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MACAULAY’S TWO ESSAYS ON THE 
 EARL OF CHATHAM 
 
MACAULAY 
 
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 LONDON 
 
 ARTHUR L. HUMPHREYS 
 
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CHATHAM 
 
 HOUGH several years have elapsed 
 since the publication of this 
 work, it is still, we believe, a 
 new publication to most of our 
 readers. Nor are we surprised at 
 this. The book is large, and the style heavy. 
 The information which Mr Thackeray has ob- 
 tained from the State Paper Office is new; 
 but much of it is very uninteresting. The 
 rest of his narrative is very little better than 
 Gifford’s or Tomline’s Life of the second 
 Pitt, and tells us little or nothing that may 
 not be found quite as well told in the Par- 
 liamentary History, the Annual Register, 
 and other works equally common. 
 
 Almost every mechanical employment, it 
 is said, has a tendency to injure some one 
 or other of the bodily organs of the artisan. 
 Grinders of cutlery die of consumption ; 
 
2 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 weavers are stunted in their growth ; smiths 
 become blear-eyed. In the same manner 
 almost every intellectual employment has a 
 tendency to produce some intellectual malady. 
 Biographers, translators, editors, all, in short, 
 who employ themselves in illustrating the 
 lives or the writings of others, are peculiarly 
 exposed to the ‘ Lues Boswelliana,’ or disease of 
 admiration. But we scarcely remember ever 
 to have seen a patient so far gone in this dis- 
 temper as Mr Thackeray. He is not satisfied 
 with forcing us to confess that Pitt was a great 
 orator, a vigorous minister, an honourable and 
 high-spirited gentleman. He will have it that 
 all virtues and all accomplishments met in his 
 hero. In spite of Gods, men, and columns, 
 Pitt must be a poet, a poet capable of pro- 
 ducing a heroic poem of the first order; and 
 we are assured that we ought to find many 
 charms in such lines as these : — 
 
 ‘ Midst all the tumults of the warring sphere, 
 
 My light-charged bark may haply glide ; 
 
 Some gale may waft, some conscious thought 
 shall cheer, 
 
 And the small freight unanxious glide.’ 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 3 
 
 Pitt was in the army for a few months in 
 time of peace. Mr Thackeray accordingly 
 insists on our confessing that, if the young 
 cornet had remained in the service, he would 
 have been one of the ablest commanders 
 that ever lived. But this is not all. Pitt, 
 it seems, was not merely a great poet ‘ in 
 esse,’ and a great general ‘ in posse,’ but a 
 finished example of moral excellence, the 
 just man made perfect. He was in the right 
 when he attempted to establish an inquisi- 
 tion, and to give bounties for perjury, in 
 order to get Walpole’s head. He was in 
 the right when he declared Walpole to have 
 been an excellent minister. He was in the 
 right when, being in opposition, he main- 
 tained that no peace ought to be made with 
 Spain, till she should formally renounce the 
 right of search. He was in the right when, 
 being in office, he silently acquiesced in a 
 treaty by which Spain did not renounce the 
 right of search. When he left the Duke of 
 Newcastle, when he coalesced with the Duke 
 of Newcastle, when he thundered against 
 subsidies, when he lavished subsidies with 
 
4 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 unexampled profusion, when he execrated the 
 Hanoverian connection, when he declared 
 that Hanover ought to be as dear to us as 
 Hampshire, he was still invariably speaking 
 the language of a virtuous and enlightened 
 statesman. 
 
 The truth is that there scarcely ever lived 
 a person who had so little claim to this sort 
 of praise as Pitt. He was undoubtedly a 
 great man. But his was not a complete and 
 well-proportioned greatness. The public life 
 of Hampden or of Somers resembles a regular 
 drama, which can be criticised as a whole, 
 and every scene of which is to be viewed in 
 connection with the main action. The public 
 life of Pitt, on the other hand, is a rude 
 though striking piece, a piece abounding in 
 incongruities, a piece without any unity of 
 plan, but redeemed by some noble passages, 
 the effect of which is increased by the tame- 
 ness or extravagance of what precedes and 
 of what follows. His opinions were unfixed. 
 His conduct at some of the most important 
 conjunctures of his life was evidently deter- 
 mined by pride and resentment. He had 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 5 
 
 one fault, which of all human faults is most 
 rarely found in company with true greatness. 
 He was extremely affected. He was an 
 almost solitary instance of a man of real 
 genius, and of a brave, lofty, and command- 
 ing spirit, without simplicity of character. 
 He was an actor in the Closet, an actor at 
 Council, an actor in Parliament ; and even 
 in private society he could not lay aside his 
 theatrical tones and attitudes. We know 
 that one of the most distinguished of his 
 partisans often complained that he could 
 never obtain admittance to Lord Chatham’s 
 room till everything was ready for the repre- 
 sentation, till the dresses and properties 
 were all correctly disposed, till the light 
 was thrown with Rembrandt-like effect on 
 the head of the illustrious performer, till 
 the flannels had been arranged with the 
 air of a Grecian drapery, and the crutch 
 placed as gracefully as that of Belisarius or 
 Lear. 
 
 Yet, with all his faults and affectations, 
 Pitt had, in a very extraordinary degree, 
 many of the elements of greatness. He had 
 
G 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 genius, strong passions, quick sensibility, and 
 vehement enthusiasm for the grand and the 
 beautiful. There was something about him 
 which ennobled tergivei'sation itself. He often 
 went wrong, very wrong. But, to quote the 
 language of Wordsworth, 
 
 ‘ He still retained, 
 
 ’Mid such abasement, what he had received 
 
 From nature, an intense and glowing mind.’ 
 In an age of low and dirty prostitution, in 
 the age of Dodington and Sandy s, it was 
 something to have a man who might perhaps, 
 under some strong excitement, have been 
 tempted to ruin his country, but who never 
 would have stooped to pilfer from her, a man 
 whose errors arose, not from a sordid desire 
 of gain, but from a fierce thirst for power, 
 for glory, and for vengeance. History owes 
 to him this attestation, that at a time when 
 anything short of direct embezzlement of the 
 public money was considered as quite fair in 
 public men, he showed the most scrupulous 
 disinterestedness ; that, at a time when it 
 seemed to be generally taken for granted 
 that Government could be upheld only by 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 7 
 
 the basest and most immoral arts, he ap- 
 pealed to the better and nobler parts of 
 human nature ; that he made a brave and 
 splendid attempt to do, by means of public 
 opinion, what no other statesman of his day 
 thought it possible to do, except by means 
 of corruption ; that he looked for support, 
 not, like the Pelhams, to a strong aristo- 
 cratical connection, not, like Bute, to the 
 personal favour of the sovereign, but to the 
 middle class of Englishmen ; that he inspired 
 that class with a firm confidence in his 
 integrity and ability ; that, backed by them, 
 he forced an unwilling court and an unwill- 
 ing oligarchy to admit him to an ample 
 share of power ; and that he used his power 
 in such a manner as clearly proved him to 
 have sought it, not for the sake of profit or 
 patronage, but from a wish to establish for 
 himself a great and durable reputation by 
 means of eminent services rendered to the 
 State. 
 
 The family of Pitt was wealthy and re- 
 spectable. His grandfather was Governor of 
 Madras, and brought back from India that 
 
8 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 celebrated diamond which the Regent Orleans, 
 by the advice of Saint-Simon, purchased for 
 upwards of two millions of livres, and which 
 is still considered as the most precious of 
 the crown jewels of France. Governor Pitt 
 bought estates and rotten boroughs, and sat 
 in the House of Commons for Old Sarum. 
 His son Robert was at one time member for 
 Old Sarum, and at another for Oakhampton. 
 Robert had two sons. Thomas, the elder, 
 inherited the estates and the parliamentary 
 interest of his father. The second was the 
 celebrated William Pitt. 
 
 He was born in November 1708. About 
 the early part of his life little more is known 
 than that he was educated at Eton, and 
 that at seventeen he was entered at Trinity 
 College, Oxford. During the second year of 
 his residence at the University, George the 
 First died ; and the event was, after the 
 fashion of that generation, celebrated by the 
 Oxonians in many middling copies of verses. 
 On this occasion Pitt published some Latin 
 lines, which Mr Thackeray has preserved. 
 They prove that the young student had but 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 9 
 
 a very limited knowledge even of the me- 
 chanical part of his art. All true Etonians 
 will hear with concern that their illustrious 
 schoolfellow is guilty of making the first 
 syllable in ‘ labenti ’ short. The matter of 
 the poem is as worthless as that of any col- 
 lege exercise that was ever written before 
 or since. There is, of course, much about 
 Mars, Themis, Neptune, and Cocytus. The 
 Muses are earnestly entreated to weep over 
 the urn of Csesar; for Caesar, says the Poet, 
 loved the Muses ; Caesar, who could not read 
 a line of Pope, and who loved nothing but 
 punch and fat women. 
 
 Pitt had been, from his school-days, cruelly 
 tormented by the gout, and was advised to 
 travel for his health. He accordingly left 
 Oxford without taking a degree, and visited 
 France and Italy. He returned, however, 
 without having received much benefit from 
 his excursion, and continued, till the close of 
 his life, to suffer most severely from his con- 
 stitutional malady. 
 
 His father was now dead, and had left very 
 little to the younger children. It was neces- 
 
10 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 sary that William should choose a profession. 
 He decided for the army, and a cornet’s com- 
 mission was procured for him in the Blues. 
 
 But, small as his fortune was, his family 
 had both the power and the inclination to 
 serve him. At the general election of 1734, 
 his elder brother Thomas was chosen both 
 for Old Sarum and for Oakhampton. When 
 Parliament met in 1735, Thomas made his 
 election to serve for Oakhampton, and 
 William was returned for Old Sarum. 
 
 Walpole had now been, during fourteen 
 years, at the head of affairs. He had risen 
 to power under the most favourable circum- 
 stances. The whole of the Whig party, of 
 that party which professed peculiar attach- 
 ment to the principles of the Revolution, 
 and which exclusively enjoyed the confidence 
 of the reigning house, had been united in 
 support of his administration. Happily for 
 him, he had been out of office when the 
 South-Sea Act was passed ; and, though he 
 does not appear to have foreseen all the 
 consequences of that measure, he had strenu- 
 ously opposed it, as he had opposed all the 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 11 
 
 measures, good and bad, of Sunderland’s 
 administration. When the South-Sea Com- 
 pany were voting dividends of fifty per cent., 
 when a hundred pounds of their stock were 
 selling for eleven hundred pounds, when 
 Threadneedle Street was daily crowded with 
 the coaches of dukes and prelates, when 
 divines and philosophers turned gamblers, 
 when a thousand kindred bubbles were daily 
 blown into existence, the periwig company, 
 and the Spanish-jackass-company, and the 
 quicksilver-fixation-company, Walpole’s calm 
 good sense preserved him from the general 
 infatuation. He condemned the prevailing 
 madness in public, and turned a considerable 
 sum by taking advantage of it in private. 
 When the crash came, when ten thousand 
 families were reduced to beggary in a day, 
 when the people, in the frenzy of their rage 
 and despair, clamoured, not only against the 
 lower agents in the juggle, but against the 
 Hanoverian favourites, against the English 
 ministers, against the King himself, when 
 Parliament met, eager for confiscation and 
 blood, when members of the House of Com- 
 
12 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 mons proposed that the directors should be 
 treated like parricides in ancient Rome, tied 
 up in sacks, and thrown into the Thames, 
 Walpole was the man on whom all parties 
 turned their eyes. Four years before he had 
 been driven from power by the intrigues of 
 Sunderland and Stanhope ; and the lead in 
 the House of Commons had been intrusted 
 to Craggs and Aislabie. Stanhope was no 
 more. Aislabie was expelled from Parlia- 
 ment on account of his disgraceful conduct 
 regarding the South - Sea scheme. Craggs 
 was perhaps saved by a timely death from 
 a similar mark of infamy. A large minority 
 in the House of Commons voted for a severe 
 censure on Sunderland, who, finding it im- 
 possible to withstand the force of the 
 prevailing sentiment, retired from office, 
 and outlived his retirement but a very 
 short time. The schism which had divided 
 the Whig party was now completely healed. 
 Walpole had no opposition to encounter 
 except that of the Tories ; and the Tories 
 were naturally regarded by the King with 
 the strongest suspicion and dislike. 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 13 
 
 For a time business went on with a smooth- 
 ness and a despatch such as had not been 
 known since the days of the Tudors. During 
 the session of 1724, for example, there was 
 hardly a single division except on private 
 bills. It is not impossible that, by taking 
 the course which Pelham afterwards took, 
 by admitting into the government all the 
 rising talents and ambition of the Whig 
 party, and by making room here and there 
 for a Tory not unfriendly to the House of 
 Brunswick, Walpole might have averted the 
 tremendous conflict in which he passed the 
 later years of his administration, and in 
 which he was at length vanquished. The 
 Opposition which overthrew him was an 
 opposition created by his own policy, by his 
 own insatiable love of power. 
 
 In the very act of forming his Ministry 
 he turned one of the ablest and most 
 attached of his supporters into a deadly 
 enemy. Pulteney had strong public and 
 private claims to a high situation in the 
 new arrangement. His fortune was immense. 
 His private character was respectable. He 
 
14 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 was already a distinguished speaker. He had 
 acquired official experience in an important 
 post. He had been, through all changes of 
 fortune, a consistent Whig. When the Whig 
 party was split into two sections, Pulteney 
 had resigned a valuable place, and had 
 followed the fortunes of Walpole. Yet, when 
 Walpole returned to power, Pulteney was 
 not invited to take office. An angry dis- 
 cussion took place between the friends. The 
 ministry offered a peerage. It was impossible 
 for Pulteney not to discern the motive of such 
 an offer. He indignantly refused to accept 
 it. For some time he continued to brood 
 over his wrongs, and to watch for an oppor- 
 tunity of revenge. As soon as a favourable 
 conjuncture arrived he joined the minority, 
 and became the greatest leader of Opposi- 
 tion that the House of Commons had ever 
 seen. 
 
 Of all the members of the Cabinet Carteret 
 was the most eloquent and accomplished. 
 His talents for debate were of the first 
 order ; his knowledge of foreign affairs was 
 superior to that of any living statesman ; 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 15 
 
 his attachment to the Protestant succession 
 was undoubted. But there was not room 
 in one Government for him and Walpole. 
 Carteret retired, and was, from that time 
 forward, one of the most persevering and 
 formidable enemies of his old colleague. 
 
 If there was any man with whom Walpole 
 could have consented to make a partition 
 of power, that man was Lord Townshend. 
 They were distant kinsmen by birth, near 
 kinsmen by marriage. They had been friends 
 from childhood. They had been school- 
 fellows at Eton. They were country neigh- 
 bours in Norfolk. They had been in office 
 together under Godolphin. They had gone 
 into opposition together when Harley rose 
 to power. They had been persecuted by the 
 same House of Commons. They had, after 
 the death of Anne, been recalled together to 
 office. They had again been driven out 
 together by Sunderland, and had again come 
 back together when the influence of Sunder- 
 land had declined. Their opinions on public 
 affairs almost always coincided. They were 
 both men of frank, generous, and com- 
 
16 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 passionate natures. Their intercourse had 
 been for many years affectionate and cordial. 
 But the ties of blood, of marriage, and of 
 friendship, the memory of mutual services, 
 the memory of common triumphs and com- 
 mon disasters, were insufficient to restrain 
 that ambition which domineered over all 
 the virtues and vices of Walpole. He was 
 resolved, to use his own metaphor, that the 
 firm of the house should be, not Townshend 
 and Walpole, but Walpole and Townshend. 
 At length the rivals proceeded to personal 
 abuse before a large company, seized each 
 other by the collar, and grasped their swords. 
 The women squalled. The men parted the 
 combatants. By friendly intervention the 
 scandal of a duel between cousins, brothers- 
 in-law, old friends, and old colleagues, was 
 prevented. But the disputants could not 
 long continue to act together. Townshend 
 retired, and, with rare moderation and public 
 spirit, refused to take any part in politics. 
 He could not, he said, trust his temper. He 
 feared that the recollection of his private 
 wrongs might impel him to follow the example 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 17 
 
 of Pulteney, and to oppose measures which 
 he thought generally beneficial to the country. 
 He therefore never visited London after his 
 resignation, but passed the closing years of 
 his life in dignity and repose among his 
 trees and pictures at Rain ham. 
 
 Next went Chesterfield. He too was a 
 Whig and a friend of the Protestant suc- 
 cession. He was an orator, a courtier, a 
 wit, and a man of letters. He was at the 
 head of ‘ton’ in days when, in order to be 
 at the head of ‘ton,’ it was not sufficient to 
 be dull and supercilious. It was evident 
 that he submitted impatiently to the ascend- 
 ancy of Walpole. He murmured against the 
 Excise Bill. His brothers voted against it 
 in the House of Commons. The Minister 
 acted with characteristic caution and char- 
 acteristic energy ; caution in the conduct of 
 public affairs ; energy where his own suprem- 
 acy was concerned. He withdrew his Bill, 
 and turned out all his hostile or wavering 
 colleagues. Chesterfield was stopped on the 
 great staircase of St James’s, and summoned 
 to deliver up the staff' which he bore as 
 
18 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 Lord Steward of the Household. A crowd 
 of noble and powerful functionaries, the 
 Dukes of Montrose and Bolton, Lord Bur- 
 lington, Lord Stair, Lord Cobham, Lord 
 Marchmont, Lord Clinton, were at the 
 same time dismissed from the service of 
 the Crown. 
 
 Not long after these events the Opposition 
 was reinforced by the Duke of Argyle, a man 
 vainglorious indeed and fickle, but brave, 
 eloquent and popular. It was in a great 
 measure owing to his exertions that the 
 Act of Settlement had been peaceably 
 carried into effect in England immediately 
 after the death of Anne, and that the Jacob- 
 ite rebellion which, during the following 
 year, broke out in Scotland, had been 
 suppressed. He too carried over to the 
 minority the aid of his great name, his 
 talents, and his paramount influence in his 
 native country. 
 
 In each of these cases taken separately, 
 a skilful defender of Walpole might perhaps 
 make out a case for him. But when we see 
 that during a long course of years all the 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 19 
 
 footsteps are turned the same way, that all 
 the most eminent of those public men who 
 agreed with the Minister in their general 
 views of policy left him, one after another, 
 with sore and irritated minds, we find it im- 
 possible not to believe that the real explana- 
 tion of the phenomenon is to be found in 
 the words of his son, ‘Sir Robert Walpole 
 loved power so much that he would not 
 endure a rival.’ Hume has described this 
 famous minister with great felicity in one 
 short sentence, — ‘moderate in exercising 
 power, not equitable in engrossing it.’ Kind- 
 hearted, jovial, and placable as Walpole was, 
 he was yet a man with whom no person of 
 high pretensions and high spirit could long 
 continue to act. He had, therefore, to stand 
 against an Opposition containing all the most 
 accomplished statesmen of the age, with no 
 better support than that which he received 
 from persons like his brother Horace or 
 Henry Pelham, whose industrious mediocrity 
 gave no cause for jealousy, or from clever 
 adventurers, whose situation and character 
 diminished the dread which their talents 
 
20 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 might have inspired. To this last class 
 belonged Fox, who was too poor to live 
 without office ; Sir William Yonge, of whom 
 Walpole himself said, that nothing but such 
 parts could buoy up such a character, and 
 that nothing but such a character could drag 
 down such parts ; and Winnington, whose 
 private morals lay, justly or unjustly, under 
 imputations of the worst kind. 
 
 The discontented Whigs were, not perhaps 
 in number, but certainly in ability, experience, 
 and weight, by far the most important part 
 of the Opposition. The Tories furnished 
 little more than rows of ponderous fox- 
 hunters, fat with Staffordshire or Devonshire 
 ale, men who drank to the King over the 
 water, and believed that all the fundholders 
 were Jews, men whose religion consisted in 
 hating the Dissenters, and whose political 
 researches had led them to fear, like Squire 
 Western, that their land might be sent over 
 to Hanover to be put in the sinking-fund. 
 The eloquence of these zealous squires, the 
 remnant of the once formidable October 
 Club, seldom went beyond a hearty Aye or 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 21 
 
 No. Very few members of this party had 
 distinguished themselves much in Parlia- 
 ment, or could, under any circumstances, have 
 been called to fill any high office ; and those 
 few had generally, like Sir William Wyndham, 
 learned in the company of their new asso- 
 ciates the doctrines of toleration and political 
 liberty, and might indeed with strict propriety 
 be called Whigs. 
 
 It was to the Whigs in Opposition, the 
 Patriots, as they were called, that the most 
 distinguished of the English youth who at 
 this season entered into public life attached 
 themselves. These inexperienced politicians 
 felt all the enthusiasm which the name of 
 liberty naturally excites in young and ardent 
 minds. They conceived that the theory of 
 the Tory Opposition and the practice of 
 Walpole’s Government were alike inconsis- 
 tent with the principles of liberty. They 
 accordingly repaired to the standard which 
 Pulteney had set up. While opposing the 
 Whig minister, they professed a firm ad- 
 herence to the purest doctrines of Whiggism. 
 He was the schismatic ; they were the true 
 
22 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 Catholics, the peculiar people, the deposi- 
 taries of the orthodox faith of Hampden and 
 Russell, the one sect which, amidst the cor- 
 ruptions generated by time and by the long 
 possession of power, had preserved inviolate 
 the principles of the Revolution. Of the 
 young men who attached themselves to this 
 portion of the Opposition the most dis- 
 tinguished were Lyttelton and Pitt. 
 
 When Pitt entered Parliament, the whole 
 political world was attentively watching the 
 progress of an event which soon added great 
 strength to the Opposition, and particularly 
 to that section of the Opposition in which 
 the young statesman enrolled himself. The 
 Prince of Wales was gradually becoming 
 more and more estranged from his father 
 and his father’s ministers, and more and 
 more friendly to the Patriots. 
 
 Nothing is more natural than that, in a 
 monarchy where a constitutional Opposition 
 exists, the heir-apparent of the throne should 
 put himself at the head of that Opposition. 
 He is impelled to such a course by every 
 feeling of ambition and of vanity. He can- 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 23 
 
 not be more than second in the estimation 
 of the party which is in. He is sure to be 
 the first member of the party which is out. 
 The highest favour which the existing ad- 
 ministration can expect from him is that he 
 will not discard them. But, if he joins the 
 Opposition, all his associates expect that he 
 will promote them ; and the feelings which 
 men entertain towards one from whom they 
 hope to obtain great advantages which they 
 have not are far warmer than the feelings 
 with which they regard one who, at the very 
 utmost, can only leave them in possession of 
 what they already have. An heir-apparent, 
 therefore, who wishes to enjoy, in the highest 
 perfection, all the pleasure that can be de- 
 rived from eloquent flattery and profound 
 respect, will always join those who are 
 struggling to force themselves into power. 
 This is, we believe, the true explanation of 
 a fact which Lord Granville attributed to 
 some natural peculiarity in the illustrious 
 House of Brunswick. 4 This family,’ said he 
 at Council, we suppose after his daily half- 
 gallon of Burgundy, 4 always has quarrelled, 
 
24 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 and always will quarrel, from generation to 
 generation.’ He should have known some- 
 thing of the matter ; for he had been a 
 favourite with three successive generations 
 of the royal house. We cannot quite admit 
 his explanation ; but the fact is indisputable. 
 Since the accession of George the First, 
 there have been four Princes of Wales, and 
 they have all been almost constantly in 
 Opposition. 
 
 Whatever might have been the motives 
 which induced Prince Frederick to join the 
 party opposed to the Government, his sup- 
 port infused into many members of that 
 party a courage and an energy of which 
 they stood greatly in need. Hitherto it had 
 been impossible for the discontented Whigs 
 not to feel some misgivings when they found 
 themselves dividing night after night, with 
 uncompromising Jacobites who were known 
 to be in constant communication with the 
 exiled family, or with Tories who had im- 
 peached Somers, who had murmured against 
 Harlev and St John as too remiss in the 
 cause of the Church and the landed interest, 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 25 
 
 and who, if they were not inclined to attack 
 the reigning family, yet considered the in- 
 troduction of that family as, at best, only the 
 less of two great evils, as a necessary but 
 painful and humiliating preservative against 
 Popery. The Minister might plausibly say 
 that Pulteney and Carteret, in the hope of 
 gratifying their own appetite for office and 
 for revenge, did not scruple to serve the pur- 
 poses of a faction hostile to the Protestant 
 succession. The appearance of Frederick at 
 the head of the patriots silenced this re- 
 proach. The leaders of the Opposition might 
 now boast that their course was sanctioned 
 by a person as deeply interested as the King 
 himself in maintaining the Act of Settle- 
 ment, and that, instead of serving the pur- 
 poses of the Tory party, they had brought 
 that party over to the side of Whiggism. It 
 must indeed be admitted that, though both 
 the King and the Prince behaved in a man- 
 ner little to their honour, though the father 
 acted harshly, the son disrespectfully, and 
 both childishly, the royal family was rather 
 strengthened than weakened by the disagree- 
 
26 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 ment of its two most distinguished members. 
 A large class of politicians, who had con- 
 sidered themselves as placed under sentence 
 of perpetual exclusion from office, and who, 
 in their despair, had been almost ready 
 to join in a counter-revolution as the only 
 mode of removing the proscription under 
 which they lay, now saw with pleasure an 
 easier and safer road to power opening 
 before them, and thought it far better to 
 wait till, in the natural course of things, 
 the Crown should descend to the heir of 
 the House of Brunswick, than to risk their 
 lands and their necks in a rising for the 
 House of Stuart. The situation of the 
 royal family resembled the situation of those 
 Scotch families in which father and son took 
 opposite sides during the rebellion, in order 
 that, come what might, the estate might not 
 be forfeited. 
 
 In April 1736, Frederick was married to 
 the Princess of Saxe Gotha, with whom he 
 afterwards lived on terms very similar to 
 those on which his father had lived with 
 Queen Caroline. The Prince adored his 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 27 
 
 wife, and thought her in mind and person 
 the most attractive of her sex. But he 
 thought that conjugal fidelity was an un- 
 princely virtue ; and, in order to be like 
 Henry the Fourth, and the Regent Orleans, 
 he affected a libertinism for which he had 
 no taste, and frequently quitted the only 
 woman whom he loved for ugly and dis- 
 agreeable mistresses. ' 
 
 The address which the House of Commons 
 presented to the King on the occasion of 
 the Prince’s marriage was moved, not by the 
 Minister, but by Pulteney, the leader of the 
 Whigs in Opposition. It was on this motion 
 that Pitt, who had not broken silence during 
 the session in which he took his seat, ad- 
 dressed the House for the first time. ‘A 
 contemporary historian,’ says Mr Thackeray, 
 ‘ describes Mr Pitt’s first speech as superior 
 even to the models of ancient eloquence. 
 According to Tindal, it was more ornamented 
 than the speeches of Demosthenes, and less 
 diffuse than those of Cicero.’ This unmean- 
 ing phrase has been a hundred times quoted. 
 That it should ever have been quoted, except 
 
28 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 to be laughed at, is strange. The vogue which 
 it has obtained may serve to show in how 
 slovenly a way most people are content to 
 think. Did Tindal, who first used it, or 
 Archdeacon Coxe and Mr Thackeray, who 
 have borrowed it, ever in their lives hear 
 any speaking which did not deserve the 
 same compliment ? Did they ever hear 
 speaking less ornamented than that of 
 Demosthenes, or more diffuse than that of 
 Cicero ? We know no living orator, from 
 Lord Brougham down to Mr Hunt, who is 
 not entitled to the same eulogy. It would 
 be no very flattering compliment to a 
 man’s figure to say, that he was taller 
 than the Polish Count, and shorter than 
 Giant O’Brien, fatter than the ‘Anatomie 
 Vivante,’ and more slender than Daniel 
 Lambert. 
 
 Pitt’s speech, as it is reported in the 
 Gentleman’s Magazine, certainly deserves 
 Tindal’s compliment, and deserves no other. 
 It is just as empty and wordy as a maiden 
 speech on such an occasion might be expected 
 to be. But the fluency and the personal 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 29 
 
 advantages of the young orator instantly 
 caught the ear and eye of his audience. He 
 was, from the day of his first appearance, 
 always heard with attention ; and exercise 
 soon developed the great powers which he 
 possessed. 
 
 In our time, the audience of a member of 
 Parliament is the nation. The three or four 
 hundred persons who may be present while 
 a speech is delivered may be pleased or dis- 
 gusted by the voice and action of the orator ; 
 but, in the reports which are read the next 
 day by hundreds of thousands, the difference 
 between the noblest and the meanest figure, 
 between the richest and the shrillest tones, 
 between the most graceful and the most 
 uncouth gesture, altogether vanishes. A 
 hundred years ago, scarcely any report of 
 what passed within the walls of the House 
 of Commons was suffered to get abroad. In 
 those times, therefore, the impression which 
 a speaker might make on the persons who 
 actually heard him was everything. His fame 
 out of doors depended entirely on the report 
 of those who were within the doors. In the 
 
30 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 Parliaments of that time, therefore, as in 
 the ancient commonwealths, those qualifica- 
 tions which enhance the immediate effect of 
 a speech were far more important ingredients 
 in the composition of an orator than at pre- 
 sent. All those qualifications Pitt possessed 
 in the highest degree. On the stage, he 
 would have been the finest Brutus or Corio- 
 lanus ever seen. Those who saw him in his 
 decay, when his health was broken, when 
 his mind was untuned, when he had been 
 removed from that stormy assembly of which 
 he thoroughly knew the temper, and over 
 which he possessed unbounded influence, to 
 a small, a torpid, and an unfriendly audience, 
 say that his speaking was then, for the most 
 part, a low, monotonous muttering, audible 
 only to those who sat close to him, that 
 when violently excited he sometimes raised 
 his voice for a few minutes, but that it soon 
 sank again into an unintelligible murmur. 
 Such was the Earl of Chatham, but such 
 was not William Pitt. His figure, when he 
 first appeared in Parliament, was strikingly 
 graceful and commanding, his features high 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 31 
 
 and noble, his eye full of fire. His voice, 
 even when it sank to a whisper, was heard 
 to the remotest benches ; and when he 
 strained it to its full extent the sound rose 
 like the swell of the organ of a great 
 cathedral, shook the house with its peal, 
 and was heard through lobbies and down 
 staircases to the Court of Requests and the 
 precincts of Westminster Hall. He culti- 
 vated all these eminent advantages with the 
 most assiduous care. His action is described 
 by a very malignant observer as equal to 
 that of Garrick. His play of countenance 
 was wonderful : he frequently disconcerted 
 a hostile orator by a single glance of indig- 
 nation or scorn. Every tone, from the 
 impassioned cry to the thrilling aside, was 
 perfectly at his command. It is by no 
 means improbable that the pains which he 
 took to improve his great personal advan- 
 tages had, in some respects, a prejudicial 
 operation, and tended to nourish in him 
 that passion for theatrical effect which, as 
 we have already remarked, was one of the 
 most conspicuous blemishes in his character. 
 
32 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 But it was not solely or principally to 
 outward accomplishments that Pitt owed 
 the vast influence which, during nearly thirty 
 years, he exercised over the House of Com- 
 mons. He was undoubtedly a great orator; 
 and, from the descriptions given by his 
 contemporaries, and the fragments of his 
 speeches which still remain, it is not difficult 
 to discover the nature and extent of his ora- 
 torical powers. 
 
 He was no speaker of set speeches. His 
 few prepared discourses were complete fail- 
 ures. The elaborate panegyric which he pro- 
 nounced on General Wolfe was considered 
 as the very worst of all his performances. 
 ‘ No man,’ says a critic who had often heard 
 him, ‘ever knew so little what he was going 
 to say.’ Indeed, his facility amounted to a 
 vice. He was not the master but the slave 
 of his own speech. So little self-command 
 had he when once he felt the impulse, that 
 he did not like to take part in a debate 
 when his mind was full of an important 
 secret of state. ‘ I must sit still,’ he once 
 
 said to Lord Shelburne on such an occasion ; 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 33 
 
 ‘for, when once I am up, every thing that 
 is in my mind comes out.’ 
 
 Yet he was not a great debater. That 
 he should not have been so when first he 
 entered the House of Commons is not 
 strange. Scarcely any person has ever 
 become so without long practice and many 
 failures. It was by slow degrees, as Burke 
 said, that Charles Fox became the most 
 brilliant and powerful debater that ever 
 lived. Charles Fox himself attributed his 
 
 own success to the resolution which he 
 formed when very young, of speaking, well 
 or ill, at least once every night. ‘ During 
 five whole sessions,’ he used to say, ‘ I 
 spoke every night but one ; and I regret 
 only that I did not speak on that night 
 too.’ Indeed, with the exception of Mr 
 
 Stanley, whose knowledge of the science of 
 parliamentary defence resembles an instinct, 
 it would be difficult to name any eminent 
 debater who has not made himself a master 
 of his art at the expense of his audience. 
 
 But, as this art is one which even the 
 ablest men have seldom acquired without 
 
34 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 long practice, so it is one which men of 
 respectable abilities, with assiduous and in- 
 trepid practice, seldom fail to acquire. It is 
 singular that, in such an art, Pitt, a man 
 of great parts, of great fluency, of great 
 boldness, a man whose whole life was passed 
 in parliamentary conflict, a man who, during 
 several years, was the leading minister of 
 the Crown in the House of Commons, should 
 never have attained to high excellence. He 
 spoke without premeditation ; but his speech 
 followed the course of his own thoughts, and 
 not the course of the previous discussion. 
 He could, indeed, treasure up in his memory 
 some detached expression of an opponent, 
 and make it the text for lively ridicule or 
 solemn reprehension. Some of the most cele- 
 brated bursts of his eloquence were called 
 forth by an unguarded word, a laugh, or a 
 cheer. But this was the only sort of reply 
 in which he appears to have excelled. He 
 was perhaps the only great English orator 
 who did not think it any advantage to have 
 the last word, and who generally spoke by 
 choice before his most formidable antagonists. 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 35 
 
 His merit was almost entirely rhetorical. He 
 did not succeed either in exposition or in 
 refutation ; but his speeches abounded with 
 lively illustrations, striking apophthegms, well 
 told anecdotes, happy allusions, passionate 
 appeals. His invective and sarcasm were 
 terrific. Perhaps no English orator was ever 
 so much feared. 
 
 But that which gave most effect to his 
 declamation was the air of sincerity, of 
 vehement feeling, of moral elevation, which 
 belonged to all that he said. His style was 
 not always in the purest taste. Several con- 
 temporary judges pronounced it too florid. 
 Walpole, in the midst of the rapturous 
 eulogy which he pronounces on one of Pitt’s 
 greatest orations, owns that some of the 
 metaphors were too forced. Some of Pitt’s 
 quotations and classical stories are too trite 
 for a clever schoolboy. But these were 
 niceties for which the audience cared little. 
 The enthusiasm of the orator infected all who 
 heard him ; his ardour and his noble bearing 
 put fire into the most frigid conceit, and 
 gave dignity to the most puerile allusion. 
 
