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In 1643 the English Parliament ordered that every book must be approved by an official censor before it was printed. John Milton replied with this speech…
In 1643 the English Parliament ordered that every book must be approved by an official censor before it was printed. John Milton replied with this speech, written as if addressed to Parliament, arguing that censorship insults readers, cannot work and stifles the search for truth: 'Give me the liberty to know, to utter, and to argue freely according to conscience, above all liberties.' Truth, he says, has nothing to fear from a free and open encounter with falsehood.
Context and significance
Milton published the pamphlet in 1644, without a licence, naming it after the Areopagus, the hill of Athens where a council met, in memory of a speech by the Greek orator Isocrates. It became one of the founding texts of the freedom of the press. Compare Mill's On Liberty, and see Milton's life.
About the author
John Milton (1608–1674) was a London scholar-poet who wrote Lycidas and other early poems before devoting twenty years to politics. He wrote pamphlets defending divorce and the freedom of the press, in his famous Areopagitica, and served Cromwell's government as Latin secretary, losing his sight around 1652.
After the monarchy was restored he was briefly imprisoned and lucky to escape execution. Blind, poor and disappointed, he dictated Paradise Lost, published in 1667, followed by Paradise Regained and Samson Agonistes. He is often ranked second only to Shakespeare among English poets.