■ ■■■■ jA i r- mm • ■ -, ' - ■ c 4 ^^m JTrial of jrjastings— Butfec's opening jspeecf). " I impeach him in the name of the Commons of Great Britain in Parliament assem- bled, whose parliamentary trust he has betrayed. ... I impeach him in the name and by virtue of those eternal laws of justice, which he lias violated." C.Crake THE PUBLIC AND DOMESTIC LIFE OF THE RIGHT HON. EDMUND BURKE. 1IY PETER BURKE, ESQ. OF T11K INNER TEMPLE AND THE NORTHERN f'TROUIT. Scroti Oition. LONDON: NATIIANIEL COOKE, MILFORD HOUSE, STRAND. MIKICCLIV. PBEEACE. " Vir bonus dicendi peritus" — a virtuous man skilled in the art of speaking — suck is the definition of an orator given by Cato the elder, and handed down by Quinctilian. Certainly no one on record more aptly accords with the description than the illustrious subject of this biography. Perfect in private and in public life, as far perhaps as the common failings of humanity would permit, Edmund Burke presents throughout his whole course an example pleasing to contemplate, and of infinite ad- vantage to study. Burke's speeches and writings have, by frequent repetition, reference, and cpiotation, become known to most people in and out of Parliament. Few political emergen- cies occur — few measures of imminent interest and importance fall into discussion and debate — without recourse, either for guidance or encouragement, to the lessons and language of Ed- mund Burke ; and thus it is that his thoughts of wisdom and his words of fire have become familiar to us all. Yet his own history, like that of Shakespeare, is far less known than his works. This circumstance, the truth of "which will be readily b VI PREFACE. admitted, is the more to be lamented when one considers that Edmund Burke's whole life was a precept; that his domestic ac- tions, as well as his historic deeds, were constantly of a nature to cheer, instruct, and edify mankind. Mr. Fry, in one of his popular and instructive discourses on the subject of Edmund Burke, particularly alludes to this. "Nor is it," says the learned lecturer, " only in the glare of public life, nor only for his immortal compositions, that Mr. Burke is to be studied and admired. The quiet under-current of his existence equally deserves our attentive approbation, and honourably distinguishes him from his eminent contemporaries. ... In all the private relations we see the conduct of this great man harmonious and consistent — anxiously discharging every private duty of hus- band, father, friend, and fellow- creature, till his great heart had ceased to beat." This is certainly true; and the probable reason why there exists such imperfect knowledge of the man himself arises doubtless from there having been really no com- plete and readable account of the life of Burke. The more extensive memoirs of him are mere disjointed, discursive, and confusing compilations. Political and private matters are so mixed up and jumbled together in them, with such little re- gard to following the time or tide of events as they flow on, that the reader who attempts to master the narrative finds himself lost as in a labyrinth, until utter weariness and per- plexity impede, or altogether prevent, his going further. Each of these long and tedious memoirs is wretched as a whole, yet the present author has found in some of the earlier of them PREFACE. VU facts and details pertinent and applicable to this book: such parts lie lias endeavoured to mould, make use of, and incorpo- rate in this condensed and in some measure compiled biography. Nevertheless, after so general a condemnation of writers who, whether living or dead, have long since passed into merited oblivion, the author avoids, as invidious, pointing out any of them by name. There are some smaller biographies of Burke — much better productions; but these,, again, are either too short, or, like Dr. Croly's very able work, which first appeared in Blackwood's Magazine, are professedly or in effect confined to politics only. The present volume attempts to remedy the deficiency, by re- lating the history of Edmund Burke, both as a private person and a public character, in a compact, and, it is presumed, an easily intelligible shape. The author's aim and anxiety have been to furnish a plain and popular biography. In his endea- vour to effect that object, he has experienced, from the quantity of matter he has had to sift and set in order, far more difficulty and toil than he could have anticipated, or than probably the result of his labours may make it be believed. His success has now in some measure been tested, by the sale of a very large edition of this book within a very short space of time. This favourable reception, and early call for another edition,. are so far cheering, that they go to confirm what the author's estimation and admiration of the character and doctrine of Edmund Burke had led him already to hope, — that no effort Avould prove entirely vain which sought to aid in extending the Vlll PREFACE. knowledge of what was said and done by a master-spirit, whose reason and eloquence, the more their influence should expand, the more would they conduce to the public and general good. If, therefore, this production has proved at all available for its intended purpose, the time and trouble devoted to the task of its formation seem light; the recompense is ample and agree- able indeed. • s ^iSSSiir a'l ^5 H ft:., .i-i'SjN THE HOUSE, 33 AREAS QUAY (NOW A CHEMIST'S), WHERE EDMUND BURKE WAS BORN. CONTENTS. CHAPTER 1. PAGE Family of Do Burgh, or Burke — Parentage and kindred of Edmund Burke— Edmund Burke's birth at the house No. 33, Arran Quay, Dublin (now McDermott and Co.'s well-known chemical laboratory and violet-ink establishment) — Early education — The Shackletons — College life — Essays against Lucas— Burke entered at the Middle , Temple— His arrival in London 1 CHAPTER II. Burke's student-life— Arthur Murphy — Burke's association with litera- ture—His early success as a writer— Miss Woffington — " The Vindi- cation of Natural Society" — The " Essay on the Sublime and Beau- tiful" — Sir Joshua Reynolds, Dr. Johnson, Macklin — Glasgow — America 12 CONTENTS. CHAPTER III. PAGE Marriage— Domestic life — Further literary labours — Establishment of the " Annual Register" — Opening political career . . . .31 CHAPTER IV, Burke in Parliament — The dispute with America — Burke's first Speech — His energy in support of Ministry — His conference with Wilkes — Termination of the Rockingham Administration — Burke's pamphlet in its defence — The Pitt and Grafton Ministry — Burke's eloquence touching Lord Chatham and Charles Townshend — Dissolution of Parliament — Burke again elected for Wendover — Pamphlet on the State of the Nation — Lord Chatham's resignation — Wilkes — Junius — Libel Bill — Dissenters — " Thoughts on the present Discontents" — Sjjeech on American taxation — Charles Fox — Burke's election for Malton and Bristol — Speech onAmerican conciliation — Dr. Johnson's pamphlet — American war — Economical reform — Gordon Riots — Skive-trade abolition — Difference with Bristol constituents — Howard — Burke's retirement from Bristol and re-election for Malton — Failure of ministerial measures with regard to America — Accession of the Rockingham Administration — Burke Paymaster of the Forces — His proceedings — Death of the Marquess of Rockingham — His Mauso- leum at Wentworth Park — Shelbm-ne Ministry — Peace with America 53 CHAPTER V. Burke's domestic life — His acquisition of a country-house at Beacons- field— His agricultural pursuits — Hospitality at Gregories — Burke's manners and habits — Anecdotes — Marie Antoinette — Burke in Scot- land — The Literary Club — Baretti's Trial — Burke's brother Richard — Burke's son Richard — William Burke— John Bourke — Burke's sister, Mrs. French— Death of Goldsmith— Johnson's visit to Bea- consfield — Abraham Shackleton — Mrs. Leadbeater's poetry — Lord North— Garrick — Miss Bumey — Burke's philanthropy — Barry the Painter — Crabbe the Poet 101 CONTENTS. XI CHAPTER VI. PAGE Coalition Ministry— Burke again Paymaster-General— India and the affairs of the East India Company— Philip Francis— Warren Hast- ings—Fox's East India Bill— The Pitt Administration— The Nabob of Arcot's debts— Burke Lord Rector of Glasgow University — Bur- glary at Beaconsfield — Death and funeral of Dr. Johnson — Im- peachment and trial of Warren Hastings — Acquittal of Hastings ; his subsequent career and death — Death of Francis . . • 153 CHAPTER VII. The Regency question— The French Revolution— Burke's opposition to it : his conduct relative to France in and out of Parliament — Publi- cation of his " Reflections on the French Revolution," and of his other works on the same subject — Burke's retirement from the House of Commons 2-5 CHAPTER VIII. Death of Edmund Burke's Sister and Brother— Death of his Son : his, grief in consequence — Edmund Burke's pension : his Letter to the Duke of Bedford relative to it— Burke's declining health— His death, funeral, and will— Dr. King, Bishop of Rochester— Sir Richard Bourke — Edmund Burke's family and representatives— Sale of his estate at Beaconsfield, and accidental destruction by fire of his seat — Personal description of Burke — Concluding remarks . . . 275 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. PAGE Frontispiece — Edmund Burke concluding his opening speech at the trial of Warren Hastings. Vignette in title-page — Portrait of Edmund Burke. House where Edmund Burke was born ix The Quays, Dublin • . . . 1 Arms of the family of Burke 3 Buins of Kilcolman Castle 5 The Middle Temple 12 Arthur Murphy, Esq. 14 Burke in the gallery of the House of Commons 17 Margaret "Woffington in the character of Mrs. Ford . . . .19 Charles Macklin 27 View of Bath : temp. 1757 31 Lord Charlemont 40 Burke caricatured by Gilray 51 The old Parliament Houses ......... 53 Burke's first speech in Parliament 56 The Marquess of Rockingham 58 Junius as represented in a print of the time 71 View of Bristol : temp. 1774 82 Howard the Philanthropist 93 The Rockingham Mausoleum ........ 98 Burke's House at Beaconsfield • • 101 Burke seeing Marie Antoinette 113 LordNoith 126 Fac-simile of Burke's Handwriting . . . .... 130 Burke's kindness to a destitute woman 135 Xiv LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. PAGE The Prince of Wales, after Gilray 137 I '.airy the Painter 142 Crabbe the Poet 148 Benares 153 Charles Pox, after Gilray 155 Philip Francis • 157 William Pitt 171 Warren Hastings 188 Richard Brinslcy Sheridan 198 Plan of the Court at the trial of Warren Hastings .... 202 Edmund Burke, after a painting by Reynolds 225 Louis XVI 244 ' Marie Antoinette 247 The Dagger-Scene, caricatured by Gilray 262 The Duke of Portland 273 Village of Beaconsfield 275 Cromwell House, Old Brompton 279 Louis XVIII 284 Burke consulted on the French Revolution 294 The Burke Tablet in Beaconsfield Church 307 Mr. Haviland Burke 309 Tail-piece — Burke's armorial ensigns among French lilies . . . 316 -^#£@~ As, in far realms, where Eastern kings are laid, In pomp of death, beneath the cypress shade, The perfumed lamp, with unestinguish'd light, Flames through the vault, and cheers the gloom of night ; So,. Edmund Burke, in thy sepulchral urn, To fancy's view, the lamp of truth shall burn ; Thither late times shall turn their reverent eyes, Led by thy light, and by thy wisdom wise. GEORGE CANNING. THE QUAYS, DUBLIN. CHAPTER I. Archidamiis The greatest promise that ever came into my note. Cam (Ho. I very well agree with you in the hopes of him : it is a gallant child. Shakespeare. Family op De Burgh or Burke— Parentage and Kindred of Edmund Burke — Edmund Burke's Birth— Early Education — The Shackle- tons — College Life— Essays against Lucas— Burke entered at the Middle Temple — His Arrival in London. The family, originally Norman, of De Burgli, Bourke, or Burke, established in the sister island by William Fitz-A.delm, who was sent there with Hugh de Lacie to receive the submission of Rode- rick O'Connor, king of Connaught, temp. Henry II., has " yielded 2 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. (to quote from Sir Richard Cox, the historian.) " many brave and worthy men, that have proved eminently serviceable to their king and country, whereby the name and estate are preserved in great honour and reputation to this day." The race thus referred to has been for centuries spread over the counties of Galway, Mayo, Limerick, Cork, and Tipperary ; has possessed extensive landed property, and been ennobled at various epochs, under the titles of Clanricarde, Ulster, Clanmoris, St. Albairs, Leitrim, Brittas, Mayo, Tyaquin, Galway, Castle Connell, and Downes. The derivative branches were numerous, and many still maintain their footing in the west of Ireland, despite of the ruthless con- fiscations of Cromwell and William's times, and the scarcely less sweeping spoliation of the Encumbered Estates Court of the present day. From which of these branches Edmund Burke traced his ancestry has never been clearly ascertained. That he was a de- scendant of an offshoot of Clanricarde, several circumstances tend to show. Tradition, so often, and more especially in Ireland, an unerring guide on the misty path of the genealogist, affirms that the branch from which the great statesman sprung was a scion of the main stem of Clanricarde, long settled in the counties of Gal- way and Limerick; and this popular belief is corroborated by the arms borne by Edmund Burke, and his proved progenitors, which were those precisely of the Clanricarde family ; as well as by the recognition of John Smith Burke the eleventh Earl, who on mure than one occasion addressed the rising statesman as " cousin." It is, at any rate, pretty certain that Edmund Burke's im- mediate progenitors possessed estates in the county of Limerick, the greater portion of which were lost in the civil commotions of the seventeenth century : the great grandfather of the statesman retired, in consequence, to the property he possessed in the county of Cork, and settled there in the neighbourhood of Castletown Boche, a village about five miles from Doneraile. The grandson, Richard Bourke or Burke, the father of Edmund Burke, was HIS PARENTS AND KINDRED. brought up to the profession of the law, and resided for Some time in Limerick, but eventually removed to Dublin, where he took a house on Arran Qua}-, and there practised as an attorney with eminent success. About the year 1725 he married Mary, daughter of Patrick Xagle, Esq., of Ballyduff and Moneaminy (descended from an ancient family in the county of Cork, of which was Sir Richard Xagle, Attorney-General for Ireland, temp. James II.). Through the Xagles, Edmund Burke was in a distant degree connected with the illustrious poet Edmund Spenser. Spenser's eldest son, Sylvanus of Kilcolman in the county of Cork, married Ellen, daughter of David Xagle, Esq. of Moneaminy. Mr. Richard Burke had, by his wife, no less than fifteen children, all of whom died in youth except Garrett — Edmund — 4 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. magnum nomen — Richard, and Juliana. Garrett, the eldest son, followed his parent's profession, and resided in Dublin; he was never married, and died, not long after his father, in 1765, wdien the county of Cork property, which had been for several genera- tions in his ancestors' possession, devolved on his brother Edmund, by whom it was sold for 4000Z. Richard, the third son, acquired reputation in the political circles of London as a barrister, a wit, and a writer. More will be related of him in the course of this biography. Of the only daughter, Juliana, afterwards Mrs. French, further mention also will be made. Edmund BupjyE, the second son, was born in his fathers house, on Arran Quay, Dublin, the 1st January, 1730; or, as otherwise alleged, 1728. In his early years he was extremely delicate, even to the risk of consumption. This caused him to re- main at home longer than youths usually do. His first instructor was his mother, and he was fortunate in being taught by her. There are few men of transcendent ability who have not been the children of clever women, and Burke was no exception to this : his mother had a strong and cultivated understanding; to this she added the highest moial sense and the most fervent piety. No doubt her lessons kindled in the infant mind of her pupil the incipient sparks of that intellectual fire which w r as afterwards to burn so brightly ; no doubt also the fond care of such a woman implanted in her child's breast those seeds of virtue and relh'ion which grew with his growth, and secured the remarkable purity of his after-life. Another circumstance contributed not a little to give early vent to the ardent aspirations of the boy. Necessity for country air, for the invigoration of his frame, made the parents of Edmund Burke send him to sojourn at intervals in his grand- father's house at Castletown Roche, in the county of Cork, a town situate in a neighbourhood of romantic and surpassingly rural at- tractions and of glorious recollections. Here, at Kilcolman Castle, had Spenser written the Faerie Queene ; here had lived Essex and Raleigh, and here were plenty of stories and legends about them. HIS CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 5 The locality was classic ground, and imagination may easily trace the youthful Edmund wandering amid such scenes, now ahsorhed in the quaint but glowing verse of that other Edmund whom he might in some measure associate with his ancestry, now all-atten- tive to some marvellous tale of the Elizabethan times which touched upon history, his favourite theme. It is but natural to suppose that upon the beautiful banks of the Blackwater, Eng- land's future orator imbibed in the poetry of the Faerie Queene the taste for ornate and eastern imagery which gave such splen- dour to his eloquence ; that amid the memories hanging around the rains of Kilcolman, he first thirsted for the historic knowledge which was to throw such power and prophetic force into his rea- soning and his language. TINS OF KILCOLMAN CASTLE. After a residence, on and off, of five years at Castledown Roche, where he picked up the rudiments of Latin and other juvenile scholastic information from a worthy pedagogue named OTIalloran, at the neighbouring village school of Glamvorth, G LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. Edmund Burke arrived at a more serious stage of Lis education. He became in the year 1741, in his twelfth year, as well as his brothers Garrett and Richard, an inmate of the famous classical academy at Ballitore, in the county of Kildare, a village some twenty-eight miles from Dublin. This academy, one of wide- spread and just repute, was then kept by Abraham Shackleton, a member of the Society of Friends, and a very accomplished and amiable man. He had come from Yorkshire, and had opened the school in Ballitore hi 172G. Mr. Abraham Shackleton was a skilful and successful teacher, and at his school were educated many who became afterwards of considerable public note ; Barry the painter, the protege of Edmund Burke, being, as well as his patron, among the number. The following quaint verses, from an old magazine, bear tri- bute to the acknowledged eminence of the academy : " I've read in foreign climes of Ballitore, He said, and of its celebrated school, Where Irish youths imbibed that classic lore, Which taught to win the field, or senates rule. The days of Shackleton are days of yore, To us who on life's stage now play the fool ; But they shall bloom in story ever green, Nor ever fade, till fades the earthly scene." Ballitore school continued to thrive long after the days of its most distinguished pupil. Abraham Shackleton' s only son Richard succeeded his father in the management of the establishment about the year 1750, and from him the direction passed in 1775 to his sole surviving son Abraham Shackleton, who, in his turn, ceded it in 1809 to his son-in-law, James White, who remained at its head until its final close in 1840. Mr. White's daughter by his marriage with Miss Shackleton is wedded to a talented French gentleman, M. Theodore Eugene Suliot. Mr. White had a second wife, who, now his widow, lives with her children at Orange Hill, in the north of Ireland. HIS EDUCATION AT BALLITORE. 7 The main stem of the Shackletons still flourishes as worthy and as respectable as ever. Abraham Shackleton, the grandson of him who originated the school, died in 1815, and his three sons, Richard, Ebenezer, and George, all married men, and the two latter blessed with many children, are now resident in or near Ballitore. The memory of the illustrious senator, their friend, is green with them yet, as attest their ever -cordial readiness and courtesy, in reverting to their recollections and knowledge of him. The associations and amities which Burke made at this school remained dear to him through life. One friend of this period was Abraham Shackleton's son, Richard Shackleton, who, as above stated, succeeded his father in managing the school. To this Richard Shackleton, Burke was ever after warmly attached. Affectionate correspondence and mutual visits passed between them till Mr. Shackleton's decease in 1792 ; and after that event Mr. Burke continued his intimacy with the Shackletons until his own death. One of his very last letters was addressed to the daughter of his friend, Mrs. Mary Leadbeater ; her affecting answer is to be found hi the correspondence published by Lord FitzwiUiam and Sir Richard Bourke, and the reader is referred to it as a production fully worthy of a lady who, inheriting the talent of her family, obtained public favour herself as an author, and won the approbation of another genius of Ireland, Maria Edgeworth — a name, like that of Edmund Burke, of never- fading reputation. Mrs. Mary Leadbeater died in 1826, leaving a son and two daughters. Her son, Richard S. Leadbeater, lives at Stradbally, Queen's Co., Ireland. At Ballitore Edmund Burke devoted himself with ardour, industry, and perseverance to his studies, and laid the foundation of a classical erudition, which would have entitled ordinary men to the character of scholars, but constituted a very small propor- tion of his multifarious knowledge. His learning was the learning of a philosopher, not of a pedant. He considered the dead Ian- 8 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. guages not as mere scholastic lore, but as keys to the best thoughts and imagery, knowledge and reasoning. Of the versatility of Burke's genius, even at this time, the fol- lowing anecdote is related. Mr. Shackleton one day, when the assizes were commencing at Carlow, permitted his scholars to have a holiday to view the pi-ocession, on condition that the elder boys should give a description in Latin verse of the objects they saw, with their impressions from them. Edmund wrote* on his own account, a full and able description of what he beheld. A schoolfellow, whose exercises Burke often composed for him, applied rather late for the usual help on this occasion. Burke hurriedly undertook the job, and having his ideas somewhat ex- hausted by his own exercise, he tried to get new hints from the youth, but found that the promising juvenile had observed at the assize ceremony no other object but a fat piper with a brown coat. Edmund accordingly began in doggerel Latin : " Piper erat fattus qui brownum tegmen habebat ;" and went on with remarkable humour through many verses in the same style as the Polemomidinia of the celebrated Scotch bard, Drummond of Hawthornden. Burke's brother Richard, who abounded in vivacity and pointed wit, was by many esteemed, in their boyish days, the abler of the two ; as, among superficial judges, boys are rated ac- cording to the vivacity, not the force of their intellectual qualities and operations, — by the quickness of the vegetation more than the value of the production. Of the comparative merits of the two brothers, both their master and father entertained a very different opinion from that which others had conceived. They allowed that Richard was bright, but maintained that Edmund would be wise. The event justified their opinion. Richard was quick and acute ; Edmund went beyond that : his faculties were inventive and comprehensive, sagacious and energetic. Edmund Burke left Mr. Shackleton's school after being there HIS CAREER AT COLLEGE. 9 three years, and then immediately entered Trinity College, Dub- lin, on the 14th April, 1744. He became, the 26th May, 1746, a scholar of the house, which is similar to being a scholar of Christ Church, Oxford. Oliver Goldsmith, who was at Trinity College with Burke, has asserted that Burke did not render himself very eminent in the performance of hie academical exercises. Dr. Le- land, who was also Burke's contemporary, has declared the same. This, however, was not strictly correct. A desultory taste for all sorts of knowledge no doubt impeded Burke's more brilliant progress in the strict academical course; yet he did not go through college altogether without distinction. "Witness the scholarship just mentioned ; and it is also known that he received prizes for classic proficiency. In 1748 Burke took his degree of B.A. ; that of M.A. he obtained in 1751. He was presented with the further degree of LL.D. in 1791. Edmund Burke devoted a great portion of his time at college to general reading ; Lis chief subject was history — the future wea- pon of his strength ; among historians Plutarch was his favourite. In oratory, he pored over Demosthenes ; he took his moral phi- losophy from Francis Bacon, and especially from Addison ; and he doated on the poetry of Shakespeare. In classics his bias was for Horace, Virgil, and Lucretius. ■ He was also extremely fond of works of fiction : " A good novel is a good book," was a remark he used frequently to make. Burke went through his college career as he passed the rest of his life, — without any vice or dissipation, not appearing to think of such tilings. At this period too, as ever after, he de- lighted in society — in being surrounded by warm friends and pleasant companions. A high moral tone and dignified bearing, tempered by an extreme urbanity of manner, and a wonderful power of charming in conversation, had already become his cha- racteristics : already too his company was sought among the gay and fashionable, as much as among the learned. He had that 10 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. great art of good breeding which rendered men pleased with hirn and with themselves. He had an inexhaustible fund of discourse, either serious or jocose, seasoned with wit and humour, poignant, strong, delicate, sportive, as answered the purpose or occasion. He had a vast variety of anecdotes and stories, which were always well adapted and well told; he had also constant cheerfulness and high spirits. His looks and voice were in unison with the agreeable insinuation and impressiveness of his conversation and manners. Owning these attractions, — his lasting possessions, — it was no wonder that at all times Burke found it easy to have whatever associates he liked ; and he always chose the best. While at college, Burke was a member of that excellent insti- tution of juvenile debate for the use of the students of Trinity, called the Historical Society, which was the arena not only of his incipient oratory, but of that of many others among the greatest men Ireland has produced. Burke's varied studies had made him an adept hi rhetoric and composition, as well as in logic, physics, history, and moral philo- sophy ; and before he left college an opportunity occurred for a display of his proficiency. The occasion also afforded an early and remarkable instance of that aristocratic inclination of his mind, which, whatever might be afterwards thought or said of him, never at any time forsook him. The circumstance was this: In the year 17-11) one Dr. Charles Lucas, a demagogue apothecary, wrote a number of daring papers against government, and acquired as great popularity in Dublin as Wilkes afterwards did in London. Burke, versed in scholastic logic, and full of other knowledge suited to his purpose, perceived the noxious and insidious tendency of the doctors extreme levelling doctrines, and adopted a novel and clever mode of counteracting them. He wrote several essays in the style of Lucas, imitating it so completely as to deceive the public, pursuing Lucas's principles to consequences obviously re- sulting from them, and at the same time showing their absurdity and danger. Thus the first literary effort of his mind was an ex- HIS ENTRY AT THE TEMPLE. 11 posure of the absurdity of violent harangues about wild demo- cratic innovations. In Burke's correspondence, at and about this time, with his friend Shackleton and others, one cannot but be struck with his early acquisition of that deeply religious and moral style of thought and tone which characterised him through life. His letters to Shackleton, published among those edited by Earl Fitzwilliam and Sir Richard Bourke, may be always read hi then' entirety with pleasure and advantage. Many of these were written while Burke was in, or little past his teens ; and there frequently oc- cur such expressions as the following : " I assure you, my friend, that without the superior grace of God, 1 shall find it very difficult to be commonly virtuous." " It is one of the subtlest stratagems the enemy of mankind uses to delude us, that by lulling us into a false security his con- quest may be the easier. We should always be in no other than the state of a penitent, because the most righteous of us is no better than a sinner." " Providence never intended to much the greater part an entire life of ease and quiet. A peaceable, honourable, and affluent decline of life must be purchased by a laborious or hazardous youth; and every day I think more and more that it is well worth the purchase. Poverty and age sort very ill together ; and a course of struggling is miserable indeed when strength is decayed and hope gone. Turpe senex miles." " Advice should proceed from a desire to improve ; never from a desire to reproach." " Parting from a relative or friend, if I may make such a comparison, is like the sensation a good man is said to feel at the hour of death." Edmund Burke was intended by his father for the bar ; he was consequently entered at the Middle Temple on the 23d April, 1747. In 1750 he came to keep his terms in London. THE MIDDLE TEMPLE. CHAPTER II. " Well do I know that stately youth ! The broad daylight of cloudless truth Like a sunbeam bathes his face ; Though silent, still a gracious smile, That rests upon his eyes the while, Bestows a speaking grace. That smile hath might of magic art To sway at will the stoniest heart, As a ship obeys the gale ; And when his silver voice is heard, The coldest blood is warmly stirred, As at some glorious tale." Professor Wilson. BURKE'S STUDENT-LIFE. Burke's Student-life — Arthur Murphy — Burke's Association with Literature — His early Success as a Writer — Miss Woffington — " The Vindication of Natural Society" — The " Essay on the Sublime and Beautiful" — Sir Joshua Reynolds, Dr. Johnson, Macklin — Glasgow — America. According to the earnest desire of bis father, and pursuant also to his own purpose at the time, Burke forthwith made prepara- tions to become a barrister, and commenced the study of the law. But tbe narrow and tedious path which leads to legal display and fo- rensic triumph soon became far too confined and lengthy for a mind already at the goal of so much knowledge, and conscious of pow r ers that would brook no delay, and must be at once in action. The ripe fruit of tbe man's genius was ready to be plucked, and might pos- sibly have withered under prolonged cultivation. Law he read, it is true, and as with all other information within bis reach, he quickly grasped its theory and principles, mastering the science so as to effectively serve bis purpose upon some important occasions in his subsequent career. Burke, in one of his letters, makes the following apt remark as to forensic study : " Tbe law," he writes, " causes no difficulty to those who readily understand it, and to those who never will understand it ; a-id for all between these extremes, God knows, they have a hard task of it." From the exclusive drudgery customarily imposed on tbe law-student, Burke fled to the common and dangerous, but in his case very fortunate refuge, literature. Yet even here, though his talents speedily placed him high among authors, it would seem that he took to writing merely as the readiest means to the great end foreshadowed, though still scarcely distinct, to bis aspiring vision. Another motive for Burke's early truancy towards the law may be ascribed to his acquaintance with a fellow-student and l'< ! low-countryman, some few years his senior, who, like himself, was paying court to the Muses within the atmosphere of the forum. This was Arthur Murphy, a name eminent in dramatic and other 14 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. brandies of English literature. Arthur Murphy was the author of an able standard translation of Tacitus, which, by the way, he ARTHUR MURPHT, ESQ. dedicated to Edmund Burke : he also wrote many charming dramas ; some of them remain in vogue even to this day. His Way to keep Him is a chef-d'oeuvre. Murphy's life was indeed varied. Educated for a merchant, he relinquished the toils of traffic for BURKE AXD ARTHUR MURPHV. 15 literature ; he not only wrote for the stage, but he acted upon it, and successfully too. He was popular at Covent Garden theatre in some tragic characters, such as that of Othello. He was after- wards called to the bar in 1762, and went the Norfolk circuit. He died at Knightsbridge in 1805, a retired commissioner of bank- rupts, with a pension of 2001. a year. Murphy was both a wit and a gentleman ; he was the friend of Dr. Johnson, and was intimate with all the leading men of the day. He was, when Burke first met him, editing the well-known Gray's Inn Journal. The discovery of such an associate proved invaluable to Burke ; it opened to him the very society and re- sources he sought. Murphy found no less pleasure in knowing Burke. The introduction thus took place : Mr. Thomas Kelly, a common friend of both, and Burke's bondsman at the Temple, said one day to Murphy, "You should, sir, know our countryman Burke; a strangely clever fellow, I assure you;" and he then launched out into much more praise about him. " Bring us toge- ther," was Murphy's reply; and Kelly made a party soon after at his chambers, where the young gentlemen met each other. Mr. Murphy was filled with astonishment, not only at the brilliancy and force of his new acquaintance's genius, but at the extent and variety of the literary attainments of a man little more than twenty years of age. From that day he and Burke were friends through life. Of Mr. Burke's pecuniary means at this period conflicting accounts have been given. Some assert that he continually re- ceived large supplies from his family, and that he was extremely well off. Others say that it was not so, and that he was driven to his pen for a livelihood. The truth most probably lies between, Burke's father, a flourishing attorney in easy circumstances, made hrs son unquestionably a fair allowance, such as suited the wants and ways of a law-student; but Burke, be it observed, sought from the beginning a higher and more prominent position. To ex- travagance, in the sense of money thrown away upon debauchery and dissipation, Burke was ever a stranger ; but he was neverthe- 10 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. a man of fashion, making his way into associations and com- pany oi wealth and distinction. This, as every one knows, could not be done without extra expense; and to a lather annoyed, as was th" fact, by bis son's evident distaste for his profession, it would bave been vain for Burke to look for more than his student allowance. I nder these circumstances he adopted the all-honour- abli i relieving the lightness of his purse by the powers of his brain, lie began regularly to write for daily, weekly, and monthly publications. To these he contributed essays on various subjects "i general literature, and particularly politics. His com- positions united already information, reasoning, and invention much beyond his ordinary contemporaries, though the profits came iu but slowly, and public distinction had not yet arrived. At this period, Burke was in the habit, either alone or with ae agreeable friend, of travelling about England and sojourning at differenl country places, for the benefit of his still delicate health and weak constitution. One giant attraction would now draw the youthful genius from his desk, his journeys, and even from the intellectual tables of his friends. It was Burke's frequent and favourite custom to alone to the House of Commons; to there ensconce himself in the gallery, and to sit for hours, his attention absorbed, and his mind enrapt in the scene beneath him: " Some of these men," he remarked to a friend, "talk like Demosthenes and Cicero, and I feel when I am listening to them as if I were in Athens or Home." Soon these nightly visits became his passion ; a strange fascination drew him again and again to the same place. No doubt the magic of his own master spirit was upon him, and the spell was work- ing, lie might be compared to the young eagle accustoming its eye to the sun before it soared aloft: but with him events had yet to occur prior to the full flight of his ambition. While the House of Commons was but his place of recreation, literature con- tinued i" be his chief employment. Among Burke's earliest effusions some were in verse ; these ESSAY ON THE SUBLIME AND BEAUTIFUL. 17 wanted neither grace nor feeling, and rose above mediocrity ; but the writer, in all he undertook, would be great or nothing ; and he had the sense soon to see that his qualifications were not those BURKE IN THE GALLERY OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. of a first-rate poet. Verse, therefore, he gave up, and devoted himself to prose, of which he was becoming so rapidly a master, thai he was soon, by means of a single essay — that on the Sublime and Beautiful — to take, at the age of twenty-six, a position among c ]8 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. the standard authors of his country. All indeed who knew him, even at this time, were struck with the amazing strength of his intellect, and the infinite resources of his knowledge. He was prepared at the very shortest notice to write or speak well and ably upon almost any suhject. One cause of this superior readi- ness over most men of his years may perhaps be found in that total abstinence from vicious indulgences already alluded to. He eat and drank with great moderation. He took but little wine, his grand object at the social board being the feast of wit and rea- son. Of gambling or play he knew nothing, even now and then to Ids own annoyance ; for he used to declare, that whenever he was obliged to join a family-party in the amusement of cards, lie had to begin by learning the game. It might be added, that the softer sex could not allure him from his course ; but the breath of scandal, whether in joke or earnest, has just saved the great champion of chivalry from the ungallantry of not unbending to female fascination — from being reputed more of a Ulysses than a knight-errant. The object of Burke's attachment, or amour, as his friends would maliciously have it, was no less a person than the famous Miss, or Mistress, or, to use her more familiar designation, Peg. "WuffimTton. A few words about this lady may not be here misplaced. Margaret Wofhngton, an Irishwoman, and an actress of great ability and repute, was of very humble origin. While she was a child, her mother, a poor widow, kept a small grocer's, or, to use the Irish term, a hucksters shop, upon Ormond Quay, Dub- lin. Under these inauspicious circumstances Margaret began her career. Her first rise occurred thus : The Beggars' Opera was then the rage over the three kingdoms. A Frenchwoman, one Madame Violante, a rope-dancer and exhibitor of mountebank and such -like performances, undertook to get up a representation of this celebrated musical drama with a company of children, or, as they were called in the bills, " Lilliputians." Little Woffing- MISTRESS WOFFINGTON. 19 ton, then a pretty child in her tenth year, impersonated the bold Macheath, and did it so well, that the Lilliputian theatre was crowded every night. The sense and spirit of the girlish hero MARGARET WOFFIXGTON IN THE CHARACTER OF MRS. FORD. became the theme of general talk and praise. The career of Margaret "Woffington was thus begun, and her after proficiency did not belie the promise of her infantine talents. 20 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. As she grew up, she continued to act ; and a few years saw her the favourite of that eminent dramatic temple, Smock Alley Theatre, Dublin, where she was able, despite of her low birth and early education, to represent to perfection ladies of rank and fashion. Of tall stature, and dignified in form — elegant, and, though not an absolute beauty, possessing a face full of expression and vivacity — a perfect mistress of dancing, and, thanks to Madame Violante, speaking French fluently — lively, intelligent, witty, and accomplished — no wonder Mistress Woffmgton turned the heads and won the hearts of her audiences. Rich, the manager of Covent Garden Theatre, brought her to London in the winter of 1740. She was just twenty-two when she made her first appear- ance at his theatre, and took the town by storm in the male cha- racter of Sir Harry Wildair. This, and her Millimants, her Lady Townlys, and Lady Bettys, and lots of other dashing representa- tions, charmed the belles and bewitched the beaux of George the II.'s time. Garrick acted with her, fell in love with her, and lived her slave. A comical quarrel, that made the town laugh, ended then - tender intimacy, and she returned to Dublin, and to the Smock Alley Theatre of her early fame. Her beauty and accomplishments, her wit and vivacity, the endless charms of her conversation, made her company, in her native city, equally attractive off and on the stage ; even the grave and dignified in church and state looked at then' convivial meetings for the society of Peg Woffington ; she was the only woman admitted a member of the famous Beef-steak Club, the rendezvous hi Dublin of all the intellect of the day, including lords and members of parlia- ment, men of fashion, and literati. This club, of which she was even president, dwindling into party and political strife, Miss Wof- fington retired in disgust, and returned to London in 1756. It was at this time that Edmund Burke became enamoured of, at least, her intelligence and wonderful powers of conversation. Whether her beauty also enslaved him, his own high morality, and the fact of her being somewhat passee and an invalid, must leave VINDICATION OF NATURAL SOCIETY. 21 a matter of doubt. Their acquaintance was of short duration; for poor Peg's rapidly declining health forced her soon after into re- tirement, and brought on her death early in 1760. She passed from the mimic and the real scene much regretted ; for, like Nell Gwynne, her blame had the palhation of many womanly cpualifi- cations and much goodness of heart. John Hoole, the graceful translator of Tasso and Ariosto, wrote a monody to her memory, of which the following lines form a part : " Blest in each art, by Nature fonn'd to please, With beauty, sense, with elegance and ease, Whose piercing genius studied all mankind, All Shakespeare opening to thy vigorous mind ; In every scene of comic humour known, In sprightly sallies wit was all thy own ; Whether you seemed the cit's more humble wife, Or shone in Townly's higher sphere of life, Alike thy spirit knew each turn of wit, And gave new force to all the poet writ. Nor was thy worth to public scenes confined, Thou knew'st the noblest feelings of the mind ; Thy ears were ever open to distress, Thy ready hand was ever stretch'd to bless, Thy breast humane for each unhappy felt, Thy heart for others' sorrows prone to melt. In vain did Envy point her scorpion sting, In vain did Malice shake her blasting wing, Each generous breast disdain'd th' unpleasing tale, And cast o'er every fault oblivion's veil." The influence of Mistress "Woffington, of whatsoever nature it might be, proved to Mr. Burke in its result beneficial, since re- port has it that it was she who induced him to produce in a sepa- rate form his first important and acknowledged work. This bore the following title, " A Vindication of Natural Society, or a View of the Miseries and Evils arising to Mankind from every species of Artificial Society. In a letter to Lord * * * *, by a late Noble Writer." It came out in 175C. The purport of it was this: — the celebrated statesman and political writer of latitudina- 22 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. rian notoriety, Henry St. John, Viscount Bolingbroke, dying in 1751, bequeathed his manuscripts for publication to his friend, the poet David Mallet. Mallet brought them out in 1753; but scarcely had they appeared when a general cry was raised against them on account of their attack on Christianity and their infidel tone and tendency. The grand jury of Westminster, on the 16th of October, 1754, presented them as tending to the subversion of religion, government, and morality, and as being also against his Majesty's peace. The sensation about these productions still existed, when Edmund Burke, ever ready to enter the lists against profanity, adopted the like plan of confuting Bolingbroke, which he had before employed in the case of Dr. Lucas. This was to imi- tate (and he admirably did so) the style of Bolingbroke, which he had heard called inimitable, and to carry on a course of ironical argument in the same language and the same mode of persuasion as his model, so as to show that the system of reasoning used by the noble writer against religion might be urged with equal strength and equal falsity against any institution, whether human or divine. The Vindication of Natural Suciety displayed at once the extent of its author's knowledge in the historical statements, the versa- tility of his genius in the happy mimicry of Bolingbroke, and the force of his sagacity in perceiving, though hitherto unguided by experience, the tendency of scepticism to dissolve the batids of so- ciety. So absolute was the imitative art of Burke, that Mallet, who had ushered the disgraceful writings of Bolingbroke into public notice, actually went to Dodsley the publisher's shop, when crowded, to make an open disclaimer as to Bolingbroke or he being author or editor of the insidious production. One fault only may be at- tributed to this Vindication of Natural Society, and that lies in its very cleverness ; for, so concealed is the irony throughout, that the reader runs the risk of taking the whole for earnest, and being led by the fascinating elegance and energetic eloquence of the diction to a conclusion far different from the one intended. This pamphlet attracted much attention, and had a fan; success. It dr. Johnson's opinion of burke's essay. 23 brought Burke, when he came to be known as its author, such favour and encouragement as induced him to make, in the same year, another literary venture of a very different nature. This was his celebrated " Philosophical Inquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful"' — an essay which at once established its author's eminence as a writer, and which has never ceased to retain its merited popularity. This charming production is a valuable addition to English literature. It dis- plays the learning of a scholar, the invention of a poet, and the wisdom of a philosopher. Dr. Johnson considered it a model of philosophical judgment. "We have," he said, "an example of true criticism in Burke's Essay on the Sublime and Beautiful. There is no great merit in showing how many plays have ghosts in them, or how this ghost is better than that ; you must show how terror is impressed on the human heart." In this famous essay the author's design is to lay down such principles as may tend to ascertain and distinguish the sublime and the beautiful in any art, and to form a sort of standard for each. In his mode of doing this, he exhibits a mind feelingly alive to each line impulse, able to investigate its own operations, their effects and causes. He unites Longinus and Aristotle. Burke is a philosophical anatomist of human sensations. Who- ever turns his attention to subjects of taste must see that his enumeration of the qualities which constitute sublimity and beauty is exact. Of the sublime he says, " Whatever is fitted in any sort to excite the ideas of pain and danger, that is to say, what- ever is in any sort terrible, or conversant about terrible objects, or operates in a manner analogous to terror, is a source of the sublime." When he comes to speak of beauty, he propounds a theory, of which the following is the substance. Beauty is that quality, or those qualities, of bodies by which they cause love, or some passion similar to it. This idea cannot arise from proportion, since, in vegetables and animals, there is no standard by which we can 24 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. measure our ideas of proportion, and in man exact proportion is not always the criterion of beauty ; neither can it arise from fit- ness, since then all animals would have beauty, for every one seems best adapted to its own way of living ; and hi man strength would have the name of beauty, which, however, presents a very different idea. Nor is it the result of perfection, for we are often charmed with the imperfections of an agreeable object ; nor, lastly, of the qualities and virtues of the mind, since such rather conciliate our esteem than our love. Beauty, therefore, is no creature of reason, but some merely sensible quality acting mechanically upon the mind by the intervention of the senses." It is needless, how- ever, to enter further, or perhaps thus far, into the contents of a production so generally read and known, and every where to be had. What resulted from its first publication is more appropriate to the present subject. The appearance of the Essay on the Sublime and Beautiful proved a grand epoch hi Burke's life. From it date his eminence as a writer and his position as a public man. He had achieved the manifestation of his intellectual powers ; and great people sought to know Mm. Among them Sir Joshua Reynolds and Dr. Johnson courted intimacy with the author of the Sublime and Beautiful. Warm, intimate, life-lasting friendship followed swiftly in the track of this acquaintance with the illustrious painter and with the colossus of English literature. Reynolds was rich and hospitable, and his house was the favourite resort of talent. Among the moral and wise, Johnson stood like Saul among the people. The potent Doctor from the commencement discovered hi Burke that extraordinary genius and knowledge which the world afterwards saw. He it was who declared that Burke was the greatest man living ; and that if one were to be driven to seek shelter from a shower of rain under the same gateway with him, one must hi a few minutes perceive his superiority over common men. This observation showed not only Johnson's exalted idea of Burke, but also Ids own discernment. He perceived in Burke DK. JOHNSON. — GOLDSMITH. 25 both a surprising facility of communicating and applying Ins intel- lectual stores, and a wonderful versatility in adapting Ms expla- nations and discourses to the subject, and to the capacity of his hearers. " If," said Johnson, " Burke were to go into a stable, and talk for a short time with the ostlers, they would venerate him as the wisest man they had ever seen." Indeed, in every company, of whatever rank or capacity, Burke poured out the fulness of his mind in no stream of pedantry, but in a clear glit- tering effusion of knowledge. Though mentioned here in anticipation, Johnson's acquaintance with Burke began somewhat later than just after the publication of the Essay on the Sublime and Beautiful. At the house of David Garrick, on Christmas-day 1758, Dr. Johnson first dined in company with Mr. Burke. It was even then observed that the Doctor would, from his new associate, bear contradiction, which he would tolerate from no other person. The principal subject of conversation was Bengal, concerning which, though then a topic hardly known, Burke had ready, accurate, and extensive infor- mation. Among those who hailed the dawn of Edmund Burke's bril- liant day, no one came to him with more cordial congratulation — the fervid ebullition of a heart warm and loving to the core — than his former fellow-collegian and ever-devoted friend, poor, excel- lent, inimitable Oliver Goldsmith, who was then, as indeed be always was, scribbling for a bare existence from the London pub- lishers — seeking life from those to whom he was about to give things immortal in exchange for dady bread. Strange does it now r seem, when one reverts to Goldsmith, and finds him looked down upon by Johnson, Reynolds, Horace "Walpole, Garrick, and other celebrities of his day. Johnson loved him, but treated him as he would a wayward and foolish schoolboy. Walpole tempered his admiration by calling him an inspired idiot. Posterity has done Goldsmith justice ; for who dreams now of want of sound common sense and the sanest intellect in the author of The De- 26 LIFE OF EDMUND BUItKE. serted Village, She Stoops to Conquer, and that purest, most perfect of novels, The Vicar of Wakefield, where the writer, with fervid inspiration, rich imagination, and boundless fancy, makes beautifully rational the Live of every domestic virtue, and instils into his reader the sweetest philosophy that ever warmed the heart of man ? Poor Goldsmith ! It was his perfect good-nature and utter want of selfishness, his boyish spirits, and his droll in- considerateness, that made him appear to men, few of them his equals, none his superiors, as a person more simple and less sen- sible than he really was. His fond reliance upon others gave an additional semblance of weakness to his character ; this confidence he often misplaced, but he showed his discernment when he enthu- siastically fixed it on Johnson and Burke. Goldsmith thought them the greatest men in the world. He looked up to, and delighted in their society with all the earnest affection of a school- boy, feeling something of the awe of school-hours in the pre- sence of the Doctor, while all was pleasure and playtime in his association with Edmund Burke. Goldsmith's poetry presents one well-known and remarkable instance of how he appreciated Burke and Johnson. In the " Haunch of Venison," partially an imitation of the third satire of Boileau, when Goldsmith came to the French poet's line, announcing the non-arrival of the promised grand guests — " Nous n'avons, m'a-t-il dit, ni Lambert ni Moliere," he put in place of the original names those of the two supreme objects of his own admiration : " My friend bade me welcome, but struck me quite dumb With tidings that Johnson and Burke would not come." < )f Goldsmith's further verse touching Burke and his family, more hereafter. To another standard writer of comedy, the author of The Man of the World and Love a la Mode, Charles Macklin, Burke owed his first opportunity of speaking before a public audience. MACKXIN S SCHEMES. 27 Macklin, one of that right royal and right worthy dynasty of actors, which, through Kemhle, Siddons, Cooke, and the Keans, has come down to the present day, had had from early life his surfeit of applause, and imagined when he had reached his sixty- CHARLES MACKLIX. third year, while still as stout as ever in fame and constitution, that it was time for him to retire from the stage : he accord- ingly made, what turned out to be, a temporary secession. In lieu of his profession, he set about executing a scheme of achiev- ing his fortune by the establishment of a tavern and coffee-house iu the Piazza, Covent Garden: to this he afterwards added a school of oratory, upon a plan hitherto unknown in England, founded upon the Greek, Roman, French, and Italian societies, 28 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. under the title of " the British Inquisition." The first part of this plan was opened on the eleventh of March, 1754, by a public ordinary, which was to take place daily at four o'clock, the price being three shillings each person, with allowance of port, claret, or whatever spirituous liquor the party should choose. The arrangement of the ordinary was this. Dinner was an- nounced by public advertisement to be ready at four o'clock, and just as that hour struck, a large bell affixed to the top of the house gave notice of the approaching repast. This bell continued ringing for about five minutes ; the dinner was then ordered to be dished, and in ten minutes afterwards it appeared upon the table ; after that, the outer room door was shut, and no other guest ad- mitted either for love or money. Macklin himself always brought in the first dish, habited in an appropriate suit of clothes, with a napkin slung across his left arm ; and he then remained to super- intend his waiters, whom previous drilling had accomplished in the art of attending silently and noiselessly, according to a system of signs. This arrangement, it is said, imposed a useful constraint upon the guests, and while the concern lasted, there occurred fewer quarrels than were then unhappily but too usual in such places. Of the other part of Macklin's scheme, which he called " the British Inquisition/' the main features were public discussion, directed by Macklin, on history, literature, art, and science ; and lectures of his own on elocution and dramatic action. The following passages from his first advertisement give fur- ther explanation of the plan. "At Macklin's great room in Hart Street, Covent Garden, this day, being the 21st November, 1754, will be commenced the British Inquisition. " The doors will be opened at five, and the lecture will begin precisely at seven o'clock, every Monday and Friday evening. Ladies will be admitted. Price one shilling each person. The first lecture will be on Hamlet. "N.B. The question to be debated after this day's lecture BURKE CANDIDATE FOR A PROFESSORSHIP. 29 will be, ' Whether the people of Great Britain have profited by their intercourse with, or their imitation of, the French nation ? ' "N.B. Tins evening the public subscription card-room will be opened. Subscriptions taken in by Mr. Macklin." Both at the ordinary and at the more intellectual entertain- ment, the company generally consisted of authors, players, tem- plars, and lounging-men about town. In this " British Inquisition" Burke was a debater, whether a leaching one or not is unknown, but certainly so much so to his own satisfaction and advantage, that he recommended Macklin to Alexander AYedderburn, then a seceder from the Scotch bar and a student at the Temple, for Macklin to teach him elocution, and cure him, if possible, of Ins Northern accent. This pupil, who be- came Lord Chancellor, and a peer as Baron Loughborough, and eventually Earl of Bosslyn, always acknowledged Macklin's powers as an instructor. The dinner and debating scheme of Macklin ended in bankruptcy — a fortunate result for the public, since its projector returned to the drama and the stage, to delight, when past eighty, his own and future ages with his creation of Sir Per- tinax MacSycophant, and to charm, until near his ninetieth year, Iris audiences with his impersonations of that character and Shy- lock. Singular enough, Macklin lived through all Burke's subse- cuient statesman-career, and died two days after him, on the 11th July, 1797. This chapter should not conclude without mention of two cir- cumstances relative to Burke at this period, though the particulars rest on evidence somewhat obscure. In 1752 or 1753, Burke, during a ramble he took in Scotland to benefit his health, offered himself a candidate for the chair of logic in the University of Glasgow, as the successor of his countryman Dr. Hutchison, who had already shed a lustre over that professorship which Adam Smith and Ferguson were afterwards to make more brilliant still. Whether Burke retired from the scholastic contest or was defeated 30 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. | at the election does not clearly appear ; but scarcely had he escaped this rock in the way of his political greatness, when, it is generally understood from a letter to his father, that he ran risk of another. It would seem that in 1754 he meditated going to the British American colonies ; hut it is not known in what capacity ; it is doubtful whether as an adventurer or to take a place under go- vernment — whether for permanent or temporary sojourn. His father put his veto on the intention, and the son at once submitted with ready and earnest expressions of filial obedience and affection. Burke was to have to do with these British colonies in America, but in a different way. The flashes of his intellect and the thun- der of his language — chances of light and warning which England threw away — were soon to mingle with the storm that cleared the atmosphere of American independence. He was to be with America, not in person, but in prophecy, — he who could foretell the future magnitude of those colonies, and who exclaimed, the very first time he saw the British ministry, in the weakness of its policy and the plenitude of its parliamentary majorities, open the way for those calamitous measures which led to final separa- tion from the mother country : " It is a poor compensation that you have tiiumphed hi a debate, whilst we have lost an empire!" VIEW OF BATH, TEMP. 1757. CHAPTER HI. " His force of genius burned in early youth With thirst of knowledge and with love of truth ; His learning, joined with each endearing art, Charmed every ear and gained on every heart. Thus early wise, th' endangered realm to aid, His country called him from the studious shade." Dr. Johnson. Marriage ; Domestic Life— Further Literary Labours— Establish- ment of the " Annual Register"— Opening Political Career. Tiie labour of perfecting and producing in one year two such works as the "Vindication of Natural Society" and the "Essay on the Sublime and Beautiful" was too much, if not for the mind, at least fur the body of the author. Intense application 32 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. impaired his health. Threatening symptoms of a consumptive cha- racter became too alarming to be further trilled with ; and Burke quitted his books and went to recruit at Bath, a place he had before visited for the same purpose with success. He had here already formed an acquaintance, — that of bis compatriot Dr. Christopher Nugent, a physician of repute, whose talents were now to save the life, and whose hospitality was to bring about the hap- piness of his patient. The Doctor, finding Burke too ill to remain in lodgings, generously took him into his own house, in accordance with a custom with medical men, formerly not of unfrequent occur- rence in the hospitable country whence the Doctor came.* Tender attention and skilful treatment, not from the Doctor only, but all his family, had soon a more powerful effect than any medicine in producing restoration to health. Among the most watchful of the patient and guest was the Doctor's daughter, Jane Mary Nugent, whose amiable solicitude soon excited a passion in the sensible heart of Burke. He offered her his hand, which she accepted ; and during a long life of various vicissitudes and trying situations, he had, in her soothing and affectionate conduct, every reason to rejoice at his lot. A few words here of the lady's father and his descendants. Christopher Nugent, M.D., was the scion of a highly respectable family hi Westmeath in Ireland, but was himself born to a scanty inheritance. He made a runaway match with the daughter of Colonel Leake, of Holycross, in the county of Tipperary, and by * In proof of this the following fact, in the writer's own knowledge, may be related. Some few years ago an English traveller in Ireland was sud- denly laid up with a severe illness at the inn at Birr, or Parsonstown, in the King's Co. The physician of the place, the late very eminent Dr. Hubert Kelly, being called in, saw the seriousness of the case, and the ne- cessity for the most watchful care. Without further to do, he insisted on taking the invalid home with him, and there he actually retained him for six months, until he effected his complete cure. On the traveller's leaving, the Doctor would not listen to the mention of any professional remunera- tion, as he had looked on his patient only in the light of a guest. MRS. BURKE — DR. NUGENT. 33 the timely aid of his wife's fortune, which was a large one, was enabled to complete his medical studies, and settle in Bath as a physician. By his union with Miss Leake, Dr. Nugent had a son and a daughter. The daughter was the wife of Edmund Burke ; the son was John Nugent, Esq., of London, Surveyor- General of the Customs, who married Lucy, daughter of Garrett Nagle, Esq., of Bally duff, county Cork, and left two sons and six daughters. The elder son was Christopher Richard Nugent, Esq. (since de- ceased), who married a daughter of Thomas Nash, Esq., of Guilford Street, London, an eminent Oporto merchant, and had a family. Christopher Nugent's younger son was Thomas Nugent, Esq., who died unmarried, at Pau, in France. Of the six daughters of Chris- topher Nugent, five are still living, viz. Jane, married to Henry Barnewall, Esq., of Loudon, and Richmond Hill, Surrey, a scion of the family of Barnewall, Baronets, of Crickstown Castle, county Meath; Catherine, widow of Captain St. Leger Hill, of the 12th Lancers ; Mary, married to the Ven. Isaac Wood, Archdeacon of Chester ; Lucy and Elizabeth, unmarried. The sixth daughter, now deceased — the youngest — Margaret, was wedded to James, son of the late James Hill, Esq., of Craig, county Cork. The marriage of Edmund Burke with Miss Nugent took place in the spring of 1757. This union, as above stated, was most for- tunate. Of high intellect, of gentle disposition and pleasing man- ners, the lady proved herself every way worthy of such a husband. Gratified and proud at having won the attachment of so good and great a man, she loved almost to idolatry, and her husband's hap- piness became the darling object of her life. Burke returned her devotion with the full warmth and energy of his chivalrous nature. 1 lis affection was deep, ardent, unchangeable ; his felicity centred in his wife's society and in the home she secured him. The inces- sant agitation of his public life found there a haven and a refuge. His language touching that, his cherished sanctuary, is beautifully expressive. " Every care," would he say, " vanishes the moment I enter under my own roof." D 34 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. Burke returned from Bath with his bride to London, where Lis father-in-law soon after joined him, and took up his residence with him — an arrangement that turned out very agreeahle to all parties. Dr. Nugent was not only a man of esteemed professional ability, but he had much general information and very pleasing manners. He had published some essays, chiefly on medical sub- jects, and, as a literary man and a social companion, had gamed one important step — the favourable attention of Dr. Johnson. Burke's house in Wimpole Street became a point of increased attraction to his Mends. The expenses of extended housekeeping and aug- mented society added force to Burke's exertions in literature, still the chief resource of his livelihood. In January 1757 appeared a very able descriptive sketch of the British American colonies, entitled " An Account of the European Settlements in America." This work, which had much success, was understood to be the joint production of Edmund Burke, of his brother Richard, and of a friend and relative, a Mr. William Burke, whose name will fre- quently occur in this biography. No doubt the labour bestowed upon it not a little aided Burke's subsequent master-display of knowledge on the American question. A new edition of the " Essay on the Sublime and Beautiful" — the result of a rapid sale, and the forerunner of many and many an edition to come — brought from Mr. Burke's father a present of 100/., hi admiration of his son's literary success, and in forgiveness of that which had tem- porarily vexed him — Edmund's neglect and abandonment of the legal profession. To this edition was first annexed the introduc- tory chapter on " Taste." In 1757 Mr. Burke published the commencement of an Eng- lish History. He had written it some years before, and his further proceeding with it was, it seems, stopped by his hearing that Hume had entered on the same topic. Literature suffered a loss by this suspension of his labours ; for, all-valuable as Hume's history proved to be, the few chapters which exist of that by Burke give sample of a composition of a character so different from that of ESSAY ON ENGLISH HISTORY. 35 Hume, yet so peculiar and excellent in its way, that, instead of interfering with, it would have added to the public benefit con- ferred by such writers as Hume, Robertson, and Gibbon. Mr. Burke entitled the few sheets he brought out " An Essay towards an Abridgment of English History, from the invasion of Julius Caesar to the end of the reign of King John." The work teems with the sense and philosophy of its author. It differs much in lauguage and thought from the great histories of Burke's own time. It exhibits little of their dazzling, yet but too often de- ceptive diction, but adopts rather the earnest and contemplative mode of writing pursued by later historians, such as Roscoe, Hal- lam, and Mackintosh. It is a pity that, while the " Essay on the Sublime and Beautiful" continues so popular, these chapters on early English history — perhaps the abler production of the two — should have sunk into comparative oblivion. Few accounts of the period of Anglo-Saxon rule hi England are better than that given by Mr. Burke, or more likely to assist those seeking know- ledge on the subject,* * In portraying- individuals, Burke is often scarcely less felicitous than Hume. His characters of William the Conqueror, Lanfranc, and Henry II., which were much admired when the work appeared, gracefully prove this. They are as follow : William I.— Lanfranc. " There is nothing more memorable in history than the actions, fortunes, and character of this great man (William) ; whether we consider the gran- deur of the plans he formed, the courage and wisdom with which they were executed, or the splendour of that success, which, adorning his youth, continued without the smallest reserve to support his age, even to the last moments of his life. He lived above seventy years, and reigned within ten years as long as he lived— sixty over his dukedom, above twenty over Eng- land — both of which ho acquired or kept by his own magnanimity, \\ it b hardly any other title than he derived from his arms ; so that he might be reputed in all respects, as happy as the highest ambition the most fully gratified can make a man. The silent inward satisfactions of domestic happiness he neither had nor sought. He had a body suited to the character of his mind — erect, firm, large, and active, whilst to bo active was a praise; a countenance stern, and which became command. Magnificent in liis living, reserved in his conversation, grave iu his common deportment, but relaxing 36 LITE OF EDMUND BUKKE. The opening of the year 1758 brought with it the birth of a son to Edmund Burke — a precious but a fatal gift. After the with a wise facetiousness, he knew how to relieve his mind and preserve his dignity ; for he never forfeited by a personal acquaintance that esteem he had acquired by his great actions. Unlearned in books, he formed his understanding by the rigid discipline of a large and complicated expe- rience. He knew men much, and therefore generally trusted them but little ; but when he knew any man to be good, he reposed in him an entire confidence, which prevented his prudence from degenerating into a vice. He had vices in his composition, and great ones ; but they were vices of a great mind — ambition, the malady of every extensive genius ; and avarice, the madness of the wise. One chiefly actuated his youth ; the other go- verned his age. The vices of young and light minds, the joys of wine, aud the pleasures of love, never reached his aspiring nature. The general run of men he looked on with contempt, and treated with cruelty when they opposed him. Nor was the rigour of his mind to be softened but with the appearance of extraordinary fortitude in his enemies, which by a sympathy, congenial to his own virtues, always excited his admiration, and insured his mercy ; so that there were often seen in this one man, at the same time, the extremes of a savage cruelty, and a generosity that does honour to human nature. Religion, too, seemed to have a great influence on his mind from policy, or from better motives ; but his religion was displayed in the regularity with which he performed its duties, not in the submission he showed to its ministers, which was never more than what good govern- ment required. Yet his choice of a counsellor and favourite was (not ac- cording to the mode of the time) out of that order, and a choice that does honour to his memory : this was Lanfranc, a man of great learning for the times, and extraordinary piety, He owed his elevation to William ; but though always inviolably faithful, he never was the tool or flatterer of the power that raised him ; and the greater freedom he showed, the higher he rose in the confidence of his master. By mixing with the concerns of state he did not lose his religion and conscience, or make them the covers or in- struments of ambition ; but tempering the fierce policy of a new power by tli mild lights of religion, he became a blessing to the country in which he was promoted. The English owed to the virtue of this stranger, and the influence he had on the king, the little remains of liberty they conti- nued to enjoy, and at last such a degree of his confidence as in some sort counterbalanced the severities of the former part of his reign." Henry II. '■ John was Henry II.'s youngest and favourite child. In him he re- posed all his hopes, and consoled himself for the undutifulness of his other bueke's children. 37 first burst of joy which the parental fondness of one so strong in home affections would naturally feel, pride and hope, as time went on, enhanced the pleasure. With increase of fame and fortune, the expectation grew larger and larger, that hereditary vitality and hereditary honour awaited the statesman — that with himself his genius was not to pass away, hut to flourish in descent. Burke's very soul wrapt itself in this flattering vision. He doated on the object of such auspicious promise beyond almost a fathers love — perhaps, to judge from the result, beyond the devo- tion that should be bestowed on earthly things ; for, through the very sunshine of his affection, came from Providence the stroke, which made a wreck of the great man's aspirations, happiness, sons ; but after concluding the treaty with the king of France and Richard, he found too soon that John had been as deep as any in the conspiracy. This was his last wound. Afflicted by his children in their deaths, and harassed in their lives ; mortified as a father and a king ; worn down with cares and sorrows more than with years, he died cursing his fortune, his children, and the hour of his birth When he perceived that death approached him, by bis own desire he was carried into a church and laid at the altar's foot. Hardly had he expired when he was stripped, then forsaken by his attend- ants, and left a longtime a naked and unheeded corpse in an empty church ; affording a just consolation for the obscurity of a mean fortune, and an in- structive lesson how little an outward greatness, and enjoyments foreign to the mind, contribute towards a solid felicity, in the example of one who was the greatest of kings and the unhappiest of mankind." The following graphic description of Ireland occurs in this English History : — " Ireland is about half as largo as England. In the temperature of the climate there is little difference, other than that more rain falls, as the country is more mountainous, and exposed full to the westerly wind, which blowing from the Atlantic Ocean, prevails during the greater part of the year. This moisture, as it has enriched the country with large and fre- quent rivers, and spread out a number of fair and magnificent lakes beyond the proportion of other places, has, on the other hand, encumbered the island with an uncommon multitude of bogs and morasses ; so that in general it is less praised for corn than pasturage, in which no soil is more rich and luxuriant. Whilst it possesses these internal means of wealth, it opens on all sides a great number of ports, spacious and secure, and, by their advantageous situation, inviting to universal commerce." 