36 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 His powers soon began to give annoyance 
 to the Government ; and Walpole deter- 
 mined to make an example of the patriotic 
 cornet. Pitt was accordingly dismissed from 
 the service. Mr Thackeray says that the 
 Minister took this step, because he plainly 
 saw that it would have been vain to think 
 of buying over so honourable and disin- 
 terested an opponent. We do not dispute 
 Pitt’s integrity ; but we do not know what 
 proof he had given of it when he was 
 turned out of the army ; and we are sure 
 that Walpole was not likely to give credit 
 for inflexible honesty to a young adventurer 
 who had never had an opportunity of re- 
 fusing anything. The truth is, that it was 
 not Walpole’s practice to buy off enemies. 
 Mr Burke truly says, in the Appeal to the 
 Old Whigs, that Walpole gained very few 
 over from the Opposition. Indeed, that great 
 minister knew his business far too well. He 
 knew that, for one mouth which is stopped 
 with a place, fifty other mouths will be in- 
 stantly opened. He knew that it would 
 have been very bad policy in him to give 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 37 
 
 the world to understand that more was to 
 be got by thwarting his measures than by 
 supporting them. These maxims are as old 
 as the origin of parliamentary corruption in 
 England. Pepys learned them, as he tells us, 
 from the counsellors of Charles the Second. 
 
 Pitt was no loser. He was made Groom 
 of the Bedchamber to the Prince of Wales, 
 and continued to declaim against the 
 ministers with unabated violence and with 
 increasing ability. The question of maritime 
 right, then agitated between Spain and 
 England, called forth all his powers. He 
 clamoured for war with a vehemence which 
 it is not easy to reconcile with reason or 
 humanity, but which appears to Mr 
 Thackeray worthy of the highest admiration. 
 We will not stop to argue a point on which 
 we had long thought that all well informed 
 people were agreed. We could easily show, 
 we think, that, if any respect be due to 
 international law, if right, where societies of 
 men are concerned, be anything but another 
 name for might, if we do not adopt the 
 doctrine of the Buccaneers, which seems to 
 
38 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 be also the doctrine of Mr Thackeray, that 
 treaties mean nothing within thirty degrees 
 of the line, the war with Spain was alto- 
 gether unjustifiable. But the truth is, that 
 the promoters of that war have saved the 
 historian the trouble of trying them. They 
 have pleaded guilty. ‘I have seen,’ says 
 Burke, ‘and with some care examined, the 
 original documents concerning certain impor- 
 tant transactions of those times. They per- 
 fectly satisfied me of the extreme injustice 
 of that war, and of the falsehood of the 
 colours which Walpole, to his ruin, and 
 guided by a mistaken policy, suffered to be 
 daubed over that measure. Some years 
 after, it was my fortune to converse with 
 many of the principal actors against that 
 minister, and with those who principally 
 excited that clamour. None of them, no not 
 one, did in the least defend the measure, 
 or iattempt to justify their conduct. They 
 condemned it as freely as they would have 
 done in commenting upon any proceeding in 
 history in which they were totally uncon- 
 cerned.’ Pitt, on subsequent occasions, gave 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 39 
 
 ample proof that he was one of these peni- 
 tents. But his conduct, even where it ap- 
 peared most criminal to himself, appears 
 admirable to his biographer. 
 
 The elections of 1741 were unfavourable 
 to Walpole ; and after a long and obstinate 
 struggle he found it necessary to resign. 
 The Duke of Newcastle and Lord Hard- 
 wicke opened a negotiation with the leading 
 patriots, in the hope of forming an adminis- 
 tration on a Whig basis. At this conjuncture, 
 Pitt and those persons who were most nearly 
 connected with him acted in a manner very 
 little to their honour. They attempted to 
 come to an understanding with Walpole, 
 and offered, if he would use his influence 
 with the King in their favour, to screen him 
 from prosecution. They even went so far 
 as to engage for the concurrence of the 
 Prince of Wales. But Walpole knew that 
 the assistance of the Boys, as he called 
 the young Patriots, would avail him nothing 
 if Pulteney and Carteret should prove in- 
 tractable, and would be superfluous if the 
 great leaders of the Opposition could be 
 
40 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 gained. He, therefore, declined the pro- 
 posal. It is remarkable that Mr Thackeray, 
 who has thought it worth while to preserve 
 Pitt’s bad college verses, has not even alluded 
 to this story, a story which is supported by 
 strong testimony, and which may be found in 
 so common a book as Coxe’s Life of Walpole. 
 
 The new arrangements disappointed al- 
 most every member of the Opposition, and 
 none more than Pitt. He was not invited 
 to become a place-man ; and he therefore 
 stuck firmly to his old trade of patriot. 
 Fortunate it was for him that he did so. 
 Had he taken ofiice at this time, he would 
 in all probability have shared largely in 
 the unpopularity of Pulteney, Sandys, and 
 Carteret. He was now the fiercest and most 
 implacable of those who called for vengeance 
 on Walpole. He spoke with great energy 
 and ability in favour of the most unjust and 
 violent propositions which the enemies of 
 the fallen minister could invent. He urged 
 the House of Commons to appoint a secret 
 tribunal for the purpose of investigating 
 the conduct of the late First Lord of 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 41 
 
 the Treasury. This was done. The great 
 majority of the inquisitors were notoriously 
 hostile to the accused statesman. Yet they 
 were compelled to own that they could find 
 no fault in him. They therefore called for 
 new powers, for a bill of indemnity to 
 witnesses, or, in plain words, for a bill to 
 reward all who might give evidence, true 
 or false, against the Earl of Orford. This 
 bill Pitt supported, Pitt, who had himself 
 offered to be a screen between Lord Orford 
 and public justice. These are melancholy 
 facts. Mr Thackeray omits them, or hurries 
 over them as fast as he can ; and, as eulogy 
 is his business, he is in the right to do so. 
 But, though there are many parts of the life 
 of Pitt which it is more agreeable to con- 
 template, we know none more instructive. 
 What must have been the general state of 
 political morality, when a young man, con- 
 sidered, and justly considered, as the most 
 public-spirited and spotless statesman of his 
 time, could attempt to force his way into 
 office by means so disgraceful ! 
 
 The Bill of Indemnity was rejected by 
 
42 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 the Lords. Walpole withdrew himself 
 quietly from the public eye ; and the 
 ample space which he had left vacant was 
 soon occupied by Carteret. Against Carteret 
 Pitt began to thunder with as much zeal 
 as he had ever manifested against Sir 
 Robert. To Carteret he transferred most 
 of the hard names which were familiar to 
 liis eloquence, sole minister, wicked minister, 
 odious minister, execrable minister. The 
 chief topic of Pitt’s invective was the favour 
 shown to the German dominions of the 
 House of Brunswick. He attacked with 
 great violence, and with an ability which 
 raised him to the very first rank among the 
 parliamentary speakers, the practice of paying 
 Hanoverian troops with English money. The 
 House of Commons had lately lost some of 
 its most distinguished ornaments. Walpole 
 and Pulteney had accepted peerages ; Sir 
 William Wyndham was dead ; and among 
 the rising men none could be considered as, 
 on the whole, a match for Pitt. 
 
 During the recess of 1744, the old Duchess 
 of Marlborough died. She carried to her 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 43 
 
 grave the reputation of being decidedly the 
 best hater of her time. Yet her love had 
 been infinitely more destructive than her 
 hatred. More than thirty years before, 
 her temper had ruined the party to which 
 she belonged and the husband whom she 
 adored. Time had made her neither wiser 
 nor kinder. Whoever was at any moment 
 great and prosperous was the object of her 
 fiercest detestation. She had hated Walpole ; 
 she now hated Carteret. Pope, long before 
 her death, predicted the fate of her vast 
 property. 
 
 ‘ To heirs unknown descends the un - 
 guarded store, 
 
 Or wanders, heaven - directed, to the 
 poor.’ 
 
 Pitt was then one of the poor ; and to 
 him Heaven directed a portion of the wealth 
 of the haughty Dowager. She left him a 
 legacy of ten thousand pounds, in considera- 
 tion of ‘ the noble defence he had made for 
 the support of the laws of England, and to 
 prevent the ruin of his country.’ 
 
 The will was made in August. The 
 
44 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 Duchess died in October. In November Pitt 
 was a courtier. The Pelhams had forced the 
 King, much against his will, to part with Lord 
 Carteret, who had now become Earl Granville. 
 They proceeded, after this victory, to form 
 the Government on that basis, called by the 
 cant name of ‘the broad bottom.’ Lyttelton 
 had a seat at the Treasury, and several other 
 friends of Pitt were provided for. But Pitt 
 himself was, for the present, forced to be 
 content with promises. The King resented 
 most highly some expressions which the ardent 
 orator had used in the debate on the Hano- 
 verian troops. But Newcastle and Pelham 
 expressed the strongest confidence that time 
 and their exertions would soften the royal 
 displeasure. 
 
 Pitt, on his part, omitted nothing that 
 might facilitate his admission to office. He 
 resigned his place in the household of Prince 
 Frederick, and, when Parliament met, exerted 
 his eloquence in support of the Government. 
 The Pelhams were really sincere in their 
 endeavours to remove the strong prejudices 
 which had taken root in the King’s mind. 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 45 
 
 They knew that Pitt was not a man to be 
 deceived with ease or offended with impunity. 
 They were afraid that they should not be 
 long able to put him off* with promises. Nor 
 was it their interest so to put him off. There 
 was a strong tie between him and them. He 
 was the enemy of their enemy. The brothers 
 hated and dreaded the eloquent, aspiring, 
 and imperious Granville. They had traced 
 his intrigues in many quarters. They knew 
 his influence over the royal mind. They 
 knew that, as soon as a favourable oppor- 
 tunity should arrive, he would be recalled 
 to the head of affairs. They resolved to 
 bring things to a crisis ; and the question 
 on which they took issue with their master 
 was whether Pitt should or should not be 
 admitted to office. They chose their time 
 with more skill than generosity. It was 
 when rebellion was actually raging in Britain, 
 when the Pretender was master of the 
 northern extremity of the island, that they 
 tendered their resignations. The King found 
 himself deserted, in one day, by the whole 
 strength of that party which had placed his 
 
46 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 family on the throne. Lord Granville tried 
 to form a government; but it soon appeared 
 that the parliamentary interest of the Pelhams 
 was irresistible, and that the King’s favourite 
 statesman could count only on about thirty 
 Lords and eighty members of the House 
 of Commons. The scheme was given up. 
 Granville went away laughing. The ministers 
 came back stronger than ever ; and the King 
 was now no longer able to refuse anything 
 that they might be pleased to demand. He 
 could only mutter that it was very hard that 
 Newcastle, who was not fit to be chamberlain 
 to the most insignificant prince in Germany, 
 should dictate to the King of England. 
 
 One concession the ministers graciously 
 made. They agreed that Pitt should not be 
 placed in a situation in which it would be 
 necessary for him to have frequent interviews 
 with the King. Instead, therefore, of making 
 their new ally Secretary-at-War as they had 
 intended, they appointed him Vice-Treasurer 
 of Ireland, and in a few months promoted 
 him to the office of Paymaster of the Forces. 
 
 This was, at that time, one of the most 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 47 
 
 lucrative offices in the Government. The 
 salary was but a small part of the emolument 
 which the Paymaster derived from his place. 
 He was allowed to keep a large sum, which, 
 even in time of peace, was seldom less than 
 one hundred thousand pounds, constantly in 
 his hands ; and the interest on this sum he 
 might appropriate to his own use. This 
 practice was not secret, nor was it considered 
 as disreputable. It was the practice of men 
 of undoubted honour, both before and after 
 the time of Pitt. He, however, refused to 
 accept one farthing beyond the salary which 
 the law had annexed to his office. It had 
 been usual for foreign princes who received 
 the pay of England to give to the Paymaster 
 of the Forces a small percentage of the sub- 
 sidies. These ignominious vails Pitt resolutely 
 declined. 
 
 Disinterestedness of this kind was, in his 
 days, very rare. His conduct surprised and 
 amused politicians. It excited the warmest 
 admiration throughout the body of the people. 
 In spite of the inconsistencies of which Pitt 
 had been guilty, in spite of the strange 
 
48 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 contrast between his violence in Opposition 
 and his tameness in office, he still possessed 
 a large share of the public confidence. The 
 motives which may lead a politician to change 
 his connections or his general line of conduct 
 are often obscure ; but disinterestedness in 
 pecuniary matters everybody can understand. 
 Pitt was thenceforth considered as a man 
 who was proof to all sordid temptations. If 
 he acted ill, it might be from an error in 
 judgment ; it might be from resentment ; it 
 might be from ambition. But poor as he 
 was, he had vindicated himself from all 
 suspicion of covetousness. 
 
 Eight quiet years followed, eight years 
 during which the minority, which had been 
 feeble ever since Lord Granville had been 
 overthrown, continued to dwindle till it be- 
 came almost invisible. Peace was made with 
 France and Spain in 1748. Prince Frederick 
 died in 1751 ; and with him died the very 
 semblance of opposition. All the most dis- 
 tinguished survivors of the party which had 
 supported Walpole and of the party which 
 had opposed him were united under his 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 49 
 
 successor. The fiery and vehement spirit of 
 Pitt had for a time been laid to rest. He 
 silently acquiesced in that very system of 
 continental measures which he had lately 
 condemned. He ceased to talk disrespect- 
 fully about Hanover. He did not object to 
 the treaty with Spain, though that treaty 
 left us exactly where we had been when he 
 uttered his spirit-stirring harangues against 
 the pacific policy of Walpole. Now and 
 then glimpses of his former self appeared ; 
 but they were few and transient. Pelham 
 knew with whom he had to deal, and felt 
 that an ally, so little used to control, and so 
 capable of inflicting injury, might well be in- 
 dulged in an occasional fit of waywardness. 
 
 Two men, little, if at all, inferior to Pitt 
 in powers of mind, held, like him, subordinate 
 offices in the Government. One of these, 
 Murray, was successively Solicitor - Genei'al 
 and Attorney - General. This distinguished 
 person far surpassed Pitt in correctness of 
 taste, in power of reasoning, in depth and 
 variety of knowledge. His parliamentary 
 eloquence never blazed into sudden flashes 
 
50 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 of dazzling brilliancy; but its clear, placid, 
 and mellow splendour was never for an 
 instant overclouded. Intellectually he was, 
 we believe, fully equal to Pitt ; but he was 
 deficient in the moral qualities to which 
 Pitt owed most of his success. Murray 
 wanted the energy, the courage, the all- 
 grasping and all-risking ambition, which 
 make men great in stirring times. His 
 heart was a little cold, his temper cautious 
 even to timidity, his manners decorous even 
 to formality. He never exposed his fortunes 
 or his fame to any risk which he could 
 avoid. At one time he might, in all proba- 
 bility, have been Prime Minister. But the 
 object of his wishes was the judicial bench. 
 The situation of Chief Justice might not be 
 so splendid as that of First Lord of the 
 Treasury ; but it was dignified ; it was quiet ; 
 it was secure ; and therefore it was the 
 favourite situation of Murray. 
 
 Fox, the father of the great man whose 
 mighty efforts in the cause of peace, of truth, 
 and of liberty, have made that name immortal, 
 was Seci’etary-at- War. He was a favourite 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 51 
 
 with the King, with the Duke of Cumberland, 
 and with some of the most powerful members 
 of the great Whig connection. His parlia- 
 mentary talents were of the highest order. 
 As a speaker he was in almost all respects 
 the very opposite to Pitt. His figure was un- 
 graceful ; his face, as Reynolds and Nollekens 
 have preserved it to us, indicated a strong 
 understanding; but the features were coarse, 
 and the general aspect dark and lowering. 
 His manner was awkward ; his delivery was 
 hesitating ; he was often at a stand for want 
 of a word ; but as a debater, as a master of 
 that keen, weighty, manly logic, which is 
 suited to the discussion of political questions, 
 he has perhaps never been surpassed except 
 by his son. In reply he was as decidedly 
 superior to Pitt as in declamation he was 
 Pitt’s inferior. Intellectually the balance was 
 nearly even between the rivals. But hex - e, 
 again, the moral qualities of Pitt turned the 
 scale. Fox had undoubtedly many virtues. 
 In natural disposition as well as in talents, 
 he bore a great resemblance to his more 
 celebrated son. He had the same sweetness 
 
52 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 of temper, the same strong passions, the same 
 openness, boldness, and impetuosity, the same 
 cordiality towards friends, the same placability 
 towards enemies. No man was more warmly 
 or justly beloved by his family or by his 
 associates. But unhappily he had been 
 trained in a bad political school, in a school, 
 the doctrines of which were, that political 
 virtue is the mere coquetry of political prosti- 
 tution, that every patriot has his price, that 
 Government can be carried on only by means 
 of corruption, and that the state is given as 
 a prey to statesmen. These maxims were too 
 much in vogue throughout the lower ranks 
 of Walpole’s party, and were too much 
 encouraged by Walpole himself, who, from 
 contempt of what is in our day vulgarly 
 called humbug, often ran extravagantly and 
 offensively into the opposite extreme. The 
 loose political morality of Fox presented a 
 remarkable contrast to the ostentatious 
 purity of Pitt. The nation distrusted the 
 former, and placed implicit confidence in 
 the latter. But almost all the statesmen of 
 the age had still to learn that the con- 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 53 
 
 fidence of the nation was worth having. 
 While things went on quietly, while there 
 was no opposition, while everything was 
 given by the favour of a small ruling junto, 
 Fox had a decided advantage over Pitt ; 
 but when dangerous times came, when 
 Europe was convulsed with war, when Par- 
 liament was broken up into factions, when 
 the public mind was violently excited, the 
 favourite of the people rose to supreme 
 power, while his rival sank into insignifi- 
 cance. 
 
 Early in the year 1754, Henry Pelham 
 died unexpectedly. ‘Now I shall have no 
 more peace,’ exclaimed the old King, when 
 he heard the news. He was in the right. 
 Pelham had succeeded in bringing together 
 and keeping together all the talents of the 
 kingdom. By his death, the highest post to 
 which an English subject can aspire was 
 left vacant ; and at the same moment, the 
 influence which had yoked together and 
 reined in so many turbulent and ambitious 
 spirits was withdrawn. 
 
 Within a week after Pelham’s death, it 
 
54 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 was deteri ni ned that the Duke of Newcastle 
 should be placed at the head of the 
 Treasury ; but the arrangement was still far 
 from complete. Who was to be the leading 
 Minister of the Crown in the House of 
 Commons ? Was the office to be intrusted 
 to a man of eminent talents ? And would 
 not such a man in such a place demand 
 and obtain a larger share of power and 
 patronage than Newcastle would be dis- 
 posed to concede ? Was a mere drudge to 
 be employed ? And what probability was 
 there that a mere drudge would he able to 
 manage a large and stormy assembly, abound- 
 ing with able and experienced men ? 
 
 Pope has said of that wretched miser, Sir 
 John Cutler, 
 
 ‘ Cutler saw tenants break and houses fall 
 For very want : he could not build a wall.’ 
 Newcastle’s love of power resembled Cutler’s 
 love of money. It was an avarice which 
 thwarted itself, a penny-wise and pound- 
 foolish cupidity. An immediate outlay was 
 so painful to him that he would not venture 
 to make the most desirable improvement. 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 55 
 
 If he could have found it in his heart to 
 cede at once a portion of his authority, he 
 might probably have ensured the continu- 
 ance of what remained. But he thought it 
 better to construct a weak and rotten govern- 
 ment, which tottered at the smallest breath, 
 and fell in the first storm, than to pay the 
 necessary price for sound and durable 
 materials. He wished to find some person 
 who would be willing to accept the lead of 
 the House of Commons on terms similar to 
 those on which Secretary Craggs had acted 
 under Sunderland, five-and-thirty years before. 
 Craggs could hardly be called a minister. 
 He was a mere agent for the Minister. He 
 was not trusted with the higher secrets of 
 state, but obeyed implicitly the directions of 
 his superior, and was, to use Dodington’s 
 expression, merely Lord Sunderland’s man. 
 But times were changed. Since the days of 
 Sunderland, the importance of the House 
 of Commons had been constantly on the 
 increase. During many years, the person 
 who conducted the business of the Govern- 
 ment in that House had almost always been 
 
50 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 Prime Minister. In these circumstances, it 
 was not to be supposed that any person who 
 possessed the talents necessary for the situa- 
 tion would stoop to accept it on such terms 
 as Newcastle was disposed to offer. 
 
 Pitt was ill at Bath ; and, had he been 
 well and in London, neither the King nor 
 Newcastle would have been disposed to 
 make any overtures to him. The cool and 
 wary Murray had set his heart on profes- 
 sional objects. Negotiations were opened 
 with Fox. Newcastle behaved like himself, 
 that is to say, childishly and basely. The 
 proposition which he made was that Fox 
 should be Secretary of State, with the lead 
 of the House of Commons ; that the dis- 
 posal of the secret-service money, or, in 
 plain words, the business of buying mem- 
 bers of Parliament, should be left to the 
 First Lord of the Treasury; but that Fox 
 should be exactly informed of the way in 
 which this fund was employed. 
 
 To these conditions Fox assented. But 
 the next day everything was in confusion. 
 Newcastle had changed his mind. The con- 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 57 
 
 versation which took place between Fox 
 and the Duke is one of the most curious 
 in English history. ‘My brother,’ said New- 
 castle, ‘when he was at the Treasury, never 
 told anybody what he did with the secret- 
 service money. No more will I.’ The 
 answer was obvious. Pelham had been, not 
 only First Lord of the Treasury, but also 
 manager of the House of Commons ; and it 
 was therefore unnecessary for him to con- 
 fide to any other person his dealings with 
 the members of that House. ‘ But how,’ 
 said Fox, ‘can I lead in the Commons 
 without information on this head ? How 
 can I talk to gentlemen when I do not 
 know which of them have received gratifi- 
 cations and which have not? And who,’ 
 he continued, ‘is to have the disposal of 
 places ? ’ — ‘ I myself,’ said the Duke. — ‘ How 
 then am I to manage the House of Com- 
 mons ? ’ — ‘ Oh, let the members of the 
 House of Commons come to me.’ Fox 
 then mentioned the general election which 
 was approaching, and asked how the minis- 
 terial boroughs were to be filled up. ‘Do 
 
58 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 not trouble yourself,’ said Newcastle; ‘that 
 is all settled.’ This was too much for 
 human nature to bear. Fox refused to 
 accept the Secretaryship of State on such 
 terms ; and the Duke confided the manage- 
 ment of the House of Commons to a dull, 
 harmless man, whose name is almost for- 
 gotten in our time, Sir Thomas Robinson. 
 
 When Pitt returned from Bath, he affected 
 great moderation, though his haughty soul 
 was boiling with resentment. He did not 
 complain of the manner in which he had 
 been passed by, but said openly that, in his 
 opinion, Fox was the fittest man to lead 
 the House of Commons. The rivals, recon- 
 ciled by their common interest and their 
 common enmities, concerted a plan of opera- 
 tions for the next session. ‘Sir Thomas 
 Robinson lead us ! ’ said Pitt to Fox. ‘ The 
 Duke might as well send his jack-boot to 
 lead us.’ 
 
 The elections of 1754 were favourable 
 to the administration. But the aspect of 
 foreign affairs was threatening. In India 
 the English and the French had been 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 59 
 
 employed, ever since the peace of Aix-la- 
 Chapelle, in cutting each other’s throats. 
 They had lately taken to the same practice 
 in America. It might have been foreseen 
 that stirring times were at hand, times 
 which would call for abilities very different 
 from those of Newcastle and Robinson. 
 
 In November the Parliament met ; and 
 before the end of that month the new 
 Secretary of State had been so unmercifully 
 baited by the Paymaster of the Forces and 
 the Secretary at War that he was thoroughly 
 sick of his situation. Fox attacked him with 
 great force and acrimony. Pitt affected a 
 kind of contemptuous tenderness for Sir 
 Thomas, and directed his attacks principally 
 against Newcastle. On one occasion he 
 asked in tones of thunder whether Parlia- 
 ment sat only to register the edicts of one 
 too powerful subject ? The Duke was scared 
 out of his wits. He was afraid to dismiss 
 the mutineers ; he was afraid to promote 
 them ; but it was absolutely necessary to 
 do something. Fox, as the less proud and 
 intractable of the refractory pair, was pre- 
 
60 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 ferred. A seat in the Cabinet was offered 
 to him on condition that he would give 
 efficient support to the ministry in Parlia- 
 ment. In an evil hour for his fame and 
 his fortunes he accepted the offer, and aban- 
 doned his connection with Pitt, who never 
 forgave this desertion. 
 
 Sir Thomas, assisted by Fox, contrived 
 to get through the business of the year 
 without much trouble. Pitt was waiting 
 his time. The negotiations pending be- 
 tween France and England took every day 
 a more unfavourable aspect. Towards the 
 close of the session the King sent a message 
 to inform the House of Commons that he 
 had found it necessary to make prepara- 
 tions for war. The House returned an 
 address of thanks, and passed a vote of 
 credit. During the recess, the old animosity 
 of both nations was inflamed by a series 
 of disastrous events. An English force was 
 cut off in America ; and several French 
 merchantmen were taken in the West 
 Indian seas. It was plain that an appeal 
 
 to arms was at hand. 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 61 
 
 The first object of the King was to 
 secure Hanover; and Newcastle was dis- 
 posed to gratify his master. Treaties were 
 concluded, after the fashion of those times, 
 with several petty German princes, who 
 bound themselves to find soldiers if England 
 would find money ; and, as it was suspected 
 that Frederic the Second had set his heart 
 on the electoral dominions of his uncle, 
 Russia was hired to keep Prussia in awe. 
 
 When the stipulations of these treaties 
 were made known, there arose throughout 
 the kingdom a murmur from which a 
 judicious observer might easily prognosti- 
 cate the approach of a tempest. Newcastle 
 encountered strong opposition, even from 
 those whom he had always considered as 
 his tools. Legge, the Chancellor of the 
 Exchequer, refused to sign the Treasury 
 warrants which were necessary to give 
 effect to the treaties. Those persons who 
 were supposed to possess the confidence 
 of the young Prince of Wales and of his 
 mother held very menacing language. In 
 this perplexity Newcastle sent for Pitt, 
 
62 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 hugged him, patted him, smirked at him, 
 wept over him, and lisped out the highest 
 compliments and the most splendid promises. 
 The King, who had hitherto been as sulky 
 as possible, would be civil to him at the 
 levee ; he should be brought into the 
 Cabinet ; he should be consulted about 
 every thing; if he would only be so good as 
 to support the Hessian subsidy in the House 
 of Commons. Pitt coldly declined the 
 proffered seat in the Cabinet, expressed 
 the highest love and reverence for the 
 King, and said that, if his Majesty felt a 
 strong personal interest in the Hessian 
 treaty he would so far deviate from the 
 line which he had traced out for himself 
 as to give that treaty his support. ‘Well, 
 and the Russian subsidy,’ said Newcastle. 
 ‘No,’ said Pitt, ‘not a system of subsidies.’ 
 The Duke summoned Lord Hardwicke to 
 his aid ; but Pitt was inflexible. Murray 
 would do nothing. Robinson could do 
 nothing. It was necessary to have recourse 
 to Fox. He became Secretary of State, 
 with the full authority of a leader in the 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 63 
 
 House of Commons ; and Sir Thomas was 
 pensioned off on the Irish establishment. 
 
 In November, 1755, the Houses met. 
 Public expectation was wound up to the 
 height. After ten quiet years there was to 
 be an Opposition, countenanced by the heir- 
 apparent of the throne, and headed by the 
 most brilliant orator of the age. The 
 debate on the address was long remem- 
 bered as one of the greatest parliamentary 
 conflicts of that generation. It began at 
 three in the afternoon, and lasted till five 
 the next morning. It was on this night 
 that Gerard Hamilton delivered that single 
 speech from which his nickname was de- 
 rived. His eloquence threw into the shade 
 every orator, except Pitt, who declaimed 
 against the subsidies for an hour and a 
 half with extraordinary energy and effect. 
 Those powers which had formerly spread 
 terror through the majorities of Walpole 
 and Carteret were now displayed in their 
 highest perfection before an audience long 
 unaccustomed to such exhibitions. One 
 fragment of this celebrated oration remains 
 
G4 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 in a state of tolerable preservation. It is 
 the comparison between the coalition of 
 Fox and Newcastle, and the junction of 
 the Rhone and the Saone. ‘ At Lyons,’ 
 said Pitt, ‘ I was taken to see the place 
 where the two rivers meet, the one gentle, 
 feeble, languid, and though languid, yet of 
 no depth, the other a boisterous and im- 
 petuous torrent : but different as they are, 
 they meet at last.’ The amendment moved 
 by the Opposition was rejected by a great 
 majority ; and Pitt and Legge were imme- 
 diately dismissed from their offices. 
 
 During several months the contest in 
 the House of Commons was extremely 
 sharp. Warm debates took place on the 
 estimates, debates still warmer on the 
 subsidiary treaties. The Government suc- 
 ceeded in every division ; but the fame of 
 Pitt’s eloquence, and the influence of his 
 lofty and determined character, continued 
 to increase through the Session ; and the 
 events which followed the prorogation made 
 it utterly impossible for any other person 
 to manage the Parliament or the country. 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 65 
 
 The war began in every part of the 
 world with events disastrous to England, 
 and even more shameful than disastrous. 
 But the most humiliating of these events 
 was the loss of Minorca. The Duke of 
 Richelieu, an old fop who had passed his 
 life from sixteen to sixty in seducing women 
 for whom he cared not one straw, landed 
 on that island, and succeeded in reducing 
 it. Admiral Byng was sent from Gibraltar 
 to throw succours into Port - Mahon ; but 
 he did not think fit to engage the French 
 squadron, and sailed back without having 
 effected his purpose. The people were in- 
 flamed to madness. A storm broke forth, 
 which appalled even those who remem- 
 bered the days of Excise and of South- 
 Sea. The shops were filled with libels and 
 caricatures. The walls were covered with 
 placards. The city of London called for 
 vengeance, and the cry was echoed from 
 every corner of the kingdom. Dorsetshire, 
 Huntingdonshire, Bedfordshire, Buckingham- 
 shire, Somersetshire, Lancashire, Suffolk, 
 Shropshire, Surrey, sent up strong addresses 
 
 E 
 
66 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 to the throne, and instructed their repre- 
 sentatives to vote for a strict inquiry into 
 the causes of the late disasters. In the 
 great towns the feeling was as strong as 
 in the counties. In some of the instruc- 
 tions it was even recommended that the 
 supplies should be stopped. 
 
 The nation was in a state of angry and 
 sullen despondency, almost unpai’alleled in 
 history. People have, in all ages, been in 
 the habit of talking about the good old 
 times of their ancestors, and the degeneracy 
 of their contemporaries. This is in general 
 merely a cant. But in 1756 it was some- 
 thing more. At this time appeared Brown’s 
 Estimate, a book now remembered only by 
 the allusions in Cowper’s Table Talk and 
 in Burke’s Letters on a Regicide Peace. 
 It was universally read, admired, and be- 
 lieved. The author fully convinced his 
 readers that they were a race of cowards 
 and scoundrels ; that nothing could save 
 them ; that they were on the point of being- 
 enslaved by their enemies, and that they 
 richly deserved their fate. Such were the 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 67 
 
 speculations to which ready credence was 
 given at the outset of the most glorious 
 war in which England had ever been en- 
 gaged. 
 
 Newcastle now began to tremble for his 
 place, and for the only thing which was 
 dearer to him than his place, his neck. 
 The people were not in a mood to be 
 trifled with. Their cry was for blood. For 
 this once they might be contented with 
 the sacrifice of Byng. But what if fresh 
 disasters should take place ? What if an 
 unfriendly sovereign should ascend the 
 throne ? What if a hostile House of Com- 
 mons should be chosen ? 
 
 At length, in October, the decisive crisis 
 came. The new Secretary of State had been 
 long sick of the perfidy and levity of the 
 First Lord of the Treasury, and began to 
 fear that he might be made a scapegoat to 
 save the old intriguer who, imbecile as he 
 seemed, never wanted dexterity where 
 danger was to be avoided. Fox threw 
 up his office. Newcastle had recourse to 
 Murray ; but Murray had now within his 
 
68 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 reach the favourite object of his ambition. 
 The situation of Chief-Justice of the King’s 
 Bench was vacant ; and the Attorney-General 
 was fully resolved to obtain it, or to go into 
 Opposition. Newcastle offered him any 
 terms, the Duchy of Lancaster for life, a 
 tellership of the Exchequer, any amount of 
 pension, two thousand a year, six thousand 
 a year. When the Ministers found that 
 Murray’s mind was made up, they pressed 
 for delay, the delay of a session, a month, 
 a week, a day. Would he only make his 
 appearance once more in the House of 
 Commons ? Would he only speak in favour 
 of the address ? He was inexorable, and 
 peremptorily said that they might give or 
 withhold the Chief- Justiceship, but that he 
 would be Attorney-General no longer. 
 
 Newcastle now contrived to overcome the 
 prejudices of the King, and overtures were 
 made to Pitt, through Lord Hardwicke. Pitt 
 knew his power, and showed that he knew 
 it. He demanded as an indispensable con- 
 dition that Newcastle should be altogether 
 excluded from the new arrangement. 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 69 
 
 The Duke was in a state of ludicrous dis- 
 tress. He ran about chattering and crying, 
 asking advice and listening to none. In 
 the meantime, the Session drew near. The 
 public excitement Avas unabated. Nobody 
 could be found to face Pitt and Fox in the 
 House of Commons. Newcastle’s heart failed 
 him, and he tendered his resignation. 
 
 The King sent for Fox, and directed him 
 to form the plan of an administration in 
 concert with Pitt. But Pitt had not for- 
 gotten old injuries, and positively refused 
 to act Avith Fox. 
 
 The King noAv applied to the Duke of 
 Devonshire, and this mediator succeeded 
 in making an arrangement. He consented 
 to take the Treasury. Pitt became Secre- 
 tary of State, with the lead of the House 
 of Commons. The Great Seal was put 
 into commission. Legge returned to the 
 Exchequer ; and Lord Temple, whose sister 
 Pitt had lately married, was placed at the 
 head of the Admiralty. 
 
