His youth had been full of adventure
and of dissipation. 'I know not how it is,' said Wilmot, Lord Rochester,
'but my Lord Dorset can do anything, and is never to blame.' He had, in
truth, a heart; he could bear to hear others praised; he despised the
arts of courtiers; he befriended the unhappy; he was the most engaging
of men in manners, the most loveable and accomplished of human beings;
at once poet, philanthropist, and wit; he was also possessed of
chivalric notions, and of daring courage.
Like his royal master, Lord Dorset had travelled; and when made a
gentleman of the bedchamber to Charles II., he was not unlike his
sovereign in other traits; so full of gaiety, so high-bred, so lax, so
courteous, so convivial, that no supper was complete without him: no
circle 'the right thing,' unless Buckhurst, as he was long called, was
there to pass the bottle round, and to keep every one in good-humour.
Yet, he had misspent a youth in reckless immorality, and had even been
in Newgate on a charge, a doubtful charge it is true, of highway robbery
and murder, but had been found guilty of manslaughter only. He was again
mixed up in a disgraceful affair with Sir Charles Sedley.
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