It was this elogium that gave occasion to the reply (taken notice of in
Bayle's Dictionary), which Waller made to King Charles II. This king, to
whom Waller had a little before (as is usual with bards and monarchs)
presented a copy of verses embroidered with praises, reproached the poet
for not writing with so much energy and fire as when he had applauded the
Usurper (meaning Oliver). "Sir," replied Waller to the king, "we poets
succeed better in fiction than in truth." This answer was not so sincere
as that which a Dutch ambassador made, who, when the same monarch
complained that his masters paid less regard to him than they had done to
Cromwell. "Ah, sir!" says the Ambassador, "Oliver was quite another
man--" It is not my intent to give a commentary on Waller's character,
nor on that of any other person; for I consider men after their death in
no other light than as they were writers, and wholly disregard everything
else. I shall only observe that Waller, though born in a court, and to
an estate of five or six thousand pounds sterling a year, was never so
proud or so indolent as to lay aside the happy talent which Nature had
indulged him. The Earls of Dorset and Roscommon, the two Dukes of
Buckingham, the Lord Halifax, and so many other noblemen, did not think
the reputation they obtained of very great poets and illustrious writers,
any way derogatory to their quality. They are more glorious for their
works than for their titles. These cultivated the polite arts with as
much assiduity as though they had been their whole dependence.
They also have made learning appear venerable in the eyes of the vulgar,
who have need to be led in all things by the great; and who,
nevertheless, fashion their manners less after those of the nobility (in
England I mean) than in any other country in the world.