 It was clear from the first that this 
 administration would last but a very short 
 
70 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 time. It lasted not quite five months ; and, 
 during those five months, Pitt and Lord 
 Temple were treated with rudeness by the 
 King, and found but feeble support in the 
 House of Commons. It is a remarkable 
 fact, that the Opposition prevented the re- 
 election of some of the new Ministers. 
 Pitt, who sat for one of the boroughs which 
 were in the Pelham interest, found some 
 difficulty in obtaining a seat after his accept- 
 ance of the seals. So destitute was the 
 new Government of that sort of influence 
 without which no Government could then 
 be durable. One of the arguments most 
 frequently urged against the Reform Bill 
 was that, under a system of popular repre- 
 sentation, men whose presence in the House 
 of Commons was necessary to the conduct- 
 ing of public business might often find it 
 impossible to find seats. Should this incon- 
 venience ever be felt, there cannot be the 
 slightest difficulty in devising and applying 
 a remedy. But those who threatened us 
 with this evil ought to have remembered 
 that, under the old system, a great man 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 71 
 
 called to power at a great crisis by the 
 voice of the whole nation was in danger of 
 being excluded, by an aristocratical cabal, 
 from that House of which he was the most 
 distinguished ornament. 
 
 The most important event of this short 
 administration was the trial of Byng. On 
 that subject public opinion is still divided. 
 We think the punishment of the Admiral 
 altogether unjust and absurd. Treachery, 
 cowardice, ignorance amounting to what 
 lawyers have called ‘ crassa ignorantia,’ are 
 fit objects of severe penal inflictions. But 
 Byng was not found guilty of treachery, of 
 cowardice, or of gross ignorance of his pro- 
 fession. He died for doing what the most 
 loyal subject, the most intrepid warrior, the 
 most experienced seaman, might have done. 
 He died for an error in judgment, an error 
 such as the greatest commanders, Frederick, 
 Napoleon, Wellington, have often committed, 
 and have often acknowledged. Such errors 
 are not proper objects of punishment, for 
 this reason, that the punishing of such errors 
 tends not to prevent them, but to produce 
 
72 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 them. The dread of an ignominious death 
 may stimulate sluggishness to exertion, may 
 keep a traitor to his standard, may prevent 
 a coward from running away, but it has no 
 tendency to bring out those qualities which 
 enable men to form prompt and judicious 
 decisions in great emergencies. The best 
 marksman may be expected to fail when 
 the apple which is to be his mark is set 
 on his child’s head. We cannot conceive 
 anything more likely to deprive an officer 
 of his self-possession at the time when he 
 most needs it than the knowledge that, if 
 the judgment of his superiors should not 
 agree with his, he will be executed with 
 every circumstance of shame. Queens, it 
 has often been said, run far greater risk 
 in child-bed than private women, merely 
 because their medical attendants are more 
 anxious. The surgeon who attended Marie 
 Louise was altogether unnerved by his emo- 
 tions. ‘Compose yourself,’ said Bonaparte; 
 ‘imagine that you are assisting a poor girl 
 in the Faubourg Saint Antoine.’ This was 
 surely a far wiser course than that of the 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 73 
 
 Eastern king in the Arabian Nights’ Enter- 
 tainments, who proclaimed that the physicians 
 who failed to cure his daughter should have 
 their heads chopped off'. Bonaparte knew 
 mankind well ; and, as he acted towards this 
 surgeon, he acted towards his officers. No 
 sovereign was ever so indulgent to mere 
 errors of judgment; and it is certain that no 
 sovereign ever had in his service so many 
 military men fit for the highest commands. 
 
 Pitt acted a brave and honest part on 
 this occasion. He ventured to put both 
 his power and his popularity to hazard, and 
 spoke manfully for Byng, both in Parlia- 
 ment and in the royal presence. But the 
 King was inexorable. ‘ The House of Com- 
 mons, Sir,’ said Pitt, ‘ seems inclined to 
 mercy.’ ‘Sir,’ answered the King, ‘you 
 have taught me to look for the sense of 
 my people in other places than the House 
 of Commons.’ The saying has more point 
 than most of those which are recorded of 
 George the Second, and, though sarcastic- 
 ally meant, contains a high and just com- 
 pliment to Pitt. 
 
74 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 The King disliked Pitt, but absolutely 
 bated Temple. The new Secretary of State, 
 his Majesty said, bad never read Vatel, and 
 was tedious and pompous, but respectful. 
 The First Lord of the Admiralty was grossly 
 impertinent. Walpole tells one story, which, 
 we fear, is much too good to be true. He 
 assures us that Temple entertained his royal 
 master with an elaborate parallel between 
 Byng’s behaviour at Minorca, and his 
 Majesty’s behaviour at Oudenarde, in which 
 the advantage was all on the side of the 
 Admiral. 
 
 This state of things could not last. Early 
 in April, Pitt and all his friends were turned 
 out, and Newcastle was summoned to St 
 James’s. But the public discontent was not 
 extinguished. It had subsided when Pitt 
 was called to power. But it still glowed 
 under the embers ; and it now burst at 
 once into a flame. The stocks fell. The 
 Common Council met. The freedom of the 
 city was voted to Pitt. All the greatest cor- 
 porate towns followed the example. ‘ For some 
 weeks,’ says Walpole, ‘it rained gold boxes.’ 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 75 
 
 This was the turning point of Pitt’s life. 
 It might have been expected that a man 
 of so haughty and vehement a nature, 
 treated so ungraciously by the Court, and 
 supported so enthusiastically by the people, 
 would have eagerly taken the first oppor- 
 tunity of showing his power and gratifying 
 his resentment ; and an opportunity was not 
 wanting. The members for many counties 
 and large towns had been instructed to vote 
 for an inquiry into the circumstances which 
 had produced the miscarriage of the pre- 
 ceding year. A motion for inquiry had 
 been carried in the House of Commons, 
 without opposition ; and, a few days after 
 Pitt’s dismissal, the investigation commenced. 
 Newcastle and his colleagues obtained a vote 
 of acquittal ; but the minority were so strong 
 that they could not venture to ask for a vote 
 of approbation, as they had at first intended ; 
 and it was thought by some shrewd obser- 
 vers that, if Pitt had exerted himself to the 
 utmost of his power, the inquiry might have 
 ended in a censure, if not in an impeach- 
 ment. 
 
76 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 Pitt showed on this occasion a modera- 
 tion and self-government which was not 
 habitual to him. He had found by experi- 
 ence, that he could not stand alone. His 
 eloquence and his popularity had done much, 
 very much for him. Without rank, without 
 fortune, without borough interest, hated by 
 the King, hated by the aristocracy, he was 
 a person of the first importance in the state. 
 He had been suffered to form a ministry, 
 and to pronounce sentence of exclusion on 
 all his rivals, on the most powerful noble- 
 man of the Whig party, on the ablest debater 
 in the House of Commons. And he now 
 found that he had gone too far. The English 
 Constitution was not, indeed, without a popu- 
 lar element. But other elements generally 
 predominated. The confidence and admira- 
 tion of the nation might make a statesman 
 formidable at the head of an Opposition, 
 might load him with framed and glazed 
 parchments and gold boxes, might possibly, 
 under very peculiar circumstances, such as 
 those of the preceding year, raise him for 
 a time to power. But, constituted as Parlia- 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 77 
 
 ment then was, the favourite of the people 
 could not depend on a majority in the people’s 
 own House. The Duke of Newcastle, how- 
 ever contemptible in morals, manners, and 
 understanding, was a dangerous enemy. His 
 rank, his wealth, his unrivalled parliamentary 
 interest, would alone have made him impor- 
 tant. But this was not all. The Whig ai’isto- 
 cracy regarded him as their leader. His long 
 possession of power had given him a kind 
 of prescriptive right to possess it still. The 
 House of Commons had been elected when 
 he was at the head of affairs. The members 
 for the ministerial boroughs had all been 
 nominated by him. The public offices 
 swarmed with his creatures. 
 
 Pitt desired power ; and he desired it, 
 we really believe, from high and generous 
 motives. He was, in the strict sense of the 
 word, a patriot. He had none of that phil- 
 anthropy which the great French writers of 
 his time preached to all the nations of 
 Europe. He loved England as an Athenian 
 loved the City of the Yiolet Crown, as a 
 Roman loved the City of the Seven Hills. 
 
78 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 He saw his country insulted and defeated. 
 He saw the national spirit sinking. Yet he 
 knew what the resources of the empire, 
 vigorously employed, could effect ; and he 
 felt that he was the man to employ them 
 vigorously. ‘My Lord,’ he said to the Duke 
 of Devonshire, ‘ I am sure that I can save 
 this country, and that nobody else can.’ 
 
 Desiring, then, to be in power, and feeling 
 that his abilities and the public confidence 
 were not alone sufficient to keep him in 
 power against the wishes of the Court and 
 of the aristocracy, he began to think of a 
 coalition with Newcastle. 
 
 Newcastle was equally disposed to a re- 
 conciliation. He, too, had profited by his 
 recent experience.. He had found that the 
 Court and the aristocracy, though powerful, 
 were not everything in the state. A strong 
 oligarchical connection, a great borough in- 
 terest, ample patronage, and secret - service 
 money, might, in quiet times, be all that a 
 Minister needed ; but it was unsafe to trust 
 wholly to such support in time of war, of 
 discontent, and of agitation. The composi- 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 79 
 
 tion of the House of Commons was not 
 wholly aristocratical ; and, whatever be the 
 composition of large deliberative assemblies, 
 their spirit is always in some degree popular. 
 Where there are free debates, eloquence 
 must have admirers, and reason must make 
 converts. Where there is a free press, the 
 governors must live in constant awe of the 
 opinions of the governed. 
 
 Thus these two men, so unlike in char- 
 acter, so lately mortal enemies, were neces- 
 sary to each other. Newcastle had fallen in 
 November, for want of that public confidence 
 which Pitt possessed, and of that parlia- 
 mentary support which Pitt was better quali- 
 fied than any man of his time to give. Pitt 
 had fallen in April, for want of that species 
 of influence which Newcastle had passed his 
 whole life in acquiring and hoarding. Neither 
 of them had power enough to support him- 
 self. Each of them had power enough to 
 overturn the other. Their union would be 
 irresistible. Neither the King nor any party 
 in the state would be able to stand against 
 them. 
 
80 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 Under these circumstances, Pitt was not 
 disposed to proceed to extremities against 
 his predecessors in office. Something, how- 
 ever, was due to consistency ; and something 
 was necessary for the preservation of his 
 popularity. He did little ; but that little 
 he did in such manner as to produce great 
 effect. He came down to the House in all 
 the pomp of gout, his legs swathed in flannels, 
 his arm dangling in a sling. He kept his 
 seat through several fatiguing days, in spite 
 of pain and languor. He uttered a few 
 sharp and vehement sentences ; but during 
 the greater part of the discussion, his language 
 was unusually gentle. 
 
 When the inquiry had terminated without 
 a vote either of approbation or of censure, 
 the great obstacle to a coalition was removed. 
 Many obstacles, however, remained. The 
 King was still rejoicing in his deliverance 
 from the proud and aspiring Minister who 
 had been forced on him by the cry of the 
 nation. His Majesty’s indignation was excited 
 to the highest point when it appeared that 
 Newcastle, who had, during thirty years, been 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 81 
 
 loaded with marks of royal favour, and who 
 had bound himself, by a solemn promise, 
 never to coalesce with Pitt, was meditating 
 a new perfidy. Of all the statesmen of that 
 age, Fox had the largest share of royal 
 favour. A coalition between Fox and New- 
 castle was the arrangement which the King 
 wished to bring about. But the Duke was 
 too cunning to fall into such a snare. As 
 a speaker in Parliament, Fox might perhaps 
 be, on the whole, as useful to an administra- 
 tion as his great rival ; but he was one of 
 the most unpopular men in England. Then, 
 again, Newcastle felt all that jealousy of Fox, 
 which, according to the proverb, generally 
 exists between two of a trade. Fox would 
 certainly intermeddle with that depart- 
 ment which the Duke was most desirous 
 to reserve entire to himself, the jobbing 
 department. Pitt, on the other hand, was 
 quite willing to leave the drudgery of cor- 
 ruption to any who might be inclined to 
 undertake it. 
 
 During eleven weeks England remained 
 without a ministry ; and in the meantime 
 
82 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 Parliament was sitting, and a war was raging. 
 The prejudices of the King, the haughtiness 
 of Pitt, the jealousy, levity, and treachery 
 of Newcastle, delayed the settlement. Pitt 
 knew the Duke too well to trust him without 
 security. The Duke loved power too much 
 to be inclined to give security. While they 
 were haggling, the King was in vain attempt- 
 ing to produce a final rupture between them, 
 or to form a Government without them. At 
 one time he applied to Lord Waldegrave, 
 an honest and sensible man, but unprac- 
 tised in affairs. Lord Waldegrave had the 
 courage to accept the Treasury, but soon 
 found that no administration formed by him 
 had the smallest chance of standing a single 
 week. 
 
 At length the King’s pertinacity yielded 
 to the necessity of the case. After exclaim- 
 ing with great bitterness, and with some 
 justice, against the Whigs, who ought, he 
 said, to be ashamed to talk about liberty 
 while they submitted to be the footmen of 
 the Duke of Newcastle, his Majesty submitted. 
 The influence of Leicester House prevailed 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 83 
 
 on Pitt to abate a little, and but a little, of 
 his high demands ; and all at once, out of 
 the chaos in which parties had for some time 
 been rising, falling, meeting, separating, arose 
 a government as strong at home as that of 
 Pelham, as successful abroad as that of 
 Godolphin. 
 
 Newcastle took the Treasury. Pitt was 
 Secretary of State, with the lead in the 
 House of Commons, and with the supreme 
 direction of the war and of foreign affairs. 
 Fox, the only man who could have given 
 much annoyance to the new Government, 
 was silenced by the office of Paymaster, 
 which, during the continuance of that war, 
 was probably the most lucrative place in 
 the whole Government. He was poor, and 
 the situation was tempting ; yet it cannot 
 but seem extraordinary that a man who had 
 played a first part in politics, and whose 
 abilities had been found not unequal to that 
 part, who had sat in the Cabinet, who had 
 led the House of Commons, who had been 
 twice entrusted by the King with the office 
 of forming a ministry, who was regarded as 
 
84 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 the rival of Pitt, and who at one time 
 seemed likely to be a successful rival, should 
 have consented, for the sake of emolument, 
 to take a subordinate place, and to give 
 silent votes for all the measures of a govern- 
 ment to the deliberations of which he was 
 not summoned. 
 
 The first acts of the new administration 
 were characterised rather by vigour than by 
 judgment. Expeditions were sent against 
 different parts of the French coast with little 
 success. The small island of Aix was taken, 
 Rochefort threatened, a few ships burned in 
 the harbour of St Maloes, and a few guns 
 and mortars brought home as trophies from 
 the fortifications of Cherbourg. But soon 
 conquests of a very different kind filled the 
 kingdom with pride and rejoicing. A suc- 
 cession of victories undoubtedly brilliant, 
 and, as it was thought, not barren, raised to 
 the highest point the fame of the minister 
 to whom the conduct of the war had been 
 entrusted. In July, 1758, Louisburg fell. 
 The whole island of Cape Bx-eton was 
 induced. The fleet to which the Court 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 85 
 
 of Versailles had confided the defence of 
 French America was destroyed. The cap- 
 tured standards were borne in triumph 
 from Kensington Palace to the city, and 
 were suspended in St Paul’s Church, amidst 
 the roar of guns and kettle-drums, and the 
 shouts of an immense multitude. Addresses 
 of congratulation came in from all the 
 great towns of England. Parliament met 
 only to decree thanks and monuments, 
 and to bestow, without one murmur, sup- 
 plies more than double of those which had 
 been given during the war of the Grand 
 Alliance. 
 
 The year 1759 opened with the conquest 
 of Goree. Next fell Guadaloupe ; then Ticon- 
 deroga; then Niagara. The Toulon squadron 
 was completely defeated by Boscawen off” 
 Cape Lagos. But the greatest exploit of 
 the year was the achievement of Wolfe on 
 the heights of Abraham. The news of his 
 glorious death and of the fall of Quebec 
 reached London in the very week in which 
 the Houses met. All was joy and triumph. 
 Envy and faction were forced to join in the 
 
86 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 general applause. Whigs and Tories vied 
 with each other in extolling the genius and 
 energy of Pitt. His colleagues were never 
 talked of or thought of. The House of 
 Commons, the nation, the colonies, our 
 allies, our enemies, had their eyes fixed on 
 him alone. 
 
 Scarcely had Parliament voted a monu- 
 ment to Wolfe, when another great event 
 called for fresh rejoicings. The Brest fleet, 
 under the command of Conflans, had put 
 out to sea. It was overtaken by an English 
 squadron under Hawke. Conflans attempted 
 to take shelter close under the French coast. 
 The shore was rocky ; the night was black : 
 the wind was furious : the waves of the Bay 
 of Biscay ran high. But Pitt had infused 
 into every branch of the service a spirit 
 which had long been unknown. No British 
 seaman was disposed to err on the same 
 side with Byng. The pilot told Hawke that 
 the attack could not be made without the 
 greatest danger. ‘You have done your duty 
 in remonstrating,’ answered Hawke ; ‘ I will 
 answer for everything. I command you 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 87 
 
 to lay me alongside the French admiral.’ 
 Two French ships of the line struck. Four 
 were destroyed. The rest hid themselves in 
 the rivers of Brittany. 
 
 The year 1760 came ; and still triumph 
 followed triumph. Montreal was taken ; the 
 whole province of Canada was subjugated ; 
 the French fleets underwent a succession 
 of disasters in the seas of Europe and 
 America. 
 
 In the meantime conquests equalling in 
 rapidity, and far surpassing in magnitude, 
 those of Cortes and Pizarro, had been 
 achieved in the East. In the space of 
 three years the English had founded a 
 mighty empire. The French had been 
 defeated in every part of India. Chander- 
 nagore had surrendered to Clive, Pondi- 
 cherry to Coote. Throughout Bengal, Bahar, 
 Orissa, and the Carnatic, the authority of 
 the East India Company was more absolute 
 than that of Acbar or Aurungzebe had ever 
 been. 
 
 On the continent of Europe the odds 
 were against England. We had but one 
 
88 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 important ally, the King of Prussia ; and 
 he was attacked, not only by France, but 
 also by Russia and Austria. Yet even on 
 the Continent the energy of Pitt triumphed 
 over all difficulties. Vehemently as he 
 had condemned the practice of subsidising 
 foreign princes, he now carried that practice 
 farther than Carteret himself would have 
 ventured to do. The active and able Sove- 
 reign of Prussia received such pecuniary 
 assistance as enabled him to maintain the 
 conflict on equal terms against his powerful 
 enemies. On no subject had Pitt ever 
 spoken with so much eloquence and ardour 
 as on the mischiefs of the Hanoverian con- 
 nection. He now declared, not without 
 much show of reason, that it would be 
 unworthy of the English people to suffer 
 their King to be deprived of his electoral 
 dominions in an English quarrel. He 
 assured his countrymen that they should 
 be no losers, and that he would conquer 
 America for them in Germany. By taking 
 this line he conciliated the King, and lost 
 no part of his influence with the nation. 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 89 
 
 In Parliament, such was the ascendency 
 which his eloquence, his success, his high 
 situation, his pride, and his intrepidity had 
 obtained for him, that he took liberties 
 with the House of which there had been 
 no example, and which have never since 
 been imitated. No orator could there ven- 
 ture to reproach him with inconsistency. 
 One unfortunate man made the attempt, 
 and was so much disconcerted by the scorn- 
 ful demeanour of the Minister that he stam- 
 mered, stopped, and sat down. Even the 
 old Tory country gentlemen, to whom the 
 very name of Hanover had been odious, 
 gave their hearty Ayes to subsidy after 
 subsidy. In a lively contemporary satire, 
 much more lively indeed than delicate, this 
 remarkable conversation is not unhappily 
 described. 
 
 ‘ No more they make a fiddle-faddle 
 About a Hessian horse or saddle. 
 
 No more of continental measures; 
 
 No more of wasting British treasures. 
 
 Ten millions, and a vote of credit, 
 
 ’Tis right. He can’t be wrong who did it.’ 
 
90 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 The success of Pitt’s continental measures 
 was such as might have been expected from 
 their vigour. When he came into power, 
 Hanover was in imminent danger ; and 
 before lie had been in office three months, 
 the whole electorate was in the hands of 
 France. But the face of affairs was speedily 
 changed. The invaders were driven out. 
 An army, partly English, partly Hanoverian, 
 partly composed of soldiers furnished by 
 the petty princes of Germany, was placed 
 under the command of Prince Ferdinand 
 of Brunswick. The French were beaten in 
 1758 at Crevelt. In 1759 they received a 
 still more complete and humiliating defeat 
 at Minden. 
 
 In the meantime, the nation exhibited 
 all the signs of wealth and prosperity. The 
 merchants of London had never been more 
 thriving. The importance of several great 
 commercial and manufacturing towns, of 
 Glasgow in particular, dates from this 
 period. The fine inscription on the monu- 
 ment of Lord Chatham in Guildhall re- 
 cords the general opinion of the citizens of 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 91 
 
 London, that under his administration com- 
 merce had ‘been united with and made to 
 flourish by war.’ 
 
 It must he owned that these signs of 
 prosperity were in some degree delusive. 
 It must be owned that some of our con- 
 quests were rather splendid than useful. It 
 must he owned that the expense of the 
 war never entered into Pitt’s consideration. 
 Perhaps it would be more correct to say 
 that the cost of his victories increased the 
 pleasure with which he contemplated them. 
 Unlike other men in his situation, he loved 
 to exaggerate the sums which the nation 
 was laying out under his direction. He was 
 proud of the sacrifices and efforts which his 
 eloquence and his success had induced his 
 countrymen to make. The price at which 
 he purchased faithful service and complete 
 victory, though far smaller than that which 
 his son, the most profuse and incapable of 
 war ministers, paid for treachery, defeat, and 
 shame, was long and severely felt by the 
 nation. 
 
 Even as a war minister, Pitt is scarcely 
 
92 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 entitled to all the praise which his contem- 
 poraries lavished on him. We, perhaps 
 from ignorance, cannot discern in his ar- 
 rangements any appearance of profound or 
 dexterous combination. Several of his ex- 
 peditions, particularly those which were sent 
 to the coast of France, were at once costly 
 and absurd. Our Indian conquests, though 
 they add to the splendour of the period 
 during which he was at the head of affairs, 
 were not planned by him. He had un- 
 doubtedly great energy, great determination, 
 great means at his command. His temper 
 was enterprising ; and, situated as he was, 
 he had only to follow his temper. The 
 wealth of a rich nation, the valour of a 
 brave nation, were ready to support him in 
 every attempt. 
 
 In one respect, however, he deserved all 
 the praise that he has ever received. The 
 success of our arms was perhaps owing less 
 to the skill of his dispositions than to the 
 national resources and the national spirit. 
 But that the national spirit x’ose to the 
 emergency, that the national resources were 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 93 
 
 contributed with unexampled cheerfulness, 
 this was undoubtedly his work. The ardour 
 of his soul had set the whole kingdom on fire. 
 It inflamed every soldier who dragged the 
 cannon up the heights of Quebec, and every 
 sailor who boarded the French ships among 
 the rocks of Brittany. The Minister, before 
 he had been long in office, had imparted to 
 the commanders whom he employed his own 
 impetuous, adventurous, and defying char- 
 acter. They, like him, were disposed to risk 
 everything, to play double or quits to the 
 last, to think nothing done while anything 
 remained undone, to fail rather than not to 
 attempt. For the errors of rashness there 
 might be indulgence. For over-caution, for 
 faults like those of Lord George Sackville, 
 there was no mercy. In other times, and 
 against other enemies, this mode of warfare 
 might have failed. But the state of the 
 French government and of the French nation 
 gave every advantage to Pitt. The fops and 
 intriguers of Versailles were appalled and 
 bewildered by his vigour. A panic spread 
 through all ranks of society. Our enemies 
 
94 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 soon considered it as a settled tiling that 
 they were always to be beaten. Thus victory 
 begot victory ; till, at last, wherever the forces 
 of the two nations met, they met with dis- 
 dainful confidence on one side, and with a 
 craven fear on the other. 
 
 The situation which Pitt occupied at the 
 close of the reign of George the Second was 
 the most enviable ever occupied by any 
 public man in English history. He had con- 
 ciliated the King; he domineered over the 
 House of Commons ; he was adored by the 
 people ; he was admired by all Europe. He 
 was the first Englishman of his time ; and 
 he had made England the first country in 
 the world. The Great Commoner, the name 
 by which he was often designated, might 
 look down with scorn on coronets and garters. 
 The nation was drunk with joy and pride. 
 The Parliament was as quiet as it had been 
 under Pelham. The old party distinctions 
 were almost effaced ; nor was their place 
 yet supplied by distinctions of a still more 
 important kind. A new generation of country 
 squires and rectors had arisen who knew not 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 95 
 
 the Stuarts. The Dissenters were tolerated ; 
 the Catholics not cruelly persecuted. The 
 Church was drowsy and indulgent. The 
 great civil and religious conflict which began 
 at the Reformation seemed to have ter- 
 minated in universal repose. Whigs and 
 Tories, Churchmen and Puritans, spoke with 
 equal reverence of the constitution, and with 
 equal enthusiasm of the talents, virtues, and 
 services of the Minister. 
 
 A few years sufficed to change the whole 
 aspect of affairs. A nation convulsed by 
 faction, a throne assailed by the fiercest 
 invective, a House of Commons hated and 
 despised by the nation, England set against 
 Scotland, Britain set against America, a rival 
 legislature sitting beyond the Atlantic, English 
 blood shed by English bayonets, our armies 
 capitulating, our conquests wrested from us, 
 our enemies hastening to take vengeance for 
 past humiliation, our flag scarcely able to 
 maintain itself in our own seas, such was 
 the spectacle which Pitt lived to see. But 
 the history of this great revolution requires 
 far more space than we can at present 
 
96 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 bestow. We leave the Great Commoner in 
 the zenith of his glory. It is not impossible 
 that we may take some other opportunity of 
 tracing his life to its melancholy, yet not 
 inglorious close. 
 
 More than ten years ago we commenced 
 a sketch of the political life of the great 
 Lord Chatham. We then stopped at the 
 death of George the Second, with the 
 intention of speedily resuming our task. 
 Circumstances, which it would be tedious to 
 explain, long prevented us from carrying this 
 intention into effect. Nor can we regret 
 the delay. For the materials which were 
 within our reach in 1834 were scanty and 
 unsatisfactory when compared with those 
 which we at present possess. Even now, 
 though we have had access to some valu- 
 able sources of information which have not 
 yet been opened to the public, we cannot 
 but feel that the history of the first ten 
 years of the reign of Geoi’ge the Third is 
 but imperfectly known to us. Nevertheless, 
 we are inclined to think that we are in 
 a condition to lay before our readers a 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 97 
 
 narrative neither uninstructive nor uninter- 
 esting. We therefore return with pleasure 
 to our long interrupted labour. 
 
 We left Pitt in the zenith of prosperity 
 and glory, the idol of England, the terror of 
 France, the admiration of the whole civilised 
 world. The wind, from whatever quarter it 
 blew, carried to England tidings of battles 
 won, fortresses taken, provinces added to the 
 empire. At home, factions had sunk into a 
 lethargy, such as had never been known since 
 the great religious schism of the sixteenth 
 century had roused the public mind from 
 repose. 
 
 In order that the events which we have 
 to relate may be clearly understood, it may 
 be desirable that we should advert to the 
 causes which had for a time suspended 
 the animation of both the great English 
 parties. 
 
 If, rejecting all that is merely accidental, 
 we look at the essential characteristics of 
 the Whig and the Tory, we may consider 
 each of them as the representative of a 
 great principle, essential to the welfare of 
 
 G 
 
98 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 nations. One is, in an especial manner, the 
 guardian of liberty, and the other of order. 
 One is the moving power, and the other the 
 steadying power of the state. One is the 
 sail, without which society would make no 
 progress ; the other the ballast, without 
 which there would be small safety in a 
 tempest. But, during the forty-six years 
 which followed the accession of the House 
 of Hanover, these distinctive peculiarities 
 seemed to be effaced. The Whig conceived 
 that he could not better serve the cause of 
 civil and religious freedom than by strenu- 
 ously supporting the Protestant dynasty. 
 The Tory conceived that he could not better 
 prove his hatred of revolutions than by 
 attacking a government to which a revolu- 
 tion had given birth. Both came by degrees 
 to attach more importance to the means 
 than to the end. Both were thrown into 
 unnatural situations ; and both, like animals 
 transported to an uncongenial climate, lan- 
 guished and degenerated. The Tory, re- 
 moved from the sunshine of the court, was 
 as a camel in the snows of Lapland. The 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 99 
 
 Whig, basking in the rays of royal favour, 
 was as a reindeer in the sands of Arabia. 
 
 Dante tells us that he saw, in Malebolge, 
 a strange encounter between a human form 
 and a serpent. The enemies, after cruel 
 wounds indicted, stood for a time glaring 
 on each other. A great cloud surrounded 
 them, and then a wonderful metamorphosis 
 began. Each creature was transfigured into 
 the likeness of its antagonist. The serpent’s 
 tail divided itself into two legs ; the man’s 
 legs intertwined themselves into a tail. The 
 body of the serpent put forth arms ; the 
 arms of the man shrank into his body. At 
 length the serpent stood up a man, and 
 spake ; the man sank down a serpent, and 
 glided hissing away. Something like this 
 was the transformation which, during the 
 reign of George the First, befell the two 
 English parties. Each gradually took the 
 shape and colour of its foe, till at length 
 the Tory rose up erect the zealot of free- 
 dom, and the Whig crawled and licked the 
 dust at the feet of power. 
 
 It is true that, when these degenerate 
 
100 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 politicians discussed questions merely specu- 
 lative, and, above all, when they discussed 
 questions relating to the conduct of their 
 own grandfathers, they still seemed to differ 
 as their grandfathers had differed. The 
 Whig, who, during three Parliaments, had 
 never given one vote against the court, and 
 who was ready to sell his soul for the 
 Comptroller’s staff or for the Great Ward- 
 robe, still professed to draw his political 
 doctrines from Locke and Milton, still wor- 
 shipped the memory of Pym and Hampden, 
 and would still, on the thirtieth of January, 
 take his glass, first to the man in the mask, 
 and then to the man who would do it 
 without a mask. The Tory, on the other 
 hand, while he reviled the mild and tem- 
 perate Walpole as a deadly enemy of liberty, 
 could see nothing to reprobate in the iron 
 tyranny of Strafford and Laud. But, what- 
 ever judgment the Whig or the Tory of 
 that age might pronounce on transactions 
 long past, there can be no doubt that, as 
 respected the practical questions then pend- 
 ing, the Tory was a reformer, and indeed an 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 101 
 
 intemperate and indiscreet reformer, while 
 the Whig was conservative even to bigotry. 
 We have ourselves seen similar effects pro- 
 duced in a neighbouring country by similar 
 causes. Who would have believed, fifteen 
 years ago, that M. Guizot and M. Ville- 
 main would have to defend property and 
 social order against the attacks of such 
 enemies as M. Genoude and M. de La 
 Roche Jaquelin ? 
 
 Thus the successors of the old Cavaliers 
 had turned demagogues ; the successors of 
 the old Roundheads had turned courtiers. 
 Yet was it long before their mutual animo- 
 sity began to abate ; for it is the nature of 
 parties to retain their original enmities far 
 more firmly than their original principles. 
 During many years, a generation of Whigs, 
 whom Sidney would have spurned as slaves, 
 continued to wage deadly war with a genera- 
 tion of Tories whom Jeffreys would have 
 hanged for republicans. 
 
 Through the whole reign of George the 
 First, and through nearly half of the reign 
 of George the Second, a Tory was regarded 
 
102 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 as an enemy of the reigning house, and was 
 excluded from all the favours of the crown. 
 Though most of the country gentlemen were 
 Tories, none but Whigs were created peers 
 and baronets. Though most of the clergy 
 were Tories, none but Whigs were appointed 
 deans and bishops. In every county, opulent 
 and well descended Tory squires complained 
 that their names were left out of the com- 
 mission of the peace, while men of small 
 estate and mean birth, who were for tolera- 
 tion and excise, septennial parliaments and 
 standing armies, presided at quarter sessions, 
 and became deputy lieutenants. 
 
 By degrees some approaches were made 
 towards a reconciliation. While Walpole 
 was at the head of affairs, enmity to his 
 power induced a large and powerful body 
 of Whigs, headed by the heir apparent of 
 the throne, to make an alliance with the 
 Tories, and a truce even with the Jacobites. 
 After Sir Robert’s fall, the ban which lay on 
 the Tory party was taken off. The chief places 
 in the administration continued to be filled 
 by Whigs, and, indeed, could scarcely have 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 103 
 
 been filled otherwise ; for the Tory nobility 
 and gentry, though strong in numbers and 
 in property, had among them scarcely a 
 single man distinguished by talents, either 
 for business or for debate. A few of them, 
 however, were admitted to subordinate 
 offices ; and this indulgence produced a 
 softening effect on the temper of the whole 
 body. The first levee of George the Second 
 after Walpole’s resignation was a remarkable 
 spectacle. Mingled with the constant sup- 
 porters of the House of Brunswick, with the 
 Bussells, the Cavendishes, and the Pelhams, 
 appeared a crowd of faces utterly unknown 
 to the pages and gentlemen ushers, lords 
 of rural manors, whose ale and foxhounds 
 were renowned in the neighbourhood of the 
 Mendip hills, or round the Wrekin, but who 
 had never crossed the threshold of the 
 palace since the days when Oxford, with 
 the white staff' in his hand, stood behind 
 Queen Anne. 
 
 During the eighteen years which followed 
 this day, both factions were gradually sinking 
 deeper and deeper into repose. The apathy 
 
104 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 of the public mind is partly to be ascribed 
 to the unjust violence with which the ad- 
 ministration of Walpole had been assailed. 
 In the body politic, as in the natural body, 
 morbid languor generally succeeds morbid 
 excitement. The people had been mad- 
 dened by sophistry, by calumny, by rhetoric, 
 by stimulants applied to the national pride. 
 In the fulness of bread, they had raved as 
 if famine had been in the land. While 
 enjoying such a measure of civil and religious 
 freedom as, till then, no great society had 
 ever known, they had cried out for a Timoleon 
 or a Brutus to stab their oppressor to the 
 heart. They were in this frame of mind 
 when the change of administration took 
 place ; and they soon found that there was 
 to be no change whatever in the system of 
 government. The natural consequences fol- 
 lowed. To frantic zeal succeeded sullen 
 indifference. The cant of patriotism had not 
 merely ceased to charm the public ear, but 
 had become as nauseous as the cant of 
 Puritanism after the downfall of the Rump. 
 The hot fit was over, the cold fit had begun : 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 105 
 
 and it was long before seditious arts, or 
 even real grievances, could bring back the 
 fiery paroxysm which had run its course and 
 reached its termination. 
 
