realm,
Or strive with him that sits and guides the helm.
I know your reading will inform you soon,
What creatures they were, that barkt against the moon.
I'll give you better counsel as a friend:
Cobblers their latchets ought not to transcend;
Meddle with common matters, common wrongs;
To the House of Commons common things belongs.
Leave him the oar that best knows how to row,
And state to him that best the state doth know.
If I by industry, deep reach, or grace,
Am now arriv'd at this or that great place,
Must I, to please your inconsiderate rage,
Throw down mine honours? Will nought else assuage
Your furious wisdoms? True shall the verse be yet--
There's no less wit required to keep, than get.
Though Lambe be dead, I'll stand, and you shall see
I'll smile at them that can but bark at me.

After Buckingham's death, Charles the First cherished his memory as
warmly as his life, advanced his friends, and designed to raise a
magnificent monument to his memory;[244] and if any one accused the
duke, the king always imputed the fault to himself. The king said, "Let
not the duke's enemies seek to catch at any of his offices, for they
will find themselves deceived." Charles called Buckingham "his martyr!"
and often said the world was much mistaken in the duke's character; for
it was commonly thought the duke ruled his majesty; but it was much the
contrary, having been his most faithful and obedient servant in all
things, as the king said he would make sensibly appear to the world.
Indeed, after the death of Buckingham, Charles showed himself extremely
active in business. Lord Dorchester wrote--"The death of Buckingham
causes no changes; the king holds in his own hands the total direction,
leaving the executory part to every man within the compass of his
charge."[245] This is one proof, among many, that Charles the First was
not the puppet-king of Buckingham, as modern historians have imagined.

FELTON, THE POLITICAL ASSASSIN.

Felton, the assassin of the Duke of Buckingham, by the growing
republican party was hailed as a Brutus, rising, in the style of a
patriotic bard,

Refulgent from the stroke.--AKENSIDE.

Gibbon has thrown a shade of suspicion even over Brutus's "god-like
stroke," as Pope has exalted it. In Felton, a man acting from mixed and
confused motives, the political martyr is entirely lost in the contrite
penitent; he was, howe