men of mere literary
ability, especially when that ability is not transcendent, but whose cue
it was to conciliate all men according to their respective positions and
capabilities, paid great attention to his kinsman. Waller found Cromwell
well acquainted with the ancient historians, and they conversed a good
deal on such topics. It is said, that when Waller jeered him on his
using the peculiar phraseology of the Puritans in his conversation with
them, the Protector answered, "Cousin Waller, I must talk to these men
in their own way;" an anecdote which is sometimes quoted as if it proved
that Cromwell had no religion; whereas it only proved that he had at
heart no cant. It was not as if he had privately avowed infidelity to
his kinsman. Cromwell found _cant_ prevalent on his stage, just as any
great actor of that century found _rant_ on his, and, like the actor, he
used it occasionally as a means of gaining his own lofty ends, and as a
foil to his own genuine earnestness and power.

The Protector, however, seems to have profoundly impressed even Waller's
light and fickle mind; and the panegyric which he produced on him in
1654, is not only the ablest, but seems the sincerest of his
productions. He had hitherto been writing about women, courtiers, and
kings; but now he had to gird up his loins and write on a man. The piece
is accordingly as masculine in style, as it is just in appreciation;
and, with the exception of Milton's glorious sketch in the "Defensio pro
populo Anglicano," and Carlyle's lecture in his "Heroes and
Hero-worship," it is, perhaps, the best encomium ever pronounced on the
Lord Protector of England--almost worthy of Cromwell's unrivalled merits
and achievements, and more than worthy of Waller's powers. It is said,
that when twitted with having written a better panegyric on Cromwell
than a congratulation to Charles II., he wittily replied, "You should
remember that poets succeed better in fiction than in truth." Perhaps in
this he spoke ironically; certainly the fact was the reverse of his
words. It is because he has spoken truth in the first, and fiction in
the second, of productions, that the first is incomparably the better
poem. Sketches of character taken from the life are better than those
where imagination operates on hearsays and on recorded actions. And
certainly few men had a better opportunity than Waller of seeing in
private and in undress, and with an eye in which native sagacity was
sharp