on the wider question of the general
responsibility of kings, sound and noble in themselves, suffer from the
mass of irrelevant quotation with which it was in that age necessary to
prop them up. The great success of his reply ("Pro Populo Anglicano
Defensio") arose mainly from the general satisfaction that Salmasius
should at length have met with his match. The book, published in or
about March, 1651, instantly won over European public opinion, so far as
the question was a literary one. Every distinguished foreigner then
resident in London, Milton says, either called upon him to congratulate
him, or took the opportunity of a casual meeting. By May, says Heinsius,
five editions were printed or printing in Holland, and two translations.
"I had expected nothing of such quality from the Englishman," writes
Vossius. The Diet of Ratisbon ordered "that all the books of Miltonius
should be searched for and confiscated." Parisian magistrates burned it
on their own responsibility. Salmasius himself was then at Stockholm,
where Queen Christina, who did not, like Catherine II., recognize the
necessity of "standing by her order," could not help letting him see
that she regarded Milton as the victor. Vexation, some thought,
contributed as much as climate to determine his return to Holland. He
died in September, 1653, at Spa, as, remote from books, but making his
memory his library, he was penning his answer. This unfinished
production, edited by his son, appeared after the Restoration, when the
very embers of the controversy had grown cold, and the palm of literary
victory had been irrevocably adjudged to Milton.

Milton could hear the plaudits, he could not see the wreaths. The total
loss of his sight may be dated from March, 1652, a year after the
publication of his reply. It was then necessary to provide him with an
assistant--that no change should have been made in his position or
salary shows either the value attached to his services or the feeling
that special consideration was due to one who had voluntarily given his
eyes for his country. "The choice lay before me," he writes, "between
dereliction of a supreme duty and loss of eyesight; in such a case I
could not listen to the physician, not if AEsculapius himself had spoken
from his sanctuary; I could not but obey that inward monitor, I know not
what, that spoke to me from heaven." In September, 1654, he described
the symptoms of his infirmity to his friend, the Greek Philaras