Part V.
One must judge men by a real and not ideal standard of mankind.—Criticisms on Mr. Canning’s conduct.—His faults when in a subordinate position.—His better qualities developed in a superior one.—Nature of faculties.—Influence on his own time and the succeeding one.—Foreign policy considered.—Person; manners; specimens of his various abilities; eloquence; art; and turn for drollery and satire.—Style of speaking of despatches.—Always young, and inspiring admiration and affection, even when provoking censure.
I.
In estimating the character of public men, the biographer or critic, if he descend from the sublimity of unbounded panegyric, is often apt to elevate himself at the expense of the person of whom he speaks; and to treat with artificial severity any dereliction from that perfection of conduct which he sees nowhere attained. Thanks to this affected severity or paltry envy, we have hardly a great man left to us. Bolingbroke is nothing but a quack; the elder Pitt only a charlatan; Burke himself a declaimer and a renegade; Fox an ambitious politician out of place; all of which things these great men to a certain degree were, being still great men; and deserving the admiration of a posterity which can hardly hope to furnish their equals.
“No one should write history,” said Montaigne, “who has not himself served the State in some civil or military capacity.” By which this shrewd and impartial observer meant, that no man is fit to judge the conduct of men of action who is not himself a man of action, and can judge it practically, according to what men really are in the world, and not according to any imaginary theory which he may adopt in the obscure nook of his own chimney corner, as to what they might and ought to be.
“We are not,” says Cicero, “in the Republic of Plato, but in the mud of Romulus;” and they who have observed and meditated upon the vicissitudes of empires, will have seen that such have risen or fallen according to the number of eminent men, endowed with lofty intelligences and daring spirits, whom they have produced. And where have such eminent men existed without defects? Human nature is too imperfect for us to expect to find extraordinary abilities and energies under the constant control of moderate virtues.
To those, then, who have read the preceding pages, the whole of Mr. Canning’s career may be shortly summed up in the words of Lord Orford (Horace Walpole), who, speaking of Lord Chatham, says:
“His ambition was to be the most illustrious man in the first country in the world, and he thought that the eminence of glory could not be sullied by the steps to it being passed irregularly” (vol. iv. p. 243).
In the same manner Canning was less scrupulous than he should have been to obtain power and fame. But, in the most memorable part of his life, he made a noble use of the one and well deserved the other. Desirous of office and distinction, he attached himself, on entering life, to that minister by whom office and distinction were most likely to be conferred. The circumstances of the time afforded him not merely an apology, but a fair reason for doing this; still, there seems no injustice in adding that, in ranging himself under the banner of the great commoner’s great son, he thought of his own personal prospects as well as of the public interests.
Mr. Pitt died; Mr. Canning was, as he declared himself, henceforth without a leader. Some of his opinions inclined him to unite with his early friends and recent opponents (the Whigs), who then came into office; and this, it seems, he was on the point of doing, when, by a sudden whirl of Fortune’s wheel, the persons he was seceding from were jerked into power, and those he was about to join jerked out of it. A young man, conscious of his own abilities, and satisfied in his own mind that, however he might obtain influence, he would use it for the public advantage, he did not refuse a high situation from the party to which he still publicly belonged, in order to follow a party just driven from the Administration, and with which he had but begun to treat.
There are things to say in excuse of this conduct, and I have said them; but no one who wishes that Mr. Canning’s life had been without a flaw, can do otherwise than regret that the statesman who made so many subsequent sacrifices for the Catholics, should have joined, at this juncture, a Ministry which rallied its partisans under the cry of “No Popery!”
It is likewise to be regretted that having so frequently expressed his sense of the incapacity of Lord Castlereagh, he should nevertheless have consented first to serve as a subordinate under him when he was mismanaging foreign affairs; and, secondly, to serve as a colleague with him when he was alike lowering us abroad and misgoverning us at home.