33 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. ami life. Burke's son, who was called Richard, was born hi Janu- ary 1758. With the exception of a child christened Christopher, that died in infancy, Burke bad no other issue. This year, 1758, Mr. Burke planned and prepared, under the auspices of the publisher Mr. Dodsley, a periodical which, with but one exception, " the Gentleman's Magazine," has had the longest life of any such work that has appeared in this country. This was the still-existing and still-flourishing " Annual Regis- ter," a miscellany of great utility, which has had, through its whole course, the good fortune of able and effective editorship. The " Annual Register's" historical 4chronicle, begun by Edmund Burke, and sustained to the present time by other writers, with consummate industry and skill, has been a plentiful source to the majority of modern bistorians, and affords in itself a most copious supply of knowledge. The other features of the " Annual Register" are also good. Its reviews have ever been trust- ' worthy and just ; such, indeed, as distinguish the labours of the critic from the Zoilus, that character, whose cowardice and ma- lignity Henry Fielding has so powerfully depicted, entitling him the " slanderer of books." The philosophical and lighter articles, and the poetry of the " Annual Register," frecpiently partake of the excellences of that very best of all our periodicals, " Black- wood's Magazine." A peculiar worth of the "Annual Register" consists in the continual maintenance of that intellectual tone and fair spirit which Edmund Burke first gave it. This makes the work appear as if still composed by its sagacious originator. The first volume of the " Annual Register" was issued hi June 1759. It is curious now to refer to that volume, and to observe how much there is of Edmund Burke's bent of mind about it. The historical portion opens with the subject of America, and the first among the essays inserted is that on Taste, by Montesquieu. The preface unmistakably comes from the pen of Burke. It commences thus : " Some of the learned have been very severe upon such works " THE AJtNUAL REGISTER." 39 as we now lay before the public. Their severity would have been just, if such works had been recommended or used to the exclu- sion of more important studies. Those who aspire to a solid eru- dition must undoubtedly take other methods to accuiire it. They have their labour and their merit. But there are readers of ano- ther order, who must not be left wholly unprovided. For such readers it is our province to collect matters of a lighter nature ; but pleasing even by their levity, by their variety, and their apti- tude to enter into common conversation. Things of this sort often gradually and imperceptibly insinuate a taste for knowledge, and in some measure gratify that taste. They steal some moments from the round of dissipation and pleasure. They relieve the minds of men of business, who cannot pass from severe labour to severe study, with an elegant relaxation. They preserve the strenuous idleness of many from a worse employment. These pretensions we have in common with all the other periodical com- pilers ; and the same apology serves us all. But it will be ex- pected, that in offering a new performance to the public, we should mention some new and peculiar advantage which we pretend to have over our fellow-labourers. Some such advantages we flatter ourselves we possess, partly arising from our scheme of an annual rather than niontldy publication ; partly from our own attention and industry." The " Annual Begister" was for several years carried on by Burke himself, or under his immediate inspection. During a fur- ther period, when he became immersed in active politics, which necessarily took him from the miscellany, it had still the benefit of liis general superintendence and of the occasional exercise of his own talents. At no time, however, would Burke allow his name or any particular mention of himself, further than could be avoided, to appear in connexion with this periodical, since he held it to be the better taste always to preserve, in such kind of writing, a per- fect inco-nito. 40 LIFE OF EDMUND BUEKE. Whilst the compilation of the historical part of the " Annual Register" was gradually enlarging the capacity of Burke for poli- tical life, events were drawing near which were to place him in it. The talents of Burke had attracted the favourable attention of one of the worthiest and most patriotic noblemen of that age, James Caulfeild, fourth Viscount, and subsequently first Earl of Charlemont, an Irishman dear to the memory of his country. "When Ireland had prepared to make her boldest strokes for a free trade, and then an uncontrolled constitution, the direction of the movement was intrusted to this Earl, as to one whom dangers LORD CHARLEMONT. could not intimidate, nor gold corrupt. A unanimous election made him commander-in-chief of the famous volunteer army of 50,000 men, which included nobles, gentles, and commons, the SINGLE-SPEECH HAMILTON. 41 very strength and sinews of the kingdom. To the Irish of every creed and party, the twenty years of independence achieved in 1780 and 1782 — an oasis in the desert of their history — remain a gladsome and glorious remembrance. The Earl of Charlemont, whose own lamp of existence went out just as the brilliant constitutional light he had lit up was flickering and about to ex- pire in the socket, lias his fame attached, in death as in life, to a past that Ireland seems proudly and unceasingly to doat upon. Among bis many virtuous qualities, this good nobleman had pecu- liarly a love of protecting and advancing men of ability in their various avocations. He had read with delight the Essay on the Sublime and Beautiful, and he determined to serve its au- thor : he sought his acquaintance, and a lasting friendship arose between them. In furtherance of his intention to aid Mr. Burke, Lord Charlemont introduced him to a personage then of political influence, the Bight Hon. William Gerard Hamilton. This gentleman, who has since enjoyed a kind of bye-word reputation from his well-known nickname of Single-speech Hamil- ton, had risen hito public notice through his own abilities, which were of no ordinary kind. The scion of a respectable legal fa- mily, he had received his education at Oriel College, Oxford, had entered on the profession of the law at Lincoln's Inn, and had early relinquished that career, and become, in 1754, a member of parliament. By one brilliant harangue, his only display of elo- quence in the British House of Commons, Hamilton established his fortune. He was thereupon appointed a lord of trade under the then president, Lord Halifax. About the same time he came to know and to form a close alliance with Mr. Burke ; indeed so intimate were they, and so readily did Hamilton acknowledge the extraordinary mental powers of his new friend, that rumour would have it that Burke had composed his single speech for him, winch it seems was not the fact. In 17G1 Lord Halifax became Lord Lieutenant of Ireland ; Hamilton was named the chief se- cretary of his government, and Burke stepped into political life 42 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. by being appointed private secretary to Hamilton. He accom- panied bis patron to Ireland ; and there is no doubt that the ad- ministration of Lord Halifax owed much of its prosperity to the confidential advice and aid of Burke. To him Lord Halifax was confessedly indebted for some of his best measures and best ad- dresses. Hamilton did again in the Irish House of Commons what he had done in the British senate : he made one splendid oration and no more, and again was Burke supposed to be its au- thor. Those who were best acquainted with Burke and Hamil- ton denied the reality of the report. The truth was most pro- bably this : Hamilton had talents and attainments fully adequate to the production of the speeches which he so strangely spoke, but he had great indolence also. He may too have felt peculiar enjoy- ment in this curious kind of celebrity, as, indeed, his very repeti- tion of the act in the Irish House would go to show. His retire- ment upon a profitable sinecure office after a very few years of political labour, and his subsequent life spent in luxurious idleness, prove that the man made the exercise by starts and flashes of his genius available merely to procure him such public reputation as would not be inconsistent with private comfort and pleasure. Hamilton might well and safely, while in office in freland, indulge in his sluggish propensities ; there was another at work fur him, ardent, aspiring, indefatigable. Burke felt himself launched on the political sea that was to waft him to a world of fame. He put every energy to his work ; he quickly mastered the difficulties of his employment, and made the very drudgery subservient to the acquisition of official knowledge. Attentive to whatever passed around him, despising no routine, determined to learn the minutest particulars, he taught himself valuable lessons, whilst he toiled successfully for a government that was reaping the harvest of such rare assistance. Two years passed in this way made Burke an accomplished official ; yet during these same two years, public labour was not his sole avocation. It was once ob- served by hhn, " that idleness filled up a man's time much more QUARREL WITH HAMILTON 1 . 43 completely, and left hiin less Lis own master, than any sort of employment whatsoever." He was himself a living proof of the truth of his maxim. He seemed to have time for every thing. Despite of official occupation, he adhered to his literary pursuits ; he renewed his associations with many of his former instructors and contemporaries at Trinity College. One evening at least in each week would he spend with them in conversation and discus- sion upon learned subjects. There his love of society found for him new friends — many of them great names, that were to flow down upon the tide of time — names such as Lord Pery, Sir Her- cules Langrishe, and Henry Flood. Then, again, there was his domestic hearth ; there were his visits of affection. Burke never forgot nor forsook. He travelled to Cork to spend some time with his brother Garrett. Kilcohnan and the loved scenes of his childhood saw him once more wandering amongst them ; even the old Irish schoolmaster, O'Halloran, who taught him his rudiments, bad a call and a warm shake of his hand. To Balhtore and the Shackletons, Burke of course must also go. Mr. and Mrs. Shackle- ton returned the visit at Dublin Castle, then Edmund's abode by virtue of his office. The incident that occurred when they went there recals a similar story of the famous Bourbon prince, Henry the Great. The Shackletons, instead of finding, as they expected, the incipient statesman immersed in government affairs, surprised him with his children, carrying one of them on his back, all fours, round the room, whilst the other, an infant, lay crowing with delight upon the carpet. Burke's useful industry in the service of the Irish government received a substantial acknowledgment in the grant, on the 14th of April, 1763, of a pension of 300Z. per annum. This he enjoyed hardly two years ; for, discovering that official work was not to be the sole consideration of the income, bis pride revolted, and he spumed a favour that touched his honour. He resigned the pen- sion, transferring it to Mr. Colthurst, Mr. Hamilton's solicitor, on the 10th of April, 17G5 ; and he broke off all further connexion 44 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. with Hamilton himself. The real particulars of this affair have come to light by the publication of a letter from Burke to his friend, the eminent statesman, Henry Flood, dated the 18th May, 1765, and to be found in the Burke Correspondence of Lord Fitzwil- liam and Sir Richard Bourke. The communication marks Burke's lofty and independent spirit ; it commences and proceeds thus : '•' My dear Flood, — I thank you for your very kind and most obliging letter. You are a person whose good offices are not snares, and to whom one may venture to be obliged, without dan- ger to his honour. As I depend upon your sincerity, so I shall most certainly call upon your friendship, if I should have any thing to do hi Ireland. This, however, is not the case at present, at least in any way in which your interposition may be employed, with a proper attention to yourself, a point which I shall always very tenderly consider in any applications I make to my friends. It is very true that there is an eternal rupture between me and Hamilton, which was on my side neither sought nor provoked ; for though his conduct in public affairs has been for a long time directly contrary to my opinions, very reproachful to himself, and utterly disgustful to me ; and though in private he has not justly fulfilled one of his engagements to me, yet I was so uneasy and awkward at coming to a breach, where I had once a close and intimate friendship, that I continued with a kind of desperate fidelity to adhere to his cause and person ; and when I found him greatly disposed to quarrel with me, I used such submissive measures as I never before could prevail upon myself to use to any man. The occasion of our difference was not any act whatsoever on my part ; it was entirely on his ; by a voluntary but most in- solent and intolerable demand, amounting to no less than a claim of servitude during the whole course of my life, without leaving me at any time a power either of getting forward with honour, or of retiring with tranquillity. This was really and truly the sub- stance of his demand upon me, to which I need not tell you I refused, with some degree of indignation, to submit. On this we RETURN TO LONDON. 45 ceased to see each other, or to correspond, a good while before you left London. He then commenced, through the intervention of others, a negotiation with me, in which he showed as much of meanness in his proposals as he had done of arrogance in his de- mands ; but as all these proposals were vitiated by the taint of that servitude with which they were all mixed, his negotiation came to nothing. He grounded those monstrous claims (such as never were before heard of in this country) on that pension which he had procured for me through Colonel Cunninghame, the late Primate, and Lord Halifax ; for through all that series of persons this paltry business was contrived to pass. Now, though I was sensible that I owed this pension to the goodness of the Primate, in a great degree, and though, if it had come from Hamilton's pocket, instead of being derived from the Irish Treasury, I had earned it by a long and laborious attendance, and might, in any other than that unfortunate connexion, have got a much better thing, yet, to get rid of Mm completely, and not to carry even a memorial of such a person about me, I offered to transmit it to his attorney in trust for him. This offer he thought proper to accept. I beg pardon, my dear Flood, for troubling you so long, on a sub- ject which ought not to employ a moment of your thoughts, and never shall again employ a moment of mine." Hamilton caused his solicitor, Mr. Colthurst, to assign the pension to Mr. Jephson, one of Hamilton's new fiiends ; for thus, in those days, were these matters jobbed. In 1764 Burke returned permanently to London, and resided in a house hi Queen Anne Street. He betook himself again to his literary avocations, to frequenting the gallery of the House of Commons, and to perfecting the powers of his oratory by attending various debating associations in the metropolis. Among others he frequented the Ilobin Hood Society, then popular with most men of information or fluency aspiring to be orators. He practised there the replies and contentions of eloquence. A baker v( considerable argumentative powers was, at the time, the great genius of the 46 LIFE OF EDMUND BUKKE. Society ; him Burke frequently encountered, and though now and then, by his own confession, the incipient statesman was defeated, lie derived from the contest commensurate advantage in acquiring readiness of reasoning and expression. Oliver Goldsmith, often a spectator of his friend's hard rhetorical struggles with the man of dough, used to declare that the baker ought to become lord chan- cellor. In the February of 1764 was founded the celebrated social union first known as the Turk's Head, and afterwards called the Literary Club ; Burke was one of its earliest members. The club originated in a suggestion of Sir Joshua Reynolds to Dr. Johnson, who united in its formation. The members, at its establishment, besides the two founders and Burke, were Dr. Nugent, Burke's father-in-law ; Topham Beauclerk ; Mr. Lang- ton, a Lincolnshire squire and a distinguished favourite and friend of Johnson ; Oliver Goldsmith ; Mr. Chamier, a learned stock- broker ; and Sir John Hawkins, a literary pretender, subse- quently the executor and biographer of Johnson, and the writer of a History of Music. It had been Dr. Johnson's first intention that the association should consist of nine members only ; but on the return from abroad of Mr. Samuel Dyer (subsequently sup- posed to be Junius), who had belonged to the old Ivy Lane Club, an exception was made in his favour, and he was also included. TMs gave rise to more extended admissions. Thus constituted, the club met every Friday evening at the Turk's Head in Ger- rard Street, Soho, at the early hour of seven; but it was gene- rally late before the members parted, a concession made, it may be presumed, to the peculiar habits of Dr. Johnson, who seems to have been as little willing to go to bed as to leave it when once he was there. The conversation was miscellaneous, but for the most part literary, politics being rigorously excluded. In a short time the celebrity of the associates brought many applicants to join them. Soon after the institution of the club, the great actor David Garrick, who had been travelling, returned to England ; and THE LITERARY CLUB. 47 being well acquainted with most of the members, gave intimation that he would be one of their number, supposing that the least hint of such desire would be eagerly embraced. Dr. Johnson, though an early friend of Garrick, who had been one of his pupils when he kept his school at Lichfield, undervalued the actor's pro- fession, and was offended at what he esteemed the presumption of an offer where he ought to have made a request. " He will be one of us ! How does he know we will let him ?" Burke, who regarded Garrick with greater affection, and thought much more highly of theatrical talents, wished he might be introduced ; but Johnson exclaimed, " He will disturb us with his buffoonery." Neither Burke nor others, who were disposed to let him in, dared insist on his immediate admission ; but he was afterwards received, and he continued a member to his death. One evening Sir John Hawkins attacked Burke so rudely on the merit of Fielding's novels, which Burke advocated, that all the company testified their displeasure. At their next meeting they received Hawkins very coolly, and thus prevented his future visits. The club itself continued to increase, as it went on, in numbers and popularity. Burke owed Ids next advance in politics to the favourable im- pression he maintained at the club. An old and close ally of Dr. Johnson, a Mr. FitzHerbert, struck with the varied and wondrous powers of Burke's intellect, had become his friend, and had not only the will but the power to serve him. A word or two about this patron. William FitzHerbert, Esq., of Tissington, in Derby- shire, elected M.P. for Derby in 1762 and in 1708, was, though himself a Protestant, sprang from the very ancient Catholic family of FitzHerbert of Swinnerton, and was the grandfather of the pre- sent Sir Henry FitzHerbert, Bart., of Tissington. A younger son of Mr. William FitzHerbert, Alleyne FitzHerbert, had been created a peer by the title of Lord St. Helens, but had died un- married. Mr. William FitzHerbert wedded Mary, eldest daughter of Littleton Poyntz Meynell, Esq., of Bradley, Derbyshire. Both the husband and wile were particular friends of Dr. Johnson. 48 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. Their memories live in his observations about them. Of the lady he said she had the best understanding he ever met with in any human being. Touching the gentleman he was not quite so en- thusiastic ; yet he spoke thus : " There was no sparkle, no bril- liancy hi FitzHerbert, but I never knew a man who was so ge- nerally acceptable. He made every body quite easy ; overpowered nobody by the superiority of his talents ; made no man think the worse of himself by being his rival ; seemed always to listen ; did not oblige you to hear much from him, and did not oppose what you said ;" — just, in fact, the kind of character the Doctor would be likely to admire. Mr. FitzHerbert was a man of high political standing and in- fluence, and a lord of trade and plantations under the Rockingham and other administrations of that period. Aware how valuable Mr. Burke's services would be to Government, he urged his claims on the notice of the then distinguished leader of the aristocratic section of the Whigs — the upright and amiable Marquess of Rock- ingham — who had just come into power with his party. Burke was introduced to the marquess, and won favour at once. The peer foimd his principles completely correspond with his own, and he determined to avail himself of his abilities. Lord Rockingham had become Prime Minister, for the first time, on the 10th July, 1765. He had Burke appointed his private secretary within a week after- wards. Another friend of Mr. FitzHerbert's, and a warm ad- mirer of Burke's (Ralph, second Earl Verney), had Burke elected member of Parliament for his Buckinghamshire borough of Wen- dover, the very place that, in 1626, sent Hampden to the senate. Biographers follow one another in asserting that Lord Verney ad- mitted Burke to the borough for the paltry consideration of bemg himself named a privy councillor. As his lordship really did not become one of the Council till some time after, is it not more fair to believe that he was led to the act because he felt, with Mr. FitzHerbert, the vital importance of attaching so able a man as Mr. Burke to a \ arty so feeble hi talent as that of the Marquess BURKE AGAIN A SECRETARY. 49 of Rockingham then was ? Edmund Burke had now got his foot upon the threshold of Ins fame : a curious circumstance threatened to put a fatal stop to his farther progress. The well-known peer and politician, Henry second Duke of Newcastle, who had ac- cepted office as Lord Privy Seal, hearing of Burke's nomination, hurried down to Lord Rockingham, and urged his lordship to be on his guard against this adventurer, whose real name was O'Bourke, and whom his grace understood to be a wild Irishman, a Jacobite, a Papist, and a concealed Jesuit. The calumny was startling. The marrpiess, somewhat surprised, sent for his new secretary. Burke, with earnest indignation and a conscious spirit of rectitude, refuted the charges, stated he was a member of the Church of England, and declared his inviolable loyalty to the House of Brunswick. He had been educated at Trinity College, Dublin, and had never been in any way under Jesuit tutorship. There was no such name as O'Bourke. Lord Rockingham readily admitted the explanation ; but after it was given, found a diffi- culty in preventing Burke from resigning his office, as doubt and suspicion had been cast upon his principles. The kind consider- ation the peer displayed in soothing Burke's agitated feelings won him the heart of the latter. Burke, as might be supposed, was true hi what he said, and never swerved from his fealty ; but gratitude drew him still nearer to the marquess. His devotion to Rockingham while living, and his eloquent sorrow for him when dead, remain on record among the brightest instances of his affec- tionate and noble nature. Most biographers of Burke have regarded this affair as a piece of pure folly on the part of the Duke of Newcastle, and have en- larged upon the absurdity of the general rumour that so long ex- isted as to Burke's particular limits of political and religious faith ; yet the duke's conduct was not quite so irrational as is surmised. Burke, like his friend Dr. Johnson, had, probably unknown to himself, a tinge of the Catholic and the cavalier. No doubt both he and Johnson were loyal supporters \)f the sovereigns whom the E 50 LIFE OF EDMUND BUEKE. Kevolution had set upon the throne ; they were both also stanch members of the established Church ; yet they were not the sort of men to approve of dynasties changed by force, or the rights of longs invaded. They had elevated notions in matters of reli- gion, and their spiritual creed had more in common with the high- church notions of times previous, and the Puseyite doctrines of times subsequent to their own, than with the sober Whig theology of their day. Burke, at the actual period of the trials and execu- tions that followed the battle of Culloden, does not hesitate, in a letter to Shackleton, to commiserate the cruel fate of many leaders of the insurrection. " 'Tis indeed," he writes, " melancholy to consider the state of these unhappy gentlemen who engaged in this affair — (as for the rest, they lose but their lives) — who have thrown away their lives and fortunes, and destroyed their fami- lies for ever, in what I believe they thought a just cause." As regards Burke, too, it should be remembered his first teacher (and one whose instructions the child never forgets) was his mother, and she was a Catholic. This accounts for his strong advocacy through life of the cause of Catholic emancipation ; just as his after education among the Society of Friends and his marriage with a Presbyterian lady, explain his friendliness towards the Dissenters. Though not the least a bigot, he was a high churchman ; though true to the tenets of the Revolution, he was a royalist. Expres- sions now and then in unison with innate sentiments might (such as the above-cited passage in his letter to Shackleton) have inno- cently raised the suspicion that Burke secretly inclined to the Ca- tholic church and the Chevalier ; and the very fact of his being introduced to government by Mr. FitzHerbert, a Protestant closely related to a Catholic race, would naturally lead the Duke of New- castle to believe that the public report was not without founda- tion. When Burke was once launched into political life, he showed himself, beyond being religious and loyal, neither of the Society of Jesus nor of the Jacobite faction ; yet the imputation of his being a member of the former, at least, long adhered to him. GILEAY S CARICATURE OF BURKE. 51 It was not until after the part he took against the French Revo- lution — until, rather oddly, the time he really did advocate the cause of a Catholic clergy and nobility, viz. those of France, that BURKE CARICATURED BY GILRAY. 52 LITE OF EDMUND BURKE. the caricaturists of Lis day ceased to represent hiin in the garh of an ecclesiastic of the Church of Rome, or that the populace with- drew from him the nickname of " Neddy St. Omers," taken from the great Jesuit college, a place he had actually never seen. In one of his subsequent speeches in parliament, Burke thus feelingly alludes to his fortunate introduction to the Marquess of Rockingham : " In the year '65, heing in a very private station, far enough from any line of business, and not having the honour of a seat in this house, it was my fortune, unknowing and unknown to the then ministry, by the intervention of a common friend, to become connected with a very noble person, and at the head of the Trea- sury department. It was indeed in a situation of little rank and no consequence, suitable to the mediocrity of my talents and pre- tensions, but a situation near enough to enable me to see, as well as others, what was going on ; and I did see in that noble person (Lord Rockingham) such sound principles, such an enlargement of mind, such clear and sagacious sense, and such unshaken fortitude, as have bound me, as well as others much better than me, by an inviolable attachment to him from that time forward." THE OLD PARLIAMENT HOUSES. CHAPTER IV. Sign and sigil well doth he know, And can bode of weal and woe,. Of kingdoms' fall, and fate of wars. Sir Walter Scott. Bcrke in Parliament — The Dispute with America — Burke's first Speech— His energy in support of Ministry— His conference with Wilkes — Termination of the Rockingham Admlnistration — Burke's Pamphlet in its defence — The Pitt and Grafton Minis- try— Burke's Eloquence touching Lord Chatham and Charles Townshend— Dissolution of Parliament— Burke again elected for Wendover — Pamphlet on the State of the Nation — Lord 5i LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. Chatham's Resignation— Wilkes— Junius — Libel Bill — Dissenters — " Thoughts on the present Discontents" — Speech on American Taxation — Charles Fox— Burke's election for Malton and Bristol— Speech on American Conciliation — Dr. Johnson's Pam- phlet — American War— Economical Reform— Gordon Riots — Slave-Trade Abolition — Difference with Bristol Constituents — Howard— Burke's retirement from Bristol, and re-election for Malton — Failure of ministerial measures with regard to Ame- eica — Accession of the Rockingham Administration — Burke Pay- master of the Forces — His proceedings— Death of the Marquess of Rockingham — His Mausoleum at Wentworth Park — Shelburne Ministry — Peace with America. Wlten the eloquence of Edmund Burke came upon the ear of Parliament, it was indeed a time, to use his own words, " for a niau to act in." The political world then bore a gloomy and frowning aspect. It w r as the year 1765. George III. had been but a short time on the throne, when he found himself obliged to contend with the dominion of the aristocracy, and to experience the strength of the people. His favourite, the Earl of Bute, ar- bitrarily made minister, and afterwards a comptroller of ministers, was about to succumb to the oligarchy, and leave to it the struggle for place and power. John "Wilkes, the unworthy instrument of a great cause, had just taught a startling lesson of what danger lay in invading the security of the British hearth, or the freedom of the British press. These w r ere lesser troubles: one giant event was to crush them into minor significance. The fated act which declared it proper to charge certain stamp-duties in the colonies and plantations of America had passed ; the colonists were men of a caste and temper not to submit : the storm of discontent had begun, rife with rebellion and redolent of revolution. The Gren- ville administration, though strong in kingly favour, and in the eloquence of Charles Townshend, shrunk from the very outburst of the tempest. The public looked to Pitt ; but the king disliked and feared the future Earl of Chatham. Before employing bun again, his majesty sought aid elsewhere. The king's uncle, the AMERICA AND THE STAMP ACT. 55 Duke of Cumberland, the victor of Culloclen, opened a negotiation with the least democratic section of the Whigs, and another ad- ministration not altogether unpalatable to the royal taste came into office. This was the ministry of Lord Rockingham, in which, besides himself, were the Dukes of Newcastle and Graf- ton — all mere feebleness but for one man, the premier's untried secretary. The sentiments of two opposing parties rendered the situation of Lord Rockingham extremely delicate and difficult. On the one hand, the Grenville body, the devisers of taxation and the framers of the Stamp Act, insisted on its continuance and on coercive mea- sures ; on the other, the haughty Pitt aud his adherents would have the Stamp Act absolutely repealed, and would have pub- licly asserted, at the same time, the right of the British parlia- ment to legislate for the Americans in all matters whatsoever, ex- cept in taxing them without then- own consent. Lord Rocking- ham consulted for the first time with lus secretary ; and Burke's advice was, " to choose a middle course between the opposite ex- tremes : neither to precipitate affairs with the colonists by rash counsels ; nor to sacrifice the dignity of the crown and nation by irresolution or weakness." This advice carries the very stamp of Burke's policy. His principle was always to apply a practical re- medy to a practical grievance, and "never to discuss abstract prin- ciples, or, at all events, not before the most imperious necessity compelled such course. A plan was formed consonant to Burke's opinion. To gratify America, the Stamp Act was to be repealed ; to vindicate the honour of Britain, a law was to be passed declaring her right to legislate for America iu taxation and all cases what- soever. With this scheme, ministry met Parliament on the 17th December, 17G5 ; and on the 14th January, of the following year, the real business of the session commenced. Bills following the plan decided on were forthwith brought in by government. The Stamp Act was to disappear, but the omnipotent authority of Parliament was to be maintained. Intense interest attached to the debate 5G LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. that ensued in the Commons. It was no ordinary scene. Burke was prepared at the first opportunity to address the house. Pitt had come down from a sick hed to thunder forth the constitutional doctrine he would uphold. He was ready to support the Repeal Bill, hut he would not allow that men's money should he taken without their concurrence. The Tory phalanx, with George Grenville, brother of the first Earl Temple, and the brilliant Charles Townshend, second son of the third Viscount Towns- FIRST SPEECH IN PARLIAMENT. 57 bend, in front, urged their dogma of absolute colonial vassalage. Many a member present bad hopeful eyes on Burke. Dear friends of his sat in anxious expectation in the gallery. There might be observed the keen look of Arthur Murphy, and the good-humoured affectionate stare of Oliver Goldsmith. Johnson, no doubt, too, from what is handed down, impatiently awaited the result in a neighbouring tavern, with his heart for once upon the Whig side. Burke rose and addressed the House. The speech is not pre- served, but the effect recorded tells what it was. The first shock of a fluid stream of philosophic oratory, sparkling with intellect and imagery, electrified the house. Language lavish in the riches of expression, and gorgeously metaphoric, with a roll of periods beautifully harmonious, and with thought accumulating upon thought — a union of sense and splendour such as cannot even now be read, repeated, or listened to without emotion, struck upon the astonished auditory with novel and marvellous sound. A murmur of applause burst forth : as Burke proceeded, it sank into the silence of attentive admiration. When he sat down, the aspirations of years of labour and study were realised ; he had ac- complished his reputation even beyond his fondest hope. Pitt, of soul too noble for any selfish hesitation, followed Burke in the debate, and instantly and warmly acknowledged the new orator's excellence ; declared that the member for Wendover had left him but little to say, and congratulated the ministry on their valuable acquisition. Johnson writes to his friend Langton that Burke has filled the town with wonder ; that he is a great man by nature, and that he is expected soon to attain civil greatness. From that night forward to the day of his death, Burke be- longed to the history of his country ; he was part and parcel of the state : its records of necessity embrace the main course and action of his life. In the succeeding debates upon their measures, Burke fought the battle of ministers with equal energy and effect. He also en- deavoured to serve them in another way. The terrible agitator, 53 LIFE OF EDMUND BUEKE. Wilkes, hearing the Duke of Grafton was in office, had come from Paris, determined, he said, to make his fortune either by frighten- ing or annoying the ministry. Burke, in company with FitzHer- bert, went to negotiate a peace between the government and their threatening tormentor. Without acceding to Wilkes' exorbitant demands, Burke succeeded, by promise of a private pension, in inducing liini for the time to go abroad again. THE MARQUESS OF ROCKINGHAM. The act repealing the Stamp Act and the act declaring the legislative power of Great Britain were passed. These statutes were found to answer their purpose ; and had they been adhered to, America might possibly have remained to Britain. The Bock- inghani ministry did not survive the passing of their laws. Though CHATHAM AND GEAFTOX MINISTRY. 59 supported by the genius and acquirements of Burke, they were deficient in political experience and vigour, and failed to maintain themselves, especially after the death of the Duke of Cumberland. They went out of office on the 30th July, 1766 ; and were suc- ceeded by what is known as the Chatham administration, from Pitt, the new Earl of Chatham, having formed it. Dining a brief existence, the Rockingham ministry proposed and carried, besides the acts alluded to, several popular, and some good laws. These Burke supported with all the powers of Ins eloquence. The cider-tax was repealed, by which the jurisdiction of the ex- cise was contracted, and great satisfaction afforded. Resolutions were passed against general warrants and the seizure of private papers. Several regulations were made favourable to commerce. Burke, under the title of " A short account of a late short Ad- ministration," composed and published, in 1766, a defence of the Rockingham government. It was written in a plain, simple style, without any of Burke's usual digressive, though beautiful embel- lishments. His object was to appear a fan, candid witness, when lie was really a dexterous advocate. In a seeming narration of the several measures, he embodied inferences most favourable to his friends. The succeeding administration which Pitt, the popular fa- vourite, constituted, with the reluctant permission of the king, was made up of most heterogeneous materials. He himself, cre- ated Lord Chatham, took the Privy Seal ; the Duke of Grafton was made First Lord of the Treasury ; and the gifted son of the third Viscount Townshend, the Right Hon. Charles Townshend, Chancellor of the Exchequer. Lord North and George Cooke, Esq., were constituted joint paymasters, to whom Burke's " truc- kle-bed" is supposed to allude. The formation of this administra- tion and what immediately followed, Burke's satirical description has placed on lasting record. It is to be found in his magnificent speech on American taxation, and is as follows : " Another scene was opened, and other actors appeared on the GO LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. stage ; the State was delivered into the hands of Lord Chatham, a great and celebrated name, — a name that keeps the name of this country respectable in every other part of the globe. It may be truly called ' Clarum efc venerabile nomen, Gentibus, et multum nostroe quod proderat urbi.' Sir, the venerable age of this great man, his merited rank, his superior eloquence, his splendid qualities, his eminent sendees, the vast space be fills in the eye of mankind, and, more than all the rest, bis fall from power, which, like death, canonises and sancti- fies a great character, will not suffer me to censure any part of his conduct. I am afraid to flatter him ; I am sure I am not disposed to blame him. Let those who have betrayed him by their adula- tion, insult him with their malevolence. But what I do not pre- sume to censure, I may have learnt to lament. For a wise man, he seemed to me, at that time, to be governed too much by gene- ral maxims. I speak with the freedom of history, and I hope without offence. One or two of these maxims, flowing from an opinion not the most indulgent to our unhappy species, and surely a little too general, led Mm into measures that were greatly mis- chievous to himself, and for that reason, among others, perhaps fatal to his country, — measures, the effects of which, I am afraid, are for ever incurable. He made an administration, so chequered and speckled ; he put together a piece of joinery, so crossly in- dented and whimsically dovetailed ; a cabinet so variously inlaid ; such a piece of diversified mosaic ; such a tesselated pavement without cement, here a bit of black stone, and there a bit of white ; patriots and courtiers, king's friends and republicans, Whigs and Tories, treacherous Mends and open enemies, that it was indeed a very curious show, but utterly unsafe to touch, and unsure to stand on. The colleagues whom he had assorted at the same boards stared at each other, and were obliged to ask, ' Sir, jowc name ? — Sir, you have the advantage of me. — Mr. Such-a- one, — I beg a thousand pardons.' I venture to say, it did so LOUD CHATHAM AND CHARLES TOWXSHEND. 61 happen, that persons had a single office divided between them who had never spoke to each other in their lives, until they found themselves, they knew not how, pigging together, heads and points, in the same truckle-bed." The influence of Chatham, even with partisans chosen by himself, was of no long continuance. Their want of union was irreparable. Lord Chatbam, too, soon perceived that there was an influence behind the throne which counteracted his exertions. He made overtures for a coalition with the Rockingham party ; that step might bave been effectual sooner, but was then too late. Lord Rockingham, conceiving Lord Chatbam to bave been instru- mental in the dismission of him and bis Mends, refused. Burke, however, and the other associates of the marquess, while Chatham was actively minister, were not very violent in then- opposition. Lord Chatham was thwarted cbiefly by an interior cabinet. Declining health compelled his absence and impaired Ins vigour. He con- tinued minister merely in name. Measures for taxing the colonies, beheved to originate from royal favouritism, were again proposed by Charles Townshend, which blew the discontent of America into a violent flame. Townshend did not hve to witness the result ; he died, aged 42, on the 2d September, 1767, and Chat- ham was thenceforward scarcely heeded by his coadjutors. The decline of Chatham, and the cbaracter and death of Townshend, are embahned in the eloquence of Burke : " When he (Lord Chatham) had accomplished his scheme of administration, he was no longer a minister. When his face was hid but for a moment, bis whole system was on a wide sea, with- out cbart or compass. The gentlemen, his particular friends, who, with tbe names of various departments of ministry, were admitted to seem as if they acted a part under him, with a modesty that becomes all men, and with a confidence in liim, which was justi- fied even hi its extravagance by bis superior abilities, bad never, in any instance, presumed upon any opinion of then own. De- G2 LIFE OF EDMUND BUKKE. prived of his guiding influence, they were whirled about the sport of every gust, and easily driven into any port ; and as those who joined with them in manning the vessel were the most directly op- posite to his opinions, measures, and character, and far the most artful and most powerful of the set, they easily prevailed, so as to seize upon the vacant, unoccupied, and derelict minds of his friends, and instantly they turned the vessel wholly out of the course of his policy. As if it were to insult as well as to betray him, even long before the close of the first session of his adminis- tration, when every thing was publicly transacted, and with great parade, in his name, they made an act, declaring it highly just and expedient to raise a revenue in America. For even then, sir, even before this splendid orb was entirely set, and while the west- ern horizon was hi a blaze with his descending glory, on the op- posite quarter of the heavens arose another luminary, and, for his hour, became lord of the ascendant. " This light too is passed, and set for ever. You understand, to be sure, that I speak of Charles Townshend, officially the re- producer of this fatal scheme, whom I cannot even now remember without some degree of sensibility. In truth, sir, he was the de- light and ornament of this House, and the charm of every private society which he honoured with his presence. Perhaps there never arose in this country, nor in any country, a man of a more pointed and finished wit, and (where his passions were not con- cerned) of a more refined, exquisite, and penetrating judgment. If he had not so great a stock, as some have had who flourished formerly, of knowledge long treasured up, he knew better by far tban any man I ever was acquainted with, how to bring together within a short time all that was necessary to establish, to illustrate, and to decorate that side of the question he supported. He stated his matter skilfully and powerfully. He particularly excelled in a most luminous explanation and display of his subject. His style of argument was neither trite and vulgar, nor subtle and abstruse. He hit the House just between wind and water. And not beincr PAMPHLET ON THE STATE OF THE NATION. 63 troubled with too anxious a zeal for any matter in question, he was never more tedious, or more earnest, than the pre-conceived opinions and present temper of his hearers required, to whom he was always in perfect unison. He conformed exactly to the tem- per of the House, and he seemed to guide, because he was always sure to follow it." At the close of the session, parliament was dissolved. Burke, who had been only two years a member, was already considered the leading orator in the house, at a time when it had a splendid assemblage. His eloquence at first was more tinctured with the metaphysical learning which had occupied a great part of his early life, than is to be perceived in the speeches of his mature political experience. Burke was re-elected for Wendover. The new parliament met in November 1768. In the following December the ministry was remodelled, though retaining the Duke of Grafton as premier, and it was known by the name of the Grafton administration. The leading man of this government was the famous Lord North, who now came prominently forward. The opposition consisted of two parties of very different views and principles, though agreed in their disapprobation of this Grafton ministry : these were the party of which Lord Rockingham was the nominal leader, and Burke the most distinguished orator, and that of which George Grenville was the head. In 1769 two pamphlets appeared; the first entitled " The Present State of the Nation," written either by Grenville or under his direction ; the second entitled " Observations on the Present State of the Nation," the work of Burke. Grenville' s pampldet went over the war, the peace, the finances, trade, foreign politics, and the constitution, with a view to show the country to be in a very bad state, and its situation to be owing to a departure from the plan of politics, especially of finance, adopted by the Grenville ministry. Burke, considering " The State of the Nation" as in G4 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. itself erroneous, calculated to diffuse unfounded alarms, and as im- plying censure on the Marquess of Rockingham, answered it in Ms observations. He displayed at once his superiority over Gren- ville ; he showed that when a man of genius encounters a man of mere detail, he can, with ease, drive him from his own ground. Burke, without any great effort of industry, mastered the minutige winch constituted the stronghold of Ms adversary. Burke de- monstrated in his pampMet the vast extent and particularity of Ms commercial and political knowledge. He followed Grenville over the wide ground he had taken ; proved him to be wrong m his alleged facts and calculations, and consequently in his inferences. He described British manufactures and trade with the colonies and with foreign countries ; told their actual state, and the various circumstances which might affect them in future. It is m this pamphlet that he gives it as his opmion that the alarm of the whole tradmg body of England must never be laughed at as an ill- grounded or a pretended pamc. The universal desire of that body will always have great weight m every consideration connected with commerce ; neither ought its opmion to be slighted m any consideration whatsoever of revenue. " Nothing among us," he goes on to say, " is more quickly or deeply affected by taxes of any ldnd than trade." Of discord existing among the members of an admmistration, he in the same pampMet speaks thus : "It is a serious affair, tMs studied disunion in government. In cases where union is most consulted in the constitution of a ministry, and where persons are best disposed to promote it, dif- ferences, from the various ideas of men, will arise ; and from their passions will often ferment mto violent heats, so as greatly to dis- order all public business. What must be the consequence when the very distemper is made the basis of the constitution ; and the original weakness of human nature is still further enfeebled by art and contrivance? It must subvert government from the very foundation. It turns our public councils into the most miscMevous cabals ; where the consideration is, not how the nation's busmess THE LETTERS OF JUNIUS. 65 shall be carried on, but how those who ought to carry it on shall circumvent each other. In such a state of things, no order, uni- formity, dignity, or effect, can appear in our proceedings either at home or abroad. Nor will it make much difference, whether some of the constituent parts of such an administration are men of virtue or ability, or not ; supposing it possible that such men, with their eyes open, should choose to make a part in such a body." Before the appearance of these pamphlets, two events of mo- ment had occurred in 1768, viz. the resignation of Lord Chatham, and the return to London of Wilkes. It is unnecessary to relate here matters of such general knowledge as the political agitation, public disturbance, and legal contention, which ensued when the terrible tormentor of government in those days, John Wilkes, came once more upon the scene. The unwise way in which the Grafton administration set about opposing him is equally notorious. Ephe- meral as might otherwise have been the recollection of his auda- city and their weakness, one circumstance has rendered the pro- ceedings against Wilkes memorable for ever — a circumstance which must be always linked with the name of Mr. Burke. The conduct of the Grafton administration gave life to Junius — the man not in the iron, but the literary mask, which time and theory, search and research, cannot remove. The mysterious let- ters of Junius know few equal essays among political publications. Under cover of the darkness that lies on them, they have been as- cribed to several authors, — among them, to Edmund Burke. Leav- ing other claimants out of the question, it becomes necessary here to gee what Burke had to do with this epistolary mystery. The follow- ing arguments may be, and have been, brought forward to support the charge of his connexion with the secret. First : from his text, Junius is held to be an Irishman, and so was Burke. The style of Junius is Irish in thought and tone, and now and then an expression escapes him which an Englishman would never have employed. For instance, Junius in allusion to a government measure calls it F 66 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. " a Castle job." He mentions some one " degrading even the name of Lnttrell," a personage little, if ever heard of in England, but proverbially common in Irish parlance, as having been the traitor who betrayed the passage of the Shannon to the enemy in 1691. He refers to the inmates of a university as ' collegians,' the exact term used in Trinity College, Dublin ; ' gownsmen' being the designation given to them at Oxford and Cambridge. Burke, be it remembered, was educated at Trinity College. Secondly : Burke was supposed the author, or aiding in the authorship, as the only man then equal to the performance. On that ground Johnson, according to Boswell, once thought him the writer ; but on Burke's spontaneously declaring the contrary, was convinced by his assertion. " I should," said Johnson, " have believed Burke to be Junius, because I know no man but Burke who is capable of writing these letters ; but Burke spontaneously denied it to me : the case would have been different had I asked him if he was the author ; a man may think he has a right to deny it, when so ques- tioned as to an anonymous publication." With all his confidence in Burke's veracity, Johnson may here be wrong. Disavowal apparently positive of a performance, by many imputed to Burke, where such supposition might have exposed him to prosecution, does not go for much. As to the proof that lies hi seemingly direct denial, men of honour have since shown its fallacy. The author of far-famed Waverley in particular had recourse to denials scarcely evasive, as his only shield against accidental suspicion or pertina- cious inquiry : and moralists have been loath to quarrel -with his apology for having made use of such protection. The letters of Junius were no doubt an extraordinary production, and Burke was the extraordinary man of the time equal to the task. Thirdly : the letters must have been written by a person inimical to the Grafton administration, and to the secret influence by which it was believed to be guided. In the general opinion, and in the particular cir- cumstances of Burke, motives might have induced lmn to commence and continue the attack. The Duke of Grafton had been brought bueke's connexion with jcnius. 67 into administration by the Rockingham party, and was represented as having betrayed that nobleman and his friends. On that ac- count, or because he succeeded to another ministry , he was very obnoxious to the partisans of the marquess ; hence it was natural to impute a severe attack on him to one of a party in which the pre-emmence of genius unquestionably belonged to Burke. Burke, in the house, poured forth his eloquence in assaults upon the Grafton administration in general, and more particularly on those of its acts which are the principle butts of Junius's invective. Burke strenuously maintained that there existed a system of court favouritism, and he joined in ascribing to its influence the dismissal of his own friends. He reprobated the measures he supposed to originate from that source ; he spared not the principal agents of that junto. The Duke of Bedford, the negotiator of Lord Bute's peace and the opposer of the Rockingham interest, naturally ex- cited the displeasure of Burke. The Whigs of Burke's party considered the doctrines advanced by the Lord Chief Justice Mansfield on the bench as inconsistent with constitutional liberty, and as plants of Tory or Jacobite growth. Burke, in the House of Commons, frequently enlarged with force against the law and practice of Lord Mansfield. Burke execrated the proceedings respecting Wilkes and the Middlesex election. In all these cir- cumstances Burke completely coincided with Junius. Fourthly: some external evidence has arisen to strengthen the presumption that Burke was at least in communication with Junius. In 1767, two years before Junius commenced, — at a time when debates were not reported, one of Burke's earliest parliamentary speeches, evidently written out under his dictation, came in manuscript to Woodfall's Public Advertiser, with (for Woodfall's guidance) the private signature of C. Tbat identical signature of C was the private one which Junius afterwards adopted in communi- cating with that same Woodfall, the well-known publisher of the " Public Advertiser" in which the letters appeared. Among the persons tben supposed to be Junius was a Mr. Dyer, a member of the Gerrard Street or Literary Club, and a man much mixed up 68 LIFE OF EDMUND BUEKE. with the private, official, and political affairs of the day. Dyer was very intimate with Mr. Burke and his family. When Dyer died in 1772, the letters of Junius eeased; hut what was even more strange was this fact, related hy Sir Joshua Reynolds, one of Dyer's executors. The moment Dyer was dead, Edmund Burke's cousin, William Burke, went to the deceased's lodgings, and there seized and destroyed a large quantity of manuscript. Reynolds happening to come in, found the room covered with the papers, cut up into the minutest fragments, there being no fire in the grate. Reynolds expressed some surprise, and Mr. William Burke hurriedly explained that " the papers were of great import- ance to himself, and of none to any body else." Mrs. Burke once admitted that she believed her husband knew the author of the letters, but that he did not write them. It is, moreover, certain that on one occasion Edmund Burke himself acknowledged to Sir Joshua Reynolds that he knew who was the writer of Junius' s Letters ; intimating, when he said so, that he wished to hear no more upon the subject. Another argument, and not a weak one, is this : Junius would fiercely retort upon any man criticising or condemning him, yet he did not reply to the attack of Dr. Johnson. This fact is of the more weight, not only because Johnson was one of Burke's dearest friends, but because the Doctor was not power- ful in political writing ; and Burke well knew how sensitive he would be if defeated in the contest : his bodily health might even suffer, which Burke would be the last man to endanger. Fifthly : two of the greatest lawyers of Burke's time — men who were mas- ters of the art of considering testimony, Lord Mansfield and Sir WUliam Blackstone, — both believed Burke had to do with the let- ters. The universal popular credence, too, during the course of pub- lication, was, that Burke, at least, was allied with Junius ; and — as in the case of the authorship of the " Waverley Novels" — con- temporary general suspicion is not usually very wide of the mark. La addition to these reasons, one important piece of evidence occurs to the writer of the present biography in support of Burke's originating or helping the letters of Junius. It seems strange the REASONS FOR JUNIUS' S CONCEALMENT. 69 circumstance has scarcely been before alluded to, and certainly never relied on ; yet it is of some value, being that kind of proof which arises from the party charged having undoubtedly done, and been addicted to doing, the same thing before. Burke, it will be remembered, on the two occasions of confuting Dr. Lucas and Lord Boliugbroke, was wonderfully successful in starting anonymous publications, so different from his ordinary compositions, that, until they were acknowledged, no one would believe them to be his. The personification of Lord Boliugbroke, in particular, shows Burke to have had complete possession of a very rare faculty, that of writing at considerable length in a style totally unlike his own — of writing, not as a mere imitator might, but eloquently, naturally, and powerfully. Few authors at any time — none but himself in his own day — have been known to have had this gift, and to have used it. Now, if not the author himself of Junius, might he not have planned and aided some other in this clever, and to him easy mode of deception ? Again, Burke had a particular fancy for writ- ing anonymously. Not only the imitations of Lucas and Boling- broke, but the majority of Burke's publications appeared without his name. His favourite plan seemed to be this : he would pro- duce the work anonymously, and when it had made a sensation, then avow it. Thus he acted with the " Vindication of Natural Society," with the " Essay on the Sublime and Beautiful," with the " Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs," and with many other of his lucubrations. Why he should hesitate to acknowledge his connexion with the letters of Junius is sufficiently obvious. Those letters had made an impression beyond all anticipation, and had placed their author or authors within reach of a penal prose- cution ; and even setting aside the danger of a criminal charge, it would have been next to ruin for any rising politician or statesman to have, by confessing, confronted the anger of the incensed king, George III., a prince always obdurate in his wrath. A charm, moreover, as it turned out, lay in the very continuation of the mystery. Still stronger ground for secrecy would also exist if 70 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. more than one party was engaged in the composition of these cele- brated epistles, as there would be probably no union in agreeing to a public acknowledgment. From the variety of testimony con- necting different persons with the letters, the likelihood really is tbat they did not emanate from a single writer. That theory wdl account, in particular, for Burke's friend Sir Philip Francis being so feasibly shown to be mixed up with the transaction, and even identified as the actual author. It is indeed very difficult to believe some of those charged, and especially Francis, innocent of a parti- cipation in Junius. To the fact of Burke having himself written the letters of Junius there certainly can be opposed his letter to Charles Townshend, son of the Hon. Thomas Townshend, and brother of the first Viscount Sydney, dated the 24th Nov. 1771, and to be found in Lord Fitzwilliam and Sir R. Bourke's collec- tion. Burke iu that letter says : " I now give you my word and honour that I am not the author of Junius, and that I know not the author of that paper ; and I do authorise you to say so." This denial admits of observation. In the first place, it was most tardily and reluctantly given, after Townshend' s second inquiry on the subject, he not being satisfied with Burke's former and evi- dently evasive reply. The communication which contains the above assertion begins with this strange statement : "I delayed my answer to you until I twice .consulted my pillow." Surely there was no need of that if Burke had merely to give a contra- .diction ; but there was need of it if he had to contrive a clever evasion. Secondly, as to Burke's actual words : they, after all, only amount to a negative pregnant. Burke declares he is not the .author of Junius, but he goes no further. He does not state, as Townshend asks him to do, " that he is neither directly nor indi- rectly engaged in publishing Junius' s letters ;" he, instead, catches hold of a subterfuge his inquirant has left him, and confines him- self, clearly with some secret intent, to alleging that he knows not " the author of that paper" (pointing merely to " the letter signed JZeno in the ' Public Advertiser,' " which Townshend happens to JUNIUS A COMBINATION OF PERSONS. 71 make particular mention of). All this, therefore, so far from re- moving the impression as to Burke, goes in support of the hypo- thesis, that though not strictly the author, he was somehow or JUNIUS AS REPRESENTED IN A PRINT OF THE TIME, other a planner, aider, or abettor of the scheme ; that he, with' others, set and maintained the terrible engine in motion. Curious- ly enough, nearly every one charged with being Junius was really an intimate of Burke's. Edmund Burke may have not been the chief, but it is both 7 2 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. plausible and probable that lie was one of the shielded Ajaces of this famous and formidable literary conspiracy. In conclusion, it may be observed, that great signs evidence great things. The mammoth is known by his bones. A powerful king ordered the iron mask ; and therefore it could have been used for no common purpose. Men would have it that Louis XIV. sought with that grim visor to hide the close resemblance of a brother nearer to the throne than himself. So the very talent of Junius gave note of some mighty reality. The shadow marked the substance of a giant, and suspicion naturally fell upon Edmund Burke, the prince of the political writers and reasoners of his age. The popular eye of that time looked for the light where light was. Years have since rolled on : new and manifold attempts have arisen to pene- trate the obscurity — failures all — all (with the exception of Mr. Britton's able essay in favour of Col. Barre) weaker than the one earlier supposition. Until a contradicting certainty come, and it is likely it never will come, the lasting impression will remain, that Junius and Burke were in earnest and energetic alliance. Stat ruarjni nominis umbra. Junius, in effect, proved a powerful help to the opposition of which Burke was the leader. Between the writings of Junius and the parliamentary philippics of Burke, the administration felt so goaded, that its principal, the Duke of Grafton, took fright, and resigned on the 28th of Jan., 1770. His successor was the well-known Frederick, Lord North, a man of pleasing and engaging manners, and imperturbable good temper; a man dis- tinguished for wit and readiness of argument, for classical know- ledge, for taste, and for elegant literature ; but perhaps fitter for the enjoyment and participation of enlightened discourse in private society, than for the conduct of public affairs at so difficult a junc- ture. In a peculiar kind of persuasive eloquence, Lord North had few superiors in the house ; but his political notions were wavering and unsettled. His counsels were fluctuating, the result generally of occasion, and not the efforts of a great,, consistent, and well- LOED NORTH MADE PEEMIEE. 73 concerted plan. His conduct was unsteady, now feeble, now rash, now conceding, now coercing ; with considerable talents and many virtues, he was the cause of great disasters. His best proof of courage was his taking office when he had almost singly to con- front, in an angry House of Commons, the formidable attacks of Burke. The session, with Lord North as ministerial leader, began on the 13th of November, 1770; and the first proceedings of the government happening to touch the freedom of the press, brought much discussion. The debate timnng on a constitutional point, found Burke in full animation. The subject was this : — Among many printers who republished Junius's Letters from the originals in the " Pubhc Advertiser," one was Almon, a man obnoxious to government on account of personal attacks on some of the ministers and supposed favourites of the court. Almon had put the famous letter of Junius to the King into a monthly magazine. Although it had been copied before into all the newspapers hi the kingdom, none of the publishers had been prosecuted ; but instantly an action was commenced against Almon. This step had evidently more of resentment than justice ; for justice pointed to the first publisher. Burke loudly impugned the conduct of the attorney- general ; he was, he said, no favourer of libels, but he insisted on fairness in their prosecution. In his speech occurred the following celebrated description of Junius : — " How conies this Junius to have broke through the cobwebs of the law, and to range uncontrolled, unpunished through the land ? The myrmidons of the court have been long, and are still, pursuing him in vain. They will not spend their time upon me, or upon you, when the mighty boar of the forest that has broke through all their toils is before them. But what will all their efforts avail ? No sooner has he wounded one, than he strikes down another dead at his feet. For my own part, when I saw his attack upon the king, I own my blood ran cold. I thought he had ventured too far, and that there was an end of his triumphs ; 74 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. not that he had not asserted many bold truths. Yes, sir ; there are in that composition many bold truths by which a wise prince might profit. It was the rancour and venom with which I was struck. But while I expected from this daring flight his final ruin and fall, behold him rising still higher and coming down souse upon both houses of parliament. Yes, he made you his quarry, and you still bleed from the effects of his talons. You crouched, and still crouch beneath his rage. Nor has he dreaded the terrors of your brow, sir — [the Speaker, Sir Fletcher Norton, remarkable for his large eyebrows] — for he has attacked even you, and I believe you have no reason to triumph in the encounter. Not content with carrying away our royal eagle in his pounces and dashing him against a rock, he has laid you prostrate, and King, Lords, and Commons thus become the sport of his fury. Were he a member of this house, what might not be expected from his knowledge, his firmness, and his integrity? He would be easily known by his contempt of all danger, by his penetration, and by his vigour. Nothing would escape his vigilance and ac- tivity. Bad ministers could conceal nothing from his sagacity, nor could promises nor threats induce him to conceal any thing from the public." This effort in favour of the press was followed by a bill, which Burke prepared, to amend the law of libel ; he could not then pass it, but it is remarkable that it was the identical measure which Fox carried in 1791, and which has since proved of such sterling advantage. Notwithstanding the change in the ministry, the same fatal course was pursued towards America. Every year, every month, events became more critical. Burke's powers seemed to expand in proportion. In 1771 he was appointed agent for the State of New York, and he stood forward the avowed champion of the colonists. True to the constitutional principle of the Rockingham party, that the power of Parliament was omni- potent, but that that power must not be oppressively or unjustly SPEECH FOE THE DISSENTERS. 75 used, Burke poured forth upon government appeals, arguments, warnings, all in vain. To the benighted, obstinate ministers, the prophet was Cassandra, — the orator, Laocoon. Burke, although high-church in his notions of matters of faith, was always an ardent advocate of religious liberty. In the parlia- ments of 1772 and 1773 he entered warmly into the measures brought forward to benefit the Dissenters. He advocated their cause with his usual energetic eloquence. In 1773, a bill for their relief came before the house. In the debate that ensued Burke spoke thus : " At the same time that I would cut up the very root of atheism, I would respect all conscience ; all conscience, tbat is really such, and which perhaps its very tenderness proves to be sincere. I wish to see the established church of England great and powerful ; I wish to see her foundations laid low and deep, that she may crush the giant powers of rebellious darkness ; I would have her head raised up to that Heaven to which she con- ducts us. I would Lave her open wide her hospitable gates by a noble and liberal comprehension ; but I would have no breaches in her wall ; I would have her cherish all those who are within, and pity all those who are without ; I would have her a common blessing to the world, an example, if not an instructor, to those who have not the happiness to belong to her ; I would have her give a lesson of peace to mankind, that a vexed and wandering generation might be taught to seek for repose and toleration in the maternal bosom of Christian charity, and not in the harlot lap of infidelity and indifference. Nothing has driven people more into that house of seduction than the mutual hatred of Christian con- gregations. Long may we enjoy our church under a learned and edifying episcopacy. But episcopacy may fail, and religion exist. The most horrid and cruel blow that can be offered to civil society is through atheism. Do not promote diversity ; when you have it, bear it ; have as many sorts of religion as you find in your country ; there is a reasonable worship in them all. The others, the infidels, are outlaws of the constitution ; not of this country, ' b LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. but of the human race. They are never, never to be supported, never to be tolerated. Under the systematic attacks of these people, I see some of the props of good government already begin to fail ; I see propagated principles, which will not leave to reli- gion a toleration. I see myself sinking every day under the attacks of these wretched people — How shall I arm myself against them ? by uniting all those in affection, who are united in the be- lief of the great principles of the Godhead, that made and sustains the world. They, who hold revelation, give double assurance to the country. Even the man who does not hold revelation, yet who wishes that it were proved to him, who observes a pious silence with regard to it, — such a man, though not a Christian, is governed by religious principles. Let him be tolerated in this country. Let it be but a serious religion, natural or revealed, take what you can get; cherish, blow up the slightest spark. One day it may be a pure and holy flame. By this proceeding you form an alliance, offensive and defensive, against those great ministers of darkness in the world, who are endeavouring to shake all the works of God established in order and beauty. — Perhaps I am carried too far ; but it is in the road into which the honourable gentleman has led me. The honourable gentleman would have us fight tins confederacy of the powers of darkness with the single arm of the church of England ; would have us not only fight against infidelity, but fight at the same time with all the faith in the world except our own. In the moment we make a front against the common enemy, we have to combat with all those who are the natural friends of our cause. Strong as we are, we are not equal to this. The cause of the church of England is included in that of religion, not that of religion in the church of England. I will stand up at all times for the rights of conscience, as it is such, not for its particular modes against its general principles. One may be right, another mistaken ; but if I have more strength than my brother, it shall be employed to support, not oppress, his weakness ; if I have more light, it shall be used to guide, not to dazzle him." " THOUGHTS ON THE PRESENT DISCONTENTS." 77 In the same year, 1773, the political opinions and principles of Burke were published at considerable length, in a pamphlet en- titled " Thoughts on the Causes of the Present Discontents." The work teems with the wisdom of the man. These " Thoughts" deserve the studious perusal of the politician ; they mark out with brilliant eloquence and correct reasoning a course of constitutional policy truly English. The book produced a powerful effect on the public mind. In his pamphlet, Burke held that government ought to be in the hands of an aristocracy of rank and property. He was consequently assailed by the republicans of that period with as much violence as afterwards by the supporters of the French Revolution, — a strong proof of the uniformity of his doctrines. Some splendid passages occur in these " Thoughts :" the following are samples : " "When ministry rests upon public opinion, it is not, indeed, built upon a rock of adamant ; it has, however, some stabdity. But when it stands upon private humour, its structure is of stubble, and its foundation is on quicksand They may be assured, that however they amuse themselves with a variety of projects for substituting something else in the place of that great and only foundation of government, the confidence of the people, every at- tempt will but make their condition worse. When men imagine that their food is only a cover for poison, and when they neither love nor trust the hand that serves it, it is not the name of the roast beef of Old England that will persuade them to sit down to the table that is spread for them. When the people conceive that laws, and tribunals, and even popular assemblies, are perverted from the ends of their institution, they find in those names of de- generated establishments only new motives to discontent Those bodies, which, when full of life and beauty, lay in their arms, and were their joy and comfort, when dead and putrid, become but the more loathsome from remembrance of former endearments. A sullen gloom and furious disorder prevail by fits ; the nation loses its relish for peace and prosperity ; as it did in that season of ful- 78 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. ness which opened our troubles in the time of diaries the First. A species of men to whom a state of order would become a sen- tence of obscurity, are nourished into a dangerous magnitude by the heat of intestine disturbances ; and it is no wonder that, by a sort of sinister piety, they cherish, in their turn, the disorders which are the parents of all their consequence. Superficial ob- servers consider such persons as the cause of the public uneasiness, when, in truth, they are nothing more than the effect of it. Good men look upon this distracted scene with sorrow and indignation. Their hands are tied behind them. They are despoiled of all the power which might enable them to reconcile the strength of go- vernment with the rights of the people. They stand hi a most distressing alternative. But in the election among evils they hope better things from temporary confusion than from established ser- vitude. In the meantime the voice of law is not to be heard. Fierce licentiousness begets violent restraints. The military arm is the sole reliance ; and then call your constitution what you please, it is the sword that governs. The civil power, like every other that calls in the aid of an ally stronger than itself, perishes by the assistance it receives." On the 19th of April, 1774, Mr. Burke made his celebrated speech on American taxation. The dehate which included it arose on the motion of Mr. Rose Fuller, member for Bye, " for a com- mittee of the whole house to take hito consideration the duty of three-pence per pound weight upon tea, payable in all his majesty's dominions in America, and also the appropriation of the said duty." It was late in the evening when Mr. Burke got up to speak ; the discussion seemed to be in some measure exhausted; but such was the energy of his appeal, such the extent of his information, such his delineations of character, so warm, so animated, so pa- thetic, that the house was roused into intense wakeful attention, which hushed all but the one magnificent voice, untd after many hours that voice ceased amid a mighty burst of unanimous ap- probation. It was a night to be remembered. The orator had - SPEECH ON AMERICAN TAXATION. 