old, at which age Aubrey affirms " he was a poet," as having been executed in order to operate as a powerful incentive to the future exertion of the infant author. This supposition is very probable: And, as the portrait was drawn by a painter " then rifing into fame, and whose price for a head was five broad pieces, the mark of encouragement was rendered more handfome and more confpicuous.

From the tuition of Mr. Young, Milton was removed to St. Paul's School, under the care of • Alexander Gill, who at that time was the master; to whose son, who was then usher and afterwards master, and with whom Milton was a favourite scholar, are addressed, in friendship, three of the poet's Latin epistles. There is no regifter of admiffions into St. Paul's School fo far back as the beginning of the feventeenth century. But, as Milton's domeftick preceptor quitted England in 1623, it is probable that he was then admitted into that feminary; at which time he was in his fifteenth year. He had already studied with uncommon avidity; but at the fame time with fuch inattention to his health,

Jansen's first works in England are faid to be dated about 1618; the year, in which the young poet's portrait was drawn, See Walpole's Anecdotes of Painting, Works, vol. iii. p. 149. edit. 1798.

• See the first Note on the first Elegy, vol. vi. p. 174.

As I found, upon inquiry of the Rev. Dr. Roberts, the prefent Head-Master.

feldom retiring from his books before midnight, that the fource of his blindness may be traced to his early paffion for letters. In his twelfth year, as a he tells us, this literary devotion began; from which he was not to be deterred either by the natural debility of his eyes, or by his frequent head-aches. The union of genius and application in the fame person was never more confpicuous.

In 1623 he produced his first poetical at*tempts, the Translations of the 114th and 1 36tb Pfalms, to which, as to fome other juvenile productions, he has annexed the date of his age. It has been uncandidly supposed, that he intended, by this method, to obtrude the earliness of his own proficiency on the notice of posterity. Dr. Johnfon calls it a boaft, of which Politian

“

Pater me puerulum humaniorum literarum studiis desti. navit; quas ita avidè arripui, ut ab anno ætatis duodecimo vix unquam ante mediam noctam à lucubrationibus cubitum difce. derem, quæ prima oculorum pernicies fuit, quorum ad naturalem debilitatem accefferant et crebi capitis dolores; quæ omnia cùm difcendi impetum non retardarent, et in ludo literario, et fub aliis domi magiftris erudiendum quotidiè curavit." Def. fec. ut fupr.

Aubrey also relates, that "when Milton went to schoole, and when he was very younge, he studied very hard, and fate up very late, commonly till twelve or one o clock; and his father ordered the maid to fett up for him." MS. Ashmol. Muf. ut fupr. His early reading was in poetical books. See the Notes on the Translations of the 114th and 136th Pfalms in the fixth volume of this edition. Humphry Lownes, a printer, living in the same street with his father, supplied him at least with Spenfer and Sylvester's Du Bartas.

has given him an example." But both Milton and Politian have followed classical authority. Lucanthus speaks of himself:

" Est mihi, crede, meis animus conftantior annis, " Quamvis nunc juvenile decus mihi pingere malas " Cœperit, et nondum vicefima venerit æstas."

However, in these Translations may surely be difcerned the dawning of real genius. And in his poem, On the death of a fair Infant, written soon after, how finely has that genius grown even with his little growth! For, as a poetical composition, it displays the vigour and judgement of maturer life; while, by its sensibility, it powerfully affects the feeling mind. The verses also, At a Vacation Exercise in the College, written at the age of nineteen, have been repeatedly and justly noticed as containing indications of the future bard, "whose genius was equal to a fubject that carried him beyond the limits of the

world."

Few readers will be inclined to admit that Cowley and other poets have furpassed, in " products of vernal fertility," the efforts of Milton. Few will regard, without aversion, the unfair, I had almost said (confidering the age in which Milton lived) the ridiculous, comparison of

• Lucanus de seipfo, in Panegyrico ad Calpurnium Pifonem, Epigr. & Poem. Vet, Paris, 1590, p. 121.

• In the Biograph. Brit. vol. iv, p. 591. edit. Kippis.

Milton's juvenile effusions with those of Chat terton. Milton, as he is the most learned of modern poets, may perhaps retain his princely rank also in the list of those who have written valuable pieces at as early or an earlier age; and Politian, Taffo, Cowley, Metastafio, Voltaire, and Pope, may bow to him, " as to fuperiour Spirits is due."

In the 17th year of his age, diftinguished as a classical scholar, and converfant in several languages, he was fent, from St. Paul's School, to Cambridge; and was admitted a Penfioner at Chrift's College on the 12th of February, 1624-5 under the tuition of Mr. William Chappel, afterwards Bishop of Cork and Ross in Ireland. Here he attracted particular notice by his acade mical exercises, as well as by several copies of verses, both Latin and English, upon occafional fubjects. He neglected indeed no part of literature, although his chief object seems to have been the cultivation of his poetical abilities.

"This good hap I had from a careful education," he says; to be inured and feafoned betimes with the best and eleganteft authors of the learned tongues; and thereto brought an ear that

"Johannes Milton, Londinenfis, filius Johannis, institutus fuit in Literarum elementis sub Mag. Gill, Gymnafii Paulini Præfecto, admissus est Pensionarius Minor Feb. 12°. 1624, fub Mr. Chappell, solvitque pro Ingr. 0. 10. 8." Extract from the College Registers

could measure a just cadence, and scan without articulating; rather nice and humorous in what was tolerable, than patient to read every drawling verfifier."

To his eminent skill, at this time, in the Latin tongue Dr. Johnfon affords his tribute of commendation. 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 nice difcernment. I once heard Mr. Hampton, the tranflator of Polybius, remark, what I think is true, that Milton was the first Englishman who, after the revival of letters, wrote Latin verses with claffic elegance." Milton's Latin exercises, which he recited publickly, are alfo marked with characteristick animation. From fome remarkable passages in these, as Mr. Hayley observes, it appears "that he was first an object of partial feverity, and afterwards of general admiration, in his college. He had differed in opinion concerning a plan of academical studies with fome persons of authority in his College, and thus excited their difpleasure. He speaks of them as highly incenfed against him; but expresses, with the most liberal sensibility, his surprise, delight, and gratitude, in finding that his enemies forgot their animofity to honour him with unexpected applause."

But incidents unfavourable to the character of Milton, while a student at Cambridge, have been