The Life of John Milton Volume 3 1643-1649 / Narrated in Connexion with the Political, Ecclesiastical, and Literary History of His Time

by David Masson

SECOND PROSECUTION OF MILTON BY THE STATIONERS' COMPANY: CONDUCT OF THE HOUSE OF LORDS IN THE CASE.

It might have been safer for Milton to let the Stationers alone. For, within five weeks after the publication of the Areopagitica, I find him again in trouble, and all by the doing of the Stationers' Company, in revenge for his past offences and this new insult. The story, as I have dug it out of the Lords' Journals, with some help from old pamphlets, is as follows:—

Monday the 9th of December, 1644, there being twenty-one Peers present, and Lord Grey of Wark in the chair, "a scandalous printed libel against the Peerage of this realm was brought into the House and read; and this House ordered, that the Master and Wardens of the Company of Stationers shall attend this House at four of the clock this afternoon, to know of them whether they do know of the print and can discover the author of it." That same afternoon, accordingly, there being now but fifteen peers present, the three gentlemen who had been sent for—Messrs. Mead, Parker, and Whittaker—appeared, and with this result: "The Master and Wardens of the Company of Stationers desired some longer time, and they will do their best endeavours to find out the printer that printed the scandalous libel brought into this House this day; and this House gave two or three days longer." On Friday the 13th of December they have not yet found either the author or the printer; but they have caught a poor fellow, George Jeffrey, apprentice to a hosier in Cornhill, who had been dispersing copies of the libel in London. Examined by the Earls of Salisbury and Kent, aided by the Judges, this George Jeffrey confesses all about it. On Monday morning last (the very day on which the Lords first discussed the subject) he had found two-and-twenty copies of the thing between the stall-boards of his master's stall, put there by he knew not whom. He had taken them into the shop, read one of them, and been so greatly amused by it that he had told his neighbours of the prize. Some of the more unruly of the neighbours had snatched at copies and carried them off, so that he had only two left. When he found that there was a hue and cry on the matter, and that he had got himself into trouble, he had done what he could. He had sent his own two remaining copies to the Lord Mayor, and had recovered six of the other copies and sent them to the Mayor too, naming the persons from whom he got them back. One was an exciseman, one an oilman; and one or two were apprentices like himself; but there was also one Thomas Heath, who was actually the Lord Mayor's kinsman. This was positively all he knew of the matter; and he could not tell where the papers came from, nor where any more were to be found. Apparently the Peers believed him, for he was discharged on his own promise to attend again if he should be called for.

The libel, however, seems to have been unusually flagrant. The Peers sent a copy of George Jeffrey's examination to the Lord Mayor, with instructions that he should both give an account of what he had already done in the business and also prosecute it farther. It is not till Dec. 26 that we hear more. On that day, two-and-twenty Peers being present, and nothing having been farther reported either by the Lord Mayor or the Stationers, it was ordered "that the Lord Mayor of London and the Printers be sent to, to give an account of the scandalous paper printed and dispersed, what they have done in discovering the Author, Printer, and Publisher." The Mayor and the Stationers still not responding, the order was repeated more peremptorily on Saturday, Dec. 28, one-and-twenty Peers being present. The gentleman-usher of the House went there and then for the two Wardens of the Stationers' Company, who forthwith appeared and gave this account: "They have used their best endeavours to find out the printer and author of the scandalous libel, but they cannot yet make any discovery thereof, the letter [type] being so common a letter; and further complained of the frequent printing of scandalous Books by divers, as Hezekiah Woodward and Jo. Milton."—Here was an extremely clever trick of Messrs. Parker and Whittaker! They were themselves in trouble for not being good detectives: what if they diverted the attention of the Peers, while they were in this angry mood, upon other objects? It is as if they said to the Peers, "It is a very hard matter sometimes to find out the authors and printers of scandalous tracts; but really the abuse has attained to frightful dimensions, and perhaps the leniency of your Lordships in cases where the authors of scandalous tracts are well enough known encourages others. Last August, for example, we took the liberty of calling the attention of the House of Commons to a Tract on Divorce by Mr. John Milton, which the Assembly unanimously condemns as containing horrid doctrine, and which Mr. Palmer denounced on that ground in the hearing of your Lordships. It was our duty to do so, because the Tractate, in any case, was unlicensed and unregistered, and therefore a violation of the Printing Ordinance. The Commons referred the subject to their Committee for Printing, but nothing appears to have been done. And now, as your Lordships have sent for us on this other matter, in which we are sorry not to have succeeded as we could have wished, allow us to mention that the same Mr. Milton has since then—in fact, only last month-put forth another pamphlet, called Areopagitica, with his name to it certainly and addressed to your Lordships and the other House, but with no printer's name, and unlicensed and unregistered, like most of its predecessors. The pamphlet contains some very injurious personal reflections on us; but we should not think of mentioning it merely on that ground. It is very bold and strange altogether, very disrespectful to the Assembly, and is an attack on the whole Ordinance for Printing which it wilfully breaks. Besides Mr. Milton there are others as bad: for instance, Mr. Hezekiah Woodward."

