Sackville, the junior of nearly all his compeers and associates, during this short career of his Muse,[44] had also to sustain the labour and restlessness of politics. He was elected member for Westmorland, and sat in parliament the 4th and 5th of Philip and Mary. Upon the accession of Elizabeth, he represented Sussex at the time his father did Kent, and in 1562, upon the latter being chosen for Sussex, he was returned one of the members for Buckinghamshire. He early obtained the confidence of Elizabeth, (to whom he was related, as first cousin by his grand mother to Anne Boleyn), being, in his younger years, “by her particular choice and liking, selected to a continual private attendance upon her own person,” and is named in D’Ewes Journal, March 17, 1563, as conveying a message from her to the House of Commons, relative to making an “allowance for Justices Diets,” &c. About this period he visited France, Italy, and Rome, where, for some imprudency of a pecuniary nature, he was detained prisoner for fourteen days. On the death of his father he returned to England. His prodigal taste for splendour was first checked and finally stopped by the influence and admonitions of his royal relative, who, it is said, “would not know him, till he began to know himself.” On the 8th of June, 1567, he was knighted in her presence by the Duke of Norfolk, and created Baron of Buckhurst. In 1573 he was sent ambassador to France, and in the following year sat on the trial of the Earl of Arundel, being styled the Queen’s beloved and faithful counsellor. In 1586 he was nominated a commissioner on the trial of Mary Queen of Scots. In 1587 he went ambassador to the States General, but recalled by the influence of the Earl of Leicester and Lord Burleigh, and confined to his house, by the queen’s command, for nine months, when, upon the death of the Earl of Leicester, he was immediately restored to presence and favour, and on April 24, 1589, without previous intimation, made Knight of the Garter. In January 1591-2 he was elected Chancellor of the University of Oxford. On the 15th March, 1599, after the death of Lord Burleigh, he was appointed Lord High Treasurer; the patent whereof was renewed for life on the accession of King James, by whom, in 1603, he was created Earl of Dorset, and appointed one of the commissioners for executing the office of Lord Marshal. He died suddenly at the council table at Whitehall on April 19th, 1608, and being taken to Dorset house, Whitefriars, was embowelled and so much of him buried on the 20th, at Saint Bride’s Fleetstreet. Much state ceremony and solemnity followed, and after a lapse of above a month there was _A Sermon preached at Westminster May 26, 1608, at the Fvnerall Solemnities of the Right Honorable Thomas Earle of Dorset, late L. High Treasurer of England: By George Abbott Doctor of Diuinitie and Deane of Winchester one of his Lordships Chaplines_.[45] 1608. qto. It does not appear that these