CHAPTER I.
Debates on East Indian Affairs.—Wilkes and the Duke of Grafton.—Expulsion of the Jesuits from Spain.—Parliamentary Discussions.—Attempts to construct a new Administration in Prospective.—The Court of Proprietors vote themselves a Dividend in spite of the Ministry.—Extraordinary Conduct of Townshend in the House of Commons.
1767.
I have said that the Opposition, perceiving how much the tide ran against them, determined to attempt putting an end to the East Indian business the moment the examination was closed; a weak and silly plan, that betrayed a jealousy of their own cause. Sir William Meredith fixed on the 14th for making that attempt. Lord Bute had been seriously alarmed, and he and the Duke of Grafton exerted themselves to defeat the Opposition. Beckford observed that the evidence had proved all he had asserted, and said he intended to make some motions in consequence, but the examination had been so voluminous, he had not had time to digest his matter. Sir William Meredith said, he doubted whether it was fit to proceed at all further or not: that it had been Beckford’s own fault if the examination had been voluminous. His questions to the evidences had been unjust, and would not have been admitted in a court of justice. It were better to stop, if violence alone was to be the consequence. The Ministers in the Treasury ought to make the motions, if any were proper; but they did not seem to be trusted in this question. The Company would not make proposals while a doubt subsisted of their having any property in the territorial acquisitions. He did not know what motion to make; he thought that the Speaker should leave the chair. Townshend and Conway spoke for allowing more time; Grenville for going into the Committee to see if any one had any proposal to make. Beckford declared he would never propose any question of forfeiture. Norton, in a very indefinite speech, said, if the Company had exceeded their charter, the Crown could call them to account. That the acquisitions were not conquest, because the King was not at war with the Mogul: they seemed to be only plunder. It seemed to be difficult to know judicially what to do with those acquisitions. They ought to be restored, but nobody wished to see that. The Attorney-General desired Norton to give his opinion how to try the case. He refused, saying, “It will be alleged that a prerogative lawyer has pointed out to the Crown a way of getting possession.” The Attorney-General showed that, by the nature of a process in the courts of law, it was impossible for the King to recover his right by law, supposing the territory were his by his prerogative, or by the forfeiture of the Company. There must be an information of intrusion: a jury must be chosen where the lands lie, and yet where there is no sheriff. The sheriff must deliver the profits; must appoint a receiver for the three provinces, who must give security for two years in a court of law to examine the necessary witnesses. The court would not order possession to be delivered. Then there must be a sequestration of the Company’s effects. Having thus exposed with much humour the fruitlessness of a legal suit, he said if nobody else would, he would move for a bill to prevent the Company from making a dividend beyond such a sum without consent of Parliament. It was necessary to frighten them: he would not violate their charter, but as he thought they had no right to their territorial revenues, he would take the half of them. Wedderburn replied, that an action might lie against the Company as a corporation: all he desired was to ascertain the right; the Legislature would settle the rest. Grenville declaimed against any violence, and said with passion, the view was not to vest money in the public, but in the Crown; and a profuse Minister had been found who wanted to give four millions to the King, a year before the general election. He should advise to take this money by taxation. Conway said boldly, he should insist on security that this money, if taken, should be vested in the public, not in the Crown. Taxation was like Mr. Grenville’s Morocco politics. Burke pleaded that in the last charter the Crown had granted the Company privileges as indemnification: what could that mean but territory, revenue, and commerce? Yet he owned there was a political reserve in the charters.
The debate lasted till one in the morning when the Opposition were beaten by 213 to 157. After the division I told the Duke of Richmond that, notwithstanding our victory, I was as ready as ever to unite Conway and his Grace’s friends on the American affairs. The King was informed of Grenville’s apprehensions that the money to be taken from the Company was designed for his Majesty, and highly resented the insinuation—perhaps resented Grenville’s dislike of such a disposition. There wanted no new aggravation of Grenville’s offences. His tediousness in the closet had left a lasting impression; and an ill-judged obstinacy of economy in an article of no great moment, but which was ever before the King’s eyes, could not be forgotten. When his Majesty took in a portion of the Green Park to form a new garden for Buckingham House, the fields on the opposite side of the road were to be sold; the price twenty thousand pounds. This sum Grenville refused to issue from the Treasury. The ground was sold to builders, and a new row of houses, each of which overlooked the King in his private walks, was erected to his great annoyance.
