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There is also a sonnet by Joshua Sylvester, of which I will only quote the anagram prefixed to it:

Sackvilus Comes Dorsetius

Vas Lucis Esto decor Musis

Sacris Musis celo devotus

But although there can scarcely be two opinions about Gorboduc—that it is sometimes noble, and always dull—Sackville’s two other poems, the Induction to the Mirror for Magistrates and the Complaint of Henry Duke of Buckingham, have never met with the recognition they deserve, save for the discriminating applause of men of letters. I do not say that they are works which can be read through with an unvarying degree of pleasure; there are stagnant passages which have to be waded through in between the more admirable portions. But such portions, when they are reached, do contain much of the genuine stuff of poetry, impressive imagery, a surprising absence of cumbersome expression—especially when the reader bears in mind that Sackville was writing before Spenser, and long before Marlowe—and a diction which is consistently dignified and suitable to the gravity of the theme. Take these stanzas for instance: