_On Sir_ WILLIAM TRUMBULL, _one of the principal Secretaries of State to
King_ WILLIAM III., _who_, _having resigned his place_, _died in his
retirement at Easthamstead_, _in Berkshire_, _1716_.
A pleasing form, a firm, yet cautious mind,
Sincere, though prudent; constant, yet resigned;
Honour unchanged, a principle profest.
Fixed to one side, but moderate to the rest;
An honest courtier, yet a patriot too,
Just to his prince, and to his country true;
Filled with the sense of age, the fire of youth,
A scorn of wrangling, yet a zeal for truth;
A generous faith, from superstition free;
A love to peace, and hate of tyranny;
Such this man was; who new from earth removed
At length enjoys that liberty he loved.
In this epitaph, as in many others, there appears at the first view a
fault which I think scarcely any beauty can compensate. The name is
omitted. The end of an epitaph is to convey some account of the dead;
and to what purpose is anything told of him whose name is concealed? An
epitaph, and a history of a nameless hero, are equally absurd, since the
virtues and qualities so recounted in either are scattered at the mercy
of fortune to be appropriated by guess. The name, it is true, may be
read upon the stone; but what obligation has it to the poet, whose verses
wander over the earth and leave their subject behind them, and who is
forced, like an unskilful painter, to make his purpose known by
adventitious help? This epitaph is wholly without elevation, and
contains nothing striking or particular; but the poet is not to be blamed
for the defect of his subject. He said perhaps the best that could be
said. There are, however, some defects which were not made necessary by
the character in which he was employed. There is no opposition between
an _honest courtier_ and a _patriot_; for an _honest_, _courtier_ cannot
but be a _patriot_. It was unsuitable to the nicety required in short
compositions to close his verse with the word _too_; every rhyme should
be a word of emphasis: nor can this rule be safely neglected, except
where the length of the poem makes slight inaccuracies excusable, or
allows room for beauties sufficient to overpower the effects of petty
faults.
At the beginning of the seventh line the word _filled_ is weak and
prosaic, having no particular adaptation to any of the words that follow
it. The thought in the last line is impertinent, having no connection
with the foregoing character, nor with the condition of the man
described. Had the epitaph been written on the poor conspirator who died
lately in prison, after a confinement of more than forty years, without
any crime proved against him, the sentiment had been just and pathetical;
but why should Trumbull be congratulated upon his liberty who had never
known restraint?