79 reached the acme of his powers, and the senate, in which he spoke, oft the scene of some of the finest eloquence in the world, then list- ened to a piece of oratory, which perhaps has never been surpassed. Anecdotes handed down record the effect it produced ; one in par- ticular tells how Lord John Townshend, who had retired with other members to the gallery during Burke's address, was earned quite away by a splendid passage, and cried aloud : " Good God ! what a man tins is ! How could he acquire such transcendent powers ?" The speech on American taxation was a complete history of the colonies and their affairs during the preceding eleven years, taken from the best sources ; the dryness of the matter was re- lieved by a happy selection of biographical anecdote, and illumi- nated with all the brilliancy of elocution. This speech, the first of Burke's fully reported, has fortunately been published under the author's supervision. Extracts from it have already been given in this volume ; the following are additional passages : " Again and again revert to your old principles ; seek peace and ensue it ; leave America, if she has taxable matter in her, to tax herself. I am not here going into the distinctions of rights, not attempting to mark their boundaries. I do not enter into these metaphysical distinctions ; I hate the very sound of them. Leave the Americans as they anciently stood, and these distinc- tions, born of our unhappy contest, will die along with it. They and we, and their and our ancestors, have been happy under that system. Let the memory of all actions, in contradiction to that good old mode, on both sides, be extinguished for ever. Be con- tent to bind America by laws of trade ; you have always done it. Let this be your reason for binding their trade. Do not burden them by taxes ; you were not used to do so from the beginning. Let this be your reason, for not taxing. These are the arguments of states and kingdoms. Leave the rest to the schools ; for there only they may be discussed with safety. But if, intemperately, unwisely, fatally, you soplusticate and poison the very source of 80 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. government, by urging subtle deductions, and consequences odious to those you govern, from the unlimited and illimitable nature of supreme sovereignty, you will teach them by these means to call that sovereignty itself in question. When you drive him hard, the boar will surely turn upon the hunters. If that sovereignty and their freedom cannot be reconciled, which will they take ? They will cast your sovereignty in your face. Nobody will be argued into slavery." * * * * * " Such, sir, is my idea of the constitution of the British empire, as distinguished from the constitution of Britain ; and on these grounds, I think, subordination and liberty may be sufficiently re- conciled through the whole ; whether to serve a refining specu- latist, or a factious demagogue, I know not ; but enough surely for the ease and happiness of man. " Sir, whilst we held this happy course, we drew more from the colonies than all the impotent violence of despotism ever could extort from them. We did this abundantly in the last war. It has never been once denied; and what reason have we to imagine that the colonies would not have proceeded in supplying govern- ment as liberally, if you had not stepped in and hindered them from contributing, by interrupting the channel in which their libe- rality flowed with so strong a course, by attempting to take, in- stead of being satisfied to receive ? Sir William Temple says, that Holland has loaded itself with ten times the impositions which it revolted from Spain rather than submit to. He says true. Ty- ranny is a poor provider. It knows neither how to accumulate nor how to extract Could any thing be a subject of more just alarm to America, than to see you go out of the plain high-road of finance, and give up your most certain revenues and your clearest interests, merely for the sake of insulting your colo- nies ? No man ever doubted that the commodity of tea could bear an imposition of three-pence. But no commodity will bear three-pence, or will bear a penny, when the general feelings of men are irritated, and two millions of people are resolved not to CHARLES JAMES FOX. 81 pay. The feelings of the colonies were formerly the feelings of Great Britain. Theirs were formerly the feelings of Mr. Hamp- den when called upon for the payment of twenty shillings. Would twenty shillings have ruined Mr. Hampden's fortune ? No ; but the payment of half twenty shillings, on the principle it was de- manded, would have made him a slave. It is the weight of that preamble of which you are so fond, and not the weight of the duty, that the Americans are unable and unwilling to bear." In this parliament of 1774 the Tory party was deserted hi disgust by one, long the ardent admirer of Burke, a member of liis literary club, and his warm friend — one who, if he had the fad- ings, abounded also in the worth of human nature. This was the gifted son of Henry Lord Holland, Charles James Fox, the greatest of the champions of the Whigs. Henceforward Burke and he were to fight together the momentous cause of colonial America. A greater question was unhappily, on a future day, to sever their alliance, sanctified as it was by the rarest public spirit and ability. A dissolution of parliament took place in the summer of 1774. Mr. Burke, owing to the embarrassed state of Lord Verney's af- fairs, was, at the general election, obliged to relinquish Wendover : he was elected for Malton in Yorkshire. Malton, however, had not then the honour of being so represented ; for, just as the elec- tion terminated, and the new member was sitting down to dinner with his constituents, there arrived from the then all-influential city of Bristol a deputation of respectable merchants, to inform him that a considerable body of the Bristol citizens, wishing, at so critical a time, to be represented by some gentleman of tried abi- lities and known commercial knowledge, had put him in nomina- tion as one of their candidates. The deputation had come express to apprise him of the event. Mr. Burke, after acknowledging the high honour intended for him, and thanking the deputation for their zeal and assiduity in his favour, returned into the room where his Malton constituents were waiting his presence to begin 82 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. dinner, and told them the nature of the news lie had just received. He requested their advice, observing, that as they had done him the compliment of thinking liim worthy to be their member, he would, if it were their wish, endeavour to support that station with gratitude and integrity ; but if they thought the general VIEW OF BRISTOL, TEMP. 1774. cause on which they were all embarked could be better assisted by his representing the city of Bristol, he was equally at their order. His Malton friends immediately decided for Bristol. Burke was in instant activity : the repast scarcely over, he threw himself into a post-chaise, and travelling day and night, with incredible speed, he, in about four-and-twenty hours, reached Bristol. It was the sixth day of the poll. Without resting a BURKE M.P. FOR BRISTOL. 83- moment, he repaired to the Guildhall, and powerfully harangued the electors. After a protracted contest, he was returned, with Mr. Cruger, on the 3d November, Mr. Brickdale and Lord Clare, the former members, being ousted. In his address of thanks on the hustings, Burke's language was manly and characteristic. He did not, as many successful candidates would probably have done, yield to the spur of mistaken gratitude, or the artifice of popular conciliation ; he would not pledge himself to be the mere vehicle of his constituents' instructions ; and he frankly told them his opinion of the trust they reposed in him. The subject, it should be observed, was forced on him by the conduct of his co-candidate, Mr. Cruger, who had, hi the course of the proceed- ings, made an admission in favour of the coercive authority of the electors over their representatives. Burke's sentiments on this occasion are well worth transcribing, if only to show his constant opinion on the much-mooted question, " how far repre- sentatives are bound by the instructions of their constituents?" Burke spoke to the electors thus : " Certainly, gentlemen, it ought to be the happiness and glory of a representative to live in the strictest union, the closest cor- respondence, and the most unreserved communication with his constituents. Their wishes ought to have great weight with Mm, their opinion high respect, their business unremitted attention. It is his duty to sacrifice his repose, his pleasures, his satisfactions, to theirs ; and above all, ever, and in all cases, to prefer their in- terest to his own. But, his unbiassed opinion, his mature judg- ment, his enlightened conscience, he ought not to sacrifice to you, to any man, or to any set of men living. These he does not de- rive from your pleasure ; no, nor from the law and the constitu- tion. They are a trust from Providence, for the abuse of which he is deeply answerable. Your representative owes you, not bis industry only, but his judgment; which he betrays, instead of serving you, if he sacrifices it to your opinion. " My worthy colleague says, his will ought to be subservient..' 84 LITE OF EDMUND BURKE. to yours. If that be all, the thing is innocent. If government were a matter of will upon any side, yours, without question, ought to be superior. But government and legislation are matters of reason and judgment, and not of inclination ; and what sort of reason is that in which the determination precedes the discussion ; in which one set of men deliberate, and another decide, and where those who form the conclusion are perhaps three hundred miles distant from those who hear the arguments ? " To deliver an opinion is the right of all men ; that of con- stituents is a weighty and respectable opinion, which a represent- ative ought always to rejoice to hear, and which he ought always most seriously to consider. But authoritative instructions ; man- dates issued, which the member is bound blindly and implicitly to obey, to vote, and to argue for, though contrary to the clearest conviction of his judgment and conscience, — these are things ut- terly unknown to the laws of this land, and which arise from a fun- damental mistake of the whole order and tenour of our constitution. " Parliament is not a congress of ambassadors from different and hostile interests, which interests each must maintain, as an agent and advocate, against other agents and advocates ; but par- liament is a deliberative assembly of owe nation, with one interest, that of the whole ; where, not local purposes, not local prejudices, ought to guide, but the general good, resulting from the general reason of the whole. You choose a member, indeed ; but when you have .chosen him, he is not member of Bristol, but he is a member of parliament. If the local constituent should have an interest, or should form a hasty opinion, evidently opposite to the real good of the rest of the community, the member for that place ought to be as far as any other from any .endeavour to give it effect. I beg pardon for saying so much on this subject. I have been unwillingly drawn into it ; but I shall ever use a respectful frankness of communication with you. Your faithful friend, your devoted servant, I shall be to the end of my life : a flatterer you do not wish for." SPEECH ON AFRICAN CONCILIATION. 85 A humorous incident terminated the day's triumph. Mr. Cruger, Burke's colleague, a worthy merchant in the American trade, and a citizen of Bristol, but no orator, was dumbfounded by the eloquence of his mighty coadjutor. When his own turn came to thank the electors, he had recourse to a speech which, though savouring of his counting-house, was, under the circumstances, about the best he could make. He cried out : " Gentlemen, I say ditto to Mr. Burke ! ditto to Mr. Burke ! " A roar of laughter and applause marked the approval of his audience. With these free and constitutional sentiments, Mr. Burke un- dertook the charge of being one of the two members for Bristol ; and during his six years of representation he served the city faith- fully and well. " Truly," to use his own words, " neither ambi- tion nor avarice jostled him out of the straight line of his duty, — nor that grand foe of the offices of active life, that master-vice in men of business, a degenerate and inglorious sloth, made him flag and languish in his course." La the session of 1775, on the 22d March, Mr. Burke laid be- fore the House his thirteen resolutions for reconcilement with Ame- rica. Waving the discussion of right, he confined himself to ex- pediency. He proceeded upon a principle admitted by the wisest legislators, that government must be adapted to the nature and situation of the people for whose benefit it is exercised. Instead of recurring to abstract ideas, he considered the circumstances, modes of thinking, dispositions, and principles of action of the peo- ple in particular whose treatment was the subject of deliberation. It is in this oration, termed " the Speech on American Concili- ation," that occurs the well-known vision of the greatness of the British Colonies in America ; it is as follows : " Mr. Speaker, I cannot prevail on myself to hurry over this great consideration. It is good for us to be here. We stand where we have an immense view of what is, and what is past. Clouds, indeed, and darkness rest upon the future. Let us, how- ever, before we descend from this noble eminence, reflect that this 8G LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. growth of our national prosperity has happened within the short period of the life of man. It has happened within sixty-eight years. There are those alive whose memory might touch the two extremities. For instance, my Lord Bathurst* might re- member all the stages of the progress. He was in 1704 of an age at least to be made to comprehend such things. He was then old enough acta parentum jam legcre, et qua? sit potent cognoscere virtus. Suppose, sir, that the angel of this auspicious youth, fore- seeing the many virtues which made him one of the most amiable, as he is one of the most fortunate men of his age, had opened to lnm in vision, that, when, in the fourth generation, the third prince of the house of Brunswick had sat twelve years on the throne of that nation, which (by the happy issue of moderate and healing councils) was to be made Great Britain, he should see his son, Lord Chancellor of England, turn back the current of hereditary dignity to its fountain, and raise him to a higher rank of peerage, whilst he enriched the family with a new one. If amidst these bright and happy scenes of domestic honour and pro- sperity, that angel should have drawn up the curtain, and unfolded the rising glories of his country, and whilst he was gazing with admiration on the then commercial grandeur of England, the genius should point out to him a little speck, scarce visible in the mass of the national interest, a small seminal principle rather than a formed body, and should tell him, ' Young man, there is Ame- rica, which at this day serves for little more than to amuse you with stories of savage men and uncouth manners ; yet shall, before * Allen, first Earl Bathurst, an enlightened, benevolent, and agreeable man, was then above ninety. He was father of Henry Lord Apsley, an eminent lawyer, who had risen to be Lord Chancellor. The old Earl's health was so firm and vigorous, that he used to sit up to enjoy the plea- sures of social conversation for several hours after his son, the Lord Chan- cellor's more delicate temperament obliged him to go to bed. When Lord Apsley departed for the night, the venerable peer used to call for another bottle, and say, '.' Come, my friends, let us young fellows drink to the re- pose of the old gentleman that has left us." burke's splendid bursts of eloquence. 87 you taste of death, show itself equal to the whole of that com- merce which now attracts the envy of the world. Whatever England has been growing to by a progressive increase of im- provement, brought on by varieties of people, by succession of civilising conquests and civilising settlements in a series of seven- teen hundred years, you shall see as much added to her by America in the course of a single life.' If this state of his coun- try had been foretold to him, would it not require all the sanguine credulity of youth, and all the fervid glow of enthusiasm, to make him believe it ? Fortunate man, he has lived to see it ! Fortu- nate indeed if he lives to see nothing that shall vary the prospect, and cloud the setting of his day !" In this speech also is the following magnificent burst of elo- quence : " For that service, for all service, whether of revenue, trade, or empire, my trust is in her (America's) interest in the British constitution. My hold of the colonies is in the close affection which grows from common names, from kindred blood, from simi- lar privileges, and equal protection. These are ties, which, though light as air, are as strong as links of iron. Let the colonies always keep the idea of their civil rights associated with your govern- ment; — they will cling and grapple to you ; and no force under Heaven will be of power to tear them from their allegiance. But let it be once understood, that your government may be one thing, and their privileges another; that these two things may exist with- out any mutual relation; the cement is gone, the cohesion is loosened, and every tiling hastens to decay and dissolution. As long as you have the wisdom to keep the sovereign authority of this country as the sanctuary of liberty, the sacred temple conse- crated to our common faith, wherever the chosen race and sons of England worship freedom, they will turn their faces towards you. The more they multiply, the more friends you will have; the more ardently they love liberty, the more perfect will be their obedience. Slavery they can have any where. It is a weed that 88 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. grows in every soil. They may have it from Spain, they may have it from Prussia. But, until you become lost to all feeling of your true interest and your natural dignity, freedom they can have from none but you. This is the commodity of price, of which you have the monopoly. This is the true act of navigation, which binds to you the commerce of the colonies, and through them se- cures to you the wealth of the world. Deny them this participa- tion of freedom, and you break that sole bond, which originally made, and must still preserve, the unity of the empire. Do not entertain so weak an imagination, as that your registers and your bonds, your affidavits and your sufferances, your cockets and your clearances, are what form the great securities of your commerce. Do not dream that your letters of office, and your instructions, and your suspending clauses, are the things that hold together the great contexture of this mysterious whole. These things do not make your government. Dead instruments, passive tools as they are, it is the spirit of the English communion that gives all their life and efficacy to them. It is the spirit of the English constitu- tion, which, infused through the mighty mass, pervades, feeds, unites, invigorates, vivifies every part of the empire, even down to the minutest member. " Is it not the same virtue which does every thing for us here in England ? Do you imagine then that it is the land-tax act which raises your revenue ? that it is the annual vote in the com- mittee of supply which gives you your army ? or that it is the mutiny-bill which inspires it with bravery and discipline ? No ! surely no ! It is the love of the people ; it is their attachment to their government, from the sense of the deep stake they have in such a glorious institution, which gives you your army and your navy, and infuses into both that liberal obedience, without which your army would be a base rabble, and your navy nothing but rotten timber." The sum of Burke's reasoning was this : " By your old mode of treating the colonies they were well affected to you, and you dk. johnsox's pamphlet. 89 derived from them immense and rapidly increasing advantage : by, your new mode they are ill affected to you ; you have obstructed and prevented the emolument. I recommend to you to return from the measures by which you now lose to those by which you formerly gained. I do not examine whether the giving away a man's money be a power excepted and reserved out of the general trust of government ; and how far all mankind, in all forms of polity, are entitled to an exercise of that right by the charter of nature. Or whether, on the contrary, a right of taxation is ne- cessarily involved in the general principle of legislation, and inse- parable from the ordinary supreme power. These are deep ques- tions, where great names militate against each other ; where reason is perplexed, and an appeal to authorities only thickens the confusion. For high and reverend authorities lift up their heads on both sides ; and there is no sine footing in the middle. This point is the ' great Serbonian bog, betwixt Damiata and Mount Cassius old, where armies whole have sunk.' I do not intend to be overwhelmed in that bog, though in such respectable com- pany. The question with me is, not whether you have a right to render your people miserable ; but whether it is not your interest to make them happy ? It is not what a lawyer tells me I may do ; but what humanity, reason, and justice tell me I ought to do." In many of Burke's harangues, imagination occupies a great share, passion not a small one. The speech on American con- ciliation is one of calm wisdom, drawing from the most extensive information the most salutary conclusions, and recommending the most beneficial conduct. Burke met an opponent on this occasion in his warmest ally, Dr. Johnson. " No, sir," we may imagine the doctor exclaiming, " 'Mund must not have this all his own way." So, the great phi- losopher brought out a pamphlet entitled " Taxation no Tyranny," as an answer to Burke's speech. The high tone, little short of ultra bigotry, which frequently sent a cloud over the bright mind of the illustrious sage, deprived his political essays of that excel- 90 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. lence which marks his criticisms and ethics. His views on sub- jects of government were partial, and wanted comprehensiveness. The usual perspicacity of his mind seemed dimmed by prejudice. " Taxation no Tyranny " was much like the Doctor's other poli- tical effusions, and it made but little sensation. Burke, however, failed not to treat it with marked respect. Burke's eloquent warnings to Government were uttered in vain. The infatuated ministry heard him not. Hostilities, in fact, had already commenced at Lexington, at Concord, and at Bunker's Hill ; and General Washington had taken the command of the colonial forces. La the following session, the haughty tone of the address again called Burke to offer a strong but ineffectual protest against an obstinate appeal to force in the disputes with America. Nor did he stop here ; five weeks afterwards he brought forward a second scheme of conciliation with America, founded on the statute of Edward I., de tallagio non concedendo. This speech is said to have been a wonderful effort of oratory, but scarcely a vestige of it remains. The motion that it would sustain brought on a divi- sion, in which the numbers were 105 for, and 210 against. Such was the power, and such the infatuation of ministry. Although Burke adhered closely to a party, he by no means went every length with its more violent supporters. Mr. Wilkes, during the first pressure of the American contest, made a futile motion for a reform in parliament, which Burke, through life an anti-parliamentaiy-reformer, thought most unseasonable in time of war, and opposed. Lord North treated the subject as a joke. The war, now begun in right earnest, went terribly on. Peti- tions and remonstrances from merchants, both at home and abroad, met with a sort of ostentation of neglect from ministers, which at length provoked Mr. Burke to move a resolution in the shape of a taunt, to the effect that, " the house knowing all things rela- tive to America, needed no further information." In fine, Lord Rockingham's party determined to absent themselves from par- PLAN OF ECONOMICAL REFORM. 91 liament, and no longer endure the humiliation of seeing measures passed which they helieved fraught with calamities to the country, and to which they could offer no availing resistance. Two ad- dresses, one to the king and the other to the colonies, were drawn up in explanation of their conduct hy Mr. Burke. This unprece- dented policy was not persisted in. It, however, called forth Burke's eloquent letter to the " Sheriffs of Bristol." The celehrated attempt to remove certain heavy restrictions on the trade of Ireland met with the approbation and support of Burke. But the narrow spirit of Bristol, jealous for its commer- cial interests, took alarm. Burke, however, resolved to preserve his independence, though at the expense of his popularity. He accordingly persisted in his course ; and in consequence, his patri- otism cost him much of the favour of his constituency. He de- fended his conduct in " Two Letters to Gentlemen of Bristol, on the Bills relative to the Trade of Ireland." Nor in this point only did he give umbrage to his constituents. The people of Bristol could not sympathise with his support of Sir George Saville's Bill for the relief of the Catholics. The state of things, however, at Bristol, met a counterbalance in the conduct of Dublin, which, in the ardour of gratitude and admira- tion, proposed a statue to his honour. At this period an occurrence proved Burke's constancy in friendship. Admiral Keppel had fought an indecisive action with the French fleet. For this he had to appear before a court- martial. Burke, who had long felt for hini the wannest friend- ship, attended the gallant seaman throughout the anxious scene of Lis trial at Portsmouth ; cheered and encouraged him ; and re- port says, aided hi preparing his defence. This trial afforded one of the earliest displays of the oratorical powers of Erskine, who was counsel for Keppel. In 1780 Burke exercised liis eloquence and his extensive knowledge in another effort. Taxes had increased in proportion to the expenses of a costly and rubious war, and the people at 92 LIFE OF EDMUND BUKKE. length became clamorous for redress. Mr. Burke undertook the arduous task of constructing a measure on this subject ; hence his speech on " Economical Reform." The chief points this speech embraced were an abolition of all the inferior royal jurisdictions, of an immense number of useless offices in the royal household, of some of the civil departments of the Mint and the Ordnance, of the patent offices of the Exchequer ; the regulation of the army, navy, and pension j>ay-offices ; and a new adjustment of the civil list. The wasteful expenditure he thus proposed to get rid of, did, in fact, no more than furnish further means to government of parlia- mentary influence and corruption. Applause unbounded this oration obtained ; but the project shared the usual fate of opposition measures, and at that time fell to the ground. After the melancholy riots stirred up by Lord George Gordon, Mr. Burke, while urging condign punishment on the principal offenders, evinced great humanity hi exerting himself to procure pardon for the subordinate agents. About the same time he drew up the heads of the plan for the abolition of the slave-trade. It became impracticable, however, then to bring it forward: the great achievement remained for Wilberforce. On the dissolution of parliament in the autumn of 1780, when Mr. Burke repaired to Bristol, he found his constituents in no very propitious mood. Their prejudices, duly inflamed by the industry of his opponents, had poisoned their minds against him. Piesolved, however, that he would neither abandon the con- test, if a reasonable prospect of success remained, nor persist in it merely for the sake of ojipositiou, he called a meeting at the Giuldhall on the 6th of September, to enable him to form an opinion of the issue of an election. On this occasion he defended himself at great length from the charges which had been brought against him. The principal seemed to be that he had not visited the city so frequently as he ought ; in other words, that he had not practised with sufficient assiduity the common artifices for gaining EULOGIUM OF HOWARD. 93 popular favour. He had preferred serving his constituents to flat- tering them. The other objections were to his support of the Insolvent Debtors' Bill, the Irish Trade Acts, and the relief granted to the Catholics. On all these questions his speech breathes the spirit of manly independence and a sustaining con- sciousness of integrity. In this address, when enlarging on prisons and the then horrible system of endless incarceration for debt, Burke gave the well-known beautiful eulogium of John Howard the philanthropist, who devoted his life to prison reform, and who died in that noble cause on the 20th January, 1790, of a fever caught in visiting a jail at Cherson, a Russian settlement on the HOWARD, THE PHILANTHROPIST. Black Sea. Howard's grave is there : his monument adorns St. Pauls cathedral. There is an able biography of him written by the late James Baldwin Brown, Esq., LL..D., a learned barrister of the Northern Circuit. Burke, in his address, spoke of Howard as follows : 94 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. " I cannot name Mr. Howard without remarking that his Labours have clone much to open the eyes and hearts of mankind. He has visited all Europe, not to survey the sumptuousness of palaces, or the stateliness of temples ; not to make accurate mea- surements of the remains of ancient grandeur, nor to form a scale of the curiosity of modern art ; not to collect medals or collate manuscripts ; but to dive into the depths of dungeons, to plunge into the infection of hospitals, to survey the mansions of sorrow and pain, to take the gauge and dimensions of misery, depression, and contempt ; to remember the forgotten, to attend to the ne- glected, to visit the forsaken, and to compare and collate the dis- tresses of all men in all countries. His plan is original, and it is full of genius as it is full of humanity. It was a voyage of dis- covery, a circumnavigation of charity. Already the benefit of his labour is felt more or less in every country ; I hope he will anti- cipate his final reward by seeing all its effects fully realised in his own. He will receive not by retail but in gross the reward of those who visit the prisoner; and he has so forestalled and mono- polised this branch of charity, that there will be, I trust, little room to merit by such acts of benevolence hereafter." Having thus given vent to his feelings, Burke retired from the contest. He sought Malton again ; and this humble borough had the high honour of retaining him its member during the remainder of his parliamentary career. "Whilst these events passed in Burke's life, the American war, however success might now and then momentarily vary, proceeded inevitably towards that unfavourable result which became every day more and more apparent. What else could England expect, with no good cause, no wise cabinet, no confident or well-com- manded army to oppose to the all-powerful counsel and conduct of a leader, the best of able soldiers and of sagacious statesmen, because the purest and the least selfish, — a leader who had not only the stern determination of roused America, but the feeling of al- most every other country enlisted in his favour ? With George, DEFEAT OF LORD NORTH S MINISTRY. 95 Washington's successes, the spirits of the English ministry sunk. Lord North proposed plans of conciliation, not as Burke did when there remained a chance of allaying hostility, hut vainly, when all was next to lost. Then France prepared to join America ; and then the concession of independence to the colonies was talked of hy the Rockingham party, and listened to by other politicians. One only was sternly immovable. At the very idea of this kind of surrender the imperial mind of Chatham revolted. He held it to be submission to the house of Bourbon — base yielding to the enemies of England, whom he had once so effectually and so gloriously humbled. On the 7th April, 1778, the Earl stood up in the House of Lords, a spectre of wrath and indignation, crying out with dying voice " against the dismemberment of tins ancient and most noble monarchy." Suddenly he sunk, to speak words of eloquence no more, and fell into the arms of a son, who possessed the same spirit and energy, who, in common with the greatest statesmen of England, could brook no humiliation from France, and who, at the aspect again of such a thing, found, like his father, relief in death. Lord Chatham's demise sounded the knell of resistance to acknowledging an independence already past contention. The Whigs, who had supported him, wavered now in further mainten- ance of a course that he alone could possibly have carried out ; the government losing every help, shrunk within itself. Burke and Fox, in the buff and blue uniform of the Americans, thundered nightly against the ministers who had brought England to such a pass. The nation was no longer deaf: the crisis came at last. In 1782, when the wretched American war had continued nearly seven years ; when France and other continental powers were making head against us as they had never made before ; when all was gloom, and would have been despair, but for Parker and Bodney on the seas ; it should be remembered for ever that " in a dark and terrible day," as Mr. Macaulay terms the period, the same party whose fan- counsels sixteen years before had experi- 9G LITE OF EDMUND BUKKE. enced from king and corn-tiers insult and contempt — the Rockingham party, of which Burke was the very soul — came forward with principles unchanged to save the state. Burke had now not only the aid of Fox, hut also of William Pitt and Richard Brmsley Sheridan, who the year before had joined the brilliant throng in parliament. On the 18th March, 1782, the minister, Lord North, was attacked in force, and, two days after, he had to yield, just as he touched the goal of the mischief he had done. A new administration was formed under the auspices of the Marquess of Rockingham. The ministerial arrangements were as follow: Lord Rockingham was first Lord of the Treasury, the Earl of Shelbume and Charles Fox were joint Secretaries of State, Lord Camden was President of the Council, the Duke of Grafton Privy Seal, and Lord John Cavendish Chancellor of the Ex- chequer, Admiral Keppel First Lord of the Admiralty, and Ge- neral Conway Commander-in-Chief ; Mr. Burke (who was at the same time made a Privy Councillor) became Paymaster-General of the Forces ; Sheridan was an Under-Secretary of State. Upon the meeting of parliament after the recess, the new ministry, winch stood pledged to the country for many reforms, began in right earnest to put them into execution. Their very first mea- sure breathed the spirit of Burke, and evidenced his deep love of his native Ireland. The cause of Hibernian independence, that cause which was upheld by the armed hand of his friend Lord Charlemont, and the eloquent tongue of his other friend Henry Grat- tan, Burke and his colleagues now brought to a bright conclusion. On the 18th May, 1782, the day of the illumination for Rodney's victory over the Count de Grasse, the obnoxious act, the 6th of George I., for securing the dependency of Ireland, was repealed, and the cup of Erin's pride was filled to the brim. The Irish parliament immediately voted 100,000^. for the purpose of raising 20,000 Irish seamen, thus verifying the words which Burke had shortly before addressed to his Bristol constituency : " Ireland has never made a single step in its progress towards prosperity, by PLAN OF ECONOMICAL REFORM CARRIED. 97 which you have not had a share, and perhaps the greatest share, in the benefit Believe me, if Ireland is beneficial to you, it is not so from the parts in which it is restrained, but from those in which it is left free, though not left unrivalled. The greater its freedom, the greater must be your advantage. If you should lose in one way, you will gain in twenty." To further carry out amelioration, a bill was passed disquali- fying revenue officers for voting in the election for members of parliament ; and ]\Ir. Burke himself brought forward and carried, with some unavoidable modifications, his great plan of reform in the civil-list expenditure. This measure entailed the regulation of his own office of Paymaster- General, and in effecting that, he voluntarily reduced his income by 1300£. a year, which he ap- propriated to the public service. In the midst of these salutary changes, just as the country was reviving from its stupor, the administration was in part broken, sadly and suddenly. On the 1st July, 1782, to the grief of the nation, the Marquess of Piockingham died. Burke deeply mourned a friend — his help to fame, and the object of his warmest venera- tion and attachment. Some few years after, Burke joined in a lasting tribute to the remembrance of his good and generous patron. Wentworth House, the seat of the Earls Fitzwilham, the relatives and heirs of the marquess, is about four miles north-west from Ro- therliam, in Yorkshire. On approaching that superb mansion, the eye is struck with a magnificent mausoleum, erected in 1788 by the marquess's nephew, the fourth Earl Fitzwilliam, in honour of his uncle. The monument occupies an elevated situation, and is itself ninety feet high. -Its upper story, of the Ionic order, dis- closes a beautiful sarcophagus ; but the most interesting part is the interior of the basement, a room covered by a dome, and supported by eight columns. In the wall of this apartment, within the pil- lars, are four recesses, receptacles for eight busts, the images of the marquess's able and attached associates, who seem thus to con- tinue their alliance, and to be with him even in the silence of u 98 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. death. The busts are those of Edmund Burke, the Duke of Port- land, Frederick Montagu, Sir George Saville, Charles James Fox, Admiral Keppel, John Lee, and Lord George Cavendish. In the centre stands a white marble statue of the marquess in his robes, THE ROCKINGHAM MAUSOLEUM. the size of life, by Nollekins. The statue has a square pedestal. There, as well as the titles of the good statesman, may be read his eulogium in verse and prose, by two of those whose effigies grace the space around. The poetry, by the Right Hon. Frederick Montagu, is as follows : INSCRIPTION IN THE ROCKINGHAM MAUSOLEUM. Angels, whose guardian care is England, spread Your shadowing wings o'er patriot Wentworth dead : With sacred awe his hallowed ashes keep, Where commerce, science, honour, friendship weep The pious hero — the deeply-sorrowing wife — All the soft ties that blest his virtuous life. Gentle, intrepid, generous, mild, and just ; These heartfelt titles grace his honour'd dust. No fields of blood by laurels ill repaid ; No plunder" d provinces disturb his shade ; But white-rob'd peace composed his closing eyes, And join'd with soft humanity her sighs. They mourn their patron gone, their friend no more, And England's tears his short-lived power deplore. The character, in prose, hy Edmund Burke, is this : " CHARLES MARQUESS OF ROCKINGHAM. " A statesman in whom constancy, fidelity, sincerity, and di- rectness were the sole instruments of his policy. His virtues were his arts. A clear, sound, unadulterated sense, not perplexed with intricate design, or disturbed by ungoverned passion, gave consistency, dignity, and effect to all his measures. In opposition he respected the principles of government ; in administration he provided for the liberties of the people. He employed his mo- ments of power in realising every thing which he had promised in a popular situation. This was the distinguishing mark of his con- duct. After twenty-four years of service to the public, in a critical and trying time, he left no debt of just expectation unsatisfied. " By his prudence and patience he brought together a party which it was the great object of his labours to render permanent, not as an instrument of ambition, but as a living depositoiy of principle. ' The virtues of his public and private life were not in him of different characters. It was the same feeling, benevolent, liberal mind that, in the internal relations of life, conciliates the unfeigned love of those who see men as they are, which made him an inflex- 100 LIFE OF EDMUND BUKKE. ible patriot. He was devoted to the cause of liberty, not because be was haughty and intractable, but because he was beneficent and humane. Let bis successors, who from this house behold this monument, reflect that then- conduct will make it their glory or their reproach. Let them be persuaded that similarity of man- ners, not proximity of blood, gives them an interest in this statue. " Eemember — Resemble — Persevere." On Lord Rockingham's death, the secretary of state, William second Earl of Shelburne (afterwards Marquess of Lansdowne) was appointed his successor as first lord of the treasury. The condition of the Earl's call to the premiership was that the Ame- rican colonies should not be entirely severed from the mother country. This gave umbrage to Burke (who personally disliked Lord Shelburne), to Fox, Cavendish, and Sheridan: they re- signed, and fell once more into the ranks of the opposition. Wil- liam Pitt became chancellor of the exchequer. The administra- tion had soon to give up the undertaking which made Shelburne premier. The 30th November, 1782, provisional articles of peace were signed at Paris between Great Britain and the United States of America on the basis of a full acknowledgment of the independence of the latter. In the following January, prelimina- ries of peace were also entered into with France and Spam. Thus virtually ended the American war, by Edmund Burke himself pronounced " an era of calamity, disgrace, and downfall, which no feeling mind will ever mention without a tear for England." Nevertheless, pride has since wiped that tear away — the pride of a subsequent mighty contest, whose glorious ending made the nation herself again. It should be ever borne in mind that in the one war the genius of Burke was antagonistic — assenting in the other. BURKE'S HOUSE AT BEACONSFIELD. CHAPTER V. Can I of worth like thine, Eusebius, speak ? The man is willing, but the muse is weak. 'Tis thine to wait on woe, to soothe, to heal, With learning social, and polite with zeaL Crabbe. He helped young merit into fame. Charles Mackat. Burke's Domestic Life — His acquisition of a Country-house at Bea- consfield— His agricultural Pursuits — Hospitality at Gregories — Burke's Manners and Habits— Anecdotes — Marie Antoinette — Burke in Scotland — The Literary Club — Baretti's Trial — Burke's brother Richard — Burke's son Richard— William Burke — John Bourke— Burke's sister, Mrs. French— Death of Gold- smith—Johnson's Visit to Beaconsfield— Abraham Shackleton — Mrs. Leadbeater's Poetry — Lord North— Garrick— Miss Burnet —Burke's Philanthropy— Barry the Painter— Crabbe the Poet, 102 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. Let us now, for a time, turn from the confusing and calamitous politics of the period at which the last chapter ends, and view the statesman's private life, so good, so graceful, and so happy. Let us see him in that home, the centre of his pleasures and affections, where his cares woidd vanish, and where he lived the idol of his family and the charm and delight of friends, whose numerous roll included all people, the humhle and the lofty, from the peasant to the prince, from the poor struggling son of genius to the mightiest possessor of fortune's favours. Burke's society had irresistible attraction; childhood in its innocence loved to be with him: manhood, in its wisdom and learning, found a match in Burke, and relished his encounter. The meritorious, in their hour of distress, while shrinking from other exposure and solicitation, feared not to crave aid from him : his well-known character gave confidence, and the applicant, " no longer proud, Claimed kindred there, and had his claims allowed." His benevolence would extend to common mendicants. When walking in the streets he generally disposed of all his loose pence, and even sixpences, in indiscriminate charity. This amiable weak- ness he had in common with his friend Dr. Johnson ; and, as with the doctor, the beggars used to waylay him to take advantage of his generosity. On being blamed for the habit, Burke said, " I impute inattention to the petitions of these poor people not to the policy of discouraging beggars, but to unwillingness to part with money," " That old fellow," observed a friend one day to Burke, " will no doubt spend the sixpence you have given him in gin." " Well," replied Burke, " if he even do so, the poor wretch seems to have had so few of the enjoyments of this life, that it would be churlish to grudge Mm this chance of an occa- sional pleasure." In one of his letters, Burke, in allusion to the subject of cha- rity, makes the following observation : " Whatever one gives ought PURCHASE OF A SEAT AT BEACONSFIELD. 103 to be from what one would otherwise spend, not from what one would otherwise pay. To spend little and give much is the highest glory a man can aspire to." Edmund Burke always preferred a rural life, and dwelt in the country whenever he could. At one time he resided with his family at Parson's Green, then a place far more rural than now, and the favourite sojourn of Dr. Johnson's friend, Richardson, the author of " Clarissa Harlowe." Burke afterwards went to live at Plaistow in Essex ; and eventually, in the year 1768, he pur- chased, for 23,000/., an estate in Buckinghamshire, called Gre- gories, or Butler's Court, situated about a mile from the market- town of Beaconsfield. His address from it, as he used to give it himself, was simply " Beaconsfield," or " Beconsfield," and con- sequently it became known and alluded to frequently by such designation only. How Burke obtained the funds necessary for this landed acquisition has been the subject of much question and surmise. This arose, not from any doubt of his honour or con- duct in the transaction, but from the complete secrecy he always adopted in any matters relating to himself personally. The solu- tion of the affair is simple enough. In the first place, by his father's death and by that of his eldest brother Garrett, unmarried, in 1765, the parental lands in Ireland had come to him : the sale of these gave him some of the money ; the rest he undoubtedly owed to the munificence of Lord Rockingham, who, when he heard that further funds were to have been procured on mortgage, volun- tarily offered to lend the sum necessary to complete the purchase. It is even said that his lordship proposed a yet greater loan, which was declined by Burke ; he would accept no more than was ab- solutely indispensable for his purpose, and that, upon a perfect understanding of its being a loan to be returned with the first opportunity. Nevertheless, the money was never reclaimed, nor ever really intended to be so by the marquess ; a generous act, no doubt, on his part ; but it should also be considered that he was under great obligations to Burke, both of a public and private 104 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. nature. Politically, Burke was the making and the mainstay of his party ; in domestic matters Burke had also served him by valu- able advice and assistance in the management of some of his lordship's extensive estates. John Lee, a barrister of eminence, at one time solicitor-general, the legal adviser of Lord Rock- ingham, and the trustee of his will, has confirmed this account of the transaction, by a statement he made to the following effect. When the marquess was near his death, Mr. Lee was summoned to the sick room. On seeing him, the peer expressed much plea- sure, and desired they might be left alone. After a few words on some other subject, " My dear Lee," said the marquess, " there is a piece of business I wish you to execute immediately, as there is no time to be lost. Pecuniary transactions have passed between me and my admirable friend, Edmund Burke. To the best of my recollection, I have added the fullest discharges to bonds or other documents ; but, lest my memory shoidd have failed me, I, a dying man, but in the full use of my reason, desire you, as a pro- fessional man, will make out a codicil of my will, cancelling every paper that may be found containing any acknowledgement of a debt due to me from Edmund Burke." Mr. Lee drew up the codicil to the desired effect. This fact is further proved by no claim having ever been made on Mr. Burke by the marquess's representatives. With Earl Fitzwilliam, the marquess's nephew and heir, Mr. Burke continued through life on terms of the warm- est and most intimate friendship. The sojourn of Edmund Burke in his early youth near Kil- colman, allied him, as it were, nearer to one with whom he boasted ancestorial association — Edmund Spenser. His purchase of the lands of Gregories brought lriin in union with another poetic remembrance — Edmund Waller. In the century previous to the time of Burke, his acres at Beaconsfield had formed a portion of the estate of the poet Waller, who, although a slippery politician, was a bard of fair repute. The family of this poet possessed the -whole manor of Beaconsfield, which at one time belonged to ACCOUNT OF GREGORIES. 105" Bumliam Abbey. Waller bimself built on the manor a seat called Hall Barn, since the residence of Sir Gore Ouseley, Bart., and now in the possession of John Hargreaves, Esq., of Broadoak, Lancashire. This mansion was Waller's abode on his return from exile, and here he terminated his days in retirement, amid the recollections of his blighted ambition, and his bygone love for Sacharissa, and other aristocratic objects of his poetic affec- tions. Waller died at the place in his 83d year, on the 1st October, 1G87. His widow, after his demise, continued to dwell there till her death in 1708. The name of " Gregories," which was given to that part of the property where Burke lived, is de- rived from the family of Gregory, citizens of London, at one time its owners. Mistress Martha Gregory, who was buried at Bea- consfield the 15th November, 1704, erected the mansion which Burke partly rebuilt, and greatly ameliorated. Lipscomb, in his History of the County of Buckingham, thus describes Gregories whilst in Burke's possession : — " The diversified combination of woods, hills, valleys, and beautiful enclosures by which the resi- dence of Burke assumed a resemblance of Chilton, Wotton, Chef- den ; and the splendid colonnades which gave it, at a little dis- tance, the dignity of a royal residence in miniature, by its simili- tude to Queen Charlotte's palace, called Buckingham House, in St. James's Park, together with the magic name of Burke, ren- dered it an object of very general curiosity." With the house at Beaconsfield, Burke was obliged, much against his inclination, to take the seller's collection of pictures and marbles, and thus, as he writes to his friend Barry, the painter, he went to an expense he would not have otherwise in- curred. Once, however, in possession of his new estate, Burke applied his comprehensive mind so assiduously to the pursuits of agriculture, that he soon tripled the value of the land, and aston- ished his visitors and neighbours by his improvements. As a farmer he pursued the plan which had been found, by experience, tn produce the best corn and cattle; and he was, in fact, without 106 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. any unusual expense, one of the most successful farmers in the county. When in town he had Ins mutton, poultry, and all other meats, except heef, and also the various productions of the dairy and gardens, from his own estate, brought by his own horses and carts. The same horses which served for his carriage were em- ployed on his farms. In London he had no permanent house after he left Queen Anne Street, on taking Butler's Court, but lived in temporary residences, which he frequently changed. At one time he sojourned in Westminster, first in Fludyer Street, and then in the Broad Sanctuary. Latterly his abode was in Charles Street, St. James's. In town and coimtry he was remark- able for hospitality — a hospitality of real benevolence: there was no parade of style, no ostentatious display of plate, no sump- tuous entertainments ; every thing was plain, substantial, and agreeable, with kind looks, kind manners, and a hearty welcome. He would often insist, when in London, on eight or ten of his associates going to his town home with him to eat mutton-chops or beef-steaks; and on such occasions, literally gave such din- ners — dinners which, considering the zest of his company, few banquets could be found to excel. At Gregories, where the cheer was of course more in accord- ance with the dignity of the seat, he received his friends and ad- mirers frequently and cordially. His house was the continual resort of rank, beauty, wit, and talent. In his domestic circle politics were readily laid aside. Various anecdotes represent the statesman entering with glee into the sports and pranks of the witty crowd around him ; sharing earnestly in the games of school- boys, and even listening to, or inventing with serious face, in the company of children, fairy adventures and infantine histories. He once observed to his friend Murphy, that ' Tom Thumb' and 'Jack the Giant Killer,' were both, " from intrinsic merit, and from their popularity, fictions of no inferior stamp." Of the interest he took in children of all classes, the following anecdote is related. Burke being one day with a friend at a country fair, observed a bukke's domestic habits. 107 lot of boys in front of a show of attractive aspect, looking on with eager and longing countenances, but evidently with pockets too empty to enable them to penetrate into the interior. Burke forth- with went up to the showman, and agreed for the admission of the whole youthful crowd at his expense. On his friend asking him the reason of his strange proceeding, " I could not," he said, " miss the opportunity of making so many urchins happy." Burke's own domestic life was extremely regular. Both as a student and afterwards as a man of business, he was an early riser, and used to dispatch important affairs before many of the other members of the House of Commons were able to get up or recruit themselves after a previous long debate. In this he entirely dif- fered from his mighty coadjutor, Charles James Fox. Fox, owing either to the nights not occupied in the senate being spent at a tavern or in a gaming-house, usually dosed the morning away. His valet, towards the afternoon, would apply to his brow a cloth wet with the coldest spring water, and he would then arise per- fectly revived. Burke, in his way to the house, frequently called on Fox, and would find him at three o'clock sitting cool and comfortable at his breakfast : " There's Charles," he would say ; " whilst I have exhausted the day and fatigued myself with read- ing and business, he is cmite fresh : it is no wonder he is so much more vigorous in parliament." The notion of the morning, and the early stirring lark, were favourite themes with Burke. In one of his poetic effusions, he writes thus : " Teach me, lark ! with thee to greatly rise, To exalt my soul and lift it to the skies ; To make each worldly joy as mean appear, Unworthy care, when Heavenly joys are near." Burke liked wine as an enlivener of society, but he never drank much. During dinner he took water, and afterwards gene- rally claret or some other light beverage. Wine, in fact, could not add to the rational animation of his conversation and exhilara- 103 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. tion of liis spirits. Touching liis friendly patronage of the juice of the grape some anecdotes are recorded. One evening, at the Literary Club, he observed that a hogshead of claret, which had been sent them as a present, was almost out, and proposed that Dr. Johnson should write for another, in such ambiguity of ex- pression as might have a chance of procuring it also as a gift. A member of the company said, " Dr. Johnson shall be our dictator." " Were I," observed Johnson, " your dictator, you should have no wine ; it would be my business cavere ne quid detrimenti respub- lica caperet : — wine is dangerous ; Rome was ruined by luxury." Burke replied : "If you allow no wine as dictator, you shall not have me for master of the horse." Dining one clay at Sir Joshua Reynolds', Dr. Johnson repeated his gradation of licpiors — claret for boys, port for men, brandy for heroes. " Then," said Burke, " let me have claret : I love to be a boy, and to have the careless gaiety of boyish days." Burke was frequently, with the other leading men of his party, invited to the table of the Prince of Wales, afterwards George IV. On one occasion, after dinner, the prince about to propose a bum- per toast, asked Burke if a toast-master was not absolute ? He instantly answered : " Yes, jure de vino." George's rejoinder was ready and graceful : " That is the only way," said his royal highness, " in which I should wish to be absolute." Burke's love of books and literature was boundless. He liked mostly those works which brought human nature to his view ; he perused with exquisite delight writings which exhibited particular characters, general manners, the active principles of the mind, and their operation on the relations and duties of society. This pre- dilection for pictures of moral kind is tested by the modern writers whom he preferred : among these were Bacon, Shakespeare, Fielding, Le Sage, and Addison. Concerning Fielding he differed with his friend Dr. Johnson, and preferred him to Richardson : the painter from real life to the painter from his own fancy. Mr. Burke was very fond of novels in general, and often amused BURKE'S RELISH FOR THE ARTS THE DRAMA. 109 friendly parties at his own house with reading good new works of that kind, and still more so old. He was partial to Smollet's " Roderick Random," as a natural and excellent description of a young man, coming, with all his provincial notions and peculiari- ties, to push his fortune in the capital. Though he preferred Field- ing on the whole, yet he thought Smollet's hero, in point of enter- prise and active exertion, preferable to " Tom Jones." " Both," he would say, " set out poor from then respective homes. Roderick, by industry, endeavours to supply his wants ; while Jones, bene- volent and meritorious as his character was in many respects, yet, when he has nothing to depend on but his own efforts, continues in a state of inaction. The conduct of Roderick was in this more natural, and more worthy of imitation than that of Jones." The whole of the novel of Fielding, however, he greatly preferred to the whole of Smollet's. Swift he did not relish, because he only gave one side, and that the worst side of human nature. He entertained a poor opinion of the then all-popular Beggars' Opera. He thought its intellectual excellence small, and totally over- balanced by its moral defects. He did not admit the common- place blame, that it was calculated to increase the number of rob- bers. Those who betake themselves to the highway, he deemed it probable, were impelled by much more powerful motives than the imitation of a fictitious robber ; but he objected that the opera placed vice in too pleasant and fanhliar an aspect. Burke had an excpiisite taste for the fine arts, and was deemed by Sir Joshua Reynolds an excellent judge of pictures. Much of his leisure time was spent in Sir Joshua's house. The amuse- ment, however, in which he most delighted was the theatre. He did not, like Johnson, contemn scenical personation; he had a high admiration of theatrical excellence : "I am gratified," he would say, " with tbat perfect imitation of human characters and passions which a Garrick and a Siddons exhibit." Of the stage Mr. Burke thus writes in 1796 : " The theatres are a prominent feature of our gaiety and profusion. They are established through 110 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. every part of the kingdom, at a cost unknown till our days. There is hardly a provincial capital which does not possess or which does not aspire to possess a theatre royal. Most of them engage, for a short time at a vast price, every actor or actress of name in the metropolis ; a distinction which in the reign of my old friend Gar- rick was confined to very few. The dresses, the scenes, the de- corations of every kind, I am told, are in a new style of splendour and magnificence ; whether to the advantage of our dramatic taste, upon the whole, I very much doubt. It is a show and a specta- cle, not a play, that is exhibited. This is undoubtedly in the genuine manner of the Augustan age, but in a manner which was censured by one of the best poets and critics of that or any age : migravit ab aure voluptas Omnis ad incertos ociilos, et gaudia vana : Quatuor aut plures aulsea premuntur in horas, Dum fugiunt equituni turmse, peditumque catervae." Burke took infinite pleasure in beholding, as well as in read- ing, the dramatic performances of his friend and countryman Murphy. He declared that both as a comic and serious writer Murphy showed a profound insight into man in his general nature, as well as peculiar diversities arising from local and temporary circumstances, prejudices, opinions, fashions, and customs. Mur- phy's genius he held to be both strong and versatile. Burke could himself repeat the greater part of Murphy's " Citizen" and " Apprentice." He had an anecdote respecting the " Apprentice" that he often related with great glee. Mr Murphy, when he first prepared his farce for the stage, composed it without the character of Wingate, the hero's father. Murphy had an uncle, a trader in the city, who had often endeavoured to enrich his mind with economical maxims, and to prove to him the uselessness of literature. The nephew heard this advice in vain ; but conceiving himself to be still a favourite with his uncle, not- withstanding his dereliction of the mercantile path he had chalked bueke's manifold abilities. Ill out for him, expected a handsome legacy at his death ; and on the faith of it, with juvenile imprudence, incurred a debt of two hun- dred pounds. On the decease of the uncle, he found there was not a farthing bequeathed to him. In great anxiety about his embarrassment, he at last reflected on the lessons his relative had doled out, and thought he would make not a bad figure as a cha- racter in his farce. He accordingly brought him forward as Old Wingate, recommending Cocker's Arithmetic as the only book worthy of being studied, and keeping very closely to his wonted sentiments and language. The added personage tended consider- ably to the great success* of the performance. " So," said Mr. Murphy, " I made old ' nunks' at last extricate me from my diffi- culties," Of all comedies, however, Burke gave the preference to " The School for Scandal." Part of each recess Mr. Burke spent at Beaconsfield as a country gentleman. He liked to give counsel to the peasants and labourers, for whose employment, and the amelioration of whose condition, he would occupy himself devising means. He planned in his neighbourhood various institutions for making the poorer mechanics and working men save a little from their wages or profits to assist each other in sickness or poverty, and give to their children the education necessary or useful in their humble stations. He would, in fact, be at all things. As an instance, he bestowed attention to practical medicine, and frequently made up prescrip- tions. Here, however, he went a step too far, and once involved himself in very great misery for several hours. Mrs. Burke having been mdisposed, the husband undertook to make up a draught ordered by the physician, but unfortunately mistaking one phial for another, gave her laudanum. The error being immedi- ately discovered by examining the other phial, efficacious antidotes were applied, and the lady at length recovered, but not until she had undergone much pain, and Burke much inexpressible terror and agony. Dr. Johnson used to say that Burke was ignorant of nothing 112 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. but gaining and music. Of Burke's amazing power of noting and knowing every thing, this anecdote is related : on his arriving once in Bath, with Mrs. Burke, after a long journey, she was too fatigued to attend the assembly in the evening, and yet wished to see the ladies' new fasliions, so that she might give directions to her dressmaker in accordance with the taste of the place. Burke playfully undertook to make the requisite observations in her stead, and he actually did so to such perfection, that he astonished the workwoman in the morning with his apt and available infor- mation. No pictured account in a Belle Assemblee, or Journal de Modes coidd have guided better. ^ Part of the summer Burke frequently devoted to revisiting his ever- cherished native country, or to travelling about England to view the various seats and picturesque places. For this latter ob- ject he would ensconce himself, incognito, in a stage coach, proving on such occasions, as may be supposed, a rare boon to his fellow- travellers. A lady that once came in the stage with him a consi- derable part of the road from Yorkshire, without knowing who he was, foimd the attention of herself and the other passengers fixed by his great fund of local knowledge, and the anecdotes with which it was interspersed. They all concurred in thinking him the most entertaining personage they had ever met. What was the lady's surprise to discover afterwards in London, at a public assembly, that he who had delighted a stage-coach company was the great statesman, formed " The applause of listening senates to command." A visit to France in 1772 was marked by a circumstance which made an indelible impression on Burke's chivalrous mind. He saw, at Versailles, Marie Antoinette, then aged sixteen, and just two years married — a momentous meeting. That transient view brought the royal lady the greatest champion distressed princess ever had. The stranger, who then looked at her hi silent admiration, was afterwards, with words of lire, to proclaim her JOURNEY TO SCOTLAND. 113 virtues and wrongs throughout the world, and to arm nations in her cause. His immortal description of her — immortal as the memory of her own unnatural sufferings — has gone to posterity with sad and withering effect. Who can read it without a tear of sympathy for the Queen — without horror at the wickedness which wrought her such immeasurable woe ? The exquisite passage will be found in this volume in the chapter on the French Revolution. In 1785, Burke, then delicate and ordered change of air, took a jaunt, in company with William Windham, to Scotland : they rode their own horses, went by Edinburgh, and proceeded northward to the Highlands. Burke enjoyed this journey more than Dr. Johnson did his to the Hebrides ; for though Burke, like 114 LIFE OF EDMUND BUKKE. the Doctor, delighted in the exhibition of the human mind in its di- versities and contrasts, he was much more readily charmed with the external beauties of nature. " I found," he used to say, " health and pleasure in Scotland ; I there beheld the works of God and man in a new and striking aspect." He also confessed that the visit cured him entirely of that hostility to Scotchmen, which he shared in common with the Whigs of his time who had opposed Lord Bute and the partisans of that unpopular minister. Burke, however occupied, never slackened in his zeal towards the welfare of the Literary Club. He was a constant frequenter of it. In course of time, it received great accessions of genius and literature. Edward Gibbon, the historian, Richard Brinsley She- ridan, and Charles Fox, became members. Fox, strange to say, was generally mute in the company of Dr. Johnson, not from fear of his talents, but from a desire of information and instruction ; he liked, he said, " to listen and reap from the knowledge and experience of the old sage." Gibbon did not shine in the club ; he disliked Dr. Johnson, and did not enter freely into conversation when he was present. This disrelish partly arose from the great difference of their sentiments on religion. Johnson had no patience with unbelievers. Besides, he undervalued that species of literary labour in which Gibbon excelled, and had declared in his company that the greater part of what was called history was nothing but conjecture. Whether or not this was the cause, Gibbon was reserved in the club, and abstained from intellectual contests. When he did speak, his conversation was rather epigrammatic and sarcastic than replete with the ability and learning which his works demonstrate. Johnson himself proposed Sheridan as a member, saying, when he recommended him, " he who has written the best comedies of the age must be a considerable man." Burke used to display his taste for general and classic punning at the club. One evening, speaking of the deanery of Ferns, which was then vacant, he said it must be barren, and that he believed there would be a contest for it between the two known burke's regard for his family. 115 divines Dr. Heath and Dr. Moss. As to livings in general, he said, Horace described a good manor — ** Est modus in rebus, sunt certi denique fines ;" which he translated, " There are a modus in the tithes and fixed fines." Burke's punning alteration of Horace's line, to make it describe the mob chairing Wilkes, is well known : " Fertur humeris lege solutis," In November 1769, Dr. Johnson, Garrick, Sir Joshua Rey- nolds, Mr. FitzHerbert, and Edmund Burke — a grand array, ap- peared together at the Old Bailey, to give evidence to the cha- racter of a gentleman on trial for his life. Joseph Baretti, the well-known author, traveller, and editor of MacchiaveFs works, had been attacked by a woman of the town, near the Hayrnarket, at night. In endeavouring to get away, he was surrounded by three fellows, who supported the woman and struck Baretti. On then: continuing to molest him, he, apprehensive of his life, drew a knife, and warned them to keep off ; a scuffle ensued, and Baretti stabbed two of them, of whom one named Evan Morgan died. Baretti was charged with murdering the man. Baretti's distin- guished witnesses bore testimony to the goodness of his general character and the peaceableness of his disposition. The jury con- sidered the homicide as in self-defence, and he was accordingly accpiitted. Baretti was very intimate with the members of the Literary Club, and especially with Burke and Johnson, who highly valued him. He died in 1789. Burke loved deeply and regarded with watchful solicitude all the members of his own family. He procured for Iris brother Richard, who had engaged in mercantile affairs, the collectorship of Grenada, during the first administration of Lord Rockingham, and had him appointed secretary to the Treasury when his lordship was minister again. Burke's influence, no doubt, secured the Iiecordership of Bristol for Richard, who succeeded, in the dignity, 116 LITE OF EDMUND r.TT>KT.. the eminent lawyer John Dunning, Lord Ashhurton. These bene- fits were obtained for no undeserving object. Richard Burke was a man of very considerable ability : he was engaged in several publications, and had even by some persons been deemed one of the authors of Junius. Letters that appeared in the Public Ad- vertiser, signed Valens, during the American war, were supposed to be written by Richard, with the assistance of Mr. "William Burke, who afterwards went to India, Richard Burke was called to the bar hi 1778 — the year ofErskme's acquiring practice and reputation in his profession, — and was highly thought of by Lord Mansfield. Richard went the Western circuit ; and some amusing letters of his, penned during his forensic journeys, occur in Lord Fitzwilliam and Sir Richard Bourkes Collection. In one letter, dated from Launceston, March 1783, he writes that he had got no brief, but had heard au as- size semiou wherein it was certified, " that the juilges of England were above not only conviction but corruption, owing to their having very large salaries.*' Handsome in person, fascinating in manners, and abounding in humour, wit, and fun. Richard Burke was a very popular member of the fashionable society of Lon- don. He was warmly attached to Edmund and his family, and whenever he could, he resided with them. He used frequently to indulge in practical jokes, and would not even refrain from now and then playing them off on his more dignified brother, which the statesman took in perfect good-humour, as part of the neces- sary mirth of his home. Richard Burke, probably in some of his venturesome escapades, had at different times slightly fractured an arni and a leg. It is in allusion to this and to Ms eccentric ways that Goldsmith wrote on him the well-known hues in " Re- taliation :" " Here lies honest Richard, whose fate I must sigh at. Alas, that such frolic should now be so quiet ! What spirits were his ! what wit and what whim ! Now breaking a jest, and now breaking a limb ; LETTER OF BURKE'S MOTHEE. 117 Now wrangling and grumbling, to keep up the ball ; Now teasing and vexing, yet laughing at alh In short, so provoking a devil was Dick, That we wish'd him full ten times a day at old Nick ,- But missing his mirth and agreeable vein, As often we wish'd to have Dick back again." Another object of Edmund Burke's tender affection was his sister Juliana. This lady was married at the commencement of January 1766 to William French, Esq., of Loughrea, in the county of Galway, Ireland, and had in the October of the same year an only child, Mary. Edmund Lurke and his family visited Ireland in 1766, and saw Mrs. French and his other relatives and friends, just prior to the birth of this daughter. In the Burke correspondence of Lord Fitzwilliam and Sir Bichard Bourke, there occurs a very pleasant letter, recording the event, written by Edmund Burke's widowed mother, in the fulness of her heart, to her niece, Mrs. Ellen Hen- nessy, wife first of James Hennessy, and after his death, of Bichard Hennessy of Cognac, France, who were both junior members of the ancient and honourable house of Hennessy of Ballymacmoy, in the county of Cork. Lr this letter, dated Loughrea, October 25) 1760, Mrs. Burke, after announcing the birth of her grand- daughter, proceeds thus on the subject of her children's visit : " I believe I need not tell you that my pleasure in having them here, where I kept them in view during the time of their stay, was heartily dashed at parting. They had all the gentlemen and ladies of this town and neighbourhood to visit them, and bad as many invitations to dinner, had they accepted of them, as would take up a great many days. Mr. French of Basan was in Cork when they came to this country ; the next morning after his coming home, he, Miss Xagle, Mrs. O'Flaherty, and Miss Driscoll, came here, and in two days after we were all engaged to Basan, where we dined, and could not get from thence that night, and it was with much ado Jane and I could get away. Mr. French of Basan, Ned and Lick (her sons Edmund and BichardJ, went to look at Galway US LIFE OF EDMUND BUEKE. and a great lake that .was near. As soon as they got into Gal- way, the bell rang for them. The Monday following the cor- poration met, and voted the freedom of that city to be sent to Ned in a silver box. " My dear Nelly, I believe yon will think me very vain ; but as you are a mother, I hope you will excuse it. I assure you that it's no honour that is done him (Edmund) that makes me vain of him, but the goodness of his heart, which I believe no man living has a better ; and sure there can't be a better son, nor can there be a better daughter-in-law than his wife. I will say nothing of Dick (her son Richard), because you would have no longer pati- ence with me. I am much obliged to you for your desire in seeing me in your country, which I believe will never be. You and your father were the only friends that ever inquired for me since I left it last, and I really do not blame them in the least ; for I am now very sensible how exceeding troublesome I was, for the very long time that I was in a very poor way amongst you all, which makes me shudder as often as I think of it, and I believe it has been worse with me than I can recollect. My consolation is, that the great God afflicted me in this world for my good. I am very sorry to hear that your mother Hennessy is in a bad state of health ; when you see her, thank her most heartily for her kind inquiries for me. I have at all times received a great deal of friendship from her, and I wish her better health with all my heart. Pat French could not meet with sheeting he liked, but has bespoke a piece to be made on purpose for you, which he is promised will be very good, and will be sent to you as soon as it is wove. It is to be made of white yarn. This is a very agree- able town to live in ; and I believe there is not a little town in Ireland that has so many families of fortune as there are here. I hope to be hi Dublin about the middle of next mouth, where I will find a great change, from a very good table here, — two courses ; a broad coach and six to take the air ; to return to a leg of mutton, and good strong boxes to walk in. However, I THE HAVILANDS. 