The Earliest Life of ]\1ilton. 19 



In these Works, and the instruction of some Youth or 

 other at the intreaty of his friends, hee in great Serenity 

 spent his time & expir'd no k^ss eahnly in the Yeare 1674. 



He had naturally a Sharp AVitt, and steddy Judgment; 

 which helps toward attaining Learning hee improv'd by an 

 indefatigable attention to his Study ; and was supported in 

 that by a Temperance, all ways ol)serv*d by him, but in his 

 Y'^outh even with great Nicety. Yet did hee not reckon this 

 Talent but as intrusted with him; and therefore dedicated 

 all his labours to the glory of God, & some public Good; 

 Neither binding hiniselfe to any of the gainfuU Professions, 

 nor having any worldly Interest for aim in what he taught. 

 Hee nuide no address or Court for that emploiment of Latin 

 Secretary, though his eminent fitness for it appeers by his 

 printed Letters of that time.^" And hee was so farr from 

 whilst in his tii'st and second Defensio pro popiilo Anglicano 

 he was an Advocate for Liberty against Tyranny & Oppression 

 (which to him seem'd the case, as well by the public Declara- 

 tions on the one side [and hee was a Stranger to thir private 

 Counsels®^] as by the Arguments on the other side, which 

 run mainly upon the justifying of exorbitant & lawless 

 power) hee took care all along strictly to define, and persuade 

 to true Liberty, and especially in very solemn Perorations 

 at the close of those Books; where hee also, little less than 

 Prophetically, denouuc'd the Punishments due to the abusers 

 of that Specious name. And as hee was not link'd to one 

 Party by self Interest,"- so neither was hee divided from the 



'• Probably a reference to a pirated edition of Milton's State Letters, 

 printed in 1676; or perhaps to the volume of Familiar Letters (Epis- 

 tolarum Familiannn Liber Uuus), printed in 1674. 

 beeing concern 'd in the corrupt designs of his Masters,"" that 



*" lliere is evident sj'mpathy liere with the attitude which Milton 

 took towards the puritan government in its later days, with the mood 

 in which he wrote A Ready aiid Easy Way to establish a Free Common- 

 wealth. 



" An explicit statement of Milton's exclusion from the inner circle 

 of the puritan government. 



"On the back ot the last page are five lines of writing carefully 

 crossed out, which were evidently the first draft of the passage, ' Perora- 

 tions . . . self Interest.' They are as follows: — 



