“Our Expiring Libertie” 1658–1660costs of publication himself. All the other radical tracts published in the final weeks
before the Restoration were anonymous, but Milton boldly inscribed his title page
with that very familiar phrase “The author J. M.” and took entire responsibility for
the work, “Printed for the author.”^112 It was a last brave, defiant gesture, taken in
full awareness that he might have been signing his death warrant. The revised edi-
tion is very rare; only a few copies survive.^113 Milton’s explanation for the new
edition – that he wanted to correct some faults due to hasty publication and took
the occasion to enlarge his argument – is a familiar rhetorical topos. He wanted in
fact to address some other audiences: his degenerate countrymen crying out for the
king, the remaining staunch supporters of a Commonwealth, possibly Lambert’s
army in the field, and the Convention Parliament which, he tries to believe, may
listen to sound “counsel from any in a time of public deliberation” (408). He feels
bound to do what he can, up to the last possible moment of decision, hoping that
God may open enough minds to the force of his argument and stir up a remnant of
lovers of liberty to resist a Stuart restoration. Milton now proposes that the Con-
vention Parliament cast itself as the permanent Supreme Council. The deletions
and the extensive additions in the new version^114 are often rhetorically motivated,
to appeal to the several groups he would persuade, although many passages restate
forcefully his core beliefs. Most references to the Rump Parliament are, naturally,
deleted. Several changes address the Presbyterians in and out of parliament, inviting
their moral revulsion for the vices of the court they seek to restore; others incorpo-
rate some Harringtonian features; still others justify a minority in using force to
preserve their freedom – in an effort, perhaps, to marshal support for Lambert’s
uprising. Milton also expands upon his earlier provisions for local autonomy in
education, justice, law, legislation, and control of the militia, describing such a
federal system as a hedge against tyranny and as a means to shape a republican
culture. Most important, now as always, is that “a few main matters” be put speed-
ily in execution, and that the new parliament become a perpetual Grand Council.
It was, of course, hopeless: in the latest additions to the opening and concluding
paragraphs Milton voiced his fear that these would be “the last words of our expir-
ing liberty.” The complex rhetoric and politics of this tract are discussed on pages
389–97.
Milton probably sent copies to a few sympathetic members of parliament: only
16 Rump Parliament members were reelected amid a sea of Presbyterians and roy-
alists. On May 1 parliament heard the King’s Declaration at Breda read, with its
promises of toleration and general amnesty except for those designated for punish-
ment by parliament. They immediately voted that England’s government is and
ought to be by King, Lords, and Commons, sparking a night of revelry which
Milton surely heard with dread and dismay. About this time he realized that his
money might be lost; he had invested most of his savings from his salary as secretary
(about £2,000) in excise bonds, but it was already too late to convert these into
cash. On May 5 he transferred at least one of these bonds, and perhaps all of them,