 Two attempts were made to disturb this 
 tranquillity. The banished heir of the House 
 of Stuart headed a rebellion ; the discon- 
 tented heir of the House of Brunswick headed 
 an opposition. Both the rebellion and the 
 opposition came to nothing. The battle of 
 Culloden annihilated the Jacobite party. 
 The death of Prince Frederic dissolved the 
 faction which, under his guidance, had feebly 
 striven to annoy his father’s government. 
 His chief followei’s hastened to make their 
 peace with the ministry ; and the political 
 torpor became complete. 
 
 Five years after the death of Prince 
 Frederic, the public mind was for a time 
 violently excited. But this excitement had 
 nothing to do with the old disputes between 
 Whigs and Tories. England was at war with 
 France. The war had been feebly con- 
 ducted. Minorca had been torn from us. 
 Our fleet had retired before the white flag 
 
100 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 of the House of Bourbon. A bitter sense 
 of humiliation, new to the proudest and 
 bravest of nations, superseded every other 
 feeling. The cry of all the counties and 
 great towns of the realm was for a govern- 
 ment which would retrieve the honour of 
 the English arms. The two most powerful 
 men in the country were the Duke of 
 Newcastle and Pitt. Alternate victories and 
 defeats had made them sensible that neither 
 of them could stand alone. The interest of 
 the state, and the interest of their own am- 
 bition, impelled them to coalesce. By their 
 coalition was formed the ministry which was 
 in power when George the Third ascended 
 the throne. 
 
 The more carefully the structure of this 
 celebrated ministry is examined, the more 
 shall we see reason to marvel at the skill 
 or the luck which had combined in one 
 harmonious whole such various and, as it 
 seemed, incompatible elements of force. The 
 influence which is derived from stainless in- 
 tegrity, the influence which is derived from 
 the vilest arts of corruption, the strength 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 107 
 
 of aristocratical connection, the strength of 
 democratical enthusiasm, all these things 
 were for the first time found together. 
 Newcastle brought to the coalition a vast 
 mass of power, which had descended to him 
 from Walpole and Pelham. The public 
 offices, the church, the courts of law, the 
 army, the navy, the diplomatic service, 
 swarmed with his creatures. The boroughs, 
 which long afterwards made up the memor- 
 able schedules A and B, were represented 
 by his nominees. The great Whig families, 
 which, during several generations, had been 
 trained in the discipline of party warfare, 
 and were accustomed to stand together 
 in a firm phalanx, acknowledged him as 
 their captain. Pitt, on the other hand, 
 had what Newcastle wanted, an eloquence 
 which stirred the passions and charmed the 
 imagination, a high reputation for purity, 
 and the confidence and ardent love of 
 millions. 
 
 The partition which the two ministers 
 made of the powers of government was 
 singularly happy. Each occupied a province 
 
108 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 for which he was well qualified ; and neither 
 had any inclination to intrude himself into 
 the province of the other. Newcastle took 
 the treasury, the civil and ecclesiastical 
 patronage, and the disposal of that part of 
 the secret service money which was then 
 employed in bribing members of Parliament. 
 Pitt was Secretary of State, with the direction 
 of the war and of foreign affairs. Thus the 
 filth of all the noisome and pestilential 
 sewers of government was poured into one 
 channel. Through the other passed only 
 what was bright and stainless. Mean and 
 selfish politicians, pining for commissioner- 
 ships, gold sticks, and ribands, flocked to 
 the great house at the corner of Lincoln’s 
 Inn Fields. There, at every levee, appeared 
 eighteen or twenty pair of lawn sleeves ; for 
 there was not, it was said, a single Prelate 
 who had not owed either his first elevation 
 or some subsequent translation to Newcastle. 
 There appeared those members of the House 
 of Commons in whose silent votes the main 
 strength of the government lay. One wanted 
 a place in the excise for his butler. Another 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 109 
 
 came about a prebend for bis son. A third 
 whispered that he had always stood by his 
 Grace and the Protestant succession ; that 
 his last election had been very expensive ; 
 that potwallopers had now no conscience ; 
 that he had been forced to take up money 
 on mortgage ; and that he hardly knew 
 where to turn for five hundred pounds. 
 The Duke pressed all their hands, passed 
 his arms round all their shoulders, patted 
 all their backs, and sent away some with 
 wages, and some with promises. From this 
 traffic Pitt stood haughtily aloof. Not only 
 was he himself incorruptible, but he shrank 
 from the loathsome drudgery of corrupting 
 others. He had not, however, been twenty 
 years in Parliament, and ten in office, with- 
 out discovering how the government was 
 carried on. He was perfectly aware that 
 bribery was practised on a large scale by 
 his colleagues. Hating the practice, yet de- 
 spairing of putting it down, and doubting 
 whether, in those times, any ministry could 
 stand without it, he determined to be blind 
 to it. He would see nothing, know nothing, 
 
110 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 believe nothing. People who came to talk 
 to him about shares in lucrative contracts, 
 or about the means of securing a Cornish 
 corporation, were soon put out of counten- 
 ance by his arrogant humility. They did 
 him too much honour. Such matters were 
 beyond his capacity. It was true that his 
 poor advice about expeditions and treaties 
 was listened to with indulgence by a gracious 
 sovereign. If the question were, who should 
 command in North America, or who should 
 be ambassador at Berlin, his colleagues would 
 probably condescend to take his opinion. 
 But he had not the smallest influence with 
 the Secretary of the Treasury, and could not 
 venture to ask even for a tide-waiter’s place. 
 
 It may be doubted whether he did not 
 owe as much of his popularity to his osten- 
 tatious purity as to his eloquence, or to his 
 talents for the administration of war. It 
 was everywhere said with delight and ad- 
 miration that the great Commoner, without 
 any advantages of birth or fortune, had, in 
 spite of the dislike of the Court and of the 
 aristocracy, made himself the first man in 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 111 
 
 England, and made England the first country 
 in the world ; that his name was mentioned 
 with awe in every palace from Lisbon to 
 Moscow ; that his trophies were in all the 
 four quarters of the globe ; yet that he was 
 still plain William Pitt, without title or 
 riband, without pension or sinecure place. 
 Whenever he- should retire, after saving the 
 state, he must sell his coach horses and his 
 silver candlesticks. Widely as the taint of 
 corruption had spread, his hands were clean. 
 They had never received, they had never 
 given, the price of infamy. Thus the coali- 
 tion gathered to itself support from all the 
 high and all the low parts of human nature, 
 and was strong with the whole united strength 
 of virtue and of Mammon. 
 
 Pitt and Newcastle were co-ordinate chief 
 ministers. The subordinate places had been 
 filled on the principle of including in the 
 government every party and shade of party, 
 the avowed Jacobites alone excepted, nay, 
 every public man who, from his abilities or 
 from his situation, seemed likely to be either 
 useful in office or formidable in opposition. 
 
112 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 The Whigs, according to what was then 
 considered as their prescriptive right, held 
 by far the largest share of power. The main 
 support of the administration was what may 
 be called the great Whig connection, a con- 
 nection which, during near half a century, 
 had generally had the chief sway in the 
 country, and which derived an immense 
 authority from rank, wealth, borough in- 
 terest, and firm union. To this connection, 
 of which Newcastle was the head, belonged 
 the houses of Cavendish, Lennox, Fitzroy, 
 Bentinck, Manners, Conway, Wentworth, and 
 many others of high note. 
 
 There were two other powerful Whig con- 
 nections, either of which might have been a 
 nucleus for a strong opposition. But room 
 bad been found in the government for both. 
 They were known as the Grenvilles and the 
 Bedfords. 
 
 The head of the Grenvilles was Richard 
 Earl Temple. His talents for administration 
 and debate were of no high order. But his 
 great possessions, his turbulent and un- 
 scrupulous character, his restless activity, 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 113 
 
 and his skill in the most ignoble tactics of 
 faction, made him one of the most formid- 
 able enemies that a ministry could have. 
 He was keeper of the privy seal. His 
 brother George was treasurer of the navy. 
 They were supposed to be on terms of 
 close friendship with Pitt, who had married 
 their sister, and was the most uxorious of 
 husbands. 
 
 The Bedfords, or, as they were called by 
 their enemies, the Bloomsbury gang, pro- 
 fessed to be led by John Duke of Bedford, 
 but in truth led him wherever they chose, 
 and very often led him where he never 
 would have gone of his own accord. He 
 had many good qualities of head and heart, 
 and would have been certainly a respectable, 
 and possibly a distinguished man, if he had 
 been less under the influence of his friends, 
 or more fortunate in choosing them. Some 
 of them were indeed, to do them justice, 
 men of parts. But here, we are afraid, 
 eulogy must end. Sandwich and Rigby 
 were able debaters, pleasant boon com- 
 panions, dexterous intriguers, masters of all 
 
 H 
 
114 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 the arts of jobbing and electioneering, and 
 both in public and private life, shamelessly 
 immoral. Weymouth bad a natural elo- 
 quence, which sometimes astonished those 
 who knew how little he owed to study. But 
 he was indolent and dissolute, and had early 
 impaired a fine estate with the dice box, 
 and a fine constitution with the bottle. Tlie 
 wealth and power of the Duke, and the 
 talents and audacity of some of his retainers, 
 might have seriously annoyed the strongest 
 ministry. But his assistance had been 
 secured. He was Lord Lieutenant of Ire- 
 land ; Rigby was his secretary ; and the 
 whole party dutifully supported the measures 
 of the Government. 
 
 Two men had, a short time before, been 
 thought likely to contest with Pitt the lead 
 of the House of Commons, William Murray 
 and Henry Fox. But Murray had been 
 removed to the Lords, and was Chief J ustice 
 of the King’s Bench. Fox was indeed still 
 in the Commons : but means had been found 
 to secure, if not his strenuous support, at 
 least his silent acquiescence. He was a 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 115 
 
 poor man ; lie was a doting father. The 
 office of Paymaster - General during an ex- 
 pensive war was, in that age, perhaps the 
 most lucrative situation in the gift of the 
 government. This office was bestowed on 
 Fox. The prospect of making a noble for- 
 tune in a few years, and of providing amply 
 for his darling boy Charles, was irresistibly 
 tempting. To hold a subordinate place, how- 
 ever profitable, after having led the House 
 of Commons, and having been intrusted with 
 the business of forming a ministry, was in- 
 deed a great descent. But a punctilious 
 sense of personal dignity was no part of the 
 character of Henry Fox. 
 
 We have not time to enumerate all the 
 other men of weight who were, by some tie 
 or other, attached to the government. We 
 may mention Hardwicke, reputed the first 
 lawyer of the age ; Legge, reputed the first 
 financier of the age ; the acute and ready 
 Oswald; the bold and humorous Nugent; 
 Charles Townshend, the most brilliant and 
 versatile of mankind ; Elliot, Barrington, 
 North, Pratt. Indeed, as far as we recol- 
 
116 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 lect, there were in the whole House of 
 Commons only two men of distinguished 
 abilities who were not connected with the 
 government ; and those two men stood so 
 low in public estimation, that the only ser- 
 vice which they could have rendered to any 
 government would have been to oppose it. 
 We speak of Lord George Sackville and 
 Bubb Dodington. 
 
 Though most of the official men, and all 
 the members of the cabinet, were reputed 
 Whigs, the Tories were by no means ex- 
 cluded from employment. Pitt had gratified 
 many of them with commands in the militia, 
 which increased both their income and their 
 importance in their own counties ; and they 
 were therefore in better humour than at 
 any time since the death of Anne. Some 
 of the party still continued to grumble over 
 their punch at the Cocoa Tree ; but in the 
 House of Commons not a single one of the 
 malcontents durst lift his eyes above the 
 buckle of Pitt’s shoe. 
 
 Thus there was absolutely no opposition. 
 Nay, there was no sign from which it could 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 117 
 
 be guessed in what quarter opposition was 
 likely to arise. Several years passed during 
 which Parliament seemed to have abdicated 
 its chief functions. The Journals of the 
 House of Commons, during four sessions, 
 contain no trace of a division on a party 
 question. The supplies, though beyond pre- 
 cedent great, were voted without discussion. 
 The most animated debates of that period 
 were on road bills and inclosure bills. 
 
 The old King was content; and it mat- 
 tered little whether he were content or not. 
 It would have been impossible for him to 
 emancipate himself from a ministry so power- 
 ful, even if he had been inclined to do so. 
 But he had no such inclination. He had 
 once, indeed, been strongly prejudiced against 
 Pitt, and had repeatedly been ill used by 
 Newcastle; but the vigour and success with 
 which the war had been waged in Germany, 
 and the smoothness with which all public 
 business was carried on, had produced a 
 favourable change in the royal mind. 
 
 Such was the posture of affairs when, on 
 the twenty-fifth of October, 1760, George the 
 

 118 MACAULAY 
 
 Second suddenly died, and George the Third, 
 then twenty -two years old, became King. 
 The situation of George the Third differed 
 widely from that of his grandfather and that 
 of his great-grandfather. Many years had 
 elapsed since a sovereign of England had 
 been an object of affection to any part of 
 his people. The first two Kings of the 
 House of Hanover had neither those heredi- 
 tary rights which have often supplied the 
 defect of merit, nor those personal cjualities 
 which have often supplied the defect of title. 
 A prince may be popular with little virtue 
 or capacity, if he reigns by birthright derived 
 from a long line of illustrious predecessors. 
 An usurper may be popular, if his genius 
 has saved or aggrandised the nation which 
 he governs. Perhaps no rulers have in our 
 time had a stronger hold on the affection 
 of subjects than the Emperor Francis, and 
 his son-in-law the Emperor Napoleon. But 
 imagine a ruler with no better title than 
 Napoleon, and no better understanding than 
 Francis. Richard Cromwell was such a 
 ruler ; and, as soon as an arm was lifted 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 119 
 
 up against him, he fell without a struggle, 
 amidst universal derision. George the First 
 and George the Second were in a situation 
 which bore some resemblance to that of 
 Richard Cromwell. They were saved from 
 the fate of Richard Cromwell by the strenuous 
 and able exertions of the Whig party, and 
 by the general conviction that the nation 
 had no choice but between the House of 
 Brunswick and popery. But by no class 
 were tbe Guelphs regarded with that devoted 
 affection, of which Charles the First, Charles 
 the Second, and James the Second, in spite 
 of the greatest faults, and in the midst of 
 the greatest misfortunes, received innumerable 
 proofs. Those Whigs who stood by the new 
 dynasty so manfully with purse and sword did 
 so on principles independent of, and indeed 
 almost incompatible with, the sentiment of de- 
 voted loyalty. The moderate Tories regarded 
 the foreign dynasty as a great evil, which must 
 be endured for fear of a greater evil. In the 
 eyes of the high Tories, the Elector was the 
 most hateful of robbers and tyrants. The 
 crown of another was on his head ; the blood 
 
120 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 of the brave and loyal was on his hands. Thus, 
 during many years the Kings of England were 
 objects of strong personal aversion to many of 
 their subjects, and of strong personal attach- 
 ment to none. They found, indeed, firm and 
 cordial support against the pretender to their 
 throne ; but this support was given, not at all 
 for their sake, but for the sake of a religious 
 and political system which would have been 
 endangered by their fall. This support, too, 
 they were compelled to purchase by perpetu- 
 ally sacrificing their private inclinations to 
 the party which had set them on the throne, 
 and which maintained them there. 
 
 At the close of the reign of George the 
 Second, the feeling of aversion with which 
 the House of Brunswick had long been re- 
 garded by half the nation had died away ; 
 but no feeling of affection to that house had 
 yet sprung up. There was little, indeed, in 
 the old King’s character to inspire esteem 
 or tenderness. He was not our countryman. 
 He never set foot on our soil till he was 
 more than thirty years old. His speech be- 
 wrayed his foreign origin and breeding. His 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 121 
 
 love for his native land, though the most 
 amiable part of his character, was not likely 
 to endear him to his British subjects. He 
 was never so happy as when he could ex- 
 change St James’s for Hernhausen. Year 
 after year, our fleets were employed to convoy 
 him to the Continent, and the interests of his 
 kingdom were as nothing to him when com- 
 pared with the interests of his Electorate. 
 As to the rest, he had neither the qualities 
 which make dulness respectable, nor the 
 qualities which make libertinism attractive. 
 He had been a bad son and a worse father, 
 an unfaithful husband and an ungraceful 
 lover. Not one magnanimous or humane 
 action is recorded of him ; but many in- 
 stances of meanness, and of a harshness 
 which, but for the strong constitutional re- 
 straints under which he was placed, might 
 have made the misery of his people. 
 
 He died ; and at once a new world opened. 
 The young King was a born Englishman. 
 All his tastes and habits, good or bad, were 
 English. No portion of his subjects had any 
 thing to reproach him with. Even the re- 
 
122 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 maining adherents of the House of Stuart 
 could scarcely impute to him the guilt of 
 usurpation. He was not responsible for the 
 Revolution, for the Act of Settlement, for 
 the suppression of the risings of 1715 and 
 of 1745. He was innocent of the blood of 
 Derwentwater and Kilmarnock, of Balmerino 
 and Cameron. Born fifty years after the old 
 line had been expelled, fourth in descent 
 and third in succession of the Hanoverian 
 dynasty, he might plead some show of heredi- 
 tary right. His age, his appearance, and all 
 that was known of his character, conciliated 
 public favour. He was in the bloom of 
 youth ; his person and address were pleas- 
 ing. Scandal imputed to him no vice ; and 
 flattery might, without any glaring absurdity, 
 ascribe to him many princely virtues. 
 
 It is not strange, therefore, that the senti- 
 ment of loyalty, a sentiment which had lately 
 seemed to be as much out of date as the 
 belief in witches or the practice of pilgrimage, 
 should, from the day of his accession, have 
 begun to revive. The Tories in particular, 
 who had always been inclined to King- 
 
 I 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 123 
 
 worship, and who had long felt with pain 
 the want of an idol before whom they conld 
 bow themselves down, were as joyful as the 
 priests of Apis, when, after a long interval, 
 they had found a new calf to adore. It was 
 soon clear that George the Third was re- 
 garded by a portion of the nation with a 
 very different feeling from that which his two 
 predecessors had inspired. They had been 
 merely First Magistrates, Doges, Stadtholders; 
 he was emphatically a King, the anointed of 
 heaven, the breath of his people’s nostrils. 
 The years of the widowhood and mourning 
 of the Tory party were over. Dido had 
 kept faith long enough to the cold ashes of 
 a former lord ; she had at last found a com- 
 forter, and recognised the vestiges of the 
 old flame. The golden days of Harley would 
 return. The Somersets, the Lees, and the 
 Wyndhams would again surround the throne. 
 The latitudinarian Prelates, who had not 
 been ashamed to correspond with Doddridge 
 and to shake hands with Whiston, would be 
 succeeded by divines of the temper of South 
 and Atterbury. The devotion which had 
 
124 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 been so signally shown to the House of 
 Stuart, which had been proof against defeats, 
 confiscations, and proscriptions, which perfidy, 
 oppression, ingratitude, could not weary out, 
 was now transferred entire to the House of 
 Brunswick. If George the Third would hut 
 accept the homage of the Cavaliers and 
 High Churchmen, he should he to them 
 all that Charles the First and Charles the 
 Second had been. 
 
 The Prince, whose accession was thus 
 hailed by a great party long estranged from 
 his house, had received from nature a strong 
 will, a firmness of temper to which a harsher 
 name might perhaps be given, and an under- 
 standing not, indeed, acute or enlarged, hut 
 such as qualified him to he a good man 
 of business. But his character had not yet 
 fully developed itself. He had been brought 
 up in strict seclusion. The detractors of the 
 Princess Dowager of Wales affirmed that she 
 had kept her children from commerce with 
 society, in order that she might hold an un- 
 divided empire over their minds. She gave 
 a very different explanation of her conduct. 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 125 
 
 She would gladly, she said, see her sons and 
 daughters mix in the world, if they could do 
 so without risk to their morals. But the 
 profligacy of the people of quality alarmed 
 her. The young men were all rakes ; the 
 young women made love, instead of waiting 
 till it was made to them. She could not 
 bear to expose those whom she loved best to 
 the contaminating influence of such society. 
 The moral advantages of the system of edu- 
 cation which formed the Duke of York, the 
 Duke of Cumberland, and the Queen of Den- 
 mark, may perhaps be questioned. George 
 the Third was indeed no libertine ; but he 
 brought to the throne a mind only half 
 opened, and was for some time entirely 
 under the influence of his mother and of 
 his Groom of the Stole, John Stuart, Earl 
 of Bute. 
 
 The Earl of Bute was scarcely known, 
 even by name, to the country which he was 
 soon to govern. He had indeed, a short 
 time after he came of age, been chosen to 
 fill a vacancy, which, in the middle of a 
 parliament, had taken place among the 
 
126 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 Scoteli representative peers. He had dis- 
 obliged the Whig ministers by giving some 
 silent votes with the Tories, had consequently 
 lost his seat at the next dissolution, and 
 had never been re-elected. Near twenty 
 years had elapsed since he had borne any 
 part in politics. He had passed some of 
 those years at his seat in one of the 
 Hebrides, and from that retirement he had 
 emerged as one of the household of Prince 
 Frederic. Lord Bute, excluded from public 
 life, had found out many ways of amusing 
 his leisure. He was a tolerable actor in 
 private theatricals, and was particularly suc- 
 cessful in the part of Lothario. A hand- 
 some leg, to which both painters and satirists 
 took care to give prominence, was among his 
 chief qualifications for the stage. He de- 
 vised quaint dresses for masquerades. He 
 dabbled in geometry, mechanics, and botany. 
 He paid some attention to antiquities and 
 works of art, and was considered in his own 
 circle as a judge of painting, architecture, 
 and poetry. It is said that his spelling was 
 incorrect. But though, in our time, incor- 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 127 
 
 rect spelling is justly considered as a proof 
 of sordid ignorance, it would be unjust to 
 apply the same rule to people who lived 
 a century ago. The novel of Sir Charles 
 Grandison was published about the time at 
 which Lord Bute made his appearance at 
 Leicester House. Our readers may per- 
 haps remember the account which Charlotte 
 Grandison gives of her two lovers. One of 
 them, a fashionable baronet who talks French 
 and Italian fluently, cannot write a line in 
 his own language without some sin against 
 orthography ; the other, who is represented 
 as a most respectable specimen of the young 
 aristocracy, and something of a virtuoso, is 
 described as spelling pretty well for a lord. 
 On the whole, the Earl of Bute might fairly 
 be called a man of cultivated mind. He was 
 also a man of undoubted honour. But his 
 understanding was narrow, and his manners 
 cold and haughty. His qualittcations for the 
 part of a statesman were best described by 
 Frederic, who often indulged in the unprincely 
 luxury of sneering at his dependents. ‘ Bute,’ 
 said his Royal Highness, ‘you are the very 
 
128 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 man to be envoy at some small proud Ger- 
 man court where there is nothing to do.’ 
 Scandal represented the Groom of the 
 Stole as the favoured lover of the Princess 
 Dowager. He was undoubtedly her con- 
 fidential friend. The influence which the 
 two united exercised over the mind of the 
 King was for a time unbounded. The Prin- 
 cess, a woman and a foreigner, was not 
 likely to be a judicious adviser about affairs 
 of state. The Earl could scarcely be said 
 to have served even a noviciate in poli- 
 tics. His notions of government had been 
 acquired in the society which had been in 
 the habit of assembling round Frederic at 
 Kew and Leicester House. That society 
 consisted principally of Tories, who had 
 been x'econciled to the House of Hanover 
 by the civility with w'hich the Prince had 
 treated them, and by the hope of obtaining 
 high preferment when he should come to 
 the throne. Their political creed was a 
 peculiar modification of Toryism. It was 
 the creed neither of the Tories of the seven- 
 teenth nor of the Tories of the nineteenth 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 129 
 
 century. It was the creed, not of Filmer 
 and Sacheverell, not of Perceval and Eldon, 
 but of the sect of which Bolingbroke may 
 be considered as the chief doctor. This 
 sect deserves commendation for having 
 pointed out and justly reprobated some 
 great abuses which sprang up during the 
 long domination of the Whigs. But it is 
 far easier to point out and reprobate abuses 
 than to propose beneficial reforms : and the 
 reforms which Bolingbroke proposed would 
 either have been utterly inefficient, or would 
 have produced much more mischief than 
 they would have removed. 
 
 The Revolution had saved the nation from 
 one class of evils, but had at the same time 
 — such is the imperfection of all things 
 human — engendered or aggravated another 
 class of evils which required new remedies. 
 Liberty and property were secure from the 
 attacks of prerogative. Conscience was re- 
 spected. No government ventured to in- 
 fringe any of the rights solemnly recognised 
 by the instrument which had called William 
 and Mary to the throne. But it cannot be 
 
130 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 denied that, under the new system, the 
 public interests and the public morals were 
 seriously endangered by corruption and fac- 
 tion. During the long struggle against the 
 Stuarts, the chief object of the most en- 
 lightened statesmen had been to strengthen 
 the House of Commons. The struggle was 
 over ; the victory was won ; the House of 
 Commons was supreme in the state ; and 
 all the vices which had till then been latent 
 in the representative system were rapidly 
 developed by prosperity and power. Scarcely 
 had the executive government become really 
 responsible to the House of Commons, when 
 it began to appear that the House of Com- 
 mons was not really responsible to the 
 nation. Many of the constituent bodies 
 were under the absolute control of indi- 
 viduals ; many were notoriously at the com- 
 mand of the highest bidder. The debates 
 were not published. It was very seldom 
 known out of doors how a gentleman had 
 voted. Thus, while the ministry was account- 
 able to the Parliament, the majority of the 
 Parliament was accountable to nobody. In 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 131 
 
 such circumstances, nothing could be more 
 natural than that the members should insist 
 on being paid for their votes, should form 
 themselves into combinations for the pur- 
 pose of raising the price of their votes, and 
 should at critical conjunctures extort large 
 wages by threatening a strike. Thus the 
 Whig ministers of George the First and 
 George the Second were compelled to re- 
 duce corruption to a system, and to practise 
 it on a gigantic scale. 
 
 If we are right as to the cause of these 
 abuses, we can scarcely be wrong as to the 
 remedy. The remedy was surely not to 
 deprive the House of Commons of its weight 
 in the state. Such a course would un- 
 doubtedly have put an end to parliamentary 
 corruption and to parliamentary factions : 
 for, when votes cease to be of importance, 
 they will cease to be bought ; and, when 
 knaves can get nothing by combining, they 
 will cease to combine. But to destroy cor- 
 ruption and faction by introducing despot- 
 ism would have been to cure bad by worse. 
 The proper remedy evidently was, to make 
 
132 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 the House of Commons responsible to the 
 nation ; and this was to be effected in two 
 ways; first, by giving publicity to parlia- 
 mentary proceedings, and thus placing every 
 member on bis trial before the tribunal of 
 public opinion ; and secondly, by so reform- 
 ing the constitution of the House that no 
 man should be able to sit in it who had 
 not been returned by a respectable and 
 independent body of constituents. 
 
 Bolingbroke and Bolingbroke’s disciples 
 recommended a very different mode of treat- 
 ing the diseases of the state. Their doctrine 
 was that a vigorous use of the prerogative 
 by a patriot King would at once break all 
 factious combinations, and supersede the 
 pretended necessity of bribing members of 
 Parliament. The King had only to resolve 
 that he would be master, that he would not 
 be held in thraldom by any set of men, that 
 he would take for ministers any persons in 
 whom he had confidence, without distinction 
 of party, and that he would restrain his ser- 
 vants from influencing by immoral means 
 either the constituent bodies or the represen- 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 133 
 
 tative body. This childish scheme proved 
 that those who proposed it knew nothing 
 of the nature of the evil with which they 
 pretended to deal. The real cause of the 
 prevalence of corruption and faction was 
 that a House of Commons, not accountable 
 to the people, was more powerful than the 
 King. Bolingbroke’s remedy could be ap- 
 plied only by a King more powerful than 
 the House of Commons. How was the 
 patriot Prince to govern in defiance of the 
 body without whose consent he could not 
 equip a sloop, keep a battalion under arms, 
 send an embassy, or defray even the charges 
 of his own household ? Was he to dissolve 
 the Parliament? And what was he likely to 
 gain by appealing to Sudbury and Old Sarum 
 against the venality of their representatives ? 
 Was he to send out privy seals ? Was he 
 to levy ship - money ? If so, this boasted 
 reform must commence in all probability by 
 civil war, and, if consummated, must be 
 consummated by the establishment of abso- 
 lute monarchy. Or was the patriot King to 
 carry the House of Commons with him in 
 
134 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 his upright designs ? By what means ? In- 
 terdicting himself from the use of corrupt 
 influence, what motive was he to address to 
 the Dodingtons and Winningtons ? Was 
 cupidity, strengthened by habit, to be laid 
 asleep by a few fine sentences about virtue 
 and union ? 
 
 Absurd as this theory was, it had many 
 admirers, particularly among men of letters. 
 It was now to be reduced to practice ; and 
 the result was, as any man of sagacity must 
 have foreseen, the most piteous and ridicu- 
 lous of failures. 
 
 On the very day of the young King’s 
 accession, appeared some signs which indi- 
 cated the approach of a great change. The 
 speech which he made to his council w r as 
 not submitted to the cabinet. It was drawn 
 up by Bute, and contained some expressions 
 which might be construed into reflections on 
 the conduct of affairs during the late reign. 
 Pitt remonstrated, and begged that these 
 expressions might be softened down in the 
 printed copy ; but it was not till after some 
 hours of altercation that Bute yielded ; and, 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 135 
 
 even after Bute had yielded, the King 
 affected to hold out till the following after- 
 noon. On the same day on which this 
 singular contest took place, Bute was not 
 only sworn of the privy council, but intro- 
 duced into the cabinet. 
 
 Soon after this Lord Holdernesse, one of 
 the Secretaries of State, in pursuance of a 
 plan concerted with the court, resigned the 
 seals. Bute was instantly appointed to the 
 vacant place. A general election speedily 
 followed, and the new Secretary entered 
 Parliament in the only way in which he 
 then could enter it, as one of the sixteen 
 representative peers of Scotland. 
 
 Had the ministers been firmly united it 
 can scarcely be doubted that they would 
 have been able to withstand the court. The 
 parliamentary influence of the Whig aristo- 
 cracy, combined with the genius, the virtue, 
 and the fame of Pitt, would have been irre- 
 sistible. But there had been in the cabinet 
 of George the Second latent jealousies and 
 enmities, which now began to show them- 
 selves. Pitt had been estranged from his 
 
MACAULAY 
 
 186 
 
 old ally Legge, the Chancellor of the Ex- 
 chequer. Some of the ministers were 
 envious of Pitt’s popularity. Others were, 
 not altogether without cause, disgusted by 
 his imperious and haughty demeanour. 
 Others, again, were honestly opposed to 
 some parts of his policy. They admitted 
 that he had found the country in the 
 depths of humiliation, and had raised it to 
 the height of glory : they admitted that he 
 had conducted the war with energy, ability, 
 and splendid success ; but they began to hint 
 that the drain on the resources of the state 
 was unexampled, and that the public debt 
 was increasing with a speed at which Mon- 
 tague or Godolphin would have stood aghast. 
 Some of the acquisitions made by our fleets 
 and armies were, it was acknowledged, profit- 
 able as well as honourable ; but, now that 
 George the Second was dead, a courtier 
 might venture to ask why England was to 
 become a party in a dispute between two 
 German powers. What was it to her whether 
 the House of Hapsburg or the House of 
 Brandenburg ruled in Silesia ? Why were 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 137 
 
 the best English regiments fighting on the 
 Main ? Why were the Prussian battalions 
 paid with English gold ? The great minister 
 seemed to think it beneath him to calculate 
 the price of victory. As long as the Tower 
 guns were fired, as the streets were illumi- 
 nated, as French banners were carried in 
 triumph through London, it was to him 
 matter of indifference to what extent the 
 public burdens were augmented. Nay, he 
 seemed to glory in the magnitude of those 
 sacrifices which the people, fascinated by 
 his eloquence and success, had too readily 
 made, and would long and bitterly regret. 
 There was no check on waste or embezzle- 
 ment. Our commissaries returned from the 
 camp of Prince Ferdinand to buy boroughs, 
 to rear palaces, to rival the magnificence of 
 the old aristocracy of the realm. Already 
 had we borrowed, in four years of war, 
 more than the most skilful and economical 
 government would pay in forty years of 
 peace. But the prospect of peace was as 
 remote as ever. It could not be doubted 
 that France, smarting and prostrate, would 
 
138 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 consent to fair terms of accommodation ; but 
 this was not what Pitt wanted. War had 
 made him powerful and popular; with war, 
 all that was brightest in his life was asso- 
 ciated : for war his talents were peculiarly 
 fitted. He had at length begun to love war 
 for its own sake, and was more disposed to 
 quarrel with neutrals than to make peace 
 with enemies. 
 
 Such were the views of the Duke of 
 Bedford and of the Earl of Hardwicke ; but 
 no member of the government held these 
 opinions so strongly as George Grenville, the 
 treasurer of the navy. George Grenville was 
 brother-in-law of Pitt, and had always been 
 reckoned one of Pitt’s personal and political 
 friends. But it is difficult to conceive two 
 men of talents and integrity more utterly 
 unlike each other. Pitt, as his sister 
 often said, knew nothing accurately except 
 Spenser’s Fairy Queen. He had never 
 applied himself steadily to any branch of 
 knowledge. He was a wretched financier. 
 He never became familiar even with the 
 rules of that House of which he was the 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 139 
 
 brightest ornament. He had never studied 
 public law as a system ; and was, indeed, so 
 ignorant of the whole subject, that George 
 the Second, on one occasion, complained 
 bitterly that a man who had never read 
 Vattel should presume to undertake the 
 direction of foreign affairs. But these 
 defects were more than redeemed by high 
 and rare gifts, by a strange power of inspir- 
 ing great masses of men with confidence 
 and affection, by an eloquence which not 
 only delighted the ear, but stirred the 
 blood, and brought tears into the eyes, by 
 originality in devising plans, by vigour in 
 executing them. Grenville, on the other 
 hand, was by nature and habit a man of 
 details. He had been bred a lawyer; and 
 he had brought the industry and acuteness 
 of the Temple into official and parlia- 
 mentary life. He was supposed to be inti- 
 mately acquainted with the whole fiscal 
 system of the country. He had paid especial 
 attention to the law r of Parliament, and was 
 so learned in all things relating to the privi- 
 leges and orders of the House of Commons 
 
140 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 that those who loved him least pronounced 
 him the only person competent to succeed 
 Onslow in the Chair. His speeches were 
 generally instructive, and sometimes, from 
 the gravity and earnestness with which he 
 spoke, even impressive, but never brilliant, 
 and generally tedious. Indeed, even when 
 he was at the head of affairs, he sometimes 
 found it difficult to obtain the ear of the 
 House. In disposition as well as in intel- 
 lect, he differed widely from his brother-in- 
 law. Pitt was utterly regardless of money. 
 He would scarcely stretch out his hand to 
 take it ; and, when it came, he threw it 
 away with childish profusion. Grenville, 
 though strictly upright, was grasping and 
 parsimonious. Pitt was a man of excitable 
 nerves, sanguine in hope, easily elated by 
 success and popularity, keenly sensible of 
 injury, but prompt to forgive ; Grenville’s 
 character was stern, melancholy, and per- 
 tinacious. Nothing was more remarkable in 
 him than his inclination always to look on 
 the dark side of things. He was the raven 
 of the House of Commons, always croak- 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 141 
 
 ing defeat in the midst of triumphs, and 
 bankruptcy with an overflowing exchequer. 
 Burke, with general applause, compared 
 him, in a time of quiet and plenty, to the 
 evil spirit whom Ovid described looking 
 down on the stately temples and wealthy 
 haven of Athens, and scarce able to refrain 
 from weeping because she could find nothing 
 at which to weep. Such a man was not 
 likely to be popular. But to unpopularity 
 Grenville opposed a dogged determination, 
 which sometimes forced even those who hated 
 him to respect him. 
 
