te appears less remarkable than the
vigour of his understanding. It might be that he knew the vices of men
better than their virtues; yet he was no shallow disbeliever in the
latter: he read the heart too accurately not to know that it is guided
as often by its affections as its interests. In his early life he had
incurred, not without truth, the charge of licentiousness; but even in
pursuit of pleasure, he had been neither weak on the one hand, nor gross
on the other;--neither the headlong dupe, nor the callous sensualist:
but his graces, his rank, his wealth, had made his conquests a matter
of too easy purchase; and hence, like all voluptuaries, the part of his
worldly knowledge, which was the most fallible, was that which related
to the sex. He judged of women by a standard too distinct from that by
which he judged of men, and considered those foibles peculiar to the
sex, which in reality are incident to human nature.

His natural disposition was grave and reflective; and though he was
not without wit, it was rarely used. He lived, necessarily, with the
frivolous and the ostentatious, yet ostentation and frivolity were
charges never brought against himself. As a diplomatist and a statesman,
he was of the old and erroneous school of intriguers; but his favourite
policy was the science of conciliation. He was one who would so far have
suited the present age, that no man could better have steered a nation
from the chances of war; James the First could not have been inspired
with a greater affection for peace; but the Peer's dexterity would have
made that peace as honourable as the King's weakness could have made it
degraded. Ambitious to a certain extent, but neither grasping nor
mean, he never obtained for his genius the full and extensive field it
probably deserved. He loved a happy life above all things; and he knew
that while activity is the spirit, fatigue is the bane, of happiness.

In his day he enjoyed a large share of that public attention which
generally bequeaths fame; yet from several causes (of which his own
moderation is not the least) his present reputation is infinitely
less great than the opinions of his most distinguished cotemporaries
foreboded.

It is a more difficult matter for men of high rank to become illustrious
to posterity, than for persons in a sterner and more wholesome walk of
life. Even the greatest among the distinguished men of the patrician
order, suffer in the eyes of the after-age f