119 will be as content with the latter as the former ; and will think myself very happy, if it pleases God to preserve me the few chil- dren I have alive and well. Your friend Julia and I could wish you had said something of your little ones. She and Mrs. French desire to he most affectionately remembered to you, Mr. Hennessy, and your father ; and pray assure them of my best regards. They say that it would give them great pleasure to see you and James here. They were in hopes that your father would be at Balhnas- loe fair, and that he would come from thence here. I was sorry to hear of the death of poor Mrs. Burke of Daran. In her situa- tion it must be shocking ; she scarcely deserved pity for changing her condition at her time of life. I have filled my paper, and have only room left to wish you all happiness ; and believe me to be your most affectionate aunt, Mary Burke. " I forgot to tell you that you are a great favourite of Mrs. Burke's ; and that you appeared more amiable in her eyes in your crape gown than the finest-dressed lady she saw in your country." Edmund Burke's sister, Mrs. French, (bed in 1790; and after her demise her only and orphan child, Miss Mary French, came to reside permanently with Mr. and Mrs. Burke at Beaconsfield, and was, in fact, adopted by them. She wedded, in 1792, Major Thomas Haviland, only son of Edmund Burke's neighbour and friend, General William Haviland, of Penn in Buckinghamshire, a gallant and distinguished veteran, who was celebrated not only for his many and valuable military services, but for his rare ma- thematical and mechanical abilities, which had enabled him to construct a useful kind of bridge for the passage of troops over rivers in time of war. The general died in 1784. The younger Haviland, who served in his father's regiment, and who became a lieutenant-colonel in it, was also an officer of much talent and promise. To the great grief of all who knew him, he died pre- maturely at Martinique, whither he had gone with his regiment. His demise occurred in 1795, within three years of his marriage. 120 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. His wife, who had remained in England, gave birth to a son shortly after her husband's death, the news of which nearly caused her own. There are letters of Edmund Burke extant describing at the time most feelingly these domestic afflictions, and showing how intense were the devotion and care of himself and his wife in endeavouring to soothe the sorrows and restore the health of their niece. The son and only child of Mrs. Colonel Haviland was the late Thomas Haviland Burke, Esq., of whom and whose family, as now representing the illustrious statesman, further men- tion will be made at the conclusion of this biography; Edmund Burke's only child Richard, as he approached man- hood, became every day more and more the object of parental pride and affection. This son formed the chief and most cheering prospect of Burke's existence. He watched with intense anxiety over the youth's education and progress, and seemed to regard his own greatness as a mere prelude to the son's still higher advance- ment. He lived, to use Ms own words, in hope of a succession — in hope of being the founder of a family. Richard Burke, the son, was educated at Westminster School, and at Christ Church College, Oxford. He was called to the bar by the Hon. Society of the Middle Temple in Michaelmas term 1780, and he continued for some years the practice of his pro- fession. He was first on the Northern and afterwards on the Oxford circuit. Richard Burke was doatingly attached to Ins parents. Edmund Burke had friends among those of his own name, either distant kinsmen or nowise related, to whom he was warmly allied. He never lost an opportunity of serving them. One of these, Mr. William Burke, already alluded to, a person of con- siderable literary and political ability and repute, was Edmund's constant guest and companion. Mr. William Burke's career was active and varied. He was under-secretary of state in the office of the minister, General Conway; and he was elected, in 1768, M.P. for Bedwin. In July 1775 he left England to travel over- DEATH OF GOLDSMITH HIS MONUMENT. 121 land to India with dispatches to Lord Pigot, whom he found dead when he arrived. On coming back, he was made agent to the Rajah of Tanjore ; and in 1779 he went again to the East, as deputy-paymaster to the king's troops in India ; he accompanied Lord Cornwallis there in his military progress, and enjoyed the close friendship of that gallant nobleman. Ill health compelled Mr. William Burke to finally return and settle in England in 1793. His declining years were spent mostly in the society of his beloved friends Mr. and Mrs. Burke. He survived the orator but a few months, and died in 1798. Goldsmith, in " Retaliation," thus writes of the three Burkes — the brothers Edmund and Richard, and the friend William : " Our Burke shall be tongue, with a garnish of brains ; Our Will shall be wild fowl, of excellent flavour ; Our Dick, with his pepper, shall heighten the savour." Another connexion, Mr. John Bourke or Burke (the name is pronounced the same, spelt either way), was the son of Edmund Bourke of Cornelaunagh, county Mayo, and grandson of Edmund Bourke of Urey, whose lineage is traceable to the noble house of Bourke, Earls of Ulster. Mr. John Bourke had commenced as a merchant in London. Not being successful, he went to Lidia, where, owing to Edmund's introduction of him to his friend Sir Philip Francis, he ultimately prospered. This Mr. John Bourke had a nephew, Mr. Charles Palmer, who, by bis genius and appli- cation, became, at twenty-seven years of age, one of the most eminent lawyers in Jamaica : lie was father of Charle3 H. Palmer, MP. for Surrey. Mr. John Bourke, as will be seen in the last chapter of this biography, was father-in-law of the present Sir Richard Bourke, K.C.B. In 1774 Dr. Johnson and Edmund Burko lost their friend Goldsmith, whom they both so loved and regarded. Poor Gold- smith lived and died in a state of continual poverty, occasioned by his own improvidence, and alleviated only by such cheerful help as friends like Burke and Johnson could bestow. He expired on 122 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. the 4th of April, 1774, and was interred in the churchyard of the Temple. The Literary Club furnished the funds that procured the poet the monument executed by NoOekins, which stands to his memory in Poet's Corner, Westminster Abbey. How Dr. Johnson wrote the Latin epitaph, and how the gentlemen of the club, who dined at Sir Joshua Reynolds's, sat in conclave upon it, are well known. They wished the inscription in English, and ob- jected to some of its details ; but the question was, who should have the courage to propose the alteration and emendation to the author. At last it was resolved that there could be no way so good as that of a Round Robin. The Robin was written within a circle formed by the names of Edmund Burke, Thomas Franklin, Anthony Chamier, G. Colman, Wm. Vaskell, Joshua Reynolds, William Forbes, T. Barnard, R. B. Sheridan, P. Metcalfe, E. Gib- bon, Joseph Warton. Dr. Barnard, Bishop of Limerick, drew up an appeal to Johnson on the occasion, which, it was feared by the rest, the Doctor might thmk treated the subject with too much levity. Burke then proposed the address as it stands in the Round Robin, and Sir William Forbes officiated as clerk and wrote it. It ran thus : " We, the circumscribers, having read with great pleasure an intended epitaph for the monument of Dr. Goldsmith, which, con- sidered abstractedly, appears to be, for elegant composition and masterly style, in every respect worthy of the pen of its learned author, are yet of opinion that the character of the deceased as a writer, particularly as a poet, is perhaps not delineated with all the exactness which Dr. Johnson is capable of giving it. We therefore, with deference to his superior judgment, humbly re- quest that he would at least take the trouble of revising it, and of making such additions and alterations as he shall think proper upon a further perusal. But if we might venture to express our wishes, they would lead us to request that he would write the epitaph in English rather than hi Latin; as we think that the memory of so eminent an English writer ought to be perpetuated DK. JOHXSOX AT BEACOXSFIELD. 123 in the language to which his works are likely to be so lasting an ornament, which we also know to have been the opinion of the late Doctor himself.'' Sir Joshua Reynolds agreed to carry it to Dr. Johnson, who received it with great good humour, and desired Sir Joshua to tell the gentlemen that he would alter the inscription in any manner they pleased as to the sense of it ; but he would never consent to disgrace the walls of Westminster Abbey with an English epitaph ; and observing the names of Dr. Warton and Edmund Burke among the circumscribers, said to Sir Joshua, " I wonder that Joe Warton, a scholar by profession, should be such a fool ; and I should have thought that 'Mund Burke would have had more sense." The epitaph, as first written by Johnson, is engraved on Goldsmith's monument without any change. Dining the recess, after the session, in the summer of 1774, Burke received at Beaconsfield a visit from his friend Dr. Johnson, who came in company with Mr. and Mrs. Thrale. On viewing Burke's beautiful seat, he exclaimed, in the words of Virgil, " Non equidem in video, miror magis." Although the two great men had frequent political arguments hi town, here there was no altercation. The polite host refrained from subjects of contention. The guest laid, for the time, all state feeling and disrelish of the Whigs aside. Mr. and Mrs. Burke exerted themselves to their utmost to please then illustrious visi- tor and his favourite associates, and they were eminently success- ful. The sage expressed himself extremely gratified ; he was in continuous good humour, and most conversational. Mrs. Thrale was charmed with Burke's politeness, and construed it all into an admiration of her own talents and acquirements : she de- clared him a delightful man, and the meeting a delightful party, Burke made his guests pleased with themselves, with each other, and consequently with their entertainer. Although his fulness could not avoid venting itself, yet did he manage his conversa- 124 LIFE OF EDMUND BUKKE. tion so as not to mortify others by a sense of their inferiority, or overbear them with his powers. They felt they were won, and knew they were instructed by the discourse, without being drawn to a humiliating comparison with the speaker. He never brought his strength to a comparative trial unless provoked by an attack, nor, indeed, always then. Mrs. Thrale mentions a strange compliment paid by Johnson to Burke at parting. The general election terminated the visit, and called them all dif- ferent ways. Mr. Burke having to set out for Malton to get elected, and to commence operations in favour of his party, John- son taking him by the hand, said, his heart wavering between Toryism and friendship, "Farewell, my dear sir; and remember that I wish you all the success which ought to be wished you — which can possibly be wished you by an honest man." Burke's friend Abraham Shackleton found, as the orator rose in the world, that he experienced still greater attention from him. Shacldeton continued Burke's frequent correspondent, and often also would be invited to Beaconsfield. Burke loved in his society to retrace the scenes of his juvenile days, and to talk of Ireland. Burke scarcely ever visited his native country without sojourning with Shackleton, or with another old class-fellow of Shackleton' s academy, one Michael Smith, a country schoolmaster, who, Burke used to say, always valued him according to his abili- ties and personal character, and not according to his accidental situation. Mr. Smith was head of the grammar-school of Fenagh, in the comity of Leitiim. Letters often passed, of a most familiar description, between him and his senator friend. In one of Shack- leton's summer excursions to Beaconsfield, with his sister Mary Leadbeater, that talented lady wrote a poem descriptive of the mansion of Gregories and its owner. The folio whig lines form part of it. " All hail, ye woods, in deepest gloom array 'd ! Admit a stranger through your reverend shade, With timid step to seek the fair retreat, Where Virtue and where Genius &x their seat : MRS. LEADBEATER's LINES ON GEEGOPaES. 125 In rain retiring from the public gaze, Not deepest shades can veil so bright a blaze. Lo ! there the mansion stands in princely pride ; The beauteous wings extend on either side ; Unsocial pomp flies from the cheerful gate, Where hospitality delights to wait ; A brighter grace her candid smile bestows Than the majestic pillars' comely rows. Enter these ever-open doors, and find All that can strike the eye, or charm the mind * Painting and sculpture there their pride display, And splendid chambers deck'd in rich array. But these are not the honours of the dome Where Burke resides and strangers find a home ; To whose glad hearth the social virtues move,-— Paternal fondness and connubial love, Benevolence unwearied, friendship true, And wit unforced, and converse ever new, And manners, where the polished court we trace, Combined with artless nature's noble grace. See where amid the tow 'ring trees he moves, And with his presence dignifies the groves : Approach with silent awe the wondrous man, While his great mind revolves some mighty plan ; Yet fear not from his brow a frown austere, For mild benevolence inhabits there ; And while thine eye feasts on his graceful mien, Think on the worth that lies within unseen, And own that Heav'n in wisdom has enshrined In the most perfect form the noblest mind. Like Virgil, prince of Latin poets, he, Lover of rural life and poesy, Improves with skilful industry the soil, Cheers the poor peasant, and rewards his toil ; While the rich stores of his prolific mind Instruct, adorn, amend, and please mankind. Friend to mankind he lives, and all the race Glad would enfold within his large embrace ; Nations and empires modelled by his hand Would with more strength consolidated stand ; Fair science, by his fostering genius led, Would with new lustre raise her drooping head ; And all the arts of civil life would bo Nursed by his skill and his humanity. 12G LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. Blest be the man ! and blest is he— and shall — In spite of the great vulgar and the small, Who, though high Heaven with talents hath endowed, With talents scarce to human lot allowed, Yet while the festive board displays its charms, And sprightly mirth and social friendship warms, When the sad voice of indigence he hears, And pain and sickness eloquent in tears — Forsakes the festive board, with pitying eyes, Mingles the healing draught, and sickness flies ; Or, if the mind be torn with deep distress, Seeks, with kind care, the grievance to redress. This, this is Edmund Burke— and this his creed, This is sublime and beautiful indeed." Burke lived on very good terms with many of his political opponents. As an instance, he was always friendly with Lord North, and was liberal in his encomiums on his lordship's general LORD NORTH. abilities and disposition, however he disliked his political measures. Burke used to say that North possessed one of the best heads and LORD NORTH. 127 one of the best hearts in the world, if he only knew how to use them. He thought that, in point of sterling wit, North excelled most men. The regard was reciprocal. Lord North greatly admired Burke, and was always ready privately to oblige him. Burke would, though in fierce opposition at the time, apply to Lord North in behalf of his friends, and never in vain, if no political interest interfered. " There is, my lord," he would say, " an office vacant that would just suit a very able and worthy friend of mhie : if you have no parliamentary interest to answer, do let him have the place." " In this case I am happy, my dear Mr. Burke, I can gratify you," would often be the answer. Many witty encounters would pass between Burke and Lord North in parliament. One night the prime minister, as he was often wont, was indulging himself in a profound nap. " I hope," said Burke, " government is not defunct, but dozing (pointing to Lord North) : Brother Lazarus is not dead, only sleejieth." The laugh was loud on both sides of the house, and the noble lord himself seemed to enjoy the allusion as heartily as the rest as soon as he was sufficiently awake to conceive the cause of mirth. Lord North's own wit on another similar occasion was both excellent and ready. Whilst he was sleeping during a debate on America, an indignant member thundered forth a proposal for having him impeached. " Alas !" said his lordship, aroused from slumber by the noise, " allow me at least the criminal's usual privilege — a night of rest before execution." The general burst of laughter at once silenced the accuser. In the course of his speech on economical reform, Burke, while enforcing on the minister, Lord North, the sage and valuable ex- pression of Cicero — Magnum vectigal est parcimonia — spoke with a false quantity, pronouncing the second wprd vectigal. Lord North, in a low tone, corrected the error ; when Burke, with admirable presence of mind, turned the slip to his own advantage. " The noble lord," said he, " hints that I have erred in the quantity of a principal word in my quotation ; I rejoice at it, because it gives 123 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. mo an opportunity of repeating the inestimable adage ;"— and then lie loudly repeated : "Magnum vect-l-gal est parcimonia." Among the warmest friends of Edmund Burke was the great actor David Garrick. Burke, when beginning his career, had formed Garriek's acquaintance, and the kindness he then expe- rienced from him he never forgot. He would not tolerate Dr. Johnson's pompous affectation of superiority over Garrick because the latter was a player ; and he cordially aided the admission of the modern Roscius into the Literary Club. He and Mrs. Burke kept up a most social and agreeable intercourse with Mr. and Mrs. Garrick, whose hospitable house in the Adelphi was the resort of some of the greatest in the land, whether in rank or talent. On one occasion Burke showed that right feeling which he ever che- rished in regard to the stage, by passing a high public eulogium upon Garrick. It happened thus : In the spring of 1777, Garrick chanced to be present in the gallery of the House of Commons during a debate which produced an altercation between two mem- bers that became so warm as to oblige, the Speaker and the house to interpose to prevent a duel. Whilst the assembly was in this agitation, a Shropshire member observed Mr. Garrick sitting in the gallery, and immediately moved to clear the house. Roscius contrived to keep himself concealed, and avoided the consequence of the illiberal motion ; but when the same gentleman, the day after, harangued the house on the impropriety of suffering players to hear their debates, Mr. Burke arose and appealed to the hon- ourable assembly whether it could possibly be consistent with the rules of decency and liberality to exclude from the hearing of their debates a man to whom they were all obliged — one who was the great master of eloquence— in whose school they had all im- bibed the art of speaking, and been taught the elements of rhetoric. For his part, he owned that he had been greatly indebted to his instructions. Much more he said in commendation of Mr. Gar- rick, and was warmly seconded by Mr. Fox and Mr. Thomas Townshend. garrick's funeral. 129 Within two years after this, on the 20th January, 1779, David Garrick died, and had a public funeral. Edmund Burke, who deeply mourned his loss, took an active part in the interment and in the subsequent tribute paid to his memory. Garrick's re- mains were, in eleven days after his demise, conveyed with much splendid ceremonial from his house in the Adelphi, where he breathed his last, to Westminster Abbey, and were deposited in Poets' Corner, near the monument of Shakespeare. The obsequies were magnificent. The last rites were performed by the Bishop of Rochester. The pall-bearers were the great Lord Camden, the Earl of Ossory, the Bight Hon. Mr. Bigby, the Hon. Mr. Stanley, John Patterson, Esq., the Duke of Devonshire, Earl Spencer, Viscount Palmerston, Sir Watkyn Williams Wynn, and Garrick's ultimate friend and executor, Albany Wallis, Esq. The train of carriages is said to have reached from Charing Cross to Westminster, the whole way being lined with a prodigious con- course of people. A deputation of the princij al actors from the patent theatres followed the coffin of their great master. Amid the multitude of other mourners were to be found most of, and perhaps all, the illustrious characters of the day, whether pre- eminent by birth, station, or ability. Edmund Burke was present in company with Charles Fox, Dr. Johnson, George Colman the elder, and Mr. Dunning, afterwards Lord Ashburton. In a few years, a handsome monument to Garrick was erected in West- minster Abbey by Mr. Albany Wallis, at his own expense, and at a cost of no less than 1,000Z. The autograph collection of that eminent divine, the Lev. Dr. Bailies of Liverpool, contains the following note from Edmund Burke relative to this monument and its epitaph : " Albany Wallis, Esq., Norfolk-street. " My dear Sir, — May I hep you to call here to see an epitaph for Gar- rick as soon as you can, for the Dean and Chapter arc to have it at twelve at the utmost. 1 showed it to Mr. Windham, who approved it much. I very truly yours, " Tuesday, 29 (July), 1794. Edm. Burke." K THE BURNEYS. 131 This autograph, coming from the authentic repertory of Dr. Baffles, is clearly genuine ; and as it presents a fair specimen of Burke's handwriting, a facsimile of it is here annexed. The chief pall-hearer, Charles Pratt, Lord Camden, it should he ob- served, was the actual author of Garrick's epitaph. Dr. Charles Burney, the celebrated musician, writer, and composer, and his still more famous daughter, the authoress of "Evelina" and other chefs -d'ceuvre, Fanny, afterwards Madame D'Arblay, as well as the rest of the intellectual Burney family, were constant and cordial allies of Edmund Burke. Burke owed this valuable acquaintance to Sir Joshua Reynolds and to Dr. Johnson. The latter, though knowing and caring nothing about music, much enjoyed the friendship and society of Dr. Burney, and suffered him to rank among his satellites. Fanny Burney — or, as he would call her " the little Burney" — eventually occupied in the regard of the great Doctor the place that had been forfeited by the faithless Mrs. Thrale. Before they met, Edmund Burke had won the heart of Miss Bumey, from her knowledge of the fact that, in his ardour of novel-reading, he had sat up all night to peruse "Evelina." Her account of her introduction to him in 1782, given in her memoirs of her father, is remarkably graphic. One day, in the June of that year, Sir Joshua Reynolds invited Dr. Bumey and his daughter to a dinner at his house on Rich- mond Hill, next to the Star and Garter, to meet his, Sir Joshua's, niece, Miss Palmer, and also a galaxy of talent, including Dr. Shipley, Bishop of St. Asaph, the Burkes, Lord Cork, and Ed- mund Gibbon the historian. The brilliancy of such a reunion may be easily imagined. Miss Burney describes it as delightful ; but she nearly forgets all else in her rapturous praise of Edmund Burke. To her old friend and admirer, Mr. Samuel Crisp — her " Daddy Crisp," as she used to call him — she writes thus : " No expectation that I had formed of Mr. Burke, either from his works, his speeches, his character, or his fame, had anticipated to me such a man as I now met. He appeared, perhaps, at the 13 '2 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. moment, to the highest possible advantage in health, vivacity, and spirits. Removed from the impetuous aggravations of party con- tentions, that at times, by inflaming his passions, seemed (momen- tarily, at least,) to disorder his character, he was hilled into gen- tleness by the grateful sense of prosperity; exhilarated, but not intoxicated, by sudden success ; and just rising, after toiling years of failures, disappointments, fire and fury, to place, affluence, and honours, which were brightly smiling on the zenith of his powers. He looked, indeed, as if he had no wish but to diffuse philanthropic pleasure and genial gaiety all around. " His figure is noble, his air commanding, his address graceful ; his voice clear, penetrating, sonorous, and powerfid ; his language copious, eloquent, and changefully impressive ; his manners are attractive ; Iris conversation is past all praise. " You may call me mad, I know ; but if I wait till I see an- other Mr. Burled for such another fit of ecstasy, I may be long enough in my sober good senses. " Sir Joshua next made Mrs. Burke greet me on my new coming into this select circle, which she did with marked distinc- tion. She appeared to be pleasing and sensible, but silent and reserved. " Sir Joshua then went through the same introductory etiquette with Mr. Richard Burke, the brother ; Mr. "William Burke, the cousin ; and young Burke, the son of the Burke. They all in different ways seem lively and agreeable, but at miles and myriads of miles from the towering chief." Miss Burney, in other parts of the same memoirs, speaks of Mrs. Burke as " soft, serene, reasonable, sensible, and obliging;" of Richard Burke, Edmund's brother, as " original, humorous, 1 ladling, and entertaining ;" and of Miss French, as " a lively niece of Mr. Burke's." After the dinner at Richmond, Edmund Burke became a con- tinual and ever-welcome visitor at the tea-table of Dr. Burney's happy home in St. Martins Court, a residence that had formerly burke's kindness to the bukneys. 133 been the house of Isaac Newton. There, in that humble but at- tractive dwelling, would Burke meet not only Dr. Johnson and Reynolds, but most of the other distinguished people of the day, authors, artists, and musicians ; also peers and nobles, English and foreign, all ready to pay homage to the intellectual and social influ- ence of the B-urney family. Burke, as usual, could be friends with none without trying to benefit them when needed, and he soon rendered Dr. Burney an essential service. Just as he was resign- ing his place in the ministry, he contrived to procure for the Doctor the appointment of organist to Chelsea College, with a residence there, and an increased salary. This much added to the comforts of Dr. Burney, who passed the rest of his life in the college, and died in it in 1814. Burke announced the nomination of the Doctor to him and his family with unfeigned glee and satisfaction : " I must," he wrote, " have this commemorated as my last act of office." In another matter relative to the Burneys, Burke's prophetic powers were somewhat at fault. When Miss Burney was, through the influence of her " dear old Mrs. Delany," made mistress of the robes to Queen Charlotte, and was to cpiit her high position in the literary world for a situation little better than that of a lady's maid, Burke, like the rest of her friends, was blinded by the apparent lustre of the appointment, and complimented the vic- tim of royal favour, by leaving at her residence a card with these words : " Mr. Burke, to offer congratulations upon the honour done by the Queen to Miss Burney and to herself." Three years of humiliating servitude in the palace, cheered even, as it was, by the gentlemanly kindness of George III., and the warm but incon- siderate friendship of his consort, brought Miss Burney nearly to her grave. Among those whose eyes were then opened, and who insisted and achieved her emancipation from the thraldom, and her restoration to her former home and happiness, no one was more zealous or determined than Edmund Burke. Miss Burney was strangely forgetful of these kindnesses, and committed a sad act of 134 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. temporary ingratitude, when, in her courtier-like fancy to act as a partisan of Warren Hastings, she chose, on the first day of the famous trial, to be openly rude to Mr. Burke, who had come from the managers' box to chat with her, quite unconscious of any offence. Poor Miss Burney soon perceived she was behaving badly, for she was in a terrible fright at the idea of losing the great man's friendship. Her trouble, until she met Mr. Burke again, is rather amusingly recorded in her memoirs of her father ; but she had no need to fear. The good Edmund was of far too chivalrous a nature to quarrel with a lady ; and the first time he saw her after the occurrence, he seemed to have entirely forgotten it, and was even more cordial with her than ever. This for the future made the very thought of him sacred with Miss Burney. Burke's kindness to her ceased but with his life. When, having become Madame D'Arblay, she published her novel of" Camilla" by subscription, Burke ordered four copies of it, and he read it through as he lay, broken in health and spirit, on his couch at Bath, just before his removal to his death-bed at Beaconsfield. Such was his last graceful compliment to a lady who had won his deep regard and admiration, who had enlivened some of his most social hours, and who had been honoured with the affection of his dearest friend Dr. Johnson. Such was his final act in reverence of a gleeful and genial past. Burke's character for practical philanthropy has been already alluded to: there are some particular instances of the help he af- forded in horns of need, and of the relief he bestowed on distress and destitution, which must not be passed over. On one of these occasions England owed him a painter, — on another, a poet. To begin, however, with ininor incidents. On his way home one night from the House of Commons, Mr. Burke w r as addressed by a woman of that most wretched class, whose want and shame infest and degrade the streets. He was passing on, heedless of the interruption, when the woful creature, altering her tone, craved his charity with extreme energy of sup- ANECDOTES OF BURKE S BENEVOLENCE. 135 plication. Something beyond the common either in her voice or manner arrested his attention, and he no longer refused to hear her. She told him her story : she had been a servant, had become the victim of her mistress's son, had endured the consequences of her error, and was then at that goal of misery when the outcast welcomes or hastens death. It was an ordinary tale of sin and ruin ; but there was a sincerity about it that savoured of truth and repent- ance. Burke suffered her to walk by his side, detailing this cala- mitous narrative, until he reached his own door ; he there turned 136 LIFE OF EDMUND BUEKE. round, and with that solemn accent which few, high or low, could listen to unmoved, he said to her : " Woman, you have related a pathetic story, whether true or false is best known to yourself. I have but one question to ask you : Will you, if you can, quit your present way of life ?" " I will do any thing on earth to quit it," was her answer ; upon which he brought her into the house, and intrusted her to the care of the housekeeper who opened the door — Mrs. Webster, an old and confidential servant of the family. He informed Mrs. Burke of the circumstance, who saw the outcast in the morning, and afforded her temporary shelter. In fine, the woman was saved: she obtained a place, and regained a comfortable position by her subsequent good conduct. When at Bristol, during his election as member for that city, Mr. Burke was staying at the house of a particular friend, Mr. Noble. Among the company he met there, was a poor curate, whose manners and conversation pleased him ; and Burke, having furthered the iutimacy, expressed a wish that it might, at any future time, be in his power to serve a man of his ability. Some years after, the rector of the parish where this clergyman served as curate died ; the living was vacant, and in the gift of the Prince of Wales. The curate thought of Burke, and made Mr. Noble recall the matter to the statesman, which he did, and told Burke the curate much needed the advancement. " I will do what I can," said Burke at once ; " let our friend write a letter, and I will present it myself to his Royal Highness." And so Burke did; and the prince instantly granted the request in the most gracious manner. Burke, flushed by his success, and caught by the prince's good-natured readiness to oblige, launched into a speech of thanks, with his usual flow of eloquence, and proceeded to impress on his hearer how much good lay in the power of per- sons of high station ; how much popularity, how much happiness, might result from the exercise of their benevolence. Suddenly he stopped, for he became aware he was making quite a dissertation : he blushed, and begged pardon for his earnestness. " No apolo- THE POOR CURATE AND THE PRINCE OF WALES. 137 gies, my dear sir," exclaimed his royal highness, with exquisite courtesy, while he laid his hand familiarly upon Burke's shoulder ; THE TRIJJCE OF WALES, AFTER GILRAY. 138 LITE OF EDMUND BU11KE. " from your lessons we princes must all learn wisdom : I only regret that so few of our friends imitate your candour." " The fact was," used Burke to say when relating the story, " I forgot the prince in the gentleman, and I found myself giving a lecture to a young man, just as I might be doing to my own son." These anecdotes bring us to still greater acts, those relating to Barry and Crabbe. Barry the painter affords a striking instance of Burke's gene- rous spirit, and his anxious readiness to assist unfriended genius. A brief sketch of the accpiaintance of Burke and Barry, from its commencement to the time when it was finally broken off by the death of the former, will, by connecting the facts together, put the matter in one clear and complete view. A picture painted by Barry, representing St. Patrick baptising a royal convert in the person of an Irish monarch, caught the discrimi- nating eye of Burke while in Dublin, in 1763 ; and this led to the painter, formerly his fellow-student at Ballitore, being brought to him by an old friend, Dr. Sleigh, a physician at Cork. Barry, of humble origin and connexion, was at the time struggling hard for existence. Burke's aid proved his stepping-stone to success. A slight circumstance— life often turns upon such — gave a zest to their inti- macy. In an argument which Burke and his new friend happened to have on the subject of the arts as grounded on taste, Barry quoted an opinion in direct opposition to that of Burke, from what he termed an able though anonymous work, which had then lately appeared, entitled an Essay on the Sublime and Beautiful. Burke, who was really playing with the discussion, and merely debating for victory, at once caught the humour of being thus handled to his own confusion, and carried on the joke. He condemned his own book as a theoretical romance, of no sufficient merit to be cited as an authority. Barry fired up ; he had been captivated with the style and language, with the beautiful illustrations and well-put theories of the essay ; he had even been at the pains of transcribing it throughout. He therefore felt doubly nettled at BUEKE S PATEONAGE OF BAEBY." 139 the injustice done to the work, and the slight of his own judgment, and got quite into a rage. Burke laughed heartily, while he ap- peased his opponent hy confessing his authorship. The astonished Barry ran to ernhrace him, and showed him exultingly the copy he had transcribed. Burke brought Barry with him to London, and recommended him there with earnest approbation of his talents. The praise of such a man as Burke would of itself have gone far in establishing the painter's reputation. But Burke did more. When Sir Joshua Reynolds declared that a journey to, and prolonged residence in Italy were indispensable to the young and promising artist's further education, Burke, aided hy his brother Richard, supplied Barry, in 1765, with the necessary funds for visiting Paris and Borne, and for proceeding to Florence, Bologna, and Naples. Barry remained five years abroad; and during the whole of that period derived all his resources of living from the two Burkes, though they were any thing but rich at the time. Edmund enhanced the value of this benevolence by occasionally writing to Barry letters of counsel and direction, which (for they are fortu- nately preserved) contain some of the most graceful essays on the fine arts in the language. " Dr. Sleigh," said Barry, " first put me upon Mr. Burke, who has been, under God, all in all to me." But of such a friend Barry was scarcely worthy, being himself of uncertain disposition, obstinate, self-sufficient, and quarrelsome — defects which marred his better qualities, and impeded the pros- perity his real talents might earn. He was not positively ungrate- ful to Burke ; but the wretched infirmity of his temper made him behave in such a way to his generous patron as leaves a painful slur upon his history. Early in the acquaintance, Burke perceived the weak points of Barry's character, and felt how hurtful they might prove to his prospects. While Barry was in Italy, rumours reached his Mends at home of his odd, querulous, and overbearing behaviour towards parties whom he met, or to whom he was re- commended. Many abroad were altogether estranged from him; some had become his active foes. Burke, when made aware of 140 LIFE OF EDMUND BUEKE. this, was acutely grieved ; but instead of deserting so refractory a protege, he endeavoured to reclaim him by a mixture of wisdom and kindness, such as is seldom witnessed. One letter Burke wrote to Barry is of itself sufficient to stamp bim a pre-eminently wise and good man. Tbat letter shows such worldly sense, such power of judging of the future from tbe present, and at tbe same time such cordial benevolence, that it woidd be wrong to omit here the main portion of it. " My dear Barry," writes Burke from Gregories, the 16th Sept. 17G9, " as to reports concerning your conduct and beha- viour, you may be very sure they would bave no kind of influence here ; for none of us are of such a make as to trust to any one's report for the character of a person whom we ourselves know. Until very lately I have never beard any thing of your proceed- ings from others ; and when I did, it was much less than I had known from yourself — that you had been upon dl terms with the artists and virtuosi of Rome, without much mention of cause or consequence. If you have improved these unfortunate quarrels to your advancement in your art, you have turned a very disagree- able circumstance to a very capital advantage. However you may have succeeded in this uncommon attempt, permit me to suggest to you, with that friendly liberty which you have always had the goodness to bear from me, that you cannot possibly always have the same success, either with regard to your fortune or your reputation. Depend upon it, that you will find the same competition, the same jealousies, the same arts and cabals, the emulations of interest and of fame, and the same agitations and passions here that you have experienced in Italy ; and if they have the same effect on your temper, they will have just the same effects on your interest ; and be your merit what it will, you will never be allowed to paint a picture. It will be the same at London as at Rome, and the same in Paris as in London ; for the world is pretty nearly alike in all its parts. Nay, though perhaps it would be a little inconvenient to me, I had a thousand times rather you should fix your residence BURKE'S LETTER TO BARRY. 141 in Rome than here, as I should not then have the mortification of seeing with my own eyes a genius of the first rank lost to the world, himself, and his friends, as I certainly must if you do not assume a manner of acting and thinking here totally different from what your letters from Rome have described to me. That you had just subjects of indignation always, and of anger often, I do noways doubt ; who can five in the world without some trial of his patience ? But believe me, my dear Barry, that the arms with which the ill dispositions of the world are to be combated, and the qualities by which it is to be reconciled to us, and we reconciled to it, are moderation, gentleness, a little indulgence to others, and a great deal of distrust of ourselves — which are not qualities of a mean spirit, as some may possibly think them, but virtues of a great and noble kind, and such as dignify our nature as much as they contribute to our repose and fortune ; for nothing can be so unworthy of a well-composed soul as to pass away life in bicker- ings and litigations, in snarling and scuffling with every one about us. Again and again, my dear Barry, we must be at peace with our species, if not for their sakes, yet very much for our own. Think what my feelings must be, from my unfeigned regard to you, and from my wishes that your talents might be of use, when I see what the inevitable consequences must be of your persevering in what has hitherto been your course ever since I knew you, and which you will permit me to trace out to you beforehand. You will come here ; you will observe what the artists are doing, and you will sometimes speak a disapprobation in plain words, and sometimes in a no less expressive silence. By degrees you will produce some of your own works; they will be variously criticised. You will defend them ; you will abuse those that have attacked you ; expostulations, discussions, letters, possibly challenges, will go forward ; you will shun your brethren ; they will shun you. In the meantime gentlemen will avoid your friendship for fear of being engaged in your quarrels ; you will be obliged for maintenance to do any thing for any body; your very talents will depart for want 142 LIFE OF EDMTIND BURKE. of hope and encouragement, and you will go out of the world fretted, disappointed, and ruined. Nothing but my real regard for you could induce me to set these considerations in this light before you. Remember we are born to serve and to adorn our country, and not to contend with our fellow-citizens ; and that, in particular, your business is to paint, and not to dispute." BARRY. The result justified the profound sagacity of Burke's prediction. Barry came to London, and soon established his reputation as a first-rate painter. He was made a member of the Royal Academy, and professor of painting there ; but his unfortunate temper, in a short time, set the world against him ; and, worst of all, it at last BURKE'S DINNER WITH BARRY. 143 had an effect on the endurance of Barry's truest friend, though that endurance was of too nohle a nature to he ever entirely worn out. Edmund Burke bore most patiently and good-humouredly with the infirmities and eccentricities of the cross-grained but not bad-hearted nor unamusing man of genius. One anecdote of a dinner he had with Barry, Burke used himself to narrate with much gratification. Barry, it seems, though flourishing at the time, lived in a wretchedly neglectful way at a house in Castle Street, Oxford Street, No. 36, where he used a carpenter's shop for a painting-room, with scarcely any change of its previous arrange- ments or appurtenances. Burke, curious to get an insight into the painter's reported singular bachelor and domestic habits, contrived to have himself invited by Barry. The rest of the story is better told in Burke's own words. " To my very apparent intimation," would Burke relate, " Barry responded cheerfully. ' You know, sir,' said be, ' I five alone ; but if you will come and help me to eat a steak, I shall have it tender and hot, and from the most classic market in London, — that of Oxford.' The day and the hour came. I was punctual, and I found Barry ready to receive me. He conducted me into his painting-room, on one of the walls of which I saw hung his large and beautiful picture of Pandora. Around were placed the studies of his six pictures for the Society of Arts in the Adelphi. There were also rickety straining-frames, old sketches, and a ju-inting-press, in which he printed his plates with his own hand. Over and about all I observed the too visi- ble marks of some laborious spiders ; their webs rivalled in extent and colour pieces of ancient tapestry. I say I saw this ; yet I wisely seemed to see it not. I remarked, moreover, that most of the windows were in a broken or cracked condition, and that the roof had tiles, but no ceiling : the light came in through many crevices above. A couple of old chairs and a deal table composed the whole of the furniture. Yet two tilings were bright, — the painter was in good humour, and the fire was burning brilliantly. The steaks were put on to broil, and Barry spread a clean cloth 144 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. on the table, and then put a pair of tongs into my hands, saying, ' Be useful, my dear friend, and look to the steaks till I fetch the porter.' I acted according to his desire. The painter soon re- turned with the porter in his hand, exclaiming, ' What a misfor- tune ! the wind carried away the fine foaming top of froth as 1 crossed Titchfield Street ! ' We sat down together, and com- menced the feast. The steak was tender, and done to a moment, which are matters of essential consequence in such a repast. The host was lively and full of anecdote ; and I can safely declare I have seldom spent a happier evening in my life," It would have been well had the intimacy always continued in the same pleasant course ; but Barry would not let it be so. In lapse of time he found occasions to be discontented with, and even impertinent to Burke. Burke's forbearance was really, wonderful, considering the very different positions the two held in society. One cause of complaint on the part of Barry originated thus : Sir Joshua Reynolds, it seems, became completely disgusted with Barry's behaviour, and did not conceal his disrelish of him. " B: there be," would the President say, " a man on earth that I seri- ously dislike, it is that Barry." Barry not only returned this feeling with at least equal vehemence, but was actually offended with his munificent patron for not being a thorough-going partisan, and for not withdrawing his friendship from Sir Joshua in compli- ment to Barry's own prejudices. In this humour, Barry gave a striking proof how far pride and ill-temper could, at least for the moment, make him forget all sense of gratitude and propriety. Burke had been induced by their mutual friend Dr. Brocklesby to promise to sit to Barry for his portrait, which Barry gladly under- took. Burke consequently called on the painter ; but meanwhile Barry happened to have been put out of temper, and he made the statesman repeat his visit again and again, and was always too much occupied to give him a sitting. Burke — for the end of this occurred in 1774 — was then in the zenith of his career, and in the midst of intense toil : time was of the utmost value to him. barry's conduct to burke, 145 At length Barry coolly signified to him that he must send a day's notice of his coming ; upon which Burke cut the matter short, though still preserving his usual sereneness and urbanity. The following is the letter he wrote to Barry : " Sir, — I ought to apologise to you for the liberty I have pre- sumed to take of troubling you with what I find an unseasonable visit. I humbly beg your pardon for the intrusion. My apology is this : my worthy friend Dr. Brocklesby, who has honoured me so much as to desire my picture, and wished to have it painted by you, complained to me yesterday, that he has been two years de- siring it without effect. I should be very insensible of this mark of his attention, and very undeserving of it, if I had not endea- voured, as far as in me lay, to obey his obliging commands. I have therefore, several times, almost in every week since he first spoke to me (except about two months, when I was wholly in the country without coming to town at all,) presented myself to you, that if you were not better engaged I might sit to you. You have always been so much employed that you have required a day's previous notice of my intention, and for that reason declined to paint the picture at the times which suited me. It has been very unfortunate to me that my time, too, is so irregularly occupied, that I can never, with certainty, tell beforehand when I shall be disengaged. No man can be more sensible of the insignificance of my occupations, but to me they are of some importance, and the times of them certainly very irregular. I came to town upon very pressing business at four on Thursday evening ; yesterday I had some hours upon my hands, I waited upon you, but, I found, im- properly. Contrary to my expectation, a gentleman, who was to go out of town with me this morning, delays till half an hour after four o'clock ; this gave me near five hours to dispose of, and which I was willing to give to my friend's wishes. I waited on you exactly at half an hour after eleven, and had the pleasure of finding you at home, but, as usual, so employed as not to permit you to undertake this disagreeable business. I have L 14 G LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. troubled you with this letter, as I think it necessary to make an excuse for so frequent and importunate intrusions. Much as it might flatter my vanity to he painted by so eminent an artist, I assure you that, knowing I had no title to that honour, it was only in compliance with the desire (often repeated) of our common friend, that I have been so troublesome. You, who know the value of friendship and the duties of it, I dare say, will have the goodness to excuse me on that plea. On no other should I deserve it for intruding on you at other times than those you should please to order. Nobody, I flatter myself, regards that time more, or pays, and has always paid, a more sincere (though a very unlearned) homage to your great talents and acquirements. I must once more repeat my apology, hoping to obtain your pardon on the usual plea of not committing the same fault again." The fine and delicate but not the less keen irony of this letter did not overcome the painter ; lie was still inflexible : he wrote complaining of Burke's sarcasm ; this produced a rejoinder from Burke, wherein he disclaims all idea of giving offence, and con- cludes by observing : " Other artists have condescended to live with me without ceremony, and they have painted me, when my friends desired it, at such times as I casually went to admire their performances, and just as it mutually suited us. A picture of me is now painting for Mr. Thrale by Sir Joshua Reynolds ; and in this maimer, and iu this only. I will not presume to say that the condescension of some men forms a rule for others. I know that extraordinary civility cannot be claimed as a matter of strict justice. In that view possibly you may be right. It is not for me to dispute with you. I have ever looked up with reverence to merit of all kinds, and have learned to yield submission even to the captrices of men of parts. I shall certainly obey your commands, and send you regular notice whenever I am able. I have done so at times, but having been, with great mortification to myself, obliged once or CRABBE THE POET. 147 twice to disappoint you, and having been as often disappointed by your engagements, it was to prevent this that I have offered you (I may freely say,) every leisure hour that I have had sure and in my own possession for near two years past. I think a person possessed of the indulgent weakness of a friend would have given credit to the irregularity of the calls of my little occupations, on my assuring liim so frequently of the fact." This letter awakened the painter to a better sense, and he made the most earnest apology. Burke easily relented, and the picture was painted ; but the cordiality of the friendship was irre- parably injured, and never resumed its former footing. Burke's mauuer became more distant, but he still continued to take an in- terest in Barry, and was always ready to serve him. Barry survived Burke some eight or nine years, and to Ins credit it must be added, that though he was too heedlessly way- ward with his patron while living, he did the great man due honour and justice when dead. He always spoke in reverence of his memory, and in remorse at his own conduct. " The peace of God be for ever with Edmund Burke !" he was heard to say : " he was my first, my best, and my wisest friend ; and I behaved, indeed, too harshly to him." Barry himself died in 1806, having done but little for the fame and fortune his really great talents should have secured him. The prophecy of Edmund Burke proved but too true. Barry lived and died the victim of his own temper. The well-known picture of the death of General Wolfe, and those able but eccentric paintings that adorn the premises of the Society of Arts in John Street, Adelphi, are but too slight memorials. of a man who had every qualification but personal popu- larity to enable him to have left living records of his genius in all the galleries of the empire. The life of Crabbe, as ably narrated by his son, brings us another and a more prosperous example of Burke's benevo- lence. George Crabbe, the future poet, the son of a humble 148 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. custom-house officer, had for some years been struggling with the difficulties that too commonly beset the path of unfriended talent. His son tells us that when he had reached his twenty-seventh year, " absolute want stared him in the face ; a gaol seemed the only im- mediate refuge for his head ; and the best he could hope for was, dismissing all his dreams of literary distinction, to find the means of daily bread in the capacity of druggist's assistant." True it is that CRABBE THE POET. he had a poem almost ready for the press ; but he had seen too much of the world not to know that he would stand but little chance of either fame or profit " without the introductory probat of some well-known and distinguished character." But how was such an introduction to be obtained ? He had few friends, none of suffi- cient influence to open for him the doors of the great or the emi- nent. In this dilemma he decided on appealing to Edmund Burke; a resolution that he would hardly have adopted if Burke's charac- ceabbe's letter to bitrke. 149 ter had not been as manifest for humanity and generosity, as his genius was known to be colossal. In 1781, Crabbe addressed a letter to the statesman, and left it at his then residence in Charles Street, Westminster. That letter ran thus : " Sir, — I am sensible that I need even your talents to apolo- gise for the freedom I now take ; but I have a plea which, how- ever simply urged, will, with a niind like yoius, sir, procure me pardon. I am one of those outcasts on the world who are without a friend, without employment, and without bread. "Pardon me a short preface. I had a partial father, who gave me a better education than his broken fortune would have allowed, and a better than was necessary, as he could give me that only. I was designed for the profession of physic, but not having wherewithal to complete the requisite studies, the design but served to convince me of a parent's affection, and the error it had occasioned. In April last I came to London with three pounds, and flattered myself this would be sufficient to supply me with the common necessaries of life till my abilities should procure me more ; of these I had the highest opinion, and a poetical vanity contributed to my delusion. I knew little of the world, and had read books only ; I wrote, and fancied perfection in my composi- tions ; when I wanted bread, they promised me affluence, and soothed me with dreams of reputation, whilst my appearance sub- jected me to contempt. " Time, reflection, and want, have shown me my mistake. I see my trifles in that which I think the true light ; and whilst I deem them such, have yet the opinion that holds them superior to the common run of poetical publications. " I had some knowledge of the late Mr. Nassau, the brother of Lord Iiochford, in consequence of which I asked his lordship's permission to inscribe my little work to him. Knowing it to be free from all political allusions and personal abuse, it was no very material point to me to whom it was dedicated. His lordship thought it none to him, and obligingly consented to my request. 150 LIFE OF EDMUND BUKKE. " I was told that a subscription would be the more profitable method for me, and therefore endeavoured to circulate copies of the enclosed proposals. "Iain afraid, sir, I disgust you with this very dull narration, but believe me punished in the misery that occasions it. You will conclude that during this time I must have been at more ex- pense than I could afford ; indeed, the most parsimonious could not have avoided it. The printer deceived me, and my little business has had every delay. The people with whom I live per- ceive my situation, and find me to be indigent and without friends. About ten days since I was compelled to give a note for seven pounds, to avoid an arrest for about double that sum, which I owe. I wrote to every friend I had ; but my friends are poor likewise ; the time of payment approached, and I ventaed to represent my case to Lord Rochford. I begged to be credited for this sum till I received it of my subscribers, which I believe will be within one month ; but to this letter I had no reply, and I have probably offended by my importunity. Having used every honest means in vain, I yesterday confessed my inability, and obtained, with much entreaty, and as the greatest favour, a week's forbearance, when, I am positively told, I must pay the money or prepare for a prison. " You will guess the purpose of so long an introduction. I appeal to you, sir, as a good, and, let me add, a great man. I have no other pretensions to your favour than that I am an un- happy one. It is not easy to support the thoughts of confinement, and I am coward enough to dread such an end to my suspense. " Can you, sir, in any degree, aid me with propriety? Will you ask any demonstrations of my veracity ? I have imposed upon myself, but I have been guilty of no other imposition. Let me, if possible, interest your compassion. I know those of rank and for- tune are teased with frequent petitions, and are compelled to refuse the requests even of those whom they know to be in distress ; it is, therefore, with a distant hope I ventured to solicit such favour ; RECEPTION AND RELIEF OF CRABBE, 151 but you will forgive me, sir, if you do not think proper to relieve. It is impossible that sentiments like yours can proeeecl from any but a humane and generous heart. " I will call upon you, sir, to-morrow ; and if I have not the happiness to obtain credit with you, I must submit to my fate. My existence is a pain to myself, and every one near and dear to me are distressed in my distresses. My connexions, once the source of happiness, now embitter the reverse of my fortune ; and I have only to hope a speedy end to a life so unpromisingly begun ; in which (though it ought not to be boasted of) I can reap some consolation from looking to the end of it. " I am, sir, with the greatest respect, your obedient and most humble servant, " Geoeoe Crabbe." At the time of this letter, — in 1781, as already stated,— Mr. Burke was closely occupied. His time was absorbed in a sea of parliamentary business and trouble. It should also be remembered that he was far from possessing affluence. Yet when he read the letter, he did not hesitate an instant. Stress upon his time, or nar- rowness of bis fortune, must not check his bounty ; the interview must be granted. He forthwith appointed an hour for Crabbe to call upon him ; and the poor bard, who only the day before had his foot on the very brink of ruin, found himself all at once in the presence of one who must have appeared to him as an angel of succour. The meeting was momentous, not only for Crabbe's future welfare, but for the literature of this country. On that day, by that act of benevolence, Burke rescued and secured for England a poet whom not many have rivalled, very few excelled. A re- markable scene it was ! The man of humanity receiving the men of misery, — charity the first impulse — approbation the next ; for, when Johnson and Goldsmith's friend — the author of " the Sub- lime and Beautiful," cast his eye over the sterling verse the needy hand tendered to him, the intellect of the scholar-statesman came 152 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. into play. He saw directly that the distressed heing hefore him was no common individual. He confessed his genius, while he comforted his sorrows ; and from that hour Crabbe was a made man. Burke not only relieved Ins more pressing necessities, but domesticated him in his own house, introduced him to a large cir- cle of noble and literary friends, afforded him the inestimable ad- vantage of his critical advice, and having established his poetical reputation in the world, finally crowned the most ardent aspira- tions of his protege by getting him admitted into the Church. This, as matters stood, was somewhat difficult to be brought to pass ; Crabbe had never received a regular education, an impedi- ment generally considered insuperable. Burke was well aware of this : but his was a zeal that nothing could chill when he had once taken up a cause ; he exerted himself with Mr. Dudley North and Mr. Charles Long, and his influence being backed by theirs, he overcame the scruples of the Bishop of Norwich, and obtained his consent to Crabbe's ordination. This led to a living in the Church, and to Crabbe's subsequent happiness and prosperity. If there be aught that can be compared with the generous soul of Burke, it is the gratitude of the poet in preserving, as sacred, the record of these benefits conferred, and the manly frankness of his son in publishing it to the world. Crabbe was deserving of his patron ; and that is the highest eulogy that can be pronounced upon him. Of Burke himself it may be said, that these deeds of charity, more, even, than his greatness, speak to his eternal honour, and make one easily accord with Abraham Shackleton, the son of his early friend, who, when Burke was near his death, wrote to him thus : " the memory of Edmund Burke's philanthropic virtues will outlive the period when his shining political talents will cease to act. New fashions of political sentiment will exist, but philan- thropy — immortelle manet." BENARES. CHAPTER YL " When the loud cry of trampled Hindostan Arose to Heaven in her appeal from man, His was the thunder, his the avenging rod, The wrath — the delegated voice of God, Which shook the nations through his lips, and blazed, Till vanquished senates trembled as they praised." — Byron. " . . . . Reus in judicium adductus est Caius Verres, homo vita atque factis, omnium jam opinione, damnatus, pecuniae magnitudine, sua ape ac praedicatione, absolutus. Huic ego causae, judices, cum summa voluntate et expectatione populi Romani actor accessi, non ut augerem invidiam or- dinis, sed ut infamise communi succurrerem. Adduxi enim hominem, in quo reconciliare existimationem judiciorum amissam, rediro in gratiam cum populo Romano, satisfacere exteris nationibus possetis ; depeculatorem serarii, vexatorem Asiae atquc Pamphyhaa, prsedoncm juris urbani, labem atque perniciem provincial Sicilian" — Cicero in Verrem. Coalition Ministry— Burke again Paymaster-General— India and the Affairs of the East India Company— Puiuf Francis— Wabren Hastings— Fox's East India Bill— The Pitt Administration— The 154 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. Nabob of Arcot's Debts— Burke Lord Eector of Glasgow Uni- versity—Burglary at Beaconsfield — Death and Funeral of Dr. Johnson — Impeachment and Trial of Warren Hastings — Acquit- tal of Hastings ; his subsequent Career and Death — Death of Francis. The Shelburne government had but brief vitality. The famous coalition between Fox and Lord North, which Burke joined, suc- ceeded in putting an end to this administration on the 21st Fe- bruary, 1783. The new cabinet, which was formed in the April following, and of which the Duke of Portland was the nominal head, had Lord John Cavendish as chancellor of the exchecpier, and Mr. Fox and Lord North joint secretaries of state. Mr. Burke was once more paymaster of the forces. In this much-blamed alliance, Burke came in for a less share of condemnation than Fox, Lord North, or any of the rest. Burke, when charged in common with those of his party with his former political enmity against Lord North, answered that " he considered that lord as a principal promoter and encourager of the American war ; a war which he held destructive of the interests and consti- tutional rights of this country. As a minister, therefore, he repro- bated his conduct ; but the American contest being over, and other measures about to be pursued, which, in his opinion, might heal the bruises of this war, he coalesced with him as a man who (be- nefiting himself by his former mistakes) might still render impor- tant services to his country." Burke, unlike Fox, had really never directed his attack against Lord North personally. The formation of the coalition administration leads to a subject winch formed another great phasis in Burke's brilliant course — India ; a topic that has not been previously entered upon here, it seeming better to embrace the whole of it under one chapter. To understand it, however, rightly, some few steps must be retraced. The East, and especially the British territories there, had, from Burke's earliest public career, been a favourite theme with him. As far back as 1755, a friendship he had formed with a talented bcrke's KNOWLEDGE OF INDIA. 155 orientalist, named Yuseph Emin, whose prospects lie aided and advanced, first turned bis thoughts and studies to the history and CHARLES FOX, AFTER GILRAT. 15G LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. affairs of British India. A correspondence with Eniin, who was established at Calcutta, supplied Burke with much information ; his own comprehensive and industrious mind soon mastered a great deal more ; and his knowledge was made perfect hy his sub- sequent close intimacy with the eminent son of the Bev. Dr. Francis, the translator of Horace — Sir Philip Francis, a bold politician, whose temper and talents strengthened the strong sus- picion, that arose from other circumstances, of his being Junius, and who, just as Junius ceased, went out to Bengal as member of council, to act an important part in the drama of Indian affairs. Thus was Burke prepared for the subject of India, which, in the session of 1772, grew into a' topic of much serious parliamentary deliberation; and from that time forward continued at intervals more or less to occupy public attention. Political investigation, in fact, was continually hovering over the territories and officers of the Company. The gallant but not immaculate Give had passed through the ordeal of accusation in a measure unscathed. An act of Lord North's, in 1773, called the Begulating Act, made considerable changes in the government of India, giving to Bengal the chief control over all the possessions of the Company, and making the chief of that presidency governor- general. Clive was then in England. The place of the first governor-general fell to the lot of his former minion, Wan-en Hastings. Philip Francis, the friend of Burke, arrived from England to sit as a member of Hastings' council, and there to act in opposition to him. No doubt, much that followed was owing to the inquiring and obstinate spirit of Francis — a man, equally with Burke, intolerant of wrong, and far more personally im- placable. Francis stirred Burke to the impeachment, and Burke became inveterate also ; but Burke's disinterestedness was much more evident. He was convinced that Hastings was a very bad and culpable man ; and none, indeed, not even Hastings' recent and brilliant defender, Mr. Macaulay, pretend now to show him guiltless. Certainly Burke was not altogether right in the BURKE S CONDUCT RELATIVE TO INDIA. 157 extreme violence with which he attacked the doings in India, and denounced and pursued the governor-general. But this at least may be said: when Burke discovered the abuses of the Company's servants, and fearful abuses they were, his temper, ever impatient of evil, ever " too fond of the right to pursue the expedient," would suffer no middle course, no temporising nor moderation. The whole Indian system of corruption, cruelty, and PHILIP FRANCIS. oppression fell a prey to his ungovernable wrath. Like the anger of the avenging deities of classic story, it sought satisfac- tion in judgment and immolation ; it went beyond discretion, even to the limits of mercy. But it had its ultimate effect. Take British India up to the time of Burke, sinking as it then was be- neath its own extortionate and wasteful excesses, " a cutpurse of the empire and the rule," and compare it with the Company's possessions now, which, with all the faults and imperfections still existing, form the best and most flourishing nation of the East ; it will be then seen whether it did not require some exertion, 158 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. almost superhuman, to inaugurate the change. That was done by Burke, fiercely and intemperately no doubt ; but it was done. The thunder of his eloquence cleared the atmosphere, and pro- duced a better temperature. Msgovernnient died away before his words : the native millions in India ceased to be common spoil, and began to prosper under a dominion converted from a curse to a blessing — from a quicksand to a harbour of refuge. This great struggle Burke, through a course of years, commenced, recommenced, and returned to again and again, incessantly, in- defatigably, indomitably. His influence was the mainspring of the whole. Early in 1781, two Indian committees — one select, the other secret — were appointed by the House of Commons to inquire into the notorious maladministration and wretched state of the East India Company's affairs. The reports of these committees led to much debating relative to the general misconduct of the governing powers in India; but in consequence of a successful motion of adjournment, the whole proceedings, for the time, fell to the ground. On the 15th April, 1782, a new set of resolutions were presented to parliament relative to India. One of them was to the effect that "Warren Hastings, governor-general of Bengal, and "William Hornsby, Esq., president of Bombay, had acted in a manner repugnant to the honour and pohcy of the nation ; had brought great calamities on India, enormous expenses on the East India Company, and that the directors of the Company should remove both Hastings and Hornsby. The directors were willing to do so ; but the general court of proprietors interfered and pre- vented them. Thus ended this parliamentary attempt at redress. In 1783 the introduction of Mr. Fox's East India bills roused the subject again in right earnest. Parliament met on the 11th November of that year. The speech from the throne annoimced that definitive treaties of peace had been concluded with France, Spain, and the United States of America, and that the preliminary articles had been ratified with the States General of the United FOX'S EAST INDIA BILL. 159 Provinces. The speech then directed the attention of parliament to East Indian affairs. The subject was entered upon forthwith. ]\Ir. Fox submitted two bills to the consideration of the Commons. One bill was for " vesting the affairs of the East India Company in the hands of certain commissioners, for the benefit of the pro- prietors and the public." The other bill was " for the better government of the territorial possessions and dependencies in In- dia." On the 18th November Mr. Fox made an able speech in support of these measures. His plan was to establish a board, to consist of seven persons, who should be appointed with full power to appoint and displace officers in India, and under whose control the whole government of India should be placed ; he also proposed to appoint another class, to consist of eight persons, to be called assistants, who should have charge of the sales, outfits, &c. of the Company, and in general of all commercial concerns, but still to be under the control of the first seven. The discussion on these bills was of the most exciting kind. The debates frequently lasted till five o'clock in the morning. The speakers in favour of the bills were, besides Fox, Mr. Burke, Sir Grey Cooper, Mr. Sheridan, Mr. Anstruther, and Mr. Adam ; those against the bills were Mr. Pitt, Mr. Thomas Pitt (after- wards Lord Camelford), Mr. Dundas, Mr. Powis, Mr. Jenkinson, and Mr. Macdonald. The arguments urged in opposition to the bills were drawn from two sources : 1st, the proposed arbitrary defeazance of the chartered rights of the court of proprietors and directors, without a justifiable plea of necessity ; and 2dly, the dangerous power lodged in the hands of the intended new com- missioners. On both these grounds issue was joined by the advo- cates of the new system. On the 1st of the ensuing December, upon the question of the House going into committee on the first of these bills, Edmund Burke supported Fox in a magnificent harangue. He commenced with the following description of British India as it was in 1783 : " With very few, and those inconsiderable intervals, the Bri- 160 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. tish dominion, either in the Company's name, or in the names of princes absolutely dependent upon the Company, extends from the mountains that separate India from Tartary, to Cape Comorin, — that is, one-and-twenty degrees of latitude ! " In the northern parts it is a solid mass of land, about eight hundred miles in length, and four or five hundred broad. As you go southward, it becomes narrower for a space. It afterwards dilates ; but narrower or broader, you possess the whole eastern and north-eastern coast of that vast country, quite from the bor- ders of Pegu. Bengal, Bahar, and Orissa, with Benares (now, unfortunately, in our immediate possession), measure 161,978 square English miles ; a territory considerably larger than the whole kingdom of France. Oude, with its dependent provinces, is 53,286 square miles, not a great deal less than England. The Camatic, with Tanjore and the Circars, is 65,948 square miles, very considerably larger than England ; and the whole of the Company's dominions, comprehending Bombay and Salsette, amount to 281,412 square miles; which forms a territory larger than any European dominion, Russia and Turkey excepted. Through all that vast extent of country there is not a man who eats a mouthful of rice but by permission of the East India Company. " So far with regard to the extent. The population of this great empire is not easily to be calculated. When the countries of which it is composed came into our possession, they were all eminently peopled and eminently productive, though at that time considerably declined from their ancient prosperity. But, since they are come into our hands ! ! However, if we make the period of our estimate immediately before the utter desolation of the Carnatic, and if we allow for the havoc which our government had even then made in these regions, we cannot, in my opinion, rate the population at much less than thirty millions of souls — more than four times the number of persons in the island of Great Britain. SPEECH ON THE EAST INDIA BILLS. 