Page:The Life of Sir Thomas Bodley written by himself.djvu/16

10 a career of diplomacy, and was selected by Queen Elizabeth for many state embassies, which he recounts with naïve pride. He seems to have conducted these embassies with tact and ability, but they are almost forgotten, while Sir Thomas will always be remembered for the library which bears his name, at whose door he "set up his staff" when, tired of statecraft, he withdrew from public life, determining still to "do the true part of a profitable member of the state."

His own account of his life ends here, with the wish that the library itself may show how well he has sped in his endeavours. And who could wish a nobler