Page:The Lives of the Most Eminent English Poets, Volume 1.djvu/139

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MILTON.
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sent away a colle&tion of music and other books, travelled to Geneva, which he probably considered as the metropolis of orthodoxy.

Here he reposed, as in a congenial element, and became acquainted with John Diodati and Frederick Spanheim, two learned professors of Divinity. From Geneva he passed through France; and came home, after an absence of a year and three months. At his return he heard of the death of his friend Charles Diodati; a man whom it is reasonable to suppose of great merit, since he was thought by Milton worthy of a poem, intituled, Epitaphium Damonis, written with the common but childish imitation of pastoral life.

He now hired a lodging at the house of one Russel, a tailor in St. Bride's Churchyard, and undertook the education of John and Edward Philips, his sister's sons. Finding his rooms too little, he took a house and garden in Aldersgate-street[1], which was

was
  1. This is inaccurately expressed: Philips, and Dr. Newton after him, say a garden house, i.e. a house situ-
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ate