George Villiers Buckingham (1628 – 1687)
English dramatist, poet, politician, wit and rake.
O! what a prodigal have I been of that most valuable of all possessions — Time!
Kisses are but like sands of gold and silver, found upon the ground which are not worth much themselves but as they promise a mine near too be dig'd.
The blackest Ink of Fate, sure, was my Lot,
And, when she writ my Name, she made a blot.
A Lady that was drown'd at Sea, and had a wave for her Winding sheet.
A man so various, that he seemed to be
Not one, but all mankind's epitome:
Stiff in opinions, always in the wrong;
Was everything by starts, and nothing long;
But, in the course of one revolving moon,
Was chemist, fiddler, statesman, and buffoon. …
Beggar'd by fools, whom still he found too late,
He had his jest, but they had his estate.
Nature's chief masterpiece is writing well.
What a Devil is the Plot good for, but to bring in fine things?
A mans fame and hayre grow most after death, and are both equally uselesse.
All these threatening storms, which, like impregnate Clouds, hover o'er our heads, will (when they once are grasp'd but by the eye of reason) melt into fruitful showers of blessings on the people.
I drink, I huff, I strut, look big and stare;
And all this I can do, because I dare.
Ay, now the Plot thickens very much upon us.
The first gentleman of person and wit I think I ever saw.
Make my breast
Transparent as pure crystal, that the world,
Jealous of me, may see the foulest thought
My heart holds.
Buckingham was a sated man of pleasure, who had turned to ambition as a pastime. As he had tried to amuse himself with architecture and music, with writing farces and with seeking for the philosopher's stone, so he now tried to amuse himself with a secret negotiation and a Dutch war.
He had no principles of religion, virtue, or friendship. Pleasure, frolic, or extravagant diversion, was all that he laid to heart. He was true to nothing, for he was not true to himself.
Methinks, I see the wanton houres flee,
And as they passe, turne back and laugh at me.
We might well call this short Mock-play of ours
A Posie made of Weeds instead of Flowers;
Yet such have been presented to your noses,
And there are such, I fear, who thought 'em Roses.
There are few have Dana's fortune, to have God and gold togather.
The world is made up, for the most part, of fools and knaves, both irreconcileable foes to truth.
Why, Sir, when I have anything to invent, I never trouble my head about it, as other men do; but presently turn over this Book, and there I have, at one view, all that Perseus, Montaigne, Seneca's Tragedies, Horace, Juvenal, Claudian, Pliny, Plutarch's lives, and the rest, have ever thought upon this subject: and so, in a trice, by leaving out a few words, or putting in others of my own, the business is done.