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decree of election, and will provide in best manner for the performance of them by his authentic letters; which decree of election we, by divine aid desirous to put in execution, do send by common consent, to deliver it into the hand of the most serene elect, the most illustrious and reverend lord bishop of Cracovia, together with some senators and chief officers, and the illustrious and magnificent Benedictus Sapieha, treasurer of the court of the great dukedom of Lithuania, marshal of the equestrian order; committing to them the same degree of intimating an oath, upon the aforesaid premises, and receiving his subscription; and at length to give and deliver the same decree into the hands of the said elect, and to act and perform all other things which this affair requires: in assurance whereof the seals of the lords senators, and those of the equestrian order deputed to sign, are here affixed.

Given by the hands of the most illustrious and reverend father in Christ, the lord Andrew Olszonski, bishop of Culma and Pomisania, high-chancellor of the kingdom, in the general ordinary assembly of the kingdom, and great dukedom of Lithuania, for the election of the new king. Warsaw, the twenty-second day of May, in the year of our Lord sixteen hundred and seventy-four.

In the presence of Franciscus Praskmouski, provost of Guesna, abbot of Sieciethovia, chief secretary of the kingdom; Joannes Malachowski, abbot of Mogila, referendary of the kingdom, &c.; with other great officers of the kingdom and clergy, to the number of fourscore and two. And the rest, very many great officers, captains, secretaries, courtiers, and inhabitants of the kingdom, and great dukedom of Lithuania, gathered together at Warsaw to the present assembly of the election of the kingdom and great dukedom of Lithuania. Assistants at the solemn oath taken of his sacred majesty on the fifth day of the month of June, in the palace at Warsaw, after the letters-patents delivered upon the covenants, and agreements, or capitulations, the most reverend and excellent lord Francisco Bonvisi, archbishop of Thessalonica, apostolic nuncio; count Christopherus a Scaffgotsch, Cæcareus Tussanus de Forbin, de Jason, bishop of Marseilles in France, Joannes free-baron Hoverbec, from the marquis of Brandenburg, ambassadors, and other envoys and ministers of state.

EDITOR'S PRELIMINARY REMARKS.

THESE Epistles, originally written in Latin, are here given in the very elegant translation of Mr. Fellowes, of Oxford, who, in most instances, has happily and with much feeling entered into and expressed the views of Milton. For nobleness of sentiment, and lofty dignity of thought, no letters with which I am acquainted surpass these. They commence in youth, and, few, alas! as they are, carry us forward to a period not far removed from the writer's death. It seems to me impossible to peruse them without the deepest interest. They open to us, though doubtless much too little, a view into the every-day frame of mind, and household habits, of our great poet; and few, perhaps, will read these valued fragments of his inner life, without experiencing the sincerest regret that there should be no more of them, without perceiving with sorrow the number of the leaves decrease, and the end approaching, of what, to all who love, as I do, the memory of this great and good man, must be an enjoyment of the most perfect and exalted nature.

I.

To his Tutor, THOMAS YOUNG.

THOUGH I had determined, my excellent tutor, to write you an epistle in verse, yet I could not satisfy myself without sending also another in prose, for the emotions of my gratitude, which your services so justly inspire, are too expansive and too warm to be expressed in the confined limits of poetical metre; they demand the unconstrained freedom of prose, or rather the exuberant richness of Asiatic phraseology: though it would far exceed my power accurately to describe how much I am obliged to you, even if I could drain dry all the sources of eloquence, or exhaust all the topics of discourse which Aristotle or the famed Parisian logician has collected. You complain with truth that my letters have been very few and very short; but I do not grieve at the omission of so pleasureable a duty, so much as I rejoice at having such a place in your regard as makes you anxious often to hear from me. I beseech you not to take it amiss, that I have not now written to you for more than three years; but with your usual benignity to impute it rather to circumstances than to inclination. For Heaven knows, that I regard you as a parent, that I have always treated you with the utmost respect, and

that I was unwilling to teaze you with my compositions. And I was anxious that if my letters had nothing else to recommend them, they might be recommended by their rarity. And lastly, since the ardour of my regard makes me imagine that you are always present, that I hear your voice and contemplate your looks; and as thus (which is usually the case with lovers) I charm away my grief by the illusion of your presence, I was afraid when I wrote to you the idea of your distant separation should forcibly rush upon my mind; and that the pain of your absence, which was almost soothed into quiescence, should revive and disperse the pleasurable dream. I long since received your desirable present of the Hebrew Bible. I wrote this at my lodgings in the city, not, as usual, surrounded by my books. If, therefore, there be anything in this letter which either fails to give pleasure, or which frustrates expectation, it shall be compensated by a more elaborate composition as soon as I return to the dwelling of the muses.