1G1 " My next inquiry to that of the number, is the quality and description of the inhabitants. This multitude of men does not consist of an abject and barbarous populace ; much less of gangs of savages, like the Guaranies and Chiquitos, who wander on the waste borders of the river of Amazons or the Plate ; but a people fur ages civilised and cultivated — cultivated by all the arts of polished life whilst we were yet in the woods. There have been (and still the skeletons remain) princes once of great dignity, au- thority, and opulence. There are to be found the chiefs of tribes and nations. There is to be found an ancient and venerable priesthood, the depository of their laws, learning, and their his- tory, — the guides of the people whilst living', and their consolation in death ; a nobility of great antiquity and renown ; a multitude of cities, not exceeded in population and trade by those of the first class in Europe ; merchants and bankers, individual houses of whom have once vied in capital with the Bank of England, whose credit had often supported a tottering state, and preserved their governments in the midst of war and desolation ; millions of inge- nious manufacturers and mechanics ; millions of the most diligent, and not the least intelligent, tillers of the earth. There are to be found almost all the religions professed by men, — the Brahminical, the Mussulman, the Eastern and the Western Christian. " If I were to take the whole aggregate of our possessions there, I should compare it, as the nearest parallel I can find, with the empire of Germany. Our immediate possessions I should are with the Austrian dominions ; and they would not suffer in the comparison. The nabob of Oude might stand for the king of Prussia ; the nabob of Arcot I woidd compare, as superior in territory and equal in revenue, to the elector of Saxony. Cheyt Sing, the rajah of Benares, might well rank with the prince of Hesse, at least ; and the rajah of Tanjore (though hardly equal in extent of dominion, superior in revenue) to the elector of Bavaria. The Polygars and the northern Zemindars, and other great chiefs, might well clas.i with the rest of the princes, dukes, counts, mar- M 1G2 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. quesses, and bishops in the empire ; all of whom I mention to honour, and surely without disparagement to any or all of those most respectable princes and grandees, " All this vast mass, composed of so many orders and classes of men, is again infinitely diversified by manners, by religion, by hereditary employment, through all their possible combinations. This renders the handling of India a matter in a high decree cri- tical and delicate. But oh, it has been handled rudely indeed! Even some of the reformers seem to have forgot that they had any thing to do but to regulate the tenants of a manor, or the shopkeepers of the next county town. " It is an empire of this extent, of this complicated nature, of this dignity and importance, that I have compared to Germany and the German government ; not for an exact resemblance, but as a sort of a middle term, by which India might be approximated to our understandings, and if possible to our feelings, in order to awaken something of sympathy for the unfortunate natives, of which I am afraid we are not perfectly susceptible whilst we look at this very remote object through a false and cloudy medium." The conduct of the East India Company and its officers Burke then proceeded to detail thus : " With regard, therefore, to the abuse of the external federal trust ; . . . first, I say, that from Mount Imaus (or whatever else you call that large range of mountains that walls the northern frontier of India), where it touches us in latitude twenty-nine, to Cape Comorin, in the latitude of eight, that there is not a single prince, state, or potentate, great or small, hi India, with whom they have come into contact, whom they have not sold. I say sold, though sometimes they have not been able to deliver according to their bargain. Secondly, I say, that there is not a single treaty they have ever made, which they have not broken. Thirdly, I say, there is not a single prince or state who ever put any trust in the Company, who is not utterly ruined ; and that none are in any DESCRIPTION OF THE GREAT MOGUL. 163 degree secure or flourishing, but in the exact proportion to their settled distrust and irreconcilable enmity to this nation. " These assertions are universal. I say in the full sense uni- versal. They regard the external and political trust only ; but I shall produce others fully equivalent in the internal. For the present, I shall content myself with explaining my meaning ; and if I am called on for proof whilst these bills are depending (which I believe I shall not), I will put my finger on the appendixes to the reports, or on papers of record hi the house, or the committees, which I have distinctly present to my memory, and wliich I think I can lay before you at half an hour's warning. " The first potentate sold by the Company for money was the Great Mogul — the descendant of Tamerlane. This high person- age, as high as human veneration can look at, is by every account amiable in his manners, respectable for his piety according to his mode, and accomplished in all the Oriental literature. All this, and the title, derived under his charter, to all that we hold in India, could not save him from the general sale. Money is corned in his name ; in his name justice is administered ; he is prayed for in every temple through the countries we possess, — but he was sold. " It is impossible, Mr. Speaker, not to pause here for a mo- ment, to reflect on the inconstancy of human greatness, and the stupendous revolutions that have happened hi our age of wonders. Could it be believed when I entered into existence, or when you, a younger man, were born, that on this day, in this house, we should be employed in discussing the conduct of those British subjects who had disposed of the power and person of the Grand Mogul ? This is no idle speculation. Awful lessons are taught by it, and by other events, of which it is not yet too late to profit. " This is hardly a digression ; but I return to the sale of the Mogul. Two districts, Corah and Allahabad, out of his immense grants, were reserved as a royal demesne to the donor of a king- 1G4 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. dom, and the rightful sovereign of so many nations. After withholding the tribute of 2G0,000Z. a year, which the Company was, by the charter they had received from this prince, under the most solemn obligation to pay, these districts were sold to his chief minister Sujah-ul-Dowlah ; and, what may appear to some the worst part of the transaction, these two districts were sold for scarcely two years' purchase. The descendant of Tamerlane now stands in need almost of the common necessaries of life ; and in this situation we do not even allow him as bounty the smallest portion of what we owe him in justice. " The next sale was that of the whole nation of the Rohillas, which the grand salesman (Warren Hastings), without a pretence of quarrel, and contrary to his own declared sense of duty and rectitude, sold to the same Sujah-ul-Dowlah. He sold the people to utter extirpation for the sum of 400,0007. Faithfully was the bargain performed on our side. Hafiz Rhamet, the most eminent of their chiefs, one of the bravest men of his time, and as famous throughout the east for the elegance of his literature and the spirit of his poetical compositions (by which he supported the name of Hafiz) as for his courage, was invaded with an army of 100,000 men, and an English brigade. This man, at the head of inferior forces, was slain valiantly fighting for his country. His head was cut off, and delivered for money to a barbarian. His wife and children, persons of that rank, were seen begging a handful of rice through the English camp. The whole nation, with inconsiderable exceptions, was slaughtered or banished. The country was laid waste with fire and sword ; and that land, dis- tinguished above most others by the cheerful face of paternal government and protected labour, the chosen seat of cultivation and plenty, is now almost throughout a dreary desert, covered with rushes and briers, and jungles full of wild beasts. " The British officer who commanded in the delivery of the people thus sold felt some compunction at his employment. He represented these enormous excesses to the president of Bengal, VENALITY OF THE EAST INDIAN GOVERNMENT. 165 for which he received a severe reprimand from the civil governor ; and I much doubt whether the breach caused by the conflict be- tween the compassion of the military and the firmness of the civil governor be closed at this hour. "In Bengal, Seraja Dowlah was. sold to Mir Jaffier; Mir Jaffier was sold to Mir Cossim ; and Mir Cossim was sold to Mir Jaffier again. The succession to Mir Jaffier was sold to his eldest son ; another son of Mir Jaffier, Mobarech-ul-Dowlah, was sold to his step-mother. The Maratta empire was sold to Rogabo, and Rogabo was sold and delivered to the Peishwa of the Ma- rattas. Both Rogabo and the Peishwa of the Marattas were offered to sale to the Rajah of Berar. Scindia, the chief of Malwa, was offered to sale to the same rajah ; and the Subah of the Deccan was sold to the great trader Mahomet Ali, Nabob of Arcot. To the same Nabob of Arcot they sold Hyder Ali and the kingdom of Mysore. To Mahomet Ali they twice sold the kingdom of Tanjore. To the same Mahomet Ali they sold at least twelve sovereign princes, called the Polygars. But to keep things even, the territory of Tinnivelly, belonging to their nabob, they would have sold to the Dutch ; aud to conclude the account of sales, their great customer, the Nabob of Arcot himself, and his lawful succession, have been sold to his second son, Arnir-ul- Omrah, whose character, views, and conduct, are in the accounts upon your table. It remains with you whether they shall finally perfect this last bargain. " All these bargains and sales were regularly attended with the waste and havuc of the country, always by the buyer, and sometimes by the object of the sale. * * * * * * " My second assertion is, that the Company never has made a treaty which they have not broken. * * * * * * " It only remains, sir, for me just to recapitulate some heads. — The treaty with the Mogul, by winch we stipulated to pay him 1G6 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. 2G0,000Z. annually, was broken. This treaty they have broken, and not paid him a shilling. They broke their treaty with him jn which they stipulated to pay 400,000?. a year to the Subah of Bengal. They agreed with the Mogul, for services admitted to have been performed, to pay Nudjif Cawn a pension. They broke this article with the rest, and- stopped also this small pension. They broke their treaties with the Nizam and with Hyder Ah. As to the Marattas, they had so many cross treaties with the states-general of that nation, and with each of the chiefs, that it was notorious that no one of these agreements could be kept with- out grossly violating the rest. It was observed, that if the terms of these several treaties had been kept, two British armies would at one and the same time have met in the field to cut each other's throats. The wars which desolate India originated from a most atrocious violation of public faith on our part. In the midst of profound peace, the Company's troops invaded the Maratta terri- tories, and surprised the island and fortress of Salsette. The Marattas nevertheless yielded to a treaty of peace, by which solid advantages were procured to the Company. But this treaty, like every other treaty, was soon violated by the Company. Again the Company invaded the Maratta dominions. The disaster that ensued gave occasion for a new treaty. The whole army of the Company was obliged, in effect, to surrender to this injured, be- trayed, and insulted people. Justly irritated, however, as they were, the terms which they prescribed were reasonable and mo- derate ; and their treatment of their captive invaders of the most distinguished humanity. But the humanity of the Marattas was of no power whatsoever to prevail on the Company to attend to the observance of the terms dictated by then' moderation. The war was renewed with greater vigour than ever ; and such was their insatiable lust of plunder, that they never would have given ear to any terms of peace, if Hyder Ali had not broke through the Ghauts, and rushing like a torrent into the Carnatic, swept away every thing in his career. This was hi consequence of that con- CONTRAST BETWEEN EASTERN AND BRITISH INVASION. 167 federacy, which, by a sort of miracle, united the most discordant powers for our destruction, as a nation in winch no other could put any trust, and who were the declared enemies of the human species. * * * * " The several irruptions of Arabs, Tartars, and Persians, into India were, for the greater part, ferocious, bloody, and wasteful in the extreme ; our entrance into the dominion of that country was, as generally, with small comparative effusion of blood ; being introduced by various frauds and delusions, and by taking advan- tage of the incurable, blind, and senseless animosity which the several country powers bear towards each other, rather than by open force. But the difference in favour of the first conquerors is this : the Asiatic concpierors very soon abated of their ferocity, because they made the conquered country their own. They rose or fell with the rise or fall of the territory they lived in. Fathers there deposited the hopes of their posterity ; and children there beheld the monuments of their fathers. Here their lot was finally cast ; and it is the natural wish of all, that their lot should not be cast into bad land. Poverty, sterility, and desolation are not a recreating prospect to the eye of man ; and there are very few who can bear to grow old among the curses of a whole people. If their passion or their avarice drove the Tartar lords to acts of rapacity or tyranny, there was time enough, even in the short life of man, to bring round the ill effects of an abuse of power upon the power itself. If hoards were made by violence and tyranny, they were still domestic hoards ; and domestic profusion, or the rapine of a more powerful and prodigal hand, restored them to the people. With many disorders, and with few political checks upon power, nature had still fair play ; the sources of acquisition were not dried up ; and therefore the trade, the manufactures, and the commerce of the country flourished. Even avarice and usury itself operated both for the preservation and the employment of national wealth. The husbandman and manufacturer paid heavy interests; but then they augmented the fund from whence they were again 1G3 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. to borrow. Their resources were dearly bought, but they were sure ; and the general stock of the community grew by the general effort. " But under the English government all this order is re- versed. The Tartar invasion was mischievous ; but it is our protection that destroys India. It was their enmity, but it is our friendship. Our conquest there, after twenty years, is as crude as it was the first day. The natives scarcely know what it is to see the grey head of an Englishman. Young men (boys almost) go- vern there, without society and without sympathy with the native. They have no more social habits with the people than if they still resided in England ; nor, indeed, any species of intercourse but that which is necessary to making a sudden fortune, with a view to a remote settlement. Animated with all the avarice of age, and all the impetuosity of youth, they roll in one after an- other, wave after wave ; and there is nothing before the eyes of the natives but an endless, hopeless prospect of new flights of birds of prey and passage, with appetites continually renewing for a food that is continually wasting. Every rupee of profit made by an Englishman is lost for ever to India. "With us are no re- tributory superstitions, by which a foundation of charity compen- sates, through ages, to the poor, for the rapine and injustice of a day. With us no pride erects stately monuments which repair the mischiefs which pride had produced, and which adorn a coun- try out of its own spoils. England has erected no churches, no hospitals, no palaces, no schools ; England has built no bridges, made no high roads, cut no navigations, dug out no reservoirs. Every other conqueror of every other description has left some monument, either of state or beneficence, behind him. Were we to be driven out of India this day, nothing would remain to tell that it had been possessed, during the inglorious period of our dominion, by any thing better than the ourang-outang or the tiger. " There is nothing in the boys we send to India worse than in the boys whom we are whipping at school, or that we see trail- BRITISH RULERS IN INDIA. 169 ing a pike, or bending over a desk at home. But as English youth in India drink the intoxicating draught of authority and dominion before then' heads are able to bear it, and as they are full-grown in fortune long before they are ripe in principle, nei- ther nature nor reason have any opportunity to exert themselves for remedy of the excesses of their premature power. The conse- quences of their conduct, which in good minds (and many of theirs are probably such) might produce penitence or amendment, are unable to pursue the rapidity of then 1 flight. Their prey is lodged in England ; and the cries of India are given to seas and winds, to be blown about, in every breaking up of the monsoon, over a remote and unhealing ocean. In India all the vices operate by which sudden fortune is acquired ; in England are often displayed by the same persons the virtues which dispense hereditary wealth. Arrived in England, the destroyers of the nobility and gentry of a whole kingdom will find the best company in this nation at a board of elegance and hospitality. Here the manufacturer and husbandman will bless the just and punctual hand that in India has torn the cloth from the loom, or wrested the scanty portion of rice and salt from the peasant of Bengal, or wrung from lum the very opium in which he forgot his oppressions and his oppres- sor. They marry into your families ; they enter into your senate ; they ease your estates by loans ; they raise their value by de- mand ; they cherish and protect your relations which lie heavy on your patronage ; and there is scarcely a house in the kingdom that dues not feel some concern and interest, that makes all re- form of our eastern government appear officious and disgusting; and, on the whole, a most discouraging attempt. In such an at- tempt you hurt those who are able to return kindness, or to resent injury. If you succeed, you save those who cannot so much as give you thanks. All these things show the difficulty of the work we have on hand ; but they show its necessity too. Our Indian government is in its best state a grievance. It is necessary that the correctives should be uncommonly vigorous ; and the work of 170 LIFE OF EDMUND BUKKE. men, sanguine, warm, and even impassioned in the cause. But it is an arduous tiling to plead against abuses of a power which ori- ginates from your own country, and affects those whom we are used to consider as strangers." The division on the question of going into committee was 229 for, and 120 against. These hills of Mr. Fox, at any other time, might have won popularity and fame ; but the court and the public feeling ran so strong against the coalition ministry, that no measure of theirs had a fair chance. As it was, the first bill, sup- ported by the eloquence of Fox and Burke, passed the Commons by a large majority. On the first reading in the House of Lords, Lord Temple and the Duke of Richmond, and Lord Thurlow, expressed their abhorrence of the measure in the most strong and unqualified language ; but the bill went safe through this ordeal, and the second reading was appointed for an early day. In the mean time, George III. sent for Earl Temple, and put a written note into his hand to this effect : " That the king would deem those who voted for the India bill not only not his friends, but his enemies ; and that if Lord Temple did not think these expressions strong enough, he was at liberty to make use of any which seemed to him stronger or more to the purpose." In con- sequence of this, when the bill was brought up for a second read- ing, the house divided, when it was thrown out ; there being 79 in favour of it, and 87 against it. This measure being lost, it was to be expected that the ministers, who had proposed it con- trary to the wishes of their sovereign, would not long retain their places; accordingly, at twelve o'clock at night, a message was sent to Mr. Fox and Lord North, ordering, " That they should deliver up the seals of their offices, and send them by the under secretaries, Mr. Fraser and Mr. Nepean, as a personal interview on the occasion would be disagreeable to the king ;" and early the next morning a note of dismission, signed " Temple," was sent to each of the other members of the cabinet. A new adminis- WILIIAM PITT S ADMINISTEATION. 171 tration was formed the 22d Dec. 1783. Mr. Pitt was appointed first Lord of the Treasury and Chancellor of the Exchequer, aud he continued minister during the rest of Burke's life. Pitt's col- leagues were as follow : Earl Gower (afterwards Marquess of Stafford) was declared President of the Council ; and on the resignation of Earl Temple, who only held the seals three days, Lord Sydney was appointed Secretary of State for the Home, aud WILLIAM PITT. the Marquess of Carmarthen for the Foreign Department ; Lord Thurlow was restored to the Chancellorship; the Duke of Put- land had the Privy Seal, but was shortly alter Lord Lieutenant of Ireland ; Lord Howe was placed at the head of the Admiralty, 172 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. and the Duke of Richmond at the head of the Ordnance ; Lord Mulgrave succeeded Mr. Burke as Paymaster-General. On the accession of the new ministry, the memorable struggle ensued between the royal will, which had chosen Mr. Pitt for minister, and the Commons bent on thwarting that choice. It belongs not to these pages to detail the well-known contest, re- sulting in defeat of the coalesced opposition majority, through means of a new general election, and ending in the permanent establishment of Pitt. The subject here relates more particularly to India, now Edmund Burke's absorbing theme. The new government endeavoured to soothe his asperity, and to subvert the strength of his remonstrances, by bringing in on then' side a measure to improve matters in India. After his own accession to power, but before the parliament of the coalition ministry was dissolved, Mr. Pitt, on the 14th Jan. 1784, introduced a bill, by which the commercial affairs of the Company were left in their own management, while a Board of Control was to be nominated by the king, possessing a veto over their political measures. This bill passed through two read- ings ; but, as Burke, Fox, and their party had still the majority, it was rejected on the motion for committal, by a majority of eight. Mr. Fox then gave notice of Ms intentions to bring in another bill relative to the same object ; but the dissolution of Parliament stopped his further proceeding ; and when the new election was over, his majority and his power were ended. Mr. Pitt, however, on the meeting of what might be called Ms own Parliament, when Mr. Burke's proposed remonstrance to the throne had met with but poor success, brought in his three bills for settling the East India dividend, for respiting duties, and for better governing the affairs of the East India Company. The first two of these bills, after some divisions, passed easily. The third bill was on the same principle as that which be bad unsuc- cessfully introduced in the last parliament ; namely, for the insti- tution of a Board authorised to check and superintend the civil THE NABOB OF ARCOTS DEBTS. 173 and military government and revenue of India ; and thence deno- minated the Board of Control. It was to be composed of six commissioners of the rank of privy councillors, nominated by the king, and removable at his pleasure. The governor-general, pre- sidents, and the members of council were to be named by the Court of Directors, subject to the approval of the king ; the com- mander-in-chief was to be chosen by the king only. A special tribunal was to be established for punishing delin- quencies incurred in India ; the fortunes acquired there were to be ascertained, on the return to England of each servant of the Company from India. These latter provisions were subsequently repealed by the 2G Geo. III. c. 4. This bill encountered much opposition, but was passed by large majorities. Thus Indian affairs rested until the next session, that of 1785, when came on the debate which produced Mr. Burke's celebrated speech on the Nabob of Arcot's debts. The history of the trans- actions which led to the parliamentary discussion on that subject is as follows : Mahomet Ali, Nabob of Arcot, owed the establish- ment of his government, against the claims of his elder brother, as well as those of other competitors, to the arms and influence of the British East India Company. Being thus fixed in a con- siderable extent of dominion, he began, about the year 1765, to form, at the instigation of the servants of the Company, a variety of designs for the further enlargement of his territories. Some years after he carried his "views to objects of interior ar- rangement. None of these designs could be compassed without the aid of the Company's arms ; nor could those arms be em- ployed consistently with an obedience to the Company's orders. He was therefore advised to form a more secret, but an equally powerful interest among the servants of that Company, and among others both at home and abroad. By engaging them in his in- terests, the use of the Company's power might be obtained with- out their ostensible authority, and even in defiance of it. The Company had put the nabob into possession of several 174 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. great cities and magnificent castles. The good order of his affairs, his sense of personal dignity, his ideas of oriental splendour, and the habits of an Asiatic life (to which, being a native of India and a Mahometan, be bad from his infancy been inured), would naturally have led him to fix the seat of his government within his own dominions. Instead of this, he totally sequestered him- self from his country ; and, abandoning all appearance of state, he took up his residence in an ordinary house, which he purchased in the suburbs of the Company's factory at Madras. In that place he lived, without removing one day from thence, for several years. He there continued a constant cabal with the Company's servants, from the highest to the lowest ; creating brilliant fortunes for those who were, and entirely destroying those who were not, subservi- ent to his purposes. An opinion prevailed, strongly confirmed by several passages in letters written by the nabob, as well as by a combination of evidence, that very great sums had been by him distributed, through a long course of years, to some of the Com- pany's servants. Besides these presumed payments in ready money (of which, from the nature of the thing, the direct proof was very difficult), debts had at several periods been acknow- ledged due by him to an immense amount. There was strong reason to suspect that the body of these debts was wholly fictitious, and was never created by money bond fide lent. But even on a supposition tbat this vast sum was really advanced, it was im- possible that the very reality of such an astonishing transaction should not cause alarm and incite inquiry. Nor was it thought seemly, at a moment when the Company itself was distressed, that their servants should appear in so flourishing a condition, as, be- sides ten millions of other demands on their masters, to be entitled to claim a debt of millions more from the territorial revenue of one of their dependent princes. The ostensible pecuniary trans- actions of the Nabob of Arcot with very private persons were so enormous, that they evidently set aside every pretence of policy, which might induce a prudent government in some instances to SPEECH ON THE NABOB OF ARCOTS DEBTS. 175 wink at ordinary loose practice in ill-managed departments. These facts relative to the debts being so notorious, and being thought a source of the disorders of government in India, parliament urged a vigorous inquiry into the business, before they admitted any part of that vast and suspicious charge to be laid upon an ex- hausted country. Resolutions on the subject had been moved by Mir. Dundas in April 1782, and Mr. Fox included a provision touching the claim in his India bill. By Mr. Pitt's Regulating Act, the exami- nation into the nature and circumstances of the debts was referred to the Court of Directors. The Court of Directors accordingly set about executing the trust confided to them, and found that the as- serted debts amounted to 2,945, 600£., and that their origin was most unsatisfactorily accounted for. They consequently prepared orders to be sent to their council at Madras, in which, after stating their dissatisfaction and suspicions, they directed the Madras coun- cil to proceed to a more complete investigation. These orders be- ing forthwith communicated to the Board of Control, they were rejected by them, and'a new letter drawn up, in which the claims of the creditors were all, with some little limitation, established, and a fund for their discharge assigned and set apart out of the revenues of the Carnatic, and the priority of payment settled amongst the several classes of creditors. The opposition was at once aroused by this glaring piece of jobbing and evasion ; and on the 28th February, 1785, Mr. Fox made a motion ha the Com- mons, after having the clauses in Mr. Pitt's India act, touching the nabob's debts, read : " That the proper officer do lay before the house copies and extracts of all letters and orders of the Court of Directors of the united East India Company, in pursuance of the injunctions contained in the 37th and 38th clauses (the clauses in question] of the said act." Ministry was now, however, all power- ful, and their large majority defeated the motion, but not until Mr. Burke bad made a speech in its favour, which was, perhaps, one of the most eloquent ever delivered within the walls of Par- 17G LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. liament. In this speech is the following account of the Carnatic and Hyder Ali : " Among' the victims to this magnificent plan of universal plunder, worthy of the heroic avarice of the projectors, you have all heard (and lie Las made himself to he well remembered) of an Indian chief called Hyder Ali Kalm. This man possessed the west- ern, as the Company, under the name of the Nabob of Arcot, does the eastern division of the Carnatic. It was among the leading measures in the design of this cabal (according to their own em- phatic language) to extirpate this Hyder Ali. They declared the Nabob of Arcot to be his sovereign, and himself to be a rebel, and publicly invested their instrument with the sovereignty of the kingdom of Mysore. But their victim was not of the passive kind. They were soon obliged to conclude a treaty of peace and close alliance with this rebel at the gates of Madras. Both before and since this treaty, every principle of policy pointed out this power as a natural alliance ; and on his part it was courted by every sort of amicable office. But the cabinet council of English cre- ditors would not suffer their Nabob of Arcot to sign the treaty, nor even to give to a prince, at least his equal, the ordinary titles of respect and courtesy. From that time forward a continued plot was carried on within the divan, black and white, of the Nabob of Arcot, for the destruction of Hyder Ali. As to the outward members of the double, or rather treble government of Madras, which had signed the treaty, they were always prevented by some overruling influence (which they do not describe, but which can- not be misunderstood) from performing what justice and interest combined so evidently to enforce. " When at length Hyder Ali found that he had to do with men who either would sign no convention, or whom no treaty and no signature could bind, and who were the determined enemies of human intercourse itself, he decreed to make the country possessed by these incorrigible and predestinated criminals a memorable ex- ample to mankind. He resolved, in the gloomy recesses of a mind HYDEK ALl's DEVASTATION OF THE CARNATIC. 177 capacious of such thiugs, to leave the whole Carnatic an ever- lasting monument of vengeance, and to put perpetual desolation as a barrier between him and those against whom the faith which holds the moral elements of the world together was no protection. He became at length so confident of his force, so collected in Ins might, that he made no secret whatsoever of his dreadful resolu- tion. Having terminated his disputes with every enemy and every rival, who buried their mutual animosities in their common detestation against the creditors of the Nabob of Arcot, he drew from every quarter whatever a savage ferocity could add to his new rudiments in the arts of destruction ; and compounding all the materials of fury, havoc, and desolation into one black cloud, he hung for a while on the declivities of the mountains. Whilst the authors of all these evils were idly and stupidly gazing on tins menacing meteor, which blackened all their horizon, it suddenly burst, and poured down the whole of its contents upon the plains of the Carnatic. Then ensued a scene of woe, the like of which no eye had seen, no heart conceived, and which no tongue can adequately tell. All the horrors of war before known or heard of were mercy to that new havoc. A storm of universal fire blasted every field, consumed every house, destroyed every temple. The miserable inhabitants, flying from their flaming villages, in part were slaughtered ; others, without regard to sex, to age, to the respect of rank, or sacredness of function, — fathers torn from chil- dren, husbands from wives, — enveloped in a whirlwind of cavalry, and amidst the goading spears of drivers, and the trampling of pursuing horses, were swept into captivity in an unknown and hostile land. Those who were able to evade this tempest fled to the walled cities. But escaping from fire, sword, and exile, they fell into the jaws of famiue. " The alms of the settlement, in this dreadful exigency, were certainly liberal; and all was done by charity thai private charity could do: but it was a people in beggary; it was a nation which stretched out its hands for food. For months together these crea- 178 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. lures of sufferance, whose very excess and luxury in their most plenteous days had fallen short of the allowance of our austerest fasts, silent, patient, resigned, without sedition or disturbance, al- most without complaint, perished hy a hundred a day in the streets of Madras ; every day seventy at least laid their bodies in the streets, or on the glacis of Tanjore, and expired of famine in the granary of India, I was going to awake your justice towards this unhappy part of our fellow-citizens, by bringing before you some of the circumstances of this plague of hunger. Of all the calamities which beset and waylay the life of man, this comes the nearest to our heart, and is that wherein the proudest of us all feels himself to he nothing more than he is : but I find myself un- able to manage it with decorum ; these details are of a species of horror so nauseous and disgusting ; they are so degrading to the sufferers and to the hearers ; they are so humiliating to human nature itself, that, on better thoughts, I find it more advisable to throw a pall over this hideous object, and to leave it to your ge- neral conceptions. " For eighteen months, without intermission, this destruction raged from the gates of Madras to the gates of Tanjore ; and so completely did these masters in their art, Hyder Ah and his more ferocious son, absolve themselves of their impious vow, that when the British armies traversed, as they did, the Carnaticfor hundreds of miles hi all directions, through the whole line of their march they did not see one man, not one woman, not one child, not one four-footed beast of any description whatever. One dead, uniform silence reigned over the whole region. With the inconsiderable exceptions of the narrow vicinage of some few forts, I wish to be understood as speaking literally ; — I mean to produce to you more than three witnesses, above all exception, who will support this assertion in its full extent. That hurricane of war passed through every part of the central provinces of the Carnatic. Six or seven districts to the north and to the south (and these not wholly un- touched) escaped the general ravage. TAXATION OF THE CARNATIC. 170 " The Carnatic is a country not much inferior in extent to Eng- land. Figure to yourself, Mr. Speaker, the land in whose repre- sentative chair you sit ; figure to yourself the form and fashion of your sweet and cheerful country from Thames to Trent, north and south, and from the Irish to the German sea, east and west, emptied and eml> welled (may God avert the omen of our crimes !) by so accomplished a desolation. Extend your imagination a little further, and then suppose your ministers taking a survey of this scene of waste and desolation : what would be your thoughts if you should be informed that they were computing how much had been the amount of the excises, how much the customs, how much the land and malt tax, in order that they should charge (take it in the most favourable light) for public service, upon the relics of the satiated vengeance of relentless enemies, the whole of what England had yielded in the most exuberant seasons of peace and abundance ? What would you call it ? To call it tyranny sublimed into madness, would be too faint an image ; yet this very madness is the principle upon which the ministers at your right hand have proceeded in their estimate of the revenues of the Car- natic, when they were providing, not supply for the establishments of its protection, but rewards for the authors of its ruin. " Every day you are fatigued and disgusted with this cant : ' the Carnatic is a country that will soon recover, and become instantly as prosperous as ever.' They think they are talking to innocents, who wiLl believe that, by sowing of dragons' teeth, men may come up ready grown and ready armed. They who will give themselves the trouble of considering (for it requires no great reach of thought, no very profound knowledge,) the manner in which mankind are increased and countries cultivated, will regard all this raving as it ought to be regarded. In order that the people, after a long period of vexation and plunder, maybe in a condition to maintain government, government must begin by maintaining them. Here the road to economy lies not through receipt, but through expense ; and in that country nature has given no short 180 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. cut to your object. Men must propagate, like other animals, by the mouth. Never did oppression light the nuptial torch; never did extortion and usury spread out the genial bed. Does any one of you think that England, so wasted, would, under such a nursing attendance, so rapidly and cheaply recover ? But he is meanly acquainted with either England or India who does not know that England would a thousand times sooner resume population, fer- tility, and what ought to be the ultimate secretion from both — revenue — than such a country as the Carnatic. " The Carnatic is not by the bounty of nature a fertile soil. The general size of its cattle is proof enough that it is much other- wise. It is some days since I moved that a curious and interest- ing map kept in the India House should be laid before you.* The India House is not yet in readiness to send it ; I have therefore brought down my own copy, and there it lies for the use of any gentleman who may think such a matter worthy of his attention. It is indeed a noble map, and of noble things ; but it is decisive against the golden dreams and sanguine speculations of avarice run mad. In addition to what you know must be the case in every part of the world — the necessity of a previous provision of habita- tion, seed, stock, capital — that map will show you that the uses of the influences of Heaven itself are in that country a work of art. The Carnatic is refreshed by few or no living brooks or running streams, and it has rain only at a season ; but its product of rice exacts the use of water subject to perpetual command. This is the national bank of the Carnatic, on which it must have a perpe- tual credit, or it perishes irretrievably. For that reason, in the happier times of India, a number almost incredible of reservoirs have been made in chosen places throughout the whole country. They are formed, for the greater part, of mounds of earth and stones, with sluices of solid masonry ; the whole constructed with admirable skill and labour, and maintained at a mighty charge. In the territory contained in that map alone I have been at the * Mr. Barnard's inap of the Jaghirc. THE RESERVOIRS IN THE CARNATIC. 181 trouble of reckoning the reservoirs, and they amount to upwards of eleven hundred, from the extent of two or tlu'ee acres to five miles in circuit. From these reservoirs currents are occasionally drawn over the fields, and these water-courses again call for a con- siderable expense to keep them properly scoured and duly levelled. Taking the district in that map as a measure, there cannot be in the Carnatic and Tanjore fewer than ten thousand of these reser- voirs of the larger and middling dimensions, to say nothing of those for domestic services and the uses of religious purification. These are not the enterprises of your power, nor in a style of magnificence suited to the taste of your minister. These are the monuments of real kings, who were the fathers of their people — testators to a posterity which they embraced as their own. These are the grand sepulchres built by ambition ; but by the ambition of an insatiable benevolence, which, not contented with reigning in the dispensa- tion of happiness during the contracted term of human life, had strained, with all the reachings and graspings of a vivacious mind, to extend the dominion of their bounty beyond the hmits of nature, and to perpetuate themselves through generations of generations the guardians, the protectors, the nourishers of mankind. " Long before the late invasion, the persons who are objects of the grant of public money now before you had so diverted the supply of the pious funds of culture and population, that every where the reservoirs were fallen into a miserable decay ; but after those domestic enemies had provoked the entry of a cruel foreign foe into the country, he did not leave it until his revenge had com- pleted the destruction begun by their avarice. Few, very few indeed of these magazines of water that are not either totally destroyed, or cut through with such gaps as to require a serious attention and much cost to re-establish them, as the means of pre- sent subsistence to the people and of future revenue to the state. " What, sir, would a virtuous and enlightened ministry do on the view of the ruins of such works before them — on the view of such a chasm of desolation as that which yawned in the midst 182 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. of those countries to the north and south which still bore some vestiges of cultivation ? They would have reduced all their most necessary establishments ; they would have suspended the justest payments ; they would have employed every shilling derived from the producing to reanimate the powers of the unproductive parts. While they were performing this fundamental duty — whilst they were celebrating these mysteries of justice and humanity — they would have told the corps of fictitious creditors, whose crimes were their claims, that they must keep an awfid distance; that. they must silence their inauspicious tongues ; that they must hold off their profane, unhallowed paws from this holy work. They would have proclaimed, with a voice that should make itself heard, that on every country the first creditor is the plough ; that this origi- nal, indefeasible claim supersedes every other demand. " This is what a wise and virtuous ministry woidd have done and said : this, therefore, is what our minister could never think of saying or doing. A ministry of another kind would have first improved the country, and have thus laid a solid foundation for future opulence and future force; but on this grand point of the restoration of the country there is not one syllable to be found in the correspondence of our ministers from the first to the last. They felt nothing for a land desolated by fire, sword, and famine. Their sympathies took another direction. They were touched with pity for bribery, so long tormented with a fruitless itching of its palms ; their bowels yearned for usury, that had long missed the harvest of its returning months ; they felt for peculation, which had been for so many years raking in the dust of an empty treasury ; they were melted into compassion for rapine and oppression, licking their dry, parched, unbloody jaws. These were the objects of their solicitude ; these were the necessities for which they were studious to provide." Mr. Burke proceeds to speak of the debt of the Nabob of Arcot thus: " But my principal objection lies a good deal deeper. That USURIOUS PLUNDER BY THE SOUCAES. 1S3 debt to the Company is the pretext under which all the other debts lurk and cover themselves. That debt forms the foul, putrid mucus in which are engendered the whole brood of creeping asca- jidea — a n the endless involutions, the eternal knot added to a knot of those inexpugnable tape-worms which devour the nutri- ment and eat up the bowels of India. It is necessary, sir, you should recollect two things : First, that the nabob's debt to the Company carries no interest. In the next place, you will observe that, whenever the Company has occasion to barrow, she has always commanded whatever she thought fit at eight per cent. Carrying in your mind these two facts, attend to the process with regard to the public and private debt, and with what little appear- ance of decency they play into each other's hands a game of utter perdition to the unhappy natives of India. The nabob tails into an arrear to the Company. The presidency presses for payment ; the nabob's answer is, I have no money. Good ; but there are soucars who will supply you on the mortgage of your territories. Then steps forward some Paul Benfield ; and from his grateful compassion to the nabob, and his filial regard to the Company, he unlocks the treasures of his virtuous industry, and for a conside- ration of twenty-four or thirty-six per cent on a mortgage of the territorial revenue, becomes security to the Company for the nabob's arrear. All this intermediate usury thus becomes sanctified by the ultimate view to the Company's payment " In consequence of this double game all the territorial reve- nues have, at one time or other, been covered by those locusts, the English soucars (money-dealers). Not one single foot of the Car- natic has escaped them — a territory as large as England. 1 Hiring these operations what a scene has that country presented! The usurious European assignee supersedes the nabob's native farmer of the revenue ; the farmer Hies to the nabob's presence to claim his bargain ; whilst his servants murmur for wages, and his soldiers mutiny for pay. The mortgage to the European assignee is then resumed, and the native farmer replaced — replaced again to be 184 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. removed on the new clamour of the European assignee. Every- man of rank and landed fortune being long since extinguished, the remaining miserable last cultivator, who grows to the soil, after having his hack scored by the farmer, has it again flayed by the whip of the assignee, and is thus by a ravenous because a short- lived succession of claimants, lashed from oppressor to oppressor, whilst a single drop of blood is left as the means of extorting a single grain of com. Do not think I paint — far, very far from it ; I do not reach the fact, nor approach to it. Men of respectable condition, men equal to your substantial English yeomen, are daily tied up and scourged to answer the multiplied demands of various contending and contradictory titles, all issuing from one and the same source. Tyrannous exaction brings on servile concealment ; and that again calls forth tyrannous coercion. They move in a circle, mutually producing and produced ; till at length nothing of htmiauity is left in the government, no trace of integrity, spirit, or manliness in the people, who drag out a precarious and degraded existence under this system of outrage upon human nature. Such is the effect of the establishment of a debt to the Company, as it has hitherto been managed, and as it ever will remain, until ideas are adopted totally different from those which prevail at this time." The failure of the motion on the subject of the nabob's iniqui- tous debts, showed Burke the utter futility of such parliamentary attempts ; but he was nothing daunted ; his courage seemed to increase with defeat. He now resolved upon his boldest measure, and concentrated his whole energy to strike one terrible blow at the head and front of this offending. The Governor-general of India must be impeached and put upon his trial ; the prosecution might fail, but nevertheless the lesson would remain as a future direction and warning to those lieutenants of the Crown — those trustees of the sovereign majesty of Britain — who should have, with more or less authority, to guard the national interests, to exercise sacred functions, and to wield imperial power. BURKE LORD RECTOR OF GLASGOW UNIVERSITY. 185 Before, however, coming to the actual proceedings against Warren Hastings, it will be a relief to turn again to some more personal incidents in the life of Burke. In the April of 1784, Edmund Burke was chosen lord rector of the University of Glasgow. Having arrived in Edinburgh, he was received with marked attention by the great literati of the place, men well able to appreciate his extraordinary excellence in those pursuits which had procured for themselves so much distinction. The historians Ferguson and Robertson hailed Burke as a genius and an equal. The following account of Mr. Burke's inauguration is extracted from a paper of the time: " April 10th, 1784, the Right Honour- able Edmund Burke was installed in the office of lord rector of the University of Glasgow. He was attended by several persons of rank and eminence ; the spectators were very numerous, and testified their satisfaction by the highest marks of approbation and applause. His lordship, after taking the oaths of office, addressed the meeting in a very polite and elegant speech, suited to the occa- sion. Having attended public worship in the college chapel, he was afterwards entertained by the gentlemen of the University." On the 28th September, in the same year, a rather serious annoyance happened to Mr. Burke. His house at Beaconsfield was broken open, and plundered of a variety of plate and other valuable articles. The robbers proceeded with a degree of delibe- ration not common in such adventures. They came down from London in a phaeton, which they had hired in Oxford Street. They broke open a field-gate at the side of the road, opposite to the avenue which led to the house, and left their phaeton in a corner of tiie field. Mr. Burke was in town ; but Mrs. Burke and the rest of the family were at Beaconsfield. The rogues made tin -ir way into the house through the area; they proceeded to the place where the plate in daily use was kept, the rest being in an iron chest in a pantry, in which the butler slept. Having got one hundred and fifty pounds' worth, they retreated with their booty. ISO LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. They left behind them a match and tinder-box, a sack, a wax- taper, a fashionable cane, and an iron instrument for forcing win- dow-shutters. They also left a tea-canister, which they carried out of the house ; but they broke it open, and took out of it all the tea. The robbery was discovered about six o'clock, and a pursuit instantly set on foot, but to no purpose. It was afterwards found that they had crossed the country to Harrow, and from Harrow returned to town through Islington. The perpetrators were sus- pected to have been a discharged servant and accomplices ; but the affair remained a mystery, and the culprits were never discovered. Little more than two months after this, Burke sustained a real affliction. His great friend, the constant companion of his fortunes, who regarded and appreciated him so dearly, Dr. John- son, died on the 13th December, 1784. During the final illness of the excellent and venerable sage, Burke was frequently beside the bed of sickness. The last time he saw his Mend alive he was visiting him in company with Mr. Windham and some other gen- tlemen. The hand of death was visibly on Samuel Johnson ; and Burke said to him, " I am afraid, my dear sir, such a number of us may be oppressive to you." " No, sir," replied Johnson, " it is not so ; and I must be in a wretched state indeed, when your company would not be a delight to me." Burke, bursting into tears, ex- claimed, " My dear sir, you have always been too good to me." His feelings overpowered his further utterance, and he left the apart- ment. The death of Johnson deprived him of another interview. Johnson's lofty spirit, unbroken by old age and compli- cated disease, used to strike Burke as much as the intellectual powers of the man. He suggested to Boswell, as applicable to Johnson, what Cicero in his Cato Major says of Appius : " In- tentum enim anirnum quasi arcum habebat, nee languescens suc- cumbebat senectuti:" repeating at the same time the following noble words in the same passages : '• Ita enim senectus honesta est, si se ipsa defendit, si jus suum retinet, si nemini emancipata est, si usque ad extremum vitas vindicat jus suum." FUNERAL OF DE. JOHNSON. 187 At the funeral of his illustrious friend in Westminster Abbey, on the 20th December, 1784, Burke, together with Sir Joseph Banks, Mr. Windham, Mr. Langton, Sir Charles Bunbury, and Mr. Column, bore the pall. The other chief mourners were Sir Joshua Reynolds, Sir John Hawkins, and the deceased's faithful negro servant and principal legatee, Francis Barber. Dr. Horsley, General Paoli, Mr. Stevens, and Mr. Malone, the Chapter of Westminster, the remaining members of the Literary Club then in London, and a host of distinguished persons also attended. Burke, in the anguish of his grief for the loss of John- son, uttered the following sentence : "He has made a chasm which not only notliing can fill up, but which nothing has a ten- dency to fill up. Johnson is dead. Let us go to the next best : there is nobody. No man can be said to put the world in mind of Juhnson." To return to Eastern politics. The impeachment of Hastings may not be inappropriately prefaced by a brief memoir of the subject of the trial. Warren Hastings was descended from an ancient and hon- ourable family seated at Daylesford, in the comity of Worces- ter, where his ancestors for many years possessed an estate, which shortly prior tu Warren's birth passed from them by sale. Hastings was burn in December 1732, at the village of Churchill in Oxfordshire, where his grandfather was clergyman of the parish. His father died young, and the charge of him fell to the lot of an uncle, and subsequently to a distant relative. He re- ceived his education at Westminster School. There he very early exhibited marks of genius, and attracted the notice of Dr. Nichols, the master. His acquisitions in literature did credit as well to the preceptor as the pupil ; and when the latter left West- minster, he was esteemed an excellent scholar. Li 1750 he was appointed a Writer in the service of the East India Company at Bengal; and soon after his arrival applied himself with great assi- 183 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. duity and attention to acquire the Persian and Hindostan lan- guages, in which he succeeded to so great a degree, that he was selected as a fit person to attempt the establishing of a factory in the interior parts of Bengal, where no European had hitherto appeared. Although the scheme proved unsuccessful, he conciliated WARREN HASTINGS. the esteem of the natives in such a manner, that when he was made prisoner by the troops of Surajah Dowlah at the taking of Calcutta, they showed their respect by treating him with singular humanity and attention. This lenity enabled Hastings to serve Clive, by giving him information of what was passing in Surajah Dowlalrs court. The fortune of war soon changed ; and Surajah Dowlah, who had MEMOIR OF WARREN HASTINGS. 189 aimed at the destruction of the English, was defeated, dethroned, and in the end murdered by his successor, Meer Jaffier, hi whose court it became necessary for the Company to have a resident minister. Lord Give selected Hastings for this important office. He deported himself in it so as to give general satisfaction, and he became a member of administration in Bengal. In 17G5 he returned to England, where he remained four years, and then went again to India, forming while on his passage thither an acquaintance, and subsequently a marriage, with a lady named Imhoff. In 1769 he obtained the appointment of second in council at Madras. In 1772 the Directors named him Governor of Bengal. The distresses of the East India Company at that period, arising from every species of mismanagement both at home and abroad, were at a great height. After the passing of the Regu- lating Act in 1773, Hastings, as already stated, became Governor- general of India. He continued in this government until 1785. During his long tenure of office, there is no doubt that Hastings had to encounter serious difficulties, and acted on many occa- sions with consummate skill and ability ; but his great public sin was this : he would increase and strengthen the power of the Company at the expense of the native princes of India, and to the detriment of the character of England for good faith and hu- manity. He was guilty of cruel oppression and fold injustice to obtain his ends. Let what will be said in his favour, the following events cer- tainly took place under his administration. The governor had been forbidden by the East India Company to engage in offensive wars. The Nabob of Oude, Surajah Dow- lah, nevertheless was, in consideration of a sum of money, assisted by Hastings in the unjustifiable and murderous ' reduction and extirpation of a brave, honourable, and independent people called the Rohillas. English judges had taken cognisance of causes between native 190 LIFE OF EDMUND BUKKE. landholders not in the service of the Company, and by act of par- liament not within the jurisdiction of an English court; they had proceeded in several cases to inflict fines and severe penalties on those who refused to recognise their authority. Nuncomar, a Hindoo, and a Brahmin of the highest caste, whose chief offence lay in his being a dangerous and deadly foe of Hastings, was in the following manner got rid of. He was, at the instigation, no doubt, of the Governor-general, tried before Hastings' friend, the mere creature of Hastings' will, Sir Elijah Impey, and condemned and hanged on a statute against forgery, the 2d of George II. c. 25 ; an act so strictly confined and appro- priated to England and its paper currency, that, by its last clause, it was especially provided, that nothing in the act contained should extend, or be construed to extend, to that part of Great Britain called Scotland. The 45th Geo. III. c. 89, which carried the operation of this 2 Geo. H. c. 25 even so far as to all Great Bri- tain, did not pass till some years after. The evidence against Nuncomar, if not palpably perjured, was at least very suspicious. Neither he, nor the person whose name was forged, were subject to the jurisdiction of the English court. By the laws of India, forgery was not punishable capitally. Thus a man was put to death by a court to which he was not amenable, by laws which should not touch him, and for a crime not capital in India. Thus was the Maharajah Nuncomar, a patrician of sacred rank among the Hindoos, hanged up by the neck, illegally, in view and amid the groans of a vast multitude of his own people. The charge against Hastings relative to Nuncomar, it should be observed, formed, from legal difficulties connected with it, no part of the parliamentary impeachment. A principle avowed and acknowledged by Hastings in the ma- nagement of the revenue had gone forth throughout the Company's territories, " that the ruling power in India was the absolute pro- prietor of the soil ; that therefore the zemindars (or landholders) w T ere subject to every exaction they could possibly bear, and which HASTINGS' TREATMENT OF THE RAJAH OF BEXAEES. 191 the English government chose to require." In the compact be- tween the Nabob of Oucle and the Governor-general, it was settled that Cheyt-Sing, Rajah of Benares, a prince tributary of Oude, should transfer one-half of his tribute to the India Company ; that the zemindary of (or landed right to) Benares, which had de- scended to him from his father, should be guaranteed to him by the Company on paying that tribute ; the Company pledging its faith that no encroachments should ever be made on his rights by itself. This faith was pledged for the Company by the signa- ture of "Warren Hastings. The rights guaranteed by this pledge were, the undisturbed possession of the zemindary of Benares, on the due performance of his part of the covenant — the pay- ment monthly of a sum amounting annually to about 260,000^. Cheyt-Sing was uniformly punctual in the stipulated payments, as Hastings himself admitted. On the breaking out of the war with France in 1778, the Governor-general required from Cheyt-Sing a contribution not stipulated in the agreement, viz. the establishment and maintenance of three battalions of sepoys. Estimating the expense of the required troops at about 55,O00Z. (five lacs of rupees), he ordered the rajah to pay that sum immediately into the treasury of Calcutta. Cheyt-Sing pleading inability to obey this order of payment beyond agreement, prayed for delay and for monthly instalments. That accommodation was not allowed him; he was compelled to pay the whole of the exaction within three months. The same plunder was made the two succeeding years, and the rajah was obliged to submit. In 1781 an additional levy of thirteen hundred horse was insisted on by Hastings. The rajah equipped part, but declared Ms inability to furnish the whole of tin; requisition. Mr. Hastings deigned no answer to this represen- tation; but proceeded to Benares, accused the rajah of a conspiracy to stir up rebellion, and finally put him under arrest. The rajah's subjects conceiving their lord, to whom they were warmly at- tached, to be in danger, attacked the guards, and forcing their way through them with great slaughter, rescued the rajah, and 192 LIFE OF EDMUND BUEKE. conveyed him to a distant place of refuge. Thence he sent a sup- pliant letter to the Governor-general ; Hastings made no reply, but attacked the troops of Benares as if in a state of rebellion, and soon reduced tbat whole country, and took violent possession of its capital. The rajah retired into banishment. The extent of the cruelty and outrage of this unjustifiable attack upon, and seizure of, a princely metropolis, is considerably increased when one recollects that the beautiful city of Benares on the Ganges is a holy place to all of Brahmin faith. Its streets, its temples, and its rivers are sacred in the eyes not only of its inhabitants, but of the worshippers of Bramah far and near, who come in constant pilgrimage thither. It is the cherished locality of their great de- votion — the Jerusalem of the 'Hindoos. This city the horror- struck castes of Hindostan saw subjected to the sacrilegious spo- liation of Warren Hastings, in the face of every notion of right and reason. But this was not enough. The plundered trea- sures of Cheyt-Sing and of Benares proving less than was ex- pected, another piece of iniquity was carried out. Hastings declared it to be his opinion, that what he called Cheyt-Sing's rebellion was only a part of a grand combination against the Company. Bumours, he pretended, had spread that the Begums, the grandmother and mother of the Nabob of Oude, were concerned in this conspiracy, aud had fomented the insur- rection in Benares. Certain jaghires (treasures) had been left by the late nabob for the support of his widow and mother, and the property had been secured to those princesses by the guarantee of the Supreme Council of Calcutta. After Cheyt-Sing's expulsion, the Nabob of Oude, a sellish and cowardly tyrant, met Hast- ings at Chunar, six leagues from Benares, and the following villany was concocted between them. A treaty was concluded by which the nabob was permitted to resume the treasures, — to seize upon the property of his parents that was bequeathed to them by his father, and guaranteed by the British Council of Bengal, of which the principal member now sanctioned the conns- MR. DUXDAS's MOTION AGAINST HASTINGS. 193 cation. The nabob acknowledged a great debt to the Company ; and as his mother and grandmother were very rich in money, jewels, and other effects, then wealth was no doubt a very effi- cient and productive fund for the liquidation of his debts. It was, besides, alleged, that the Begums were likely to use their treasures to very pernicious purposes. There could not be more effectual means for preventing them from the misapplication of money, than leaving them none to misapply. The payment to the Company of the treasure so confiscated would, no doubt, add to the currency ; it was therefore, in the view of emolument, a very desirable object. The opinion that the Begums were likely to make a bad use of then money had for its support numbers of affidavits, which Hastings and his ever-ready chief-justice, Impey, professed to credit. The matter of the affidavits, mostly general, stated that the Begums were disaffected to the Company ; and the evidence, mere hearsay, reported that they fomented the rebellion of Cheyt-Sing. No specific proofs were adduced to show that they were disloyal to the English, or were advisers of the rebellion of the rajah, or, indeed, that there was any rebellion to foment. Hastings, however, professed to think otherwise ; and at last not only permitted, but urged the nabob to seize the property of his mother and grandmother. Middleton, Hastings' agent in Oude, was instructed to insist on the nabob's resumption of the treasures, and found, to use his own words, much trifling evasion and many puerile excuses on the part of the nabob, when admonished to chaw from Ins relatives. At length, however, the nabob con- sented ; the act of plunder was performed with treachery and violence, and with extreme expedition and eagerness. The prin- cesses, before immensely rich, were suddenly left almost without the necessaries of life. Hastings and his government got the money. Lastly, presents had been accepted by Governor -general Hastings, although contrary to the orders of his employers and the tenour of his oath ; and to his conduct the desperate war with the Mahrattas and with Hyder Ali was imputed. o 191 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. On the 28th May, 1782, Mr. Dundas moved, and the House of Commons adopted, the following resolution : " That "Warren Hastings, Esq., Governor-general of Bengal, and William Hornby, Esq., President of the Council at Bombay, having in sundry instances acted in a manner repugnant to the honour and policy of this nation, and thereby brought great cala- mities on India, and enormous expenses on the East India Com- pany, it is the duty of the directors of the said Company to pursue all legal and effectual means for the removal of the said governor- general and president from their respective offices, and to recall them to Great Britain." In consequence of this resolution of the House of Commons, the directors took the necessary steps for carrying it into effect ; but as their proceedings were subject to a general court of proprie- tors, the friends of Mi*. Hastings had recourse to that expedient, and on the 31st of October, 1782, the order of the court of directors for his recall was rescinded by a large majority. Finally, however, Hastings voluntarily resigned, and decided on leaving India. He set sail from Calcutta on the 9th February, 1785, and on the 16th June following he arrived in London. During his passage he wrote a poetic paraphrase of Horace's ode " Otium Divos," the commencement and ending of which are as follow : For ease the harassed seaman prays, When equinoctial tempests raise The Cape's surrounding wave ; When hanging o'er the reef he hears The cracking mast, and sees or fears, Beneath, his wat'ry grave. For ease the slow Mahratta spoils, And hardier Seik erratic toils, While both their ease forego ; For ease, which neither gold can buy, Nor robes, nor gems, which oft belie The cover'd heart, bestow. ****** To thee, perhaps, the Fates may give — I wish they may — in health to live, HASTINGS ACCUSED IN THE COMMONS. 105 Herds, flocks, and fruitful fields ; Thy vacant hours in mirth to shine ; With these the Muse, already thine, Her present bounties yields. For me, O Shore, I only claim, To merit, not to seek for, fame, The good and just to please ; A state above the fear of want, Domestic love, Heaven's choicest grant, Health, leisure, peace, and ease. This peace Hastings found not in England ; for on the 20th June, 1785, just four days after his arrival, Edmund Burke gave notice in the House of Commons, " That if no other gentleman would undertake the business, he would at a future day make a motion respecting the conduct of a gentleman just returned from India."' Thus the matter rested until the opening of the next session of parliament, the 24th January, 1786, when Major Scott, memher for West Looe, the agent of Hastings, observing Mr. Burke in his place, begged leave to remind the house that Mr. Hastings had been in England some months ; and he therefore called upon Mr. Burke to produce the charges which he had pledged himself in the preceding session to bring forward against Mr. Hastings, and requested Mm to fix the earliest possible time for the discussion of them. Mr. Burke's haughty reply to the Major was the relation of the anecdote of the great Duke of Parma, who being challenged by Henry IV. of France to bring his forces into open field, and instantly decide their disputes, answered with a smile, " that he knew very well what he had to do, and was not come so far to be directed by an enemy." The promised proceedings, however, began the following 17th of February, when Mr. Burke moved for a copy of the corre- spondence which had passed, from January 1785 to January 1786, between Warren Hastings, Esq., and the Court of Directors of the East India Company, including his correspondence since his arri- val. This first motion produced a long debate, that turned chiefly, however, upon a point of order with respect to the regularity of 19G LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. the proceedings. On the 4th April after, Mr. Burke in his place accused Warren Hastings, Esq., late Governor-general of Bengal, of sundry high crimes and misdemeanours. He delivered, at the time, the first nine articles of his charge, and the rest in the course of the ensuing week, amounting in all to twenty-two, and presenting to the house several serious accusations of high crimes and misdemeanours against the said Warren Hastings. On April 2Gth, Major Scott moved for leave to bring up a petition from Warren Hastings, Esq., praying to be heard by himself against the matter of the charges now exliibited to the house against liim, and also for a copy of those charges ; which was agreed to. The petition was brought up and read at the table. May 1st, the Speaker, in consequence of the resolution of the house to hear the defence before going into committee to examine evidence, called Mr. Hastings to the bar, who begged the house would indulge him with the hearing of what he had drawn out in his defence. To this the house acceded ; and Mr. Hastings went on reading a written defence for about two boms ; when becoming fatigued, he was relieved by his private secretary, Mr. Markham, son of the Archbishop of York, and afterwards successively by two clerks. This defence took up two days in its delivery. Mr. Burke ex- pressed satisfaction with the minute manner hi which it was couched ; and Mr. Hastings obtained leave to. deliver into the housje the minutes and papers from which he had read answers to the several charges. The house having then gone into committee, proceeded to examine the proof of each charge ; and on the 1st June, Mr. Burke, at the urgent desire of the house, entered upon his first charge against Hastings, which was an inquiry into the Rohilla war. The debate relative to it was carried on with great warmth till about three o'clock in the ensuing morning, when a motion of ad- journment was put and carried. The following day Philip Francis resumed the discussion. It would be vain to attempt to convey even a faint idea of the wonderful displays of oratory and argument which were exhibited. At seven the next morning the gallery was IIASTIXGS DECLARED IMPEACHABLE. 197 cleared, and there appeared — for the charge, 67 ; against it, 119. Thus there was a majority of fifty-two in favour of Mr. Hastings, that his conduct in the Rohilla war was not impeachable ; aud thus far he was safe. The real blow was struck on the next charge, which, on the 13th June following, was moved by Fox, relative to the rajah of Benares. In the debate on it, Mr. Pitt took a decisive part against Mr. Hastings ; aud, after a speech of several hours, concluded with declaring, " that, upon the whole, Mr. Hastings' conduct in the transaction alluded to had been so cruel, unjust, and oppressive, that it was impossible he, as a man of honour or honesty, or having any regard to faith and conscience, could any longer resist ; and therefore he had fully satisfied his conscience that Warren Hastings had been guilty of such enormities and mis- demeanours as constituted a crime sufficient to call upon the justice of the House to impeach him." At half after twelve the gallery was cleared, and the committee divided ; aud the result showed one hundred and eighteen votes for the motion, and seventy-nine against it. Thus, by a majority of thirty-nine, it was declared that Hastings was impeachable of high crimes and for misdemeanours hi his conduct to Cheyt-Sing, rajah of Benares. During the course of these proceedings, another subject relative to the administration of the Company's affairs in India underwent a warm discussion in both houses of parliament. This was a bill brought in by Mr. Dundas for amending Mr. Pitt's Regulating Act of 1781, by en- larging the powers of the g)vernor-general, restricting tluse of his council, and uniting to his office that of commander-in-chief. Mr. Burke, with strenuous eloquence, opposed this bill; nevertheless it passed into a law. Parliament was soon afterwards, on the 11th July, prorogued ; but on its again meeting in the following year, the charges were proceeded with. That relative to the spoliation, through the nabob of Oude and Hastings' joint contrivance, of the Begums, the nib >l/s female relatives, was opened by Sheridan in a speech which filled his hearers with amazement and admiration. The subject of this charge was peculiarly fitted for pathetic 198 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. powers of oratory ; and never were they displayed with greater skill, force, and elegance than upon this occasion. For five hours and a half, Mr. Sheridan kept the attention of the house — which, from the expectation of the day, was uncommonly crowded — fasci- nated hy his eloquence ; and when he sat down, members, peers, and strangers, all involuntarily joined in a tumult of applause, and adopted a new and irregular mode of expressing their appro- bation, by loudly and repeatedly clapping their hands. Mr. Burke declared it to be the most astonishing effort of eloquence, argu- ment, and wit united, of which there is any record or tradition. Mr. Fox said, all that he had ever heard, all that he had ever read, when compared with it, dwindled into nothing, and vanished RICHARD BRINSLET SHERIDAN. like vapour before the sun. Mr. Pitt acknowledged that it sur- passed the eloquence of ancient or modern times, and possessed every thing that genius or art could furnish to agitate and control the human mind. The effects it produced were proportioned to its merits. After a considerable suspension of the debate, one of the Mends of Mr. Hastings, with some difficulty, obtained for a THE COMMITTEE OF MANAGEMENT. 