is not the eating, nor it is not the drinking, that is to be blamed, but the excess. So in pride.

King.

A king is a thing men have made for their own sakes, for quietness' sake; just as in a family one man is appointed to buy the meat: if every man should buy, or if there were many buyers, they would never agree; one would buy what the other liked not, or what the other had bought before, so there would be a confusion. But that charge being committed to one, he, according to his discretion, pleases all. If they have not what they would have one day, they shall have it the next, or something as good.

Heresy.

It is a vain thing to talk of an heretic, for a man for his heart can think no otherwise than he does think. In the primitive times, there were many opinions, nothing scarce, but some or other held. One of these opinions being embraced by some prince, and received into his kingdom, the rest were condemned as heresies; and his religion, which was but one of the several opinions, first is said to be orthodox, and so to have continued ever since the apostles.

Learning and Wisdom.

No man is wiser for his learning: it may administer matter to work in, or objects to work upon; but wit and wisdom are born with a man.

Oracles.

Oracles ceased presently after Christ, as soon as nobody believed them: just as we have no fortune-tellers, nor wise men [wizards], when nobody cares for them. Sometimes you have a season for them, when people believe them; and neither of these, I conceive, is wrought by the devil.

Deams and Prophecies.

Dreams and prophecies do thus much good: they make a man go on with boldness and courage upon a danger, or a mistress. If he obtains, he attributes much to them; if he miscarries, he thinks no more of them, or is no more thought of himself.

Sermons.

Nothing is text but what is spoken of in the Bible, and meant there for person and place; the rest is application, which a discreet man may do well; but 'tis his scripture, not the Holy Ghost's.

First, in your sermons use your logic, and then your rhetoric: rhetoric without logic is like a tree with leaves and blossoms, but no root.

Libels.

Though some make slight of libels, yet you may see by them how the wind sits: as take a straw and throw it up into the air, you shall see by that which way the wind is, which you shall not do by casting up a stone. More solid things do not shew the complexion of the times so well as ballads and libels. `

Devils in the Head.

A person of quality came to my chamber in the Temple, and told me he had two devils in his head-I wondered what he meant-and, just at that time, one of them bid him kill me. With that I began to be afraid, and thought he was mad. He said he knew I could cure him, and therefore entreated me to give him something, for he was resolved he would go to nobody else. I. perceiving what an opinion he had of me, and that it was only melancholy that troubled him, took him in hand, warranted him, if he would follow my directions, to cure him in a short time. I desired him to let me be alone about an hour, and then to come again; which he was very willing to. In the meantime, I got a card, and wrapped it up handsome in a piece of taffeta, and put strings to the taffeta, and when he came, gave it to him to hang about his neck; withal charged him that he should not disorder himself, nei

ther with eating nor drinking, but eat very little of supper, and say his prayers duly when he went to bed; and I made no question but he would be well in three or four days. Within that time I went to dinner to his house, and asked him how he did. He said he was much better, but not perfectly well; for, in truth, he had not dealt clearly with me; he had four devils in his head, and he perceived two of them were gone, with that which I had given him, but the other two troubled him still. Well,' said 1, I am glad two of them are gone; I make no doubt to get away the other two likewise.' So I gave him another thing to hang about his neck. Three days after, he came to me to my chamber, and professed he was now as well as ever he was in his life, and did extremely thank me for the great care I had taken of him. I, fearing lest he might relapse into the like distemper, told him that there was none but myself and one physician more in the whole town that could cure the devils in the head, and that was Dr. Harvey, whom I had prepared, and wished him, if ever he found himself ill in my absence, to go to him, for he could cure his disease as well as myself. The gentleman lived many years, and was never troubled after.

We quote the following from the preface to Selden's History of Tithes:'

Free Inquiry.

For the old sceptics that never would profess that they had found a truth, yet shewed the best way to search for any, when they doubted as well of what those of the dogmatical sects too credulously received for infallible principles, as they did of the newest conclusions: they were, indeed, questionless, too nice, and deceived themselves with the nimbleness of their own sophisms, that permitted no kind of established truth. But, plainly, he that avoids their disputing levity, yet, being able, takes to himself their liberty by inquiry, is in the only way that in all kinds of studies leads and lies open even to the sanctuary of truth; while others, that are servile to common opinion and vulgar suppositions, can rarely hope to be admitted nearer than into the base court of her temple, which too speciously often counterfeits her inmost sanctuary.

MILTON.

MILTON began, at the commencement of the Civil War, to write against Episcopacy, and continued during the whole of the ensuing stormy period to devote his pen to the service of his party, even to the defence of that boldest of their measures, the execution of the king. His stern and inflexible principles, both in regard to religion and to civil government, are displayed in these treatises. The first, 'Of Reformation touching Church Discipline in England,' was published in 1641, and the same year appeared a treatise, Of Prelatical Episcopacy,' being a reply to Bishop Hall's Humble Remonstrance' in favour of Episcopacy. A defence of Hall's Remonstrance' having been published, Milton replied with Animadversions upon the 'Remonstrant's Defence,' &c. (1641); and in the following year,' An Apology for Smectymnuus,* and The Reason of Church Government urged against Prelaty,' a more elaborate treatise in two books. In 1644 appeared the noblest of his prose works, his 'Areopagitica, a Speech for the Liberty of Unlicensed Printing; and a Tractate of Education' The same year produced his Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce,' and The Judgment of Martin Bucer concerning Divorce.' Next year he followed up these heretical but ably written

This word was composed of the initials of the names of five Puritan ministers: Stephen Marshall, Edward Calamy, Thomas Young, Matthew Newcomen, and William Spenstow. The w in the last name was resolved into two us.