Who Mr. Hezekiah Woodward was the reader already, in some degree, knows. He was that old friend of Samuel Hartlib's to whom Hartlib, in Aug. 1644, had addressed a letter requesting his opinion of Edwards's Antapologia, and who had furnished that opinion, which was published, with Hartlib's letter, in the following month (antè). He must have been fond of using his pen; for I find him to have been the author of at least seven other pamphlets, published before our present date, viz. The Kings Chronicle (1643); Three Kingdoms made One (1643); The Cause, Use, and Cure of Fear (1643); A Good Soldier maintaining his Militia (1644); The Sentence from Reason and Scripture against Archbishops and Bishops, with their Curates (1644); As you were (1644); Inquiries into the Causes of our Miseries (1644). The last-named but one of these pamphlets gives at least one additional particular about Woodward. Its full title is "As you were: or a Reducing (if possibly any) seduc't ones to facing-about, turning head-front against God, by the Recrimination (so intended) upon Mr. J. G. (Pastor of the Church in Coleman Street) in point of fighting against God. By an unworthy auditor of the said (Juditious pious Divine) Master John Goodwin." This may have been the very pamphlet, or one of the pamphlets, of Woodward which the Stationers had in view when they complained of him; for it was published Nov. 13, 1644, or exactly eleven days before the Areopagitica, and it appeared anonymously and without a licence. Out of the confused wording of the title we gather that Woodward was a hearer and admirer of John Goodwin, and that the tract was intended as in some sort a vindication of that Sectary against attacks that had been made upon him in connexion more especially with a pamphlet of his entitled Theomachia. All this, though slight, is not uninteresting. It presents to us Woodward as a London citizen of what maybe called the Hartlib-Goodwin connexion, and possibly therefore known to Milton personally. He lived in Aldermanbury, and was addicted to writing pamphlets. From what I have read of them I judge him to have been a mild, hazy-headed person, with a liking for indefiniteness and elbow-room rather than Presbyterian strictness, and therefore ranking among the Sectaries, but of such small mark individually that, but for his incidental association with Milton in the business under notice, we should not now have had any particular interest in inquiring about him. For some reason or other, however, the Stationers thought him worth their hostility. Had they any trade dislike to Hartlib? It is somewhat curious that the two persons they selected to be complained against were two of Hartlib's friends. [Footnote: For particulars here about Woodward, in addition to those already given (antè pp. 230-1), my authorities are (1) The British Museum Library Catalogue: Woodward, Hezekiah; (2) The two publications named as consulted by myself, viz., Woodward's As You Were, and his joint-tract with Hartlib, A Short Letter, &c., with a large but modest answer, which last is not given in the Museum Catalogue among Woodward's publications, but came in my way in my researches for Hartlib; (3) MS. notes of Thomason in Museum copies of these two publications: viz., in the first the words "suposed to be Ezech. Woodward's," and the date "Novemb. 13, London;" in the second the date "Sept 14.">[

To resume our story from the Lords' Journals:—The device of the two Wardens for diverting the attention of the Peers was for the moment successful. The Peers on the same day (Sat. Dec. 28), as soon as the Wardens had withdrawn, passed this order: "Hereupon it is ordered, that it be referred to Mr. Justice Reeves and Mr. Justice Bacon to examine the said Woodward and Milton, and such others as the Master and Wardens of the Stationers' Company shall give information of, concerning the printing and publishing their Books and Pamphlets, and to examine also what they know concerning the Libel [the Libel against the Peers of which George Jeffrey had dispersed copies], who was the author, printer, and contriver of it; and the Gentleman-Usher shall attach the parties, and bring them before the Judges; and the Stationers are to be present at their examinations, and give evidence against them."