During four years he did not shrink from the promulgation of any arbitrary edict—from the suppression of any popular right; and though I admit that many liberal and prudent persons (influenced, I cannot but think, by most exaggerated apprehensions) considered that the strongest measures were necessary at that time to control a spirit of insurrection, which the mingled harshness and incapacity of the ruling Administration had provoked; still, there is a great difference between men who sanction bad laws which a bad government, in which they have had no share, may render momentarily necessary, and men who bring forward bad laws as the result of a bad government which has been carried on by themselves.
It is hardly an excuse to say his errors were committed in an inferior situation, with the idea of rising to a commanding one; but, at all events, when he reached the eminence towards which he had so long been toiling, he made, as I have shown, the best use of that power which had not always been sought for by the best means. Thus, from first to last, we see a man anxious to have power and to use it well; but as anxious to have it as to use it well. That he was blamed and praised with exaggeration was natural; for amidst confronting arrays he was seen for ever in the first rank with the most glittering arms, exciting the admiration of friends and the hatred of foes by his scornful air and ostentatious attitude of defiance.
His talents, by nature showy, were given their peculiar turn by his early education, and his career was shaped to the paths which offered to lead him most easily to distinction. Trained to the juvenile task of writing a foreign language in polished periods, he was at times less anxious to find solid arguments than striking expressions. Not brought up in communication with the uneducated classes, he was more keenly alive to the opinion of the cultivated and refined. Too accommodating as to the temporary suspension of national freedom at home, he was constantly anxious and determined to maintain the power and prestige of the country abroad—throughout his whole life he exhibited the effects of the public school and the close borough.
Like most men who have become illustrious, Mr. Canning owed much to fortune. Lucky in the time of his decease, lucky in the times at which many of those with whom he had hitherto acted deserted him. If he had lived longer, it would have been difficult for him to have kept the station to which he had risen: if he had not been left when he was by a great portion of his party, he would never have obtained the popularity by which his death was hallowed. To few has it happened to be supported by a set of men just as long as their support was useful,—to be quitted by them just when their alliance would have been injurious. The persons who as friends gave Mr. Canning power, as enemies conferred on him reputation. That reputation was above all others, at the time of his demise, amongst his countrymen and contemporaries; and it still retains its predominance, though the influence which he exercised over our domestic policy, and over the events which succeeded his death, is not yet, perhaps, sufficiently recognised. I have already observed that if he had not been Prime Minister in 1827, it is not likely that Lord Grey would have been Premier in 1830. I may add that had not his appointment at the former period brought together all the elements of a great Liberal party, who were allied under the cry of Catholic Emancipation, thus giving a hope and a spirit to the Catholics which they had not previously possessed, the Duke of Wellington would not within a year or two afterwards have been forced to acknowledge that further resistance to them was impossible. Furthermore, if such men as Lord Melbourne, Lord Palmerston, the Grants, and a large party in the country looking up to these statesmen as safe as well as liberal guides—had not been already connected with the Whigs, and alienated from the Tories, under the influence of Mr. Canning in 1827, the Reform Bill would hardly have been proposed in 1830, and would certainly not have been carried in 1832. The more minutely, in short, that we examine the events of the last thirty-six years, the more we shall perceive how much their quiet development has been owing to Mr. Canning, and to the class of men whom Mr. Canning formed, and in his later days represented.
