PREFACE. THE period comprised in this volume extends from the year 1632 to the Restoration; and although, in the case of Milton, Clarendon, and a few minor writers, it has appeared necessary to give some account of literary productions belonging chronologically to the Restoration period, no attempt has been made to supply any general survey of those times, which have already been dealt with in an earlier volume of this series on The Age of Dryden. The writer makes, for the most part, little claim to originality—for which, indeed, the publication of Professor Masson's Life and Times of Milton has left but small scope. To that work, and to not a few others dealing with the period, the author's indebtedness will be sufficiently apparent. It has been impossible, in an introductory manual like the present, to treat at all fully of those political events with which the literary history of the period is so closely connected. Fortunately, the student who wishes to know more about these has now, in the work of Dr. S. R. Gardiner, a rich storehouse of information. The best that can be hoped of a volume of this kind is that it may excite in its readers such an interest in the period and its literature as shall lead at least some of them to the perusal of larger and more detailed works, and to an independent study of the great writers of the period. The writer's warmest acknowledgments are due for the advice and assistance he has received from Mr. J. Bass Mullinger, who, besides contributing an Introduction and the sections on Cowley, Hacket, Falkland, and the Cambridge Platonists, has revised the entire work both in manuscript and in proof. To the suggestions which he has offered, the writer has throughout been largely indebted. He also desires to express his thanks to Professor Hales for assistance very kindly afforded in connexion with various points. DEVONPORT, March, 1897. J. HOWARD B. MASTERMAN. Clarendon May Minor Historical Writers - Bio- CHAPTER XI. HOBBES AND THE CAMBRIDGE PLATONISTS 212 INTRODUCTION. THE age in which John Milton lived and wrote was one of unprecedented change and revolution. Opinion and belief, theory and practice, alike in politics, science, and theology, passed through a series of mutations with respect to which previous history and national experience afforded but little guidance and no parallel. The royal power, wielded with so much dignity by the last of the Tudors, was extinguished on the scaffold. The priestly power, albeit adorned with saintly virtues, great erudition and commanding eloquence, was overthrown and silenced. The royal heir became an exile in the Old World, a wanderer on the face of the earth. Many of the best and bravest of his father's subjects were in exile in the New World-fugitives across the ocean for faith and liberty, to raise amid virgin forests and by silent unknown rivers the temple and the psalm. At home there was everywhere strife, war, and revolution; the press teemed with controversial pamphlets; from north and south, from east and west, men hastened to decide their differences on the field of battle; while in the seats of learning ancient traditions and venerated names were repudiated and ignored, and the schismatic of yesterday appeared as the authorized instructor of to-day. We have to remember that John Milton not only witnessed all these widespread and radical changes, but that he lived to see |