knowledge, of that inimitable sweetness and delight
in conversation, and so flowing and obliging a humanity
and goodness to mankind, and of that primitive simplicity
and integrity of life, that if there were no other
brand upon this odious and accursed civil war, than
that single loss, it must be most infamous and execrable
to all posterity. He was a great cherisher of
wit and fancy, and good parts in any man; and if he
found them clouded with poverty and want, a most liberal
and bountiful patron towards them, even above his
fortune.” His lordship then enumerates
the unshaken loyalty and great abilities of this young
hero, in the warmth of a friend; he shews him in the
most engaging light, and of all characters which in
the course of this work we met with, except Sir Philip
Sidney’s, lord Falkland’s seems to be the
most amiable, and his virtues are confessed by his
enemies of the opposite faction. The noble historian,
in his usual masterly manner, thus concludes his panegyric
on his deceased friend. “He fell in the
34th year of his age, having so much dispatched the
true business of life, that the eldest rarely attain
to that immense knowledge, and the youngest enter
into the world with more innocency: whosoever
leads such a life, needs be less anxious upon how
short warning it is taken from him.”——As
to his person, he was little, and of no great strength;
his hair was blackish, and somewhat flaggy, and his
eyes black and lively. His body was buried in
the church of Great Tew. His works are chiefly
these:
First Poems.——Next, besides those
Speeches of his mentioned above,
1. A Speech concerning Uniformity, which we are
informed of by Wood.
2. A Speech of ill Counsellors about the King,
1640 [6].
A Draught of a Speech concerning Episcopacy, London,
1660, 410.
4. A Discourse of the Infallibility of the Church
of Rome. Oxford 1645, 410. George Holland,
a Cambridge scholar, and afterwards a Romish priest,
having written an answer to this discourse of the
Infallibility, the Lord Falkland made a reply to it,
entitled,
5. A View of some Exceptions made against the
Discourse of the Infallibility of the Church of Rome,
printed at Oxford, 1646, 410. He assisted Mr.
Chillingworth in his book of the Religion of the Protestants,
&c. This particular we learn from Bishop Barlow
in his Genuine Remains, who says, that when Mr. Chillingworth
undertook the defence of Dr. Pottus’s book against
the Jesuit, he was almost continually at Tew with
my Lord, examining the reasons of both parties pro
and con; and their invalidity and consequence; where
Mr. Chillingworth had the benefit of my Lord’s
company, and of his good library.
We shall present our readers with a specimen of his
lordship’s poetry, in a copy of verses addressed
to Grotius on his Christus Patiens, a tragedy, translated
by Mr. Sandys. To the author.