In determining his merits as director of the foreign policy of Great Britain, I have stood, I confess, by the old doctrines, and argued upon the assumption that England is a great state, disposed to maintain that greatness; that the English people is a proud, generous, and brave people, prepared to assert its principles and its position, and to assume its part in the affairs of the world—a nation that takes its share in the general policy of nations—that feels it has a common interest in the maintenance of justice, in the limitation of unscrupulous ambition, in the progress of civilization. I have supposed that the collective wisdom and experience of past ages, have taught us that human nature is ever, though under different forms, guided by the same rules; that the strong, unless they are adequately restrained, insult and oppress, and finally vanquish the weak; that those who under all circumstances are determined to be at peace, become eventually the certain victims of aggression and war; that the spirit of a people cannot with impunity be allowed to droop and languish without dimming the brightness of its genius and losing the force of its character. That a mere money-making population, which, lapped in the luxury of commercial prosperity, begins to disregard its nice sense of honour, its admiration for valour and daring, becomes daily weaker against the spoiler, and a greater temptation to spoliation. I have ventured to believe that a noble people has a heart open to noble emotions—that such a heart is not dead to pity for the unfortunate, to sympathy with the brave—to the love of glory inspiring to great deeds, and to the love of power, with the intention to use it for the public good. I do not think it wise to exchange the principles of action derived from these sentiments for a colder, less generous, and, as I feel convinced, a less sound code of political philosophy. The same sentiments which make one man considered and beloved above others, must distinguish the State aspiring to be great and beloved; but it does not follow that if you feel compassion for a drowning man, you are to plunge into the sea to save him if you cannot swim; that if you see two men valiantly struggling against two regiments, you are to rush into the middle of the combat with the certainty of not vanquishing the assailants, and with that of losing your own life. I condemn nations that interfere needlessly with the international affairs of others, as I should the lady who pretended to dictate to her neighbour how she should have her drawing-room swept, or her chimneys cleaned. I condemn governments which threaten heedlessly, and then fail to strike in spite of their threats; but I esteem governments which look carefully after their honour and interests, and do interfere when it is necessary or expedient to do so, in order either to defend that honour, or to maintain those interests; governments cautious to speak, but bold in acting up to their words.
It is with these views that I look upon the foreign policy of Mr. Canning,—a policy for giving England a great and proud position,—for giving to Englishmen a glorious and respected name; for safeguarding our shores by the universal prestige of our bravery and our power; for limiting the ambition of rival states, without needlessly provoking their animosity; for showing a wish to conciliate wherever moderation is displayed, and for displaying a resolution to resist when conciliation is repulsed—as a great English policy, with which the people of England will ever sympathize, and by which the permanent interests of England will best be preserved.
There are men who are anxious for civil commotion, which they think may be more easily brought about by concentrating the public mind on domestic grievances; there are men who are indifferent to the pride of country—who would as soon be Portuguese, Mexicans, or Moldo-Wallachians, as Englishmen. There are men who, though fame and consideration are the great objects of their countrymen, hold they ought not to be objects for their country. These will repudiate my opinion. But every Briton who is justly proud of his race, who will inquire from a small and despised state the value of being a great and renowned one, will, I believe, recognise the foreign policy I have been describing to be the true policy for maintaining the dignity and authority, without rashly risking the peaceful prosperity, of the British empire.
In person Mr. Canning was favoured by nature, being of a good height, of a strong frame, and of a regular and remarkably intelligent countenance. The glance of his eye when excited, and the smile of his lip when pleased, were often noted by his contemporaries.
“And on that turtle I saw a rider,
A goodly man, with an eye so merry,
I knew ’twas our foreign secretary,
Who there at his ease did sit and smile
Like Waterton on his crocodile;
Cracking such jokes, at every motion,
As made the turtle squeak with glee,
And own that they gave him a lively notion
Of what his own forced-meat balls would be.”
A Dream of a Turtle.—T. Moore.
Charming in manner, as I have said, constant in attachments, it was observed of him at one period, that he was as dear to his friends as odious to the public.[125]
Ever ready to praise his subordinates, and to consult the tastes of his associates, he was honoured as a chief as much as he was relished as a companion. His accomplishments were various, and of a kind which may leave disputes open as to the degree of their excellence, but they were all of that brilliant and genial description which was sure to attract sympathy and procure reputation. How many must have chuckled over the following light and lazy piece of satire:
“I am like Archimedes for science and skill,
I am like the young prince who went straight up the hill;
And to interest the hearts of the fair be it said,
I am like a young lady just bringing to bed.
