[58] Sir Thomas Denison died in the autumn of this year. His memory was honoured by an epitaph from the pen of his friend Lord Mansfield, very long and very dull. It is said of him “that besides being conversant with the different branches of the profession, he was in an eminent degree master of the learning of a special pleader.” Memoirs of Lord Chief Justice Wilmot, p. 13.—E.
[59] This enlightened judge and most amiable man was the second son of Robert Wilmot, of Osmaston, Derbyshire, and brother of Sir Robert Wilmot, for some years the Chief Secretary in Ireland. He subsequently became Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, but with great reluctance, for he says in one of his letters, “The acting junior in the commission is a spectre I started at; but the sustaining the office alone, I must refuse at all events. I will not give up the peace of my mind to any earthly consideration whatever. Bread and water are nectar and ambrosia, compared with the supremacy of a court of justice.” He retired from the Bench in 1771, and died in 1792, aged 82, leaving one of the most spotless characters to be found on the roll of British judges. A selection of his judgments and opinions was published by his son. They are remarkable for elegance and perspicuity, and their learning and acuteness cause them to be still highly prized. The memoir of him already cited is a pleasing tribute to the memory of a good father by a good son.—E.
[60] The resolutions were not 35 in number, but 55.—E.
[61] The late Lord Essex informed the Editor that one of the Under-secretaries of that day had often said to him, “Mr. Grenville lost America because he read the American despatches, which none of his predecessors ever did.” There is no doubt that the business of the colonies was despatched in a very slovenly manner—or, to use Mr. Burke’s words, it was treated “with a salutary neglect;” and the many volumes of Minutes of Colonial Affairs still preserved at the Board of Trade, relate generally to such insignificant transactions as to be almost ludicrous.
[62] Colonel Martin Bladen, M. P. He had in earlier life shown his industry by a translation of Cæsar, which he dedicated to the Duke of Marlborough, under whom he served in the German wars. He was made Sub-comptroller of the Mint in 1714, and one of the Board of Trade in 1717, and might have risen higher if he had chosen. He died at an advanced age in 1746. See more of him in Warton’s notes to the Dunciad.—E.
[63] I say acknowledged, because they thought it prudent, in their quarrel with the Parliament, to shelter themselves under the banner of the Crown, and because they founded themselves on their charters, which were grants from the Crown. At the same time there were some men amongst them of a more democratic spirit. It was much talked of at this era, that a wealthy merchant in one of the provinces had said, “They say King George is a very honest fellow; I should like to smoke a pipe with him,” so little conception had they in that part of the world, of the majesty of an European monarch! The Crown could not take advantage of the Americans throwing themselves into the arms of prerogative, because the Americans did it to shun paying taxes, which the Parliament was inclined to grant.
[64] In January, 1769.
[65] Colonel Barré’s eloquent invective is the only portion of the debate that has been preserved. It is directed chiefly against an observation of Mr. Grenville, that the Americans were “children planted by our care and nourished by our indulgence.” It has been often reprinted. Parliamentary History, vol. xvi. p. 38. Mr. Adolphus, in a note to vol. i. p. 171, throws doubts on the authenticity of the report, and there is nothing in Colonel Barré’s character to make it improbable that he may have been his own reporter, and not a very faithful one.—E.
[66] Barbarossa and Athelstan.
[67] This tract of Dr. Browne’s, entitled “Thoughts on Civil Liberty, Licentiousness, and Faction,” hardly deserves notice except from the success of the author’s other works, of which it has all the faults and none of the merits. Its failure was complete. The author committed suicide in the following year, being then only in his 51st year. His fame rests entirely on his tragedies, which are still favourites with the public; but his treatises display an ingenuity and extent of information, and occasionally a power of expression, at least equally commendable; and it is to be regretted that those qualities were so wasted on ephemeral publications, and directed by a mind always verging on insanity. A long and very dull life of Dr. Browne is to be found in the Biographia Britannica.—E.