London, March 26, 1625.

II.

To ALEXANDER GILL.

I RECEIVED your letters and your poem, with which I was highly delighted, and in which I discover the majesty of a poet, and the style of Virgil. I knew how impossible it would be for a person of your genius entirely to divert his mind from the culture of the muses, and to extinguish those heavenly emotions, and that sacred and ethereal fire which is kindled in your heart. For what Claudian said of himself may be said of you, your "whole soul is instinct with the fire of Apollo." If, therefore, on this occasion, you have broken your own promises, I here commend the want of constancy which you mention: I commend the want of virtue, if any want of virtue there be. But in referring the merits of your poem to my judgment, you confer on me as great an honour as the gods would if the contending musical immortals had called me in to adjudge the palm of victory; as poets babble that it formerly fell to the lot of Imolus, the guardian of the Lydian mount. I know not whether I ought to congratulate Henry Nassau more on the capture of the city, or the compo

sition of your poems. For I think that this victory produced nothing more entitled to distinction and to fame than your poem. But since you celebrate the successes of our allies in lays so harmonious and energetic, what may we not expect when our own successes call for the congratulations of your muse? Adieu, learned sir, and believe me greatly obliged by the favour of your verses.

London, May 26, 1628.

III.

To the same.

In my former letter I did not so much answer yours as deprecate the obligation of then answering it; and therefore at the time I tacitly promised that you should soon receive another, in which I would reply at length to your friendly challenge. But, though I had not promised this, it would most justly be your due, since one of your letters is full worth two of mine, or rather, on an accurate computation, worth a hundred. When your letter arrived, I was strenuously engaged in that work concerning which I had given you some obscure hints, and the execution of which could not be delayed. One of the fellows of our college, who was to be the respondent in a philosophical disputation for his degree, engaged me to furnish him with some verses, which are annually required on this occasion; since he himself had long neglected such frivolous pursuits, and was then intent on more serious studies. Of these verses I sent you a printed copy, since I knew both your discriminating taste in poetry, and your candid allowances for poetry like mine. If you will in your turn deign to communicate to me any of your productions, you will, I can assure you, find no one to whom they will give more delight, or who will more impartially endeavour to estimate their worth. For as often as I recollect the topics of your conversation, (the loss of which I regret even in this seminary of erudition,) I cannot help painfully reflecting on what advantages I am deprived by your absence, since I never left your company without an increase of knowledge, and always had recourse to your mind as to an emporium of literature. Among us, as far as I know, there are only two or three, who without any acquaintance with criticism or philosophy,

do not instantly engage with raw and untutored judgments in the study of theology; and of this they acquire only a slender smattering, not more than sufficient to enable them to patch together a sermon with scraps pilfered, with little discrimination, from this author and from that. Hence I fear lest our clergy should relapse into the sacerdotal ignorance of a former age. Since I find so few associates in study here, I should instantly direct my steps to London, if I had not determined to spend the summer vacation in the depths of literary solitude, and, as it were, hide myself in the chamber of the muses. As you do this every day, it would be injustice in me any longer to divert your attention or engross your time. Adieu.

Cambridge, July 2, 1628.

IV.

TO THOMAS YOUNG.

ON reading your letter, my excellent tutor, I find only one superfluous passage, an apology for not writing to me sooner; for though nothing gives me more pleasure than to hear from you, how can I or ought I to expect that you should always have leisure enough from more serious and more sacred engagements to write to me; particularly when it is kindness, and not duty, which prompts you to write? Your many recent services must prevent me from entertaining any suspicion of your forgetfulness or neglect. Nor do I see how you could possibly forget one on whom you had conferred so many favours. Having an invitation into your part of the country in the spring, I shall readily accept it, that I may enjoy the deliciousness of the season as well as that of your conversation; and that I may withdraw myself for a short time from the tumult of the city to your rural mansion, as to the renowned portico of Zeno, or Tusculan of Tully, where you live on your little farm, with a moderate fortune, but a princely mind; and where you practise the contempt, and triumph over the temptations of ambition, pomp, luxury, and all that follows the chariot of fortune, or attracts the gaze and admiration of the thoughtless multitude. I hope that you who deprecated the blame of delay, will pardon me for my precipitance; for after deferring this letter to the last, I chose

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