Page:The Life of Sir Thomas Bodley written by himself.djvu/63

Rh Abilities that I had, but that in some measure, in one kind or other, I should do the true part of a profitable Member of the State; whereupon examining exactly for the rest of my Life, what course I might take, and having sought (as I thought) all the ways to the Wood, to select the most proper, I concluded at the last, to set up my Staff at the Library-Door in Oxon; being thoroughly perswaded, that in my Solitude, and Surcease from the Common-Wealth Affairs, I could not busy my self to better purpose, than by reducing that Place (which then in every Part lay ruined and wast) to the publick use of Students. For the effecting whereof, I found my self