Wilkes had come over the last year, during the recess of Parliament, to try to obtain his pardon, and by the Duke of Grafton’s desire wrote a very submissive letter to his Grace, to be shown to the King. The Duke then told him his pardon could not be obtained without the concurrence of Lord Chatham, and wished him to write to the latter too. Wilkes, who had been abandoned and stigmatized by Lord Chatham, though formerly intimate with and flattered by him, had too much spirit to throw himself at Chatham’s feet, and refused: but, irritated at his disappointment, he published an exaggerated account of that transaction, with unjust severity on the Duke[1],—and returned to Paris. His Grace, Lord Rockingham, and others of that connexion, had yearly contributed the sum of 1000l. or 1100l. to his support. Mr. Fitzherbert collected their donations. It was now the season of collection. In defiance of the Duke, Wilkes sent over a new abusive pamphlet against the Administration.
March 16th.—The Houses adjourned for the holidays.
At this period happened the sudden and total expulsion of the Jesuits from Spain,—a measure so unexpected by them, that they were made prisoners in their convents throughout the kingdom, without having had the least intimation of their intended ruin; a moment of history that will ever be remarkable. The order, renowned for their subtlety and art, dreaded for the empire they had obtained over the consciences of princes and private persons, and seated in the most bigoted country upon earth, had neither sagacity to surmise their impending destruction, nor one penitent so weak and devout as to give them intelligence of what, for a whole year, was in agitation against them. That fabric of human policy and wickedness fell to the ground in an instant. Not a murmur was heard against the rigour of the sentence, though they were conducted to the sea-coasts like exiled malefactors, thrust into ships, and sent like cargoes of damaged goods to their proprietor, the Pope. Clement XIII. though an enthusiast, could not receive them. They were at last dispatched to Corsica, one and all, after being tossed about at sea for some months,[2] stowed in the narrow compass of a few vessels,—a fate so severe, that the greatest enemy of Catholic imposition must commiserate the sufferers. However detestable the maxims of the society, however criminal some of the order might have been, the greater part were undoubtedly innocent—many, perhaps, conscientious men; who, trusting to the establishment and laws of the country, and believing the doctrines they had been taught, had entered into religion. Let the impartial mind weigh the weight of the calamity that fell like thunder on those poor men! Torn from the tranquillity of their convents; too old or too ignorant to turn to new professions; delivered up to an element they were totally unaccustomed to, sickening with the natural effect of the waves, and with want of room and air; banished for ever from their country, relations, and friends; uncertain to what clime they were driven; finding with difficulty one that would receive them, and that one in a state of war, and the most unwholesome spot in Europe;—what a state of lamentation and hopeless misery! What, too, must the parents and friends of those unhappy men have felt? Could no middle term be found? What a horrible post is that of a minister, when the benefit or policy of the State calls for such sacrifices! No doubt was entertained but that the Court of Madrid had discovered that the Jesuits had been the incendiaries of the late insurrection there; and its ministers seemed to have learnt and imbibed the deep secrecy and resolute vigour of the Count D’Ocyras, the prime minister of Portugal, the profoundest and most desperate politician of the age. From M. de Mello, the Portuguese minister in England,[3] I received this account of the springs that first gave birth to that revolution. When D’Ocyras became all-powerful at Lisbon, he found the Portuguese settlements in America, that bordered on the French, extremely neglected. Apprehending a rupture with France from that quarter, he sent his own brother to examine the Portuguese possessions. At the same period Ferdinand’s Queen, who held the reins of the Spanish monarchy during the incapacity of her husband, had made a treaty with Portugal for an exchange of lands, in which Spain would have been gainer; intending to involve the Court of Lisbon in a quarrel with the Jesuits of Paraguay, part of which country was to be ceded to the Portuguese. The event happened as she had foreseen: the Jesuits refused the exchange; and imputing the machination to D’Ocyras, endeavoured to excite the confessors of both Kings and Queens to attempt the ruin of that minister.[4] This step drew upon them the wrath of that vindictive man, who, possessing all the spirit of intrigue which seemed to have deserted the fathers, never stopped till he had accomplished the destruction of the order. Had D’Ocyras[5] been a Jesuit instead of a statesman, the Jesuits might have subsisted till the Roman Church itself shall fall like other structures of human invention. So true it is, what I have more than once remarked in these pages, that great benefits are seldom conferred on mankind by good men. It is when the interests and passions of ambition, villany, and desperation clash, that some general advantage is struck out.
