He was after this recommended to that great encourager of learning, Elizabeth Countess of Kent, where he had not only the opportunity to consult all manner of learned books, but to converse also with that living library of learning, the great Mr Selden.

Our Author lived some time also with Sir Samuel Luke, who was of an ancient family in Bedfordshire but, to his dishonour, an eminent commander under the usurper Oliver Cromwell:  and then it was, as I am informed, he composed this loyal Poem.  For, though fate, more than choice, seems to have placed him in the service of a Knight so notorious, both in his person and politics, yet, by the rule of contraries, one may observe throughout his whole Poem, that he was most orthodox, both in his religion and loyalty.  And I am the more induced to believe he wrote it about that time, because he had then the opportunity to converse with those living characters of rebellion, nonsense, and hypocrisy, which he so livelily and pathetically exposes throughout the whole work.

After the restoration of King Charles ii. those who were at the helm, minding money more than merit, our Author found that verse in Juvenal to be exactly verified in himself: 

Haud facile emergunt, quorum virtutibus obstat Res angusta domi:  [They do not easily rise whose virtues are held back by the straitened circumstances of their home]

And being endued with that innate modesty, which rarely finds promotion in princes’ courts.  He became Secretary to Richard Earl of Carbury, Lord President of the Principality of Wales, who made him Steward of Ludlow-Castle, when the Court there was revived.  About this time he married one Mrs. Herbert, a gentlewoman of a very good family, but no widow, as the Oxford Antiquary has reported; she had a competent fortune, but it was most of it unfortunately lost, by being put out on ill securities, so that it was of little advantage to him.  He is reported by the Antiquary to have been Secretary to his Grace George Duke of Buckingham, when he was Chancellor to the University of Cambridge; but whether that be true or no, it is certain, the Duke had a great kindness for him, and was often a benefactor to him.  But no man was a more generous friend to him, than that Mecaenas of all learned and witty men, Charles Lord Buckhurst, the late Earl of Dorset and Middlesex, who, being himself an excellent poet, knew how to set a just value upon the ingenious performances of others, and has often taken care privately to relieve and supply the necessities of those, whose modesty would endeavour to conceal them; of which our author was a signal instance, as several others have been, who are now living.  In fine the integrity of his life, the acuteness of his wit, and easiness of his conversation, had rendered him most acceptable to all men; yet he prudently avoided a multiplicity of acquaintance, and wisely chose such only whom his discerning judgment could distinguish (as Mr. Cowley expresseth it)