199 short time a hearing ; but finding the house too strongly affected fey what they had heard, to listen to him with favour, sat down again. Several members confessed that they had come strongly prepossessed in favour of the person accused, and imagined nothing less than a miracle could have wrought so entire a revolution in then- sentiments. Others declared that though they could not resist the conviction that flashed upon their minds, yet they wished to have time to cool ; and though they were persuaded that it would require another miracle to produce another change in their opinions, yet, for the sake of decorum, they thought it proper that the debate should be adjourned. Mr. Taylor, one of the managers, strongly opposed this proposition, contending that it was not less absurd than unparliamentary to defer coming to a vote for no other reason that had been alleged than because the members were too firmly convinced; but Mr. Pitt falling in with the gene- ral opinion, the debate was adjourned a little after one o'clock. On sixteen of the twenty principal charges, Hastings was de- clared impeachable by the committee of the whole house. After the house itself had resumed, and the report of the committee had been brought up, and its resolutions read and agreed to, a secret committee was appointed to prepare articles of impeachment on the report. That committee — the committee of management, in f ac t — consisted of the following distinguished persons: Edmund Burke, Charles James Fox, Richard Brinsley Sheridan, William Windham, Sir James Erskine, the Eight Hon. Thomas Pelham, the Hon. Andrew St. John, John Anstruther, Welbore Ellis, Wil- liam Adam, M. A. Taylor, the Eight Hon. Frederick Montagu, Sir Grey Cooper, Sir Gilbert Elliot, Dudley Long, Lord Maitland, Charles Grey, the Hon. George Augustus North, Col. Fit/Patrick, and General Burgoyne. The first four of these managers it is needless to describe : the following account will explain who the others were. Sir James St. Clair Erskine, Bart., was a general officer, and became after- wards second Earl of Eosslyn at the death of his maternal uncle, 200 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. Alexander Wedderburn, Lord Loughborough and Earl ofRosslyn, the Lord Chancellor : Sir James commanded a division of the British army in the expedition to Walcheren ; he died 18th Jan- uary, 1837. . . The Right Hon. Thomas Pelham was M.P. for Sussex, and was created in 1801 Earl of Chichester. . . The Hon. Andrew St. John became in 1805 thirteenth Baron St. John. . . . John Anstruther, who was a distinguished lawyer, was constituted Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Bengal, and created a baro- net of Great Britain in 1798 : in 1808 he succeeded his brother in the old Nova Scotia baronetcy of Anstruther of that ilk, and died in 1811. . . . Welbore Ellis was brother of the first Viscount Clifden. . . . The Right Hon. William Adam, of Blair- Adam, was Lord Chief Commissioner of the Jury Court of Scotland. . . . Michael Angelo Taylor was a distinguished Chancery reformer : he died, father of the House of Commons, in 1834. . . . The Right Hon. Frederick Montagu, of Papplewick, in Northampton- shire, already mentioned in this biography as writing the poetical inscription in the Rockingham mausoleum, was a Lord of the Treasury in 1782 and in 1783. . . . Sir Grey Cooper, Bart., of Gogar, was a distinguished political writer, and author of " A Pair of Spectacles for short-sighted Politicians :" he was appointed by Lord Rockingham secretary of the Treasury, which he held for several years : his first wife was Margaret Grey, aunt of the late Earl Grey; Sir Grey Cooper died 30th July, 1801. ... Sir Gdbert Elliot, Bart., was afterwards Viceroy of Corsica: he went as Envoy Extraordinary to Vienna in 1770, was created Baron Minto in 1797, became President of the Board of Control in 1806, and filled eventually the high office of Governor-general of India. On his return he was made Earl of Minto. . . . Dudley Long was second son of Charles Long, Esq., of Hurts Hall, by Mary his wife, daughter and heir of Dudley North, Esq., of Glemham Hall, Suffolk, nephew of Francis, first Lord Guilford. Mr. Long took subsequently the surname of North : he married Sophia, sister of the late Earl of Yarborough, and died without issue in 1829, aged HASTINGS' TRIAL IX WESTMINSTER HALL. 201 eighty. . . . Lord Maitland was son and heir-apparent of the Earl of Lauderdale : he succeeded to the Scottish earldom in 1789, and was made a peer of England in 1806 : his son is the present Earl of Lauderdale. . . . Charles Grey, a distinguished statesman, became in 1807 second Earl Grey, and Premier in 1830. He died 17th July, 1815. . . . The Hon. George Augustus North was the eldest son of Lord North, the minister : he succeeded his father as third Earl of Guilford in 1792, and died in 1802 : his only sur- viving child is Susan, Baroness North. . . . Colonel, afterwards General FitzPatrick, a privy councillor, second son of the Earl of Upper Ossory, had been secretary of war in 1783 : Ms sisters were Mary, wife of Stephen second Lord Holland, and Louisa, wife of William first Marquess of Lansdowne. . . . The Bight Hon. General John Burgoyne, M.P. for Preston, was commander of the British forces in America in 1777: he was a dramatic writer of some repute — the author of the " Lord of the Manor," and other plays. Mr. Burke had proposed that Philip Francis should also be on this committee ; but as Francis was known to have been at per- sonal variance, and to have even fought a duel, in which he was wounded, with Hastings, h's name was rejected on a division. Mr. Burke was much annoyed at this. He declared, in the pre- sence of God and of the world, that he looked upon the business of the impeachment as destroyed, seeing he was deprived of the assistance of the m tn who of all persons was, from local know- ledge, the best qualified to aid in the undertaking. He said he would proceed, however, let the event be what it would. On the articles of impeachment being brought up, and the im- peachment itself on those articles being agreed to, the house forth- with directed Mr. Burke to go to the bar of the House of Lords and impeach Warren Hastings. He accordingly did so on the 9th May, L787. Two days afterwards Hastings was arrested by the sergeant-at-arms, and delivered into the custody of the gen- tleman-usher nf the black rod. Be was, however, immediately admitted to bail, his sureties being Messrs. Sullivan and Sumner. PLAN OF THE COURT AT TEtE TRIAL OF WARREN HASTINGS. I I 1 J I 1 X ■s. a, Passage to the House of Lords. B, Court of King's Bench. C, Court of Chancery. D D, Seats for Peers' tickets. E, The Lord Chancellor, under a rich canopy. F, The royal box, lined with crim- son ; seats covered with the same ; and a rich velvet chair for his Majesty if he should come ; places for the Lords-in- Waiting, &c. G, The Princes' box, lined with crimson ; seats covered with the same, for his Royal High- ness the Prince of Wales, the Duke of York, &c. H H, Heralds. 1 1, Judges, seated on woolpacks. J, Masters in Chancery. K K, Earls. L L, Bishops. M M, Viscounts. N, Great officers of state. o, Dukes. P, Marquesses. Q Q, Barons. R, The repeater. s, The prisoner, Warren Hastings, Esq. T, Place for each witness giving evi- dence. Prisoner's counsel. Counsel for the prosecution. Usher of the black rod. Committee of management for the House of Commons, Mr. Burke at their head. Short-hand writer. The Lord Great Chamberlain's box for ladies. Attendants on the Boyal Family. Foreign ministers. Speaker of the House of Com- mons. d d d. Seats for the members of the House of Commons. e e e, Seats for peeresses. /, Duke of Newcastle's seats. , C, CEREMONiAX OF COMMENCING THE TRIAL. 203 The Lords decided to proceed to trial in the following year, 1788, ou the 13th February ; and on that day the memorable in- vestigation commenced in Westminster Hall, winch was fitted up With seats and places, marked out for the occasion as in the accom- panying plan. At ten o'clock of the 13th February the House of Lords met ; and by eleven a message w r as sent to the Commons, that the house was directly going to adjourn to "Westminster Hall to proceed upon the trial of Warren Hastings, Esq. An answer was immediately returned that the Commons were ready to substantiate then charges. The Lords were then called over by the clerk, and arrayed by Sir Isaac Heard, principal king-of- arnis, when upwards of two hundred proceeded in order to West- minster Hall. Previous to their lordships' approach to the hall, about eleven o'clock, the Queen, with the Princesses Elizabeth, Augusta, and Mary, made their appearance in the Duke of New- castle's gallery, attended by the Duchess of Ancaster, Lady Hol- derness, and Lord Aylesbury. Her Majesty was dressed in a fawn-coloured satin, her head-chess plain, with a very slender sprinkling of diamonds. In the royal box were the Duchess of Gloucester and her son the young prince. The ladies were all in morning- dresses, a few with feathers and variegated flowers in their head-dress, but not so remarkable as to attract public atten- tion. Mrs. FitzHerbert was in the royal box. The Dukes of Cumberland, Gloucester, and York, and the Prince of Wales, with then trains, followed the Chancellor, and closed the procession. Upwards of two hundred of the Commons, with the speaker, were hi the gallery. The managers — Burke, Charles Fox, and all — were in court-dresses. But a very few of the other members of the House of Commons were full dressed ; some of them were in boots. Then; seats were covered with green cloth ; the rest of the building was in red cloth. Mr. Hastings, when the trial began, stood. On amotion from a peer, the Chancellor allowed, as a favour, that the prisoner should have a chair ; and he then sat the whole time, except rising occa- 204 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. sionally when he spoke to his counsel. Hastings' counsel were Edward Law (afterwards Lord Ellenborough, and Chief-Justice of the Court of Kings Bench), Mr. Plomer (afterwards Sir Thomas Plomer, Master of the Rolls), and Mr. Dallas (afterwards Sir Ro- bert Dallas, Chief-Justice of the Court of Common Pleas). The counsel for the Commons were Dr. Scott, Dr. Laurence, Mr. Mansfield, Mr. Piggott (afterwards Sir Arthur Piggott, Attorney- general), Mr. Richard Burke, junior, and Mr. Douglas, the well- known law-reporter (afterwards Lord Glenbervie). A party of horse-guards, under the command of a field-officer, with a captain's party from the horse-grenadiers, attended daily during the trial. A body of three hundred foot-guards also kept the avenues clear, and a considerable number of constables were in waiting for the purpose of taking disturbers or peace-breakers into custody. As soon as then- lordships were seated in the lower chamber, the Lord Chancellor asked leave for the judges to be covered. At twelve the court was opened, and the sergeant-at-arms, with a very audible voice, made the usual proclamation ; after which, in old- fashioned English, he cried out : " Warren Hastings, Esq., come forth in court to save thee and thy bail, otherwise the recognisance of thou and thy bail will be forfeited." Mr. Hastings immediately appeared at the bar with his two sureties, Mr. Sullivan and Mr. Sumner, and dropped on his knees, when the Lord Chancellor signified that he might rise. He seemed very infirm, and much indisposed. He was dressed in a plain poppy-coloured suit of clothes. After Mr. Hastings appeared at the bar, a proclamation as follows was made : " Whereas charges of high crimes and misdemeanours have been exhibited by the knights, citizens, and burgesses in parlia- ment assembled, in the name of themselves and of all the commons of Great Britain, against Warren Hastings, Esq., all persons con- cerned are to take notice that he now stands on his trial, and they may come forth in order to make good the said charges." bueke's opexing address. 205 Proclamation being made, the Lord Chancellor (Edward, Lord Thurlow) rose and addressed the prisoner as follows : " Warren Hastings, — You are called upon, after every expe- dient allowance, for your defence. You have had bail ; you have counsel. Much time also has been granted you, becoming well the circumstances of your case ; for the matter in the charges is most momentous, and the dates are remote since the occurrences in those charges alleged against you are said to have been com- mitted. These advantages you must understand while you feel. You are to deem them not an indulgence of this house, but the fair claim of right — a concession of nothing but what you have in com- mon with all around you — what every British subject may ask, and every British tribunal must allow. Conduct your defence, therefore, in a manner that may befit your station, and the magni- tude of the charges against you. Estimate rightly the high cha- racter of those you have to answer — the Commons of Great Britain — who at once, perhaps, attach likelihood to doubt, and enforce authority certainly on accusation." To which Mr. Hastings made almost verbatim the following answer : " My Lords, — I am come to this high tribunal equally im- pressed with a confidence in my own integrity, and in the justice of the court before which I stand." This ceremony being over, the reading of the charges and answers by the clerks of court was proceeded with. This and other preliminary forms lasted two days. On the third day, the court being seated, and Mr. Hastings appearing at the bar, the Lord Chancellor demanded who was ready on behalf of the Com- mons to substantiate the charges. Edmund Burke immediately rose and made his obeisance to the court ; every eye was at this moment riveted upon him. " He stood forth," he said, " at the command of the Commons of Great Britain, as the accuser of Warren Hastings." 20G LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. Mr. Burke then stopped for above a minute, at the end of which he began his memorable speech, one of the most stupendous pieces of oratory on record. Expression, perspicacity, argument, pathos, — all was admirable in that marvellous harangue. In the course of what he said, he led the ignorant to the most familiar acquaintance with the origin of the crimes and the evils of India, and he astonished the learned with the new aspect which he gave to the whole, after it had been so long agitated and so thorougldy discussed. He apostrophised the august tribunal before which he stood — congratulated his country on possessing so powerful an in- strument of justice, and so authoritative a corrector of abuse, which he hoped no corruptions would taint, no special pleading nor Old Bailey prevarication would be able to undermine. He stated that the subject-matter of the present impeachment had been in progress of investigation and inquiry for nearly fourteen years before the Commons of England ; that the result was their having found ample reason to conclude that Mr. Hastings ought, in justice to the millions who had lived under bis government in Asia, and in fairness to the national character, which he appeared to have dis- graced by his conduct in the exalted station of Governor-general of India, to be put upon his trial. He then went into a general view of the history of Hindostan, and of its particular events as affected by English enterprise and English rapine. He enume- rated and described the various ranks of English society in India, and carried them through their several gradations of writer, factor, junior-merchant and senior-merchant, up to the state-officers in the service. He passed from this to the Indian character, and chew the picture of a Banyan in the most forcible and glowing colours. He next presented a short but ably drawn account of the people, religion, manners, and revolutions of the Gentoo tribes — their di- vision into castes, their local religion and prejudices, the irruption and change made by the Mahomedan, the revolution accomplished by the Tartar Tamerlane, and the slow but more portentous con- sequences of the English inroad. When he described the suffer- REFUTATION OF HASTINGS' ALLEGED EXCUSE, 207 ings of the native Hindoos under the government of Mr. Hastings, he so worked upon the feelings of his audience, that the court re- peatedly called out " Hear, hear !" At half after two he concluded his exordium, and then there was an adjournment to the next day. The ensuing morning Mr. Burke proceeded ; and after surmising what possible excuses or palliations ]\Lr. Hastings might adduce in his defence, he came to the plea, which the accused had urged, that the local customs of Hindostan required the exercise of arbi- trary power. " Hastings," he said, " Hastings, the lieutenant of a British monarch, claiming absolute dominion ! From whom, in the name of all that was strange, could he derive, or how had he the audacity to claim, such authority ? He could not have de- rived it from the East India Company, for they had it not to con- fer. He could not have received it from his sovereign, for the sovereign had it not to bestow. It could not have been given by either house of parliament — for it was unknown to the British constitution ! Yet Mr. Hastings, acting under the assumption of this power, had avowed his rejection of British acts of parliament, had gloried in the success which he pretended to derive from their violation, and had on every occasion attempted to justify the ex- ercise of arbitrary power in its greatest extent. Having thus avowedly acted in opposition to the laws of Great Britain, he sought a sliield in vain in other laws and other usages. Would he appeal to the Mahomedan law for his justification ? In the whole Koran there was not a single text which could justify the powers he had assumed. Would he appeal to the Gentoo code ? Vain there the effort also ; a system of stricter justice, or more pure morality, did not exist. It was therefore equal whether he fled for shelter to a British court of justice or a Gentoo pagoda ; lie in either instance stood c .nvieted as a daring violator of the laws. And what, my lords, is opposed to all this practice of tyrants and usurpers, which Mr. Hastings takes for his rule and guidance? lie endeavours to find deviations from legal govern- ment, and then instructs his counsel to say that I have asserted 208 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. there is no sucli thing as arbitrary power in the East. . . . But, my lords, we all know that there has been arbitrary power in India ; that tyrants have usurped it ; and that in some instances princes, otherwise meritorious, have violated the liberties of the people, and have been lawfully deposed for such violation. I do not deuy that there are robberies on Hounslow Heath ; that there are such things as forgeries, burglaries, and murders ; but I say that these acts are against law, and that whoever commits them commits illegal acts. AVhen a man is to defend himself against a charge of crime, it is not instances of similar violation of law that are to be the standard of his defence. A man may as well say, ' I robbed upon Hounslow Heath, but hundreds robbed there before me :' to which I answer, ' The law has forbidden you to rob there, and I will hang you for having violated the law, notwithstanding the long list of similar violations which you have produced as precedents.' No doubt princes have violated the laws of this country; they have suffered for it. Nobles have violated the law ; then privileges have not protected them from punishment. Common people have violated the law ; they have been hanged for it. I know no human being exempt from the law. The law is a security of the people of England ; it is the security of the people of India ; it is the security of every person that is governed, and of every person that governs. There is but one law for all, namely, that law which governs all law, the law of our Creator, the law of humanity, justice, equity — the law of na- ture and of nations. So far as any laws fortify this primeval law, and give it more precision, more energy, more effect by then de- clarations, such laws enter into the sanctuary, and participate in the sacredness of its character. But the man who quotes as pre- cedents the abuses of tyrants and robbers, pollutes the very foun- tain of justice, destroys the foundations of all law, and thereby removes the only safeguard against evil men, whether governing or governed — the guard which prevents governors from becoming tyrants, and the governed from becoming rebels." CRUELTIES OF DEBI SING. 209 Mr. Burke continued the whole of that day to open the charges. The next day he reached to a portion of his speech which pro- duced a comhined effect of awe and grandeur. This was when he spoke of the horrors that ensued from the appointment, hy Hast- ings, of the infamous Gunga Govin Sing as the native confidential agent of the Governor-general, and the secretary of his council. Debi Sing, Gunga's partner in spoliation, and second only to him- self ha iniquity, was appointed hy him to farm the revenue of a large district. This miscreant resolved, by plunder and rapine of every sort, to make the most of his bargain. He immediately raised the rents, contrary to his instructions ; he threw the people of quality, as well as others, into prison, and there made them give him bonds to what amount he pleased, as the purchase of their liberty. After describing how oppressively Debi Sing put these bonds in force, Mr. Burke thus depicted the dreadful cruel- ties he perpetrated on the poor ryots or husbandmen : " Debi Sing and his instruments suspected, and hi a few cases they suspected justly, that the country people had purloined from then own estates, and had hidden hi secret places in the circum- jacent deserts, some small reserve of then own grain to maintain themselves during the unproductive months of the year, and to leave some hope for a future season. But the under tyrants knew that the demands of Mr. Hastings would admit no plea for delay, much less for subtraction of his bribe, and that he would not abate a shilling of it to the wants of the whole human race. These hoards, real or supposed, not being discovered by menaces and imprisonment, they fell upon the last resource, the naked bodies of the people. And here, my lords, began such a scene of cruelties and tortures, as I believe no history lias ever presented to the indignation of the world; such as I am sure, hi the most barbarous ages, no politic tyranny, no fanatic persecution has ever yet exceeded. Mr. Paterson, the commis- sioner appointed to inquire into the state of the country, makes his own apology and mine for opening this scene of horrors to you E 210 LIFE OF EDMUND BUEKE. in the following words : ' That the punishments inflicted upon the ryots both of Rungpore and Dinagepore for non-payment were in many instances of such a nature, that I would rather wish to draw a veil over them than shock your feelings by the detad. But that, however disagreeable the task may be to myself, it is absolutely necessary, for the sake of justice, humanity, and the honour of government, that they should be exposed, to be pre- vented in future.' " My lords, they began by winding cords round the fingers of the unhappy freeholders of those provinces, until they clung to and were almost incorporated with one another ; and then they hammered wedges of iron between them, until, regardless of the cries of the sufferers, they had bruised to pieces, and for ever crip- pled those poor, honest, innocent, laborious hands, which had never been raised to their mouths but with a penurious and scanty proportion of the fruits of then: own soil ; but those fruits (denied to the wants of their own children) have for more than fifteen years past furnished the investment for our trade with China, and been sent annually out, and without recompense, to purchase for us that delicate meal, with which your lordships, and all this auditory, and all this country, have begun every day for these fifteen years, at their expense. To those beneficent hands, that labour for our benefit, the return of the British government has been cords, and hammers, and wedges. But there is a place where these crippled and disabled hands will act with resistless power. What is it that they will not pull down, when they are lifted to Heaven against their oppressors ? Then what can with- stand such hands ? Can the power that crushed and destroyed them ? Powerful in prayer, let us at least deprecate, and thus endeavour to secure ourselves from the vengeance which these mashed and disabled hands may pull down upon us. My lords, it is an awful consideration. Let us think of it. " But to pursue this melancholy but necessary detail. I am next to open to your lordships, what I am hereafter to prove, that TORMENTS INFLICTED ON THE RYOTS. 211 the most substantial and leading yeomen, the responsible farmers, the parochial magistrates and chiefs of villages, were tied two and two by the legs together ; and then - tormentors throwing thein with their heads downwards over a bar, beat them on the soles of the feet with ratans, until the nails fell from the toes; and then attacking them at then- heads, as they hung downward, as before at their feet, they beat them with sticks and other in- struments of blind fury, until the blood gushed out at their eyes, mouths, and noses. " Not thinking that the ordinary whips and cudgels, even so a lininistered, were sufficient, to others (and often also to the same, who had suffered as I have stated) they applied, instead of ratan and bamboo, whips made of the branches of the Bale-tree — a tree full of sharp and strong thorns, which tear the skin and lacerate the flesh far worse than ordinary scourges. " For others, exploring with a searching and inquisitive malice, stimulated by an insatiate rapacity, all the devious paths of nature for whatever is most unfriendly to man, they made rods of a plant liighly caustic and poisonous, called Bechettea, every wound of which testers and gangrenes, adds double and treble to the present torture, leaves a crust of leprous sores upon the body, and often ends in the destruction of life itself. " At night these poor innocent sufferers, these martyrs of ava- rice and extortion, were brought into duugeons ; and in the sea- m when nature takes refuge in insensibility from all the miseries and cares which wait on life, they were three times scourged, and made to reckon the watches of the night by periods and intervals of tor- ment. They were then led out, in the severe depth of winter — which there at certain seasons would be severe to any, to the Indians is most severe and almost intolerable — they were led out before break of day, and, still' and sore as they were with the bruises ami wounds of the night, were plunged into water; and whilst their jaws clung together with the cold, and their bodies were rendered infinitely more sensible, the blows and stripes \ -12 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. renewed upon their backs ; and then delivering them over to sol- diers, they were sent into their farms and villages to discover where a few handfnls of gram might be found concealed, or to extract some loan from the remnants of compassion and courage not sub- dued in those who had reason to fear that their own turn of tor- ment would be next, that they should succeed them in the same punishment, and that their very humanity, being taken as a proof of then- wealth, would subject them (as it did in many cases sub- ject them) to the same inhuman tortures. After this circuit of the day through their plundered and ruined villages, they were re- manded at night to the same prison ; whipped as before at their return to the dungeon, and at morning whipped at their leaving it ; and then sent as before to purchase, by begging in the day, the reiteration of the torture in the night. Days of menace, insult, and extortion — nights of bolts, fetters, and flagellation — succeeded to each other hi the same round, and for a long time made up all the vicissitude of life to these miserable people. " But there are persons whose fortitude could bear their own suffering ; there are men who are hardened by their very pains ; and the mind, strengthened even by the torments of the body, rises with a strong defiance against its oppressor. They were assaulted on the side of their sympathy. Children were scourged almost to death in the presence of then parents. This was not enough. The son and father were boimd close together face to face, and body to body, and in that situation cruelly lashed toge- ther, so that the blow which escaped the father fell upon the son, and the blow which missed the son woimd over the back of the parent. The circumstances were combined by so subtle a cruelty, that every stroke which did not excruciate the sense should wound and lacerate the sentiments and affections of nature. " On the same principle, and for the same ends, virgins who had never seen the sun were dragged from the inmost sanctuaries of then houses. . . . Wives were torn from the arms of their husbands, and suffered the same flagitious wrongs, which were FLIGHT AXD INSURRECTION OF THE EYOTS. 213 indeed hid in the bottoms of the dungeons, in which their honour and then* liberty were buried together " The women thus treated lost their caste. My lords, we are not here to commend or blame the institutions and prejudices of a whole race of people, radicated in them by a long succession of ages, on which no reason or argument, on which no vicissitudes of things, no mixtures of men, or foreign conquest have been able to make the smallest impression. The aboriginal Gentoo inhabitants are all dispersed into tribes or castes ; each caste born to an inva- riable rank, rights, and descriptions of employment ; so that one caste cannot by any means pass into another. With the Gentoos certain impmities or disgraces, though without any guilt of the party, infer loss of caste ; and when the highest caste (that of the Brahmin, which is not only noble but sacred,) is lost, the person who loses it does not slide down into one lower but reputable — he is wholly driven from all honest society. All the relations of life are at once dissolved. His parents are no longer his parents ; his wife is no longer his wife ; his children, no longer his, are no longer to regard him as then father. It is something far worse than com- plete outlawry, complete attainder, and universal excommunica- tion. It is a pollution even to touch him ; and if he touches any of liis old caste, they are justified in putting him to death. Conta- gion, leprosy, plague are not so much shunned. No honest occu- pation can be followed. He becomes an Halichore, if (which is rare) he survives that miserable degradation " Your lordships will not wonder that these monstrous and oppressive demands, exacted with such tortures, threw the whole province into despair. They abandoned then crops on the ground. The people in a body would have fled out of its confines ; but da of soldiers invested the avenues of the province, and making a line of circumvallation, drove back those wretches, who sought exile as a relief, into the prison of their native soil. Not suffered to quit the district, they fled to the many wild thickets which op- ion had scattered through it, and sought amongst the jungles 214 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. and dens of tigers a refuge from the tyranny of Warren Hastings. Not able long to exist here, pressed at once by wild beasts and famine, the same despair drove them back ; and seeking their last resource in arms, the most quiet, the most passive, the most timid of the human race rose up in an universal insurrection, and (what will always happen in popular tumults) the effects of the fury of the people fell on the meaner and sometimes the reluctant instru- ments of the tyranny, who in several places were massacred. The insurrection began in Ilungpore, and soon spread its fire to the neighbouring provinces, which had been harassed by the same per- son with the same oppressions. The English chief in that province had been the silent witness, most probably the abettor and accom- plice, of all these horrors. He called in first irregular, and then regular troops, who by dreadful and universal military execution got the better of the impotent resistance of unarmed and undisci- plined despair. I am tired with the detail of the cruelties of peace. I spare you those of a cruel and inhuman war, and of the execu- tions which, without law or process, or even the shadow of autho- rity, were ordered by the English revenue chief in that province." The sensation produced in Westminster Hall by these harrow- ing pictures of cruelty and suffering was immense. The Chancellor was evidently moved. The accused was seen to turn pale ; the male portion of the audience could scarcely repress their excite- ment so as not to drown the voice of the orator by some outburst of sympathetic indignation ; many of the ladies, and among them Mrs. Sheridan, fainted. The exertion of the terrible detad was too much for ]\Ir. Burke himself. Just as he ended it, he was taken ill. Soon recovering himself, however, he drank a glass of water, and attempted to proceed, when he was seized with a cramp in the stomach, and could not. Medical aid at hand relieved him from pain ; but he was exhausted. Lord Derby, on a hint from the Chancellor and the Prince of AVales, went to Mr. Burke, who, yielding to his lordship and other friends, agreed to burke's peroration. 215 defer the rest of his speech till the ensuing day. Accordingly, the next morning he concluded as follows : "In the name of the Commons of England, I charge all this villany upon Warren Hastings in this last moment of my applica- tion to you. " My lords, what is it that we want here to a great act of national justice ? Do we want a cause, my lords ? You have the cause of oppressed princes, of undone women of the first rank, of desolated provinces, and of wasted kingdoms. " Do you want a criminal, my lords ? When was there so much iniquity ever laid to the charge of any one ? No, my lords, you must not look to punish any other such delinquent from India. Warren Hastings has not left suhstance enough in India to nourish such another delinquent. " My lords, is it a prosecutor you want ? You have before you the Commons of Great Britain as prosecutors ; and I helieve, my lords, that the sun in his beneficent progress round the world does not behold a more glorious sight than that of men, separated from a remote people by the material bounds and barriers of na- ture, united by the bond of a social and moral community — all the Commons of England resenting as then own the indignities and cruelties that are offered to all the people of India. " Do we want a tribunal ? My lords, no example of antiquity, nothing in the modern world, nothing in the range of human ima- gination, can supply us with a tribunal like this. My lords, here we see virtually in the mind's eye that sacred majesty of the crown, under whose authority you sit, and whose power you exercise. We see in that invisible authority, what we all feel in reality and life, the lnnencent powers and protecting justice of his Majesty. We have here the heir-apparent to the crown, such as the fond wishes of the people of England wish an heir-apparent to the crown to be. We have here all the branches of the royal family in a situation between majesty and subjection, between the sovereign and the subject, offering a pledge in that situation for the support 216 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. of the rights of the crown and the liberties of the people, both which extremities they touch. My lords, we have a great heredi- tary peerage here — those who have their own honour, the honour of their ancestors and of their posterity to guard, and who will Justify, as they have always justified, that provision in the consti- tution by which justice is made an hereditary office. My lords, wc have here a new nobility, who have risen and exalted them- selves by various merits, by great military services, which have extended the tame of this country from the rising to the setting sun ; we have those who, by various civil merits and various civil talents, have been exalted to a situation which they well deserve, and in which they will justify the favour of their sovereign and the good opinion of their fellow-subjects, and make them rejoice to see those virtuous characters, that were the other day upon a level with them, now exalted above them in rank, but feeling with them in sympathy what they felt in common with them before. We have pers >ns exalted from the practice of the law — from the place in which they administered high though subordinate justice — to a seat here, to enlighten with their knowledge and to strengthen with their votes those principles which have distinguished the courts in which they have presided. " My lords, you have here also the lights of our religion : you have the bishops of England. My lords, you have that true image of the primitive church in its ancient form, in its ancient ordinances, purified from the superstitions and the vices which a long succession of ages will bring upon the best institutions. You have the representatives of that religion which says that their God is love, that the very vital spirit of their institution is charity — a religion which so much hates oppression, that when the God whom we adore appeared in human form, he did not appear in a form of greatness and majesty, but in sympathy with the lowest of the people, and thereby made it a firm and ruling principle that their welfare was the object of all government, since the person who was the master of nature chose to appear Himself in a subordinate THE COURSE OF THE TRIAL. 217 situation. These are the considerations which influence them, which animate them, and will animate them, against all oppression, knowing that He who is called first among them and first among us all, both of the flock that is fed and of those who feed it, made Himself the servant of all. " My lords, these are the securities which we have in all the constituent parts of the body of this house. We know them, we reckon, we rest upon them, and commit safely the interests of India and of humanity into your bauds. Therefore it is with confidence that, ordered by the Commons, " I impeach Warren Hastings, Esq., of high crimes and mis- demeanours. " I impeach him in the name of the Commons of Great Bri- tain in Parliament assembled, whose parliamentary trust he has betrayed. " I impeach him in the name of all the Commons of Great Britain, whose national character he has dishonoured. "I impeach him in the name of the people of India, whose laws, rights, and liberties he has subverted, whose properties he has destroyed, whose country he has laid waste and desolate. " I impeach him in the name and by virtue of those eternal laws of justice which he has violated. " I impeach him in the name of human nature itself, which he has cruelly outfltged, injured, and oppressed in both sexes, in every age, rank, situation, and condition of life." Such was the brilliant speech which ushered in the proceed- ings. The trial then went on, Mr. Fox opening the first article of impeachment — that relating to Cheyt-Sing and Benares ; and Mr. Adam opening the second article, that relating to the Begums or princesses of Oude. On the summing up of this Begum charge, Mr. Sheridan made a splendid speech ; and when that was over, the interest of the public in the trial gradually decreased and fell away. The mass of dry detail and evidence, the incessant legal 218 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. arguments, ami the frequent interruptions and delays, seemed to make the investigation an interminable affair. Year after year rolled on, and yet it ended not ; for after the first year the court only sat at intervals, and then for not very long periods. In 1789 its sittings were but of seventeen days' duration. In this year an attempt was made to get rid of the trial altogether by a side-wind, but failed. It was this. In April 1789, when the court sat, the charge brought before them, and opened by Mr. Burke, was that relative to a corrupt receipt of money. In the course of his speech Mr. Burke had occasion to remark on the conduct of Mr. Hast- ings ; and after relating some acts of injustice and cruelty, he added that Hastings had murdered Nuncomar by the hands of Sir Elijah Impey. A few days after the charge had been thus opened, Major Scott presented a petition from Mr. Hastings to the House of Com- mons, in which he stated that Mr. Burke, in supporting the charges exhibited against him at the bar of the House of Lords, had used words accusing him of sundry heinous crimes not laid in the articles of impeachment. On this the Marquess of Graham rose and moved, " That the said words were not authorised by any proceed- ings of that house, and ought not to have been used." The house divided, when there appeared for Lord Graham's motion one hun- dred and thirty-five ; against it, sixty-six. In consequence of this vote, some difference of opinion arose in the committee of mana- gers relative to their continuance in that situation. It was, how- ever, resolved to proceed. Accordingly, the next day of trial Mr. Burke began Ids speech by commenting on the relative situations of himself and of the prisoner at the bar, and on the decision of the Commons. He declared, that in stating what he did, he had said no more than what he really believed ; he had used the word ' murder,' not, perhaps, in the strictly legal, but in its moral and popular sense, to denote a crime which stood, according to his con- ception, on the same fine of enormity, but which the poverty of language did not afford him another word to express. Soon after this vote of censure, a complaint was made to the TERMINATION OF HASTINGS' TRIAL. 219 house by Mr. Markham of a paragraph in a public newspaper, in which it was said " that the trial of Mr. Hastings was to be put off to another session, unless the House of Lords had spirit enough to put an end to so shameful a business." After some observa- tions by members upon the scandalous licentiousness of the press, a motion was made and carried unanimously for prosecuting the printer of the paper. In the course of the conversation which this motion gave rise to, Mr. Burke read from a public print a curious bill of charge made by the editor upon Major Scott for articles in- serted on his account. They chiefly consisted of speeches, letters, paragraphs composed by him ; and amongst the rest there was this singular item, " For attacking the veracity of Mr. Burke, 3s. 6<7." Uninterrupted by this petition and scheme of Hastings and his Mends, the trial dragged its slow length along. On Thursday the 2d June, 1791, Mr. Hastings opened his defence by reading an address to the court from a written paper. The evidence and the speeches of counsel in support of his case were not concluded until the 28th May, 1793, on which day the accused again himself harangued his judges. On the 28th May, 1794, Edmund Burke commenced the final reply on the part of the Commons, and con- tinued his speech nine days. He concluded with a splendid pero- ration, of which the most striking bursts of eloquence were as fol- low : " My lords, I have done ; the part of the Commons is con- cluded. With a trembling solicitude we consign this product of our long, long labours to your charge. Take it ; take it. It is a sacred trust. Never before was a cause of such magnitude sub- mitted to any human tribunal My lords, your house yet stands : it stands as a great edifice ; but let me say that it stands in the midst of ruins — in the midst of the ruins that have been made by the greatest moral earthquake that ever convulsed and shattered this globe of ours (the French Revolution). My lord-, it has pleased Providence to place us in such a state, that we appear every moment to be upon the verge of some great mu- 220 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. tations. There is one thing, and one thing only, which defies all mutation — that which existed before the world, and will survive the fabric of the world, itself — I mean justice ; that justice which, emanating from the Divinity, has a place in the breast of every one of us, given us for our guide with regard to ourselves and with regard to others, and which will stand, after this globe is burned to ashes, our advocate or our accuser before the great Judge, when He comes to call upon us for the tenour of a well- spent life My lords, if you must fall, may you so fall ; but if you stand — and stand I trust you will, together with the fortune of this ancient monarchy, together with the ancient laws and liberties of this great and illustrious kingdom, — may you stand as unimpeached in honour as in power ; may you stand, not as a substitute for virtue, but as an ornament of virtue, as a secu- rity for virtue ; may you stand long, and long stand the terror of tyrants ; may you stand the refuge of afflicted nations ; may you stand a sacred temple for the perpetual residence of an inviolable justice." On the 20th June, 1794, the managers of the impeachment received the thanks of the House of Commons. Immediately afterwards Mr. Burke retired from parliament. The trial of Hastings came at last to an end in 1795, when it had lasted somewhat more than seven years, during which wide space of time, the court, in attending to it, had occupied in all just one hundred and forty-eight days. The greatest number of lords that sat at any time was one hundred and sixty-eight ; but this number only assembled on Mr. Burke's opening speech, Mr. She- ridan's summary of the Begum charge, or on some extraordinary occasion. In general, the c airt consisted of from thirty to fifty peers. There were one hundred and eighty changes in the House of Lords during the course of the proceedings. The last day, the 23d April, 1795, when the judgment was to be given, brought back a momentary excitement, and Westminster Hall was as full of peers as at any other time of the trial. Of the managers for the Commons ACQUITTAL OF HASTINGS. 221 some were present ; but changes of time and circumstance had had their effect on that august body. One manager, General Bur- goyne, had died during the trial, two had succeeded to peerages, two were out of the kingdom on foreign service, and three were no longer members of parliament. Of these last, Burke was one. He came to hear the judgment — " sed quantum mutatus ab Mo!" — broken in spirit and corporeal energy, yet still with the same mind — the mind " that doth renew swifter than blood decays." The attendance of the public was immense. Proclamation having been made in the usual way, Warren Hastings, Esq., and his bail were called into court ; and the defendant, having knelt and been directed to rise, was ordered to withdraw. Then the Lord Chancellor, Lord Loughborough, stood up and said : " Your lordships having fully heard and considered of the evidence and arguments in this case, have agreed upon several questions, which are severally to be stated to your lordships in the usual manner." The Lord Chancellor held in his hand a list of the titles of the peers present who had taken their seats in then robes, and proceeded to put the question of guilty or not guilty on each arti- cle to each individual peer, beginning with the junior baron. It should, however, be observed, that many lords, either from having been created peers, or having succeeded to their titles since the commencement of the trial, or from other motives, not choos- ing to vote, stood unrobed about the throne, spectators of the solemnity. The first question on the first article was thus put and addressed by the Chancellor to Lord Douglas, the junior baron : " Is Warren Hastings, Esq., guilty or not guilty of high crimes and misdemeanours, charged by the Commons in the first article of charge ? George Lord Douglas (Earl of Morton in Scotland), how says your lordship, is Warren Hastings, Esq., guilty or not guilty of the said charge ?" Whereupon Lord Douglas stood up, uncovered, and laying 222 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. his right hand upon his In-east, pronounced " Not guilty, upon my honour;" and so the ceremony went on as to the rest. Hav- ing thus collected the judgment of their lordships on the sixteen charges, the Lord Chancellor declared that a large majority of the twenty-nine lords present had answered the said several ques- tions in the negative, and then declared, " That Warren Hastings, Esq., was acquitted of the articles of impeachment exhibited against him for high crimes and misdemeanours, and all things contained therein." Then the defendant was ordered to be called to the bar, and kneeling, was bid to rise. The Lord Chancellor said : " Warren Hastings, Esq., I am to acquaint you that you are acquitted of the articles of impeach- ment, &c. exhibited against you by the House of Commons for high crimes and misdemeanours, and all things contained therein ; and you are discharged, paying your fees." Mr. Hastings bowed respectfully and retired. The Lord Chancellor then put the question, " Is it your lord- ships' pleasure to adjourn to your chamber of parliament ?" Or- dered : and their lordships adjourned accordingly to their chamber of parliament. Thus was Hastings legally, though not unani- mously, absolved. It should moreover be particularly remem- bered, that whatever share Hastings had in the oppression of the Rohillas, or in the death of Nuncomar, those matters were not included in his impeachment. The real judgment to be passed on the existence and extent of Hastings' offences rests with posterity. One result of the impeachment was undoubtedly better govern- ment in India, and complete security of life and property to all the varied races subject to the sway of England there. The ac- quittal did not change the opinion of Edmund Burke ; to the end of Ins life he retained the firmest conviction of Hastings' guilt. On the other hand, Hastings' innocence was maintained with a party spirit. The general Court of Directors of the East India Company, on DEATH OF HASTINGS DEATH OF FRANCIS. 223 the 2d March, 1796, announced that they had come to the reso- lution of granting an annuity of 4000Z., from the 24th June, 1785, for twenty-eight years and a half, payable during that period to Mr. Hastings, his heirs and executors. This resolution was con- firnied by the Board of Control. The law-costs of Mr. Hastings had reached the sum of 71,030Z., and much of this was still owing. The Court of Directors advanced funds to aid in the liquidation. Hastings in 1789 had carried into effect an object of his aspirations, said to be an early and a fond one, — viz. the repurchase of the estate of Daylesford, the seat of his ancestors, which had not been more than seventy-five years out of the possession of the family, and near which he had passed his childhood. At Daylesford, Hastings spent the remainder of his life in absolute privacy. He was twice only, and that mo- mentarily, before the public again. In 1804 he took an active part in endeavouring to prevent Mr. Addington, created Viscount Sidmouth in 1805, from resigning the premiership. In 1813, when parliament was deliberating on the renewal of the East India Company's charter, Hastings, then past eighty, was ex- amined by the House of Commons ; and as he retired, the members present spontaneously rose and uncovered, an act of honour or sympathy, or of both, to the venerable octogenarian, who in his time had done great deeds, whether good or evil — once the ruler and augmentor of a mighty empire, and then the object of the most illustrious impeachment known to his country's annals. Warren Hastings died at his seat at Daylesford, on the 22d Au- gust, 1818, in the eighty-sixth year of his age. Alas for the vanity of worldly wishes ! — a recent advertisement in the Times announced Daylesford for sale again, and sold it has conse- quently been. The close of the year 1818 brought two other deaths worthy of note in Hastings' history. His leading counsel, Edward Law, Lord Ellenborough, expired the 13th December of that year. And on the very last day of the same month the vaults of Mortlake Church, Surrey, received the remains of Hast- 224 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. ings' inveterate enemy Sir Philip Francis, who had heen created a Knight of the Bath in 1806, and who survived just four months the man whose elevation and prosperity he had utterly undone. The mystery of Junius, linked with Burke and Sir Philip, seems somehow or other to sleep in Francis' grave. The motive of Sir Philip's conduct towards Hastings is also a prohlem ; and it rests for the awful Tribunal, that can search into all human thoughts, to solve the solemn question, whether Sir Philip Francis did what he did in envy, or whether, like Edmund Burke, he was an accuser " in a general honest thought, And common srood to all." EDMUND BURKE, AFTER A PAINTING BY REYNOLDS. CHAPTER VII. unmoved, Unshaken, unseduced, unterrified, His loyalty he kept, his love, his zeal ; Nor number nor example with him wrought To swerve from truth, or change his constant mind, Though single. Verses from Milton's Paradise Lost, b. v., placed by Sir Joshua Reynolds under a print of Burke's portrait published in 1791. Tin: Regency Question — The French Revolution — Burke's Opposi- tion TO IT : HIS CONDUCT RELATIVE TO FRANCE IN AND OUT OF PARLIA- MENT — Publication of his Reflections on the French Revolution, and of ins other Works on the same Subject — Burke's Retire- ment from the House of Commons. Q 22G LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. The last chapter, which was devoted entirely to India and War- ren Hastings, brought, as far as those subjects were concerned, Burke's biography down to 1795. It therefore becomes neces- sary to go a few years back, to record his course through other political events, one of which was the most important that occu- pied his public life. In the autumn of 1788, the first decided attack of that me- lancholy malady to which George III. afterwards fell a victim was announced, and caused the celebrated regency question. In the lengthened debates that ensued, Burke, with his usual energy and eloquence, took a leading part ; he supported Fox, Sheridan, and Lord North, agreeing with them that the Prhice of Wales, under the unforeseen and calamitous circumstances of the case, had an indisputable claim to exercise unrestrictedly the executive power, in the name and on behalf of the sovereign, it being left to the two houses of parliament to pronounce the exact time when his royal highness shoidd take possession of his authority. Pitt, on the other hand, insisted that the prince had no exclusive right, and that it belonged to the houses of Lords and Commons to make such provision as they thought proper to supply the temporary incapacity of the royal office. Hence the contest, in which Pitt had the power of the British parliament and the popular voice in England with him. The Irish parliament sided with his oppo- nents. On the 30th December, 1788, Pitt addressed a letter to the Prince of Wales, submitting to him the plan of limited regency he proposed. The able answer of his royal highness to this com- munication is said to have been composed by Edmund Burke. Pitt, nothing daunted by that reply, carried through parliament five restrictive resolutions, and would have passed the Regency Bill, in the shape he wished, but for the opportune recovery of the king, which was announced in the House of Lords on the 10th March, 1780, and which put a stop at once to these uupleasant proceedings. BUEKE AND THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. 227 The closing and most conspicuous scene of Mr. Burke's politi- cal career now approached — the autumn of 1789 and the French Revolution; the period when, to use his own metaphorical lan- guage, his splendid orb went down, and left the western horizon in a blaze with his descending glory. The great convulsion hi France had amazed and stupified mankind. An ancient and power- ful nation rose suddenly from a state of oppression to one of the wildest freedom. In the countries that bordered on the scene, the multitude, who looked no deeper than the surface, applauded ; many even among the wisest and the best yielded to the popular feeling. Charles James Fox, whose gallant, generous mind wor- shipped liberty in every shape and every chme, surrendered him- self entirely to this apparent consecration of his idol. When the plot thickened, and horrors accumulated upon horrors, men still stood bewildered, and knew not what to do ; but from the very first the prophetic eye of Edmund Burke went beyond ordinary mortal vision, penetrated the outward covering, and perceived the danger that larked beneath. Irreligion, anarchy, cruelty, and mob-domi- nion ; and beyond that again the dread fury of conquest and ag- grandisement that had seized the French and threatened the slavery of Europe ; he saw it all, and he addressed his country in a voice of thunder. The recollection of the loss of British America sanctified his warning ; king and people dared no longer hesitate to hear him. Yet in the beginning there was no energy; and Pitt himself showed vacillation. Burke alone grew more ani- mated as difficulties increased. Louder and louder did he proclaim, " Let there be no compact or alliance with revolutionary France ! — war upon the regicide!" until his expiring voice had roused this monarchy, and the nations that depended upon it, to continue a contest which, as he foretold, happily ended in victory, security, and peace. To blame Edmund Burke for what he did in an emergency so terrible has of late grown into a kind of fashion — temporary, no doubt, like other modes of the day. This complaining originates 228 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. *■ with certain enthusiasts who broach themes of eternal tranquillity, and imagine they must be right because they are patiently suffered to thus preach to a victorious nation, now naturally willing to re- pose under its laurels. Strange, indeed, is it, that whenever any new-fangled doctrine starts into vogue, the first ' impediment it meets is Edmund Burke. The earliest task the supporter of a political paradox has on hand, is to attempt to efface the impres- sion left by the wisdom of Burke's doctrine and example. The plan adopted in the present ^case is, to argue that Burke was wrong altogether ; that he spoke and acted like a visionary, or wild in- cendiary — a dangerous lunatic, — who hurried his country into years of useless bloodshed and unnecessary, wasteful expense. The fallacy of this foul censure is apparent, and it would have readily been answered and set at rest, but for the very apathy caused by prosperity. The actual condition of the state — the conclusion to which Burke's advice has brought it— makes men forgetful ; they do not want war now, and they allow his memory to be assaulted who secured them peace — the surest kind of peace, the pax in hello. Nothing can be more easy than to liarangue against battles, and to calumniate their advocates, in 1854, at a time when England has reached a height of good fortune and glory hitherto unsurpassed — when the cup of fame o'erflows, and when heroes and the deeds of heroes are the fond and frequent toasts of festal meetings, where triumph after triumph fills up the boastful theme. Now every town, almost every great public place in the empire, with statue, monument, or memorial, tells of Trafalgar and Waterloo. The best soldier of our history a few months ago passed to his tomb with more than royal honours amid the proud regrets of millions, and in the face of Europe. It was not so in 1789. At that period this country had suffered humiliation from the disas- trous termination of the American war, and had undoubtedly en- dured a serious check from France. England's haughty conscious- ness of invincibility had lost its force. The notion that the British people would not succumb — a notion the very sinew of their bukke's conduct investigated. 229 strength — no longer prevailed abroad. The peace of Versailles in 1783 had inflated France with inordinate self-esteem ; her aspect and her tone had become threatening and aggressive. Even be- fore the French Revolution, Burke saw and felt tins ; for in the debate in 1787 on the proposed commercial treaty with France, he called the attention of the house to the increased navy of that country, to the stupendous works erecting at Cherbourg and else- where. France, he said, stretched her arms all round to grasp and to stifle us. The house heard Burke with satisfaction, and rejected the treaty. The fact was, the British people were living as if under a heavy interdict upon their reputation. An ardent and general wish lurked in the public mind to remove the weight. Edniund Burke was keenly alive to the national honour ; lie bore, to use his own expression, its stain like a wound. This feeling he shared with most of those who, in the course of our history, had to do with the greatness of the country, whether as monarchs, usurpers, warriors, or statesmen. He had it in common with Edward III. and his heroic son; with Henry V., and Bedford and Talbot ; with the princes of the house of Tudor ; and, in later times, with Cromwell and Blake, — with Marlborough and Chatham. " I would," Cromwell is reported to have said, " that England should be as her lion is to the beasts of the forest ; so that when she roars, every other nation shall hold its breath." Mary I. heard that the French Duke of Guise had, by a sudden coup de main, tarnished her arms, and taken Calais from her. Her well-known expression on the occasion she would repeat even in her last hours : " Open my body when I am dead, and you will find the word ' Calais' engraven on my heart." " Shall this great kingdom," cried Chatham, his soul about to wing its flight under excess of indignation, — " shall this great kingdom fall prostrate before the house of Bourbon ? Surely this nation is no longer what it was. Shall a people that seventeen years ago was the terror of the world now stoop so low ?" Edniund Burke was of the same mettle ; and he felt too that the people was not what it 230 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. had been : it had stooped, and the world knew it. Yet England writhed under the degradation; and it is to our honour, never to our regret, that we should remember how British millions listened • • if* to a voice which summoned them to their greatness again. Whe- ther the achievement of this was worth the cost — for that is the main question — and whether he who advised and urged it acted rightly or wrongly, wisely or foolishly, seem propositions too ab- surd to discuss in the very face of the glorious result. Edmund Burke's own words and his own acts, as related in the remainder of this chapter, are quite enough to confute his strange, new- fashioned, and ungrateful detractors. Burke's conduct, however, in one respect, cannot be too soon explained. Though there might be some violence in his anxiety and endeavour to urge this country to persevere in a war against the French revolutionists, there was nothing whatever wild or visionary in the way he would have that war carried out. Cool and consummate calculation marked the plan which he suggested, and which, though not followed in his own day, was, strange to say, the very one that was afterwards adopted, and that proved eventually successful. Burke from the beginning clearly saw and fully appreciated the indomitable courage and mighty capabilities of the enemy. " These revolutionists," said a royalist refugee friend to Burke, " are but coqnins." " No doubt they are," was Burke's reply ; " but then they are the most terrible coquins the world ever saw — far beyond the reach or strength of such as you of the ancient noblesse, or of the army of Conde. The power that is to defeat them has yet to arise." Burke augured little from the rash manifestation and weak advance of the Duke of Bruns- wick ; he objected also to the petty military expeditions sent here and there by Pitt and his government, in one of which the Duke of York, a prince gallant and able enough in his way, was actually allowed, after victory, to fail for want of sufficient resources. Burke's advice would have the sword which England drew strongly drawn ; he urged that the whole energies of the country QUESTION OF WAR WITH RUSSIA. 231 should be forthwith put into action against the enemy, and, if pos- sible, brought to bear upon them in the very centre of their terri- tory, under the sanction and support of their legitimate monarch. These counsels were exactly the same which Wellington and tbe ministry who supported Mm, at a later period, pursued, when they resolved upon and effected the expedition to Spain, and the final and victorious invasion of France itself. As far back as October 1793, Edmund Burke thus wrote to a then leading member of Pitt's administration, the Eight Hon. Henry Dundas (afterwards Lord Melville) : " The opening at La Vendee appears to me the most important of any which has happened in this war ; and I beg leave to suggest, that the first and most vigorous of our efforts ought to be made there. Every tiling we have done is in the style of hostility to France as a nation, without distinction of causes, persons, and parties. Here is a war maintained for more than eight months against Jacobinism. It is its sole principle. They strike at the enemy in his weakest and most vulnerable part. Here, at a com- paratively less expense, we may make an impression likely to be decisive. In other places, with millions of expense and torrents of blood, little progress has been made. I am far from being sure that the expedition talked of for Martinique promises any advantage like a strong push at La Vendee, if we regard the speedy and final issue of the war. . . . Once more, excuse my earnestness, I am persuaded beyond a doubt, that if La Vendee is not very care- fully attended to, and with celerity and vigour, we shall have cause bitterly to repent it." In fine, Burke wanted the armed hostility of the revolutionists not to be irritated by a succession of small and vain attacks, but to be as speedily as possible cut down by what Canning has since termed the scythe of a magnificent war. Before any detail of the events of the French Revolution, and of the part Burke took against it, one political occurrence should be here recorded, though somewhat out of its place; for it serves to show, as well as Burke's conduct throughout the American con- 232 LIFE OF EDMUND BUEKE. test, how little he was, in the abstract, an advocate for war. In the year 1790, Catherine, Empress of Russia, was engaged in hos- tilities with Turkey. Her minister Potemkin had seized upon Wallachia ; her general Suwarrow had, with a slaughter of thirty thousand Turks, carried by assault the fortress of Ismael, the key of the lower Danube. The way to the very gates of Constanti- nople lay open to the Russian arms. The other powers of Europe, and Prussia especially, became alarmed. Great Britain attempted a mediation between the belligerents; her services were cavalierly rejected by Catherine, who refused to renew the commercial treaty with this country. Consequently, Mr. Pitt announced to the House of Commons an approaching rupture with Russia. On the subject being brought under discussion, Mr. Fox went at large into the matter ; he maintained that Prussia could not be endangered by the victories of the Russians over the Turks, and that whatever pride the Empress might have shown in declining a peace dictated by us, yet that her offer to cede all her conquests between the Niester and the Danube, reserving only what she had gained between the Bog and the Dnieper, was a reasonable offer, considering the vast ascendency of her arms. Mr. Burke, who, be it observed, had definitively sided with ministers on the French ques- tion, was in this matter as decidedly against them, and in unison with the majority of the nation. " Are we to plunge ourselves into war," said he, " into bloodshed, debt, and calamity, for the disputed possession of a distant territory, which is either a desert, or the haunt of people oppressed with the yoke of savages ? Are we to lavish the lives of Englishmen, in order that Christian na- tions should be brought back to the dominion of infidels, whose expulsion from Europe would be a blessing, as their empire is now a scourge to those quarters ?" The peace that was suddenly con- cluded at Galata, on the 11th August, 1791, between Russia, Prussia, and Turkey, put an end to any meditated hostilities on our part. Nevertheless Burke's conduct in the transaction is worthy of commemoration. Li fact, Burke, as well as most great OUTBREAK OF THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. 233 statesmen, looked on war as a misery to be cautiously and anxi- ously avoided, if possible ; yet he thought there might be times when it became the only remedy. An expression he once used on the subject is remarkable ; it was this : " Every day we live will convince thinking men that there are evils to which the cala- mities of war are blessings." To come now to French affairs. In and after 1789, revolu- tionary events followed each other rapidly in France. Letters were issued for convoking the states-general. The spirit of liberty became more fervid from the heat of elections, from the action and re-action of opinion, the close union of sentiment and sympathy. The states assembled. Government proposed that they shoidd meet in three different chambers, according to ancient usage. The people apprehended that if they were in separate bodies, the clergy and nobility might control the third estate, and unite in overruling the popular voice. They therefore insisted that the states-general should consist of one body only, to act according to the majority of votes. The court refused ; the third estate persisted, and met as a national assembly, inviting the nobles and clergy to join them as individual members. The king ordered them to separate : it was replied, the nation assembled had no orders to receive. Troops were summoned by the court to Paris, and surrounded the capital. The people of Paris took the side of the national representatives ; the army caught the prevailing feeling, the Bas- tille was destroyed, the old government fell : the Revolution in right earnest began. Burke, as the friend of mankind, had reprobated the old go- vernment of France ; and although he thought it, in the reign of Louis the Sixteenth, softened in its exercise by the progress of civilisation and the personal character of the monarch, still he deemed the welfare of the people to rest on an unstable basis, and to require very considerable reform. He esteemed arbitrary power an evil ; but he knew that unwise efforts to shake it off might pro- duce greater calamities. He respected the spirit of freedom ; but 234 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. not such freedom as the revolutionists were beginning to preach: that made him pause. Early in his political career, in his speech on American Taxation in 1774, Burke had expressed himself thus : " The distinguishing part of our constitution is its liberty. To preserve that liberty inviolate seems the particular duty and pro- per trust of a member of the House of Commons. But the liberty, the only liberty I mean, is a liberty connected with order ; that not only exists along with order and virtue, but which cannot exist at all without them. It inheres in good and steady govern- ment, as in its substance and vital principle." True to these sentiments, Burke was not to be led away by the enthusiasm of the multitude on the first outbreak of the French Revolution. As in most of the political events that occurred in his time, he was prepared for the crisis. He had already studied and mastered his subject. In this instance, accident had given him, in a very strange way, an opportunity of sifting the real mo- tives and measures of the revolutionary party in France. Chance made him acquainted with the notorious Tom Paine, his future fierce opponent ; and while the intimacy lasted, Burke contrived to get most valuable information from him. In 1787, Thomas Paine, then known as a politician but not as an infidel, had, on his coming from America, been introduced to Burke by a letter from Mr. Henry Lawrence, and was treated by Burke with the hospitality which he thought due to an American stranger so recommended. He was frequently a visitor at Bea- c msfield ; and then informed his host that he had entirely given up politics, and was devoting his attention to mechanical inquiries. He had a model of an iron bridge, which he wished to be seen by eminent characters of ]\Ir. Burke's acquaintance. Burke intro- duced him to Mr. Windham, Lord Fitzwilliam, and the Duke of Bedford ; during a summer's excursion to Yorkshire, he went with him to Walker's famous iron manufactory at Botheram. Not long after he spent a day with him at Lord Fitzwilliam's. At this time, Paine continued to abstain from political discus- INFORMATION ACQUIRED BY BURKE. 235 sions. The folio-wing winter he went over to France, and became deeply connected with the anti-monarchical partisans at Pans. Returning in 1788 to England, his discourse took a new turn. Calling frequently on Burke, he endeavoured to impress on him the views which he himself had recently fonned concerning French affairs. People in general, he asserted, did not know the change speedily about to take place in that country. The French, he averred, were determined to surpass every nation in liberty, and to establish a pure democracy. Mr. Burke saw that this was not an opinion resulting from Paine's penetration into principles and their probable effects, but from his knowledge of actually declared intentions. He was therefore the more certain that attempts would be made to cany out these designs. Paine prophesied that the same species of liberty would be extended to other coun- tries; and, led away by his wishes, fancied all Em-ope would unite in overturning monarchy. Whether of himself, or from the suggestion of his French friends, Paine expressed his anxiety that the British opposition should coincide in the republican views, and use parliamentary reform as the pretext. What Burke said to this is on record : " Do you mean to propose that I, who have all my life fought for the constitution, should devote the wretched remains of my days to conspire its destruction ? Do not you know that I have always opposed the things called reform ; to be sure, because I did not think them reform ?" Paine, perceiving Burke totally adverse to his projects, forbore repetition. Burke, however, saw that Paine was well acquainted with the designs of the innovators ; and from him learned many important facts, all tending to make a totally different impression on his philosophic wisdom from that which they made on the turbulent spirit of his informer. Thus the earliest particular intelligence respecting the mischievous designs of the republican agitators was communicated to Edmund Burke by Thomas Paine. The information did not rest there. Paine went to France early in 1789, and wrote several letters 236 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. from Paris to Burke, explaining to him the schemes of the popular leaders. In one of these, dated July 11th, he copied a uote just received from an influential American gentleman, at whose house the republican chiefs held their most confidential meetings. " The leaders of the assembly," said the note, " surpass in patriotism : they are resolved to set fire to the four comers of France, rather than not reduce their principles to practice to the last iota. Do not fear the army; we have gained them." Thus Burke knew from Paine, not only that there was a determination to overthrow existing things, but that there was a preparation of effectual means to do so by seducing the army from its duty. Paine un- wittingly, for he had quite another object in view, soon sickened Burke of the French Revolution, even if his distaste for it had not other grounds. Paine left nothing in his power undone to show Mr. Burke how apparently grand, but, as Burke viewed it, substantially destructive a system might be expected from the new French order of things. It is, indeed, a singular circum- stance hi Burke's political biography, that so great a portion of Ins dislike to, and knowledge of, the French Revolution originated in the narratives of Thomas Pame. A word or two, by way of inemoir, about this Paine. There is neither necessity nor wish to enter here on the revolting subject of the unhappy man's irreligion and blasphemy, which were un- known to Burke during his intercourse with him, and which after- wards, when made public, procured for Paine such universal and well-merited odium ; but viewed politically, this strange compound of vice and sense was no doubt endowed with wonderful natural powers of invention and argument. What rendered those abilities useless, even for his own ends, was this : he appears to have been a person whom no possible form of government could con- tent. An Englishman by birth ; by occupation first a stay- maker and then an exciseman, he dabbled early in scribbling on political themes, in that half-educated, discontented way, common among some men of the humbler classes in this country. As he PROGRESS OF THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. 