“But do I use it?”
“Nay, not to me, I own. As a manner, I never found it out, at least. However, I am less averse now than formerly to the other panegyric—close logic,—for I own the more frequently I come hither the more convinced I find myself that that is no character of commendation to be given universally.”
He could say nothing to this; and really the dilatory, desultory style of these prosecutors in general deserved a much deeper censure.
“If a little closeness of logic and reasoning were observed by one I look at now, what a man would he be, and who could compare with him!” Mr. Burke you are sure was here my object; and his entire, though silent and unwilling, assent was obvious.
“What a speech,” I continued, “has he lately made![337] how noble, how energetic, how enlarged throughout!”
“O,” cried he, very unaffectedly, “upon the French Revolution?”
“Yes; and any party might have been proud of it, for liberality, for feeling, for all in one—genius. I, who am only a reader of detached speeches, have read none I have thought its equal.”
“Yet, such as you have seen it, it does not do him justice. I was not in the House that day; but I am assured the actual speech, as he spoke it at the moment, was highly superior to what has since been printed. There was in it a force—there were shades of reflection so fine—allusions so quick and so happy—and strokes of satire and observation so pointed and so apt,—that it had ten times more brilliancy when absolutely extempore than when transmitted to paper.”
“Wonderful, wonderful! He is a truly wonderful creature!” And, alas, thought I, as wonderful in inconsistency as in greatness!
In the course of a discussion more detailed upon faculties, I ventured to tell him what impression they had made upon James, who was with me during one of the early long speeches. “I was listening,” I said, with the most fervent attention, “to such strokes of eloquence as, while I heard them, carried all before them, when my brother pulled me by the sleeve to exclaim, ‘When will he come to the point?’”