Notes to Chapter 1unknown addressee, reports the story told to him by Davenant’s son: “when his father
was in the tower he was very much assisted by Mr. Milton in gaining his Liberty, & if
I am not very much mistaken he at the same time told me his father in return upon ye
restoration was very helpfull to Milton, & Milton was very acknowledging for it &
uppon that score offered his assistance in doing any thing that should be grateful to Sr
William.” For Milton’s aid to Davenant, see chapter 9, p. 288, and note 53.
8 Annesley, soon to be Earl of Anglesey, was a leader in the Commons and a prime
mover in the Restoration; Edward Phillips writes that he was on intimate terms with
Milton later, “as much coveting his society and converse” (EL 76). See chapter 14, pp.
491, 495.
9 Commons Journal VIII, 66. The resolution was duly reported in the news sheets: Mercurius
Publicus 25 ( June 14–21, 1660), 391, and The Parliamentary Intelligencer 26 ( June 18–25,
1660), 401–2.
10 A Proclamation for... suppressing of two Books, SP 45/11, p. 14.
11 Mercurius Publicus 33 (August 9–16, 1660), 534–5; the proclamation is summarized in
The Parliamentary Intelligencer 34 (August 13–20, 1660), 538.
12 The Parliamentary Intelligencer (September 3–10), 589, reports the burning “This Week”
as does Mercurius Publicus (September 6–13), 578. Leo Miller in “The Burning of Milton’s
Books in 1660: Two Mysteries,” English Literary Renaissance 18 (1988), 424–37, argues
plausibly that the absence of Milton’s gift books (see chapter 7, pp. 206, 209–10) from
the Bodleian catalogues of 1674 and 1738 and their subsequent reappearance indicates
that they were hidden away in 1660 to save them. If there were copies of Milton’s
books at Cambridge University, as seems likely though there is no record of his sending
them, they were perhaps burnt according to this edict, as none presently there date
from that time.
13 “An Act of Free and General Pardon, Indemnity, and Oblivion,” Anno Regni Caroli II
... XII (August 29, 1660); Commons Journal VIII, 139–40; Lords Journal XL, 146–8.
14 Ibid.
15 Gilbert Burnet, History of My Own Time, ed. Osmund Airy, 2 vols (Oxford, 1897), vol.
1, 163.
16 [George Starkey], Britain’s Triumph, for her Imparallel’d Deliverance (London, 1660), broad-
side. In his signed tract, Royal and other Innocent Bloud crying... for due vengeance (Lon-
don, 1660, c. June 18), 18, he demanded vengeance for Milton’s glorification of traitors
and murderers in the Defensio.
17 A Third Conference Between O. Cromwell and Hugh Peters in Saint James’s Park (London,
1660). L’Estrange, Apology (c. June 6), repeated his earlier attacks (see chapter 11, pp.
377–80).
18 David Lloyd, Eikon Basilike. Or the True Portraiture of his Sacred Majesty Charls the II in
Three Books (London, 1660), II, 65; it was published with a different title page under the
initials R. F. The Picture of the Good Old Cause (London, 1660. c. July 14) mentions
Milton prominently as an example of God’s judgments, “struck totally blind, he being
not much above 40 years old.”
19 Collonel Baker, The Blazing-Star... Or, Nolls Nose. Newly Revived, and taken out of his
Tomb (London, 1660), 5.
20 Salmasius His Dissection and Confutation of the Diabolical Rebel Milton, in his Impious Doc-
trines of Falshood, Maxims of Policies... [which] by reason of the rigid Inquisition after Persons
Notes to Chapter 12