“Domestic or Personal Liberty” 1642–1645the Doctrine, or not favoring his Accusers, soon dismiss’d him” (EL 24). A few
weeks later, Daniel Featley urged the Lords and Commons to strike the “smartest
strokes” against the “most damnable doctrines” of Williams and Overton as well
as “a Tractate of Divorce, in which the bonds of marriage are let loose to inordi-
nate lust.”^110
Milton probably worked on his last two divorce tracts at the same time and both
were published on or before March 4, 1645. Both are unlicensed, unregistered, and
without publication data, though the author is clearly identified.^111 Tetrachordon,
named for a four-stringed Greek lyre, refers to four passages in scripture dealing
with marriage and divorce which must be made to harmonize. Addressing a schol-
arly audience, this long, thoughtful argument of some 110 quarto pages develops a
detailed exegesis of the four passages and appends testimonies that concur in some
part with Milton’s views. It was written, he explains, because “some friends” who
were persuaded by the reasonings in his Doctrine and Discipline urged a more exten-
sive discussion of the scripture proofs, while others wanted “more autorities and
citations” (CPW II, 582). This tract is Milton’s most fully developed argument on
the divorce issue and related gender issues, as well as his most extensive foray into
biblical exegesis before De Doctrina Christiana. Its argument and method are dis-
cussed on pages 185–90.
A six-page preface addresses the tract to parliament, thanking them profusely for
doing nothing, despite “furious incitements,” that would “give the least interrup-
tion or disrepute either to the Author, or to the Book” (579). Now, attacked
publicly in parliament by Palmer, Milton claims the right to clear his own “honest
name” and that of his friends (581). He charges Palmer with ignorance, wicked-
ness, and impudence. By attacking Milton he also attacks the revered Bucer, as he
should have known since Milton’s translation was published a week before he
preached his sermon and months before it was published (580–1). Also, Palmer
himself elsewhere used against the king the same natural law argument about re-
voking covenants that Milton used to legitimize divorce.^112 Featley’s “late equivo-
cating treatise” he condemns as a piece of “deep prelatical malignance against the
present state.”
Daringly, he intimates that if the marriage law is not reformed men such as
himself will be justified in arranging their own divorces, if they have the “manlinesse
to expostulate the right of their due ransom, and to second their own occasions”
(585). He ends the preface with an indication that he is tiring of the seemingly
fruitless effort – “Henceforth, except new cause be giv’n, I shall say lesse and lesse”
- and a gesture to the future: “perhaps in time to come, others will know how to
esteem” his argument better. Yet given parliament’s “glorious changes and renova-
tions,” he hopes that England need wait “for no other Deliverers” (585).
Colasterion^113 (the name means “punishment”) was published at the same time as
Tetrachordon; it is a furious diatribe against the unlucky “cock-braind solliciter” who
dared to answer DDD 1 (anonymously), and the “drones nest” of clergy assisting