On Edmund, Duke of Buckingham

Who Died in the Nineteenth Year of His Age, 1735

IF modest Youth, with cool Reflection crown’d,

And ev’ry opening Virtue blooming round,

Could save a Parent’s justest Pride from fate,

Or add one Patriot to a sinking state,

This weeping marble had not ask’d thy tear,

Or sadly told, how many hopes lie here!

The living Virtue now had shone approv’d;

The Senate heard him, and his country lov’d.

Yet softer honours and less noisy fame

Attend the shade of gentle BUCKINGHAM:

In whom a race, for Courage famed and Art,

Ends in the milder merit of the Heart;

And, Chiefs or Sages long to Britain giv’n,

Pays the last tribute of a Saint to Heav’n.