of history, threw over them a spell potent as that of Duessa; and, like the Red-Cross Knight, they thought that they were doing battle for an injured beauty, while they defended a false and loathsome sorceress. In truth, they scarcely entered at all 5 into the merits of the political question. It was not for a treacherous king or an intolerant church that they fought, but for the old banner which had waved in so many battles over the heads of their fathers, and for the altars at which they had 10 received the hands of their brides. Though nothing could be more erroneous than their political opinions, they possessed, in a far greater degree than their adversaries, those qualities which are the grace of private life.

With many

of the vices 15 of the Round Table, they had also many of its virtues,-courtesy, generosity, veracity, tenderness, and respect for women. They had far more both of profound and of polite learning than the Puritans. Their manners were more engaging, their 20 tempers more amiable, their tastes more elegant, and their households more cheerful.

Milton did not strictly belong to any of the classes which we have described. He was not a Puritan. He was not a free-thinker. He was not a Royalist. 25 In his character the noblest qualities of every party were combined in harmonious union. From the Parliament and from the Court, from the conventicle and from the Gothic cloister, from the gloomy and sepulchral circles of the Roundheads, 30

and from the Christmas revel of the hospitable Cavalier, his nature selected and drew to itself whatever was great and good, while it rejected all

the base and pernicious ingredients by which those 5 finer elements were defiled. Like the Puritans, he lived

“As ever in his great task-master's eye.' Like them, he kept his mind continually fixed on

an Almighty Judge and an eternal reward. And 10 hence he acquired their contempt of external

circumstances, their fortitude, their tranquillity, their inflexible resolution. But not the coolest sceptic or the most profane scoffer was more per

fectly free from the contagion of their frantic 15 delusions, their savage manners, their ludicrous

jargon, their scorn of science, and their aversion to pleasure. Hating tyranny with a perfect hatred, he had nevertheless all the estimable and

ornamental qualities which were almost entirely 20 monopolized by the party of the tyrant. There

was none who had a stronger sense of the value of literature, a finer relish for every elegant amusement, or a more chivalrous delicacy of honor and

love. Though his opinions were democratic, his 25 tastes and his associations were such as harmonize

best with monarchy and aristocracy. He was under the influence of all the feelings by which the gallant Cavaliers were misled. But of those feel

ings he was the master and not the slave. Like 80 the hero of Homer, he enjoyed all the pleasures of fascination; but he was not fascinated. He listened to the song of the Sirens; yet he glided by without being seduced to their fatal shore. He tasted the cup of Circe; but he bore about him a sure antidote against the effects of its bewitching 5 sweetness. The illusions which captivated his imagination never impaired his reasoning powers. The statesman was proof against the splendor, the solemnity, and the romance which enchanted the poet. Any person who will contrast the senti- 10 ments expressed in his treatises on Prelacy with the exquisite lines on ecclesiastical architecture and music in the Penseroso, which was published about the same time, will understand our meaning. This is an inconsistency which, more than any. 15 thing else, raises his character in our estimation, because it shows how many private tastes and feelings he sacrificed, in order to do what he considered his duty to mankind. It is the very struggle of the noble Othello. His heart relents; 20 but his hand is firm. He does naught in hate, but all in honor. He kisses the beautiful deceiver before he destroys her.

That from which the public character of Milton derives its great and peculiar splendor, still 25 remains to be mentioned. If he exerted himself to overthrow a forsworn king and a persecuting hierarchy, he exerted himself in conjunction with others. But the glory of the battle which he fought for the species of freedom which is the most 80 valuable, and which was then the least understood, the freedom of the human mind, is all his own. Thousands and tens of thousands among his con

temporaries raised their voices against ship-money 5 and the Star Chamber. But there were few

indeed who discerned the more fearful evils of moral and intellectual slavery, and the benefits which would result from the liberty of the press

and the unfettered exercise of private judgment. 10 These were the objects which Milton justly con

ceived to be the most important. He was desirous that the people should think for themselves as well as tax themselves, and should be emancipated from

the dominion of prejudice as well as from that of 15 Charles. He knew that those who, with the best

intentions, overlooked these schemes of reform, and contented themselves with pulling down the King and imprisoning the malignants, acted like

the heedless brothers in his own poem, who, in 20 their eagerness to disperse the train of the sorcerer,

neglected the means of liberating the captive. They thought only of conquering when they should have thought of disenchanting. “Oh, ye mistook! Ye should have snatched his wand And bound him fast. Without the rod reversed, And backward mutters of dissevering power, We cannot free the lady that sits here Bound in strong fetters fixed and motionless."

To reverse the rod, to spell the charm backward, 30 to break the ties which bound a stupefied people to

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the seat of enchantment, was the noble aim of Milton. To this all his public conduct was directed. For this he joined the Presbyterians; for this he forsook them. He fought their perilous battle; but he turned away with disdain from their insolent triumph. He saw that they, like

.

, those whom they had vanquished, were hostile to the liberty of thought. He therefore joined the Independents, and called upon Cromwell to break the secular chain, and to save free conscience from 10 the paw of the Presbyterian wolf. With a view to the same great object, he attacked the licensing system, in that sublime treatise which

every

statesman should wear as a sign upon his hand and as frontlets between his eyes. His attacks were, in 15 general, directed less against particular abuses than against those deeply seated errors on which almost all abuses are founded, the servile worship of eminent men and the irrational dread of innovation.

That he might shake the foundations of these debasing sentiments more effectually, he always selected for himself the boldest literary services. He never came up in the rear, when the outworks had been carried and the breach entered. He 25 pressed into the forlorn hope. At the beginning of the changes, he wrote with incomparable energy and eloquence against the bishops. But, when his opinion seemed likely to prevail, he passed on to other subjects, and abandoned prelacy to the 80

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