 It was natural that Pitt and Grenville, 
 being such as they were, should take very 
 different views of the situation of affairs. 
 Pitt could see nothing but the trophies ; 
 Grenville could see nothing but the bill. 
 Pitt boasted that England was victorious at 
 once in America, in India, and in Germany, 
 the umpire of the Continent, the mistress 
 of the sea. Grenville cast up the subsidies, 
 sighed over the army extraordinaries, and 
 groaned in spirit to think that the nation 
 had borrowed eight millions in one year. 
 
142 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 With a ministry thus divided it was not 
 difficult for Bute to deal. Legge was the 
 first who fell. He had given offence to the 
 young King in the late reign, by refusing 
 to support a creature of Bute at a Hampshire 
 election. He was now not only turned out, 
 but in the closet, when he delivered up his 
 seal of office, was treated with gross incivility. 
 
 Pitt, who did not love Legge, saw this 
 event with indifference. But the danger was 
 now fast approaching himself. Charles the 
 Third of Spain had early conceived a deadly 
 hatred of England. Twenty years before, 
 when he was King of the Two Sicilies, he had 
 been eager to join the coalition against Maria 
 Theresa. But an English fleet suddenly ap- 
 peared in the Bay of Naples. An English 
 captain had landed, had proceeded to the 
 palace, had laid a watch on the table, and 
 had told his majesty that, within an hour, a 
 treaty of neutrality must be signed, or a 
 bombardment would commence. The treaty 
 was signed ; the squadron sailed out of the 
 bay twenty-four hours after it had sailed in ; 
 and from that day the ruling passion of the 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 143 
 
 humbled Prince was aversion to the English 
 name. He was at length in a situation in 
 which he might hope to gratify that passion. 
 He had recently become King of Spain and 
 the Indies. He saw, with envy and appre- 
 hension, the triumphs of our navy, and the 
 rapid extension of our colonial Empire. He 
 was a Bourbon, and sympathised with the 
 distress of the house from which he sprang. 
 He was a Spaniard ; and no Spaniard could 
 bear to see Gibraltar and Minorca in the 
 possession of a foreign power. Impelled by 
 such feelings, Charles concluded a secret 
 treaty with France. By this treaty, known 
 as the Family Compact, the two powers 
 bound themselves, not in express words, but 
 by the clearest implication, to make war on 
 England in common. Spain postponed the 
 declaration of hostilities only till her fleet, 
 laden with the treasures of America, should 
 have arrived. 
 
 The existence of the treaty could not be 
 kept a secret from Pitt. He acted as a 
 man of his capacity and energy might be 
 expected to act. He at once proposed to 
 
144 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 declare war against Spain, and to intercept 
 the American fleet. He had determined, it is 
 said, to attack without delay both Havanna 
 and the Philippines. 
 
 His wise and resolute counsel was re- 
 jected. Bute was foremost in opposing it, 
 and was supported by almost the whole 
 cabinet. Some of the ministers doubted, or 
 affected to doubt, the correctness of Pitt’s 
 intelligence ; some shrank from the responsi- 
 bility of advising a course so bold and de- 
 cided as that which he proposed ; some were 
 weary of his ascendency, and were glad to 
 be rid of him on any pretext. One only of 
 his colleagues agreed with him, his brother- 
 in-law, Earl Temple. 
 
 Pitt and Temple resigned their offices. 
 To Pitt the young King behaved at parting 
 in the most gracious manner. Pitt, who, 
 proud and fiery everywhere else, was always 
 meek and humble in the closet, was moved 
 even to tears. The King and the favourite 
 urged him to accept some substantial mark 
 of royal gratitude. Would he like to be 
 appointed governor of Canada ? A salary 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 145 
 
 of five thousand pounds a year should be 
 annexed to the office. Residence would not 
 be required. It was true that the governor 
 of Canada, as the law then stood, could not 
 be a member of the House of Commons. 
 But a bill should be brought in, authorising 
 Pitt to hold his government together with 
 a seat in Parliament, and in the preamble 
 should be set forth his claims to the grati- 
 tude of his country. Pitt answered, with 
 all delicacy, that his anxieties were rather 
 for his wife and family than for himself, and 
 that nothing would be so acceptable to him 
 as a mark of royal goodness which might 
 be beneficial to those who were dearest 
 to him. The hint was taken. The same 
 Gazette which announced the retirement of 
 the Secretary of State announced also that, 
 in consideration of his great public services, 
 his wife had been created a peeress in her 
 own right, and that a pension of three 
 thousand pounds a year, for three lives, had 
 been bestowed on himself. It was doubtless 
 thought that the rewards and honours con- 
 ferred on the great minister would have a 
 
 K 
 
14 G 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 conciliatory effect on the public mind. Per- 
 haps, too, it was thought that his popularity, 
 which had partly arisen from the contempt 
 which he had always shown for money, would 
 be damaged by a pension ; and, indeed, a 
 crowd of libels instantly appeared, in which 
 he was accused of having sold his country. 
 Many of his true friends thought that he 
 would have best consulted the dignity of 
 his character by refusing to accept any 
 pecuniary reward from the court. Never- 
 theless, the general opinion of his talents, 
 virtues, and services, remained unaltered. 
 Addresses were presented to him from 
 several large towns. London showed its 
 admiration and affection in a still more 
 marked manner. Soon after his resignation 
 came the Lord Mayor’s day. The King and 
 the royal family dined at Guildhall. Pitt 
 was one of the guests. The young Sovereign, 
 seated by his bride in his state coach, 
 received a remarkable lesson. He was 
 scarcely noticed. All eyes were fixed on the 
 fallen minister; all acclamations directed to 
 him. The streets, the balconies, the chimney 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 147 
 
 tops, burst into a roar of delight as his 
 chariot passed by. The ladies waved their 
 handkerchiefs from the windows. The com- 
 mon people clung to the wheels, shook hands 
 with the footmen, and even kissed the horses. 
 Cries of ‘No Bute ! ’ ‘No Newcastle salmon ! ’ 
 were mingled with the shouts of ‘ Pitt for 
 ever ! ’ When Pitt entered Guildhall, he was 
 welcomed by loud huzzas and clapping of 
 hands, in which the very magistrates of the 
 city joined. Lord Bute, in the meantime, 
 was hooted and pelted through Cheapside, 
 and would, it was thought, have been in 
 some danger, if he had not taken the pre- 
 caution of surrounding his carriage with a 
 strong bodyguard of boxers. Many persons 
 blamed the conduct of Pitt on this occasion 
 as disrespectful to the King. Indeed, Pitt 
 himself afterwards owned that he bad done 
 wrong. He was led into this error, as he 
 was afterwards led into more serious errors, 
 by the influence of his turbulent and mis- 
 chievous brother-in-law, Temple. 
 
 The events which immediately followed 
 Pitt’s retirement raised his fame higher than 
 
148 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 ever. War with Spain proved to be, as he 
 had predicted, inevitable. News came from 
 the West Indies that Martinique had been 
 taken by an expedition which he had sent 
 forth. Havanna fell ; and it was known 
 that he had planned an attack on Havanna. 
 Manilla capitulated ; and it was believed that 
 he had meditated a blow against Manilla. 
 
 The American fleet, which he had proposed 
 to intercept, had unloaded an immense cargo 
 of bullion in the haven of Cadiz, before Bute 
 could be convinced that the Court of Madrid 
 really entertained hostile intentions. 
 
 The session of Parliament which followed 
 Pitt’s retirement passed over without any 
 violent storm. Lord Bute took on himself 
 the most prominent part in the House of 
 Lords. He had become Secretary of State, 
 and indeed prime minister, without having 
 once opened his lips in public except as an 
 actor. There was, therefore, no small curiosity 
 to know how he would acquit himself. Mem- 
 bers of the House of Commons crowded the 
 bar of the Lords, and covered the steps of the 
 throne. It was generally expected that the 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 149 
 
 orator would break down ; but his most 
 malicious hearers were forced to own that 
 he had made a better figure than they ex- 
 pected. They, indeed, ridiculed his action 
 as theatrical, and his style as tumid. They 
 were especially amused by the long pauses 
 which, not from hesitation, but from affecta- 
 tion, he made at all the emphatic words, 
 and Charles Townshend cried out, ‘Minute 
 Guns ! ’ The general opinion however was, 
 that, if Bute had been early practised in 
 debate, he might have become an impressive 
 speaker. 
 
 In the Commons, George Grenville had 
 been intrusted with the lead. The task 
 was not, as yet, a very difficult one ; for 
 Pitt did not think fit to raise the standard 
 of opposition. His speeches at this time 
 were distinguished, not only by that elo- 
 quence in which he excelled all his rivals, 
 but also by a temperance and a modesty 
 which had too often been wanting to his 
 character. When war was declared against 
 Spain, he justly laid claim to the merit of 
 having foreseen what had at length become 
 
150 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 manifest to all, but he carefully abstained 
 from arrogant and acrimonious expressions ; 
 and this abstinence was the more honour- 
 able to him, because his temper, never very 
 placid, was now severely tried, both by gout 
 and by calumny. The courtiers had adopted 
 a mode of warfare, which was soon turned 
 with far more formidable effect against 
 themselves. Half the inhabitants of the 
 Grub Street garrets paid their milk scores, 
 and got their shirts out of pawn, by abusing 
 Pitt. His German war, his subsidies, his 
 pension, his wife’s peerage, were shin of 
 beef and gin, blankets and baskets of small 
 coal, to the starving poetasters of the Fleet. 
 Even in the House of Commons, he was, on 
 one occasion during this session, assailed 
 with an insolence and malice which called 
 forth the indignation of men of all parties ; 
 but he endured the outrage with majestic 
 patience. In his younger days he had been 
 but too prompt to retaliate on those who 
 attacked him ; but now, conscious of his 
 great services, and of the space which he 
 filled in the eyes of all mankind, he would 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 151 
 
 not stoop to personal squabbles. ‘This is 
 no season,’ lie said, in the debate on the 
 Spanish war, ‘for altercation and recrimina- 
 tion. A day has arrived when every English- 
 man should stand forth for his country. 
 Arm the whole ; he one people ; forget 
 every thing but the public. I set you the 
 example. Harassed by slanderers, sinking 
 under pain and disease, for the public I 
 forget both my wrongs and my infirmities ! ’ 
 On a general review of his life, we are in- 
 clined to think that his genius and virtue 
 never shone with so pure an effulgence as 
 during the session of 1762. 
 
 The session drew towards the close ; and 
 Bute, emboldened by the acquiescence of 
 the Houses, resolved to strike another great 
 blow, and to become first minister in name 
 as well as in reality. That coalition, which 
 a few months before had seemed all power- 
 ful, had been dissolved. The retreat of Pitt 
 had deprived the government of popularity. 
 Newcastle had exulted in the fall of the 
 illustrious colleague whom he envied and 
 dreaded, and had not foreseen that his own 
 
152 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 doom was at hand. He still tried to flatter 
 himself that he was at the head of the 
 government; but insults heaped on insults 
 at length undeceived him. Places which 
 had always been considered as in his gift, 
 were bestowed without any reference to him. 
 His expostulations only called forth signifi- 
 cant hints that it was time for him to retire. 
 One day he pressed on Bute the claims of 
 a Whig Prelate to the archbishopric of 
 York. ‘If your grace thinks so highly of 
 him,’ answered Bute, ‘ I wonder that you did 
 not promote him when you had the power.’ 
 Still the old man clung with a desperate 
 grasp to the wreck. Seldom, indeed, have 
 Christian meekness and Christian humility 
 equalled the meekness and humility of his 
 patient and abject ambition. At length he 
 was forced to understand that all was over. 
 He quitted that court where he had held 
 high office during forty-five years, and hid 
 his shame and regret among the cedars of 
 Claremont. Bute became first lord of the 
 treasury. 
 
 The favourite had undoubtedly committed 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 153 
 
 a great error. It is impossible to imagine a 
 tool better suited to his purposes than that 
 which he thus threw away, or rather put 
 into the hands of his enemies. If New- 
 castle had been suffered to play at being 
 first minister, Bute might securely and 
 quietly have enjoyed the substance of power. 
 The gradual introduction of Tories into all 
 the departments of the government might 
 have been effected without any violent 
 clamour, if the chief of the great Whig con- 
 nection had been ostensibly at the head of 
 affairs. This was strongly represented to 
 Bute by Lord Mansfield, a man who may 
 justly be called the father of modern Tory- 
 ism, of Toryism modified to suit an order of 
 things under which the House of Commons 
 is the most powerful body in the state. The 
 theories which had dazzled Bute could not 
 impose on the fine intellect of Mansfield. 
 The temerity with which Bute provoked 
 the hostility of powerful and deeply rooted 
 interests, was displeasing to Mansfield’s cold 
 and timid nature. Expostulation, however, 
 was vain. Bute was impatient of advice, 
 
154 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 drunk with success, eager to be, in show as 
 well as in reality, the head of the govern- 
 ment, He had engaged in an undertaking 
 in which a screen was absolutely necessary 
 to his success, and even to his safety. He 
 found an excellent screen ready in the very 
 place where it was most needed ; and he 
 rudely pushed it away. And now the new 
 system of government came into full opera- 
 tion. For the first time since the accession 
 of the House of Hanover, the Tory party 
 was in the ascendant. The prime minister 
 himself was a Tory. Lord Egremont, who 
 had succeeded Pitt as Secretary of State, 
 was a Tory, and the son of a Tory. Sir 
 Francis Dashwood, a man of slender parts, 
 of small experience, and of notoriously im- 
 moral character, was made Chancellor of the 
 Exchequer, for no reason that could be 
 imagined, except that he was a Tory, and 
 had been a Jacobite. Tbe royal household 
 was filled with men whose favourite toast, 
 a few years before, had been the King over 
 the water. The relative position of the two 
 great national seats of learning was suddenly 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 155 
 
 changed. The University of Oxford had 
 long been the chief seat of disaffection. In 
 troubled times the High Street had been 
 lined with bayonets ; the colleges had been 
 searched by the King’s messengers. Grave 
 doctors were in the habit of talking very 
 Ciceronian treason in the theatre ; and the 
 undergraduates drank bumpers to Jacobite 
 toasts, and chanted Jacobite airs. Of four 
 successive Chancellors of the University, one 
 had notoriously been in the Pretender’s ser- 
 vice ; the other three were fully believed to 
 be in secret correspondence with the exiled 
 family. Cambridge had therefore been es- 
 pecially favoured by the Hanoverian Princes, 
 and had shown herself grateful for their 
 patronage. George the First had enriched 
 her library ; George the Second had contri- 
 buted munificently to her Senate House. 
 Bishoprics and deaneries were showered on 
 her children. Her Chancellor was Newcastle, 
 the chief of the Whig aristocracy ; her High 
 Steward was Hardwicke, the Whig head of 
 the law. Both her burgesses had held office 
 under the Whig ministry. Times had now 
 
156 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 changed. The University of Cambridge was 
 received at St James’s with comparative 
 coldness. The answers to the addresses of 
 Oxford were all graciousness and warmth. 
 
 The watchwords of the new government 
 were prerogative and purity. The sovereign 
 was no longer to be a puppet in the hands 
 of any subject, or of any combination of 
 subjects. George the Third would not be 
 forced to take ministers whom he disliked, 
 as his grandfather had been forced to take 
 Pitt. George the Third would not be forced 
 to part with any whom he delighted to 
 honour, as his grandfather had been forced 
 to part with Carteret. At the same time, 
 the system of bribery which had grown up 
 during the late reigns was to cease. It 
 was ostentatiously proclaimed that, since the 
 accession of the young King, neither consti- 
 tuents nor representatives had been bought 
 with the secret service money. To free 
 Britain from corruption and oligarchical 
 cabals, to detach her from continental con- 
 nections, to bring the bloody and expensive 
 war with France and Spain to a close, such 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 157 
 
 were the specious objects which Bute pro- 
 fessed to procure. 
 
 Some of these objects he attained. Eng- 
 land withdrew, at the cost of a deep stain 
 on her faith, from her German connections. 
 The war with France and Spain was ter- 
 minated by a peace, honourable indeed and 
 advantageous to our country, yet less honour- 
 able and less advantageous than might have 
 been expected from a long and almost un- 
 broken series of victories, by land and sea, 
 in every part of the world. But the only 
 effect of Bute’s domestic administration was 
 to make faction wilder, and corruption fouler 
 than ever. 
 
 The mutual animosity of the Whig and 
 Tory parties had begun to languish after the 
 fall of Walpole, and had seemed to be 
 almost extinct at the close of the reign of 
 George the Second. It now revived in all 
 its force. Many Whigs, it is true, were still 
 in office. The Duke of Bedford had signed 
 the treaty with France. The Duke of Devon- 
 shire, though much out of humour, still 
 continued to be Lord Chamberlain. Gren- 
 
158 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 ville, who led the House of Commons, and 
 Fox, who still enjoyed in silence the immense 
 gains of the Pay Office, had always been 
 regarded as strong Whigs. But the bulk of 
 the party throughout the country regarded 
 the new minister with abhorrence. There 
 was, indeed, no want of popular themes for 
 invective against his character. He was a 
 favourite ; and favourites have always been 
 odious in this country. No mere favourite 
 had been at the head of the government 
 since the dagger of Felton had reached the 
 heart of the Duke of Buckingham. After 
 that event the most arbitrary and the most 
 frivolous of the Stuarts had felt the necessity 
 of confiding the chief direction of affairs to 
 men who had given some proof of parliamen- 
 tary or official talent. Strafford, Falkland, 
 Clarendon, Clifford, Shaftesbury, Lauderdale, 
 Danby, Temple, Halifax, Rochester, Sunder- 
 land, whatever their faults might be, were 
 all men of acknowledged ability^. They did 
 not owe their eminence merely to the favour 
 of the sovereign. On the contrary, they 
 owed the favour of the sovereign to their 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 159 
 
 eminence. Most of them, indeed, had first at- 
 tracted the notice of the court by the capacity 
 and vigour which they had shown in oppo- 
 sition. The Revolution seemed to have for 
 ever secured the state against the domina- 
 tion of a Carr or a Yilliers. Now, however, 
 the personal regard of the King had at once 
 raised a man who had seen nothing of public 
 business, who had never opened his lips 
 in Parliament, over the heads of a crowd 
 of eminent orators, financiers, diplomatists. 
 From a private gentleman, this fortunate 
 minion had at once been turned into a 
 Secretary of State. He had made his 
 maiden speech when at the head of the 
 administration. The vulgar resorted to a 
 simple explanation of the phenomenon, and 
 the coarsest ribaldry against the Princess 
 Mother was scrawled on every wall and sung 
 in every alley. 
 
 This was not all. The spirit of party, 
 roused by impolitic provocation from its long 
 sleep, roused in turn a still fiercer and more 
 malignant Fury, the spirit of national ani- 
 mosity. The grudge of Whig against Tory was 
 
160 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 mingled with the grudge of Englishman 
 against Scot. The two sections of the great 
 British people had not yet been indissolubly 
 blended together. The events of 1715 and 
 of 1745 had left painful and enduring traces. 
 The tradesmen of Cornhill had been in 
 dread of seeing their tills and warehouses 
 plundered by barelegged mountaineers from 
 the Grampians. They still recollected that 
 Black Friday, when the news came that the 
 rebels were at Derby, when all the shops in 
 the city were closed, and when the Bank of 
 England began to pay in sixpences. The 
 Scots, on the other hand, remembered, with 
 natural resentment, the severity with which 
 the insurgents had been chastised, the military 
 outrages, the humiliating laws, the heads 
 fixed on Temple Bar, the fires and quarter- 
 ing blocks on Kennington Common. The 
 favourite did not suffer the English to forget 
 from what part of the island he came. The 
 cry of all the south was that the public 
 offices, the army, the navy, were filled with 
 high - cheeked Drummonds and Erskines, 
 Macdonalds and Macgillivrays, who could 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 161 
 
 not talk a Christian tongue, and some of 
 whom had but lately begun to wear Christian 
 bi'eeches. All the old jokes on hills without 
 trees, girls without stockings, men eating the 
 food of horses, pails emptied from the four- 
 teenth story, were pointed against these lucky 
 adventurers. To the honour of the Scots 
 it must be said, that their prudence and 
 their pride restrained them from retaliation. 
 Like the Princess in the Arabian tale, they 
 stopped their ears tight, and, unmoved by 
 the shrillest notes of abuse, walked on, with- 
 out once looking round, straight towards the 
 Golden Fountain. 
 
 Bute, who had always been considered as 
 a man of taste and reading, affected, from 
 the moment of his elevation, the character 
 of a Msecenas. If he expected to conciliate 
 the public by encouraging literature and art, 
 he was grievously mistaken. Indeed, none 
 of the objects of his munificence, with the 
 single exception of Johnson, can be said to 
 have been well selected ; and the public, not 
 unnaturally, ascribed the selection of John- 
 son rather to the Doctor’s political prejudices 
 
1G2 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 than to his literary merits: for a wretched 
 scribbler named Shebbeare, who had nothing 
 in common with Johnson except violent 
 Jacobitism, and who had stood in the pillory 
 for a libel on the Revolution, was honoured 
 with a mark of royal approbation, similar to 
 that which was bestowed on the author of 
 the English Dictionary, and of the Vanity 
 of Human Wishes. It was remarked that 
 Adam, a Scotchman, was the court architect, 
 and that Ramsay, a Scotchman, was the 
 court painter, and was preferred to Reynolds. 
 Mallet, a Scotchman, of no high literary fame, 
 and of infamous character, partook largely of 
 the liberality of the government. John Home, 
 a Scotchman, was rewarded for the tragedy 
 of Douglas, both with a pension and with 
 a sinecure place. But, when the author of 
 the Bard, and of the Elegy in a Country 
 Churchyard, ventured to ask for a Professor- 
 ship, the emoluments of which he much 
 needed, and for the duties of which he was, 
 in many respects, better qualified than any 
 man living, he was refused ; and the post 
 was bestowed on the pedagogue under whose 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 163 
 
 care the favourite’s son-in-law, Sir James 
 Lowther, had made such signal proficiency 
 in the graces and in the humane virtues. 
 
 Thus, the first lord of the treasury was 
 detested by many as a Tory, by many as a 
 favourite, and by many as a Scot. All the 
 hatred which flowed from these various 
 sources soon mingled, and was directed in 
 one torrent of obloquy against the treaty 
 of peace. The Duke of Bedford, who had 
 negotiated that treaty, was hooted through 
 the streets. Bute was attacked in his chair, 
 and was with difficulty rescued by a troop 
 of the guards. He could hardly walk the 
 streets in safety without disguising himself. 
 A gentleman who died not many years ago 
 used to say that he once recognised the 
 favourite Earl in the piazza of Covent 
 Garden, muffled in a large coat, and with 
 a hat and wig drawn down over his brows. 
 His lordship’s established type with the mob 
 was a jack boot, a wretched pun on his 
 Christian name and title. A jack boot, 
 generally accompanied by a petticoat, was 
 sometimes fastened on a gallows, and some- 
 
1G4 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 times committed to the flames. Libels on 
 the court, exceeding in audacity and rancour 
 any that had been been published for many 
 years, now appeared daily both in prose and 
 verse. Wilkes, with lively insolence, com- 
 pared the mother of George the Third to 
 the mother of Edward the Third, and the 
 Scotch minister to the gentle Mortimer. 
 Churchill, with all the energy of hatred, 
 deplored the fate of his country, invaded by 
 a new race of savages, more cruel and 
 ravenous than the Piets or the Danes, 
 the poor, proud children of Leprosy and 
 Hunger. It is a slight circumstance, but 
 deserves to be recorded, that in this year 
 pamphleteers first ventured to print at length 
 the names of the great men whom they lam- 
 pooned. George the Second had always 
 
 been the K . His ministers had been 
 
 Sir R W , Mr P , and the Duke 
 
 of N . But the libellers of George the 
 
 Thix-d, of the Princess Mother, and of Lord 
 Bute did not give quarter to a single vowel. 
 
 It was supposed that Lord Temple secretly 
 encouraged the most scurrilous assailants of 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 165 
 
 the government. In truth, those who knew 
 his habits tracked him as men track a mole. 
 It was his nature to grub underground. 
 Whenever a heap of dirt was flung up it 
 might well be suspected that he was at 
 work in some foul crooked labyrinth below. 
 Pitt turned away from the filthy work of 
 opposition, with the same scorn with which 
 he had turned away from the filthy work 
 of government. He had the magnanimity 
 to proclaim everywhere the disgust which 
 he felt at the insults offered by his own 
 
 adherents to the Scottish nation, and missed 
 no opportunity of extolling the courage and 
 fidelity which the Highland regiments had 
 displayed through the whole war. But, 
 
 though he disdained to use any but lawful 
 and honourable weapons, it was well known 
 that his fair blows were likely to be far 
 more formidable than the privy thrusts of 
 his brother-in-law’s stiletto. 
 
 Bute’s heart began to fail him. The 
 
 Houses were about to meet. The treaty 
 
 would instantly be the subject of discussion. 
 It was probable that Pitt, the great Whig 
 
166 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 connection, and the multitude, would all be 
 on the same side. The favourite had pro- 
 fessed to hold in abhorrence those means 
 by which preceding ministers had kept the 
 House of Commons in good humour. He 
 now began to think that he had been too 
 scrupulous. His Utopian visions were at an 
 end. It was necessary, not only to bribe, 
 but to bribe more shamelessly and flagi- 
 tiously than his predecessors, in order to 
 make up for lost time. A majority must be 
 secured, no matter by what means. Could 
 Grenville do this? Would he do it? His 
 firmness and ability had not yet been tried 
 in any perilous crisis. He had been gener- 
 ally regarded as a humble follower of his 
 brother Temple, and of his brother-in-law 
 Pitt, and was supposed, though with little 
 reason, to be still favourably inclined to- 
 wards them. Other aid must be called in. 
 And where was other aid to be found ? 
 
 There was one man, whose shai’p and 
 manly logic had often in debate been found 
 a match for the lofty and impassioned rhe- 
 toric of Pitt, whose talents for jobbing were 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 167 
 
 not inferior to his talents for debate, whose 
 dauntless spirit shrank from no difficulty or 
 danger, and who was as little troubled with 
 scruples as with fears. Henry Fox, or no- 
 body, could weather the storm which was 
 about to burst. Yet was he a person to 
 whom the court, even in that extremity, was 
 unwilling to have recourse. He had always 
 been regarded as a Whig of the Whigs. 
 He had been the friend and disciple of 
 Walpole. He had long been connected by 
 close ties with William Duke of Cumber- 
 land. By the Tories he was more hated 
 than any man living. So strong was their 
 aversion to him that when, in the late reign, 
 he had attempted to form a party against 
 the Duke of Newcastle, they had thrown all 
 their weight into Newcastle’s scale. By the 
 Scots, Fox was abhorred as the confidential 
 friend of the conqueror of Culloden. He 
 was, on personal grounds, most obnoxious to 
 the Princess Mother. For he had, imme- 
 diately after her husband’s death, advised 
 the late King to take the education of her 
 son, the heir apparent, entirely out of her 
 
1(58 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 hands. He had recently given, if possible, 
 still deeper offence ; for he had indulged, 
 not without some ground, the ambitious 
 hope that his beautiful sister-in-law, tbe 
 Lady Sarah Lennox, might be queen of Eng- 
 land. It had been observed that the King 
 at one time rode every morning by the 
 grounds of Holland House, and that on 
 such occasions, Lady Sarah, dressed like a 
 shepherdess at a masquerade, was making 
 hay close to the road, which was then separ- 
 ated by no wall from the lawn. On account 
 of the part which Fox had taken in this 
 singular love affjair, he was the only member 
 of the Privy Council who was not summoned 
 to the meeting at which his Majesty an- 
 nounced his intended marriage with the 
 Princess of Mecklenburg. Of all the states- 
 men of the age, therefore, it seemed that 
 Fox was the last with whom Bute the Tory, 
 the Scot, the favourite of the Princess 
 Mother, could, under any circumstances, act. 
 Yet to Fox Bute was now compelled to 
 apply. 
 
 Fox had many noble and amiable quali- 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 1G9 
 
 ties which in private life shone forth in 
 full lustre, and made him dear to his 
 children, to his dependents, and to his 
 friends ; but as a public man he had no 
 title to esteem. In him the vices which 
 were common to the whole school of Wal- 
 pole appeared, not perhaps in their worst, 
 hut certainly in their most prominent form ; 
 for his parliamentary and official talents 
 made all his faults conspicuous. His cour- 
 age, his vehement temper, his contempt for 
 appearances, led him to display much that 
 others, quite as unscrupulous as himself, 
 covered with a decent veil. He was the 
 most unpopular of the statesmen of his 
 time, not because he sinned more than 
 many of them, but because he canted less. 
 
 He felt his unpopularity ; but he felt it 
 after the fashion of strong minds. He be- 
 came, not cautious, but reckless, and faced 
 the rage of the whole nation with a scowl 
 of inflexible defiance. He was born with a 
 sweet and generous temper ; but he had 
 been goaded and baited into a savageness 
 which was not natural to him, and which 
 
170 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 amazed and shocked those who knew him 
 best. Such was the man to whom Bute, in 
 extreme need, applied for succour. 
 
 That succour Fox was not unwilling to 
 afford. Though by no means of an envious 
 temper, he had undoubtedly contemplated 
 the success and popularity of Pitt with 
 bitter mortification. He thought himself 
 Pitt’s match as a debater, and Pitt’s superior 
 as a man of business. They had long been 
 regarded as well-paired rivals. They had 
 started fair in the career of ambition. They 
 had long run side by side. At length Fox 
 had taken the lead, and Pitt had fallen 
 behind. Then had come a sudden turn 
 of fortune, like that in Virgil’s foot-race. 
 Fox had stumbled in the mire, and had not 
 only been defeated, but befouled. Pitt had 
 reached the goal, and received the prize. 
 The emoluments of the Pay Office might 
 induce the defeated statesman to submit in 
 silence to the ascendency of his competitor, 
 but could not satisfy a mind conscious of 
 great powers, and sore from great vexations. 
 As soon, therefore, as a party arose adverse 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 171 
 
 to the war and to the supremacy of the 
 great war minister, the hopes of Fox began 
 to revive. His feuds with the Princess 
 Mother, with the Scots, with the Tories, he 
 was ready to forget, if, by the help of his 
 old enemies, he could now regain the im- 
 portance which he had lost, and confront 
 Pitt on equal terms. 
 
 The alliance was, therefore, soon con- 
 cluded. Fox was assured that, if he woidd 
 pilot the government out of its embarrassing 
 situation, he should be rewarded with a peer- 
 age, of which he had long been desirous. He 
 undertook on his side to obtain, by fair or 
 foul means, a vote in favour of the peace. 
 In consequence of this arrangement he be- 
 came leader of the House of Commons ; and 
 Grenville, stifling his vexation as well as he 
 could, sullenly acquiesced in the change. 
 
 Fox had expected that his influence would 
 secure to the court the cordial support of 
 some eminent Whigs who were his personal 
 friends, particularly of the Duke of Cumber- 
 land and of the Duke of Devonshire. He 
 was disappointed, and soon found that, in 
 
172 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 addition to all his other difficulties, he 
 must reckon on the opposition of the ablest 
 prince of the blood, and of the great house 
 of Cavendish. 
 
 But he had pledged himself to win the 
 battle ; and he was not a man to go back. 
 It was no time for squeamishness. Bute 
 was made to comprehend that the ministry 
 could be saved only by practising the tactics 
 of Walpole to an extent at which Walpole 
 himself would have stared. The Pay Office 
 was turned into a mart for votes. Hundreds 
 of members were closeted there with Fox, 
 and, as there is too much reason to believe, 
 departed carrying with them the wages of 
 infamy. It was affirmed by persons who had 
 the best opportunities of obtaining informa- 
 tion, that twenty-five thousand pounds were 
 thus paid away in a single morning. The 
 lowest bribe given, it was said, was a bank- 
 note for two hundred pounds. 
 
 Intimidation was joined with corruption. 
 All ranks, from the highest to the lowest, 
 were to he taught that the King would be 
 obeyed. The Lords Lieutenants of several 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 173 
 
 counties were dismissed. The Duke of 
 Devonshire was especially singled out as the 
 victim by whose fate the magnates of England 
 were to take warning. His wealth, rank, and 
 influence, his stainless private character, and 
 the constant attachment of his family to the 
 House of Hanover did not secure him from 
 gross personal indignity. It was known that 
 he disapproved of the course which the 
 government had taken ; and it was accord- 
 ingly determined to humble the Prince of 
 the Whigs, as he had been nicknamed by the 
 Princess Mother. He went to the palace to 
 pay his duty. ‘Tell him,’ said the King to 
 a page, ‘that I will not see him.’ The page 
 hesitated. ‘ Go to him,’ said the King, ‘ and 
 tell him those very words.’ The message was 
 delivered. The Duke tore off his gold key, 
 and went away boiling with anger. His rela- 
 tions who were in office instantly resigned. 
 A few days later, the King called for the list 
 of Privy Councillors, and with his own hand 
 struck out the Duke’s name. 
 