237 progressed, he showed more ardour and aptness. Benjamin Frank- lin, happening to meet him in London, was struck with his talents, and induced him to quit the land he was so dissatisfied with, and to try America. There Franklin and Paine worked together, and Paine's writings helped to inflame the people ; but when all was won, he was again displeased. He railed at Congress, and de- nounced Washington. Then he went to revolutionised France, met with a splendid reception, and was elected to serve in the Convention as member, oddly enough, for Calais, a place that had formerly been represented by Englishmen in the British parlia- ment, Thomas Massingberd, of Braytoft Hall, in Lincolnshire, having been its last M.P. in 1552. Paine, notwithstanding his republicanism, had too much English feeling, and really too much good nature, to put up with the atrocities of Robespierre. He joined the milder faction of the Brissotins, and endeavoured to save poor King Louis. For this he got himself into prison, and nearly lost his head. When the Reign of Terror ended, and he was free, he quarrelled with the very Brissotin party for whom he had risked his life. He quitted France in disgust, and returned to die in America, utterly forsaken and forgotten. Of his " Rights of Man," written to confute Burke, a few words directly. Edmund Burke watched with anxious vigilance while the terrible drama of the French Revolution went on, scene after scene. Versailles was stormed by a hideous mob ; the sovereign had, with his family, been dragged in degrading procession to Paris. Louis found himself a prisoner there. He endeavoured to escape, but was retaken — a circumstance even more unfortunate for his country than for himself. Had there been no stop at Va- rennes, and had the royal Bourbon crossed the frontier, France might have been saved from those regal murders that are her worst disgraces. The power of the triumphant Jacobins rose up like a hideous giant Already had their exhortation gone forth to the people of other nations to assail the privileged classes, to pull down tluxmes, and to overthrow altars — to work at once 238 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. what these advisers called their emancipation from thraldom and superstition. Many of the poorer and less prosperous in Eng- land listened eagerly. It wanted hut a breath to blow disaffection into such a flame as might bring danger to the constitution. Yet the masses in this country were not disloyal. They had sense sufficient to avoid the evil, if that sense could be but once awakened. There was no want then of the same sagacity and discernment which have since made Englishmen see in their true colour and heed not the doctrines and disturbances of France ; but in 1790 the destruction of a despotism hud a novel and false light — the glare and fatal attraction of a will-o'-the-wisp — and Britain stood in fascination on the brink of a precipice. The time of rescue had come, and Burke acted fearlessly and unhesitatingly. If ever realm was saved, he saved this right royal realm of England then. His very violence, blamable per- haps on calmer occasions, was just suited to repel the violence of the revolutionists. " We will rouse nations and overthrow empires by our very exaggerations," shouted one of the ruffians of the Ja- cobin Club. Burke seized the same weapon of exaggeration, and in the hand of virtue the destructive blade became the sword of salvation. How truly has his conduct at this time been described by Canning, in those eloquent and poetic lines which he addressed to Ins memory : thou, lamented sage ! whose prescient scan Pierced through fold Anarchy's gigantic plan, Prompt to incredulous hearers to disclose The guilt of France and Europe's world of woes ; Thou, on whose name each distant age shall gaze, The mighty sea-mark of those troubled days ! Burke's first public declaration of the sentiments which actuated him was in the House of Commons on the 9th February, 1790. In the course of a debate a few nights previous on the army-esti- mates, Fox declared he saw no necessity for the increase of the then existing military forces ; and he went on to pronounce a eulo- FIRST DEBATE ON THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. 239 gium on the French Revolution. A second debate on the same subject occurring, Colonel Phipps and other members expressed their dissatisfaction at Fox's commendation. Burke then rose, evidently much excited. He contended that the crisis imperiously called for the augmentation of the army. He represented the state of France as most justly calculated to fill us with indignation and alarm. He said he felt the deepest anxiety lest the approbation of the French by a man such as ]\Ir. Fox, to whose authority so much weight was due, should be misimderstood to hold up the transac- tions in that country as a fit object of our imitation. After express- ing his thorough conviction that nothing could be further from the intentions of so able and uniformly patriotic a champion of the British constitution, Burke entered upon the merits of Fox's ar- guments, and of the question from which they had arisen. Fully coinciding with his friend respecting the evils of the old despotism, and the dangers that accrued from it to this country, and concerning the wisdom of our ancestors in preventing its contagion, as well as their rigour in resisting its ambitious projects, he thought very differently of the tranquillity to neighbours and happiness to themselves likely to ensue from the late proceedings of France. " In the last age," he continued, " we had been in danger of being entangled, by the example of France, in the net of re- lentless despotism. Our present danger arises from the model offered by a people whose character knows no medium — from a risk, from anarchy, of being led, through an admiration of successful fraud and violence, to the imitation and excesses of an irrational, unprincipled, proscribing, confiscating, plundering, ferocious, bloody, and tyrannical democracy. On the side of reli- gion, the danger of then* example is no longer from intolerance, but from atheism — a foul, unnatural vice, foe to all the dignity and consolation of mankind, which seems in France for a long time to have been embodied into a faction, accredited and almost avowed." Burke concluded with a high tribute to the merits of Fox. In reply, Fox, after expressing his esteem and veneration for Burke, 240 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. declared, " that if he were to put all the political information that he hail gained from hooks, all that he had learned from science, or that the knowledge of the world and its affairs had taught him, into one scale, and the improvement he had derived from Mr. Burke's conversation and instruction into the other, the latter would preponderate ;" still, however, he could not agree with the opinion of his friend respecting the French Revolution, at which he rejoiced as an emancipation from despotism. He declared himself us much an enemy to democratical despotism as to aristocratical or monarchical ; hut he did not apprehend that the new constitution of France would degenerate into tyranny of any sort. " He was," he said, " a friend only to a mixed government like our own, in which, if the aristocracy, or indeed any of the three branches, were destroyed, the good effects of the whole, and the happiness derived under it, would in his mind he at an end." Sheridan expressed his disapprobation of the remarks and rea- sonings of Burke on this subject much more strongly than Fox had done. He thought them quite inconsistent with the general prin- ciples and conduct of so constant and powerful a friend of liberty, and one who so highly valued the British government and the re- volution of 1688. Indignation and abhorrence of the revolution in France he deemed not consonant with the admiration of that of England. Detesting the cruelties that had been committed, he imputed them to the natural resentment of a populace for long- suffered and long-felt oppression. He praised the National As- sembly as the dispensers of good to their own country and other nations. " The National Assembly," he said, " had exerted a firmness and perseverance hitherto unexampled, that had secured the liberty of France and vindicated the cause of mankind. What action of theirs authorised the appellation of a bloody, ferocious, and tyrannical democracy?" Burke perceiving Sheridan's view of affairs in France to be totally different frum his — disapproving particularly of the opinion that there was a resemblance between the principles of the revolutions in France and in England, and PUBLICATION OF THE " REFLECTIONS." 241 thinking the construction of Ins observations uncandid — declared that Mr. Sheridan and he were from that moment separated for ever in politics. " Mr. Sheridan," he said, " has sacrificed my friendship in exchange for the applause of clubs and associations : I assure him he will find the acquisition too insignificant to be worth even the price at which it is purchased." Mr. Pitt concluded the debate in a speech suited to the dignity and reserve of a minister. He hoped that France would unite, which he rather thought she soon might, with the liberty she had acquired, the blessings of law and order. Sheridan was highly offended at this sudden and overheated attack of Burke. "When the debate was over, an attempt was made by friends to appease the difference, and it partly suc- ceeded; but Burke and Sheridan were never closely intimate again. Parliament, however, was not now to be the chief arena of Burke's proceedings against the revolutionists. He had recourse to literature, another powerfid arm of his strength. In October 1790, he published his ever-memorable " Reflections on the Revolu- tion in France." This work was instantaneously and immensely successful. It literally shook Europe. "Within a few months the sale of it in England reached thirty thousand ; it was translated by Burke's intimate ally, M. Dupont, into French, and was read every where throughout the continent. The friends of order, — and there were many of them fortunately among the poor and humble, — the higher classes, patricians, prelates, princes, even monarchs and emperors, hailed with admiration and applause a book that was to be the general safeguard. Presents and praise came to the author from various members of the House of Bourbon, from the Emperor of Germany, from Stanislaus of Poland, from Ca- therine of Russia. George III. publicly remarked that it was "a work which every gentleman ought to read ;" — a very correct ob- servation ; for let who will peruse these admirable reflections, he must rise from the occupation with his mind elevated and his spirits 242 LIFE OF EDMUND BUEKE. in cheerful tone. True gentility is visibly impressed on every page of the book's fine chivalrous doctrine. " I shall take care," said Erskine, " to put Mr. Burke's work on the French Revolution into the hands of those whose principles are left to my formation. I shall take care that they have the advantage of doing, in the regular progression of youthful studies, what I have done even in the short intervals of laborious life ; that they shall transcribe with their own hands, from all the works of this most extraor- dinary person, and from the last among the rest, the soundest truths of religion ; the justest principles of morals, inculcated and rendered delightful by the most sublime eloquence ; the highest reach of philosophy, brought down to the level of common minds, by the most captivating taste ; the most enlightened observations on history, and the most copious collection of useful maxims from the experience of common life." The " Reflections on the French Revolution" is a work that must be read entirely through to be duly understood and appre- ciated. Rs commencement contains one of the finest and most compact explanatory essays on the British constitution ever penned ; and from that beginning, the stream of combined argument and eloquence flows so glitteringly and convincingly on, that the reader is a loser if he stops at all. For this reason, the work is better judged as a whole than by extracts. Yet of itself, what more splendid piece of writing is there in the language than the follow- ing accoimt of the events at Versailles and Paris in October 1789, — of the outrages then perpetrated on the King and Queen of France, and on common humanity itself? Dr. Richard Price, an able dissenting minister, distinguished fur his mathematical and statistical powers, as well as for his pole- mics and his liberal politics, preached at a chapel in the Old Jewry, in November 1789, and immediately afterwards published, a ser- mon " On the Love of Country," in which he launched into ex- pressions of delight at the emancipation of the French people. Alluding to this homily, Burke proceeds thus : THE ATTACK UPON VERSAILLES. 243 " I find a preacher of the gospel profaning the beautiful and prophetic ejaculation, commonly called ' Nunc dimittis,' made on the first presentation of our Saviour in the temple, and applying it, with an inhuman and unnatural rapture, to the most horrid, atrocious, and afflicting spectacle that perhaps ever was exhibited to the pity and indignation of mankind. This - leading in triumph' a thing in its best form unmanly and irreligious, which fills our preacher with such unhallowed transports, must shock, I be- lieve, the moral taste of every well-born mind. Several English were the stupified and indignant spectators of that triumph. It was (unless we have been strangely deceived) a spectacle more resembling a procession of American savages, entering into Onon- dago, after some of their murders called victories, and leading into hovels hung round with scalps their captives overpowered with the scoffs and buffets of women as ferocious as themselves, much more than it resembles the triumphal pomp of a civilised, martial nation; — if a civilised nation, or any men who had a sense of generosity, were capable of a personal triumph over the fallen and afflicted. " This, my dear sir, was not the triumph of France. I must believe that, as a nation, it overwhelmed you with shame and horror " History, who keeps a durable record of all our acts, and exercises her awful censure over the proceedings of all sorts of sovereigns, will not forget either those events or the era of this liberal refinement in the intercourse of mankind. History will record, that on the morning of the 6th of October, 1789, the King and Queen of France, after a day of confusion, alarm, dismay, and slaughter, lay down, under the pledged security of public faith, to indulge nature in a few hours of respite, and troubled, melancholy repose. From this sleep the queen was first startled by the voice of the sentinel at her door, who cried out to her to save herself by flight — that this was the last proof of fidelity he could give — that they were upon him, and he was dead. Instantly he was cut 244 LIFE OF EDMUND BUKKE. down. A band of cruel ruffians and assassins, reeking with Wood, rushed into the chamber of the queen , and pierced with a hundred strokes of bayonets and poniards the bed, from whence this perse- cuted woman had but just time to fly almost naked, and, through ways unknown to the murderers, had escaped to seek refuge at the feet of a king and husband, not secure of his own life for a moment. LOUIS SVL " This long, to say no more of him, and this queen, and their infant children (who once would have been the pride and hope of a great and generous people), were then forced to abandon the sanctuary of the most splendid palace in the world, which they left swimming in blood, polluted by massacre, and strewed with THE MARCH TO PARIS. 245 scattered limbs and mutilated carcasses. Thence they were con- ducted into the capital of their kingdom. Two had been selected from the unprovoked, unresisted, promiscuous slaughter, which was made of the gentlemen of birth and family who composed the king's body-guard. These two gentlemen, with all the parade of an execution of justice, were cruelly and publicly dragged to the block, and beheaded in the great court of the palace. Their heads were stuck upon spears and led the procession ; whilst the royal captives who followed in the train were slowly moved along, amidst the horrid yells, and thrilling screams, and frantic dances, and in- famous contumelies, and all the unutterable abominations of the furies of hell, in the abused shapes of the vilest of women. After they had been made to taste, drop by drop, more than the bitter- ness of death, in the slow torture of a journey of twelve miles, protracted to six hours, they were, under a guard composed of those very soldiers who had thus conducted them through this famous triumph, lodged in one of the old palaces of Paris, now converted into a Bastile for kings. " Is this a triumph to be consecrated at altars? to be com- memorated with grateful thanksgiving? to be offered to the Divine humanity with fervent prayer and enthusiastic ejaculation ? These Theban and Thracian orgies, acted in France, and applauded only in the Old Jewry, I assure you, kindle prophetic enthusiasm in the minds but of very few people in this kingdom : although a saint and apostle, who may have revelations of his own, and who has so completely vanquished all the mean superstitions of the heart, may incline to think it pious and decorous to compare it with the entrance into the world of the Prince of Peace, proclaimed in a holy temple by a venerable sage, and not long before not worse announced by the voice of angels to quiet the innocence of shepherds " I hear that the august person, who was the principal object of our preachers triumph, though he supported himself, felt much on that shameful occasion. As a man, it became him to feel for 24G LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. his wife and his children, and the iaithful guards of his person, that were massacred in cold Wood ahont him ; as a prince, it became him to feel for the strange and frightful transformation of his civil- ised subjects, and to be more grieved for them than solicitous for himself. It derogates little from his fortitude, while it adds infi- nitely to the honour of his humanity. I am very sorry to say it, very sorry indeed, that such personages are in a situation in which it is not becoming in us to praise the virtues of the great. " I hear, and I rejoice to hear, that the great lady, the other object of the triumph, has borne that day (one is interested that beings made for suffering should suffer well), and that she bears all the succeeding days, that she bears the imprisonment of her husband, and her own captivity, and the exile of her friends, and the insulting adulation of addresses, and the whole weight of her accumulated wrongs, with a serene patience, in a manner suited to her rank and race, and becoming the offspring of a sovereign dis- tinguished for her piety and her courage ; — that, like her, she has ' lofty sentiments ; that she feels with the dignity of a Roman ma- tron ; that in the last extremity she will save herself from the last disgrace ; and that, if she must fall, she will fall by no igno- ble hand. " It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the Queen of France, then the Dauphiness, at Versailles ; and surely never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she just began to move in, — glittering like the morning star, full of life, and splendour, and joy. Oh ! what a revolution ! and what a heart must I have, to contemplate with- out emotion that elevation and that fall. Little did I dream, when she added titles of veneration to those of enthusiastic, dis- tant, respectful love, that she should ever be obliged to carry the sharp antidote against disgrace concealed in that bosom ; little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fallen upon her in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honour, and BURST OF ELOQUENCE TOUCHING MARIE ANTOINETTE. 247 of cavaliers. I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabhards to avenge even a look that threatened her MARIE ANTOINETTE. 24S LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone. That of sophisters, economists, and calculators, has succeeded ; and the glory of Europe is extinguished for ever. Never, never more shall we he- hold that generous loyalty to rank and sex, that proud suhmission, that dignified ohedience, that subordination of the heart, which kept alive, even in servitude itself, the spirit of an exalted free- dom. The unbought grace of life, the cheap defence of nations, the nurse of manly sentiment and heroic enterprise, is gone ! It is gone, that sensibility of principle, that chastity of honour, which felt a stain like a wound, which inspired courage whilst it mitigated ferocity, which ennobled whatever it touched, and under which vice itself lost half its evil, by losing all its grossness. "This mixed system of opinion and sentiment had its origin in the ancient chivalry ; and the principle, though varied in its appearance by the varying state of human affairs, subsisted and influenced through a long succession of generations, even to the time we live in. If it should ever be totally extinguished, the loss, I fear, will be great. It is this which has given its character to modern Europe ; it is this which has distinguished it under all its forms of government, and distinguished it to its advantage from the states of Asia, and possihly from those states which flourished in the most brilliant periods of the antique world. It was this which, without confounding ranks, had produced a noble equality, and handed it down through all the gradations of social life. It was this opinion which mitigated kings into companions, and raised pri- vate men to be fellows with kings. Without force or opposition, it subdued the fierceness of pride and power ; it obliged sovereigns to submit to the soft collar of social esteem, compelled stern autho- rity to submit to elegance, and gave a domination vanquisher of laws, to be subdued by manners. " But now all is to be changed. All the pleasing illusions which made power gentle and obedience liberal, which harmonised the different shades of life, and which, by a bland assimilation, in- corporated into politics the sentiments which beautify and soften THE LOSS OF CHIVALRY DEPLORED. 249 private society, are to be dissolved by this new conquering entire of light and reason. All the decent drapery of life is to be rudely torn off; all the superadded ideas furnished from the wardrobe of a moral imagination, which the heart owns and the understanding ratines as necessary to cover the defects of our naked, shivering nature, and to raise it to dignity in our own estimation, are to be exploded as a ridiculous, absurd, and antiquated fashion. " On this scheme of things, a king is but a man, a queen is but a woman, a woman is but an animal, and an animal not of the highest order. All homage paid to the sex in general as such, and without distinct views, is to be regarded as romance and folly. Kegicide and parricide and sacrilege are but fictions of superstition, corrupting jurisprudence by destroying its simplicity. The murder of a king, or a queen, or a bishop, or a father, are only common homicide ; and if the people are by any chance or in any way gainers by it, a sort of homicide much the most pardonable, and into winch we ought not to make too severe a scrutiny. " Ou the scheme of this barbarous philosophy, which is the off- spring of cold hearts and muddy understandings, and which is as void of solid wisdom as it is destitute of all taste and elegance, laws are to be supported only by their own terrors, and by the concern which each individual may find in them from his own pri- vate speculations, or can spare to them from his own private inte- rests. In the groves of their academy, at the end of every vista, you see nothing but the gallows. Nothing is left which engages the affections on the part of the commonwealth. On the principles of this mechanic philosophy, our institutions can never be em- bodied, if I may use the expression, in persons ; so as to create in us love, veneration, admiration, or attachment. But that sort of reason which banishes the affections is incapable of filling their place. These public affections, combined with manners, are re- quired sometimes as supplements, sometimes as correctives, always as aids to law. The precept given by a wise man, as well as a great critic, for the construction of poems, is equally true as to 250 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. states : ' Non satis estpulchra esse poemata, dulcia sunto.' There ought to be a system of manners in every nation which a well- formed mind would be disposed to relish. To make us love our country, our country ought to be lovely." Other parts of these " Reflections" display almost equal beau- ties. On the subject of nobility and the law of primogeniture, Burke writes thus : " All this violent cry against the nobility I take to be a mere work of art. To be honoured and even privileged by the laws, opinions, and inveterate usages of our country, growing out of the prejudice of ages, lias nothing to provoke horror and indignation in any man. Even to be too tenacious of those privileges is not ab- solutely a crime. The strong struggle in every individual to pre- serve possession of what he has found to belong to him and to distinguish him, is one of the securities against injustice and des- potism implanted in our nature. It operates as an instinct to secure property, and to preserve communities in a settled state. What is there to shock in this ? Nobility is a graceful ornament to the civil order : it is the Corinthian capital of polished society. ' Omnes boni nobilitati semper favemus,' was the saying of a wise and good man. It is indeed one sign of a liberal and benevolent mind to incline to it with some sort of partial propensity. He feels no ennobling principle in his own heart, who wishes to level all the artificial institutions which have been adopted for giving a body to opinion, and permanence to fugitive esteem. It is a sour, malignant, envious disposition, without taste for the reality or for any image or representation of virtue, that sees with joy the unmerited fall of what had long flourished in splendour and in honour. I do not like to see any thing destroyed, any void pro- duced in society, any ruin on the face of the land The power of perpetuating our property in our families is one of the most valuable and interesting circumstances belonging to it, and that which tends the most to the perpetuation of society itself. It NOISY POLITICIANS. 251 makes our weakness subservient to our virtue ; it grafts benevo- lence even upon avarice. The possessors of family wealth and of the distinction which attends hereditary possession (as most con- cerned in it) are the natural securities for this transmission. With us the House of Peers is formed upon this principle. It is wholly composed of hereditary property and hereditary distinction ; and made therefore the third of the legislature ; and, in the last event, the sole judge of all property in all its subdivisions. The House of Commons too, though not necessarily, yet hi fact is always so composed in the far greater part. Let those large proprietors be what they will — and they have their chance of being among the best — they are, at the very worst, the ballast in the vessel of the commonwealth ; for though hereditary wealth and the rank which goes with it are too much idolised by creeping sycophants, and the blind, abject admirers of power, they are too rashly slighted in shallow speculations of the petidant, assuming, short-sighted cox- combs of philosophy. Some decent, regulated pre-emiuence, some preference (not exclusive appropriation) given to birth, is neither unnatural, nor unjust, nor impolitic." On the misapplication of the term " honourable" Burke writes : " The Chancellor of France, at the opening of the states, said in a tone of oratorical flourish, that all occupations were honour- able. If he meant only that no honest employment was disgrace- in!, he would not have gone beyond the truth: but in asserting that any thing is honourable, we imply some distinction in its favour. The occupation of a hairdresser or of a working tallow- chandler cannot be a matter of honour to any person, — to say nothing of a number of other more servile employments. Such descriptions of men ought not to suffer oppression from the state ; but the state suffers oppression if such as they, either individually or collectively, are permitted to rule. In this you think you are combating prejudice, but you are at war with nature." Burke thus describes noisy politicians : 252 LITE OF EDMUND BURKE. " I Lave often been astonished, considering that we are divided from you (the French) but by a slender dyke of about twenty-four miles, and that the mutual intercourse between the two countries has lately been very great, to find how little you seem to know of us. I suspect that this is owing to your forming a judgment of this nation from certain publications which do very erroneously, if they do at all, represent the opinions and dispositions generally prevalent in England. The vanity, restlessness, petulance, and spirit of intrigue of several petty cabals, who attempt to hide their total want of consequence in bustle, and noise, and puffing, and mutual quotation of each other, makes you imagine that our con- temptuous neglect of their abilities is a general mark of acquies- cence in their opinions. No such thing, I assure you. Because half a dozen grasshoppers under a fern make the field ring with their importunate chink, whilst thousands of great cattle, reposed beneath the shadow of the British oak, chew the cud and are silent, pray do not imagine that those who make the noise are the only inhabitants of the field ; that of course they are many in num- ber ; or that, after all, they are other than the little, shrivelled, meagre, hopping, though loud and troublesome insects of the hour." The following short passages, taken at random, are remark- ably fine : " The dignity of every occupation wholly depends upon the quantity and the kind of virtue that may be exerted in it." " First of all, the science of jurisprudence, the pride of the human intellect, which, with all its defects, .redundancies, and errors, is the collected reason of ages, combining the principles of original justice with the infinite variety of human concerns." " We know, and what is better, we feel inwardly, that reli- gion is the basis of civil society, and the source of all good and of all comfort. . . We know, and it is our pride to know r , that man is by his constitution a religious animal ; that atheism is against not only our reason, but our instincts; and that it cannot prevail long." ANSWERS TO THE REFLECTIONS. 253 The first answer to Burke's " Reflections " came from the ahle pen of Dr. Priestley, an eminent philosopher, metaphysician, and divine, whose theological opinions passed through various changes, from Calvinism to Unitarianism, and went perhaps a little further. A considerable part of Priestley's publication was a vin- dication of Dr. Price's opinion concerning the source and tenure of monarchical power in England ; in the rest, the author dilated en the happy effects that must be the results of the glorious principles of the French Revolution, from which he foreboded the enlarge- raent of liberty, the amelioration of soeiety, and the increase of virtue and of happiness. Another reply to Burke — one of much pernicious effect on the then agitated feelings of the humbler classes — was the first part of " The Rights of Man," by his quondam acquaintance, Tom Paine. Perhaps there never was a writer who more completely attained the art of impressing vulgar and undistinguishing minds than Paine. He had a soberness of style, and a plain perspicacity of diction which told with force, and made the most daring falsity sound like truth. Yet, looked searchingly into, his " Rights of Man," even as mere argument, is but a weak attack upon Burke. His refusal, moreover, to contend with the impassioned portions of Burke's work renders his answer glaringly incomplete and defi- cient ; for surely the eloquence of an advocate should be met as well as his logic. The sum and substance of Paine's theory amounted to this : England had a very bad government, and France a very good one, and likely to be still better. The Eng- lish government consequently ought to be pulled down, and to be rebuilt upon the French model. Dr. Price, whom " The Reflections" denounced ; Mary Woll- stonecraft ; Mrs. Macaulay, the anti-monarchical historian, whom Burke himself called a republican virago ; and Charles, third Earl Stanhope, also attempted answers to Mr. Burke ; but they were merely attempts, no more. One reply, not to be placed in the same category with these, deserves both notice and respect. This 254 LITE OF EDMUND BURKE. was the " Vindiciae Gallica.%" which Mr. (afterwards Sir James) Mackintosh published in 1791, being then in his twenty-sixth year. The work laid the foundation of Mackintosh's fame. Other writers, in attacking Burke'B " Reflections," had mixed subjects foreign to that work ; had, in obvious error, charged the author with a dereliction of former opinions ; and some had gone to the unfair length of imputing to him either unworthy or frivolous motives. Mackintosh rejected every irrelative ques- tion, and proceeded to the main object. Having studied Burke's writings and conduct from the beginning, and investigated their principles, he had discovered, as every one must who will take the same trouble, that the charge of inconsistency was unfounded. The " Yindiciae Gallicae" is evidently the result of great and varied powers and attainments. Taste, learning, invention, judgment, eloquence, acute reasoning, profound philosophy, and habits of correct and elegant composition, are most fully and happily there displayed. The erroneous conclusions, for erroneous they are, of the forcible and profound Mackintosh appear to have arisen from two sources : first, he argued from a supposition of a possible perfection in the human character, instead of an accurate estimate of the degree of perfection which it had actually attamed; secondly, he was wo- fully misinformed concerning the principles, spirit, and character of the French revolutionists. The best answer to the work was the author's own subsequent conduct. As Ins genius grew mature from experience, he rejected imaginary theories, and reasoned from history, and from human nature as it actually exists. He saw the revolutionary character in its true colours ; he became the pro- fessed admirer of Burke, and he loyally and honestly concurred in reprobating the Jacobinical system, but too visibly the hideous offspring of the delusive speculations he had previously admired. The best possible proof that can be given of the excellence of Burke's book of " Reflections," lies in the fate of all the answers that were intended to put it down. "Where are they now ? The QUABREL WITH FOX. 255 minor replies have gone into utter oblivion ; the greater, the " Eights of Man," so alluring, and the " Yindiciae Gallicse," so able, have departed also with the occasion or excitement of the horn-, and are now scarcely if ever read. Burke's work, on the contrary, remains a classic. It has had even better fortune than the o T eat convulsion it treats of. The first French Revolution is already a thing of history, stale and unprofitable to remember, despite of its glittering hopes and gaudy show ; but these " Re- flections" upon it have not passed away. They will last in their beauty and freshness, — coeval with the piety, honour, truth, cour- tesy, and every other good attribute of society, which have made them acceptable. The very perpetuity and popularity of the book happily contradict its author in one point, and bear continual evi- dence that the age of chivalry is not entirely gone. Such was the production of Edmund Burke, and such the fame he acquired ; yet shortly after the publication of the " Reflec- tions," he did injury to his reputation by an act of excited temper. This was bis quarrel with Fox, in which he certainly was wrong, as he made personal that which should have been viewed as po- litical only, and cast aside a friend whose affection and fealty could not be doubted. The unhappy dispute arose, as that between Burke and Sheridan, from difference of opinion on the French Re- volution. It began and progressed in the warmth of public debate. The final rupture, which took place on the 6th May, 1791, in the House of Commons, happened thus : A bill had been proposed for the formation of a constitution in Canada. La discussing it, Burke entered on the general principles of legislation, and launched, some- what inappropriately, into a consideration of the new and danger- ous doctrines of France ; he expressed his conviction that there was a design formed in this country against the British constitu- tion. After some members of the party had called Burke to order, Mr. Vox spoke. Fox conceiving that an insinuation of maintain- ing republican principles had been made against him by Mr. Pitt (though explained away by Pitt), and that Mr. Burke's speech £5G LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. tended to strengthen the notion, declared his conviction that the British constitution, . though defective in theory, was in practice excellently adapted to this country. He repeated, however, his praises of the French Revolution; he thought it, on the whole, one of the most glorious events in the history of mankind ; and proceeded to express his dissent from Burke's opinion on the sub- ject, as inconsistent with just views of the inherent rights of man- kind. These were, besides, he urged, not Burke's former prin- ciples. He contended also that the discussion of the French Revolution was irrelative to the Quebec bill. Burke, in reply, said, " ]\Ir. Fox has treated me with harsh- ness and malignity : after having harassed with his light troops in the skirmishes of order, he brought the heavy artillery of his own great abilities to bear on me." Burke then maintained that the French constitution and general system were replete with anarchy, impiety, vice, and misery ; that the discussion of a new polity for a province that had been under the French, and was now under the English government, was a proper opportunity for comparing the French and British constitutions. He denied the charge of inconsistency ; his opinions on government, he insisted, had been the same during all his political life. He said, Mr. Fox and he had often differed, and that there had been no loss of friendship between them ; but that there was something in the accursed French insurrection that envenomed every thing. Fox whispered, " There is no loss of friendship now between us." Burke answered, " There is ! I know the price of my conduct : our friendship is at an end." He concluded by exhorting the two great men, Fox and Pitt, the leaders of opposite parties — that " they should not move in the political hemisphere as two blazing stars in opposite orbits, but walk together as brethren, to preserve the British con- stitution and guard it against innovation." Mr. Fox rose ; but his mind was so much agitated, and his heart so much affected, by what had fallen from Mr. Burke, that it was some minutes before he could proceed. Tears trickled QUARKEL WITH FOX : RECONCILIATION. 257 down his cheeks, and he strove hi vain to give utterance to his feelings. The sensibility of every meniher of the house seemed excited. Recovered at length, Fox said he hoped his right hon- ourable friend, for so he must still call him, woidd think on past times ; and* however any imprudent words or intemperance of his might have offended bim, it would show that at least it had not been intentionally his fault. He was willing to make many con- cessions; but he still maintained that Mr. Burke had formerly held very different principles, and that he himself had taken his instructions from those former sentiments. He referred to mea- sures which Burke had either proposed or promoted. This re- petition of the charge of inconsistency prevented the impression which the affectionate and respectful language and behaviour, and the conciliatory apologies of Fox might have made on Burke. Burke, when he spoke in answer, expressed only coolly his sorrow for the occurrences of the day, and finished by saying he sincerely hoped no member of the House woidd ever barter the constitution of his country, that eternal jewel of his soul, for a wild and visionary system, winch could only lead to confusion and disorder. No more passed ; and thus was broken a friendship which had continued beyond a cpiarter of a century. Unfortu- nately, close intimacy never was renewed, though the angry feel- ing was not, it seems, of endless duration!. Since the publication of the first edition of this biography, the author is glad to be in- formed that in all probability a reconciliation between the two great men did take place. This most important fact, kindly com- municated to him by Mr. Macqueen, of the Chancery Bar, was related to that learned gentleman by Mr. Rose, committee clerk for many years to the House of Commons. It was to this effect: Burke, some years after his retirement from parliament, when grief for his son had made a wreck of his health and spirits, walked down om; summer evening to the House of Commons, and sent Mr. Rose in to beg of Mr. Fox to come out and see "a dying man." Fox instantly attended the summons, and he and s 258 LIFE OF EDMUND BUEKE. Burke wont into an adjoining committee-room: Mr. Rose de- clared that Burke shed tears; and no doubt the illustrious oppo- nents then exchanged forgiveness. Burke, presuming from the above memorable debate of the 6th May an implied censure on his conduct as a -Whig, and having read an announcement in the Morning Chronicle of the 12th May, 1791, that the main body of the Whig party had sided with Mr. Fox, published an inquiry into the just conduct of the opposers of his doctrines. This work, his well-known " Ap- peal from the New to the Old Whigs," appeared in July 1791. The " Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs" was chiefly written in the July of its publication, while Edmund Burke and his family were at Margate. During that period, Ms mornings were mostly spent in walking about the fields, and especially to- wards the North Foreland, whence he used to take pleasure in viewing the ships ; the evenings he passed in easy and familiar intercourse with many of the Margate visitors, in the libraries or at the rooms. At Margate, as, indeed, on every occasion, he at- tended Divine service regularly ; and the fact is only here alluded to as recalling a somewhat curious incident. Burke, at church, was devoutly attentive to the prayers, and also to the sermon, if kept within its sphere of moral and religious instruction ; but when the occupant of the pulpit departed from that strict line, he could not always refrain from testifying his disapprobation. At •this time there happened to be at Margate a popular preacher from London. The reverend gentleman heard that Edmund Burke would be among his congregation, and like the Grecian declaimer who undertook to lecture before Hannibal on the art of war, he delivered, in the presence of Burke, in Margate church, a long political sermon, denunciatory of French revolutionary sentiments, and laudatory of the contest which European monarchs proposed to carry on against France. Burke manifested an impatience observable by the whole congregation. He several times stood up, and took his hat, as if expecting the discourse to end ; at last ENCOURAGING ADVICE TO MINISTERS. 259 be sat down with such visible marks of disappointment and dis- satisfaction, that the preacher, taken rather oddly aback, brought bis homily to a sudden termination. In the December of this same year 1791, Burke brought out his " Thoughts on French Affairs." Meanwhile, never did parlia- mentary eloquence shine with more lustre than during the debates consequent on the convulsion going on in France. The subject, ominous of war, sounded more important than even had done the late contest with America. Parliament still contained its grand assemblage of genius, — the same great men, with even a greater cause for their discussion. Burke, now beyond sixty years of age, never exerted his mind with more energy ; never evinced more vigour and vivacity. The warning voice and ener- getic counsels of Burke failed for a considerable period to arouse Mr. Pitt from pacific theories to a sense of the rapidly approaching danger. The first time — a day in the autumn of 1791 — that Mr. Burke ever dined with Mr. Pitt, was in a partie carree at Down- ing Street, the others present being Lord Grenville and the then Speaker, Mr. Addington. Mr. Burke strove to alarm Mr. Pitt on the aggressive nature of French principles, and the propagandism of revolution. Mr. Pitt made rather light of the danger, and said, in colloquial phrase, " This country and constitution were safe to the day of judgment." " Yes," Mr. Burke quickly retorted ; " but 'tis the day of no judgment that I am afraid of." At a subsequent and more formal dinner, when the whole coalition, — including the Duke of Portland, Lord Spencer, Lord Fitzwilliam, and Mr. Burke, — dined with Mr. Pitt, the conversation had turned, in a desponding strain, on the ruin of the French monarchy; and when the party rose to go to coffee, Mr. Burke, as his parting advice, addressed them in a loud voice thus : . " Illic fas regna resurgere Trojas ; Durate — et vosmet rebus servate secundis." One of the parliamentary scenes of this time, which Burke's enemies, and especially his petty and ignorant slanderers of recent 2G0 LITE OF EDMUND BUEKE. growth, have misrepresented and exaggerated, must not be passed over. By tliem, Burke is reported to have, in the midst of a vio- lent philippic against the French revolutionists, drawn forth a dag- ger, and to have thrown it on the floor of the House of Commons, a propos de rien, as a kind of abstract theatrical flourish to give addi- tional effect to his words. Whether what he really did was or was not in good taste is questionable ; but it was not any thing so irra- tional or unmeaning as that charged against him. The true facts were these. On the 19th December, 1792, Lord Grenville intro- duced a bill, which forthwith jessed into a law, for placing aliens under strict supervision, and for confining to certain districts those foreign emigrants who had taken refuge in England, and who re- ceived temporary assistance from government. Many causes called for tliis cautionary measure ; one in particular made it imperative. Among certain murderous plans started by the Parisian insurgents, a wretch had proposed that each citizen should carry about his per- son a concealed poniard, ready to plunge it into the heart of an aristocrat whenever a safe opportunity should occur. The sug- gestion was received with approbation and applause. Intelligence of this had reached the British government, already aware that some of the refugees in England were spies and agents of the Jacobins and various other incendiary clubs of Paris. A circum- stance, too, had come to light to confirm the information. It was discovered that orders had been sent from certain parties in France to a manufactory in Birmingham for the making of three thou- sand daggers, and that these weapons were actually hi the course of construction. Burke happened to procure one of them ; and he looked on it as damnatory proof of what he imputed to the revolutionists. When, therefore, a discussion had arisen on the very subject of the danger to be dreaded from France in its then condition, Burke took with him this dagger to the House ; and on the 28th of November, 1792, the actual evening that the news had come of the commencement of the infamous trial of Louis XVI., Burke made a long oration, one not at all wild THE DAGGER-SCENE E\ T THE COMMONS. 2G1 or irrational, but, on the contrary, most able and argumenta- tive, and very much to the purpose of the debate. In the course of his address he produced, too abruptly perhaps, but not inap- propriately, the dagger intended for the grasp of some sans-culotte assassin, and threw it indignantly down, saying, " This is what you may gain by any alliance with France. Wherever these new principles of Frenchmen are introduced, their practices follow ; you must equally proscribe their tenets and their persons from our shores." He then continued a discourse which had the effect in the House of bringing over some of the wisest to his own views. Burke's assailants, however, ridiculed, at the time, this circum- stance of the dagger, as a violation of that usual good taste so characteristic of the great orator. Gilray, as the engraving on the next page shows, caricatured the scene with his wonted humour ; but even in this sketch, which Burke himself much enjoyed, the fun, it will be observed, is not made to turn on any irrationality of Burke, but on the visible dismay of Dundas, Pitt, Sheridan, and Fox, whom the artist would represent, in connexion with the French Revolution, — the two former on account of their hesita- tion, and the two latter on account of their approbation, — to form part of the gang whose detection the production of the dagger has accomplished. The affair was at the utmost treated by those who objected to it as a passing joke ; but no one dreamt for a moment of imputing, from the act, frenzy or folly to a man whom King, Lords, and Commons were consulting and conferring with as a guide. Burke, in fact, never acted, wrote, or spoke more sensibly than at this period. France by no means monopolised or dis- tracted his attention ; he was as alive as usual to other matters, public and private. In 1791 Burke had co-operated most earnest!}; with Mr. Wil- berforce in another attempt to lessen the horrors of the slave-trade, and to abolish them if possible. Burke sent to Mr. Dundas a " Sketch of a Negro Code" — a series of regulations for the protec- tion of the unfortunate subjects of the African traffic. Every line 2G2 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. of this document demonstrates the calm practical sense and henig- n.int spirit of its author, intent as ever on the true cause of free- dom. He once more also exerted himself on hehalf of the Irish THE DAGGER-SCENE, CARICATURED BY GILRAT. Catholics against the severity of the penal laws. On the 3d Janu- ary, 1792, he wrote his first letter to Sir Hercules Langrishe, one of the ahlest essays on Catholic claims and on the state of Ireland DEAIH OF SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS. 2G3 ever produced. It abounds in iinhnpassioned and prophetic wis- dom. Not content with this, he had his son appointed agent to the Catholics ; and he sent him to Ireland, introducing him as " his other and better self" to his old friend, Lord Charlemont, in a letter, in which he says, " In the prosperity of your country, I include the most valuable interest of this." Burke's efforts were successful. One act that passed soon after in the Irish parliament conferred upon the Catholics the privileges of practising law, inter- marrying with Protestants, together with further important advan- tages in connexion with education and commerce. Another act, in 1793, gave Catholics the elective franchise. Burke, notwith- standing, was now more than ever opposed to Parliamentary Re- form, as he showed in his earnest speech against Charles (after- wards Earl) Grey's ineffectual attempt on the 30th April, 17 'J 2, in the Commons, in favour of that measure. Early in 1792 the angel of death cast a shade over the social life of Burke, which, in the grief and despondency it caused him, seemed to forebode that there were darker and sadder shadows to come. On the 2od of February, in that year, he lost his eminent friend Sir Joshua Reynolds, and in him almost the last of the lite- rary and convivial associates of his early years. Sir Joshua had always regarded Burke as the first of men, and was in turn loved, esteemed, and respected by his illustrious ally. Reynolds had assisted Burke when embarrassed ; and by his will, after can- celling a bond for 20001., he bequeathed him 20001. more, and appointed him guardian to his niece and heiress, Miss Mary Pal- mer, of Torrington, in the county of Devon, who became, in the autumn after her uncle's death, the second wife of Burke's Mend, Murrough, fifth Earl of Inchiquin, afterwards, in 1800, first Mar- quess of Thomond. Burke and Reynolds had been so continually together as to have most of their ideas in common. 1'rom the fulness of Burke's mind, Sir Joshua confessedly borrowed much, and made use of it in his own writings and academical addresses. " Burke," said Maloue, " was to Reynolds what Scipio was to 2G4 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. Lelius." Burke wrote in one of the public journals the following beautiful character of the friend whose departure he so bitterly lamented : " The illness of Sir Joshua Reynolds was long, but borne with a mild and cheerful fortitude, without the least mixture of any thing irritable or querulous, agreeably to the placid and even tenour of his whole life. He had, from the beginning of his malady, a distinct view of his dissolution; and he contemplated it with that entire composure which nothing but the innocence, integrity, and usefulness of his life, and an unaffected submission to the will of Providence, could bestow. In this situation he had every consola- tion from family tenderness, which his own kindness to his family had indeed well deserved. " Sir Joshua Reynolds was on very many accounts one of the most memorable men of his time. He was the first Englishman who added the praise of the elegant arts to the other glories of his country. In taste, in grace, in facility, in happy invention, and in the richness and harmony of colouring, he was equal to the great masters of the renowned ages. La portrait he went beyond them ; for he communicated to that department of the art, in which Eng- lish artists are the most engaged, a variety, a fancy, and a dignity derived from the higher branches, which even those who professed them in a superior manner did not always preserve when they de- lineated individual nature. His portraits remind the spectator of the invention of history and of the amenity of landscape. La painting portraits, he appears not to be raised upon that platform, but to descend to it from a higher sphere. His paintings illustrate his lessons, and his lessons seem to have been derived from his paintings. He possessed the theory as perfectly as the practice of his art. To be such a painter, he was a profound and penetrating . philosopher. " Li full happiness of foreign and domestic fame, admired by the expert in art and by the learned in science, courted by the great, caressed by sovereign powers, and celebrated by distinguished PUBLICATIONS RELATIVE TO FRANCE. 2G5 poets, his native humility, modesty, and candour never forsook him even on surprise or provocation, nor was the least degree of arro- gance or assumption visible to the most scrutinising eye in any part of bis conduct or discourse, " His talents of every kind, powerful from nature, and not meanly cultivated by letters — his social virtues in all the relations and in all the habitudes of life — rendered him the centre of a very great and unparalleled variety of agreeable societies, which will be dissipated by his death. He had too much merit not to provoke some jealousy, too much innocence to provoke any enmity. The loss of no man of his time can be felt with more sincere, general, and unmixed sorrow. " Hail ! and farewell !" Some time prior to the July of 1792, when the Duke of Bruns- wick issued his rash manifesto against the French nation, and the war began between the German potentates and the Gallic Repub- lic, Burke, with the knowledge and approbation of the British government, sent, in the autumn of 1791, his son to the princes of the House of Bourbon, and the other royal personages assem- bled at Coblentz, in order to know the dispositions of the allied powers. The news brought by Mr. Richard Burke, who came back in company with M. Cazales, was not very encouraging. From the apparent want of concert which he learned existed be- tween the belligerents, Edmund Burke did not augur highly of the success of their efforts. Hence his opinion that nothing short of a universal combination of established governments, co-operating with the royalists of France, could subdue a system which, if not crushed, he conceived would be destructive to all existing society. Soon after the retreat from France of the armies of Austria and Prussia, and the alarming successes of the republicans, Burke wrote, in November 1792, a memorial, entitled "Heads for consideration on the Present State of Affairs." In it he exhorted this country to take the lead in forming a general union with other nations for 2GG LIFE OF EDMUND BUEKE. the repression of French aggression. In this pamphlet occurs the following remarkable passage : " There never was, nor is, nor ever will he, nor ever can be, the least rational hope of making an impression on France by any continental powers, if England is not a part, is not the directing part, is not the soul of the whole confederacy against it. This, so far as it is an anticipation of future, is grounded on the whole tenour of former history." The republican government hastened the conclusion to which Burke would have England come. The acts of France to pro- mote her own aggrandisement, and her measures and decrees tending to interfere with the internal government of this country, hurried on the rupture. On the 21st January, 1793, Louis XVI. was murdered ; and before the month ended, the war with Eng- land was begun. Burke, as may be supposed, became intensely interested. His eagerness in the cause forcibly appeared in an incident that is told of him. In July 1793, the cheering news came that Valenciennes w r as taken by the Duke of York. The minister, Mr. Dundas, dispatched a messenger to communicate the tidings to Mr. Burke, who was found at the play at a country theatre at Chalfont St. Peter's, two or three miles from Beacons- field. Burke, after perusing Dundas's letter, went upon the stage, and read it to the audience with every mark of delight. Valenciennes proved, however, but a transitory success ; dis- asters followed, and the prospect grew dark and gloomy. Men were dejected, and ministers perplexed. Still Burke wrote on un- dismayed. His pamphlets of prophetic encouragement to England, and of determined denunciation to France, followed one another in rapid succession. His letter to the Duke of Portland on the conduct of the minority came out in August 1793, his " Bemarks on the Policy of the Allies" in the October of the same year, and his preface to a translation of M. Brissot's address to his consti- tuents in 1794. His four famous " Letters on a Regicide Peace" are of somewhat later date, being published in 1796 and 1797 : ENGLAND JUSTIFIED IN ITS WAR WITH FRANCE. 267 they complete the main hody of his writings on the French Re- volution and the European contest that followed, and may he as well mentioned here, as in the first of them occurs Burke's great argument of the right of Europe to make war on the French re- public; it is as follows. After giving it as his opinion that, "As to war, if it he the means of wrong and violence, it is the sole means of justice amongst nations. Nothing can banish it from the world. They who say otherwise, intending to impose upon us, do not impose upon themselves," — Burke proceeds thus : " In describing the nuisance erected by so pestilential a manu- factory, by the construction of so infamous a brothel, by digging a night-cellar for such thieves, murderers, and housebreakers as never infested the world, I am so far from aggravating, that I have fallen infinitely short of the evil. No man who has attended to the particulars of what has been done in France, and combined them with the principles there asserted, can possibly doubt it. When I compare with this great cause of nations, the trifling points of honour, the still more contemptible points of interest, the light ceremonies and undefinable punctilios, the disputes about precedency, the lowering or the hoisting of a sail, the dealing in a hundred or two of wild cat-skins on the other side of the globe, which have often kindled up the flames of war between nations, I stand astonished at those persons who do not feel a resentment, not more natural than politic, at the atrocious insults that this monstrous compound offers to the dignity of every nation, and who are not alarmed with what it threatens to their safety. " I have therefore been decidedly of opinion, with our declara- tion at Whitehall, in the beginning of this war, that the vicinage of Europe had not only a right, but an indispensable duty, and an exigent interest, to denunciate this new work before it had pro- duced the danger we have so sorely felt, and which we shall long feel. The example of what is done by France is too important not to have a vast and extensive influence ; and that example, backed with its power, must bear with great force on those who 2G8 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. are near it, especially on those who shall recognise the pretended republic on the principles upon which it now stands. It is not an old structure which you have found as it is, and are not to dis- pute of the original end and design with which it had been so fashioned. It is a recent wrong, and can plead no prescription. It violates the rights upon which not only the community of France, but those on which all communities are founded. The principles on which they proceed are general principles, and are as true in England as in any other country. They who (though with the purest intentions) recognise the authority of these regi- cides and robbers upon principle, justify their acts and establish them as precedents. It is a question not between France and England; it is a question between property and force. The property claims ; and its claim has been allowed. The property of the nation is the nation. They who massacre, plunder, and expel the body of the proprietary, are murderers and robbers. The state, in its essence, must be moral and just ; and it may be so, though a tyrant or usurper should be accidentally at the head of it. This is a thing to be lamented ; but this notwithstanding, the body of the commonwealth may remain in all its integrity and be perfectly sound in its composition. The present case is differ- ent. It is not a revolution in government. It is not the victory of party over party. It is a destruction and decomposition of the whole society ; which never can be made of right by any faction, however powerful, nor without terrible consequences to all about it, both in the act and in the example. This pretended republic is founded in crimes, and exists by wrong and robbery ; and wrong and robbery, far from a title to any thing, is war with mankind. To be at peace with robbery is to be an accomplice with it. " Mere locality does not constitute a body politic. Had Cade and his gang got possession of London, they would not have been the lord mayor, aldermen, and common council. The body politic of France existed in the majesty of its throne, in the dignity of its nobility, in the honour of its gentry, in the sanctity of its clergy, SUPPOSED STATE OF ENGLAND IE REVOLUTIONISED. 269 in the reverence of its magistracy, in the weight and consideration due to its landed property in the several baillages, in the respect due to its movable substance represented by the corporations of the kingdom. All these particular molecules united form the great mass of what is truly the body politic in all countries. They are so many deposits and receptacles of justice ; because they can only exist by justice. Nation is a moral essence, not a geograpbical arrangement, or a denommation of the nomenclator. France, though out of her territorial possession, exists ; because the sole possible claimaut, I mean the proprietary, and the government to which the proprietary adheres, exists, and claims. God forbid, that if you were expelled from your house by ruffians and assassins, that I should call the material walls, doors, and windows of the ancient and honourable family of . Am I to transfer to the intruders, who, not content to turn you out naked to the world, would rob you of your very name, all the esteem and respect I owe to you? The regicides in France are not France. France is out of her bounds, but the kingdom is the same. " To illustrate my opinions on this subject, let us suppose a case, which, after what has happened, we cannot think absolutely impossible, though the augury is to be abominated, and the event deprecated with our most ardent prayers. Let us suppose, then, that our gracious sovereign was sacrilegiously murdered ; his exem- plary cmeen, at the head of the matronage of this land, murdered in the same manner ; that those princesses, whose beauty and modest elegance are the ornaments of the country, and who are the leaders and patterns of the ingenuous youth of then sex, were put to a cruel and ignominious death, with hundreds of others, mothers and daughters, ladies of the first distinction; that the Prince of Wales and the Duke of York, princes the hope and pride of the nation, with all their brethren, were forced to fly from the laiives of assassins ; that the whole body of our excellent clergy were either massacred or robbed of all, and transported — the Christian religion, in all its denominations, forbidden and perse- 270 LIFE OF EDMUND BTOKE. cuted; the law totally, fundamentally, and in all its parts de- stroyed — the judges put to death hy revolutionary tribunals ; the peers and commons robbed to the last acre of their estates, mas- sacred if they stayed, or obliged to seek life in flight, in exile, and in beggary ; thai the whole landed property should share the very same fate — that every military and naval officer of honour and rank, almost to a man, should be placed in the same description of confiscation and exile — that the principal merchants and bankers should be drawn out, as from a hencoop, for slaughter — that the citizens of our greatest and most flourishing cities, when the hand and the machinery of the hangman were not found sufficient, should have been collected in the public squares, and massacred by thou- sands with cannon ; — if three hundred thousand others should have been doomed to a situation worse than death in noisome and pestilential prisons :— in such a case, is it in the faction of robbers I am to look for my country? Would tins be the England that you and I, and even strangers, admired, honoured, loved, and cherished ? Would not the exiles of England alone be my government and my fellow-citizens ? Would not their places of refuge be my temporary country ? Would not all my duties and all my affections be there, and there only ? Should I consider myself as a traitor to my country, and deserving of death, if I knocked at the door and heart of every potentate in Christendom to succour my friends, and to avenge them on their enemies ? Could I, in any way, show myself more a patriot ? What shoidd I think of those potentates who insulted their suffering brethren : who treated them as vagrants, or at least as mendicants ; and could find no allies, no friends, but in regicide murderers and rob- bers? What ought I to think and feel, if, being geographers instead of kings, they recognised the desolated cities, the wasted fields, and the rivers polluted with blood, of this Geometrical mea- surement, as the honourable member of Europe called England ? In that condition, what should we think of Sweden, Denmark, or Holland, or whatever power afforded us a churlish and treacherous ENGLISH LOYALTY. 271 hospitality, if they should invite us to joiu the standard of our king, our laws, and our religion, if they should give us a direct promise of protection ; if, after all this, taking advantage of our deplorable situation, which left us no choice, they were to treat us as the lowest and vilest of all mercenaries ? If they were to send us far from the aid of our king and our suffering country, to squander us away in the most pestilential climates for a venal enlargement of their own territories, for the purpose of tracking them, when obtained, with those very robbers and murderers they had called upon us to oppose with our blood ? What would be our sentiments, if in that miserable service we were not to be considered either as English, or as Swedes, Dutch, Danes, but as outcasts of the human race ? Whilst we were fighting those bat- tles of their interest, and as their soldiers, how should we feel if we were to be excluded from all their cartels ? How must we feel, if the pride and flower of the English nobility and gentry, who might escape the pestilential clime and the devouring sword, should, if taken prisoners, be delivered over as rebel subjects, to be condemned as rebels, as traitors, as the vilest of all criminals, by tribunals formed of Maroon negro slaves, covered over with the blood of their masters, who were made free and organised into judges for their robberies and murders ? What should we feel under this inhuman, insulting, and barbarous protection of Musco- vites, Swedes, or Hollanders ? Should we not obtest Heaven, and whatever justice there is yet on earth ? Oppression makes wise men mad ; but the distemper is still the madness of the wise, which is better than the sobriety of fools. The cry is the voice of sacred misery, exalted, not into wild raving, but into the sanc- tified frenzy of prophecy and inspiration. In that bitterness of soul, in that indignation of suffering virtue, in that exaltation of despair, would not persecuted English loyalty cry out with an awful warn- ing voice, and denounce the destruction that waits on monarchs who consider fidelity to them as the most degrading of all vices; who suffer it to be punished as the most abominable of all crimes ; I 272 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. and who have no respect hut for rehels, traitors, regicides, and furious negro slaves, whose crimes have broke their chains ? 'W ould not this warm language of high indignation have more of sound reason in it, more of real affection, more of true attachment, than all the lullabies of flatterers, who would hush monarchs to sleep in the arms of death ? Let them be w r ell convinced, that if ever this advantage should prevail in its whole extent, it will have its full operation. Whilst kings stand firm on then* base, though under that base there is a sure-wrought mine, there will not be wanting to their levees a single person of those who are attached to their fortune, and not to their persons or cause ; but hereafter none will support a tottering throne. Some will fly for fear of being crushed under the ruin, some will join in making it. They will seek, in the destruction of royalty, fame, and power, and wealth, and the homage of kings, with Reubel, with Carnot, with Eevelliere, and with the Merlins and the Talliens, rather than suffer exile and beggary with the Condes, or the Broglios, the Castries, the D'Avrais, the Serrents, the Cazales, and the long line of loyal, suffering, patriot nobility, or to be butchered with the oracles and victims of the laws, the D'Ormesons, the D'Es- premenils, and the Malesherbes. This example we shall give, if instead of adhering to our fellows in a cause which is an honour to us all, we abandon the lawful government and lawful cor- porate body of France, to hunt for a shameful and ruinous fra- ternity with this odious usurpation that disgraces civilised society and the human race. " And is, then, example nothing ? It is every thing. Exam- ple is the school of mankind, and they will learn at no other. This war is a war against that example. It is not a war for Louis the Eighteenth, or even for the property, virtue, fidelity of France. It is a war for George the Third, for Francis the Second, and for all the dignity, property, honour, virtue, and religion of England, of Germany, and of all nations." RETIREMENT OF BURKE FROM PARLIAMENT. 273 In parliament Burke also sustained by his eloquence the droop- ing spirits of government until his final retirement irom the house in 1794. The report of a committee to inspect the Lords' jour- nals, relative to the proceedings on the trial of Warren Hastings, was brought up in the April of that year. It occupied nearly two hundred pages, and according to the eminent conveyancer Charles THE DUKE OF PORTLAND. Butler, is one of the most learned and able legal summaries in the language. It was the work of Mr. Burke. On the 20th June following, a motion, by Mr. Pitt, fur the thanks of the house to the managers of Hastings' trial was carried. Mr. Burke acknow- ledged the honour in a speech which touched in honest explanation T 274 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. on what had passed, and warmly expressed his own grateful feel- ings. He immediately afterwards accepted the Chiltern Hundreds ; and thus he departed from that august assembly — quorum pars magna fuit — from that British House of Commons, which for more than a quarter of a century he had dignified with his virtue, en- chanted with his words, and enlightened with his wisdom. Orators have since come and gone ; but ages may pass before parliament listens to his like again — before such another voice, uttering elo- quence not only of the tongue but of the thought, falls upon and vivifies, with dewy freshness, the great council of the nation. Burke, on vacating his seat for Malton, obtained the immediate election of his son to represent that borough in his room. About the same time, through Burke's agency, government acquired a considerable and important reinforcement. In July 1794 Burke's eminent friend and intimate ally of more than twenty years' stand- ing, William Henry Cavendish, Duke of Portland, joined the minis- try and became third Secretaiy of State. Other friends of Burke, on his advice, followed the same example. Earl Fitzwilliam, first as President of the Council, and then as Lord Lieutenant of Ire- land ; Earl Spencer, as Lord Privy Seal ; and the manly, high- minded William Windham, as Secretary -at -War, took office in Mr. Pitt's administration. Burke's son, the new member for Malton, was appointed secretary to Lord Fitzwilliam. Burke, of course, might have been a minister ; but he now sought retirement for himself, and looked only to his son's advancement, that darling object of his life, apparently on the eve of accomplishment. A peerage was talked of for the orator ; the title — Lord Burke, of Beaconsfield — was even mentioned; and the patent was reported to be in contemplation. Alas, the vanity of human things ! the event of the next month swept away all Burke's worldly hopes, happiness, and anxiety for honours. BEACONSFIELD. CHAPTER YHL Death of Edmund Burke's Sister and Brother — Death of his Son : his grief in consequence— Edmund Burke's Pension : his Letter to the Duke of Bedford relative to it — Burke's declining Health— His Death, Funeral, and Will— Dr. King, Bishop of Rochester ; Sir Richard Bourke— Edmund Burke's Family and Representatives— Sale of his Estate at Beaconsfield, and acci- dbhtai Destruction by Fire of his Seat— Personal Description of Burke— Concluding Remarks. 276 LIFE OF EDMUND BUEKE. "When his lov'd child the Roman could not save, Immortal Tally, from an early grave, No common forms his home-felt passion kept — The sage, the patriot, and the parent wept. ****** The son fair rising knew too short a date ; But oh ! how more severe the parent's fate ! He saw him torn untimely from his side, Felt all a father's anguish, wept, and died. Mallet. In 1790, as already stated, death deprived Edmund Burke of his beloved sister. The year 1794 commenced with the loss of an- other of his dearest relatives. On the 4th February of that year, his brother Bichard, Recorder of Bristol, departed this life. Burke was deeply afflicted. The sorrow he felt made him for some time withdraw from his attendance in parliament, and indeed confirmed lnni in his intention of more permanent retirement. The loss of his brother was a grievous deprivation. He had been his compa- nion from his earliest years, and had constantly shared his fortunes, his pleasures, and his home. Towards the members of his own family Burke had a warmth of heart which made him regard them beyond every one else. He thought them all perfect. He accordingly looked up to his brother as a person of extraordinary abilities. Bichard Burke, though not that, had nevertheless, as already mentioned, considerable wit, acuteness, and knowledge, and was very generally esteemed and respected. He died un- married the 4th February, 1794. The August of the same year brought upon Edmund Burke another calamity, which did more to undermine his energies and to sap his vitality than all the toil and turmoil of his previous life. This was the premature death of that only and beloved son, about whom he had augured so fondly and so proudly — the child that was to be the stay and solace of the father in his declining age — the heir not only of his renown, but of a fame far brighter than his DEATHS IN BURKE'S FAMILY. 