firmed; his ftudies and meditations were an habitual prayer. The neglect of it in his family was probably a fault for which he condemned himself, and which the intended to correct, but that death, as too often happens, intercepted his reformation.

His political notions were thofe of >an acrimonious and furly republican, for which it is not known that he gave any better reafon than that a popular government was the most frugal; for the trappings of a monarchy would fet up an ordinary commonwealth. It is furely very fhallow policy, that fuppofes money to be the chief good; and even this, without confidering that the fupport and expence of a Court is, for the most

part,

part, only a particular kind of traffick, by which money is circulated, without any national impoverishment.

Milton's republicanifm was, I am afraid, founded in an envious hatred of greatnefs, and a fullen defire of independence; in petulance, impatient of controul, and pride difdainful of fuperiority. He hated monarchs in the ftate, and prelates in the church; for

he hated all whom he was required to abey. It is to be fufpected that his predominant defire was to deftroy rather than establish, and that he felt not fo much the love of liberty as repugnance to authority.

It has been obferved, that they who moft loudly clamour for liberty do not

moft liberally grant it. What we know of Milton's character, in domeftick relations, is, that he was fevere and arbitrary. His family confifted of women; and there appears in his books fomething like a Turkish contempt of females, as fubordinate and inferiour beings. That his own daughters might not break the ranks, he fuffered them to be depreffed by a mean and penurious education. He thought woman

made only for obedience, and man only for rebellion.

Of his family fome account may be expected. His fifter, first married to Mr. Philips, afterwards married Mr. Agar,

a friend of her firft hufband, who fuc

Eeeded him in the Crown-office.

She

had

had by her first hufband Edward, and John, the two nephews whom Milton educated; and by her fecond, two daughters.

His brother, Sir Chriftopher, had two daughters, Mary and Catherine, and a fon Thomas, who fucceeded Agar in the Crown-office, and left a daughter, living in 1749 in Grofvenor-street.

Milton had children only by his first wife; Anne, Mary, and Deborah. Anne, though deformed, married a mafterbuilder, and died of her first child. Mary died fingle. Deborah married Abraham Clark, a weaver in Spitalfields, and lived 76 years, to Auguft 1727. This is the daughter of whom publick mention has been made. She could

1

could repeat the first lines of Homer, the Metamorphofes, and fome of Euripides, by having often read them. Yet here incredulity is ready to make a stand. Many repetitions are neceffary to fix in the memory lines not understood; and why fhould Milton with or want to hear them fo often! These lines were at the beginning of the poems. Of a book written in a language not understood, the beginning raises no more attention than the end; and as those that understand it know commonly the beginning beft, its rehearsal will feldom be neceffary. It is not likely that Milton required any paffage to be fo much repeated as that his daughter could learn it; nor likely that he defired the initial lines to be read

at