WILLIAM AND MAET.

167

pamphlet. Out of these passages he constructed a secondpamphlet entitled Reasons for the Liberty of Unlicensed Print-ing.* To these Reasons he appended a postscript entitled AJust and True Character of Edmund Boliun. This Characterwas written with extreme bitterness. Passages were quotedfrom the licenser’s writings to prove that he held the doctrinesof passive obedience and nonresistance. He was accused ofusing his power systematically for the purpose of favouring theenemies and silencing the friends of the Sovereigns whose breadhe ate; and it was asserted that he was the friend and the pupilof his predecessor Sir Roger.

Blount’s Character of Bohun could not he publicly sold; butit was widely circulated. While it ivas passing from hand tohand, and while the Whigs were every where exclaiming againstthe new censor as a second Lestrange, he was requested toauthorise the publication of an anonymous work entitled KingWilliam and Queen Mary Conquerors.** He readily and indeedeagerly complied. For in truth there was between the doctrineswhich he had long professed and the doctrines which were pro-pounded in this treatise a coincidence so exact that many sus-pected him of being the author; norwas this suspicion weakenedby a passage in which a compliment was paid to his politicalwritings. But the real author was that very Blount who was, atthat very time, labouring to inflame the public both against theLicensing Act and the licenser. Blount’s motives may easily bedivined. His own opinions were diametrically opposed to thosewhich, on this occasion, he put forward in the most offensive

* I unhesitatingly attribute this pamphlet to Blount, though it was notreprinted among his works by Gildon. If Blount did not actually write itho must certainly have superintended the writing. That two men ofletters, acting without concert, should bring out within a very short timetwo treatises, one made out of one half of the Areopagitica and the othermade out of the other half, is incredible. Why Gildon did not choose toreprint the second pamphlet will appear hereafter.

** Bohan’s Autobiography.