Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

William Stanley Braithwaite, ed. The Book of Restoration Verse. 1910.

An Epitaph on Thomas, Third Lord Fairfax

George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham (1628–1687)

FAIRFAX the valiant; and only he

Whoe’er, for that alone a conqueror would be.

Both sexes’ virtues were in him combined:

He had the fierceness of the manliest mind,

And eke the meekness too of womankind.

He never knew what Envy was, or Hate.

His soul was filled with worth and honesty;

And with another thing, quite out of date,

Called modesty.

He ne’er seemed impudent but in the field, a place

Where impudence itself dares seldom show her face.

Had any stranger spied him in the room

With some of those whom he had overcome,

And had not heard their talk, but only seen

Their gestures and their mien,

They would have sworn he had, the vanquished been.

For as they bragged, and dreadful would appear;

While they, their own ill lucks in war repeated:

His modesty still made him blush to hear

How often he had them defeated.

Through his whole life, the part he bore

Was wonderful and great,

And yet it so appeared in nothing more

Than in his private last retreat.

For it’s a stranger thing to find

One man of such a glorious mind,

As can dismiss the Power he has got;

Than millions of the fools and braves

(Those despicable fools and knaves),

Who such a pother make,

Through dulness and mistake,

In seeking after power, but get it not.

When all the nation he had won,

With great expense of blood had bought,

Store great enough, he thought

Of fame and of renown:

He then his arms laid down

With full as little pride

As if he had been of his enemies’ side;

Or one of them could do that were undone.

He neither wealth, nor places sought;

For others, not himself, he fought.

He was content to know

(For he had found it so)

That when he pleased to conquer he was able,

And left the spoil and plunder to the rabble.

He might have been a king,

But that he understood

How much it is a meaner thing

To be unjustly Great, than honourably Good.

This from the world, did admiration draw;

And from his friends, both love and awe:

Remembering what in fight he did before.

And his foes loved him too,

As they were bound to do,

Because he was resolved to fight no more.

So blessed of all, he died. But far more blessed were we,

If we were sure to live till we could see

A man as great in War, in Peace as just, as he.