If you ask why the eleventh of June I remember
So much better than April, or March, or December,
’Tis because on that day, as with pride I assure ye,
My sainted progenitor took to his brewery.
On that day in the month he began making beer;
On that night he commenced his connubial career.
On that day he died when he had finished his summing,
And the angels all cried ‘here’s old Whitbread a coming.’
So that day I still hail with a smile and a sigh,
For his beer with an e and his bier with an i;
And that day every year, in the hottest of weather,
The whole Whitbread family dine altogether.
My Lords, while the beams of the hall shall support
The roof which o’ershades this respectable court
(Where Hastings was tried for oppressing the Hindoos),
While the rays of the sun shall shine in these windows
My name shall shine bright as my ancestor’s shines,
Emblazoned on journals as his upon signs.”
How many must have felt their minds respond and their hearts bound at the following argumentative and spirited declamation:
“When the elective franchise was conceded to the Catholics of Ireland, that acknowledgment and anticipation, which I now call upon the House formally to ratify and realize, was, in point of fact, irrevocably pronounced. To give the latter the elective franchise was to admit him to political power; for, to make him an elector and at the same time to render him incapable of being elected, is to attract to our sides the lowest orders of the community, at the same time that we repel from us the highest orders of the gentry. This is not the surest or safest way to bind Ireland to the rest of the Empire in ties of affection. And what is there to prevent our union from being wrought more closely? Is there any moral—is there any physical obstacle? Opposuit natura? No such thing. We have already bridged the channel! Ireland now sits with us in the Representative Assembly of the Empire; and when she was allowed to come there, why was she not also allowed to bring with her some of her Catholic children? For many years, alas! we have been erecting a mound, not to assist or improve the inclinations of Providence, but to thwart them. We have raised it high above the waters, and it has stood there frowning hostility and effecting a separation. In the course of time, however, chance and design—the necessities of man and the sure workings of nature—have conspired to break down this mighty structure, till there remains of it only a narrow isthmus standing
‘between two kindred seas,
Which mounting view each other from afar,
And long to meet.’
What, then, shall be our conduct? Shall we attempt to repair the breaches, and fortify the ruins? A hopeless and ungracious undertaking! or shall we leave them to moulder away by time and accident? a sure but distant and thankless consummation! Or shall we not rather cut away at once the isthmus that remains, allow free course to the current which our artificial impediments have constructed, and float upon the mighty waters the ark of our common constitution?”
And we are now to be told that this same man, so playful and jocose, so ornamented and brilliant, was a close arguer, and indefatigable in attendance at his office. But though always ready for business, he would not scruple to introduce a piece of drollery into the most serious affairs. For instance:
The embassy at the Hague is in earnest dispute with the King of Holland; a despatch addressed to Sir Charles Bagot arrives—it is in cypher. The most acute of the attachés set to work to discover the meaning of this particular document; they produce a rhyme! they are startled, thrown into confusion; set to work again, and produce another rhyme. The important paper (and it was important) contains something like the following doggrel:
“Dear Bagot, in commerce the fault of the Dutch
Is giving too little, and asking too much,
So since on this policy Mynheer seems bent,
We’ll clap on his vessels just 20 per cent.”
As a specimen of his more private and trivial pleasantries may be mentioned his observation to, I believe, Lord Londonderry, who had been telling a story of some Dutch picture he had seen, in which all the animals of antediluvian times were issuing from Noah’s Ark, “and,” said Lord Londonderry, “the elephant was last.” “That of course,” said Mr. Canning; “he had been packing up his trunk.”
In his celebrated contest with Lord Lyndhurst (then Sir John Copley), that noble lord having appeared in it with a speech borrowed for the most part from a popular pamphlet, written by the late Bishop of Exeter (then Doctor Philpotts), he was overthrown amidst shouts of laughter, by the appropriate recollection of the old song:
“‘Dear Tom, this brown jug that now foams with mild ale,
Out of which I now drink to sweet Nan of the Yale,’
Was once Toby Philpot.”
