inclined to echo it. Of his sonnets one
has been given. The splendid Epistle to the Countess of Cumberland is not
surpassed as ethical poetry by anything of the period, and often as it has
been quoted, it must be given again, for it is not and never can be too
well known:--

"He that of such a height hath built his mind,
And reared the dwelling of his thoughts so strong,
As neither fear nor hope can shake the frame
Of his resolved powers; nor all the wind
Of vanity or malice pierce to wrong
His settled peace, or to disturb the same:
What a fair seat hath he, from whence he may
The boundless wastes and wealds of man survey!

"And with how free an eye doth he look down
Upon these lower regions of turmoil!
Where all the storms of passion mainly beat
On flesh and blood: where honour, power, renown,
Are only gay afflictions, golden toil;
Where greatness stands upon as feeble feet
As frailty doth; and only great doth seem
To little minds, who do it so esteem.

"He looks upon the mightiest monarch's wars
But only as on stately robberies;
Where evermore the fortune that prevails
Must be the right: the ill-succeeding mars
The fairest and the best fac'd enterprise.
Great pirate Pompey lesser pirates quails:
Justice, he sees (as if seduced) still
Conspires with power, whose cause must not be ill.

"He sees the face of right t'appear as manifold
As are the passions of uncertain man;
Who puts it in all colours, all attires,
To serve his ends, and make his courses hold.
He sees, that let deceit work what it can,
Plot and contrive base ways to high desires,
That the all-guiding Providence doth yet
All disappoint, and mocks the smoke of wit.

"Nor is he mov'd with all the thunder cracks
Of tyrants' threats, or with the surly brow
Of Power, that proudly sits on others' crimes;
Charg'd with more crying sins than those he checks.
The storms of sad confusion, that may grow
Up in the present for the coming times
Appal not him; that hath no side at all,
But of himself, and knows the worst can fall.

"Although his heart (so near allied to Earth)
Cannot but pity the perplexed state
Of troublous and distress'd Mortality,
That thus make way unto the ugly birth
Of their own sorrows, and do still beget
Affliction upon imbecility:
Yet seeing t