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of speaking, bought and begun with servitude and forswearing?" Dr. Johnson ought to have given him credit too for having exempted those subscribing clergymen from the charge of perjury," who had consciences that could retch!"

Dr. Johnson's questioning the truth of MILTON's statement, that the reason why he did not become a clergyman was, because he could not ex animo subscribe the Thirtynine Articles; but that his chief objection was to the canons, is not creditable even to his liberality! He says:

"It seems more probable his objection related to canonical obedience: the thoughts of obedience, whether canonical or civil, raised his indignation."

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The fact is, that he also objected to swear entire and uncompromising obedience to the canons as well as to the Articles: he refused to subscribe slave, and take an oath withal," to observe human regulations in matters of religion. But does it follow, that because he would not voluntarily lay himself under an obligation to obey statutes which he was not otherwise bound to observe, that he felt repugnant to render the civil obedience which, as a subject, he owed to the state. Is it not perfectly compatible to object to submit to ecclesiastical domination, and to render cheerful obedience to constitutional laws? MILTON Could distinguish, if Dr. Johnson could not, between canonical and civil obedience: he refused to submit himself to the former, but his life affords no instance of his objecting to the latter.

Let us suppose that MILTON, in the prospect of entering the establishment, even if he had not anticipated the possibility of becoming a bishop or archbishop, yet that he might have become a dean or batchelor of divinity and laws, he would of course first read over seriously (if he could have preserved his gravity) the following:

"Articles of outward apparel of persons ecclesiastical. "First, That all archbishops and bishops do use and continue their accustomed apparel.

“Item, That all deans of cathedral churches, masters of colleges, archdeacons, and other dignitaries in cathedral churches: doctors, bachelors of divinity and law, having any ecclesiastical living, shall wear, in their common apparel, a tide gown, with sleeves straight at the hand, without any cuts in the same. And that also without any falling cape; and to wear tippets of sarcenet, as is lawful for them by that act of Parliament, Anno 24, Henrii Octavi.

“Item, That all doctors of physic, or of any other faculty, having any living ecclesiastical, or any other that may dispend by the church one hundred marks, so to be esteemed by the fruits as tenths of their promotions; and all prebendaries whose livings be valued at twenty pound a year or upward, wear the same apparel.

"Item, That they and all ecclesiastical persons, or other having any ecclesiastical living, do wear the CAP appointed by the Injunctions, and they to wear no HAT but in their journeying.

“Item, That they in their journeying do wear their cloaks with sleeves put on, and like in fashion to their gowns, gards, welts, or cuts.

"Item, That in their private houses and studies, they use their own liberty of comely apparel.

"Item, That all inferior ecclesiastical persons shall wear long gowns of the fashion aforesaid, and caps as afore prescribed. "Item, That all poor parsons, vicars, and curates, do endeavour themselves to conform their apparel in like sort, so soon and as conveniently as their ability will serve to the same. Provided that their ability be judged by the bishop of the diocese, And if their ability will not suffer them to buy them long gowns of the form afore prescribed, that then they shall wear their short gowns, agreeable to the form before expressed.

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Item, That all such persons as have been, or be, ecclesiastical, and serve not in the ministry, or have not accepted,

or shall refuse to accept, the oath of the Queen's Majesty, do from henceforth abroad wear none of the said apparel of the form and fashion aforesaid, but to go as mere laymen, till they be reconciled to obedience; and who shall obstinately refuse to do the same, that they be presented by the ordinary to the commissioners in causes ecclesiastical, and by them be reformed accordingly."*

Now, I respectfully ask those who know the honest and enlightened character of MILTON, that had he been resolved "to retch his conscience, by taking an oath withal," (which there can be no doubt Dr. Samuel Johnson, the moralist, would have recommended, as required from every obedient subject to the king,) is it likely that, for the sake of obtaining a living of twenty pounds per year, (and it was not likely that such a man as MILTON could have expected more under the archiepiscopal government of Laud,) that he would have consented to go "without his hat," and to "wear a short gown," that is, if the bishop of the diocese deemed he was not able, with twenty pounds a year, to buy a long one. I am fully persuaded that other and better reasons may be assigned, why MILTON refused to "subscribe slave," than because "the thoughts of obedience," properly understood, "whether canonical or civil, raised his indignation." It was not possible the noble mind of MILTON could have submitted to be bound by such ignoble fetters and chains.

