Unmeritingly

It was no loss to society that Buckingham failed and fell. He was not the man to regenerate the nobility of England, or to plant moral principles on its throne. Yet, altho he perished, neither lamented nor unmeritingly, it was he that wove the plans and made the cords, which pulled down Richard from his state.

I must thank you again and again for the kind wishes expressed, and feel only too happy to know that my poor verses have, perhaps unmeritingly, found approbation in your eyes, an approbation of which they well may feel proud.

I have two other reasons for quoting at some length from the poem, besides that it is little known, namely, that it will be interesting to learn as much as we can of the man who (unmeritingly) had so mighty an influence on Shakespeare’s mind; and because I shall have hereafter to consider somewhat curiously, the fact of the poet’s having, the friendship broken, formed this conception of ideal villainy in Pembroke.