_Friday, April_ 25, 1656:--Present: the Lord President Lawrence, the Earl of Mulgrave, Lord Lambert, Sir Gilbert Pickering, Colonel Sydenham, Colonel Jones, the Lord Deputy of Ireland (Fleetwood), Lord Viscount Lisle, Mr. Rous, Major-General Skippon, and Lord Strickland. "Colonel Jones reports from the Committee of the Council to whom was referred the consideration of a book entitled _Sportive Wit or the Muses' Merriment_, that the said book contains in it much scandalous, lascivious, scurrilous, and profane matter. _Ordered_ by his Highness the Lord Protector, by and with the advice of the Council, That the Lord Mayor of the City of London and the rest of the Committee for the regulation of Printing do cause all such [copies] of the said book as are not already seized to be forthwith seized on, wherever they shall be found, and cause the same, together with those already seized, to be delivered to the Sheriffs of London and Middlesex, who are to cause the same to be forthwith publicly burnt.--He further reports that Nathaniel Brookes, Stationer, at the Angel in Cornhill, caused the said book to be printed; that the printers thereof were John Grismond, living in Ivy Lane, and James Cotterill, living in Lambeth Hill; and that JOHN PHILLIPS, of Westminster, was the author of the Epistle Dedicatory. _Ordered_, That it be referred to Sir John Barkstead, Knight, Lieutenant of the Tower [and Major-General for Westminster and Middlesex], to cause the fines to be levied on the said persons according to law: [also] that the said persons do attend the Council on Tuesday next."--Milton's younger nephew, therefore, had been the editor of the offending volume. Of the eleven members of Council present when this fact came out, six were among those friends of Milton whom he had specially mentioned in his _Defensio Secunda_: viz. Fleetwood, Lambert, Lawrence, Pickering, Sydenham, and Strickland. _Saturday, April_ 26, 1656:--His Highness the Lord Protector approves of a great many recent Orders of Council presented to him all at once by Mr. Scobell, the Clerk of the Council. Among them is the order "for burning the book called _Sportive Wit_." _Friday, May_ 9, 1656:--His Highness the Lord Protector present in person, with Lord President Lawrence, Lambert, Fleetwood, Sir Gilbert Pickering, Strickland, Sydenham, and Jones:--_Ordered_, &c. "That the Lord Mayor of the City of London and the rest of the Committee for regulating Printing do cause all the books entitled _Choice Droliery, Songs and Sonnets_ (being stuffed with profane and obscene matter, tending to the corruption of manners), to be seized wherever the same shall be found, and cause the same to be delivered to the Sheriffs of London and Middlesex, who are required to give order that the same be burnt."