Notes to Chapter 142 From mid-April through June, 1649 the newsbook bore the title Mercurius Pragmaticus
(for King Charles II).
43 The council’s order of November 14 specified that he was to be released from Newgate
after taking the Engagement to support the Commonwealth. He wrote to a friend that
Bradshaw’s favor “hath once more turned the wheel of my fortune; who upon my
single letter hath been pleased to indulge me my liberty.” Blair Worden, “Milton and
Marchamont Nedham,” in David Armitage, Armand Himy and Quentin Skinner, eds,
Milton and Republicanism (Cambridge, 1995), 162.
44 Nedham’s tract, Certain Considerations (London, 1649, c. August 1) may have pleased
Milton by supporting Areopagitica’s case, though on different grounds. Nedham, with
obvious reference to his own case, argued that for reasons of civil peace and as a safety
valve for discontent the new government ought to allow publication of diverse views,
mutinous or disaffected opinion, satires and pasquils, and the like. (For the Milton–
Nedham friendship, see note 101.)
45 “Act Against Unlicensed and Scandalous Books,” Journal of the House of Commons, VI,
- Such tracts were circulating, the Act declared, “to the intolerable dishonour of the
Parliament and the whole Government of this Commonwealth.” Cf. Raymond, Inven-
tion of the Newspaper, 73–9, and Fredrick S. Siebert, Freedom of the Press in England,
1476–1776: The Rise and Decline of Government Controls (Urbana, Ill., 1952), 221–5.
46 Responsibility for oversight was shared among the clerk of the parliament (Henry Scobell),
the council’s secretary (Frost, and in a few cases, Milton), and the army secretary ( John
Rushworth).
47 The previous licenser of newsbooks, Gilbert Mabbott, was removed from his post May
22 as too lenient; one news sheet reported that he wanted to resign because he now
believed (summarizing arguments from Areopagitica) that “it is lawfull... To print any
Booke, Sheete, &c. without Licenceing, so as the Authors and Printers do subscribe
their true Names thereunto, that so they may be lyable to answer the contents thereof ”;
Perfect Diurnall, no. 304 (May 21–8, 1649), 2,531. Cf. The Kingdom’s Faithful and Impartiall
Scout, no. 18 (May 25–June 1), 143.
48 Hartlib, Ephemerides for 1650, in G. H. Turnbull, Hartlib, Dury, and Comenius: Gleanings
from Hartlib’s Papers (London, 1947), 41.
49 The first issue of the second edition almost certainly appeared before October, since the
publisher’s address on the title page is given in the form used before October, but not
after, Chronology, 102. The second and third issues appeared c. February 15, 1650.
50 Milton and the sergeant-at-arms, Edward Dendy, were authorized “both or either one”
to search his books and papers, and report on whatever they find “that may be prejuditiall
to the Commonwealth” (LR II, 268–9). Walker’s books were The History of Independ-
ency (London, 1648) and Anarchia Anglicana (London, 1649, August or September). On
November 13 he was committed to the Tower to await trial for high treason.
51 Walker, Anarchia Anglicana, 199–200.
52 The Stationers Register has this entry for the bookseller John Grismond: “Entered for
his copy under the hand of Master Milton, Secretary to the Council of State, a booke
called Histoire entiere et veritable du Proces de Charles Stuart Roy d’Anglitere, &c.” The title
page carries the publication data “London: J. g., 1650” (c. March 3).
53 The first edition appeared c. February 4, 1649; a few copies may have circulated on the
day of the king’s death. Thomason dated his copy February 9. For the text’s compli-
Notes to Chapter 8