On the 28th, when the Houses re-assembled, nothing was ready for their discussion. The Duke of Grafton had passed the holidays at Newmarket, and when he returned, could not obtain admission to Lord Chatham. The Directors of the East India Company, alarmed at the strength of the evidence against them, had determined to make a compromise or bargain with the Government; and, fearing Lord Chatham would reject their proposal, had sent severally round to the members of the Cabinet, to desire to treat. At a Council held the evening before the meeting of the Parliament, Conway brought them all over to his opinion for a treaty; and he, with the Duke of Grafton, and Charles Townshend, were commissioned by the rest to negotiate. The last was grown a great advocate for the Company, and said, that now, on the death of his wife’s mother,[6] the Duchess of Argyle, he himself was become a considerable proprietor of India stock—all the truth was, that he intended to be so; the Duchess had not had a shilling in that fund. He had acted with the same lightness when, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, he had been to open the Budget before the holidays: he had caused Onslow to make his excuse on pretence of illness, and then appeared there walking about the House. Two days after he did open it—but of that more hereafter, when I come to speak of his proposed taxes.
March 29th was the day appointed at the desire of the Opposition for the call of the House, and Conway had proposed they should go on the India business on that day, but Grenville had said he would insist on the House being called over. They now would have put off the call for a week to keep the members of their party in town, but Conway fixed them to their first proposal, and on a division carried it by a majority of fifty. Rigby then said, “We will put it off for a fortnight;” “No,” said Conway, “I will do that, for the Indian business is in a more promising way than ever.” Grenville was thunderstruck: Conway’s spirits showed how much he was pleased with his triumph—Grenville being the only man who had ever inspired him with animosity.
The next morning he came to me early, and said, the Duke of Grafton had told him things could not go on as they were; that Lord Chatham must either come forth, or quit; and he thought would do the latter. Conway therefore desired T would go to the Duke of Richmond, and say that I had persuaded him to let me come to his Grace and tell him that if he and his friends would not join Grenville, he (Conway) would assist them in a new Administration, but would take no civil place under any; should like to be Secretary at War, and Minister of the House of Commons, if Townshend had his wish and was created a peer. His idea was, that he might be Minister for the Military Department, if Lord Granby could be removed.
I said, all this was idle; that neither the King nor the House of Commons would come into it. That if he would not be First Minister, Grenville must. That he (Conway) must take the Treasury, or nothing would last; Lord Rockingham’s Administration had not lasted a year, though with the assistance of the Duke of Grafton and his friends, and with the hopes of acquiring Lord Chatham; now would have neither of them. He could not be Minister of the House of Commons without power; had Lord Rockingham imparted any to him before? He confessed he should like some share of power, and I thought would not be sorry to have the whole if Lord Rockingham could be brought to waive it. I told him I would carry no such message as he proposed, for should it afterwards prove necessary to place him at the head of the Treasury, the Duke of Richmond and Lord Rockingham might say I had given them false hopes and deceived them. Conway replied, all he meant was to keep them from Grenville, whom he feared they would join. I saw no occasion, I said, for any message: Rockingham and his friends would be rejoiced to have him whenever he would go to them; but I would propose nothing so ridiculous as Rockingham and Dowdeswell over again. He said, I only refused because I wished him Minister in some other system, but he would never more be of any but with his old friends. It was all, I replied, that I desired too; our only difference was, that I chose they should act under him, not he under them, which would never do. In the meantime I would positively carry no message. A few days after I gave him my reasons in writing, and convinced him. He then proposed to be Secretary of State for America, which I approved. It was the sphere in which he might make the greatest figure. His application was indefatigable; his temper, moderation, attention to the business of others when applied to, and the popularity he had already gained with the Colonies, adapted him peculiarly to that province. We agreed to adjust this plan with Lord Rockingham—but that project, like a thousand others of that season, was disappointed.
