What I was, if any one asked, I
concealed from no one; if any one in the very city of the Pope
attacked the orthodox religion, I defended it most freely." Beyond the
statement that the English Jesuits were indignant, we hear of no evil
consequences of this imprudence. Perhaps the Jesuits saw that Milton
was of the stuff that would welcome martyrdom, and were sick of the
affair of Galileo, which had terribly damaged the pretensions of their
church.
Milton arrived in Paris April or May, 1638. He received civilities
from the English ambassador, Lord Scudamore, who at his request gave
him an introduction to Grotius. Grotius, says Phillips, "took Milton's
visit kindly, and gave him entertainment suitable to his worth, and
the high commendations he had heard of him." We have no other record
of his stay of many days in Paris, though A. Wood supposes that "the
manners and graces of that place were not agreeable to his mind." It
was August before he reached Florence, by way of Nice and Genoa, and
in Florence he spent the two months which we now consider the most
impossible there, the months of August and September.
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