*

works with 'Expositions upon the Four Chief Places of Scripture which treat of Marriage.' Another celebrated work of Milton is a reply he published to the 'Eikon Basilike,' under the title of 'Eikonoclastes, a production to which reference will be found in the notice of Dr. Gauden. Subsequently, he engaged in a controversy with the celebrated scholar Salmasius, or 'De Saumaise; who had published a defence of Charles I.; and the war on both sides was carried on with a degree of virulent abuse and personality which, though common in the age of the disputants, is calculated to strike a modern reader with astonishment. Salmasius triumphantly ascribes the loss of Milton's sight to the fatigues of the controversy; while Milton, on the other hand, is said to have boasted that his severities had tended to shorten the life of Salmasius.

In 1659 appeared A Treatise of Civil power in Ecclesiastical Causes,' and 'Considerations touching the likeliest means to remove hirelings out of the Church.' In 1660, on the very brink of the Restoration, the eager and fearless poet published 'A Ready and Easy way to establish a Free Commonwealth,' (which was in the form of a letter to General Monk), and Brief Notes upon a late Sermon titled the Fear of God and the King'

What I have spoken is the language of that which is called not amiss the good old cause. If it seem strange to any, it will not seem more strange, I hope, than convincing to backsliders. Thus much I should perhaps have said, though I were sure I should have spoken only to trees and stones: and had none to cry to, but with the prophet: 0 earth, earth, earth!' to tell the very soil itself what her perverse inhabitants are deaf to. Nay, though what I have spoke should happen-which Thou suffer not who didst create mankind free, nor Thou next who didst redeem us from being servants of men !-to be the last words of our expiring liberty.

The more genial labours of the muse succeeded to these fierce controversial and political struggles, and Paradise Lost' was composed. In 1670, Milton published his History of England,' down to the time of the Norman Conquest, in which he has inserted the fables of Geoffrey of Monmouth and other chroniclers, as useful to poets and orators, and possibly 'containing in them many footsteps and relics of something true.' Two other prose works issued from his pen-a Treatise of True Religion, Heresy, Schism, Toleration, and the Best Means to prevent the Growth of Popery' (1673), and a collection of Familiar Epistles in Latin' (1674) It had been conjectured, from passages in Paradise Regained,' and from his treatise on True Religion,' that Milton's theological opinions underwent a change in his advanced years; and the fact was made apparent by the discovery, in 1823, in the State-paper Office, of an elaborate work in Latin, a Treatise on Christian Doctrine,' which was translated by Dr. Sumner, and published by authority of King George IV. In the beginning of this work, Milton explains his reasons for compiling it. 'I deemed it safest and most advisable,' he says, ' to compile for

* Eikon Basilike, the Royal Image or Portraiture; Eikonoclastes, the Image-breaker.

myself, by my own labour and study, some original treatise, which should be always at hand, derived solely from the Word of God it selt.' In this treatise, Milton avows and defends Arian opinions, and supports not only his peculiar views on the subject of divorce, but the lawfulness of polygamy. It is the duty of believers, he says, to join themselves, if possible, to a church duly constituted; yet such as cannot do this conveniently or with full satisfaction of conscience, are not to be considered as excluded from the blessing bestowed by God on the churches.

Milton's prose style is lofty, clear, vigorous, expressive, and frequently adorned with profuse and glowing imagery. Like many other productions of the age, it is, however, deficient in simplicity" and smoothness-qualities the absence of which is in some degree attributable to his fondness for the Latin idiom in the construction of his sentences. 'It is to be regretted,' says Lord Macaulay, that the prose writings of Milton should in our time be so little read. As compositions, they deserve the attention of every man who wishes to become acquainted with the full power of the English language. They abound with passages compared with which the finest declamations of Burke sink into insignificance. They are a perfect field of cloth of gold. The style is stiff with gorgeous embroidery. Not even in the earlier books of the 'Paradise Lost' has he ever risen higher than in those parts of his controversial works in which his feelings, excited by conflict, find a vent in bursts of devotional and lyric rapture It is, to borrow his own majestic language, “a sevenfold chorus of hallelujahs and harping symphonies.'

The following extracts are taken respectively from The Reason of Church Government,' 'Tractate of Education, and the ‘Areopagitica.' The first of them is peculiarly interesting, as an announcement of the poet's intention to attempt some great work.

Milton's Literary Musings.

