Mr. Hampden was a gentleman of a good extraction and a fair fortune,who from a life of great pleasure and license had on a sudden retired to extraordinary sobriety and strictness,and yet retained his usual cheerfulness and affability;which,together with the opinion of his wisdom and justice and the courage he had showed in opposing the ship-money,raised his reputation to a very great height,not only in Buckinghamshire where he lived,but generally throughout the kingdom.He was not a man of many words,and rarely began than discourse,or made the first entrance upon any business that was assumed;but a very weighty speaker,and after he had heard a full debate,and observed how the House was like to be inclined,took up the argument,and shortly and clearly and craftily so stated it that he commonly conducted it to the conclusion he desired;and if he found he could not do that,he was never without the dexterity to divert the debate to another time and to prevent the determining of anything in the negative which might prove inconvenient in the future.
Mr. Hampden was a gentleman of a good extraction and a fair fortune,who from a life of great pleasure and license had on a sudden retired to extraordinary sobriety and strictness,and yet retained his usual cheerfulness and affability;which,together with the opinion of his wisdom and justice and the courage he had showed in opposing the ship-money,raised his reputation to a very great height,not only in Buckinghamshire where he lived,but generally throughout the kingdom.He was not a man of many words,and rarely began than discourse,or made the first entrance upon any business that was assumed;but a very weighty speaker,and after he had heard a full debate,and observed how the House was like to be inclined,took up the argument,and shortly and clearly and craftily so stated it that he commonly conducted it to the conclusion he desired;and if he found he could not do that,he was never without the dexterity to divert the debate to another time and to prevent the determining of anything in the negative which might prove inconvenient in the future.