The King asked Lord Hertford by what means any composition with the East India Company had been obtained? He replied, that sensible of his Majesty’s difficulties, and fearing that, notwithstanding the right of the Company had been weakened by the examination, the House would never be induced to vote it away; he and his brother had prevailed on the rest of his Majesty’s servants to take the gentler method of treaty. The King owned that he was inclined to keep Lord Chatham, if capable of remaining in place, having seen how much his Government had been weakened by frequent changes. He wished that things might remain as they were, at least till the end of the Session, when he might have time to make any necessary alterations. At his levee his Majesty asked James Grenville aloud, how Lord Chatham did? he replied, “Better.” The King said, “If he has lost his fever, I desire to be his physician, and that he would not admit Dr. Addington any more into his house. He shall go into the country for four months; not so far as Bath, but to Tunbridge.” He repeated the same words publicly to Lord Bristol; everybody understanding that his Majesty’s wish was to retain Lord Chatham.[7]
On the 1st of May Beckford was to have proposed his resolutions; but Crabb Boulton,[8] an India Director, informing the House that there was now a prospect of accommodation with the Ministry, and that a general court to ratify the terms could not be held till the next week, when he did not doubt but they would approve the plan, which was only temporary, Beckford consented to postpone his motions. Sir W. Meredith called on him to read his questions. Rigby with much roughness said, he believed Beckford had no questions to propose; yet he should have some hopes of the accommodation succeeding, if Mr. Townshend (who was the fittest to be at the head of that Administration) would, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, say he had hopes. Townshend, with great decency, declared he had. Grenville, who had early in the session declared for a temporary accommodation, was much hampered and hurt: and having nothing to object, reverted to the former wrangle on Morocco politics, and said, that to take by violence was squeezing laws, as Mahometan governments do; but anything might be taken by legal taxation. Conway took this up with infinite humour, ridiculing legal tyranny; and as Grenville had asked if Lord Chatham would come into this agreement, said, he hoped it would be no mortification to hear that the Council would be unanimous. He laughed too at Rigby, who had been on the point of saying that Charles Townshend was the fittest man to be at the head of any administration; but he had turned round in time and seen his friend Mr. Grenville, or it might have made a fatal difference! Grenville replied angrily, he did not envy any junction between Lord Chatham and Conway: he knew what attempts had been made to disunite him and the Bedfords. Rigby in a greater rage said, nothing should disunite them; (he might have said, but interest, which made Rigby leave Grenville in less than two years;) himself had always stuck by his friends—he did not abandon his family and friends. As this was levelled at Conway, it either meant his former separation from the Court when Lord Hertford remained with it, or his disunion now with the Rockinghams, amongst whom was not one of his family but the Duke of Richmond, his wife’s son-in-law. Rose Fuller said properly, he did not understand such unparliamentary declarations, as of being actuated only by connexions. Conway protested he did not know what Rigby had meant, who called out contemptuously, “Oh! I meant nothing.” The House was unanimous for waiting till that day sennight.
When I went to the Duke of Richmond the next morning with Conway’s plan of being Secretary for America, I found him displeased at Conway’s attack on Grenville and Rigby. I urged, as was true, that they had given the provocation, and that Conway had not said half enough in return. His Grace was hurt too, on thinking that Conway had declared an union with Lord Chatham. I said, I was come a proof of the contrary; that Conway would oppose the American Bill, and was resolved to resign—though I would not be bound that he would; that he declared he would not take the Treasury from Lord Rockingham. But I was come, I said, to ask, in case Lord Chatham’s health should not permit him to go on, and the King should order Conway to form an Administration, whether his Grace and his friends would take on? The Duke insisted on Conway’s resigning before the end of the session. It was true, in his discontent with Lord Chatham, Conway had told them he would quit, though with no definite time marked; and it was on that rash promise the Rockinghams built all their hopes of breaking up the Administration—a point I was as eager to prevent the accomplishment of. I replied coldly, it had been usual for ministers to send for opponents: it was new to hear an Opposition order a minister to come to them. “But, my lord,” said I, “to cut matters short, Mr. Conway will not resign before the end of the session.” The Duke said, Dowdeswell was reserved, and would not speak out while Mr. Conway remained in place. I laughed, and asked, what it signified what Mr. Dowdeswell would do? My question was, what the party would do? He said, they would insist on the dismission of two or three of Lord Bute’s friends. I asked, “Why?” He said, “To weaken Bute, whose friends would desert him, if they perceived he could not protect them.” “Then, my lord,” replied I, “either he will not let you come in, or will soon turn you out again to prevent that defection.” The Duke was desirous that Grenville should be paymaster. I taxed him with leaning to Grenville. He said, neither he nor his party inclined to Grenville, though the Duke of Newcastle laboured for it daily. I asked him why his Grace himself, who had acted so long with Lord Bute was now so averse to him? He said “Formerly Lord Holland had swayed him, and that Lord Bute had then followed the same measures as had been observed in the late reign.” I cried, “Good God! my lord, were general warrants the same measures!” He paused, and said it was true, they had been ill-conducted. The Duke added, his party, Conway and Grenville, would be too strong for Bute. I said, the whole nation united would certainly be too strong for him; but that union would never happen, for there were not places enough to content all. The more his Grace and his friends were averse to Bute, the sooner Grenville would court him: the Tories and the Scotch would always adhere to him. I said at last; “My lord, I will not be unreasonable; offer Grenville to be Paymaster.” Still the Duke reverted to the dismission of some of Bute’s friends. I said, “If your Grace is in this mind, I will advise Mr. Conway to stay where he is, and not return to a weak and inefficient Opposition. All your Grace says, tends to or must end in making Grenville minister.” He was alarmed, and said, if others would acquiesce, he would not be obstinate.
