He then removed to Jewin-street, near Aldersgate-street'; and 104 being blind, and by no means wealthy, wanted a domestick companion and attendant, and therefore, by the recommendation of Dr. Paget, married Elizabeth Minshul, of a gentleman's family in Cheshire, probably without a fortune. All his wives were virgins, for he has declared that he thought it gross and indelicate to be a second husband3: upon what other principles his choice was made cannot now be known, but marriage afforded not much of his happiness. The first wife left him in disgust, and was brought back only by terror; the second, indeed, seems to have been more a favourite, but her life was short; the third, as Philips relates, oppressed his children in his life-time, and cheated them at his death 5. Soon after his marriage, according to an obscure story, he was 105 offered the continuance of his employment, and, being pressed by his wife to accept it, answered, 'You, like other women, want to ride in your coach; my wish is to live and die an honest man". ' He had first taken a house in Holborn, near Red Lyon Fields.' Phillips' Milton, p. 38. 2 lb. Aubrey mentions Dr. Nathan Paget among Milton's 'familiar learned acquaintance.' Brief Lives, ii. 72. It was through him that Ellwood 'was admitted to come to Milton.' Life of Ellwood, ed. Crump, p. 88. Under the Commonwealth he was Physician to the Tower. Masson's Milton, vi. 454. He was a cousin of Elizabeth Minshul. Her father was a yeoman. The marriage took place on Feb. 24, 1662-3. was twenty-four. In Masson's Milton, vi. 475, is given a facsimile of Milton's signature. It is the only authentic specimen of his handwriting of later date than 1652' known to Professor Masson. Ib. p. 477 n. She 3 Johnson refers, I think, to the following passage in An Apology for Smectymnuus, written when he was a bachelor:-'I think with them who both in prudence and elegance of spirit would choose a virgin of mean fortunes honestly bred before the wealthiest widow.' Works, i. 254. Johnson, who married a widow, said of a friend:-'He has done a very foolish thing, Sir; he has married a widow, when he might have had a maid.' Boswell's Johnson, ii. 77. 4 The words seem cold when we remember how Milton described her in Sonnets, No. xxiii. 5 It was not Phillips, but Dr. Birch, who related this. He was told by Elizabeth Foster, Milton's granddaughter, who had it from her mother, that 'Milton's widow, though she owned that he died worth £1,500, yet allowed his three daughters but £100 each.' Milton's Works, 1753, Preface, p. 76. See post, MILTON, 174. Aubrey describes her 'a gent. person, a peacefull and agreable humour.' Brief Lives, ii. 65. The writer of Milton's Life in Biog. Brit. (p. 3116) says that he saw her at Namptwich, where she lived about the year 1724. She seemed to have no notion of her husband's great fame, and said he left no great matter at his death.' For her excellence as a wife see Masson's Milton, vi. 476. 6 Thou art in the right (says he); you, as other women, would ride in your coach; for me, my aim is to live and die an honest man.' Richard If he considered the Latin secretary as exercising any of the powers of government, he that had shared authority either with the Parliament or Cromwell might have forborne to talk very loudly of his honesty'; and if he thought the office purely ministerial, he certainly might have honestly retained it under the king. But this tale has too little evidence to deserve a disquisition; large offers and sturdy rejections are among the most common topicks of falsehood. 106 He had so much either of prudence or gratitude that he forbore to disturb the new settlement with any of his political or ecclesiastical opinions, and from this time devoted himself to poetry and literature. Of his zeal for learning in all its parts he gave a proof by publishing the next year (1661) Accidence commenced Grammar 3; a little book which has nothing remarkable, but that its author, who had been lately defending the supreme powers of his country and was then writing Paradise Lost, could descend from his elevation to rescue children from the perplexity of grammatical confusion, and the trouble of lessons unnecessarily repeated*. 