 In this step there was at least courage, 
 though little wisdom or good nature. But, 
 
174 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 as nothing was too high for the revenge of 
 the court, so also was nothing too low. A 
 persecution, such as had never been known 
 before, and has never been known since, raged 
 in every public department. Great numbers 
 of humble and laborious clerks were deprived 
 of their bread, not because they had neglected 
 their duties, not because they had taken an 
 active part against the ministry, but merely 
 because they had owed their situations to the 
 recommendation of some nobleman or gentle- 
 man who was against the peace. The pro- 
 scription extended to tidewaiters, to gaugers, 
 to doorkeepers. One poor man to whom a 
 pension had been given for his gallantry in 
 a fight with smugglers, was deprived of it 
 because he had been befriended by the Duke 
 of Grafton. An aged widow, who, on account 
 of her husband’s services in the navy, had, 
 many years before, been made housekeeper 
 to a public office, was dismissed from her 
 situation, because it was imagined that she 
 was distantly connected by marriage with the 
 Cavendish family. The public clamour, as 
 may well be supposed, grew daily louder and 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 175 
 
 louder. But the louder it grew, the more re- 
 solutely did Fox go on with the work which 
 he had begun. His old friends could not 
 conceive what had possessed him. ‘ I could 
 forgive,’ said the Duke of Cumberland, ‘Fox’s 
 political vagaries ; but I am quite confounded 
 by his inhumanity. Surely he used to be the 
 best-natured of men.’ 
 
 At last Fox went so far to take a legal 
 opinion on the question, whether the patents 
 granted by George the Second were binding 
 on George the Third. It is said, that, if his 
 colleagues had not flinched, he would at once 
 have turned out the Tellers of the Exchequer 
 and Justices in Eyre. 
 
 Meanwhile, the Parliament met. The 
 ministers, more hated by the people than 
 ever, were secure of a majority, and they had 
 also reason to hope that they would have 
 the advantage in the debates as well as in 
 the divisions ; for Pitt was confined to his 
 chamber by a severe attack of gout. His 
 friends moved to defer the consideration of 
 the treaty till he should be able to attend : 
 but the motion was rejected. The great 
 
176 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 day arrived. The discussion had lasted 
 some time, when a loud huzza was heard in 
 Palace Yard. The noise came nearer and 
 nearer, up the stairs, through the lobby. 
 The door opened, and from the midst of a 
 shouting multitude came forth Pitt, borne in 
 the arms of his attendants. His face was 
 thin and ghastly, his limbs swathed in flannel, 
 his crutch in his hand. The bearers set him 
 down within the bar. His friends instantly 
 surrounded him, and with their help he 
 crawled to his seat near the table. In this 
 condition he spoke three hours and a half 
 against the peace. During that time he was 
 repeatedly forced to sit down and to use 
 cordials. It may well be supposed that his 
 voice was faint, that his action was languid, 
 and that his speech, though occasionally 
 brilliant and impressive, was feeble when 
 compared with his best oratorical perform- 
 ances. But those who remembered what he 
 had done, and who saw what he suffered, 
 listened to him with emotions stronger than 
 any that mere eloquence can produce. He 
 was unable to stay for the division, and was 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 177 
 
 carried away from the House amidst shouts 
 as loud as those which had announced his 
 arrival. 
 
 A large majority approved the peace. 
 The exultation of the Court was boundless. 
 ‘Now,’ exclaimed the Princess Mother, ‘my 
 son is really King.’ The young sovereign 
 spoke of himself as freed from the bondage 
 in which his grandfather had been held. On 
 one point, it was announced, his mind was 
 unalterably made up. Under no circum- 
 stances whatever should those Whig grandees, 
 who had enslaved his predecessors and en- 
 deavoured to enslave himself, be restored to 
 power. 
 
 This vaunting was premature. The real 
 strength of the favourite was by no means 
 proportioned to the number of votes which 
 he had, on one particular division, been able 
 to command. He was soon again in difficul- 
 ties. The most important part of his budget 
 was a tax on cider. This measure was 
 opposed, not only by those who were gener- 
 ally hostile to his administration, but also by 
 many of his supporters. The name of excise 
 
 M 
 
178 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 had always been hateful to the Tories. One 
 of the chief crimes of Walpole in their eyes, 
 had been his partiality for this mode of raising 
 money. The Tory Johnson had in his Dic- 
 tionary given so scurrilous a definition of the 
 word Excise, that the Commissioners of Excise 
 had seriously thought of prosecuting him. 
 The counties which the new impost particu- 
 larly affected had always been Tory counties. 
 It was the boast of John Philips, the poet 
 of the English vintage, that the Cider-land 
 had ever been faithful to the throne, and 
 that all the pruning-hooks of her thousand 
 orchards had been beaten into swords for the 
 service of the ill-fated Stuarts. The effect 
 of Bute’s fiscal scheme was to produce an 
 union between the gentry and yeomanry of 
 the Cider-land and the Whigs of the capital. 
 Herefordshire and Worcestershire were in a 
 flame. The city of London, though not so 
 directly interested, was, if possible, still more 
 excited. The debates on this question irre- 
 parably damaged the government. Dash- 
 wood’s financial statement had been confused 
 and absurd beyond belief, and had been 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 179 
 
 received by the House with roars of laughter. 
 He had sense enough to be conscious of his 
 unfitness for the high situation which he held, 
 and exclaimed in a comical fit of despair, 
 ‘ What shall I do ? The boys will point at 
 me in the street, and cry, “There goes the 
 worst Chancellor of the Exchequer that ever 
 was.”’ George Grenville came to the rescue, 
 and spoke strongly on his favourite theme, the 
 profusion with which the late war had been 
 carried on. That profusion, he said, had 
 made taxes necessary. He called on the 
 gentlemen opposite to him to say where they 
 would have a tax laid, and dwelt on this topic 
 with his usual prolixity. ‘Let them tell me 
 where,’ he repeated in a monotonous and 
 somewhat fretful tone. ‘ I say, sir, let them 
 tell me where. I repeat it, sir ; I am 
 entitled to say to them, Tell me where.’ 
 Unluckily for him, Pitt had come down to 
 the House that night, and had been bitterly 
 provoked by the reflections thrown on the 
 war. He revenged himself by murmuring 
 in a whine resembling Grenville’s, a line of 
 a well known song, ‘ Gentle Shepherd, tell 
 
180 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 me where.’ ‘ If,’ cried Grenville, ‘ gentlemen 
 
 are to be treated in this way ’ Pitt, as 
 
 was his fashion, when he meant to mark 
 extreme contempt, rose deliberately, made 
 his bow, and walked out of the House, leav- 
 ing his brother-in-law in convulsions of rage, 
 and everybody else in convulsions of laughter. 
 It was long before Grenville lost the nickname 
 of the Gentle Shepherd. 
 
 But the ministry had vexations still more 
 serious to endure. The hatred which the 
 Tories and Scots bore to Fox was implacable. 
 In a moment of extreme peril, they had con- 
 sented to put themselves under his guidance. 
 But the aversion with which they regarded 
 him broke forth as soon as the crisis seemed 
 to be over. Some of them attacked him 
 about the accounts of the Pay Office. Some 
 of them rudely interrupted him when speak- 
 ing, by laughter and ironical cheers. He 
 was naturally desirous to escape from so dis- 
 agreeable a situation, and demanded the 
 peerage which had been promised as the 
 reward of his services. 
 
 It was clear that there must be some 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 181 
 
 change in the composition of the ministry. 
 But scarcely any, even of those who, from 
 their situation, might be supposed to be in 
 all the secrets of the government, anticipated 
 what really took place. To the amazement 
 of the Parliament and the nation, it was 
 suddenly announced that Bute had resigned. 
 
 Twenty different explanations of this 
 strange step were suggested. Some attri- 
 buted it to profound design, and some to 
 sudden panic. Some said that the lampoons 
 of the opposition had driven the Earl from 
 the field ; some that he had taken office only 
 in order to bring the war to a close, and had 
 always meant to retire when that object had 
 been accomplished. He publicly assigned 
 ill health as his reason for quitting business, 
 and privately complained that he was not 
 cordially seconded by his colleagues, and that 
 Lord Mansfield, in particular, whom he had 
 himself brought into the cabinet, gave him 
 no support in the House of Peers. Mansfield 
 was, indeed, far too sagacious not to perceive 
 that Bute’s situation was one of great peril, 
 and far too timorous to thrust himself into 
 
182 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 peril for the sake of another. The proba- 
 bility, however, is that Bute’s conduct on this 
 occasion, like the conduct of most men on 
 most occasions, was determined by mixed 
 motives. We suspect that he was sick of 
 office ; for this is a feeling much more com- 
 mon among ministers than persons who see 
 public life from a distance are disposed to 
 believe ; and nothing could be more natural 
 than that this feeling should take possession 
 of the mind of Bute. In general, a statesman 
 climbs by slow degrees. Many laborious 
 years elapse before he reaches the topmost 
 pinnacle of preferment. In the earlier part 
 of his career, therefore, he is constantly lured 
 on by seeing something above him. During 
 his ascent he gradually becomes inured to 
 the annoyances which belong to a life of 
 ambition. By the time that he has attained 
 the highest point, he has become patient of 
 labour and callous to abuse. He is kept 
 constant to his vocation, in spite of all its 
 discomforts, at first by hope, and at last by 
 habit. It was not so with Bute. His whole 
 public life lasted little more than two years. 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 183 
 
 On the day on which he became a politician 
 he became a cabinet minister. In a few 
 months he was, both in name and in show, 
 chief of the administration. Greater than he 
 had been he could not be. If what he 
 already possessed was vanity and vexation of 
 spirit, no delusion remained to entice him on- 
 ward. He had been cloyed with the pleasures 
 of ambition before he had been seasoned to 
 its pains. His habits had not been such as 
 were likely to fortify his mind against obloquy 
 and public hatred. He had reached his forty- 
 eighth year in dignified ease, without know- 
 ing, by personal experience, what it was to 
 be ridiculed and slandered. All at once, 
 without any previous initiation, he had found 
 himself exposed to such a storm of invective 
 and satire as had never burst on the head 
 of any statesman. The emoluments of office 
 were now nothing to him ; for he had just 
 succeeded to a princely property by the 
 death of his father-in-law. All the honours 
 which could be bestowed on him he had 
 already secured. He had obtained the Garter 
 for himself, and a British peerage for his son. 
 
184 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 He seems also to have imagined that by 
 quitting the treasury he should escape from 
 danger and abuse without really resigning 
 power, and should still be able to exercise 
 in private supreme influence over the royal 
 mind. 
 
 Whatever may have been his motives, he 
 retired. Fox at the same time took refuge 
 in the House of Lords ; and George Grenville 
 became First Lord of the Treasury and 
 Chancellor of the Exchequer. 
 
 We believe that those who made this 
 arrangement fully intended that Grenville 
 should be a mere puppet in the hands of 
 Bute ; for Grenville was as yet very imper- 
 fectly known even to those who had observed 
 him long. He passed for a mere official 
 drudge ; and he had all the industry, the 
 minute accuracy, the formality, the tedious- 
 ness, which belong to the character. But 
 he had other qualities which had not yet 
 shown themselves, devouring ambition, daunt- 
 less courage, self - confidence amounting to 
 presumption, and a temper which could not 
 endure opposition. He was not disposed to 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 185 
 
 be anybody’s tool ; and he had no attach- 
 ment, political or personal, to Bute. The 
 two men had, indeed, nothing in common, 
 except a strong propensity towards harsh and 
 unpopular courses. Their principles were 
 fundamentally different. Bute was a Tory. 
 Grenville would have been very angry with 
 any person who should have denied his claim 
 to he a Whig. He was more prone to tyran- 
 nical measures than Bute ; but he loved 
 tyranny only when disguised under the forms 
 of constitutional liberty. He mixed up, after 
 a fashion then not very unusual, the theories 
 of the republicans of the seventeenth century 
 with the technical maxims of English law, 
 and thus succeeded in combining anarchical 
 speculation with arbitrary practice. The 
 voice of the people was the voice of God ; 
 but the only legitimate organ through which 
 the voice of the people could be uttered was 
 the Parliament. All power was from the 
 people ; but to the Parliament the whole 
 power of the people had been delegated. No 
 Oxonian divine had ever, even in the years 
 which immediately followed the Restoration, 
 
186 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 demanded for the King so abject, so un- 
 reasoning a homage, as Grenville, on what 
 he considered as the purest Whig principles, 
 demanded for the Parliament. As he wished 
 to see the Parliament despotic over the 
 nation, so he wished to see it also despotic 
 over the court. In his view the prime 
 minister, possessed of the confidence of the 
 House of Commons, ought to be Mayor of 
 the Palace. The King was a mere Childeric 
 or Chilperic, who might well think himself 
 lucky in being permitted to enjoy such hand- 
 some apartments at Saint James’s, and so 
 fine a park at Windsor. 
 
 Thus the opinions of Bute and those of 
 Grenville were diametrically opposed. Nor 
 was there any private friendship between the 
 two statesmen. Grenville’s nature was not 
 forgiving ; and he well remembered how, a 
 few months before, he had been compelled 
 to yield the lead of the House of Commons 
 to Fox. 
 
 We are inclined to think, on the whole, 
 that the worst administration which has 
 governed England since the Revolution was 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 187 
 
 that of George Grenville. His public acts 
 may be classed under two beads, outrages on 
 the liberty of the people, and outrages on the 
 dignity of the crown. 
 
 He began by making war on the press. 
 John Wilkes, member of Parliament for 
 Aylesbury, was singled out for persecution. 
 Wilkes had, till very lately, been known 
 chiefly as one of the most profane, licentious, 
 and agreeable rakes about town. He was a 
 man of taste, reading, and engaging manners. 
 His sprightly conversation was the delight 
 of green-rooms and taverns, and pleased even 
 grave hearers when he was sufficiently under 
 restraint to abstain from detailing the par- 
 ticulars of his amours, and from breaking 
 jests on the New Testament. His expensive 
 debaucheries forced him to have recourse to 
 the Jews. He was soon a ruined man, and 
 determined to try his chance as a political 
 adventurer. In parliament he did not suc- 
 ceed. His speaking, though pert, was feeble, 
 and by no means interested his hearers so 
 much as to make them forget his face, which 
 was so hideous that the caricaturists were 
 
188 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 forced, in their own despite, to flatter him. 
 As a writer, he made a better figure. He set 
 up a weekly paper, called the North Briton. 
 This journal, written with some pleasantry, 
 and great audacity and impudence, had a 
 considerable number of readers. Forty-four 
 numbers had been published when Bute 
 resigned ; and, though almost every number 
 had contained matter grossly libellous, no 
 prosecution had been instituted. The forty- 
 fifth number was innocent when compared 
 with the majority of those which had pre- 
 ceded it, and indeed contained nothing so 
 strong as may in our time be found daily 
 in the leading articles of the Times and 
 Morning Chronicle. But Grenville was now 
 at the head of affairs. A new spirit had 
 been infused into the administration. Auth- 
 ority was to be upheld. The government 
 was no longer to be braved with impunity. 
 Wilkes was arrested under a general war- 
 rant, conveyed to the Tower, and confined 
 there with circumstances of unusual severity. 
 His papers were seized, and carried to the 
 Secretary of State. These harsh and illegal 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 189 
 
 measures produced a violent outbreak of 
 popular rage, which was soon changed to 
 delight and exultation. The arrest was pro- 
 nounced unlawful by the Court of Common 
 Pleas, in which Chief Justice Pratt presided, 
 and the prisoner was discharged. This 
 victory over the government was celebrated 
 with enthusiasm both in London and in the 
 cider counties. 
 
 While the ministers were daily becoming 
 more odious to the nation, they were doing 
 their best to make themselves also odious to 
 the court. They gave the King plainly to 
 understand that they were determined not 
 to be Lord Bute’s creatures, and exacted a 
 promise that no secret adviser should have 
 access to the royal ear. They soon found 
 reason to suspect that this promise had not 
 been observed. They remonstrated in terms 
 less respectful than their master had been 
 accustomed to hear, and gave him a fortnight 
 to make his choice between his favourite and 
 his cabinet. 
 
 George the Third was greatly disturbed. 
 He had hut a few weeks before exulted in 
 
190 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 his deliverance from the yoke of the great 
 Whig connection. He had even declared 
 that his honour would not permit him ever 
 again to admit the members of that connec- 
 tion into his service. He now found that 
 he had only exchanged one set of masters 
 for another set still harsher and more im- 
 perious. In his distress he thought on Pitt. 
 From Pitt it was possible that better terms 
 might be obtained than either from Grenville, 
 or from the party of which Newcastle was 
 the head. 
 
 Grenville, on his return from an excursion 
 into the country, repaired to Buckingham 
 House. He was astonished to find at the 
 entrance a chair, the shape of which was well 
 known to him, and indeed to all London. It 
 was distinguished by a large boot, made for 
 the purpose of accommodating the great 
 Commoner’s gouty leg. Grenville guessed the 
 whole. His brother-in-law was closeted with 
 the King. Bute, provoked by what he consid- 
 ered as the unfriendly and ungrateful conduct 
 of his successors, had himself proposed that 
 Pitt should be summoned to the palace. 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 191 
 
 Pitt had two audiences on two successive 
 days. What passed at the first interview led 
 him to expect that the negotiation would be 
 brought to a satisfactory close ; but on the 
 morrow he found the King less complying. 
 The best account, indeed the only trust- 
 worthy account of the conference, is that 
 which was taken from Pitt’s own mouth 
 by Lord Hardwicke. It appears that Pitt 
 strongly represented the importance of con- 
 ciliating those chiefs of the Whig party who 
 had been so unhappy as to incur the royal 
 displeasure. They had, he said, been the 
 most constant friends of the House of 
 Hanover. Their power was great; they had 
 been long versed in public business. If they 
 were to be under sentence of exclusion, a 
 solid administration could not he formed. 
 His Majesty could not bear to think of 
 putting himself into the hands of those 
 whom he had recently chased from his court 
 with the strongest marks of anger. ‘ I am 
 sorry, Mr Pitt,’ he said, ‘but I see this will 
 not do. My honour is concerned. I must 
 support my honour.’ How his Majesty sue- 
 
192 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 ceeded in supporting his honour, we shall 
 soon see. 
 
 Pitt retired, and the King was reduced to 
 request the ministers, whom he had been on 
 the point of discarding, to remain in office. 
 During the two years which followed, Gren- 
 ville, now closely leagued with the Bedfords, 
 was the master of the court ; and a hard 
 master he proved. He knew that he was kept 
 in place only because there was no choice 
 except between himself and the Whigs. That, 
 under any circumstances, the Whigs would be 
 forgiven, he thought impossible. The late 
 attempt to get rid of him had roused his 
 resentment ; the failure of that attempt had 
 liberated him from all fear. He had never 
 been very courtly. He now began to hold 
 a language, to which, since the days of Cornet 
 Joyce and President Bradshaw, no English 
 King had been compelled to listen. 
 
 In one matter, indeed, Grenville, at the 
 expense of justice and liberty, gratified the 
 passions of the court while gratifying his 
 own. The persecution of Wilkes was eagerly 
 pressed. He had written a parody on Pope’s 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 193 
 
 Essay on Man, entitled the Essay on Woman, 
 and had appended to it notes, in ridicule 
 of Warburton’s famous Commentary. This 
 composition was exceedingly profligate, but 
 not more so, we think, than some of Pope’s 
 own works, the imitation of the second satire 
 of the first book of Horace, for example ; 
 and, to do Wilkes justice, he had not, like 
 Pope, given his ribaldry to the world. He 
 had merely printed at a private press a very 
 small number of copies, which he meant to 
 present to some of his boon companions, 
 whose morals were in no more danger of 
 being corrupted by a loose book than a negro 
 of being tanned by a warm sun. A tool of 
 the government, by giving a bribe to the 
 printer, procured a copy of this trash, and 
 placed it in the hands of the ministers. The 
 ministers resolved to visit Wilkes’s offence 
 against decorum with the utmost rigour of 
 the law. What share piety and respect for 
 morals had in dictating this resolution, our 
 readers may judge from the fact that no 
 person was more eager for bringing the 
 libertine poet to punishment than Lord 
 
 N 
 
194 
 
 . MACAULAY 
 
 March, afterwards Duke of Queensberry. On 
 the first day of the session of Parliament, the 
 book, thus disgracefully obtained, was laid 
 on the table of the Lords by the Earl of 
 Sandwich, whom the Duke of Bedford’s 
 interest had made Secretary of State. The 
 unfortunate author had not the slightest sus- 
 picion that his licentious poem had ever been 
 seen, except by his printer and by a few of 
 his dissipated companions, till it was pro- 
 duced in full Parliament. Though he was a 
 man of easy temper, averse from danger, and 
 not very susceptible of shame, the surprise, 
 the disgrace, the prospect of utter ruin, put 
 him beside himself. He picked a quarrel 
 with one of Lord Bute’s dependents, fought 
 a duel, was seriously wounded, and when 
 half recovered, fled to France. His enemies 
 had now their own way both in the Parlia- 
 ment and in the King’s Bench. He was cen- 
 sured, expelled from the House of Commons, 
 outlawed. His works were ordered to be 
 burned by the common hangman. Yet was 
 the multitude still true to him. In the minds 
 even of many moral and religious men, his 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 195 
 
 crime seemed light when compared with the 
 crime of his accusers. The conduct of Sand- 
 wich, in particular, excited universal disgust. 
 His own vices were notorious ; and, only a 
 fortnight before he laid the Essay on 
 Woman before the House of Lords, he had 
 been drinking and singing loose catches with 
 Wilkes at one of the most dissolute clubs in 
 London. Shortly after the meeting of Parlia- 
 ment, the Beggar’s Opera was acted at Covent 
 Garden Theatre. When Macheath uttered 
 the words — ‘That Jemmy Twitcher should 
 peach me I own surprised me,’ — pit, boxes, 
 and galleries, burst into a roar which seemed 
 likely to bring the roof down. From that 
 day Sandwich was universally known by the 
 nickname of Jemmy Twitcher. The cere- 
 mony of burning the North Briton was inter- 
 rupted by a riot. The constables were beaten ; 
 the paper was rescued ; and, instead of it, a 
 jack boot and a petticoat were committed to 
 the flames. Wilkes had instituted an action 
 for the seizure of his papers against the 
 Under-secretary of State. The jury gave a 
 thousand pounds damages. But neither these 
 
196 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 nor any other indications of public feeling 
 had power to move Grenville. He had the 
 Parliament with him : and, according to his 
 political creed, the sense of the nation was 
 to be collected from the Parliament alone. 
 
 Soon, however, he found reason to fear 
 that even the Parliament might fail him. On 
 the question of the legality of general war- 
 rants, the Opposition, having on its side all 
 sound principles, all constitutional authori- 
 ties, and the voice of the whole nation, 
 mustered in great force, and was joined by 
 many who did not ordinarily vote against the 
 government. On one occasion the ministry, 
 in a very full House, had a majority of only 
 fourteen votes. The storm, however, blew 
 over. The spirit of the Opposition, from 
 whatever cause, began to flag at the moment 
 when success seemed almost certain. The 
 session ended without any change. Pitt, 
 whose eloquence had shone with its usual 
 lustre in all the principal debates, and whose 
 popularity was greater than ever, was still a 
 private man. Grenville, detested alike by the 
 court and by the people, was still minister. 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 197 
 
 As soon as the Houses had risen, Gren- 
 ville took a step which proved, even more 
 signally than any of his past acts, how de- 
 spotic, how acrimonious, and how fearless 
 his nature was. Among the gentlemen not 
 ordinarily opposed to the government, who, on 
 the great constitutional question of general 
 warrants, had voted with the minority, was 
 Henry Conway, brother of the Earl of Hert- 
 ford, a brave soldier, a tolerable speaker, 
 and a well-meaning, though not a wise or 
 vigorous politician. He was now deprived 
 of his regiment, the merited reward of faith- 
 ful and gallant service in two wars. It was 
 confidently asserted that in this violent 
 measure the King heartily concurred. 
 
 But whatever pleasure the persecution 
 of Wilkes, or the dismissal of Conway, may 
 have given to the royal mind, it is certain 
 that his Majesty’s aversion to his ministers 
 increased day by day. Grenville was as 
 frugal of the public money as of his own, 
 and morosely refused to accede to the King’s 
 request, that a few thousand pounds might 
 be expended in buying some open fields to 
 
198 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 the west of the gardens of Buckingham 
 House. In consequence of this refusal, the 
 fields were soon covered with buildings, and 
 the King and Queen were overlooked in 
 their most private walks by the upper win- 
 dows of a hundred houses. Nor was this 
 the worst. Grenville was as liberal of words 
 as he was sparing of guineas. Instead of 
 explaining himself in that clear, concise, 
 and lively manner, which alone could win 
 the attention of a young mind new to 
 business, he spoke in the closet just as be 
 spoke in the House of Commons. When 
 he had harangued two hours, he looked at 
 his watch, as he had been in the habit of 
 looking at the clock opposite the Speaker’s 
 chair, apologised for the length of his dis- 
 course, and then went on for an hour more. 
 The members of the House of Commons 
 can cough an orator down, or can walk 
 away to dinner; and they were by no means 
 sparing in the use of these privileges when 
 Grenville was on his legs. But the poor 
 young King had to endure all this elo- 
 quence with mournful civility. To the end 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 199 
 
 of his life he continued to talk with horror 
 of Grenville’s orations. 
 
 About this time took place one of the 
 most singular events in Pitt’s life. There 
 was a certain Sir William Pynsent, a Somer- 
 setshire baronet of Whig politics, who had 
 been a Member of the House of Commons 
 in the days of Queen Anne, and had retired 
 to rural privacy when the Tory party, to- 
 wards the end of her reign, obtained the 
 ascendency in her councils. His manners 
 were eccentric. His morals lay under very 
 odious imputations. But his fidelity to his 
 political opinions was unalterable. During 
 fifty years of seclusion he continued to brood 
 over the circumstances which had driven 
 him from public life, the dismissal of the 
 Whigs, the peace of Utrecht, the desertion 
 of our allies. He now thought that he per- 
 ceived a close analogy between the well 
 remembered events of his youth and the 
 events which he had witnessed in extreme 
 old age ; between the disgrace of Marl- 
 borough and the disgrace of Pitt ; between 
 the elevation of Harley and the elevation 
 
200 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 of Bute ; between the treaty negotiated by 
 St John and the treaty negotiated by Bed- 
 ford ; between the wrongs of the House of 
 Austria in 1712 and the wrongs of the 
 House of Brandenburgh in 1762. This fancy 
 took such possession of the old man’s mind 
 that he determined to leave his whole pro- 
 perty to Pitt. In this way, Pitt unex- 
 pectedly came into possession of near three 
 thousand pounds a year. Nor could all the 
 malice of his enemies find any ground for 
 reproach in the transaction. Nobody could 
 call him a legacy hunter. Nobody could 
 accuse him of seizing that to which others 
 had a better claim. For he had never in 
 his life seen Sir William ; and Sir William 
 had left no relation so near as to be en- 
 titled to form any expectations respecting 
 the estate. 
 
 The fortunes of Pitt seemed to flourish ; 
 but his health was worse than ever. We 
 cannot find that, during the session which 
 began in January 1765, he once appeared in 
 parliament. He remained some months in 
 profound retirement at Hayes, his favourite 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 201 
 
 villa, scarcely moving except from his arm- 
 chair to his bed, and from his bed to his 
 armchair, and often employing his wife as 
 his amanuensis in his most confidential 
 correspondence. Some of his detractors 
 whispered that his invisibility was to be 
 ascribed quite as much to affectation as 
 to gout. In truth his character, high and 
 splendid as it was, wanted simplicity. With 
 genius which did not need the aid of stage 
 tricks, and with a spirit which should have 
 been far above them, he had yet been, 
 through life, in the habit of practising them. 
 It was, therefore, now surmised that, having 
 acquired all the consideration which could 
 be derived from eloquence and from great 
 services to the state, he had determined 
 not to make himself cheap by often appear- 
 ing in public, but, under the pretext of 
 ill-health, to surround himself with mystery, 
 to emerge only at long intervals and on 
 momentous occasions, and at other times 
 to deliver his oracles only to a few favoured 
 votaries, who were suffered to make pilgrim- 
 ages to his shrine. If such were his object, 
 
202 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 it was for a time fully attained. Never was 
 the magic of his name so powerful, never 
 was he regarded by his country with such 
 superstitious veneration, as during this year 
 of silence and seclusion. 
 
 AVhile Pitt was thus absent from Parlia- 
 ment, Grenville proposed a measure destined 
 to produce a great revolution, the effects of 
 which will long be felt by the whole human 
 race. We speak of the act for imposing 
 stamp duties on the North American colonies. 
 The plan was eminently characteristic of its 
 author. Every feature of the parent was 
 found in the child. A timid statesman 
 would have shrunk from a step, of which 
 Walpole, at a time when the colonies were 
 far less powerful, had said — ‘ He who shall 
 propose it will be a much bolder man than 
 I.’ But the nature of Grenville was in- 
 sensible to fear. A statesman of large views 
 would have felt that to lay taxes at West- 
 minster on New England and New York, 
 was a course opposed, not indeed to the 
 letter of the Statute Book, or to any 
 decision contained in the Term Reports, 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 203 
 
 but to the principles of good government, 
 and to the spirit of the constitution. A 
 statesman of large views would also have 
 felt that ten times the estimated produce 
 of the American stamps would have been 
 dearly purchased by even a transient quarrel 
 between the mother country and the colonies. 
 But Grenville knew of no spirit of the con- 
 stitution distinct from the letter of the law, 
 and of no national interests except those 
 which are expressed by pounds, shillings, 
 and pence. That his policy might give 
 birth to deep discontents in all the pro- 
 vinces, from the shore of the Great Lakes 
 to the Mexican sea ; that France and Spain 
 might seize the opportunity of revenge ; that 
 the empire might be dismembered ; that the 
 debt, that debt with the amount of which 
 lie perpetually reproached Pitt, might, in 
 consequence of his own policy, be doubled ; 
 these were possibilities which never occurred 
 to that small, sharp mind. 
 
 The Stamp Act will be remembered as 
 long as the globe lasts. But, at the time, 
 it attracted much less notice in this country 
 
204 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 than another Act which is now almost 
 utterly forgotten. The King fell ill, and was 
 thought to be in a dangerous state. His 
 complaint, we believe, was the same which, at 
 a later period, repeatedly incapacitated him 
 for the performance of his regal functions. 
 The heir apparent was only two years old. 
 It was clearly proper to make provision 
 for the administration of the government, 
 in case of a minority. The discussions on 
 this point brought the quarrel between the 
 court and the ministry to a crisis. The King 
 wished to be intrusted with the power of nam- 
 ing a regent by will. The ministers feared, or 
 affected to fear, that, if this power were con- 
 ceded to him, he would name the Princess 
 Mother, nay, possibly the Earl of Bute. They, 
 therefore, insisted on introducing into the bill 
 words confining the King’s choice to the royal 
 family. Having thus excluded Bute, they 
 urged the King to let them, in a most marked 
 manner, exclude the Princess Dowager also. 
 They assured him that the House of Commons 
 would undoubtedly strike her name out, and 
 by this threat they wrung from him a reluctant 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 205 
 
 assent. In a few days, it appeared that the 
 representations by which they had induced the 
 King to put this gross and public affront on his 
 mother were unfounded. The friends of the 
 Princess in the House of Commons moved that 
 her name should be inserted. The ministers 
 could not decently attack the parent of their 
 master. They hoped that the Opposition would 
 come to their help, and put on them a force to 
 which they would gladly have yielded. But 
 the majority of the Opposition, though hating 
 the Princess, hated Grenville more, beheld his 
 embarrassment with delight, and would do 
 nothing to extricate him from it. The Prin- 
 cess’s name was accordingly placed in the list 
 of persons qualified to hold the regency. 
 
 The King’s resentment was now at the 
 height. The present evil seemed to him 
 more intolerable than any other. Even the 
 junta of Whig grandees could not treat him 
 worse than he had been treated by his present 
 ministers. In his distress, he poured out his 
 whole heart to his uncle, the Duke of Cum- 
 berland. The Duke was not a man to be 
 loved ; but he was eminently a man to be 
 
206 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 trusted. He had an intrepid temper, a strong 
 understanding, and a high sense of honour 
 and duty. As a general, he belonged to a 
 remarkable class of captains, captains, we 
 mean, whose fate it has been to lose almost 
 all the battles which they have fought, and 
 yet to be reputed stout and skilful soldiers. 
 Such captains were Coligni and William the 
 Third. We might, perhaps, add Marshal 
 Soult to the list. The bravery of the Duke 
 of Cumberland was such as distinguished him 
 even among the princes of his brave house. 
 The indifference with which he rode about 
 amidst musket balls and cannon balls was 
 not the highest proof of his fortitude. Hope- 
 less maladies, horrible surgical operations, far 
 from unmanning him, did not even discom- 
 pose him. With courage, he had the virtues 
 which are akin to courage. He spoke the 
 truth, was open in enmity and friendship, 
 and upright in all his dealings. But his 
 nature was hard ; and what seemed to him 
 justice was rarely tempered with mercy. He 
 was, therefore, during many years one of the 
 most unpopular men in England. The severity 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 207 
 
 with which he had treated the rebels after 
 the battle of Culloden, had gained for him 
 the name of the Butcher. His attempts to 
 introduce into the army of England, then in 
 a most disorderly state, the rigorous discipline 
 of Potsdam, had excited still stronger disgust. 
 Nothing was too bad to be believed of him. 
 Many honest people were so absurd as to 
 fancy that, if he were left Regent during the 
 minority of his nephews, there would be 
 another smothering in the Tower. These 
 feelings, however, had passed away. The 
 Duke had been living, during some years, 
 in retirement. The English, full of animos- 
 ity against the Scots, now blamed his Royal 
 Highness only for having left so many 
 Camerons and Macphersons to be made 
 gaugers and customhouse officers. He was, 
 therefore, at present, a favourite with his 
 countrymen, and especially with the inhabi- 
 tants of London. 
 
 He had little reason to love the King, 
 and had shown clearly, though not obtru- 
 sively, his dislike of the system which had 
 lately been pursued. But he had high and 
 
208 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 almost romantic notions of the duty which, as 
 a prince of the blood, he owed to the head 
 of his house. He determined to extricate 
 his nephew from bondage, and to effect a 
 reconciliation between the Whig party and 
 the throne, on terms honourable to both. 
 
