months, in the year 1659. One was addressed to the parliament convened by Richard Cromwell; the other, the doctrines of which yet remain to be realized, was inscribed to the Long Parliament: both the pieces, though their author retained his Latin secretaryship, were private and unofficial. "I write not otherwise appointed or induced than by an inward persuasion of Christian duty, which I may usefully discharge to the common Lord and Master of us all." This was an important declaration. Milton was an avowed, and, on the subject of church-government, a thorough, independent. He was then addressing the presbyterians, who were as averse to toleration as ever were the episcopalians. The only real quarrel which these men had with Cromwell was, that he would not establish them; that he would not lend them his mighty arm to put down all other sectaries, and set up their Scotch inquisition, enforce their synodical censures, and place them in paramount possession of all the benefices and emoluments of the English, Scotch, and Irish hierarchies. This party, with the royalists, and the army, were now on the eve of making good the great usurper's prophecy, that, after his death, they would bring all things into confusion. The independents were not strong enough to cut through this "illunited and unwieldy brigade ;" and the mere multitude were incapable of estimating the dangers of a restoration, or the blessings of a commonwealth. Our politic author determined to avail himself of the last moments of expiring liberty, which he had "used these eighteen years on all occasions to assert the just rights and freedoms both of church and state;" and |