107 About this time Elwood the quaker, being recommended to him as one who would read Latin to him, for the advantage of his conversation 5, attended him every afternoon, except on son, who tells this story (Explanatory Notes, &c., Pref. p. 100), says he had it from Henry Bendish, a descendant of Oliver Cromwell. Milton's widow said that 'her husband was applied to by message from the King, and was invited to write for the Court.' Newton's Milton, Pref, p. 80. Professor Masson (vi. 639) thinks the story incredible. Johnson judged Dryden much less harshly when he wrote:-'It is natural to hope that a comprehensive is likewise an elevated soul, and that whoever is wise is also honest. . . . But enquiries into the heart are not for man; we must now leave him to his Judge.' Post, DRYDEN, 120. At his Majesty's happy return,' wrote Marvell, 'J. M. did partake... of his regal clemency, and has ever since expiated himself in a retired silence.' The Rehearsal Transprosed, Second Part, 1673, p. 379. 3 Works, iii. 441. Professor Masson believes that it was mainly written in 'the days of Milton's pedagogy.' It was published, not in 1661, but in 1669. Masson's Milton, vi. 640. Post, MILTON, 147; WATTS, 22. 'Mrs. Barbauld had his [Johnson's] best praise, and deserved it; no man was more struck than Mr. Johnson with voluntary descent from possible splendour to painful duty.' John. Misc. i. 157. 'Thy soul was like a Star, and dwelt apart: Thou hadst a voice whose sound was like the sea: Pure as the naked heaven, majestic, free, So didst thou travel on life's common way, In cheerful godliness; and yet thy heart [lay.' The lowliest duties on herself did WORDSWORTH, Poet. Works, 1870–4, iii. 68. 5 Life of Ellwood, p. 89; post, MILTON, 140, 145. Sundays. Milton, who, in his letter to Hartlib', had declared that 'to read [smatter] Latin with an English mouth is as ill a hearing as Law French ',' required that Elwood should learn and practise the Italian pronunciation, which, he said, was necessary, if he would talk with foreigners 3. This seems to have been a task troublesome without use. There is little reason for preferring the Italian pronunciation to our own, except that it is more general; and to teach it to an Englishman is only to make him a foreigner at home. He who travels, if he speaks Latin, may so soon learn the sounds which every native gives it, that he need make no provision before his journey; and if strangers visit us, it is their business to practise such conformity to our modes as they expect from us in their own countries. Elwood complied with the directions, and improved himself by his attendance; for he relates that Milton, having a curious ear, knew by his voice when he read what he did not understand, and would stop him and open the most difficult passages".' In a short time he took a house in the Artillery Walk, leading 108 to Bunhill fields; the mention of which concludes the register of Milton's removals and habitations. He lived longer in this place than in any other. He was now busied by Paradise Lost'. Whence he drew the 109 original design has been variously conjectured by men who cannot bear to think themselves ignorant of that which, at last, neither diligence nor sagacity can discover. Some find the hint in an Italian tragedy. Voltaire tells a wild and unauthorised story of a farce seen by Milton in Italy, which opened thus: 'Let the Rainbow be the Fiddlestick of the Fiddle of Heaven '.' It 1 Ante, MILTON, 14. 2 Works, i. 278. In his Grammar he says:- Few will be persuaded to pronounce Latin otherwise than their own English.' Ib. iii. 441. Law French is called by Blackstone that 'barbarous dialect, an evident and shameful badge of tyranny and foreign servitude.' Comm. iii. 317. 3 Life of Ellwood, p. 89. Sorbière (post, SPRAT, 6) in his Voyage en Angleterre (1664), p. 68, says: 'Les Anglais s'expliquent en latin d'un certain accent, et avec une prononciation qui ne le rend pas moins difficile que leur langue.' Evelyn, hearing the exercises at West has been already shewn that the first conception was a tragedy or mystery', not of a narrative but a dramatick work, which he is supposed to have begun to reduce to its present form about the time (1655) when he finished his dispute with the defenders of the King2. 110 He long before had promised to adorn his native country by some great performance, while he had yet perhaps no settled design, and was stimulated only by such expectations as naturally arose from the survey of his attainments and the consciousness of his powers 3. What he should undertake it was difficult to determine. He was 'long chusing, and began late *.' 