After I had, from my first years, by the ceaseless diligence and care of my father (whom God recompense!), been exercised to the tongues, and some sciences, as my age would suffer, by sundry masters and teachers, both at home and at the schools, it was found that whether aught was imposed me by them that had the overlooking, or betaken to of my own choice in English, or other tongue, prosing or versing, but chiefly the latter, the style, by certain vital signs it had, was likely to live. But much latelier, in the private academies of Italy, whither I was favoured to resort, perceiving that some trifles which I had in memory, composed at under twenty or thereabout-for the manner is, that every one must give some proof of his wit and reading there-met with acceptance above what was looked for; and other things which I had shifted, in scarcity of books and conveniences, to patch up among them, were received with written encomiums, which the Italian is not forward to bestow on men of this side the Alps, I began thus far to assent both to them and divers of my friends here at home; and not less to an inward prompting, which now grew daily upon me, that by labour and intent study, which I take to be my portion in this life, joined to the strong propensity of nature, I might perhaps leave something so written, to after-times, as they should not willingly let it die. These thoughts at once possessed me, and these other, that if I were certain to write as men buy leases, for three lives and downward, there ought no regard be sooner had than to God's glory, by the honour and instruction of my country. For which cause, and not only

for that I knew it would be hard to arrive at the second rank among the Latins, I applied myself to that resolution which Ariosto followed against the persuasions of Bembo, to fix all the industry and art I could unite to the adorning of my native tongue; not to make verbal curiosities the end-that were a toilsome vanity; but to be an interpreter, and relater of the best and sagest things among mine own citizens throughout this island, in the mother dialect. That what the greatest and choicest wits of Athens, Rome, or modern Italy, and those Hebrews of old did for their country, I, in my proportion, with this over and above, of being a Christian, might do for mine; not caring to be once named abroad, though perhaps I could attain to that, but content with these British islands as my world; whose fortune hath hitherto been, that of the Athenians, as some say, made their small deeds great and renowned by their eloquent writers, England hath had her noble achievements made small by the unskilful handling of monks and mechanics.

Time serves not now, and perhaps I might seem too profuse, to give any certain account of what the mind at home, in the spacious circuits of her musing, hath libcrty to propose to herself, though of highest hope and hardest attempting. Whether that epic form, whereof the two poems of Homer, and those other two of Virgil and Tasso, are a diffuse, and the book of Job a brief model; or whether the rules of Aristotle herein are strictly to be kept, or nature to be followed, which in them that know art, and use judgment, is no transgression, but an enriching of art. And, lastly, what king or knight before the Conquest might be chosen, in whom to lay the pattern of a Christian hero. And as Tasso gave to a prince of Italy his choice, whether he would command him to write of Godfrey's expedition against the infidels, or Belisarius against the Goths, or Charlemagne against the Lombards; if to the instinct of nature and the emboldening of art aught may be trusted, and that there be nothing adverse in our climate, or the fate of this age, it haply would be no rashness, from an equal diligence and inclination, to present the like offer in our own ancient stories. Or whether those dramatic constitutions, wherein Sophocles and Euripides reign, shall be found more doctrinal and exemplary to a nation. The Scripture also affords us a fine pastoral drama in the Song of Solomon, consisting of two persons, and a donble chorus, as Origen rightly judges; and the Apocalypse of St. John is the majestic image of a high and stately tragedy, shutting up and intermingling her solemn scenes and acts with a seven-fold chorus of hallelujahs and harping symphonies. And this my opinion, the grave authority of Paraæus. commenting that book, is sufficient to confirm. Or if occasion shall lead, to imitate those maguific odes and hymns, wherein Pindarus and Callimachus are in most things worthy, some others in their frame judicious, in their matter most, and end faulty. But those frequent songs throughout the law and prophets, beyond all these, not in their divine argument alone, but in the very critical art of composition, may be easily made appear, over all the kinds of lyric poesy, to be incomparable. These abilities, wheresoever they be found, are the inspired gift of God. rarely bestowed, but yet to some-though most abuse-in every nation: and are of power, besides the office of a pulpit, to inbreed and cherish in a great people the seeds of virtue and public civility; to allay the perturbations of the mind, and set the affections in right tune; to celebrate in glorious and lofty hymns the throne and equipage of God's almightiness, and what he suffers to be wrought with high providence in his church; to sing victorious agonies of martyrs and saints, the deeds and triumphs of just and pious nations, doing valiantly through faith against the enemies of Christ; to deplore the general relapses of kingdoms and states from justice and God's true worship. Lastly, whatsoever in religion is holy and sublime, in virtue emtable or grave, whatsoever hath passion or admiration in all the changes of that which is called fortune from without, or the wily subtleties and refluxes of man's thoughts from within; all these things, with a solid and treatable smoothness, to paint out and des cribe; teaching over the whole book of sanctity and virtue, through all the instances of example, with such delight to those, especially of soft and delicious temper, who will not so much as look upon Truth herself, unless they see her elegantly dressed; that whereas the paths of honesty and good life appear now rugged and difficult, though they be indeed easy and pleasant, they would then appear to all men both easy and pleasant, though they were rugged and difficult indeed. And what a benefit would this be to our youth and gentry, may be soon guessed by what we know of the corruption and bane which they suck in daily from the writings and interludes of libidinous and ignorant poetasters, who having scarce ever heard of that