Notes to Chapter 184 See chapter 7, p. 199, and note 5.
85 Masson, V, 230–5. Robert Boyle, the experimental chemist, was an active member of
the Hartlib circle and of the so called “Invisible College” of scholars and scientists,
especially those interested in scientific experiments. Another brother was Roger Boyle,
Lord Broghill, president of Cromwell’s Council in Ireland and soon to be author of
several poems and plays.
86 Declaration of the Lord General... Shewing the Grounds and Reasons for the dissolution of
the late Parliament (London, 1653, c. April 22), 6.
87 The exact provisions of the Bill are not known as Cromwell carried it away with him
when he dissolved the House. See Worden, Rump Parliament, 332–4.
88 Edmund Ludlow, Memoirs, ed. C. H. Firth, 2 vols (Oxford, 1894), I, 351–3. Ludlow
drew on varioue eye-witness accounts.
89 Whitelocke, Memorials, IV, 5.
90 Ludlow, Memoirs, I, 353
91 Ibid., 357.
92 The army issued its first explanatory Declaration of the reasons for the dissolution on
April 22; a second and third Declaration were published on May 3. See Cromwell,
Writings and Speeches, ed. Abbott, III, 5–8, 21.
93 Ibid., 64.
94 Secret exchanges of letters, initiated by the Dutch before the Rump Parliament dis-
solved, culminated in arrangements for the new embassy to England. None of these
letters are Milton’s. See Miller, Anglo-Dutch Negotiations, 70–2.
95 Ibid., 72–3, 278–93.
96 A letter for the council to Frederick, Duke of Holstein (July 26) dealt with the Safe-
guard being negotiated for that state, modeled on the one Milton had prepared for
Oldenburg. It was approved by parliament on December 1. Milton may or may not
have been involved with the revisions tailoring the Safeguard to Holstein, but the
document was substantially his. See Miller, Oldenburg Safeguard, 274–6. At some point
during these months Milton translated letters, nearly identical, from the council to the
Marquis of Leida and to the Spanish ambassador Cardenas complaining that an English
ship was seized at Ostend and its sailors treated barbarously (LR III, 304–5).
97 Milton’s translation was completed October 8, but held to be given to the envoy at his
return. The text and the complicated history of the Swiss letters (December 13, 1652
and February 13, 1653) and this much-delayed English reply are in CPW V.2, 660–6.
98 Psalm 2 is dated August 8, 1653 and the following psalms on succeeding days, ending
with August 15. Milton gave only the year date, 1653, to Psalm 1, but it was almost
certainly translated at about this time. They were first printed in Poems 1673, from
which all quotations are taken.
99 Mary Ann Radzinowicz, Toward Samson Agonistes (Princeton, NJ, 1978), 198–208,
points to the strong ethical thrust in Milton’s choice of psalms and use of psalmic
materials.
100 The relevant verse (5) in the AV is: “Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the
judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.”
101 Late in 1652 two German dissertations attacking the Defensio were published: James
Schaller (with response by Erhard Kieffer), Dissertationis ad quaedam loca Miltoni (Strass-
burg) and Caspar Ziegler, Circa Regicidium Anglorum Exercitationes (Leipzig). LR III,
Notes to Chapter 9