ABSTRACT
Strawberry Hill, 1758, vol. 1, pp. 163-5. A thousand accidents of birth, court-favour or popularity, concur sometimes to gild a slender proportion of merit. After ages who look when those beams are withdrawn, wonder what attracted the eyes of the multitude. No man seems to me so astonishing an object of temporary admiration as the celebrated friend of the Lord Brooke, the famous Sir Philip Sidney. The learned of Europe dedicated their works to Him; the Republic of Poland thought him at least worthy to be in the nomination for their crown. All the muses of England wept his death. When we at this distance of time inquire what prodigious merits excited such admiration, what do we find?—Great valour.—But it was an age of heroes.—In full of all other talents we have a tedious, lamentable, pedantic, pastoral romance, which the patience of a young virgin in love cannot now wade through; and some absurd attempts to fetter English verse in Roman chains; a proof that this applauded author understood little of the genius of his own language. The few of his letters extant are poor matters; one to a steward of his father,1 an instance of unwarrantable violence. By far the best presumption of his abilities (to us who can judge only by what we see) is a pamphlet published amongst the Sidney-papers, being an answer to the famous libel called Leicester’s common-wealth. It defends his uncle with great spirit: What had been said in derogation to their blood seems to have touched Sir Philip most. He died with the rashness of a volunteer [note: Queen Elizabeth used to say of Lord Essex ‘We shall have him knocked o’ the head like that rash fellow Sidney’], after having lived to write with the sang froid and prolixity of Mademoiselle Scuderi.