Here lay the misfortune. The Cavendishes, inveterate to Bute for the affront put on their late brother, saw—would see—no other object of fear. Whereas, though Bute had been the prime source of the attacks made on liberty, his pusillanimity had defeated his own purpose. Grenville, still more arbitrary, was intrepid and inflexible; and whether minister in concert with Bute, or independent of him, was a more formidable enemy to liberty, than an ignorant, trembling, exploded favourite.
Conway was hurt at my report of the above conversation, as I intended he should be. My object was to make the Rockinghams submit to him, or prevent his resignation. He would not hear of Grenville. They stickled for the Bedfords, urging that it would prevent Bute from turning them out again; whereas, it was more likely to advance it, as Grenville would stoop to Bute rather than remain subordinate to Rockingham and Conway. The intractable man of all was, as usual, Lord John Cavendish. The Duke of Portland himself, inveterate as he was to Bute, had the sense to see that if they came into place before the new Parliament, it would secure all their elections. Nobody’s fortune suffered like his Grace’s at that ensuing period, by yielding to the obstinacy of Lord John, and the ill-conducted ambition of Lord Rockingham.
Mr. Conway having declared in Council against the intended plan for America, it was determined that Charles Townshend should conduct it through the House, and the fifth of May was settled for his opening it: but his strange irresolution and versatility could not conceal itself, even on so public an occasion. That very morning he pretended to have fallen down stairs and cut his eye dangerously. On this Lord North was deputed to execute the task, and was going to explain it to the House; when Rigby, to deprive Lord North of the honour, or to embarrass Townshend, who had shuffled with them, or that Grenville had not determined what part to take, moved, with affected compliments on Townshend’s absence, to wait till he could appear, and it was agreed to.
The next day, the Opposition, who, so often foiled, were alert in making a hussar-kind of war, moved by surprise in both Houses to know what had been done on the affair of the Massachusets. In the Commons, the motion made by Grenville was rejected without a division. In the Lords, the majority against the motion was but nine, but with a great majority of proxies.
The East India Company had offered, in consideration of certain new advantages granted to them in their tea-trade, to pay four hundred thousand pounds a-year for three years to the Government; and though this sum was far below Lord Chatham’s first sanguine wishes, the impossibility of their affording more, or the impracticability of persuading Parliament to extort more, had brought the bargain nigh to a conclusion;—when, on the 6th of May, a general court of proprietors, where faction and speech-making were as rife as in the House of Commons itself, suddenly determined to treat themselves with the sweets of a dividend, before their funds should be tied up for the purposes of the treaty. The directors had foreseen and secretly insinuated this to the Ministers for prevention; but in the intemperance of the assembly, did not dare to avow the advice they had given. The dividend, so contrary to the faith of the treaty then pending with, and so contemptuous of, Parliament, was voted; and, as if themselves were accountable to none, they dismissed, without a hearing, five of their own servants, against whom there were grievous charges.
The indecency and insult of this proceeding raised high resentment in the House of Commons; and though Dempster and W. Burke, two of their own members, ventured to avow their own share of the criminality, justifying themselves as proprietors, (a character which surely, as judges, they ought to have avoided,) yet the moderation of Conway prevented the House from proceeding to rigour and censure, though he said with firmness, that if the Company should hang out the flag of defiance, he should be ready to meet it. The directors were ordered to give an account the next day of what had passed.
