tions to a Reader's easy progress which have grown up in a series of years and overspread many places once sufficiently obvious. To remove, for so much, these discouragements is the Editor's hope in the present Republication. Occasional explanation of uncommon words and phrases, and of allusions to particular circumstances which through the intermediate distance of time are become obscure, and will seldom be understood without a key; as well as notices on personal touches, which have lost their point from age, must be always convenient. Perhaps there is no English Authour of the same standing who demands glossarial and explanatory comment more frequently than MILTON. He was of "amplitude of “mind to greatest deeds:" while with him Genius and Industry, by a rare felicity, walked hand in hand. Blessed with this character of mind he was never remiss when he believed, that it might be conducive to the general welfare to exercise his thoughts and his pen on temporary topics; and if, as in this defence of an unlicensed Press, the theme were of permanent and vital importance, he was a spec tator of the striking and extraordinary scenes continually passing before him, of a complexion much too ardent for his thoughts to escape all tinge from them, which now darkening his sense renders elucidation acceptable. Exclusive, moreover, of phraseology which the mutations of language have made obsolete, he delighted in recondite meanings and in far-sought illustration. Sometimes, it may be, in ostentation of the intellectual wealth he possessed; "His was the treasure of two thousand years:" sometimes possibly forgetting how few have arisen so intimately conversant with Letters, sacred and profane, as himself, or to whom the whole range of human Science equally familiar. "He knew each lane, and every alley green, "His daily walks, and ancient neighbourhood." was THOMSON'S PREFACE. THERE is no need of a Preface to recommend this admirable Defence of the best of human Rights, to any one who has ever heard of the divine MILTON; and it is impossible to produce better Arguments, or to set them in a more convincing, awakening Light. Is it possible that any free-born Briton, who is capable of thinking, can ever lose all sense of Religion and Virtue, and of the dignity of human Nature to such a degree, as to wish for that uni versal Ignorance, Darkness, and Barbarity, against which the absolute Freedom of the Press is the only preservative? For what else spreads Light, or diffuses Knowlege through the World? But it seems, as a sense of the value of Health is sometimes lost in the midst of its full enjoyment; so Men, through a habit of Liberty, may become insensible of its inestimable worth: otherwise would not f 1 every one awake, rouse himself, and say, when the most dear and valuable of all the Privileges, that Government is designed to protect, is menaced, that he will sooner part with Life itself, than with that Liberty, without which Life is not worth the having: that he will sooner suffer his eyes to be put out, than his Understanding to be extinguished. We are told in History, of a' People, that after they had been inured to Slavery, were in a panick fear, when their Liberty was offered to them. And this terrible effect of Slavery ought to make every Lover of Mankind tremble at the Thoughts of any steps or approaches toward the diminution of Liberty. "For without it," as Homer has told us, "Men soon cease to be Men: "they soon cease to be rational Creatures"." 1 We are told in History of a People, &c.] The Cappadocians; 'see Strabo; p. 815. fol. Amstel. 1707. For without it, as Homer has told us, Men soon cease to be Men: they soon cease to be rational creatures.] Thomson, we must conjecture, intended a paraphrase on the following couplet, Ήμισυ γάρ τ' ἀρετῆς ἀποαίνυται εὐρύοπα Ζεὺς Odyss. XVII. 322. At least he approaches nearer to this than to any other passage Now without the absolute unbounded Freedom of Writing and Publishing, there is no Liberty; no shadow of it: it is an empty sound. For what can Liberty mean, if it does not mean, the Liberty of exercising, improving and informing our Understandings? "A People have Liberty," said a truly good King of England, "when they are free as "Thought is free3." "What is it that makes a City, which my mind recurs to in Homer; who, contrary to the practice of the dramatic Poets of Greece, scattered his you, or sententious thoughts, with a sparing hand. This generous distich, for the important truth it inculcates, has been cited by a succession of Writers from Plato to Franklin; so often that, compressed into a single line, it has almost become a proverbial adage. 3 A People have Liberty, said a truly good King of England, when they are free as thought is free.] A lofty sentiment, which resembles so strongly the style of a popular Oratour in our own day, that we should never expect to meet with it in the Will of an Anglo-Saxon King. To Alfred, it has, however, been ascribed by most of his Biographers, and has passed on Tyrrel, Hume, and others of our national Historians as authentic. I find it to originate in the misconception, or perhaps in the license, of the Translator of this curious record into Latin; see App. II. of Wise's Edition of Sir J. Spelman's Latin Life of Alfred: or Asser's Life of Alfred: "Et mecum tota nobilitas "West Saxonicæ gentis pro recto jure consentiunt; quod me "oportet dimittere eos ita liberos, sicut in homine cogitatio ipsius "consistit." p. 80. 8vo. 1722. Oxon. According to Tyrrell (Hist. of England; I. 310. fol. 1698.) this Translation was made by Asser Menevensis. Whoever was f 2 |