111 While he was obliged to divide his time between his private studies and affairs of state, his poetical labour must have been often interrupted; and perhaps he did little more in that busy time than construct the narrative, adjust the episodes, proportion the parts, accumulate images and sentiments, and treasure in his memory or preserve in writing such hints as books or meditation would supply. Nothing particular is known of his intellectual operations while he was a statesman, for, having every help and accommodation at hand, he had no need of uncommon expedients. 112 Being driven from all publick stations he is yet too great not to be traced by curiosity to his retirement, where he has been found by Mr. Richardson, the fondest of his admirers, sitting 'before his door in a grey coat of coarse cloth [in a grey coarse cloth coat], in warm sultry [sunny] weather, to enjoy the fresh air; and so, as well as in his own room, receiving the visits of people of distinguished parts as well as quality. His visitors of comédie intitulée Adam, ou le Péché Que l'arc-en-ciel soit l'archet du 'This relation of Voltaire's was perfectly true, as far as relates to the existence of the play, the Adamo of Andreini.' JAMES BOSWELL, JUN., Johnson's Works, vii. 100 n. 2 Aubrey records, on the authority of E. Phillips, that 'Milton began Paradise Lost about two yeares before the King came in, and finished about three yeares after the King's restauracion.' Brief Lives, ii. 69. 3 Ante, MILTON, 47. Par. L. ix. 26; ante, MILTON, 86. 5 Richardson does not say that he had seen him, but writes:-'I have heard many years since,' &c. Explanatory Notes, &c., Pref. p. 4. 'At the time of his abode in Petty France [1652-60, ante, MILTON, 96n.] he was frequently visited by persons of high quality must now be imagined to be few ; but men of parts might reasonably court the conversation of a man so generally illustrious, that foreigners are reported by Wood to have visited the house in Bread-street where he was born 2. According to another account he was seen in a small house, 113 'neatly enough dressed in black cloaths, sitting in a room hung with rusty green; pale but not cadaverous, with chalkstones in his hands. He said, that if it were not for the gout, his blindness would be tolerable 3." In the intervals of his pain, being made unable to use the 114 common exercises, he used to swing in a chair, and sometimes played upon an organ*. He was now confessedly and visibly employed upon his poem, 115 of which the progress might be noted by those with whom he was familiar; for he was obliged, when he had composed as many lines as his memory would conveniently retain, to employ some friend in writing them, having, at least for part of the time, no regular attendant. This gave opportunity to observations and reports. Mr. Philips observes that there was a very remarkable circum- 116 stance in the composure of Paradise Lost, quality, and by all learned foreigners of note.' Phillips' Milton, p. 36. I 1 Phillips mentions members of the nobility ‘and many persons of eminent quality' visiting him here; 'nor were the visits of foreigners ever more frequent than in this place almost to his dying day.' Ib. p. 39. See also Toland's Milton, p. 139. * 'The only inducement of severall foreigners that came over into England was chiefly to see Oliver Protector and Mr. John Milton; and would see the house and chamber wher he was borne. He was much more admired abrode then at home.' AUBREY, Brief Lives, ii. 72. See also Wood's Fasti Oxon. i. 486, and Masson's Milton, iv. 350. The house was destroyed in the Great Fire of 1666. 3 This account Richardson (Explanatory Notes, &c., Pref. p. 4) had 'from an ancient clergyman in Dorsetshire, Dr. Wright, who found him in a small house, he thinks but one room on a floor; in that, up one pair of stairs, which was hung with a rusty In the evidence given about his 4 'When blindness and age confined him he played much upon an organ he kept in the house, and had a pully to swing and keep him in motion.' Toland's Milton, p. 150. In his academy the students are to spend some time in recreating and composing their travailed spirits with the solemn and divine harmonies of music heard or learned.' Works, i. 283. 'Where Milton introduces music in his poems he talks the language of a master.' HAWKINS, Hist. of Music,i, Preface, p. 9. See post, MILTON, 159. |