1857.] Milton considered as a Schoolmaster. 329 



finally, he left Italy, where he had passed so many months of 

 exquisite delight, and where he had received homage so unusual for 

 any dweller on this side of the Alps, as soon as he heard of the 

 probable meeting of the new (the Long) l^arliament. 



Johnson's complaint is refuted by his own sensible opinion that 

 Milton taught iov money, and not for amusement. Since he had 

 determined that he ought to oppose the measures of the Court, was 

 it not the duty of an honourable and prudent man to secure himself 

 against the bribes of the Court ? The patronage of Charles I. was 

 bestowed with liberality and discernment. The report that a young 

 man had come to London, who had received panegyrics from the 

 academies and from the most eminent men of letters in Italy, was 

 likely enough to reach the queen or the archbishop. There was 

 nothing in Milton's previous career to render it improbable that he 

 might be induced to use his pen in their favour. Instead of de- 

 nouncing court entertainments, he had written a mask ; he could 

 be favourably spoken of by the family at Ludlow Castle. Money 

 was important to him, for he had tastes that were expensive. No 

 one would have felt more the charms of cultivated and refined 

 society. Might not his scheme of the private boarding-school then 

 be a very reasonable means of preventing him from vapouring 

 away his patriotism, first by making him independent of his pen ; 

 secondly, by making him a less creditable associate for those who 

 would have been glad to amuse themselves with his learning and 

 eloquence ? 



We learn from Howell's " Londinopolis," printed in 1657, that 

 Aldersgate Street " resembled an Italian street more than any other 

 in London." Phillips speaks of it as " freer from noise than any 

 other." Mr. Cunningham shows, in his Handbook, that it was the 

 residence of distinguished noblemen. Milton must have strained a 

 point to hire a house in such a situation. That he did so, is one 

 sign of the earnestness with which he entered upon his task. We 

 know, from his letter to Mr. Hartlib, that he regarded the building 

 in which the education was conducted as a part of the education 

 itself. 



It is useless to speculate whether any of the friends to whom 

 his letters or his sonnets are addressed committed their sons or 

 kinsmen to his care. The names of John and Edward Phillips are 

 all that have come down to us. Of these men, through the labours 

 of Mr. Godwin, we have more information than it is generally 

 possible to obtain respecting persons of their calibre. They were 

 the younger brethren of that " fair infant whose death by a cough " 

 is immortalised in one of Milton's early poems. When his sister 

 married a second time, he took the boys into his house. Both 

 became industrious literateurs. Both, even before the Restoration, 

 became Royalists. Both for a time fell into the licentiousness 

 which so commonly accompanied that reaction. John Phillips 

 began with answering an anonymous reply to his uncle's defence ; 