"Canonical obedience," MILTON well knew, would demand implicit regard to a hundred and forty-one canons, besides seventeen passed in 1640, upon pain of being presented to "commissioners in causes ecclesiastical, and by them to be reformed accordingly;" or how could he have "subscribed slave" to this engagement? I shall not openly intermeddle with any artificers, occupations, as covetously to seek a gain thereby, having an ecclesiastical living to the sum of twentysix pounds, ten nobles, or above, by the year."

Sparrow's Articles, &c. p. 126, 127.

I can conjecture, too, the possibility of the honest and upright MILTON refusing to "retch his conscience" to take the "Oath of Simony!" I think it probable he might have balked too, when taking deacon's orders, to answer to the following question:

"The Bishop. Will you reverently obey your ORDINARY, and other chief ministers of the church, and them to whom the government and charge is committed over you, following with a glad mind and will their godly admonitions ?"*

Now would not MILTON have hesitated, before he had "retched his conscience," and have "subscribed slave, and took an oath withal," to say, "I will endeavour myself, the Lord being my helper ?"-or might it not have entered his mind, "Judas got thirty pieces of silver for selling his master, but I am advised to sell my conscience, when it is possible I may only get in exchange for it twenty nobles a year!" Nothing can be more evident to my mind, than that Dr. Johnson, with all his blunt and unmannerly Toryism towards Whigs, had not the ability to comprehend the essential qualities of an honourable, conscientious mind, like that of MILTON.

Dr. Johnson, who doubtless hated MILTON for taking part with the Parliament against the king, and had therefore hastened home from the continent to take part in the national struggle for freedom, says:

"Let not our veneration for MILTON forbid us to look, with some degree of merriment, on great promises and small performance; on the man who hastens home, because his countrymen were contending for their liberty, and when he reaches the scene of action, vapours away his patriotism in a private boarding-school. This is the period of his life from which all his biographers seem inclined to shrink. They are unwilling that MILTON should be degraded to a schoolmaster; but since it cannot be denied that he taught boys, one finds out that he taught for nothing, and another that his motive was only zeal • Ibid. p. 147.

for the propagation of learning and virtue; and all tell what they do not know to be true, only to excuse an act which no wise man will consider it as in itself disgraceful. His father was alive; his allowance was not ample; and he supplied his deficiences by an honest and useful employment.”—P. 96.

Notwithstanding the closing sentence of this paragraph is an affected vindication of MILTON from the mean slanders of his opponents; yet what shall we say to the malignant inuendoes of Dr. Johnson as to "great promises and little performance?" Dr. Johnson is "willingly ignorant" of the means by which MILTON promoted the cause of civil and religious liberty. He himself thus describes his conduct: "Thinking a way might be opened to true liberty, I heartily engaged in the dispute." Was it to "vapour away his patriotism," when he employed his pen, immediately on his return, to write his two books "On Reformation," against the Established Church ?-His Reply to Usher?-Of Prelatical Episcopacy, &c. ?-the Reason of Church Government, and other works, exposing tyranny and corruption in Church and State? If Dr. J. doubts whether MILTON rendered any assistance to the "good cause," as it was called, let him account for it so satisfactorily, as by the admission that these writings contributed, more than the sword or bayonet, to all those astonishing results in eight years, to pull down the Star Chamber and High Commission Courts, to procure the abolition of the order of prelates, and the suppression of the Book of Common Prayer, and the downfall of tyranny! So far from shrinking from this period of his life, I avow my conviction, that it was on many accounts the most splendid part of it; because he wrote not only without the support or countenance of government, but in constant jeopardy of being the prey of Laud and his cringing sycophants. Most certainly, Dr. Johnson, MILTON's "patriotism" was not "vapoured away." Had it been less successful, I suspect that you would have been less malignant against him.

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