 In this mind he set off for Hayes, and 
 was admitted to Pitt’s sick-room ; for Pitt 
 would not leave his chamber, and would not 
 communicate with any messenger of in- 
 ferior dignity. And now began a long series 
 of errors on the part of the illustrious states- 
 man, errors which involved his country in 
 difficulties and distresses more serious even 
 than those from which his genius had formerly 
 rescued her. His language was haughty, un- 
 reasonable, almost unintelligible. The only 
 thing which could be discerned through a 
 cloud of vague and not very gracious phrases, 
 was that he would not at that moment take 
 office. The truth, we believe, was this. Loi’d 
 Temple, who was Pitt’s evil genius, had just 
 formed a new scheme of politics. Hatred of 
 Bute and of the Princess had, it should seem, 
 taken entire possession of Temple’s soul. He 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 209 
 
 had quarrelled with his brother George, be- 
 cause George had been connected with Bute 
 and the Princess. Now that George appeared 
 to be the enemy of Bute and of the Princess, 
 Temple was eager to bring about a general 
 family reconciliation. The three brothers, as 
 Temple, Grenville, and Pitt were popularly 
 called, might make a ministry, without leaning 
 for aid either on Bute or on the Whig connec- 
 tion. With such views, Temple used all his 
 influence to dissuade Pitt from acceding to 
 the propositions of the Duke of Cumberland. 
 Pitt was not convinced. But Temple had an 
 influence over him such as no other person had 
 ever possessed. They were very old friends, 
 very near relations. If Pitt’s talents and fame 
 had been useful to Temple, Temple’s purse had 
 formerly, in times of great need, been useful 
 to Pitt. They had never been parted in poli- 
 tics. Twice they had come into the cabinet 
 together ; twice they had left it together. Pitt 
 could not bear to think of taking office without 
 his chief ally. Yet he felt that he was doing 
 wrong, that he was throwing away a great 
 opportunity of serving his country. The ob- 
 o 
 
210 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 scure and unconciliatory style of the answers 
 which he returned to the overtures of the 
 Duke of Cumberland, may be ascribed to the 
 embarrassment and vexation of a mind not at 
 peace with itself. It is said that he mournfully 
 exclaimed to Temple, 
 
 ‘ Extinxti te meque, soror, populumque, 
 patresque 
 
 Sidonios, urbemque tuam.’ 
 
 The prediction was but too just. 
 
 Finding Pitt impracticable, the Duke of 
 Cumberland advised the King to submit to 
 necessity, and to keep Grenville and the 
 Bedfords. It was, indeed, not a time at which 
 offices could safely be left vacant. The un- 
 settled state of the government had produced 
 a general relaxation through all the depart- 
 ments of the public service. Meetings, which 
 at another time would have been harmless, 
 now turned to riots, and rapidly rose almost 
 to the dignity of rebellions. The Houses of 
 Parliament were blockaded by the Spitalfields 
 weavers. Bedford House was assailed on all 
 sides by a furious rabble, and was strongly 
 garrisoned with horse and foot. Some people 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 211 
 
 attributed these disturbances to the friends of 
 Bute, and some to the friends of Wilkes. But, 
 whatever might be the cause, the effect was 
 general insecurity. Under such circumstances 
 the King had no choice. With bitter feelings 
 of mortification, he informed the ministers that 
 he meant to retain them. 
 
 They answered by demanding from him a 
 promise on his royal word never more to 
 consult Lord Bute. The promise was given. 
 They then demanded something more. Lord 
 Bute’s brother, Mr Mackenzie, held a lucrative 
 office in Scotland. Mr Mackenzie must be dis- 
 missed. The King replied that the office had 
 been given under very peculiar circumstances, 
 and that he had promised never to take it 
 away while he lived. Grenville was obstin- 
 ate ; and the King, with a very bad grace, 
 yielded. 
 
 The session of Parliament was over. The 
 triumph of the ministers was complete. The 
 King was almost as much a prisoner as Charles 
 the First had been, when in the Isle of Wight. 
 Such were the fruits of the policy which, only a 
 few months before, was represented as having 
 
212 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 for ever secured the throne against the dicta- 
 tion of insolent subjects. 
 
 His Majesty’s natural resentment showed 
 itself in every look and word. In his extremity 
 he looked wistfully towards that Whig connec- 
 tion, once the object of his dread and hatred. 
 The Duke of Devonshire, who had been 
 treated with such unjustifiable harshness, had 
 lately died, and had been succeeded by his 
 son, who was still a boy. The King conde- 
 scended to express regret for what had passed, 
 and to invite the young Duke to court. The 
 noble youth came, attended by his uncles, and 
 was received with marked graciousness. 
 
 This and many other symptoms of the same 
 kind irritated the ministers. They had still 
 in store for their sovereign an insult which 
 would have provoked his grandfather to kick 
 them out of the room. Grenville and Bedford 
 demanded an audience of him, and read him 
 a remonstrance of many pages, which they had 
 drawn up with great care. His Majesty was 
 accused of breaking his word, and of treating 
 his advisers with gross unfairness. The Prin- 
 cess was mentioned in language by no means 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 213 
 
 eulogistic. Hints were thrown out that Bute’s 
 head was in danger. The King was plainly 
 told that he must not continue to show, as he 
 had done, that he disliked the situation in 
 which he was placed, that he must frown upon 
 the Opposition, that he must carry it fair to- 
 wards his ministers in public. He several 
 times interrupted the reading, by declaring that 
 he had ceased to hold any communication with 
 Bute. But the ministers, disregarding his 
 denial, went on ; and the King listened in 
 silence, almost choked by rage. When they 
 ceased to read, he merely made a gesture 
 expressive of his wish to be left alone. He 
 afterwards owned that he thought he should 
 have gone into a fit. 
 
 Driven to despair, he again had recourse 
 to the Duke of Cumberland ; and the Duke 
 of Cumberland again had recourse to Pitt. 
 Pitt was really desirous to undertake the 
 direction of affairs, and owned, with many 
 dutiful expressions, that the terms offered by 
 the King were all that any subject could 
 desire. But Temple was impracticable ; and 
 Pitt, with great regret, declared that he could 
 
214 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 not, without the concurrence of his brother- 
 in-law, undertake the administration. 
 
 The Duke now saw only one way of deliver- 
 ing his nephew. An administration must be 
 formed of the Whigs in opposition, without 
 Pitt’s helj). The difficulties seemed almost 
 insuperable. Death and desertion had griev- 
 ously thinned the ranks of the party lately 
 supreme in the state. Those among whom the 
 Duke’s choice lay might be divided into two 
 classes, men too old for important offices, and 
 men who had never been in any important 
 office before. The cabinet must be composed 
 of broken invalids or of raw recruits. 
 
 This was an evil, yet not an unmixed evil. 
 If the new Whig statesmen had little experi- 
 ence in business and debate, they were, on 
 the other hand, pure from the taint of that 
 political immorality which had deeply infected 
 their predecessors. Long prosperity had cor- 
 rupted that great party which had expelled 
 the Stuarts, limited the prerogatives of the 
 Crown, and curbed the intolerance of the 
 Hierarchy. Adversity had already produced 
 a salutary effect. On the day of the accession 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 215 
 
 of George the Third, the ascendency of the 
 Whig party terminated ; and on that day the 
 purification of the Whig party began. The 
 rising chiefs of that party were men of a very 
 different sort from Sandys and Wilmington, 
 from Sir William Yonge and Henry Fox. They 
 were men worthy to have charged by the side 
 of Hampden at Chalgrove, or to have ex- 
 changed the last embrace with Russell on the 
 scaffold in Lincoln’s Inn Fields. They carried 
 into politics the same high principles of virtue 
 which regulated their private dealings, nor 
 would they stoop to promote even the noblest 
 and most salutary ends by means which honour 
 and probity condemn. Such men were Lord 
 John Cavendish, Sir George Savile, and others 
 whom we hold in honour as the second 
 founders of the Whig party, as the restorers 
 of its pristine health and energy after half-a- 
 century of degeneracy. 
 
 The chief of this respectable band was the 
 Marquess of Rockingham, a man of splendid 
 fortune, excellent sense, and stainless char- 
 acter. He was indeed nervous to such a 
 degree that, to the very close of his life, he 
 
216 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 never rose without great reluctance and em- 
 barrassment to address the House of Lords. 
 But, though not a great orator, he had in a 
 high degree some of the qualities of a states- 
 man. He chose his friends well ; and he had, 
 in an extraordinary degree, the art of attaching 
 them to him by ties of the most honourable 
 kind. The cheerful fidelity with which they 
 adhered to him through many years of almost 
 hopeless opposition was less admirable than 
 the disinterestedness and delicacy which they 
 showed when he rose to power. 
 
 We are inclined to think that the use and 
 the abuse of party cannot be better illustrated 
 than by a parallel between two powerful con- 
 nections of that time, the Rockinghams and 
 the Bedfords. The Rockingham party was, in 
 our view, exactly what a party should be. It 
 consisted of men bound together by common 
 opinions, by common public objects, by mutual 
 esteem. That they desired to obtain, by 
 honest and constitutional means, the direction 
 of affairs they openly avowed. But, though 
 often invited to accept the honours and emolu- 
 ments of office, they steadily refused to do so 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 217 
 
 on any conditions inconsistent with their prin- 
 ciples. The Bedford party, as a party, had, 
 as far as we can discover, no principle what- 
 ever. Rigby and Sandwich wanted public 
 money, and thought that they should fetch a 
 higher price jointly than singly. They there- 
 fore acted in concert, and prevailed on a much 
 more important and a much better man than 
 themselves to act with them. 
 
 It was to Rockingham that the Duke of 
 Cumberland now had recourse. The Marquess 
 consented to take the treasury. Newcastle, 
 so long the recognised chief of the Whigs, 
 could not well be excluded from the ministry. 
 He was appointed keeper of the privy seal. 
 A very honest cleai'-headed coxxntry gentleman, 
 of the name of Dowdeswell, became Chancellor 
 of the Exchequei 1 . General Conway, who had 
 served under the Duke of Cumberland, and 
 was strongly attached to his royal highness, 
 was made Secx'etary of State, with the lead iix 
 the House of Comnxoxxs. A great Whig xxoble- 
 nxan, iix the prime of manhood, from whom 
 much was at that time expected, Augustus 
 Duke of Grafton, was the other Secretary. 
 
218 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 The oldest man living could remember no 
 government so weak in oratorical talents and 
 in official experience. The general opinion 
 was, that the ministers might hold office during 
 the recess, but that the first day of debate in 
 Parliament would be the last day of their 
 power. Charles Townshend was asked what 
 he thought of the new administration. ‘It is,’ 
 said he, ‘mere lutestring; pretty summer wear. 
 It will never do for the winter.’ 
 
 At this conjuncture Lord Rockingham had 
 the wisdom to discern the value, and secure 
 the aid, of an ally, who, to eloquence sur- 
 passing the eloquence of Pitt, and to in- 
 dustry which shamed the industry of Grenville, 
 united an amplitude of comprehension to 
 which neither Pitt nor Grenville could lay 
 claim. A young Irishman had, some time 
 before, come over to push his fortune in 
 London. He had written much for the book- 
 sellers ; but he was best known by a little 
 treatise, in which the style and reasoning of 
 Bolingbroke were mimicked with exquisite 
 skill, and by a theory, of more ingenuity than 
 soundness, touching the pleasures which we 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 219 
 
 receive from the objects of taste. He had 
 also attained a high reputation as a talker, 
 and was regarded by the men of letters who 
 supped together at the Turk’s Head as the 
 only match in conversation for Dr Johnson. 
 He now became private secretary to Lord 
 Rockingham, and was brought into Parlia- 
 ment by his patron’s influence. These arrange- 
 ments, indeed, were not made without some 
 difficulty. The Duke of Newcastle, who was 
 always meddling and chattering, adjured the 
 first lord of the treasury to be on his guard 
 against this adventurer, whose real name was 
 O’Bourke, and whom his grace knew to be a 
 wild Irishman, a Jacobite, a Papist, a con- 
 cealed Jesuit. Lord Rockingham treated the 
 calumny as it deserved ; and the Whig party 
 was strengthened and adorned by the acces- 
 sion of Edmund Burke. 
 
 The party, indeed, stood in need of acces- 
 sions ; for it sustained about this time an 
 almost irreparable loss. The Duke of Cum- 
 berland had formed the government, and was 
 its main support. His exalted rank and great 
 name in some degree balanced the fame of 
 
220 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 Pitt. As mediator between the Whigs and 
 the Court, he held a place which no other per- 
 son could fill. The strength of his character 
 supplied that which was the chief defect of 
 the new ministry. Conway, in particular, 
 who, with excellent intentions and respectable 
 talents, was the most dependent and irresolute 
 of human beings, drew from the counsels of 
 that masculine mind a determination not his 
 own. Before the meeting of Parliament the 
 Duke suddenly died. His death was generally 
 regarded as the signal of great troubles, and on 
 this account, as well as from respect for his per- 
 sonal qualities, was greatly lamented. It was re- 
 marked that the mourning in London was the 
 most general ever known, and was both deeper 
 and longer than the Gazette had prescribed. 
 
 In the meantime, every mail from America 
 brought alarming tidings. The crop which 
 Grenville had sown his successors had now to 
 reap. The colonies were in a state bordering 
 on rebellion. The stamps were burned. The 
 revenue officers were tarred and feathered. 
 All traffic between the discontented provinces 
 and the mother country was interrupted. The 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 221 
 
 Exchange of London was in dismay. Half the 
 firms of Bristol and Liverpool were threatened 
 with bankruptcy. In Leeds, Manchester, Not- 
 tingham, it was said that three artisans out of 
 every ten had been turned adrift. Civil war 
 seemed to be at hand ; and it could not be 
 doubted that, if once the British nation were 
 divided against itself, France and Spain would 
 soon take part in the quarrel. 
 
 Three courses were open to the ministers. 
 The first was to enforce the Stamp Act by the 
 sword. This was the course on which the 
 King, and Grenville, whom the King hated 
 beyond all living men, were alike bent. The 
 natures of both were arbitrary and stubborn. 
 They resembled each other so much that they 
 could never be friends ; but they resembled 
 each other also so much that they saw almost 
 all important practical questions in the same 
 point of view. Neither of them would bear to 
 be governed by the other ; but they were per- 
 fectly agreed as to the best way of governing 
 the people. 
 
 Another course was that which Pitt recom- 
 mended. He held that the British Parliament 
 
222 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 was not constitutionally competent to pass a 
 law for taxing the colonies. He therefore con- 
 sidered the Stamp Act as a nullity, as a docu- 
 ment of no more validity than Charles’s writ of 
 shipmoney, or James’s proclamation dispensing 
 with the penal laws. This doctrine seems to 
 us, we must own, to be altogether untenable. 
 
 Between these extreme courses lay a third 
 way. The opinion of the most judicious and 
 temperate statesmen of those times was that 
 the British constitution had set no limit what- 
 ever to the legislative power of the British 
 King, Lords, and Commons, over the whole 
 British Empire. Parliament, they held, was 
 legally competent to tax America, as Parlia- 
 ment was legally competent to commit any 
 other act of folly or wickedness, to confiscate 
 the property of all the merchants in Lombard 
 Street, or to attaint any man in the kingdom 
 of high treason, without examining witnesses 
 against him, or hearing him in his own defence. 
 The most atrocious act of confiscation or of 
 attainder is just as valid an act as the Tolera- 
 tion Act or the Habeas Corpus Act. But from 
 acts of confiscation and acts of attainder law- 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 223 
 
 givers are bound, by every obligation of mor- 
 ality, systematically to refrain. In the same 
 manner ought the British legislature to refrain 
 from taxing the American colonies. The Stamp 
 Act was indefensible, not because it was beyond 
 the constitutional competence of Parliament, 
 but because it was unjust and impolitic, sterile 
 of revenue, and fertile of discontents. These 
 sound doctrines were adopted by Lord Rock- 
 ingham and his colleagues, and were, during a 
 long course of years, inculcated by Burke, in 
 orations, some of which will last as long as the 
 English language. 
 
 The winter came ; the Parliament met ; 
 and the state of the colonies instantly became 
 the subject of fierce contention. Pitt, whose 
 health had been somewhat restored by the 
 waters of Bath, reappeared in the House of 
 Commons, and, with ardent and pathetic 
 eloquence, not only condemned the Stamp 
 Act, but applauded the resistance of Massa- 
 chusetts and Virginia, and vehemently main- 
 tained, in defiance, we must say, of all reason 
 and of all authority, that, according to the 
 British constitution, the supreme legislative 
 
224 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 power does not include the power to tax. The 
 language of Grenville, on the other hand, was 
 such as Strafford might have used at the 
 council table of Charles the First, when news 
 came of the resistance to the liturgy at Edin- 
 burgh. The colonists were traitors ; those 
 who excused them were little better. Frigates, 
 mortars, bayonets, sabres, were the proper 
 remedies for such distempers. 
 
 The ministers occupied an intermediate 
 position ; they proposed to declare that the 
 legislative authority of the British Parlia- 
 ment over the whole Empire was in all cases 
 supreme ; and they proposed, at the same 
 time, to repeal the Stamp Act. To the former 
 measure Pitt objected ; but it was carried with 
 scarcely a dissentient voice. The repeal of 
 the Stamp Act Pitt strongly supported ; but 
 against the Government was arrayed a formid- 
 able assemblage of opponents. Grenville and 
 the Bedfords were furious. Temple, who had 
 now allied himself closely with his brother, 
 and separated himself from Pitt, was no des- 
 picable enemy. This, however, was not the 
 worst. The ministry was without its natural 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 225 
 
 strength. It had to struggle, not only against 
 its avowed enemies, but against the insidious 
 hostility of the King, and of a set of persons 
 who, about this time, began to be designated 
 as the King’s friends. 
 
 The character of this faction has been 
 drawn by Burke with even more than his 
 usual force and vivacity. Those who know 
 how strongly, through his whole life, his judg- 
 ment was biassed by his passions, may not 
 unnaturally suspect that he has left us rather 
 a caricature than a likeness ; and yet there is 
 scarcely, in the whole portrait, a single touch 
 of which the fidelity is not proved by facts of 
 unquestionable authenticity. 
 
 The public generally regarded the King’s 
 friends as a body of which Bute was the direct- 
 ing soul. It was to no purpose that the Earl 
 professed to have done with politics, that he 
 absented himself year after year from the levee 
 and the drawing-room, that he went to the 
 north, that he went to Rome. The notion 
 that, in some inexplicable manner, he dictated 
 all the measures of the court, was fixed in the 
 minds, not only of the multitude, but of some 
 
22G 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 who had good opportunities of obtaining infor- 
 mation, and who ought to have been superior 
 to vulgar prejudices. Our own belief is that 
 these suspicions were unfounded, and that he 
 ceased to have any communication with the 
 King on political matters some time before 
 the dismissal of George Grenville. The sup- 
 position of Bute’s influence is, indeed, by no 
 means necessary to explain the phenomena. 
 The King, in 1765, was no longer the ignorant 
 and inexperienced boy who had, in 1760, been 
 managed by his mother and his Groom of the 
 Stole. He had, during several years, observed 
 the struggles of parties, and conferred daily 
 on high questions of state with able and ex- 
 perienced politicians. His way of life had 
 developed his understanding and character. 
 He was now no longer a puppet, but had 
 very decided opinions both of men and things. 
 Nothing could be more natural than that he 
 should have high notions of his own preroga- 
 tives, should be impatient of opposition, and 
 should wish all public men to be detached 
 from each other and dependent on himself 
 alone ; nor could anything be more natural 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 227 
 
 than that, in the state in which the political 
 world then was, he should find instruments fit 
 for his purposes. 
 
 Thus sprang into existence and into note 
 a reptile species of politicians never before 
 and never since known in our country. These 
 men disclaimed all political ties, except those 
 which bound them to the throne. They were 
 willing to coalesce with any party, to abandon 
 any party, to undermine any party, to assault 
 any party, at a moment’s notice. To them, 
 all administrations, and all oppositions were 
 the same. They regarded Bute, Grenville, 
 Rockingham, Pitt, without one sentiment 
 either of predilection or of aversion. They 
 were the King’s friends. It is to be observed 
 that this friendship implied no personal in- 
 timacy. These people had never lived with 
 their master as Dodington at one time lived 
 with his father, or as Sheridan afterwards 
 lived with his son. They never hunted with 
 him in the morning, or played cards with him 
 in the evening, never shared his mutton or 
 walked with him among his turnips. Only 
 one or two of them ever saw his face, except 
 
228 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 on public days. The whole hand, however, 
 always had early and accurate information as 
 to his personal inclinations. These people 
 were never high in the administration. They 
 were generally to be found in places of much 
 emolument, little labour, and no responsibility ; 
 and these places they continued to occupy 
 securely while the cabinet was six or seven 
 times reconstructed. Their peculiar business 
 was not to support the ministry against the 
 opposition, but to support the King against 
 the ministry. Whenever his Majesty was 
 induced to give a reluctant assent to the in- 
 troduction of some bill which his constitu- 
 tional advisers regarded as necessary, his 
 friends in the House of Commons were sure 
 to speak against it, to vote against it, to throw 
 in its way every obstruction compatible with 
 the forms of Parliament. If his Majesty found 
 it necessary to admit into his closet a Secre- 
 tary of State or a First Lord of the Treasury 
 whom he disliked, his friends were sure to 
 miss no opportunity of thwarting and hum- 
 bling the obnoxious minister. In return for 
 these services, the King covered them with 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 229 
 
 his protection. It was to no purpose that 
 his responsible servants complained to him 
 that they were daily betrayed and impeded 
 by men who were eating the bread of the 
 government. He sometimes justified the 
 offenders, sometimes excused them, some- 
 times owned that they were to blame, but 
 said that he must take time to consider 
 whether he could part with them. He never 
 would turn them out ; and, while everything 
 else in the state was constantly changing, 
 these sycophants seemed to have a life estate 
 in their offices. 
 
 It was well known to the King’s friends 
 that, though his Majesty had consented to the 
 repeal of the Stamp Act, he had consented 
 with a very bad grace, and that though he had 
 eagerly welcomed the Whigs, when, in his ex- 
 treme need and at his earnest entreaty, they 
 had undertaken to free him from an insupport- 
 able yoke, he had by no means got over his 
 early prejudices against his deliverers. The 
 ministers soon found that, while they were 
 encountered in front by the whole force of 
 a strong opposition, their rear was assailed by 
 
230 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 a large body of those whom they had regarded 
 as auxiliaries. 
 
 Nevertheless, Lord Rockingham and his 
 adherents went on resolutely with the bill for 
 repealing the Stamp Act. They had on their 
 side all the manufacturing and commercial 
 interests of the realm. In the debates the 
 government was powerfully supported. Two 
 great orators and statesmen, belonging to two 
 different generations, repeatedly put forth all 
 their powers in defence of the bill. The House 
 of Commons heard Pitt for the last time, and 
 Burke for the first time, and was in doubt to 
 which of them the palm of eloquence should 
 be assigned. It was indeed a splendid sunset 
 and a splendid dawn. 
 
 For a time the event seemed doubtful. 
 In several divisions the ministers were hard 
 pressed. On one occasion, not less than twelve 
 of the King’s friends, all men in office, voted 
 against the government. It was to no purpose 
 that Lord Rockingham remonstrated with the 
 King. His Majesty confessed that there was 
 ground for complaint, but hoped that gentle 
 means would bring the mutineers to a better 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 231 
 
 mind. If they persisted in their misconduct, 
 he would dismiss them. 
 
 At length the decisive day arrived. The 
 gallery, the lobby, the Court of Requests, the 
 staircases, were crowded with merchants from 
 all the great ports of the island. The debate 
 lasted till long after midnight. On the divi- 
 sion the ministers had a great majority. The 
 dread of civil war, and the outcry of all the 
 trading towns of the kingdom, had been too 
 strong for the combined strength of the court 
 and the opposition. 
 
 It was in the first dim twilight of a February 
 morning that the doors were thrown open, and 
 that the chiefs of the hostile parties showed 
 themselves to the multitude. ■ Conway was re- 
 ceived with loud applause. But, when Pitt 
 appeared, all eyes were fixed on him alone. 
 All hats were in the air. Loud and long 
 huzzas accompanied him to his chair, and a 
 train of admirers escorted him all the way to 
 his home. Then came forth Grenville. As 
 soon as he was recognised, a storm of hisses 
 and curses broke forth. He turned fiercely 
 on the crowd, and caught one man by the 
 
232 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 throat. The bystanders were in great alarm. 
 If a scuffle began, none could say how it might 
 end. Fortunately the person who had been 
 collared only said, ‘ If I may not hiss, sir, I 
 hope I may laugh,’ and laughed in Grenville’s 
 face. 
 
 The majority had been so decisive, that all 
 the opponents of the ministry, save one, were 
 disposed to let the bill pass without any further 
 contention. But solicitation and expostulation 
 were thrown away on Grenville. His indomit- 
 able spirit rose up stronger and stronger under 
 the load of public hatred. He fought out the 
 battle obstinately to the end. On the last 
 reading he had a sharp altercation with his 
 brother-in-law, the last of their many sharp 
 altercations. Pitt thundered in his loftiest 
 tones against the man who had wished to dip 
 the ermine of a British King in the blood of 
 the British people. Grenville replied with his 
 wonted intrepidity and asperity. * If the tax,’ 
 he said, ‘ were still to be laid on, I would lay it 
 on. For the evils which it may produce my 
 accuser is answerable. His profusion made it 
 necessary. His declarations against the con- 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 233 
 
 stitutional powers of Kings, Lords, and Com- 
 mons, have made it doubly necessary. I do 
 not envy him the huzza. I glory in the hiss. 
 If it were to be done again, I would do it.’ 
 
 The repeal of the Stamp Act was the chief 
 measure of Lord Rockingham’s government. 
 But that government is entitled to the praise 
 of having put a stop to two oppressive prac- 
 tices, which, in Wilkes’s case, had attracted 
 the notice and excited the just indignation 
 of the public. The House of Commons was 
 induced by the ministers to pass a resolution 
 condemning the use of general warrants, and 
 another resolution condemning the seizure of 
 papers in cases of libel. 
 
 It must be added, to the lasting honour 
 of Lord Rockingham, that his administration 
 was the first which, during a long course of 
 years, had the courage and the virtue to re- 
 frain from bribing members of Parliament. 
 His enemies accused him and his friends of 
 weakness, of haughtiness, of party spirit ; but 
 calumny itself never dared to couple his name 
 with corruption. 
 
 Unhappily his government, though one of 
 
234 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 the best that has ever existed in our country, 
 was also one of the weakest. The King’s 
 friends assailed and obstructed the ministers 
 at every turn. To appeal to the King was only 
 to draw forth new promises and new evasions. 
 His Majesty was sure that there must be 
 some misunderstanding. Lord Rockingham 
 had better speak to the gentlemen. They 
 should be dismissed on the next fault. The 
 next fault was soon committed, and his Majesty 
 siill continued to shuttle. It was too bad. It 
 was quite abominable ; but it mattered less 
 as the prorogation was at hand. He would 
 give the delinquents one more chance. If 
 they did not alter their conduct next session, 
 he should not have one word to sav for them. 
 He had already resolved that, long before 
 the commencement of the next session, Lord 
 Rockingham should cease to be minister. 
 
 We have now come to a part of our story 
 which, admiring as we do the genius and the 
 many noble qualities of Pitt, we cannot relate 
 without much pain. We believe that, at this 
 conjuncture, he had it in his power to give the 
 victory either to the Whigs or to the King’s 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 235 
 
 friends. If he had allied himself closely with 
 Lord Rockingham, what could the court have 
 done ? There would have been only one alter- 
 native, the Whigs or Grenville ; and there 
 could be no doubt what the King’s choice 
 would be. He still remembered, as well he 
 might, with the uttermost bitterness, the thral- 
 dom from which his uncle had freed him, and 
 said about this time, with great vehemence, 
 that he would sooner see the Devil come into 
 his closet than Grenville. 
 
 And what was there to prevent Pitt from 
 allying himself with Lord Rockingham ? On 
 all the most important questions their views 
 were the same. They had agreed in con- 
 demning the peace, the Stamp Act, the 
 general warrant, the seizure of papers. The 
 points on which they differed were few and 
 unimportant. In integrity, in disinterested- 
 ness, in hatred of corruption, they resembled 
 each other. Their personal interests coidd 
 not clash. They sat in different Houses, 
 and Pitt had always declared that nothing 
 should induce him to be First Lord of the 
 Treasury. 
 
23G 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 If the opportunity of forming a coalition 
 beneficial to the state, and honourable to all 
 concerned, was suffered to escape, the fault 
 was not with the Whig ministers. They be- 
 haved towards Pitt with an obsequiousness 
 which, had it not been the effect of sincere 
 admiration and of anxiety for the public in- 
 terests, might have been justly called servile. 
 They repeatedly gave him to understand that, 
 if he chose to join their ranks, they were ready 
 to receive him, not as an associate, but as a 
 leader. They had proved their respect for him 
 by bestowing a peerage on the person who, at 
 that time, enjoyed the largest share of his 
 confidence, Chief Justice Pratt. What then 
 was there to divide Pitt from the Whigs ? 
 What, on the other hand, was there in com- 
 mon between him and the King’s friends, that 
 he should lend himself to their purposes, he 
 who had never owed anything to flattery or 
 intrigue, he whose eloquence and independent 
 spirit had overawed two generations of slaves 
 and jobbers, he who had twice been forced by 
 the enthusiasm of an admiring nation on a 
 reluctant Prince ? 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 237 
 
 Unhappily the court had gained Pitt, not, 
 it is true, by those ignoble means which were 
 employed when such men as Rigby and Wed- 
 derburn were to be won, but by allurements 
 suited to a nature noble even in its aberra- 
 tions. The King set himself to seduce the 
 one man who could turn the Whigs out 
 without letting Grenville in. Praise, caresses, 
 promises, were lavished on the idol of the 
 nation. He, and he alone, could put an end 
 to faction, could bid defiance to all the power- 
 ful connections in the land united, Whigs 
 and Tories, Rockinghams, Bedfords, and Gren- 
 villes. These blandishments produced a great 
 effect. For though Pitt’s spirit was high and 
 manly, though his eloquence was often exerted 
 with formidable effect against the court, and 
 though his theory of government had been 
 learned in the school of Locke and Sidney, 
 he had always regarded the person of the 
 sovereign with profound veneration. As soon 
 as he was brought face to face with royalty, 
 his imagination and sensibility were too strong 
 for his principles. His Whiggism thawed and 
 disappeared ; and he became, for the time, a 
 
238 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 Tory of the old Ormond pattern. Nor was 
 he by any means unwilling to assist in the 
 work of dissolving all political connections. 
 His own weight in the state was wholly inde- 
 pendent of such connections. He was there- 
 fore inclined to look on them with dislike, 
 and made far too little distinction between 
 gangs of knaves associated for the mere pur- 
 pose of robbing the public, and confederacies 
 of honourable men for the promotion of great 
 public objects. Nor had he the sagacity to 
 perceive that the strenuous efforts which he 
 made to annihilate all parties tended only to 
 establish the ascendency of one party, and that 
 the basest and most hateful of all. 
 
 It may be doubted whether he would have 
 been thus misled, if his mind had been in 
 full health and vigour. But the truth is that 
 he had for some time been in an unnatural 
 state of excitement. No suspicion of this 
 sort had yet got abroad. His eloquence had 
 never shone with more splendour than during 
 the recent debates. But people afterwards 
 called to mind many things which ought to 
 have roused their apprehensions. His habits 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 239 
 
 were gradually becoming more and more 
 eccentric. A horror of all loud sounds, such 
 as is said to have been one of the many 
 oddities of Wallenstein, grew upon him. 
 Though the most affectionate of fathers, he 
 could not at this time bear to hear the voices 
 of his own children, and laid out great sums 
 at Hayes in buying up houses contiguous to 
 his own, merely that he might have no neigh- 
 bours to disturb him with their noise. He 
 then sold Hayes, and took possession of a 
 villa at Hampstead, where he again began to 
 purchase houses to right and left. In ex- 
 pense, indeed, he vied, during this part of his 
 life, with the wealthiest of the conquerors of 
 Bengal and Tanjore. At Burton Pynsent, he 
 ordered a great extent of ground to be planted 
 with cedars. Cedars enough for the purpose 
 were not to be found in Somersetshire. They 
 were therefore collected in London, and sent 
 down by land carriage. Relays of labourers 
 were hired ; and the work went on all night 
 by torchlight. No man could be more ab- 
 stemious than Pitt ; yet the profusion of his 
 kitchen was a wonder even to epicures. 
 
240 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 Several dinners were always dressing ; for his 
 appetite was capricious and fanciful ; and at 
 whatever moment he felt inclined to eat, he 
 expected a meal to be instantly on the table. 
 Other circumstances might be mentioned, such 
 as separately are of little moment, but such as, 
 when taken together, and when viewed in 
 connection with the strange events which fol- 
 lowed, justify us in believing that his mind 
 was already in a morbid state. 
 
 Soon after the close of the session of Par- 
 liament, Lord Rockingham received his dis- 
 missal. He retired, accompanied by a firm 
 body of friends, whose consistency and up- 
 rightness enmity itself was forced to admit. 
 None of them had asked or obtained any 
 pension or any sinecure, either in possession 
 or in reversion. Such disinterestedness was 
 then rare among politicians. Their chief, 
 though not a man of brilliant talents, had 
 won for himself an honourable fame, which 
 he kept pure to the last. He had, in spite 
 of difficulties which seemed almost insur- 
 mountable, removed great abuses and averted 
 a civil war. Sixteen years later, in a dark 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 241 
 
 and terrible day, he was again called upon 
 to save the state, brought to the very brink 
 of ruin by the same perfidy and obstinacy 
 which had embarrassed, and at length over- 
 thrown his first administration. 
 
 Pitt was planting in Somersetshire when 
 he was summoned to court by a letter written 
 by the royal hand. He instantly hastened 
 to London. The irritability of his mind 
 and body were increased by the rapidity with 
 which he travelled ; and when he reached 
 his journey’s end he was suffering from fever. 
 Ill as he was, he saw the King at Richmond, 
 and undertook to form an administration. 
 
 Pitt was scarcely in the state in which a 
 man should be who has to conduct delicate 
 and arduous negotiations. In his letters to his 
 wife, he complained that the conferences in 
 which it was necessary for him to bear a part 
 heated his blood and accelerated his pulse. 
 From other sources of information we learn, 
 that his language, even to those whose co- 
 operation he wished to engage, was strangely 
 peremptory and despotic. Some of his notes 
 written at this time have been preserved, and 
 
 Q 
 
242 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 are in a style which Lewis the Fourteenth 
 would have been too well bred to employ in 
 addressing any French gentleman. 
 