277 own. Young Burke possessed much to justify parental affection. He had talents excellent in themselves, and assiduously cultivated. His attainments were extensive, for his studies were directed and his mind formed under his father, a man himself of boundless in- formation — a man whose most casual conversation was rich with instruction — a man, too, who believed that almost every thing might be accomplished by industry, and who was the mortal enemy to those great allies of ignorance — sloth and dissipation. The son was amiable in disposition, and was devotedly attached to his parents. As he grew up, he gave proof of considerable ability. Even with the interrupted attention to business winch Ins delicate health permitted, he had earned the high opinion of men of rank and talents ; an opinion which his conduct as agent for the Catholics of Ireland confirmed. He had shown himself deeply conversant with the history and constitution both of Ireland and Great Bri- tain. He is said to have aided his father in collating some of the instances of speeches and opinions by the old Whigs, to whom Edmund Burke in his pamphlet appealed from the new. The father looked upon the son — no doubt a really clever man — as far more than that ; as, indeed, a prodigy of genius even superior to himself. His overrating fondness had created a picture of imaginary perfection, upon which his fancy dwelt for years with doating satisfaction. Great was his gratification when the time and opportunity came of making his son secretary to Earl Fitzwilliam, then Lord-lieutenant of Ireland. Burke had accompanied his son to the hustings at Malton; had introduced him to his constituents — to men devoted to him- self — tenants and friends of his late patron Rockingham, and stanch supporters of the noble house of Wentwortli, whose chief still followed where Burke would lead. The scene made Burke young again. It is related that this excursion into Yorkshire re- vived his spirits, damped by his brothers demise. He came back full of hope. He had at that time a town house iu Duke Street, St. James*s; there he and his son arrived from Malton on the 25th 278 LIFE OF EDMUND BUBKE. July, 1794. The next clay a party of intimate friends dined with him to celebrate the return to parliament and the promotion of Richard. The father found it difficult to suppress his exultation : his animation enlivened the board, but it was with a melancholy pleasure ; for others saw what he in his doating blindness could not see. They perceived the sallow hue and the emaciated form of the son — the hectic flush and the short cough — tokens but too visible of approaching dissolution. In a few days Richard grew worse ; yet none dared reveal to the unconscious parent the imminence and extent of the danger. Dr. Brocklesby, the family physician, declared from his long know- ledge of the intensity of Edmund Burke's affection, that the agony of any lengthened suspense would probably be fatal to him ; that brief as was the term of the son's existence, the torment of knowingly awaiting death must for the father be briefer still. The district of Old Brompton, the fairest and healthiest rural suburb of the great metropolis, has ever been a customary resort, and in many instances a saving refuge, for those threatened with death from consumption. Here, at a villa called Cromwell House, lod>nuffs were taken for Richard Burke. His father himself se- lected the residence, because he thought its nearness to town would the more readily enable the new secretary to depart for Ireland as soon as his health returned. Cromwell House, like many other localities nigh to it, acquired the name of " that great bad man" — as Burke termed him — the Protector, either from his having lodged or having had his head-quarters there or in the vicinity, at some eventful period of the Civil War. The tenement and its gardens must at one time have presented a pleasing coun- trified appearance. Latterly the place had been suffered to fall into decay, until its aspect became truly desolate and forlorn — a fit memorial of the statesman's perished hopes. The ruined abode has just been entirely removed, making way for new improve- ments. To this Cromwell House Burke's son was accordingly brought. The fatal symptoms pressed swiftly on, and death was LETTER DESCRIBING RICHARD BURKE S DEATH. 279 evidently close at hand. A few days before it came, Dr. Brock- lesby felt he must no longer delay disclosing the truth in its full terrors. From the moment he heard it, Edmund Burke aban- doned himself to the desperation of despair : " Mine," he exclaimed, " is a grief which cannot be comforted." Packard Burke expired on the 2d August, 1794, aged 36. CROMWELL HOUSE, OLD I5U0MPT0N. A celebrated letter, written at the time to Burke's niece, Mrs. Ilaviland, contains an exquisitely affecting description of the par- ticulars of the fatal event. The letter was from the eminent civilian, and attached friend of Burke and his family, Dr. French £80 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. Laurence, brother of Dr. Richard Laurence, late Archbishop of Cashel. According to this letter, the actual death occurred thus : During the night previous, Richard Burke was restless and discomposed. In the morning his lips were observed to have become black. His voice, however, was better ; and some little sustenance which he took remained quietly on his stomach. But his father and mother, having relinquished even the shadow of hope, thought nothing of these deceptively favourable symptoms. Their lamentations reached him where he lay. He instantly arose from his bed, and to make his emaciated appearance less shocking to his parents, changed his linen and washed himself. He then desired Mr. and Mrs. Webster, the old and faithful family servants, whose tender care of him was unremitting, to support him towards the door of the room where his father and mother were sitting in tears. As soon as he arrived at the door, he exerted himself to spring forward alone ; and treading with studious firmness, for the purpose of showing how little his strength was diminished, he crossed the room to the window. He endeavoured to enter into conversation with his father ; but grief keeping the latter silent, lie said, " Why, sir, do you not chide me for these unmanly feelings ? I am under no terror ; I feel myself better, and in spirits : yet my heart flutters, I know not why. Pray talk to me, sir; talk of religion, talk of morality, talk, if you will, on indifferent subjects." Then turning round, he asked, " What noise is that ? Does it rain ? Oh, no ; it is the rustling of the wind through the trees;" and immediately, with clear voice, with correct and impressive delivery, and with more than common ease and grace of action, lie repeated these three lines from Adam's morn- ing hymn in Milton — a favourite passage of his father, and of his uncle just deceased : " His praise, ye winds, that from four quarters blow, Breathe soft or loud ; and wave your tops, ye pines, With every plant, in sign of worship wave." He began agahi, and again pronounced the verses ; bowed his NOTICE RESPECTING RICHARD BURKE. 281 head in sign of worship, and worshipping sunk into the arms of his parents as in a profound and sweet sleep, and expired. ]\Irs. Burke with her own hands closed his eyes. Further on in this letter, Dr. Laurence states that, during the first day of the death, Edmund Burke was truly terrible in his grief. He occasionally worked himself up to an agony of affliction, and then bursting away from all control, would rush to the room where his son lay, and throw himself headlong, as it happened, on the body, the bed, or the floor ; yet at intervals he attended and gave directions relative to every little arrangement which the sad event rendered necessary, pleasing himself with thinking what would be most consonant to the living wishes and affections of his lost son. At intervals, he would argue against the ineffectual sorrow of his wife. She, on the other hand, sometimes broke into fits of violent weeping ; sometimes showed a more quiet but a more determined grief ; and at other times, again, a more serene composure than her husband. In- stead of dashing herself down, like him, she only lamented that when, a day or two before, by an accidental fall she sprained her wrist, it had not been her neck; but when her husband attempted to persuade her that she had no business still to remain in the house, she answered steadily, " No, Edmund ; while he remains here, I will not go." At last, a promise was obtained from the afflicted parents, that neither of them would ever enter more the chamber where the son lay. This promise they kept. They finally left Cromwell House shortly after. The excellent and affectionate friend of the Burke family, Dr. Walker King, afterwards Bishop of Rochester, published, within the week after Richard's death, the following notice of the lament- able event, which appeared in the papers of the day : " Died on Saturday last, at Cromwell House, aged thirty-six, Richard Burke, Esq., M.P. for the borough of Malton, and the only son of the Right Hon. Edmund Burke. " The irreparable loss which his country, his friends, and re- 282 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. lations have sustained by this event is known to those who knew hhn best. " His talents, whether for business or speculation, were not exceeded by any which the present, or perhaps any former, age could boast. In that share, unfortunately small, which fell to his lot in public affairs, the superior abilities which he manifested were acknowledged by the first characters in public life. Perhaps it was owing to their magnitude and solidity, disproportioned to the currency of the times, that they remained without further employ- ment. " The variety and extent of his erudition were great ; but what distinguished him in literature was the justness, refinement, and accuracy of bis taste. " In society his manners were elegant ; and the best judges, both at home and abroad, thought him one of the best-bred men of the age. He was, at the same time, rigidly and severely sin- cere. " He was of moderate stature, but of a beautiful coimtenance and an elegant and graceful figure. He wanted no accomplish- ment of body or mind. " In the discharge of all the duties of friendship, and in acts of charity and benevolence, his exertions were without bounds. They were often secret — always, like all his other virtues, unos- tentatious. He had no expenses which related to himself. What he wanted, from the narrowness of his means, was made up from the abundance of his heart and mind ; and the writer of this, who knew him long and intimately, and was himself under the most important obligations to him, could tell how many deserving ob- jects he assisted, and some of whom he snatched from ruin by his wise counsel and indefatigable exertions. He never gave up a pursuit of this kind whilst it was possible to continue it. " But it was in the dearer relations of nature that his mind, in which every thing was beautiful and in order, shone in all its lustre. To his father and mother his affection and assiduity RICHARD BURKE' S LOVE-AFFAIR. 283 were such as passed all description, and all examples that the writer of this has ever seen. Here every thing of self was anni- hilated ; here he was as perfect as human nature can admit. At home and to his family he was indeed all in all. He lived in and for his parents, and he expired in their arms." In one of the other letters from Dr. Laurence occurs this passage : " I went or sent yesterday (6th August, 1794,) to all the newspapers, and got promises that the paragraph should not he in- serted. At one place I learn that it actually was cut out for the purpose of heing inserted. At the Herald office I was told that it actually came from a correspondent in the country, and that it was in a female handwriting, They assured me that they would stop and send to me any thing in future communicated to them on the same subject, if any such should reach them ; at the same time, they observed that they could not answer that they might not put in paragraphs from the same quarter which, being distant allusions, they might not understand, though the lady and myself, as well as our friends, might very well know what was meant." A probable explanation of this passage affords, in some measure, an answer to a question that very naturally arises, — Why, know- ing the deep anxiety of his father to leave direct representatives, did Mr. Richard Burke remain unmarried till the age of tliirty- six, the time of his death ? The cause was owing to a romantic incident ; and Dr. Laurence's observations evidently have relation to some circumstances connected with that affair. Mrs. Burke had brought up at Beaconsfield a young lady, the daughter of neighbours in humbler life than herself, whom she had retained near her as a friend and constant companion. This girl, who was very amiable, clever, and agreeable, became a great favourite with the whole Burke family ; and a tender attachment eventually sprung up between her and the son of the house, Richard, whose playmate and associate she had been from childhood. The dis- covery of these sentiments of Richard Burke caused much an- 284 LITE OF EDMUND BURKE. xiety to his parents. They could not concur in so unequal a marriage ; and he, all filial obedience, yielded to their wishes. The lady left Beaconsfield ; and shortly afterwards, through the influence of the Burkes, formed an advantageous matrimonial alliance. Her descendants, from whom this story comes, are now living in the enjoyment of ease and respectability. Richard Burke, it seems, loved deeply ; for, after her marriage, he woidd never himself think of wedlock ; and we find his father, in one of his letters to him while in Dublin, gently chiding him for his somewhat remarkable absence from the assemblies, balls, and com- pany of the ladies there. Richard's premature and melancholy death, whether or not having one of its sources in this love-affair, aroused, no doubt, some expressions of feeling on the part of the object of his affections or her friends ; and it is to this that Dr. Laurence most probably alludes. louis xvm. Letters condoling with Edmund Burke on his sad affliction poured in from all sides,— some from the very highest quarters. Among them were communications of remarkably eloquent and earnest sympathy from Lord Fitzwilliam, Henry Grattan, and the Count d'Artois. Honour to the royal French line of Bourbon ! Be the political errors laid by their enemies to their charge what they may, the princes of that sovereign stem have been, and are, gentlemen always, — hearty, honourable, kind, considerate, and ACCOUNT OF A VISIT TO BEACONSFIELD. 285 courteous gentlemen. Louis XYIIL, — then, by the foul death of his nephew, and the proclamation of Conde's royal army, Kinc of France and Navarre, — had no sooner come to England, than he and his kinsmen with him, the Dukes of Berry and Angouleme, hastened to visit their great champion at Beaconsfield, to express their grief at the calamity that had befallen him, and to declare in person those sentiments of approbation and gratitude which they had long before transmitted in writing to him. The wisdom and piety of Edmund Burke, in time, so far mode- rated his grief for Richard's loss as to prevent its ebullitions from appearing ; but he never recovered the blow. Richard Burke was buried in Beaconsfield church. His father could not after bear to see the place of his interment ; and when going from Ins villa to town, instead of passing through Beaconsfield, he took a cross- road behind an eminence which intercepted the sight of the church. His grief, however, though wearing to the body, relaxed not the vigour of his niincl, nor the interest which he took to the last moment in the public weal. In 1795 Burke brought out his profound and sagacious " Thoughts and Details on Scarcity," and his second " Letter to Sir Hercules Langrishe" about the Irish Catholics. Of Burke's domestic life, especially at the period of his son's death, a recent charming work affords additional verification. Mr. Jesse, in his " Favourite Haunts," relates a visit he and his agreeable companion, the Bev. J. Mitford, of Benhall, Suffulk, paid to Beaconsfield. " I will," writes Mr. Jesse, " proceed to give a short account of a place of no common interest which i vi-ited at the latter end of the autumn of 1845. We passed through the little sylvan hamlet of Famham, and soon afterwards the road descended through broken banks, overshadowed with beech and oak, and we approached Beaconsfield." Mr. Jesse, when there, called at a farm-house near Gregories, where the far- mer's mother described in vivid terms the tall figure of Mr. Burke, his well-bred manners, and his interesting appearance. She spoke 286 LIFE OF EDMUND BUEKE. of his extreme grief for the loss of his son ; his avoiding the town of Beaconsfield after his death, and coming by a back way to Gregories ; and of his never having again entered the church where his son's remains were deposited. " She then," continues Mr. Jesse, " told me a circumstance that I was little prepared to hear : it was the fact, that her good, honest, and portly son-in-law, whom I saw before me, had been the very infant whom Sir Joshua Rey- nolds took as the model of his well-known picture of the Infant Hercules. The infant's father was the farm-bailiff of Mr. Burke, with whom he was an especial favourite, that great man in his happier days frequently coming to the cottage, sometimes eating potatoes roasted in the embers of a wood-fire, and once trying the merits of a rook or jackdaw pie, or rather a mixture of both. . . I had details of his (Burke's) benevolence and popularity amongst his poorer neighbours ; — of his going to town in his carriage with four horses ; of a highwayman riding up to the leading postilion with a pistol in his hand, threatening to blow out his brains if he did not stop ; of the men flogging their horses on, heedless of the threat, and only mindful of their beloved master ; of the carriage stopping at a village ; of Burke's anxious inquiries about the cause of the rapid movement ; of his blaming them for risking their lives, and then giving them ten pound a-piece for their care of him. There was also an account of Burke's being let down the shaft of a chalk-pit ; of his bailiff's refusal to follow him, and of his calling out from the bottom of the pit, ' John ! what a coward you are !' ' ; Mr. Jesse, in further narration, says, " The old gardener, who was many years with Burke, told us that his master lived hospitably and elegantly ; that his house (prior to his son's death) was always full of company, amongst whom he recollected Dr. Laurence and Mr. Windham as constant guests ; that he had always four black horses to his carriage ; and that he was very kind to his depen- dents and charitable to the poor. He recollected an instance of his good nature, when having found some ragged boys pilfering wood in the park, he brought them home with him, gave them burke's pension. 287 refreshments, and then ordered his steward to have them pro- perly clothed. He used to amuse himself in strolling over Ins lawn and grounds with a spade in his hand, digging up the plan- tain roots in the pastures, and spreading little heaps of manure on the spots where the grass had suffered injury." George HI. heard with unfeigned grief of the misery that bore so heavily on the eloquent supporter of his and of the other thrones of Europe. He did all in his power to afford alleviation. He pressed acceptance of the intended peerage ; but care for worldly honours bad departed, and this was respectfully declined. His majesty then insisted on ]\Ir. and Mrs. Burke taking a pension for their joint lives. Tins favour, so graciously offered, and so en- tirely unsolicited, directly or indirectly, Burke, with the advice of Ms friends, did not refuse. The grant amounted to 3700Z. per annum — 1500Z. of which came from the civil list, and 25001. from the West Indian 4£ per cent duties, then at the disposal of the crown. This princely benevolence was most opportune. Hos- pitality, generosity, and charity, had, despite of Mrs. Burke's re- markable prudence, economy, and care, tended much to lessen and embarrass Burke's pecuniary resources ; and now that his health and energies had received so serious a shock, a permanent provi- sion was a matter of urgent importance. Kind as was the act of royal bounty, it was just also. Edmund Burke, worn out in the service of the common weal, had strong claims upon the public. He had deserved the reward by much done for the general good : by his voluntarily surrendering a large income from the pay- office ; by his economical Beform Bill, which for the twelve pre- ceding years had saved the country nearly 80,000^. annually, as well as extinguished a possible source of undue parliamentary in- fluence; by the reformation of the pay-office, which rendered available to the government about a million sterling ; by a whole life, in fact, devoted to bettering the condition of the state, and increasing the resources and prosperity of the empire. Burke's 28S LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. political opponents, however, with a bad taste and a bad feeling, which their knowledge of his melancholy condition made even worse, chose to join in a violent and unfair attack upon this pen- sion. To any charge on the subject, Burke's whole life of politi- cal rectitude and utility was a complete answer : he had prece- dents for his conduct in the cases of Lord Chatham and other great public men, who had not disdained a similar honour- able recognition of their abilities and conduct. Francis sixth Duke of Bedford, and James eighth Earl of Lauderdale, openly reflected on the pension in the House of Lords. Such assailants as these men, worthy of his wrath, aroused the sick lion. Burke wrote a withering and memorable reply, which at once and for ever silenced his adversaries. This was his famous " Letter to a noble Lord," published hi 1796. The whole of this epistle is of surpassing eloquence and beauty. Burke thus speaks in it of his son : " Had it pleased God to continue to me the hopes of succession, I should have been, according to my mediocrity and the medio- crity of the age I live in, a sort of founder of a family ; I should have left a son who, in all the points in which personal merit can be viewed, — in science, in erudition, hi genius, in taste, in honour, in generosity, in humanity, in every liberal sentiment and every liberal accomplishment, — would not have shown himself inferior to the Duke of Bedford, or to any of those whom he traces in his hue. His grace very soon would have wanted all plausibility in his attack upon that provision which belonged more to mine than to me. He woidd soon have supplied every deficiency and sym- metrised every disproportion. It would not have been for that successor to resort to any stagnant wasting reservoir of merit in me or in my ancestry. He had in himself a salient living spring of generous and manly action. Every day he lived he woidd have repurchased the bounty of the crown, and ten times more, if ten times more he had received. He was made a public creature, and had no enjoyment whatever but in the performance of some CELEBRATED PASSAGE L\ THE BEDFORD LETTER. 289 duty. At this exigent moment the loss of a finished man is not easily supplied. But a Disposer, whose power we are little able to resist, and whose wisdom it behoves us not at all to dispute, has ordained it in another manner, and (whatever my querulous weakness might suggest) a far better. The storm has gone over me ; and I lie like one of those old oaks which the late hurricane has scattered about me : I am stripped of all my honours ; I am torn up by the roots, and lie prostrate on the earth 1 There, and prostrate there, I must unfeignedly recognise the Divine justice, and in some degree submit to it. But whilst I humlle myself before God, I do not know that it is forbidden to repel the attacks of unjust and inconsiderate man. The patience of Job' is proverbial. After some of the convulsive struggles of our irri- table nature, he submitted himself and repented in dust and ashes. But even so, I do not find him blamed for reprehending, and with a considerable degree of verbal asperity, those ill-na- tured neighbours of his, who visited his dunghill to read moral, political, and economical lectures on his misery. I am alone. I have none to meet my enemies in the gate. Indeed, my lord, I greatly deceive myself, if in this hard season I would give a peck of refuse of wheat for all that is called fame and honour in the world. This is the appetite but of a few. It is a luxury, it is a privilege, it is an indulgence for those who are at ease. But we are all of us made to shim disgrace, as we are made to shrink from pain, and poverty, and disease. It is an instinct ; and under the direction of reason, instinct is always in the right. I live in an inverted order. They who ought to have succeeded me have gone before me. They who should have been to me as posterity are in the place of ancestors. I owe to the dearest relation (which ever must subsist in memory) that act of piety which he would have performed to me ; I owe it to him to show that he was not descended, as the Duke of Bedford would have it, from an unworthy parent." Another passage hi this letter to the Duke of Bedford de- li 290 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. serves to be immortal. Alluding to the professors of the French revolutionary system, Burke exclaims, " Such are their ideas, such their religion, and such their law. But as to our country and our race, as long as the well-compacted structure of our Clnu-ch and State, the sanctuary, the holy of holies of that ancient law, defended by reverence, defended by power, a fortress at once and a temple, shall stand inviolate on the brow of the British Sion ; as long as the British monarchy, not more limited than fenced by the orders of the state, shall, like the proud Keep of AVindsor, rising in the majesty of proportion, and girt with the double belt of its kindred and coeval towers, — as long as this awful structure shall oversee and guard the subjected land, so long the mounds and dykes of the low, flat Bedford Level will have nothing to fear from all the pickaxes of all the levellers of France. As long as our sovereign lord the King, and his faithful subjects, the Lords and Commons of this realm — the triple cord which no man can break ; the solemn, sworn, constitutional frank-pledge of this na- tion ; the firm guarantees of each other's being and each other's rights; the joint and several securities, each in its place and order, for every kind and every quality, of property and of dignity ; — as long as these endure, so long the Duke of Bedford is safe : and we are all safe together — the high from blights of envy and the spoliations of rapacity ; the low from the iron hand of oppression and the insolent spurn of contempt. Amen ! and so be it : and .so it will be, Dura domus iEnese Capitoli immobile saxum .Accolet, imperiumque pater Romanus habebit." Among Burke's ultimate publications were his " Letters on a Piegicide Peace," already referred to in the previous chapter : his very last was another " Letter on the Affairs of Ireland," written in 1797, shortly before his death. He had been for a long time in earnest correspondence or personal communication, on the state •of his native country, with many eminent Irish politicians of the time, among whom were the Bight Rev. Dr. Hussey, the Bight THE SCHOOL AT PENN. 291 Rev. Dr. Coppinger, Catholic prelates; John Keogh, of Mount Jerome ; and Henry Grattan. Burke's letters to Dr. Hussey, to be found in the Fitzwilliam and Bourke collection, are very valu- able essays on the then condition and conduct of the Irish. Ed- mund Burke was the first who, when others hardly gave the subject a thought, boldly and loudly addressed the Parliament of England on the misrule and misery in Ireland, calling upon the Commons to redress the grievances, and to relieve the suffering people there. His exertions in this cause never relaxed. Ireland he brought forward at every opportunity ; and, in his expiring thoughts and language, Ireland was present with hirn to the last. Burke, after his son's death, spent his time almost entirely in the country. In writing his splendid pamphlets, in political con- versation, in the soothing company of his wife and friends, in the pleasing prospect of being able to satisfy every just demand, and to leave a competent provision for the faithful and fondly loved partner of his cares, in the exercise of active benevolence, and in the consciousness of having done his duty, he received all the consolation for the irreparable loss he had sustained of which he was susceptible. While he had employed every effort which a philanthropic heart could prompt, and the wisest head coidd direct, for stimulating civilised governments to combat irreligion and anarchy, he in a narrower sphere relieved, to the utmost of his power, those who had suffered exile and proscription from the direful system abroad. His heart, his house, his purse, were open to the distressed emigrants. Through his beneficent contribution and influence, a school was established in his neighbourhood, at. Perm, for the education of those foreign children to whom the parents, impoverished or destitute from adherence to loyal prin- ciples, were unable to afford necessary tuition. This school was funned on a plan suggested by Burke himself, and was opened in April 1790. " Burke," says a note to the correspondence pub- lished by Lord Fitzwilliam and Sir R,. Bourke, " paid the greatest attention to the school during the remainder of his life ; visiting it 292 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. daily, when his health permitted, the distance from Beaconsfield to Perm being about three miles ; giving advice and assistance to both masters and scholars, and supplying their table with various articles from his farm and garden, and the institution with other useful matters which the strict economy of the foundation denied from its own funds." The school continued to flourish, and to answer the wise and humane purposes of its institution, until a change in French affairs rendered the establishment no longer requisite. While thus promoting the advantage of alien sufferers, Burke did not relax in his attention to the humble and industrious of his own countrymen. He continued to encourage and super- intend benefit-clubs among the labourers and mechanics of Bea- consfield, and was himself a subscriber, for their advantage. His object was to encourage industry, to cherish affection, and to esta- blish a fund of provision for the sick and aged. This institution also flourished long after its founder was no more. At this sad period of his decline, Burke would often seek re- laxation in amusing himself with children. " I saw him," said an eye-witness, " while he was under infirmity, not far from death ; and yet he displayed, with the child of a friend, the most pleasing playfulness." A very interesting anecdote, indicative of the all-absorbing grief and sensibility of Burke's mind at this time, has been often told. It is one of exquisite pathos : An old horse, the favourite and companion of Richard Burke ha former years, when both man and steed were healthy and strong, was permitted, in regard to its age and in honour of its deceased master, to range unmolested and "unemployed in the grounds at Butler's Court. One day, while walking alone and sorrow- ful, Edmund Burke observed the poor wom-out horse approach close to him, and stand to gaze, as it were, on his face and person ; and then, after a moment's pause, with seeming knowledge and remembrance, it placed its head upon his bosom. The strange- ness of the act affected Burke deeply. The faithful creature's LAST COUNSELS AS TO FRENCH AFFAIRS. 293 attachment, its apparent sympathy, and, more than all, the memory the incident awakened of its dead master — the ever-dearly che- rished son — crowded in the heart of the. sorrow-stricken father, and his firmness was gone. Throwing his arms round the horse's neck, he wept and sohbed convulsively. Burke's bodily health still giving way, he, early in 1797, went to Bath to try the benefit of the waters. The spring of that year brought much general gloom with it. It was the most disastrous period of the war. Great Britain had to contend singly against France ; the Bank of England stopped payment ; a disgraceful mutiny broke out at Spithead. Meanwhile, Napoleon was con- tinuing the glorious course of his first Italian campaign, and ap- parently annihilating the power of Austria. Even the victory of Cape St. Vincent did little to cheer the drooping spirits of the pub- lic. In this extremity government would frequently seek counsel from Edmund Burke. One of these conferences is thus referred to in the recent able biography of Wilberforce : " During the awful crisis of the mutiny, he (Wilberforce) saw the last gleams of (take him for all in all) the greatest luminary of the eighteenth century." Wilberforce in the diary says : " Monday, April 17.— -Heard of Portsmouth mutiny ; con- sultati m with Burke. . . . The whole scene is now before me. Burke was lying on a sofa much emaciated, and Windham, Lau- rence, and some other Mends were around him. The attention shown to Burke by all that party was just like the treatment of Ahithopel of old : it was as if one went to inquire of the oracle of the Lord." The oracle they sought spoke plainly, without doubt or hesita- tion. " Never," said Burke to those about him, — " never suc- cumb to these difficulties. It is a struggle for your existence as a nation ; and if you must die, die with the sword in your hand. But I have no fears whatever for the result There is a salient*, living principle of energy in the public mind of England, which only requires proper direction to enable her to withstand this or 294 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. any other impending danger. Persevere, therefore, till this ty- ranny he overpast. This ambitious and insolent foe will, if he can, enslave you, his most detested as most dreaded enemies, as he has done others ; but he cannot enslave you if you are stead- fastly determined to defend yourselves." Among those who now crowded with anxious affection around the couch of the dying statesman, one, whose kindred spirit was as noble and as patriotic as his own, watched Burke with all the attention, care, and reverence of a son. This was the then Secre- tary-at-War, William Windham, who, more than any man, was keenly alive to the loss England was about to sustain, at such a moment, in Burke's death. Mr. Windham was constantly with bueke's death. 295 Burke. In one matter he had the opportunity of doing him a service. He obtained for him public explanation and reparation in the case of a piracy, by a nefarious bookseller, of one of Burke's latest political essays, where — and tbat Burke complained of most — the offender had altered the title so as to be likely to annoy Mi". Fox. Burke remained at Bath four months, but without any mate- rial improvement, At length, despairing of a change for the bet- ter, he resolved on a removal to Beaconsfield, there, as he said, " to await his end with unfeigned humiliation, and to prepare to submit to the will of God with trembling hope." He thus ex- pressed himself hi a letter to Mrs. Leadbeater : " I have been at Bath these four months to no purpose, and am therefore to be removed to my own house at Beaconsfield to-morrow, to be nearer to a habitation more permanent, humbly and fearfully trusting that my better part may find a better mansion." To the home of his affections, his friendships, and his social relaxations, he therefore returned to die. Another month, and the event occurred. His health, from the beginning of June, rapidly declined; still his body only, not his mind, was affected. His understanding lasted with undiminished force ; his disposition re- tained its sweetness and amiability. He continued regularly and strenuously to perform the duties of religion ; his concern for the happiness of his friends and the welfare of mankind was constantly vivid. He would express uneasiness at the fatigue and trouble of those attending his sick-bed. When his wife and his favourite do- mestics, confidential friends, and nearest connexions were eager to bestow the nightly care of nurses, he solicitously importuned them not to deprive themselves of rest. Although his body was in a state of constant and perceptible decay, yet it was without pain. The lamp of life was consuming fast, but gently; it was not to be violently extinguished. The week in which he died, he conversed with literary and political friends on various subjects of knowledge, and especially on the awful posture of affairs. He repeatedly re- 29G LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. quested their forgiveness if ever he had offended them, and con- jured them to make the same request, in his name, to those of his friends that were ahsent. On Friday, July the 7th, he spent the morning in a recapitulation of the most important acts of his life. Dwelling particularly on the French Revolution, and on the sepa- ration from admired friends which it had occasioned, he spoke with pleasure of the conscious rectitude of his intentions, and entreated that, if any unguarded asperity of his had hurt them, to believe that no offence was meant. He earnestly declared his forgiveness of all who had, either on that suhjector for any other cause, en- deavoured to injure him. The evening he spent in less agitating conversation, and in listening to the essays of Addison, his favou- rite author. The next morning, after consuming some time in devotion, and after bearing pathetic and impressive testimony to the fond and excellent conduct of his wife in situations of difficulty and distress, as well as through the whole course of their union, he fell into a slumber. When he awoke, placid and composed, he again desired to hear some of the elegant essays of the Christian moralist. He frequently had, during his last illness, declared (what his intimates knew well before) his thorough belief of the Christian religion, and his veneration for true Christians of all per- suasions. His end was suited to the simple greatness of mind which he displayed through life — every way unaffected, without levity, without ostentation, full of natural grace and dignity. He appeared neither to wish nor to dread, hut patiently and placidly to await the appointed hour of his dissolution. On the 8th July he had conversed for some time, with his usual force of thought and expression, on the state of his country, for the welfare of which his heart was interested till it ceased to beat. His young friend and relative, Mr. Kagle, coming to his bedside, he expressed a desire to be carried to another apartment. Mr. Nagle, with the assistance of servants, was complying with his request, when Burke, faintly uttering " God bless you!" fell back and expired a little after twelve o'clock on the night of the 8th, or rather the fox's proposal. 297 morning of the 9th July, 1797, heing then in the sixty-eighth year of his age. Such was the unsullied life, and such the dignified departure, of Edmund Burke — orator, statesman, writer, patriot, philanthro- pist, — admirable; husband, father, relative, friend, — admirable also. His conduct without vice ; his bearing gallant, unaffected, and courteous ; his mind potent in the acquisition of all know- ledge, and continually ready to impart it ; his spirit inflexible in integrity, and intolerant of oppression ; his heart copious in affec- tions public and private, and his soul devoted to religion, — with such attributes this great man realised, more than any other personage in history, a combination of the heroic qualities of classic Greece and Rome, with whatever was beautiful in the chivalry of modern and Christian Europe. That Burke always cherished this country and her happy constitution with the ardour and freshness of a bridal love, his whole existence, passed in the public service, suffi- ciently attests ; that Iris views and his policy were right, subsequent events now make it hard to dispute ; and there can be as little doubt his memory will be honoured whilst this nation, its right feelings, and its prosperity endure. " His immortality," said Grattan, " is that which is common to Cicero or to Bacon ; that which can never be interrupted while there exists the beauty of order or the love of virtue, and which can fear no death except what barbarity may impose on the globe." To the memorable credit of Charles James Fox, whose bene- volent and maidy nature was ever true to itself, the moment he heard of Burke's impending death, he wrote a letter to Mrs. Burke, couched in the kindest language, in which he wished Iris sentiments of grief and sympathy to be expressed to Mr. Burke. Mrs. Burkes reply acknowledged with gratitude Fox's attention, and conveyed the dying man's heartfelt pain that their intimacy should have been so severed by what he deemed the strict observ- ance ut bis duty. When Burke was no more, Fox was the first to propose that he should be interred, with public honours, in 298 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. Westminster Abbey. Tbe direction of Burke's will prevented this, and be was buried in Beaconsfield church. At bis funeral, on tbe 15th July, 1797, tbe pall was supported by tbe following distinguished personages, viz. the I)uke of Portland; Earl Fitz- william ; the Right Hon. William Windham ; tbe Lord Chancel- lor (Lord Loughborough) ; the Speaker of the House of Commons (Mr. Henry Addington, afterwards Lord Sidmouth) ; William, fifth Duke of Devonshire ; the Earl of Inchiquin (the husband of Sir Joshua Reynolds' niece) ; and Sir Gilbert Elliot (afterwards Lord Minto). A crowd of tbe highest persons in the land, noble and gentle, joined in the mournful ceremony. Another affecting incident of tbe solemn scene arose from the respect paid by the inmates of the benevolent institutions which the deceased had patronised. The members of those establish- ments came in deep though plain mourning, to perform the last duties to their revered benefactor. The body was placed in tbe church, as Burke had desired, close to those of bis brother and his son. Thus, to the letter, was that desire accomplished, which many years before his death, when a young man, he had ex- pressed : " I would rather sleep in tbe southern corner of a little country churchyard than in tbe tomb of the Capulets. I should like, however, that my dust should mingle with kindred dust. Tbe good old expression family burying-grownd has something pleasing in it, at least to me." The will of Edmund Burke was as follows : " If my dear son and friend had survived me, any will would have been unnecessary ; but since it has pleased God to call him to himself before bis father, my duty calls upon me to make such a distinction of my worldly effects as seems, to my best judgment, most equitable and reasonable. Therefore I, Edmund Burke, late of the parish of St. James, Westminster, though suffering under sore and inexpressible affliction, being of sound and disposing mind, do make my last will and testament in manner following : BURKE'S WILL. 299 " First, according to the ancient, good, and laudable custom, of which my heart and understanding recognise the propriety, I bequeath my soid to God, hoping for his mercy through the only merits of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. My body I desire, if I should die in any place very convenient for its trans- port thither (but not otherwise), to be buried in the church at Beaconsfield, near to the bodies of my dearest brother and my dearest son, in all humility praying that, as we have lived hi per- fect unity together, we may together have a part in the resurrec- tion of the just. " I wish my funeral to be (without any punctiliousness in that respect) the same as that of my brother, and to exceed it as little as possible in pomt of charge, whether on account of my family or of any others who would go to a greater expense ; and I desire, in the same maimer and with the same qualifications, that no monu- ment beyond a middle-sized tablet, with a small and simple in- scription on -the church-wall, or on the flag-stone, be erected. I say tliis, because I know the partial kindness to me of some of my friends ; but I have had, in my lifetime, but too much of noise and compliment. " As to the rest, it is uncertain what I shall have after the discharge of my debts, which, when I write this, are very great. Be that as it may, my will concerning my worldly substance is short. As my entirely beloved, faithful, and affectionate wife did, during the whole time in which I lived most happily with her, take on her the charge and management of my affairs, assisted by her son, whilst God was pleased to lend him to us, and did con- duct them often in a state of much derangement and embarrass- ment, with a patience and prudence which probably have no example, and thereby ieft my mind free to prosecute my public duty or my studies, or to indulge hi my relaxations, or to cultivate my friends, at my pleasure ; so, on my death, I wish things to continue substantially as they have always done. I therefore, by this my last and only will, devise, leave, and bequeath to my 300 LIFE OF EDMUND BUEKE. entirely beloved and incomparable wife, Jane Mary Burke, tbe whole real estate of which I shall die seized, whether lands, rents, or houses, in absolute fee-simple ; as also all my personal estate, whether stock, furniture, plate, money, or securities for money, annuities for lives or for years, be the said estate of what nature, quality, extent, or description it may, to her sole uncontrolled possession and disposal, as her property, in any manner which may seem proper to her, to possess and dispose of the same, whe- ther it be real estate or personal estate, by her last will or other- wise ; it being my intention that she may have as clear and un- controlled a right and title thereto and therein as I possess myself as to the use, expenditure, sale, or devise. I hope these words are sufficient to express the absolute, unconditioned, and unlimited right of complete ownership I mean to give to her to the said lands and goods ; and I trust that no words or surplusage or ambiguity may vitiate this my clear intention. There are no persons who have a right, or, I believe, a disposition to complain of this be- quest, which I have duly weighed, and made on a proper conside- ration of my duties, and the relations in which I stand. " I also make my wife, Jane Mary Burke aforesaid, my sole executrix of this my last will ; knowing that she will receive advice and assistance from my excellent friends Dr. Walker King and Dr. Laurence, to whom I recommend her and her concerns — though that, perhaps, is needless, as they are as much attached to her as they are to me. I do it only to mark my special confidence in their affection, skill, and industry. " I wish that my dear wife may, as soon after my decease as possible (which, after what has happened, she will see with con- stancy and resignation), make her will, with the advice and assistance of the two persons I have named. But it is my wish also that she will not think herself so bound up by any bequests she may make in the said will, and which, while she lives, can be only intentions, as not during her life to use her property, with ail the liberty I have given her over it, just as if she had MENTION OF FRIENDS IN THE WILL. 301 written no will at all ; but in every thing to follow the directions of her own equitable and charitable mind, and her own prudent and measured understanding. " Having thus committed every thing to her discretion, I recommend (subject always to that discretion), that if I should not, during my life, give or secure to my dear niece, Mary C. Haviland, wife of my worthy friend Captain Haviland, the sum of 1000Z., or an annuity equivalent to it, that she would bestow upon her that sum of money, or that annuity, conditioned and limited in such manner as she, my wife aforesaid, may think proper, by a devise in her will or otherwise, as she may find most convenient to the situation of her affairs, without pressure upon her, during her life. My wife put me in mind of this, which I now recommend to her. I certainly, some years ago, gave my niece reason to expect it ; but I was not able to execute my in- tentions. If I do this in my lifetime, this recommendation goes for nothing. " As to my other friends and relations, and companions through life, and especially the friends and companions of my son, who were the dearest of mine, I am not unmindful of what I owe them. If I do not name them all here, and mark them with tokens of my remembrance, I hope they will not attribute it to unkindness, or to a want of a due sense of their merits towards me. My old friend and faithful companion, Will. Burke, knows his place in my heart. I do not mention him as executor or as- sistant. I know that he will attend to my wife ; but I choose the two I have mentioned, as, from their time of life, of greater ac- tivity. I recommend him to them. " In the political world I have made many connexions, and some of them amongst persons of high rank. Then- friendship, from political, became personal to me ; and they have shown it in a manner more than to satisfy the utmost demands that could be le from my love and sincere attachment to them. They are the worthiest people in the kingdom ; then intentions are excellent, 302 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. and I wish them every kind of success. I bequeath my brother- in-law, John Nugent, and the friends in my poor son's list, which is in his mother's hands, to then* protection : as to them and the rest of my companions, who constantly honoured and chose our house, as our inmates, I have put down their names in a list, that my wife should send them the usual remembrance of little mourn- ing rings as a token of my remembrance. In speaking of my friends, to whom I owe so many obligations, I ought to name especially Lord Fitzwilliam, the Duke of Portland, and the Lord Cavendishes, with the Duke of Devonshire, the worthy head of that family. " If the intimacy which I have had with others has been broken off by political difference on great questions concerning the state of things existing and impending, I hope they will forgive whatever of general human infirmity, or of my own particular in- firmity, has entered into that contention. I heartily entreat their forgiveness. I have nothing further to say. " Signed and sealed as my last will and testament* this 11th day of August, 1794, being written all with my own hand. " Edmund Burke. " In the presence of Dupont, William Webster, Walker King, " On reading the above will, I have nothing to add or essen- tially alter; but one point may want to be perfected and explained. In leaving my lands and hereditaments to my wife, I find that I have omitted the words which in deeds create an inheritance to my wife, Jane Mary Burke, and her heirs for ever, in pure, absolute, and unconditional fee-simple. " I have now only to recommend to the kindness of my Lord Chancellor (Lord Loughborough), to his Grace the Duke of Port- land, to the Most Honourable the Marquis of Buckingham, to the Right Honourable William Windham, and to Dr. Laurence, of the Commons, and Member of Parliament, that they will, after WITNESSES TO THE WILL AND CODICIL. 303 my death, continue their protection and favour to the emigrant- school at Penn, and will entreat, with a weight on which I dare not presume, the Plight Honourable William Pitt to continue the necessary allowance which he has so generously and charitably provided for those unhappy children of meritorious parents ; and that they will superintend the same, which I wish to be under the immediate care and protection of Dr. Walker King and Dr. Laurence ; and that they will be pleased to exert their influence to place the said young persons in some military corps, or some other service, as may best suit their dispositions and capacities, praying God to bless their endeavours. " Signed and sealed as a codicil to my will, or an explana- tion and confirmation thereof, agreeably to the note placed at the end of it, this 30th day of January, 1795. " Edmund Bueke. " In the presence of Walker King, Richard Bourke, Ed. Nagle." One of the witnesses to this will and codicil was Burke's kins- man, Mr. Nagle, in whose arms he breathed his last. Another witness was the faithful domestic, William Webster, who, with his wife, lived and died in attached and devoted service to Burke and his widow. The three other witnesses were persons of public distinction. Monsieur Dupont, a well-known politician, was the translator into French of the " Reflections on the Revolution in France." Walker King was the Right Rev. Dr. Walker King, who was the second son of the Rev. James King, of Skellands, Canon of Windsor. Dr. Walker King was born at Clitheroe in 1755 ; was private secretary to the Marquess of Rockingham when premier ; and became eventually, in 1808, Bishop of Rochester. The right rev. prelate died on the 22d February, 1827. He had married Miss Sarah Dawson, of Long Whatton, Leicestershire, and had issue three sons and three daughters. Of these, three are now living, viz. the Yen. Walker King, M.A., Archdeacon of Roches- 304 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. tcr and Rector of Stone, Kent ; the Rev. James lung ; and Mrs. Sarah Frances King, wife of her cousin, the Rev. Myers King. Archdeacon King is married to Miss Heberden, granddaughter of the famous physician, Dr. Heberden, the friend of Burke and Dr. Johnson. Edmund Burke was for many years on terms of close intimacy with the Right Rev. Dr. Walker King and all the members of his family. The Bishop's eldest brother, Thomas King, afterwards a D.D. and Prebendary of Canterbury, was the companion of Ed- mund Burke and his son in a journey to France in 1773, the pur- pose of which was to leave Richard Burke and Mr. Thomas King, under French tuition, to acquire a knowledge of the manners and language of the country. This object was fully attained by a re- sidence of the two young gentlemen for a time at Auxerre, under the protection of M. de Cice, bishop of that place. The kindness then experienced from M. de Cice, Edmund Burke had the oppor- tunity of cordially requiting when the prelate, at the Revolution, came, a poor and aged emigrant, to England. Burke gladly gave him a welcome and a home. The other brothers of the Bishop of Rochester were Captain James King, R.N., who was a celebrated navigator, and the companion of Captain Cook in his last voyage round the world ; Edward lung, of Hungerhill, county York, Vice- Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, and a bencher of Gray's Inn ; and John King, Esq., who was under-secretary of state for the home department, under Lord Grenville, the Duke of Portland, and Lord Pelham. It would seem that in 1791, the Bishop of Rochester himself, then Dr. Walker King, accompanied Richard Burke in another and a very important visit to France, when the son of the statesman went on a mission to the French princes and royalists at Coblentz. Dr. King's beautiful notice of Richard Burke's death is given above at p. 281. The witness Richard Bourke is the present Lieut.-General Sir Richard Bourke, K.C.B., of Thornfield, in the comity of Lim- erick ; an eminent British officer, who won his laurels in the cam- paign of Hulland in 17'J'J, at the storming of Monte Video in THE BURKE CORRESPONDENCE. 305 1807, and in the Peninsular War. He has since been Governor of the Cape of Good Hope from 1825 to 1828, and of New South Wales from 1831 to 1837. In both these places, and particu- larly in the latter, the rule of Sir Richard effected much public good. Mr. Sidney, in his justly popular work,/' The Three Colo- nies of Australia," gives a glowing description of the benefits con- ferred in New South Wales by the wise administration of Sir Pdchard Bourke. Sir Richard's statue has been erected at Syd- ney. Sir Richard, who is distantly related to the great Edmund, and who while a schoolboy and college student in England used to pass his vacations at Beaconsfield during the last years of the statesman's life, married, in March 1800, Elizabeth Jane (now de- ceased), the youngest daughter of Edmund Burke's friend, John Bourke, Esq., of the city of London and of Carshalton, Surrey, who is mentioned above at p. 121 of this biography, and who, after eventually fillin g the office of receiver-general of the land- tax in Middlesex, died some years ago. For the descent of this Mr. John Bourke, a native of Castlebar and a scion of the house of Bourke, Earls of Ulster, as well as for a further account of the pedigree and family of Sir Richard Bourke, see the " Dic- tionary of the Landed Gentry," vol. i. p. 123. Sir Richard Bourke, in conjunction with the present Earl Fitzwilliam, has edited a valuable collection of letters from or to Edmund Burke or his family — a correspondence which forms a most important and interesting addition to Burke's other published writings and speeches. This collection, to which reference has been frequently made in the course of this biography, is now included in the new edition of Edmund Burke's works ;* the whole forming treasures * A new and complete Edition of tho Works and Correspondence of the ht Hon. Edmund Burke. In 8 vols. 8vo. Containing— 1. Mr. Burke's Correspondence between the year 1744 and his decease in 1797, first pub- lished from the original mss. in 1844, edited by Earl Fitzwilliam and Sir Richard Bourke. 2. The works of Mr. Burke, as edited by his literary executors, and completed under the superintendence of the late Bishop of Rochester, Dr. Walker King. (Rivingtons. 1852.) X 306 LIFE OF EDMUND BUEKE. of wisdom and eloquence that have seldom, if ever, been rivalled — never surpassed — " exemplaria," in fact, regarding which, the stu- dent or even adept in political and other knowledge, may well fol- low the classical direction : Nocturnd versate manu, versate diurnd. Reference to this collection recalls also the necessity of pointing at- tention to those interesting discourses on the writings and charac- ter of Burke, published a few years ago, which Alfred A. Fry, Esq., a learned counsel of Lincoln's Inn, has delivered, with me- rited applause, in most of the public lecture-rooms in the kingdom. Edniund Burke was buried in a wooden coffin only. A kind of traditionary report, current in Beaconsfield and its vicinity, will have it, that, sensible of the hatred he had incurred from the Ja- cobins, this great opponent of revolutionary France desired his body to have but a w r ooden covering, the sooner to decay, because he apprehended it might be taken up and be made a show of at some future period, should the violent faction he denounced ob- tain, through the supineness of government, a powerful footing in this country. Be this strange reason the real one or not, Burke was certainly so coffined at first ; but his remains, of which only the bones were found on the reopening, have been since encased in lead, and deposited in a vault beneath his own pew in Beacons- field Church. A tablet in the south aisle of this church bears the following inscription : " Near this place lies interred all that was mortal of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Who died on the 9th of July, 1797, aged 68 years. In the same grave are deposited the remains of his only Son, Richard Burke, Esq., Representative in Parliament for the borough of Malton, Who died the 2d August, 1794, aged 35 : Of his Brother, Richard Burke, Esq., Barrister-at-law and Recorder of the city of Bristol, Who died on the 4th February, 1794 : And of his Widow, Jane Mary Burke, Who died on the 2d April, 1812, aged 78." EDMUND BURKE S REPRESENTATIVES. 30< Two ages, as will be perceived, are not here correctly given. Edmund Burke at his death was not sixty-eight, but in his sixty- eighth year. His son's age should have been stated as thirty- six. Till) IJUKKE TABLET IX l:i;.\C'OXSFIELD CHURCH. Of Mr. Burke's immediate family, none survived himself but his widow, and his niece, Mrs. Haviland, and her son. Mrs. Burke remained, for the rest of her life, at Gregories ; her death 308 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. occurred on the 2d of April, 1812. During nearly the whole period of her widowhood, until a short time before her demise, Mrs. Burke had the benefit of the constant companionship and affectionate attention of Mrs. Haviland, who was, as already stated, the only daughter of Mr. Burke's only sister, Mrs. French, and the relict of Colonel Thomas Haviland, who died in 1795, not long after his union with her. Mrs. Haviland, who had refused a very splendid offer of a second marriage, left Beaconsfield prior to Mrs. Burke's decease, and went to live at Brompton, where she died in 1816. Her son, Thomas William Aston Haviland, who was born in August 1795, and was educated at Westminster school, assumed, by sign ma- nual, the additional surname and arms of Burke. The Royal License, which bears date the 6th April, 1818, sets forth that Mr. Haviland Burke was only child of Thomas Haviland, Esq., by Mary his wife, only child of Patrick French, Esq., of Loughrea, and Julia, his wife, which Julia was sister of the Eight Hon. Edinund Burke, of Butlers' Court, Beaconsfield ; and that the name and arms of Burke were granted in "memory of " that most distinguished statesman, the said Edmund Burke." Mr. Havi- land Burke was called to the English bar, by the Hon. Society of Lincoln's Inn, the 18th Nov. 1819, and practised as a con- veyancer and in the courts of Chancery. The law, however, was less to his taste than devotion to the fine arts. After some years he withdrew from the legal profession altogether, being in possession of a competent independence. He became a great col- lector of prints, pictures, and autographs ; and in course of time he amassed a large and rare collection of these, to the value of several thousand pounds. In connexion with these subjects, Mr. Haviland Burke pos- sessed a fund of information : Ins agreeable society was much sought and courted by his brother collectors and other men of knowledge and ability. Mr. Haviland Burke had many of the amiable and benevolent characteristics of his illustrious grand- HAYILAND BURKE. 309 uncle. " His heart," says the Gentleman s Magazine, in a me- moir of him, " was cast in the tenderest mould, and few restraints were put upon its generous impulses. Such patronage as he could bestow was not withheld from more than one painter of meiit when in difficulties. . . . Irish by descent, and possessing an Irish estate, the St. Patrick's charity early in life won his especial regard, which was never afterwards for a moment remitted. Ml!. HAVILAND BURKE. His activity and perseverance in the cause drew general notice. . . . To another charitable institution, the Middlesex- Hospital, of which he was chairman, he was almost equally devoted. Both institu- tions at his death voted addresses of condolence to his family." Mr. Haviland Burke married, in 1827, I [airiet, third daughter of William Minshull, Esq., <>f Kentish Town, the descendant of x 2 310 LIFE OF EDMTJM) BURKE. an ancient Buckinghamshire family, and by that lady, now his widow, he had seven children, three of whom are living. Mr. Haviland Burke died at his residence, 27, Gloucester Place, Marylebone, the 3d April, 1852. His surviving issue are two daughters, and one son, Edmund Haviland Burke, a student at Eton, the present heir and representative of the Bight Hon. Edmund Burke. A final word or two about Edmund Burke's seat and grounds at Beaconsfield. His widow, Mrs. Burke, some years after her husband's death, sold the estate to her neighbour, James Du Pre, Esq., of Wilton Park, father of Caledon George Du Pre, Esq., present M.P. for Bucks, Wilton Park is one mile from Beacons- field, a road only dividing it from the lands that belonged to Burke. Mrs. Burke, in the sale, reserved the occupation of her house, gardens, and some of the grass-land close to Gregories, for her life. There, as already stated, she, and for the most part of the time, her niece, Mrs. Haviland, resided until the de- mise of the elder lady in 1812, when this remaining portion of the property came also into Mr. Du Pre's possession. He let the house shortly after he got it to the Bev. Mr. Jones, who purposed converting it into a school ; but scarcely had he obtained posses- sion, when, on the 23d April, 1813, it was accidentally burnt to the ground. The land is now laid out in farms, and hardly a trace is left. A decayed wall and some stables only mark the situation of Edmund Burke's former mansion. Nothing really remains but the lasting halo of its departed greatness. The personal description of Edmund Burke has been handed down. He was about five feet ten inches high, well made and muscular; of that firm and compact frame that denotes more strength than bulk. His countenance had been in his youth hand- some. The expression of his face was less striking than might have been anticipated ; at least it was so until lit up by the ani- mation of his conversation or the fire of his eloquence. In dress, he usually wore a brown suit; and he was in his later days easily POETICAL DESCRIPTIONS OF BURKE. 311 recognisable in the House of Commons from his peculiar bob-wig and spectacles. There are many portraits of Burke. These, and the caricatures of him by contemporary artists, have made his face and figure generally familiar. Burke's full-length likeness may be seen in one of the halls of Trinity College, Dublin; but the best pictures of him are decidedly the half-lengths and heads by Rey- nolds, Romney, and Barry. The bust presented by the late Mr. Haviland Burke to the British Museum, and now there, is the work of a clever sculptor named Hickey, whom Edmimd Burke's benevolent patronage brought into public notice. During the greater part of Edmund Burke's life, his strict temperance secured for him tolerably good health ; and in the end it was not positive siclcness, but grief, which broke him down. From the period of his son's death the change in his looks and bearing is described as having become painfully discernible. His frame lost its elas- ticity, he contracted a stoop, and he gradually and almost visibly wasted away, untd nature sunk exhausted under the rooted sorrow which weighed upon his heart. To Burke's health-preserving domestic habits, and especially his preference for water as a beverage, a graceful allusion is made in the supplement to Goldsmith's "Retaliation," the production of an anonymous writer in the Gentleman s Magazine of August 1778: " To Burke a pure libation bring, Fresh drawn from clear Castalian spring ; With civic oak the goblet bind, Pit emblem of his patriot mind ; Let Clio at his table sip, And Hermes hand it to his lip." These lines recall the following more known and oft-quoted verses upon Burke in "Retaliation" itself: " Here lies our good Edmund, whose genius was such, We scarcely can praise it or blame it too much ; Who, born for the universe, narrow' d his mine I, And to party gave up what was meant for mankind : 312 LIFE OF EIHVIUND BURKE. Though fraught with all learning, yet straining his throat To persuade Tommy Townshend to lend hirn a vote ; Who, too deep for his hearers, still went on refining, And thought of convincing, while they thought of dining : Though equal to all things, for all things unfit ; Too nice for a statesman, too proud for a wit ; For a patriot too cool ; for a drudge disobedient ; Too fond of the right to pursue the expedient. In short, 'twas his fate, unemployed or in place, sir, To eat mutton cold, and cut blocks with a razor." This epitaph, or rather piece of hadinage, written, be it observed, at a time when the subject of it was little beyond the com- mencement of his public career, has been universally accepted as correctly representing the peculiarities of Edmund Burke ; and time and popularity have set a kind of stamp on the fidelity of the portrait : yet, after looking into Burke's real history, the slightest consideration will discover that much of this epitaph is quite at variance with Burke's actual character and conduct, and with the events of his life. In the first place, Burke's mind, according to those who knew and watched him, gradually and constantly ex- panded — it never contracted ; and, of all men, he was the most ready to oppose or even quit his party when that party's principles differed from his own. The cause of Burke's speeches now and then wearying his audience in the Commons arose undoubtedly, not as Goldsmith has it, from the depth or refinement they possessed, but really from their great length, and from the custom Burke had of introducing a quantity of statistic and other minute detail, lastingly valuable in itself, but tiresome to his immediate hearers. Burke may be well said to have been equal to all things ; but sUrely he was by no means unfit for all things. Whether too nice or too proud, he certainly was both a statesman and a wit ; and as a patriot he was remarkable, not for coolness, but on the contrary, for such warmth as would sometimes dead him into a blamable extreme. Goldsmith's next line and a half (the best portion of the epitaph) are, however, perfectly characteristic of goldsmith's epitaph. 313 Edmund Burke. Burke's quarrel with Hamilton enduringly re- cords how none dared attempt to make him their drudge. Every expression of Burke's nohle mind, every emanation of his pure spirit, every act of his immaculate life, prove indeed that he cherished the right ahove any expedient ; that he was always prepared to obey the precepts so impressively set forth in the verse of Robert Burns : " The fear o' hell's a hangman's whip To haud the wretch in order ; But where ye feel your honour grip, Let that aye be your border : Its slightest touches, instant pause — Debar a' side pretences ; And resolutely keep its laws, Uncaring consequences." Goldsmith in his last two lines is in error again. Burke's poli- tical measures and plans were often adopted, and were usually successful ; but Goldsmith clearly alludes to the American ques- tion, the only important political circumstance of Burke's exist- ence which the poet lived to see ; yet early as was Goldsmith's death, he must have witnessed enough to have shown him that Burke was never hi a state of neglect or privation — never, ac- cording to Goldsmith's expression, obliged to eat mutton cold. Burke, from the starting-post of his public career, enjoyed a very fair share of the pecuniary favours of fortune : honours too he got ; and eventually nobility came within his reach, had he chosen to accept it. Of his worldly success and prosperity, Burke himself never at any time complained, but always spoke with evident satisfaction. In fine, this famous epitaph should be read with due and abundant caution : it is too jocular for an earnest, too premature for a veracious description of the man it pretends to depict. No doubt Goldsmith meant it merely as a passing piece of pleasantry; and the fault lies with those who have since made the whole of it apply seriously to the charactei and conduct of Burke. 314 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. Happily for his fame, Edmund Burke, like Oliver Goldsmith, has heen subsequently fully understood and appreciated — better perhaps now than in his own day. The many recent eloquent references to and panegyrics of him testify to the fact. One of the latest, and perhaps the most perfect of these, occurs in an article in the Times of the 9th April, 1852 — in such a newspaper article as only the Times can write. Part of it so ably and so aptly describes Burke, that it is about the best conclusion that can be given to these remarks. It runs thus : " The intellectual prowess of Edmund Burke is the admi- ration of the world. Since Bacon quitted life, England had not possessed so marvellous a son. Philosophy dwelt in his soid, and raised him to the dignity of a prophet. Gorgeous eloquence was his natural inheritance, practical wisdom his chief accomplishment ; while all the intellectual graces were his hourly companions. Politics, when he dealt with them, assumed a grandeur which they had never known before, for he raised them above the exi- gencies of his own fleeting day, to apply them to the instruction and the wants of future ages. It has been justly remarked that the contemporaries of Burke, great and illustrious men, bravely fought and nobly conquered ; but they were content with the victory of the hour. Burke, too, achieved his conquest for the day ; but did not rest satisfied until he had won from the conflict wisdom, intelligence, and lofty principle for all time to come. Fox was the creation of his age. Burke is not the statesman of a period or of a place, but the enduring teacher of the universal family — the abiding light of the civilised world. When Fox spoke, says Chateaubriand, it was in vain that the stranger tried to resist the impression made upon him. ' He turned aside and wept.' We read the speeches of Fox at this not very distant day, and marvel at their declared effect ; for our tears do not flow from the perusal, our blood is not warmed by the syllables. Still more are we astonished to learn that the pregnant and singularly profound language of Burke fell too frequently upon stony ears, CONCLUDING REMARKS. 315 and that the rising of the orator was often a signal for the flight of his audience. Yet the double wonderment is easy of expla- nation. That winch will render Shakespeare faniiHar to our hearths, while a hearth can be kindled in England, will also secure the immortality of Edmund Burke. There was nothing local, nothing temporary, nothing circumscribed in his magnificent utterance. His appeals were not to the prejudices of his contem- poraries or to the ever-changing sentiments of the time. He marched with a sublime movement ever in advance of the multi- tude. Every generation can point to its popular chief, and there are few epochs which do not boast of their Fox. In what politi- cal age shall we look for a statesman in all respects so illustrious as Burke ?" One observation more to terminate tins biography. Of late years, to the credit of this country, numerous statues have been raised to those illustrious statesmen and warriors, who have suc- cessfully carried out the policy and plans proposed by Edmund Burke. Pitt, at first the reluctant and afterwards the earnest disciple of Burke's teaching ; Canning and Peel, the later followers of Burke's doctrines ; Nelson and Wellington, who did eventually at sea and on land what Burke wanted to have done in his own time — all these adorn in bronze or marble our public places ; but where is there, in the open air and the broad thoroughfare, a statue of Edmund Burke — of him whose fife was one long devo- tion to the cause of order, and whose sculptured effigy, like a landmark, would not fail to constantly recall those true limits of liberty, which form the boundaries of the British constitution ? Dublin once enthusiastically suggested a statue to Edmund Burke, but failed to erect it. No wonder. The streets and squares of that beautiful city present few mementos of Ireland's own great men. We see there no cast nor carved presentments of Swift, Goldsmith, or O'Connell. But for Hardy's able biography, and Charles Phillips' admirable " Recollections," Charlemont and Curran might be overlooked and forgotten. Truly, in this, Ire- 316 LIFE OF EDMUND BURKE. land incurs the imputation of a memory almost Athenian. Much, however, has heen clone on this side of the Channel, and latterly in particular, to earn a hetter reputation. Nevertheless, until there rises in England some monument worthy of the great Ed- mund, it cannot even he said of this country, that enough is effected — that the sure pledge exists of that just consummation by which transcendent talent and virtue may hope to experience righteous remembrance, appropriate homage, and adequate re- ward. LONDON; PRINTED BY LEVEY, ROBSON, AND FRANKLVN, Great New Street and Fetter Lane, ; n THE LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA Santa Barbara THIS BOOK IS DUE ON THE LAST DATE STAMPED BELOW. UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY AA 000 234 707 . ;