Return To England
At the close of 1651 the British House of Commons revoked Waller's sentence of banishment, and he was allowed to return to Beaconsfield, where he lived very quietly until the Restoration. In 1655 he published A Panegyric to my Lord Protector, and was made a Commissioner for Trade a month or two later, he followed this, in 1660, with a poem To the King, upon his Majesty's Happy Return. Being challenged by Charles II to explain why this latter piece was inferior to the eulogy of Cromwell, the poet smartly replied, "Sir, we poets never succeed so well in writing truth as in fiction".
Waller entered the House of Commons again in 1661, as MP for Hastings, and Burnet has recorded that for the next quarter of a century "it was no House if Waller was not there". His sympathies were tolerant and kindly, and he constantly defended the Nonconformists.
One famous speech of Waller's was: "Let us look to our Government, fleet and trade, 'tis the best advice the oldest Parliament man among you can give you, and so God bless you."
Read more about this topic: Edmund Waller
Famous quotes containing the words return to, return and/or england:
“A tree may grow a thousand feet tall, but its leaves will return to its roots.”
—Chinese proverb.
“I have often wondered how they manage to get return envelopes which miss, by one-quarter of an inch, fitting the blank you are supposed to return. They say, “Please fill out and return the enclosed envelope,” and the enclosed envelope is always one-quarter of an inch too small.”
—Robert Benchley (1889–1945)
“I know that I have the body of a weak and feeble woman, but I have the heart and stomach of a king, and of a king of England too.”
—Elizabeth I (1533–1603)