This was clearly a tighter action against Milton than the former one by the Commons. What came of it?—Woodward's business came up on the next Tuesday, Dec. 31, when Mr. Justice Bacon informed this House of some papers which Ezechiell Woodward [it was "Hezekiah" before] confessed he made: "Hereupon it is ordered, that Mr. Serjeant Whitfield shall peruse them over, and report them to this House; and, because the said Woodward is now in custody of the Gentleman-Usher, it is ordered, He shall be released, giving his own bond to appear before this House when he shall be summoned." Woodward's offence, it would therefore seem, was considered venial. He had nothing to do with the Libel that was the special subject of inquiry; and, though he had confessed to the authorship of some anonymous papers recently published, there seemed to be nothing formidable in them. He might go back to his house in Aldermanbury on his own recognisances. [Footnote: "Soft Answers unto Hard Censures, London 1645," is the title of a tract of Woodward's subsequent to the incident of the text, and possibly referring to it; after which I find him, so far as there is evidence, totally silent till 1656. In that year he published four new religious or politico religious pamphlets; which is the last I know of him at present.] But what of Milton? Not a word about him in the Journals of the same day. He was not in the custody of the Gentleman-Usher then at all events; and so far he had been more fortunate than Woodward. Possibly, he had had a call from the Usher in his house in Aldersgate Street on the Saturday or Monday, had accompanied him to the chambers of Mr. Justice Reeve or Mr. Justice Bacon, had confronted the Master and Wardens of the Stationers' Company there, and had there given such a satisfactory and straightforward account of his questioned pamphlets that there was no need for detaining him, or troubling him farther. Some report may have been made to the Peers by the Justices; but if so, it was of such a kind, and the Peers themselves had such information about Milton, that they thought it best to let the matter drop without the least farther mention of it. If even two or three of them had read the Areopagitica (and probably even more had), that alone would have honourably acquitted him. It appears, however, from a subsequent allusion by Milton himself, as if the Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce was still the real stumbling-block. On that subject too the Peers may have been a little liberal by this time. Was not the great Mr. Selden understood to hold opinions on Marriage and Divorce very much the same as those Mr. Milton had published? So the Peers may have reasoned for themselves; and it is not at all improbable that Selden, Vane, and others of the Lower House may have given them a hint what to do. And so the Booksellers were baulked again. Baillie and Gillespie, who did not leave London for their Scottish holiday till Jan. 6, 1644-5, may have been a little disappointed, and the Presbyterians generally. [Footnote: Authorities for this curious story are the entries in the Lords' Journals of the dates named—Vol. VII. pp. 91, 92, 97, 115, 116, and 118. The one-and-twenty Peers who were present on Saturday, Dec. 28, when the order for Milton's examination was issued were—Lord Grey of Wark, as Speaker; the Lord General the Earl of Essex; the Lord High Admiral the Earl of Warwick; Earls Rutland, Kent, Pembroke, Salisbury, Bolingbroke, Manchester, Nottingham, Northumberland, Denbigh, and Stamford; Viscount Saye and Sele; and Lords North, Montague, Howard of Escrick, Berkeley, Bruce, Willoughby of Parham, and Wharton. The same Peers, with the omission of the Earl of Northumberland and Lord Wharton, and the addition of the Earl of Suffolk (i.e. twenty Peers in all), were present on Dec. 31, when a report was made on Woodward's case, but none on Milton's.—Selden's Uxor Ebraica was published in 1646, and was then much welcomed by Milton.—That the Divines of the Westminster Assembly were at the back of this second prosecution of Milton, though the authorities of the Stationers' Company were the nominal accusers, is not only probable in itself, but is distinctly implied by Anthony Wood's reference to the affair (Fasti I. 483). "Upon the publication of the said three books of marriage and divorce," says Wood, with a slight error as to the number of the books on that subject then published, "the Assembly of Divines then sitting at Westminster took special notice of them; and thereupon, though the author had obliged them by his pen in his defence of Smectymnuus, and other their controversies had with the Bishops, they, impatient of having the clergy's jurisdiction (as they reckoned it) invaded, did, instead of answering or disproving what those books had asserted, cause him to be summoned before the House of Lords: but that House, whether approving the doctrine, or not favouring the accusers, did soon dismiss him.">[