He was then fent to St. Paul's School, under the care of Mr. Gill, and removed, in the beginning of his fixteenth year, to Chrift's College in Cambridge, where he entered a fizar *, Feb. 12, 1624. He was at this time eminently fkilled in the Latin tongue; and he himself, by annexing the dates to his first compofitions, a boaft of which Politian had given him an example, feems to commend the earlinefs of his own proficiency to the notice of pofterity. But the products of his vernal fertility have been furpaffed by many, and particularly by his contemporary Cowley. Of the powers of the mind it is difficult to form an estimate: many have excelled Milton in their first effays, who never rofe to works like Paradife Loft. At fifteen, a date which he ufes till he is fixteen, he tranflated or verfified two Pfalms, 114 and 136, which he thought worthy of the publick eye; but they raise no great expectations: they would in any numerous fchool have obtained praife, but not excited wonder. Many of his elegies appear to have been written. in his eighteenth year, by which it appears that he had then read the Roman authors with very nice dif I once heard Mr. Hampton, the tranflator of Polybius, remark what I think is true, that cernment. In this affertion Dr. Johnson was mistaken. Milton was admitted a penfioner, and not a fizar, as will appear by the fol lowing extract from the College Regifter: "Johannes Milton "Londinenfis, filius Johannis, inftitutus fuit in literarum elementis "fub Mag'ro Gill Gymnafii Paulini præfecto, admiffus eft Penfio"narius Minor Feb. 12°, 1624, fub M'ro Chappell, folvitq. pro "Ingr. £.0 105. od." R. Milton was the firft Englishman who, after the revival of Letters, wrote Latin verfes with claffick elegance. If any exceptions can be made, they are very few: Haddon and Ascham, the pride of Elizabeth's reign, however they have fucceeded in prose, no fooner attempt verfe than they provoke derifion. If we produced any thing worthy of notice before the elegies of Milton, it was perhaps Alabafter's Roxana*. Of these exercises, which the rules of the Univerfity required, fome were published by him in his maturer years. They had been undoubtedly applauded; for they were fuch as few can form; yet there is reafon to fufpect that he was regarded in his college with no great fondness. That he obtained no fellowship is certain; but the unkindness with which he was treated was not merely negative. I am afhamed to relate what I fear is true, that Milton was one of the last students in either univerfity that fuffered the pub. lick indignity of corporal correction. It was, in the violence of controverfial hoftility, objected to him, that he was expelled: this he fteadily denies, and it was apparently not true; but it seems plain from his own verfes to Diodati, that he had incurred Ruftication, a temporary difiniffion into the country, with perhaps the lofs of a term. Me tenet urbs refluâ quam Thamefis alluit undâ, -- Jam nec arundiferum mihi cura revisere Camum, Published 1632. R. Si fit hoc exilium patrias adiiffe penates, Et vacuum curis otia grata fequi, I cannot find any meaning but this, which even kindness and reverence can give to the term, vetiti laris, "a habitation from which he is excluded;" or how exile can be otherwise interpreted. He declares yet more, that he is weary of enduring the threats of a rigorous mafter, and something else, which a temper like his cannot undergo. What was more than threat was probably punishment. This poem, which mentions his exile, proves likewife that it was not perpetual; for it concludes with a refolution of returning fome time to Cambridge. And it may be conjectured, from the willingness with which he has perpetuated the memory of his exile, that its cause was such as gave him no fhame. He took both the ufual degrees; that of Batchelor in 1623, and that of Master in 1532; but he left the univerfity with no kindness for its inftitution, alienated either by the injudicious feverity of his governors, or his own captious perverfenefs. The caufe cannot now be known, but the effect appears in his writings. His fcheme of education, infcribed to Hartlib, fuperfedes all academical inftruction, being intended to comprise the whole time which men ufually spend in literature, from their entrance upon grammar, till they proceed, as it is called, Mafters of Arts. And in his Discourse on the likelieft Way to remove Hirelings out of the Church, he ingenuously 2 nuously proposes, that the profits of the lands forfeited by the act for fuperftitious ufes, fhould be applied to fuch academies all over the land where languages and arts may be taught together; fo that youth may be at once brought up to a competency of learning and an honeft trade, by which means fuch of them as had the gift, being enabled to fupport themselves (without tithes) by the latter, may, by the help of the former, become worthy preachers. One of his objections to academical education, as it was then conducted, is, that men defigned for orders in the Church were permitted to act plays, writhing and unboning their clergy limbs to all the antick and difhoneft gestures of Trincalos *, buffoons, and bawds, proftituting the fhame of that miniftry which they had, or were near having, to the eyes of courtiers and courtladies, their grooms and mademoifelles. This is fufficiently peevish in a man, who, when he mentions his exile from the college, relates, with great luxuriance, the compenfation which the pleasures of the theatre afford him. Plays were therefore only criminal when they were acted by academicks. He went to the univerfity with a design of entering into the church, but in time altered his mind; for he declared, that whoever became a clergyman must subscribe flave, and take an oath withal, * By the mention of this name, he evidently refers to Albu mazar, acted at Cambridge in 1614. Ignoramus and other plays. were performed at the fame time. The practice was then very frequent. The last dramatick performance at either university was The Grateful Fair, written by Christopher Smart, and reprefented at Pembroke College, Cambridge, about 1747. · R. "which, "which, unless he took with a confcience that could "not retch, he must straight perjure himself. He thought it better to prefer a blameless filence "before the office of speaking, bought and begun "with fervitude and forfwearing." Thefe expreffions are, I find, applied to the fub. fcription of the Articles; but it seems more probable that they relate to canonical obedience. I know not any of the Articles which feem to thwart his opinions: but the thoughts of obedience, whether canonical or civil, raised his indignation. His unwillingness to engage in the ministry, perhaps not yet advanced to a fettled refolution of declining it, appears in a letter to one of his friends, who had reproved his fufpended and dilatory life, which he feems to have imputed to an infatiable curiosity, and fantastick luxury of various knowledge. To this he writes a cool and plaufible answer, in which he endeavours to perfuade him, that the delay proceeds not from the delights of defultory study, but from the defire of obtaining more fitnefs for his tafk; and that he goes on, not taking thought of being late, fo it gives advantage to be more fit. When he left the univerfity, he returned to his father, then refiding at Horton in Buckinghamshire, with whom he lived five years, in which time he is faid to have read all the Greek and Latin writers. With what limitations this univerfality is to be underftood, who fhall inform us? It might be fuppofed, that he who read fo much fhould have done nothing else; but Milton found time to write the Mafque of Comus, which was prefented at Ludlow, then the refidence of the Lord Pre |