death, with whom he had contracted the ftrongest friendship. The Latin epitaph informs us, that Mr. King, was fon of Sir John King, fecretary for Ireland to queen Elizabeth, James I. and Charles I. and that he was fellow in Chrift's College, Cambridge, and was drowned in the twenty-fifth year of his age.

Upon the death of his mother, Milton obtained leave of his father to travel, and having waited upon Sir Henry Wotton, formerly ambaffador at Venice, and then provost of Eatoncollege, to whom he communicated his defign; that gentleman wrote a letter to him, dated from the college, April 18, 1638, and printed among the Reliquia Wottonian, and in Dr. Newton's life of Milton. Immediately after the receipt of this letter our author fet out for France, accompanied only with one man who attended him through all his travels.

At Paris Milton was introduced to the famous Hugo Grotius, and thence went to Florence, Siena, Rome, and Naples, in all which places he was entertained with the utmoft civility, by persons of the first diftinction.

When our author was at Naples he was introduced to the acquaintance of Giovanni Baptifta Manfo, Marquis of Villa, a Neapolitan nobleman, celebrated for his taste in the liberal arts, to whom Taffo addreffes his Dialouge on Friendship, and whom he likewife

mentions

mentions in his Gierufalemme liberata, with great honour. This nobleman fhewed extraordinary civilities to Milton, frequently vifited him at his lodgings, and accompanied him when he went to fee the feveral curiofities of the city. He was not content with giving our author thefe exterior marks of refpect only, but he honoured him with a Latin diftich in his praise, which is printed before Milton's Latin poems. Milton, no doubt, was highly pleased with fuch extreme condefcenfion and efteem from a perfon of the marquis of Villa's quality; and as an evidence of his gratitude, he prefented the marquis, at his departure from Naples, his eclogue, entitled Manfus; which, fays Dr. Newton, is well worth reading among his Latin poems; fo that it may be reckoned a peculiar felicity in the marquis of Villa's life to have been celebrated both by Taffo and Milton, the greateft poets of their nation.

Having feen the finest parts of Italy, and converfed with men of the first distinction, he was preparing to pass over into Sicily and Greece, when the news from England, that a civil war was like to lay his country in blood, diverted his purpofe; for as by his education and principles he was attached to the parlia mentary intereft, and thought it a mark of abject cowardice, for a lover of his country to take his pleasure abroad, while the friends of liberty were contending at home for the rights of human nature. He refolved therefore to return

by:

by the way of Rome, though he was diffuaded from pnrfuing that refolution, by the merchants, who were informed by their correfpondents, that the English jefuits there were forming plots against his life, in cafe he should re-. turn thither, on account of the great freedomwith which he had treated their religion, and the boldness he discovered in demonftrating the abfurdity of the popish tenets. But, ftedfaft in his refolutions, he went to Rome the fecond time, and ftayed there two monthsmore, neither concealing his name, nor declining any difputations to which his antagonifts in religious opinions invited him; he escaped the fecret machinations of the jefuits, and came fafe to Florence, where he was

re-

ceived by his friends with as mnch tenderness as if he had returned to his own country. Here he remained two months, as he had done in his former vifit, excepting only an ex-. curfion of a few days to Lucca, and then croffing the Appenine,. and paffing through Bologne, and Ferrara, he arrived at Venice, in which city he spent a month; and having fhipped off the books he had collected in his. travels, he took his courfe through Verona, Milan, and along the lake Leman, to Geneva, In this city he continued fome time, meeting there with people of his own principles, and contracted an intimate friendship with Giovanni Deodati, the moft learned profeffor of divinity, whofe Annotations on the Bible are published, in English; and from thence returning

turning to France the fame way he had gone before, he arrived fafe in England, after an abfence of fifteen months, in which Milton had feen much of the world, read the characters of famous men, examined the policy of different countries, and made more extenfive improvements than travellers of an inferior genius, and lefs penetration, can be supposed to do in double the time.

Soon after his return he took an handsome houfe in Alderfgate-street, and undertook the education of his fifter's two fons, upon a plan of his own. In this kind of fcholaftic folitude he continued fome time, but he was not fo much immersed in academical ftudies, as to ftand an indifferent fpectator of what was acted upon the public theatre of his country.

The nation was in great ferment in 1641,, and the clamour againft epiféopacy running very high, Milton, who difcovered how much inferior in eloquence and learning the puritan teachers were to the bishops, engaged warmly with the former in fupport of the common caufe, and exercifed all the power of which he was capable, in endeavouring to overthrow the prelatical eftablishment, and accordingly published five tracts relating to church government; they were all printed at London, in quarto. The first was intitled, Reformation touching Church Discipline in England, and the Caufes that have hitherto hindered it: two books written to a friend.

The fecond was of Practical Epifcopacy, and

whether

whether it may be deduced from apoftolical times, by virtue of thofe teftimonies which are alledged to that purpose in fome late treatises; one whereof goes under the name of James Ufher archbishop of Armagh. The third was the Reason of Church Government urged against the prelacy, by Mr. John Milton, in two books. The fourth was Animadverfions upon the Remonftrant's Defence against Smectymnuus; or, as the title-page is in some copies, an Apology for Smectymnuus, with the Reafon of Church Government, by John Milton.

In the year 1643 Milton married the daugh ter of Richard Powell, Efq; of Forrest hill in Oxfordshire; who, not long after, obtain ing leave of her husband to pay a vifit to her father in the country, but, upon repeated meffages to her, refufing to return, Milton feemed difpofed to marry another, and in 1644 published the doctrine and discipline of divorce; the judgment of Martin Bucer concerning divorce, and the year following his Tetrachordon and Colafterion.

Mr. Philips obferves, and would have his readers believe, that the reafon of his wife's aversion to return to him, was the contrariety of their state-principles. The lady being educated in loyal notions, poffibly imagined, that if ever the regal power thould flourish again, her being connected with a perfon fo obnoxious to the king, would hurt her father's intereft; this Mr. Philip's alledges, but, with fubmiffion

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