Again, who does not remember the celebrated sketch of Lord Nugent[126]—who went out to join the Spanish patriots when their cause was pretty well lost—a sketch which furnished Mr. Canning’s most effective defence of the neutral policy he had adopted towards Spain, during the French expedition.
“It was about the middle of last July that the heavy Falmouth coach”—(here Mr. Canning was interrupted with loud and continued laughter)—“that the heavy Falmouth coach was observed travelling to its destination through the roads of Cornwall with more than its wonted gravity (very loud laughter). The coach contained two inside passengers—the one a fair lady of no inconsiderable dimensions, the other a gentleman who was conveying the succour of his person to the struggling patriots of Spain. I am further informed—and this interesting fact, sir, can also be authenticated—that the heavy Falmouth van (which honourable gentlemen, doubtless, are aware is constructed for the conveyance of cumbrous articles) was laden, upon the same memorable occasion, with a box of most portentous magnitude. Now, sir, whether this box, like the flying chest of the conjuror, possessed any supernatural properties of locomotion, is a point which I confess I am quite unable to determine; but of this I am most credibly informed—and I should hesitate long before I stated it to the House, if the statement did not rest upon the most unquestionable authority—that this extraordinary box contained a full uniform of a Spanish general of cavalry, together with a helmet of the most curious workmanship; a helmet, allow me to add, scarcely inferior in size to the celebrated helmet in the castle of Otranto (loud laughter). Though the idea of going to the relief of a fortress, blockaded by sea and besieged by land, in a full suit of light horseman’s equipments was, perhaps, not strongly consonant to modern military operations, yet when the gentleman and his box made their appearance, the Cortes, no doubt, were overwhelmed with joy, and rubbed their hands with delight at the approach of the long-promised aid. How the noble lord was received, or what effects he operated on the councils of the Cortes by his arrival, I (Mr. Canning) do not know. Things were at that juncture moving rapidly to their final issue; and how far the noble lord conduced to the termination by throwing his weight into the sinking scale of the Cortes, is too nice a question for me just now to settle.”[127]
Mr. Canning’s wit, it is true, was not unfrequently too long and too laboured, and a happy combination of words would almost always seduce him into an indiscretion. The alliteration of “revered and ruptured,” as applied to the unfortunate Mr. Ogden, cost him more abuse, and procured him for a time more unpopularity, than the worst of his acts ever deserved. His description of the American navy (in 1812) as “half a dozen fir-frigates, with bits of bunting flying at their heads,” excited the American nation more than any actual grievance, and caused in a great measure the bitterness of that contest in which we were so insolent and so unsuccessful. His propensity to jokes made him also many enemies in private life. The late Duke of Bedford told a friend of mine that Mr. Canning, when staying with a party at Lord Carrington’s (a few weeks after Lord C. had been made a peer by Mr. Pitt), wrote in chalk, on the outside of the hall-door, the following lines:—
“One Bobby Smith lives here,
Billy Pitt made him a peer,
And took the pen from behind his ear.”
This unnecessary impertinence, I have heard, Lord Carrington never forgave.
