The Doctor undoubtedly depended, that he had fufficiently difgufted his readers with his account of Milton's profewritings, to prevent their looking for the context to his quotation, to which there is no reference, or mention of the tract from whence it is taken.

Perhaps indeed fome of the more moderate idolizers of Dr. Johnfon might perceive, even from this mutilated citation, that Milton did not blame thefe actors as they were academics, but as they were clergymen. But Milton had likewife another objection to them; they were fcurvy performers.

"There," fays Milton, "while they "acted and over-acted, among other

66

young scholars, I was a fpectator; they "thought

6.6

thought themselves gallant men, and I

thought them fools; they made fport, " and I laughed; they mif-pronounced, "and I mifliked; and, to make up the "atticifm, they were out, and I hifs'd *." Thefe were not the faults of men of the theatrical profeffion, who were daily practitioners upon the ftage, and by whom Milton was fo highly entertained in the Metropolis.

Milton's epifcopalian opponents reproached him as a diffolute rake; and, among other irregularities; mentioned: his frequenting the theatres, which they inferred from his fpeaking of vizzards and falfe beards. He anfwers, that there was no occafion to go to the public playhouses to learn the ufes of thefe difguifes; * Apology, P.213.

for

forafmuch as plays were acted in the univerfities, with the approbation of bishops, where these characteristical properties were to be seen as well as at the public theatres. "And," he concludes, "if it "be unlawful to fit and behold a merce- : "nary comedian perfonating that which "is leaft unfeemly for an hireling to do, how` "much more blameful is it to endure "the fight of as vile things acted by per-"fons, either entered, or prefently to "enter, into the miniftry! and how "much more foul and ignominious for "them to be the actors #!"

Is then Dr. Johnfon's THEREFORE the introduction of a fair inference? or do flander and mifreprefentation then only

* Apology, p. 213.

lofe

lose their malignity when delivered by

the

pen

of Dr. Johnfon?

Every page of the new narrative is full of mean flings and malevolent furmifes on Milton's most indifferent actions, which it would be endless to remark with a proper reproof of each. We shall therefore only felect a few of the most reprehenfible, either on account of their want of candour, or want of veracity.

Page 24. It is thus written: "Let not "our veneration for Milton forbid us to "look with fome degree of merriment "on great promifes and fmail perfor66 mances, on the man who haftens home "because his countrymen are contend"ing for their liberty, and when he "reaches the fcene of action vapours

away

his patriotism in a private board

"ing school."

This fneer is derived from a reflection of Mr. Fenton, "to whom it seemed "wonderful that one, of fo warm and "daring a spirit as Milton's certainly 66 was, fhould be reftrained from the in those unnatural commotions*; "and whence Dr. Johnson takes the li"berty to fubfume: But Milton was re"ftrained from the camp, therefore his patriotism was vapoured away."

66 camp

But was there no fcene of patriotic action but in the camp? or will Dr. Johnfon allow that Milton could have done more for the liberty of his coun

*Fenton's Life of Milton, p. x.

trymen