"
To Denzil the old campaigner opened his heart more freely than he had ever
done to any one except a brother in arms; and although he was resolute in
upholding the cause of Monarchy against Republicanism, he owned to the
natural disappointment which he had felt at the King's neglect of old
friends, and reluctantly admitted that Charles, sauntering along Pall Mall
with ruin at his heels, and the wickedest men and women in England for his
chosen companions, was not a monarch to maintain and strengthen the public
idea of the divinity that doth hedge a King.
"Of all the lessons danger and adversity can teach he has learnt but
one," said Sir John, with a regretful sigh. "He has learnt the Horatian
philosophy--to snatch the pleasures of the day, and care nothing what may
happen on the morrow. I do not wonder that predictions of a sudden end to
this globe of ours should have been bruited about of late; for if lust
and profaneness could draw down fire from heaven, London would be in as
perilous a case as Gomorrah. But I doubt such particular judgments belonged
but to the infancy of this world, when men believed in a Personal God,
interested in all their concerns, watchful to bless or to punish.
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