 In the attempt to dissolve all parties, Pitt 
 met with some difficulties. Some Whigs, 
 whom the court would gladly have detached 
 from Lord Rockingham, rejected all offers. 
 The Bedfords were perfectly willing to break 
 with Grenville ; but Pitt would not come up to 
 their terms. Temple, whom Pitt at first meant 
 to place at the head of the treasury, proved 
 intractable. A coldness indeed had, during 
 some months, been fast growing between the 
 brothers-in-law, so long and so closely allied 
 in politics. Pitt was angry with Temple for 
 opposing the x’epeal of the Stamp Act. Temple 
 was angry with Pitt for refusing to accede to 
 that family league which was now the favourite 
 plan at Stowe. At length the Earl proposed 
 an equal partition of power and patronage, 
 and offered, on this condition, to give up his 
 brother George. Pitt thought the demand 
 exorbitant, and positively refused compliance. 
 A bitter quarrel followed. Each of the kins- 
 men was true to his character. Temple’s soul 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 243 
 
 festered with spite, and Pitt’s swelled into 
 contempt. Temple represented Pitt as the 
 most odious of hypocrites and traitors. Pitt 
 held a different and perhaps a more provoking 
 tone. Temple was a good sort of man enough, 
 whose single title to distinction was, that he 
 had a large garden, with a large piece of water, 
 and a great many pavilions and summer-houses. 
 To his fortunate connection with a great orator 
 and statesman he was indebted for an import- 
 ance in the state which his own talents could 
 never have gained for him. That importance 
 had turned his head. He had begun to fancy 
 that he could form administrations, and govern 
 empires. It was piteous to see a well meaning 
 man under such a delusion. 
 
 In spite of all these difficulties, a ministi’y 
 was made such as the King wished to see, a 
 ministry in which all his Majesty’s friends were 
 comfortably accommodated, and which, with 
 the exception of his Majesty’s friends, con- 
 tained no four persons who had ever in their 
 lives been in the habit of acting together. 
 Men who had never concurred in a single vote 
 found themselves seated at the same board. 
 
244 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 The office of paymaster was divided between 
 two persons who had never exchanged a word. 
 Most of the chief posts were filled either by 
 personal adherents of Pitt, or by members of 
 the late ministry, who had been induced to re- 
 main in place after the dismissal of Lord Rock- 
 ingham. To the former class belonged Pratt, 
 now Lord Camden, who accepted the great 
 seal, and Lord Shelburne, who was made one 
 of the Secretaries of State. To the latter class 
 belonged the Duke of Grafton, who became 
 First Lord of the Treasury, and Conway, who 
 kept his old position both in the govern- 
 ment and in the House of Commons. Charles 
 Townshend, who had belonged to every party, 
 and cared for none, was Chancellor of the 
 Exchequer. Pitt himself was declared prime 
 minister, but refused to take any laborious 
 office. He was created Earl of Chatham, and 
 the privy seal was delivered to him. 
 
 It is scarcely necessaiy to say, that the 
 failure, the complete and disgraceful failure, 
 of this arrangement, is not to be ascribed to 
 any want of capacity in the persons whom 
 we have named. None of them was deficient 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 245 
 
 in abilities ; and four of them, Pitt himself, 
 Shelburne, Camden, and Townshend, were men 
 of high intellectual eminence. The fault was 
 not in the materials, but in the principle on 
 which the materials were put together. Pitt 
 had mixed up these conflicting elements, in the 
 full confidence that he should be able to keep 
 them all in perfect subordination to himself, 
 and in perfect harmony with each other. We 
 shall soon see how the experiment succeeded. 
 
 On the very day on which the new prime 
 minister kissed hands, three-fourths of that 
 popularity which he had long enjoyed without 
 a rival, and to which he owed the greater part 
 of his authority, departed from him. A violent 
 outcry was raised, not against that part of his 
 conduct which really deserved severe condem- 
 nation, but against a step in which we can see 
 nothing to censure. His acceptance of a peer- 
 age produced a general burst of indignation. 
 Yet surely no peerage had ever been better 
 earned ; nor was there ever a statesman who 
 more needed the repose of the Upper House. 
 Pitt was now growing old. He was much 
 older in constitution than in years. It was 
 
246 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 with imminent risk to his life that he had, on 
 some important occasions, attended his duty 
 in Parliament. During the session of 1764, he 
 had not been able to take part in a single 
 debate. It was impossible that he should go 
 through the nightly labour of conducting the 
 business of the government in the House of 
 Commons. His wish to be transferred, under 
 such circumstances, to a less busy and a less 
 turbulent assembly, was natural and reason- 
 able. The nation, however, overlooked all 
 these considerations. Those who had most 
 loved and honoured the great Commoner 
 were loudest in invective against the new 
 made Lord. London had hitherto been true 
 to him through every vicissitude. When the 
 citizens learned that he had been sent for 
 from Somersetshire, that he had been closeted 
 with the King at Richmond, and that he was 
 to be first minister, they had been in trans- 
 ports of joy. Preparations were made for a 
 grand entertainment and for a general illum- 
 ination. The lamps had actually been placed 
 round the Monument, when the Gazette an- 
 nounced that the object of all this enthusiasm 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 247 
 
 was an Earl. Instantly the feast was counter- 
 manded. The lamps were taken down. The 
 newspapers raised the roar of obloquy. Pam- 
 phlets, made up of calumny and scurrility, 
 tilled the shops of all the booksellers ; and of 
 those pamphlets, the most galling were written 
 under the direction of the malignant Temple. 
 It was now the fashion to compare the two 
 Williams, William Pulteney and William Pitt. 
 Both, it was said, had, by eloquence and simu- 
 lated patriotism, acquired a great ascendency 
 in the House of Commons and in the country. 
 Both had been intrusted with the office of 
 reforming the government. Both had, when 
 at the height of power and popularity, been 
 seduced by the splendour of the coronet. 
 Both had been made earls, and both had 
 at once become objects of aversion and scorn 
 to the nation which a few hours before had 
 regarded them with affection and veneration. 
 
 The clamour against Pitt appears to have 
 had a serious effect on the foreign relations of 
 the country. His name had till now acted 
 like a spell at Versailles and Saint Ildefonso. 
 English travellers on the Continent had re- 
 
248 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 marked that nothing more was necessary to 
 silence a whole room full of boasting French- 
 men than to drop a hint of the probability 
 that Mr Pitt would return to power. In an 
 instant there was deep silence : all shoulders 
 rose, and all faces were lengthened. Now, un- 
 happily, every foreign court, in learning that 
 he was recalled to office, learned also that he 
 no longer possessed the hearts of his country- 
 men. Ceasing to be loved at home, he ceased 
 to be feared abroad. The name of Pitt had 
 been a charmed name. Our envoys tried in 
 vain to conjure with the name of Chatham. 
 
 The difficulties which beset Chatham were 
 daily increased by the despotic manner in 
 which he treated all around him. Lord 
 Rockingham had, at the time of the change 
 of ministry, acted with great moderation, had 
 expressed a hope that the new government 
 would act on the principles of the late govern- 
 ment, and had even interfered to prevent 
 many of his friends from quitting office. Thus 
 Saunders and Keppel, two naval commanders 
 of great eminence, had been induced to re- 
 main at the Admiralty, where their services were 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 249 
 
 much needed. The Duke of Portland was 
 still Lord Chamberlain, and Lord Besborough 
 Postmaster. But within a quarter of a year, 
 Lord Chatham had so deeply affronted these 
 men, that they all retired in disgust. In 
 truth, his tone, submissive in the closet, was 
 at this time insupportably tyrannical in the 
 cabinet. His colleagues were merely his clerks 
 for naval, financial, and diplomatic business. 
 Conway, meek as he was, was on one occasion 
 provoked into declaring that such language as 
 Lord Chatham’s had never been heard west of 
 Constantinople, and was with difficulty pre- 
 vented by Horace Walpole from resigning, 
 and rejoining the standard of Lord Rock- 
 ingham. 
 
 The breach which had been made in the 
 government by the defection of so many of the 
 Rockinghams, Chatham hoped to supply by 
 the help of the Bedfords. But with the Bed- 
 fords he could not deal as he had dealt with 
 other parties. It was to no purpose that he 
 bade high for one or two members of the 
 faction, in the hope of detaching them from 
 the rest. They were to be had ; but they were 
 
250 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 to be had only in the lot. There was indeed 
 for a moment some wavering and some disput- 
 ing among them. But at length the counsels 
 of the shrewd and resolute Rigby prevailed. 
 They determined to stand firmly together, and 
 plainly intimated to Chatham that he must 
 take them all, or that he should get none of 
 them. The event proved that they were wiser 
 in their generation than any other connection 
 in the state. In a few months they were able 
 to dictate their own terms. 
 
 The most important public measure of Lord 
 Chatham’s administration was his celebrated 
 interference with the corn trade. The harvest 
 had been bad ; the price of food was high ; and 
 he thought it necessary to take on himself the 
 responsibility of laying an embargo on the 
 exportation of grain. When Parliament met, 
 this proceeding was attacked by the opposition 
 as unconstitutional, and defended by the 
 ministers as indispensably necessary. At last 
 an act was passed to indemnify all who had 
 been concerned in the embargo. 
 
 The first words uttered by Chatham, in the 
 House of Lords, were in defence of his con- 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 251 
 
 duct on this occasion. He spoke with a calm- 
 ness, sobriety, and dignity, well suited to the 
 audience which he was addressing. A sub- 
 sequent speech which he made on the same 
 subject was less successful. He bade defiance 
 to aristocratical connections, with a super- 
 ciliousness to which the peers were not accus- 
 tomed, and with tones and gestures better 
 suited to a large and stormy assembly than to 
 the body of which he was now a member. A 
 short altercation followed, and he was told 
 very plainly that he should not be suffered to 
 browbeat the old nobility of England. 
 
 It gradually became clearer and clearer 
 that he was in a distempered state of mind. 
 His attention had been drawn to the terri- 
 torial acquisitions of the East India Company, 
 and he determined to bring the whole of that 
 great subject before Parliament. He would 
 not, however, confer on the subject with any 
 of his colleagues. It was in vain that Conway, 
 who was charged with the conduct of business 
 in the House of Commons, and Charles Towns- 
 hend, who was responsible for the direction of 
 the finances, begged for some glimpse of light 
 
252 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 as to what was in contemplation. Chatham’s 
 answers were sullen and mysterious. He must 
 decline any discussion with them ; he did not 
 want their assistance ; he had fixed on a per- 
 son to take charge of his measure in the House 
 of Commons. This person was a member who 
 was not connected with the government, and 
 who neither had, nor deserved to have, the ear 
 of the House, a noisy, purseproud, illiterate 
 demagogue, whose Cockney English and scraps 
 of mispronounced Latin were the jest of the 
 newspapers, Alderman Beckford. It may well 
 be supposed that these strange proceedings pro- 
 duced a ferment through the whole political 
 world. The city was in commotion. The East 
 India Company invoked the faith of charters. 
 Burke thundered against the ministers. The 
 ministers looked at each other, and knew 
 not what to say. In the midst of the confu- 
 sion, Lord Chatham proclaimed himself gouty, 
 and retired to Bath. It was announced, after 
 some time, that he was better, that he would 
 shortly return, that he woidd soon put every- 
 thing in order. A day was fixed for his arrival 
 in London. But when he reached the Castle 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 253 
 
 inn at Marlborough, he stopped, shut himself 
 up in his room, and remained there some 
 weeks. Everybody who travelled that road 
 was amazed by the number of his attendants. 
 Footmen and grooms, dressed in his family 
 livery, filled the whole inn, though one of the 
 largest in England, and swarmed in the streets 
 of the little town. The truth was, that the 
 invalid had insisted that, during his stay, all 
 the waiters and stable-boys of the Castle 
 should wear his livery. 
 
 His colleagues were in despair. The Duke 
 of Grafton proposed to go down to Marl- 
 borough in order to consult the oracle. But 
 he was informed that Lord Chatham must 
 decline all conversation on business. In the 
 meantime, all the parties which were out of 
 office, Bedfords, Grenvilles, and Rockinghams, 
 joined to oppose the distracted government on 
 the vote for the land tax. They were rein- 
 forced by almost all the county members, and 
 had a considerable majority. This was the 
 first time that a ministry had been beaten on 
 an important division in the House of Com- 
 mons since the fall of Sir Robert Walpole. 
 
254 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 The administration, thus furiously assailed from 
 without, was torn by internal dissensions. It 
 had been formed on no principle whatever. 
 From the very first, nothing but Chatham’s 
 authority had prevented the hostile contin- 
 gents which made up his ranks from going 
 to blows with each other. That authority 
 was now withdrawn, and everything was in 
 commotion. Conway, a brave soldier, but in 
 civil affairs the most timid and irresolute of 
 men, afraid of disobliging the King, afraid 
 of being abused in the newspapers, afraid of 
 being thought factious if he went out, afraid 
 of being thought interested if he stayed in, 
 afraid of everything, and afraid of being known 
 to be afraid of anything, was beaten back- 
 wards and forwards like a shuttlecock between 
 Horace Walpole who wished to make him 
 prime minister, and Lord John Cavendish who 
 wished to draw him into opposition. Charles 
 Townshend, a man of splendid eloquence, 
 of lax principles, and of boundless vanity and 
 presumption, would submit to no control. The 
 full extent of his parts, of his ambition, and of 
 his arrogance, had not yet been made mani- 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 255 
 
 fest; for he had always quailed before the 
 genius and the lofty character of Pitt. But 
 now that Pitt had quitted the House of 
 Commons, and seemed to have abdicated the 
 part of chief minister, Townshend broke loose 
 from all restraint. 
 
 While things were in this state, Chatham 
 at length returned to London. He might 
 as well have remained at Marlborough. He 
 would see nobody. He would give no opinion 
 on any public matter. The Duke of Grafton 
 begged piteously for an interview, for an 
 hour, for half-an-hour, for five minutes. The 
 answer was, that it was impossible. The King 
 himself repeatedly condescended to expostu- 
 late and implore. ‘Your duty,’ he wrote, 
 ‘your own honour, require you to make an 
 effort.’ The answers to these appeals were 
 commonly written in Lady Chatham’s hand, 
 from her lord’s dictation ; for he had not 
 energy even to use a pen. He flings himself 
 at the King’s feet. He is penetrated by the 
 royal goodness so signally shown to the most 
 unhappy of men. He implores a little more 
 indulgence. He cannot as yet transact busi- 
 
256 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 ness. He cannot see his colleagues. Least of 
 all can he bear the excitement of an interview 
 with majesty. 
 
 Some were half inclined to suspect that he 
 was, to use a military phrase, malingering. 
 He had made, they said, a great blunder, and 
 had found it out. His immense popularity, his 
 high reputation for statesmanship, were gone 
 for ever. Intoxicated by pride, he had under- 
 taken a task beyond his abilities. He now 
 saw nothing before him but distresses and 
 humiliations ; and he had therefore simu- 
 lated illness, in order to escape from vexa- 
 tions which he had not fortitude to meet. 
 This suspicion, though it derived some colour 
 from that weakness which was the most strik- 
 ing blemish of his character, was certainly 
 unfounded. His mind, before he became 
 first minister, had been, as we have said, in an 
 unsound state ; and physical and moral causes 
 now concurred to make the derangement of 
 his faculties complete. The gout, which had 
 been the torment of his whole life, had been 
 suppressed by strong remedies. For the first 
 time since he was a boy at Oxford, he had 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 257 
 
 passed several months without a twinge. 
 But his hand and foot had been relieved 
 at the expense of his nerves. He became 
 melancholy, fanciful, irritable. The embar- 
 rassing state of public affairs, the grave 
 responsibility which lay on him, the con- 
 sciousness of his errors, the disputes of his 
 colleagues, the savage clamours raised by his 
 detractors, bewildered his enfeebled mind. 
 One thing alone, he said, could save him. 
 He must repurchase Hayes. The unwilling 
 consent of the new occupant was extorted by 
 Lady Chatham’s entreaties and tears ; and 
 her lord was somewhat easier. But if busi- 
 ness were mentioned to him, he, once the 
 proudest and boldest of mankind, behaved 
 like a hysterical girl, trembled from head to 
 foot, and burst into a flood of tears. 
 
 His colleagues for a time continued to 
 entertain the expectation that his health 
 would soon be restored, and that he would 
 emerge from his retirement. But month fol- 
 lowed month, and still he remained hidden 
 in mysterious seclusion, and sunk, as far as 
 they could learn, in the deepest dejection of 
 
258 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 spirits. They at length ceased to hope or 
 to fear anything from him ; and though he 
 was still nominally Prime Minister, took with- 
 out scruple steps which they knew to be 
 diametrically opposed to all his opinions and 
 feelings, allied themselves with those whom 
 he had proscribed, disgraced those whom he 
 most esteemed, and laid taxes on the colonies, 
 in the face of the strong declarations which 
 he had recently made. 
 
 When he had passed about a year and 
 three quarters in gloomy privacy, the King 
 received a few lines in Lady Chatham’s hand. 
 They contained a request, dictated by her 
 lord, that he might be permitted to resign the 
 Privy Seal. After some civil show of reluct- 
 ance, the resignation was accepted. Indeed 
 Chatham was, by this time, almost as much 
 forgotten as if he had already been lying in 
 Westminster Abbey. 
 
 At length the clouds which had gathered 
 over his mind broke and passed away. His 
 gout returned, and freed him from a more 
 cruel malady. His nerves were newly braced. 
 His spirits became buoyant. He woke as 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 259 
 
 from a sickly dream. It was a strange re- 
 covery. Men had been in the habit of talking 
 of him as of one dead, and, when he first 
 showed himself at the King’s levee, started 
 as if they had seen a ghost. It was more 
 than two years and a half since he had 
 appeared in public. 
 
 He, too, had cause for wonder. The world 
 which he now entered was not the world which 
 he had quitted. The administration which he 
 had formed had never been, at any one 
 moment, entirely changed. But there had 
 been so many losses and so many accessions, 
 that he could scarcely recognise his own 
 work. Charles Townshend was dead. Lord 
 Shelburne had been dismissed. Conway had 
 sunk into utter insignificance. The Duke of 
 Grafton had fallen into the hands of the 
 Bedfords. The Bedfords had deserted Gren- 
 ville, had made their peace with the King 
 and the King’s friends, and had been admitted 
 to office. Lord North was Chancellor of the 
 Exchequer, and was rising fast in importance. 
 Corsica had been given up to France without 
 a struggle. The disputes with the American 
 
260 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 colonies had been revived. A general election 
 had taken place. Wilkes had returned from 
 exile, and, outlaw as he was, had been chosen 
 knight of the shire for Middlesex. The 
 
 multitude was on his side. The Court was 
 
 % 
 
 obstinately bent on ruining him, and was pre- 
 pared to shake the very .foundations of the 
 constitution for the sake of a paltry revenge. 
 The House of Commons, assuming to itself 
 an authority which of right belongs only to 
 the whole legislature, had declared Wilkes 
 incapable of sitting in Parliament. Nor had 
 it been thought sufficient to keep him out. 
 Another must be brought in. Since the free- 
 holders of Middlesex had obstinately refused 
 to choose a member acceptable to the Court, 
 the House had chosen a member for them. 
 This was not the only instance, perhaps not 
 the most disgraceful instance, of the inveterate 
 malignity of the Court. Exasperated by the 
 steady opposition of the Rockingham party, 
 the King’s friends had tried to rob a dis- 
 tinguished Whig nobleman of his private 
 estate, and had persisted in their mean 
 wickedness till their own servile majority had 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 261 
 
 revolted from mere disgust and shame. Dis- 
 content had spread throughout the nation, 
 and was kept up by stimulants such as had 
 rarely been applied to the public mind. 
 Junius had taken the field, had trampled 
 Sir William Draper in the dust, had well nigh 
 broken the heart of Blackstone, and had so 
 mangled the reputation of the Duke of Graf- 
 ton, that his grace had become sick of office, 
 and was beginning to look wistfully towards 
 the shades of Euston. Every principle of 
 foreign, domestic, and colonial policy which 
 was dear to the heart of Chatham had, during 
 the eclipse of his genius, been violated by 
 the government which he had formed. 
 
 The remaining years of his life were spent 
 in vainly struggling against that fatal policy 
 which, at the moment when he might have 
 given it a death blow, he had been induced 
 to take under his protection. His exertions 
 redeemed his own fame, but they effected 
 little for his country. 
 
 He found two parties arrayed against the 
 government, the party of his own brothers- 
 in-law, the Grenvilles, and the party of Lord 
 
2G2 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 Rockingham. On the question of the Middle- 
 sex election these parties were agreed. But 
 on many other important questions they 
 differed widely; and they were, in truth, not 
 less hostile to each other than to the Court. 
 The Grenvilles had, during several years, 
 annoyed the Rockinghams with a succession 
 of acrimonious pamphlets. It was long before 
 the Rockinghams could be induced to re- 
 taliate. But an ill - natured tract, written 
 under Grenville’s direction, and entitled a 
 State of the Nation, was too much for their 
 patience. Burke undertook to defend and 
 avenge his friends, and executed the task 
 with admirable skill and vigour. On every 
 point he was victorious, and nowhere more 
 completely victorious than when he joined 
 issue on those dry and minute questions of 
 statistical and financial detail in which the 
 main strength of Grenville lay. The official 
 drudge, even on his own chosen ground, was 
 utterly unable to maintain the fight against 
 the great orator and philosopher. When 
 Chatham reappeared, Grenville was still 
 writhing with the recent shame and smart 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 263 
 
 of this well - merited chastisement. Cordial 
 co-operation between the two sections of 
 the Opposition was impossible. Nor could 
 Chatham easily connect himself with either. 
 His feelings, in spite of many affronts given 
 and received, drew him towards the Grenvilles. 
 For he had strong domestic affections; and 
 his nature, which, though haughty, was by 
 no means obdurate, had been softened by 
 affliction. But from his kinsmen he was 
 separated by a wide difference of opinion on 
 the question of colonial taxation. A reconcili- 
 ation, however, took place. He visited Stowe ; 
 he shook hands with George Grenville ; and 
 the Whig freeholders of Buckinghamshire, at 
 their public dinners, drank many bumpers to 
 the union of the three brothers. 
 
 In opinions, Chatham was much nearer 
 to the Rockinghams than to his own relatives. 
 But between him and the Rockinghams there 
 was a gulf not easily to be passed. He had 
 deeply injured them, and in injuring them, 
 had deeply injured his country. When the 
 balance was trembling between them and the 
 Court, he had thrown the whole weight of 
 
264 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 his genius, of his renown, of his popularity, 
 into the scale of misgovernment. It must be 
 added, that many eminent members of the 
 party still retained a bitter recollection of 
 the asperity and disdain with which they had 
 been treated by him at the time when he 
 assumed the direction of affairs. It is clear 
 from Burke’s pamphlets and speeches, and 
 still more clear from his private letters, and 
 from the language which he held in conversa- 
 tion, that he regarded Chatham with a feeling 
 not far removed from dislike. Chatham was 
 undoubtedly conscious of his error, and 
 desirous to atone for it. But his overtures of 
 friendship, though made with earnestness, and 
 even with unwonted humility, were at first 
 received by Lord Rockingham with cold and 
 austere reserve. Gradually the intercourse 
 of the two statesmen became courteous and 
 even amicable. But the past was never wholly 
 forgotten. 
 
 Chatham did not, however, stand alone. 
 Round him gathered a party, small in number, 
 but strong in great and various talents. Lord 
 Camden, Lord Shelburne, Colonel Barre, and 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 205 
 
 Dunning, afterwards Lord Ashburton, were 
 the principal members of the connection. 
 
 There is no reason to believe that, from 
 this time till within a few weeks of Chatham’s 
 death, his intellect suffered any decay. His 
 eloquence was almost to the last heard with 
 delight. But it was not exactly the eloquence 
 of the House of Lords. That lofty and pas- 
 sionate, but somewhat desultory declamation, 
 in which he excelled all men, and which was 
 set off by looks, tones, and gestures, worthy 
 of Garrick or Talma, was out of place in a 
 small apartment where the audience often 
 consisted of three or four drowsy prelates, 
 three or four old judges, accustomed during 
 many years to disregard rhetoric, and to look 
 only at facts and arguments, and three or four 
 listless and supercilious men of fashion, whom 
 anything like enthusiasm moved to a sneer. 
 In the House of Commons, a flash of his 
 eye, a wave of his arm, had sometimes cowed 
 Murray. But, in the House of Peers, his 
 utmost vehemence and pathos produced less 
 effect than the moderation, the reasonable- 
 ness, the luminous order and the serene 
 
26G 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 dignity, which characterised the speeches of 
 Lord Mansfield. 
 
 On the question of the Middlesex election, 
 all the three divisions of the Opposition 
 acted in concert. No orator in either House 
 defended what is now universally admitted to 
 have been the constitutional cause with more 
 ardour or eloquence than Chatham, before 
 this subject had ceased to occupy the public 
 mind, George Grenville died. His party 
 rapidly melted away ; and in a short time 
 most of his adherents appeared on the 
 ministerial benches. 
 
 Had George Grenville lived many months 
 longer, the friendly ties which, after years of 
 estrangement and hostility, had been renewed 
 between him and his brother-in-law, would, 
 in all probability, have been a second time 
 violently dissolved. For now the quarrel 
 between England and the North American 
 colonies took a gloomy and terrible aspect. 
 Oppression provoked resistance ; resistance 
 was made the pretext for fresh oppression. 
 The warnings of all the greatest statesmen 
 of the age were lost on an imperious court 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 2G7 
 
 and a deluded nation. Soon a colonial senate 
 confronted the British Parliament. Then the 
 colonial militia crossed bayonets with the 
 British regiments. At length the common- 
 wealth was torn asunder. Two millions of 
 Englishmen, who, fifteen years before, had 
 been as loyal to their prince and as proud 
 of their country as the people of Kent or 
 Yorkshire, separated themselves by a solemn 
 act from the Empire. For a time it seemed 
 that the insurgents would struggle to small 
 purpose against the vast financial and military 
 means of the mother country. But disasters, 
 following one another in rapid succession, 
 rapidly dispelled the illusions of national 
 vanity. At length a great British force, ex- 
 hausted, famished, harassed on evex-y side by 
 a hostile peasantry, was compelled to de- 
 liver up its arms. Those governments which 
 England had, in the late war, so signally 
 humbled, and which had during many years 
 been sullenly bixxoding over the l'ecollections 
 of Quebec, of Minden, and of the Moro, now 
 saw with exultation that the day of revenge 
 was at hand. France recognised the inde- 
 
268 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 pendence of the United States ; and there 
 coidd be little doubt that the example would 
 soon be followed by Spain. 
 
 Chatham and Rockingham had cordially 
 concurred in opposing every part of the fatal 
 policy which had brought the state into this 
 dangerous situation. But their paths now 
 diverged. Lord Rockingham thought, and, as 
 the event proved, thought most justly, that 
 the revolted colonies were separated from 
 the Empire for ever, and that the only effect 
 of prolonging the war on the American con- 
 tinent would be to divide resources which it 
 was desirable to concentrate. If the hope- 
 less attempt to subjugate Pennsylvania and 
 Virginia were abandoned, war against the 
 House of Bourbon might possibly be avoided, 
 or, if inevitable, might be carried on with 
 success and glory. We might even indemnify 
 ourselves for part of what we had lost, at the 
 expense of those foreign enemies who had 
 hoped to profit by our domestic dissensions. 
 Lord Rockingham, therefore, and those who 
 acted with him, conceived that the wisest 
 course now open to England was to acknow- 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 269 
 
 ledge the independence of the United States, 
 and to turn her whole force against her 
 European enemies. 
 
 Chatham, it should seem, ought to have 
 taken the same side. Before France had taken 
 any part in our quarrel with the colonies, he 
 had repeatedly, and with great energy of 
 language, declared that it was impossible to 
 conquer America, and he could not without 
 absurdity maintain that it was easier to 
 conquer France and America together than 
 America alone. But his passions overpowered 
 his judgment, and made him blind to his own 
 inconsistency. The very circumstances which 
 made the separation of the colonies inevitable 
 made it to him altogether insupportable. The 
 dismemberment of the Empire seemed to him 
 less ruinous and humiliating, when produced 
 by domestic dissensions, than when produced 
 by foreign interference. His blood boiled at 
 the degradation of his country. Whatever 
 lowered her among the nations of the earth, 
 he felt as a personal outrage to himself. And 
 the feeling was natural. He had made her 
 so great. He had been so proud of her ; and 
 
270 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 she had been so proud of him. He remem- 
 bered how, more than twenty years before, in 
 a day of gloom and dismay, when her posses- 
 sions were torn from her, when her flag was 
 dishonoured, she had called on him to save 
 her. He remembered the sudden and glorious 
 change which his energy had wrought, the 
 long series of triumphs, the days of thanks- 
 giving, the nights of illumination. Fired by 
 such recollections, he determined to separate 
 himself from those who advised that the inde- 
 pendence of the colonies should be acknow- 
 ledged. That he was in error will scarcely, we 
 think, be disputed by his warmest admirers. 
 Indeed, the treaty, by which, a few years later, 
 the republic of the United States was re- 
 cognised, was the work of his most attached 
 adherents and of his favourite son. 
 
 The Duke of Richmond had given notice 
 of an address to the throne, against the 
 further prosecution of hostilities with America. 
 Chatham had, during some time, absented 
 himself from Parliament, in consequence of 
 his growing infirmities. He determined to 
 appear in his place on this occasion, and 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 271 
 
 to declare that his opinions were decidedly 
 at variance with those of the Rockingham 
 party. He was in a state of great excitement. 
 His medical attendants were uneasy, and 
 strongly advised him to calm himself, and to 
 remain at home. But he was not to be 
 controlled. His son William and his son- 
 in - law Lord Mahon, accompanied him to 
 Westminster. He rested himself in the 
 Chancellor’s room till the debate commenced, 
 and then, leaning on his two young relations, 
 limped to his seat. The slightest particulars 
 of that day were remembered, and have 
 been carefully recorded. He bowed, it was 
 remarked, with great courtliness to those 
 peers who rose to make way for him and his 
 supporters. His crutch was in his hand. He 
 wore, as was his fashion, a rich velvet coat. 
 His legs were swathed in flannel. His wig 
 was so large, and his face so emaciated, that 
 none of his features could be discerned, except 
 the high curve of his nose, and his eyes, which 
 still retained a gleam of the old fire. 
 
 When the Duke of Richmond had spoken, 
 Chatham rose. For some time his voice was 
 
272 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 inaudible. At length his tones became 
 distinct and his action animated. Here and 
 there his hearers caught a thought or an 
 expression which reminded them of William 
 Pitt. But it was clear that he was not 
 himself. He lost the thread of his discourse, 
 hesitated, repeated the same words several 
 times, and was so confused that, in speaking 
 of the Act of Settlement, he could not recall 
 the name of the Electress Sophia. The House 
 listened in solemn silence, and with the aspect 
 of profound respect and compassion. The 
 stillness was so deep that the dropping of a 
 handkerchief would have been heard. The 
 Duke of Richmond replied with great ten- 
 derness and courtesy; but while he spoke, 
 the old man was observed to be restless and 
 irritable. The Duke sat down. Chatham 
 stood up again, pressed his hand on his 
 breast, and sank down in an apoplectic fit. 
 Three or four lords who sat near him caught 
 him in his fall. The House broke up in 
 confusion. The dying man was carried to 
 the residence of one of the officers of Parlia- 
 ment, and was so far restored as to be able 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 273 
 
 to bear a journey to Hayes. At Hayes, after 
 lingering a few weeks, lie expired in his 
 seventieth year. His bed was watched to 
 the last, with anxious tenderness, by his wife 
 and children ; and he well deserved their 
 care. Too often haughty and wayward to 
 others, to them he had been almost effem- 
 inately kind. He had through life been 
 dreaded by his political opponents, and re- 
 garded with more awe than love even by his 
 political associates. But no fear seems to 
 have mingled with the affection which his 
 fondness, constantly overflowing in a thousand 
 endearing forms, had inspired in the little 
 circle at Hayes. 
 
 Chatham, at the time of his decease, had 
 not, in both Houses of Parliament, ten per- 
 sonal adherents. Half the public men of the 
 age had been estranged from him by his 
 errors, and the other half by the exertions 
 which he had made to repair his errors. His 
 last speech had been an attack at once on 
 the policy pursued by the government, and 
 on the policy recommended by the opposi- 
 tion. But death restored him to his old 
 
274 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 place in the affection of his country. Who 
 could hear unmoved of the fall of that which 
 had been so great, and which had stood so 
 long ? The circumstances, too, seemed rather 
 to belong to the tragic stage than to real life. 
 A great statesman, full of years and honours, 
 led forth to the Senate House by a son of 
 rare hopes, and stricken down in full council 
 while straining his feeble voice to rouse the 
 drooping spirit of his country, could not but 
 be remembered with peculiar veneration and 
 tenderness. The few detractors who ventured 
 to murmur were silenced by the indignant 
 clamours of a nation which remembered only 
 the lofty genius, the unsullied probity, the 
 undisputed services, of him who was no more. 
 For once, the chiefs of all parties were agreed. 
 A public funeral, a public monument, were 
 eagerly voted. The debts of the deceased 
 were paid. A provision was made for his 
 family. The City of London requested that 
 the remains of the great man whom she had 
 so long loved and honoured might rest under 
 the dome of her magnificent cathedral. But 
 the petition came too late. Everything was 
 
CHATHAM 
 
 275 
 
 already prepared for the interment in West- 
 minster Abbey. 
 
 Though men of all parties had concurred 
 in decreeing posthumous honours to Chatham, 
 his corpse was attended to the grave almost 
 exclusively by opponents of the government. 
 The banner of the lordship of Chatham was 
 borne by Colonel Barre, attended by the 
 Duke of Richmond and Lord Rockingham. 
 Burke, Savile, and Dunning upheld the pall. 
 Lord Camden was conspicuous in the proces- 
 sion. The chief mourner was young William 
 Pitt. After the lapse of more than twenty- 
 seven years, in a season as dark and perilous, 
 his own shattered frame and broken heart 
 were laid, with the same pomp, in the same 
 consecrated mould. 
 
 Chatham sleeps near the northern door of 
 the Church, in a spot which has ever since 
 been appropriated to statesmen, as the other 
 end of the same transept has long been to 
 poets. Mansfield rests there, and the second 
 William Pitt, and Fox, and Grattan, and 
 Canning, and Wilberforce. In no other 
 cemetery do so many great citizens lie 
 
276 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 within so narrow a space. High over those 
 venerable graves towers the stately monu- 
 ment of Chatham, and from above, his effigy, 
 graven by a cunning hand, seems still, with 
 eagle face and outstretched arm, to bid 
 England be of good cheer, and to hurl defi- 
 ance at her foes. The generation which 
 reared that memorial of him has disappeared. 
 The time has come when the rash and indis- 
 criminate judgments which his contemporaries 
 passed on his character may be calmly revised 
 by history. And history, while, for the warn- 
 ing of vehement, high, and daring natures, 
 she notes his many errors, will yet deliber- 
 ately pronounce, that, among the eminent 
 men whose bones lie near his, scarcely one 
 has left a more stainless, and none a more 
 splendid name. 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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