Ittttro to tht tititor.
Q-Aldego's TH233.ISOEHE1IT.
lower' Street, .5th November 1864.
Sin—In your article of yesterday, on Mr. Cunningham's edition of John- son's Lives of the Poets, you point out correctly the misstatement of John- son in speaking of-Milton's visiting: Galileo, "then a prisoner in the In- quisition." You will perhaps permit me to observe, that Johnson's mistake arose from his inadvertently altering Milton's own phrase on the subject in one little preposition, which, although it makes the whole difference as to the precise correctness of Milton's statement, probably, appeared unimport- ant-to Johnson, from his not being acquainted withall the details of Galileo's punishment. The words of Milton, to be foued in his Speech for the Liberty, of Un- licensed Printing, are as follows—" There it was that I found and visited the famous Galileo, groWe old, a prisoner to the Tp.quisition, for thinking in astronomy otherwise than the Franciscan and Domuucan licensers thought."
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