The Earliest Life of Milton. 17 



Salmasins was hugely extullM. and M'' Milton as falsly de- 

 fanrd."" The Anonymous Author, W ^lilton, who had l)y 

 his last book gain'd great esteem and many friends among 

 the Learned abroad, by whom, and by the public ]\Iinisters 

 comming hether hee was often visited, soon discover 'd to bee 

 Morus, formerly a Professor & ^Minister at Geneva, then living 

 in Holland. Him, in Secunda Defensio pro populo Anglicaiio 

 he render 'd ridiculous for his trivial and weak Treatise under 

 so Tragical a title, conteyning little of Argument, which had 

 not before suft'r'd with Salmasius. And because it consisted 

 most of Railing & false Reproches, hee, in no unpleasant man- 

 ner, from very good testimonies retorted upon him the true his- 

 tory of his notorious Impurities, both at Geneva, and Leyden. 

 Himselfe hee also, by giving a particular ingenuous account 

 of his whole life Vindicated from those scurrilous aspersions, 

 with which that Book had indevor'd to blemish him:^"' Add- 

 ing perhaps thereby also reputation to the cause hoe defended, 

 at least, with impartial Readers, when they should reflect 

 upon the dift'erent qualifications of the respective Champions. 

 And Avhen Morus afterwards strove to cleer himselfe of bee- 

 ing the Author, and to represent ]\P' Milton as an injurious 

 Defamer in that particular, hee in Defensio pro se by verj-- 

 good testimonies, and other circumstantial proofs justify 'd 

 his having fixd it there, and made good sport of the others 

 shallow Evasions.®^ 



While he Avas thus employ 'd his Eysight totally faild him ; 

 not through any immediat or sudden Judgment, as his Adver- 

 saries insultingly affirm 'd; but from a weakness which his 



™ Wood's version is, ' Salniusitis was highly extol'd in it, and .l/i7- 

 ton had his just Character given tlierein.' 



*° Wood uses this passage in his description of Milton's Pro sc 

 Defensio. It belongs where the manuscript inserts it, with the Defensio 

 Secunda, which contains the most famous of the autobiographical pas- 

 sages. 



"The writer does not seem to be acquainted with the fact that the 

 author of the Clamor Rcyii Sanguinis was Peter du Moulin, D.D., after- 

 wards prebendary of Cantorbuiy Cathedral, who in 1670 acknowledged 

 the authorship of the book. Aubrey, making his notes on the life of 

 Milton about 1080, knew the fact; and Wood also states it. 



