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bed; and much about the time of her death a gutta ferena, which had for several years been gradually increasing, totally extinguished his fight *. In this melancholic condition he was eafily prevailed with to think of taking another wife, who was Catharine the daughter of Captain Woodcock of Hackney; and she too, in less than a year after their marriage, died in the fame unfortunate manner as the former had done; to whose memory he does honour in one of his Son

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These private calamities were much heightened by the different figure he was likely to make in the And Et. 52. new scene of affairs which was going to be actedin the

* It was the fight of his left eye that he loft first; and it was at the defire of his friend Leonard Philaras, the Duke of Parma's minifter at Paris, that he fent him a particular account of his cafe, and of the manner of his growing blind, for him to confult Thevenot the physician, who was reckoned famous in cafes of the eyes. The letter is the fifteenth of his Familiar Epistles. is dated September 28, 1654, and is thus tranflated by Mr. Richardfon:

"Since you advise me not to fling away all hopes of re"covering my fight, for that you have a friend at Paris, "Thevenot the physician, particularly famous for the eyes, "whom you offer to confult in my behalf, if you receive "from me an account by which he may judge of the causes "and symptoms of my disease, I will do what you advife "me to that I may not feem to refuse any afsistance that "is offered, perhaps, from God.

"I think 'tis about ten years, more or less, since I began "to perceive that my eye-fight grew weak and dim, and " at the fame time my fpleen and bowels to be opprest and "troubled with flatus; and in the morning when I began "to read, according to custom, my eyes grew painful imme"diately, and to refuse reading, but were refreshed after a "moderate exercise of the body. A certain iris began to fur"round the light of the candle if I looked at it; foon af"ter which, on the left part of the left eye (for that was Volume I.

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state: for all things now conspiring to promote the King's restoration, he was too confcious of his own activity during the ufurpation to expect any favour from the Crown; and therefore he prudently absconded 'till the act of Oblivion was published; by

which he was only rendered incapable of bearing any office in the nation. Many had a very just esteem of his admirable parts and learning who detested his principles, by whose intercession his pardon paffed the feals: and I wish the laws of Civil history could have extended the benefit of that oblivion to the memory of his guilt, which was indulged to his person; Ne tanti facinoris immanitas aut extitiffe, aut non vindicata fuiffe, videatur.

Having thus gained a full protection from the go

fome years sooner clouded) a mist arose which hid every "thing on that fide; and looking forward, if I shut my "right eye objects appeared smaller. My other eye also, " for these last three years, failing by degrees, fome months "before all fight was abolished, things which I looked upon "seemed to swim to the right and left; certain inveterate " vapours seem to possess my forehead and temples, which "after meat, especially quite to evening, generally urge " and depress my eyes with a fleepy heaviness: nor would "I omit, that whilst there was as yet some remainder of fight, " I no sooner lay down in my bed, and turned on my fide, " but a copious light dazzled out of my shut eyes; and as

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my fight diminished every day, colours gradually more "obscure flashed our with vehemence; but now that the "lucid is in a manner wholly extinct, a direct blackness, "or else spotted, and, as it were, woven with ash-colour, " is used to pour itself in. Nevertheless, the constant and "fettled darkness that is before me. as well by night as " by day, feems nearer to the whitish than the blackish; and "the eye rolling itself a little, seems to admit I know "not what little smallness of light as through a chink."

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vernment, (which was in truth more than he could have reasonably hoped) he appeared as much in public as he formerly used to do; and employing his friend Dr. Paget to make choice of a third confort, on his recommendation he married Elizabeth the daughter of Mr. Minshul, a Cheshire gentleman, by whom he had no iffue. Three daughters by his first wife were then living, two of whom are said to have been very serviceable to him in his studies: for, having been instructed to pronounce not only the modern, but also the Latin, Greek, and Hebrew languages, they read in their respective originals whatever authors he wanted to confult, though they understood none but their mother-tongue. This employment, however, was too unpleasant to be continued for any long process of time; and therefore he dismissed them, to receive an education more agreeable to their sex and temper.

We come now to take a survey of him in that point of view in which he will be looked on by all fucceeding ages with equal delight and admiration. An interval of above twenty years, had elapsed since he wrote the Mask of Comus*, L' Allegro,

26. An. Æt. † 29.

Il Penseroso, and Lycidas+; all in such an exquisite strain, that though he had left no other monuments of his genius behind him, his name had been immortal. But neither the infirmities of age and constitution, nor the vicissitudes of fortune, could depress the vigour of his mind, or divert it from exe cuting a design he had long conceived of writing an heroic poem *. The Fall of Man was a subject which he had some years before fixed on for a tragedy, which he intended to form by the models of Antiquity; and some, not without probability, say the play opened with that speech in the Fourth Book of Paradife Loft, ver. 32. which is addressed by Satan to the Sun. Were it material, I believe I could produce other pafsages which more plainly appear to have been origi nally intended for the scene. But whatever truth there may be in this report, 'tis certain that he did not be gin to mold his subject in the form which it bears now before he had concluded his controversy with Salmafius and More; when he had wholly loft the use of his eyes, and was forced to employ in the office of an amaruensis any friend who accidentally paid him a visit. Yet, under all these discouragements and vaAn. Æt. 61. rious interruptions, in the year 1669 he published his Paradise Lost †; the noblest Poem, next to those of Homer and Virgil, that ever the wit of man produced in any age or nation. Need I mention any other evidence of its inestimable worth, than that the finest geniuses who have succeeded him have ever esteemed it a merit to relish and illustrate its beau ties? whilft the critic who gazed, with so much

* Paradife Loft, B. IX, v. 26.

† Miltou's contract with nis bookfeller, S. Simmons, for the copy, bears date April 27, 1667.

wanton malice, on the nakedness of Shakespeare when
he slept, after having * formally declared war against
it, wanted courage to make his attack, flushed though
he was with his conquests over Julius Cæfar and the
Moor; which infolence his Muse, like the other affaf-
sins of Cæfart, severely revenged on herself; and
not long after her triumph became her own execu-
tioner. Nor is it unworthy our observation, that
though, perhaps, no one of our English poets hath
excited so many admirers to imitate his manner, yet
I think never any was known to aspire to emulation :
even the late ingenious Mr. Philips, who, in the
colours of style, came the nearest of all the copiers to
resemble the great original, made his distant advances
with a filial reverence, and restrained his ambition
within the fame bounds which Lucretius prescribed
to his own imitation:

Non ita certandi cupidus, quam propter amorem
Quod TE imitari aveo: quid enim contendat hirundo
Cycnis?......

And now, perhaps, it may pass for fiction what with great veracity I affirm to be fact, that Milton, after having, with much difficulty, prevailed to have this divine Poem licensed for the press, could fell the copy for no more than fifteen pounds; the payment of which valuable confideration depended on the sale of three numerous impressions. So unreasonably may * The Tragedies of the last age confidered, p. 143. † Vide Edgar.

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