"diftant, and which is animated only

by faith and hope, will glide by de

grees out of the mind, unless it be in"vigorated and reimpreffed by external "ordinances, by ftated calls to worship, and the falutary influence of exam"ple *."

The mere cant of every popifh formalift, who fets himself to fhew that images are the books of the ignorant; and that without them the common people can have no religion.

We cannot admit even Dr. Johnson's experience to decide this matter for us; who indeed hath immediately destroyed his own hypothefis, by acknowledging that Milton, who affociated with no par* Life, p. 140.

ticular

ticular church, "

appears to have had

"full conviction of the truth of Chrifti"anity; to have regarded the holy fcrip"tures with the profoundest veneration; "to have been untainted with any here"tical peculiarity of opinion; and to "have lived in a confirmed belief of the "immediate and occafional agency of "Providence."

"And yet, he grew old without any "vifible worship." Does it follow from hence, that Milton grew old without any worship at all?

Yes, truly, fuch is the conclufion. "In the diftribution of his hours there "was no hour of prayer, either folitary

" or with his household; omitting pub

66

"lic

"lic prayer, he omitted all." And then he procedes to account for it.

But thefe particulars, wherever the Doctor got them, must have come from perfons who had no more honeft bufinefs in John Milton's clofet than Dr. Johnfon himfelf, who never came there, nor can poffibly know what was done, or what was omitted in it. If "his ftudies and "meditations were an habitual prayer," what occafion had he for a stated hour, which, being a circumftance in the visible worship of a private man, may as foon be a token of pharifaical oftentation or popish superstition as of cordial piety !

Nor perhaps would Milton have accepted of Dr. Johnfon's apology for his omiffion of family worship, or have acknowledged

knowledged it to be a fault. Milton perhaps might think it fufficient to teach his family to pray for themfelves; every one as he or she fhould know the plague of bis or her own heart. Milton had doubtlefs known, by experience, how incongruous it was to truft his own prayers to the mouth of another man; and he might think it equally improper in him to dictate to the individuals of his family prayers unsuitable, for aught he could know without auricular confeffion, to their feveral cafes.

All this however is mere fpeculation on one fide and the other. We learn from a tale of Richardfon's, that one of his family at least attended public wor

fhip;

fhip; and more of them might, for any thing the Doctor knows to the contrary.

The Doctor next attacks Milton's political character.

"His political notions were thofe of ❝an acrimonious and furly republican."

When an honeft man has occafion to characterise his enemy, particularly in matters of opinion, he fhould keep a strict watch over himself, that his prejudices do not tranfport him to imputations which are either falfe, or may be retorted upon himself.

The world would have given Dr. Johnfon credit for his inveterate hatred of republican notions, without his qualifying them with the epithets of acrimonious and furly, as exhibited by Milton,

whofe