On the eighth the directors appeared at the bar of the House, and owned that they had disapproved of making a dividend in the present situation of their affairs, and pending the negotiation with Parliament. Dyson, on this, moved for leave to bring in a bill for regulating the making of dividends.
It was on that day, and on that occasion, that Charles Townshend displayed in a latitude beyond belief the amazing powers of his capacity, and the no less amazing incongruities of his character. He had taken on himself, early in the day, the examination of the Company’s conduct; and in a very cool sensible speech on that occasion, and with a becoming consciousness of his own levity, had told the House that he hoped he had atoned for the inconsideration of his past life by the care he had taken of that business. He had scarce uttered this speech, but, as if to atone for that (however false) atonement, he left the House and went home to dinner, not concerning himself with Dyson’s motion that was to follow. As that motion was, however, of a novel nature, it produced suspicion, objection and difficulties. Conway being pressed, and not caring to be the sole champion of an invidious measure, that was in reality not only in Townshend’s province, but which he had had a principal hand in framing, sent for him back to the House. He returned about eight in the evening, half-drunk with champagne, and more intoxicated with spirits. He rose to speak without giving himself time to learn, and without caring what had been in agitation, except that the motion had given an alarm. The first thing he did, was to call God to witness that he had not been consulted on the motion,—a confession implying that he was not consulted on a business in his own department; and the more marvellous, as the disgrace of which he seemed to complain or boast of, was absolutely false. There were sitting round him twelve persons who had been in consultation with him that very morning, and with his assistance had drawn up the motion on his own table, and who were petrified at his most unparalleled effrontery and causeless want of truth. When he sat down again, Conway asked him softly, how he could affirm so gross a falsehood? He replied carelessly, “I thought it would be better to say so;” but before he sat down, he had poured forth a torrent of wit, parts, humour, knowledge, absurdity, vanity, and fiction, heightened by all the graces of comedy, the happiness of allusion and quotation, and the buffoonery of farce. To the purpose of the question he said not a syllable. It was a descant on the times, a picture of parties, of their leaders, of their hopes, and defects. It was an encomium and a satire on himself; and while he painted the pretensions of birth, riches, connexions, favour, titles; while he affected to praise Lord Rockingham, and that faction, and yet insinuated that nothing but parts like his own were qualified to preside; and while he less covertly arraigned the wild incapacity of Lord Chatham,[9] he excited such murmurs of wonder, admiration, applause, laughter, pity, and scorn, that nothing was so true as the sentence with which he concluded, when speaking of Government; he said, it was become what he himself had often been called, a weathercock.
Such was the wit, abundance, and impropriety of this speech, that for some days men could talk or inquire of nothing else. “Did you hear Charles Townshend’s champagne speech?” was the universal question. For myself, I protest it was the most singular pleasure of the kind I ever tasted. The bacchanalian enthusiasm of Pindar flowed in torrents less rapid and less eloquent, and inspires less delight, than Townshend’s imagery, which conveyed meaning in every sentence. It was Garrick writing and acting extempore scenes of Congreve. A light circumstance increased the mirth of the audience. In the fervour of speaking Townshend rubbed off the patch from his eye, which he had represented as grievously cut three days before: no mark was discernible, but to the nearest spectators a scratch so slight, that he might have made, and perhaps had made it himself with a pin.[10] To me the entertainment of the day was complete. He went to supper with us at Mr. Conway’s, where, the flood of his gaiety not being exhausted, he kept the table in a roar till two in the morning, by various sallies and pictures, the last of which was a scene in which he mimicked inimitably his own wife, and another great lady with whom he fancied himself in love, and both whose foibles and manner he counterfeited to the life. Mere lassitude closed his lips at last, not the want of wit and new ideas.
To solve the contrast of such parts and absurdity in the same composition, one is almost tempted to have recourse to that system of fairy manicheism, wherein no sooner has one benevolent being endowed the hero of the tale with supernatural excellence, but a spiteful hag of equal omnipotence dashes the irrevocable gift with some counter qualification, which serves to render the accomplished prince a monster of contradictions.
It was not less worth reflection, that, while this phenomenon of genius was, perniciously to himself, and uselessly to his country, lavishing an unexampled profusion of parts on wanton buffoonery, only to excite transient and barren applause; the restorer of his country was lurking in darkness and shrouding a haughty sterility of talents from the public eye, under the veil of frenzy or untractable obstinacy. The simplicity of a great character was wanting both to Lord Chatham and Townshend.