20:B Avoid. 20:B 21:A “Thoughts close, countenance open.” 21:A 21:B This letter was printed in the edition of 1645, but omitted in that of 1673. It was written by Sir Henry Wotton, Provost of Eton College, just in time to overtake Milton before he set out on his journey to Italy. As a parting act of courtesy Milton had sent Sir Henry a letter with a copy of Lawes’s edition of his Comus, and the above letter is an acknowledgment of the favour. 21:B TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE22:A TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE JOHN, LORD VISCOUNT BRACKLEY, Son and Heir-Apparent to the Earl of Bridgewater, etc. My Lord, My Lord This Poem, which received its first occasion of birth from yourself and others of your noble family, and much honour from your own person in the performance, now returns again to make a final Dedication of itself to you. Although not openly acknowledged by the Author, yet it is a legitimate offspring, so lovely and so much desired that the often copying of it hath tired my pen to give my several friends satisfaction, and brought me to a necessity of producing it to the public view; and now to offer it up, in all rightful devotion, to those fair hopes and rare endowments of your much-promising youth, which give a full assurance to all that know you, of a future excellence. Live, sweet Lord, to be the honour of your name, and receive this as your own, from the hands of him who hath by many favours been long obliged to your most honoured Parents, and as in this representation your attendant Thyrsis,22:B so now in all real expression, Your faithful and most humble Servant, H. LAWES. 22:A Dedication of the anonymous edition of 1637: reprinted in the edition of 1645, but omitted in that of 1673.
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