Household words and rhetorical seductions in Milton's the reason of church‐government

Abstract

The argument of The Reason of Church‐government is not so much “reasonable” as rhetorical, in that Milton openly relies on his readers’ affections and desires. His strategy in the tract is therefore to argue for Presbyterianism through metaphor, principally the suggestive and powerful metaphor of family. Drawing on the language of household government, which was being used by all sides in the church‐government debate, Milton proposes a model of discipline which is “brotherly” and “fatherly” and so distinct from the coercive rule of the prelates. The essay concludes, however, that neither Milton's rhetorical strategies, nor his model of church government, are without coercion, and that Milton's “household arguments” already contain the seeds of his turn towards Independency.