In the art of speaking, our orator’s progress, like that of Pulteney, Fox, and all our great parliamentary debaters, with the exception of the two Pitts, Bolingbroke, and Lord Derby, was slow and gradual; and though I have heard Lord Lansdowne (once known as Henry Petty) observe that he considered Canning in his best days even more effective than Fox or Pitt, he had at an earlier period been often accused, by no mean judges, now of being wordy and tedious, now of being rather elegant than argumentative. To time, practice, a proud spirit, and a continually developing understanding, he owed his triumph over these defects. Then it was that his eloquence approached almost to perfection, as we consider the audience, half lounging and sleepy, half serious and awake, to which it was addressed. Quick, easy, and fluent, frequently passionate and sarcastic, now brilliant and ornamented, then again light and playful; or, if he wished it, clear, simple, and incisive; no speaker ever combined a greater variety of qualities, though many have been superior in each of the excellences which he possessed. Remarkable as a general rule for the polish of his language (we have proof, even to the last, of the pains he bestowed upon it), those who knew him well assert that he would sometimes purposely frame his sentences loosely and incorrectly, in order to avoid the appearance of preparation. “Erat memoriæ nulla tamen meditationis suspicio.” His action exhibiting when calm an union of grace and dignity, became, as he warmed, unaffectedly fervent; and made natural by its vigour and animation the florid language and figurative decorations in which he rather too fondly indulged. His arguments were not placed in that clear, logical form, which sometimes enchains, but more often wearies, attention; neither did he use those solemn perorations by which it is attempted to instil awe or terror into the mind. His was rather the endeavour to charm the ear, to amuse the fancy, to excite the feelings, to lead and fascinate the judgment; and in these different attributes of his great art he succeeded in the highest degree, insomuch that though he might be said to want depth and sublimity, the faculties he possessed were elevated to such a pitch, that at times he appeared both profound and sublime.
A great merit, which he finally possessed, was that of seizing and speaking the general sense of the popular assembly he addressed. Sir Robert Peel, his distinguished rival, told me one day, in speaking of Mr. Canning as to this particular, that he would often before rising in his place, make a sort of lounging tour of the House, listening to the tone of the observations which the previous debates had excited, so that at last, when he himself spoke, he seemed to a large part of his audience to be merely giving a striking form to their own thoughts.
Neither were his despatches, though not so elaborately perfect as those of his successor (Lord Dudley), inferior to his orations; possessing precision, spirit, and dignity, they remain what they were justly called by no incompetent authority, “models and masterpieces of diplomatic composition.”[128]
There are critics who have said that there was something in his character which tended to diminish our respect for his talents, though it softened our censure for his defects. And it is true that the same unstately love for wit—the same light facility for satire—the same imprudent levity of conduct, that involuntarily lowered our estimate of his graver abilities—involuntarily led us to excuse his graver errors. We at one time blame the statesman for being too much the child—at another we pardon the veteran politician in the same humour in which we would forgive the spoiled and high-spirited schoolboy.
Mr. Canning, indeed, was always young. The head of the sixth form at Eton—squibbing “the doctor,” as Mr. Addington was called; fighting with Lord Castlereagh; cutting jokes on Lord Nugent; flatly contradicting Lord Brougham; swaggering over the Holy Alliance; he was in perpetual personal quarrels—one of the reasons which created for him so much personal interest during the whole of his parliamentary career. Yet out of those quarrels he nearly always came glorious and victorious—defying his enemies, cheered by his friends—never sinking into an ordinary man,—though not a perfect one.
No imaginative artist, fresh from studying his career, would sit down to paint this minister with the broad and deep forehead—the stern compressed lip—the deep, thoughtful, concentrated air of Napoleon Bonaparte. As little would the idea of his eloquence or ambition call to our recollection the swart and iron features—the bold and haughty dignity of Strafford. We cannot fancy in his eye the volume depth of Richelieu’s—the volcanic flash of Mirabeau’s—the offended majesty of Chatham’s. Sketching him from our fancy, it would be as a few still living remember him, with a visage rather marked by humour and intelligence than by meditation or sternness; with something of the petulant mingling in its expression with the proud; with much of the playful overruling the profound. His nature, in short, exhibited more of the genial fancy and the quick irritability of the poet who captivates and inflames an audience, than of the inflexible will of the dictator who puts his foot on a nation’s neck, or of the fiery passions of the tribune who rouses a people against its oppressors.
Still, Mr. Canning, such as he was, will remain one of the most brilliant and striking personages in our historical annals. As a statesman, the latter passages of his life cannot be too deeply studied; as an orator, his speeches will always be models of their kind; and as a man, there was something so graceful, so fascinating, so spirited in his bearing, that even when we condemn his faults, we cannot avoid feeling affection for his memory, and a sympathetic admiration for his genius.