ed three years at the university, and having been examined
at the public schools, for the degree of bachelor of arts, he entered
himself in Lincoln's-Inn, where he was generally thought to
apply himself pretty closely to the study of the common law. But
notwithstanding his application to study, and all the efforts he was
capable of making, such was his propensity to gaining, that he was
often stript of all his money; and his father severely chiding him, and
threatening to abandon him if he did not reform, he wrote a little essay
against that vice, and presented it to his father, to convince him of
his resolution against it[2]. But no sooner did his father die, than
being unrestrained by paternal authority, he reassumed the practice, and
soon squandered away several thousand pounds.

In the latter end of the year 1641 he published a tragedy called the
Sophy, which was greatly admired, and gave Mr. Waller occasion to say
of our author, 'That he broke out like the Irish rebellion, threescore
thousand strong, when no body was aware, nor in the Ieast expected it.'
Soon after this he was pricked for high sheriff for the county of Surry,
and made governor of Farnham-Castle for the King; but not being well
skilled in military affairs, he soon quitted that post and retired to
his Majesty at Oxford, where he published an excellent poem called
Cooper's-hill, often reprinted before and since the restoration, with
considerable alterations; it has been universally admired by all good
judges, and was translated into Latin verse, by Mr. Moses Pengry of
Oxford.

Mr. Dryden speaking of this piece, in his dedication of his Rival
Ladies, says, that it is a poem, which, for the Majesty of the stile,
will ever be the exact standard of good writing, and the noble author of
an essay on human life, bestows upon it the most lavish encomium[3]. But
of all the evidences in its favour, none is of greater authority, or
more beautiful, than the following of Mr. Pope, in his Windsor Forest.

Ye sacred nine, that all my soul possess,
Whose raptures fire me, and whose visions bless;
Bear me, O bear me, to sequester'd scenes,
The bow'ry mazes, and surrounding greens;
To Thames's bank which fragrant breezes fill,
Or where the muses sport on Cooper's-hill.
(On Cooper's hill eternal wreaths shall grow,
While lasts the mountain, or while Thames shall flow.)
I seem thro' consecrated walks to rove,
I hear soft music die along the grove