[121] The Duke of Grafton states in his MS. Memoirs that Lord Rochford’s instructions only stopped short of a declaration of war. “At one time Lord Rochford was confident that he should have succeeded, and wrote over that the Duc de Choiseul’s language had so much softened, that he had every hope that the French Ambassador would not risk the attempt. In the audience of the next week, he found to his great surprise the former tone taken up; and in a private letter to me, he attributed the strange change in the Duc to the imprudent declaration of a great law Lord (Lord Mansfield), then at Paris, at one of the Minister’s tables, that the English Ministry were too weak, and the nation too wise, to support them in entering into a war for the sake of Corsica.” The remonstrances thus made by Lord Rochford having failed, the Duke of Grafton dispatched Captain Dunant, a Genevese officer, who had served with distinction in the Swiss troops of the King of Sardinia, to Corsica, with the view of learning how far assistance could be surreptitiously afforded to Paoli by the English Government, and the result of the mission was, that the Corsicans obtained several thousand stand of arms from the stock at the Tower. Lord Camden seems to have been ready to have gone further. The Duke of Grafton saw no necessity for an immediate decision, being under the impression that the Corsicans might still hold out; and the events which followed, and will be mentioned hereafter, took him completely by surprise. (Duke of Grafton’s MS. Memoirs.)—E.
[122] Almon says the sentence was condemned by everybody as unjustifiably severe. On the other hand, Mr. Grenville, in his celebrated speech against Lord Barrington’s motion for Wilkes’s expulsion, comments on it as very lenient, and contrasts it with Dr. Shebbeare’s, who for his Sixth Letter to the People of England was sentenced to be fined, to stand in the pillory, to be imprisoned for three years, and to give security for good behaviour for seven years. This, too, was whilst Mr. Pratt (afterwards Lord Camden) was Attorney-General. (Cavendish, vol. i. p. 160.)—E.
[123] The Archbishop could with little propriety have set on foot such a prosecution, having in the early part of his life exceeded Anet in the latitude of his irreligion. Whether he incited it or not, I do not know. It is justice to his character to say that he privately allowed Anet 50l. a-year to support him in prison, where he died. [This charge against the Archbishop also made by Walpole elsewhere, has been repeatedly refuted. It appears to rest on the very slender foundation of a foolish story told by some superannuated companion of Secker’s at Leyden, where the latter, in the fulness of his passion for metaphysics, probably indulged in paradoxes by way of argumentative exercises, which it would be very unjust to regard as his real opinion. Bishop Watson, when a student at Trinity, wrote a paper to refute Clarke’s main argument to prove the existence of God, yet no one ever thought of calling him an atheist.—E.]
[124] See supra, vol. i. p. 19. If Dr. Secker had not been the intimate friend of the Duke of Newcastle and Lord Chancellor Hardwicke, his character would no doubt have obtained the warm praise instead of the constant abuse of Walpole. Bishop Hurd, who did not love him, says that he was a wise man, an edifying preacher, and an exemplary bishop.—(Life of Warburton, p. 69.)—He was very young when he left the Dissenters to join the Church, and the Dissenters never questioned the honesty of his change of opinions. Some of their most eminent writers have recorded their respect for him. The purity of his life brought on him the charge of hypocrisy from those alone who did not care to practise the same virtues. After enjoying for ten years the rich revenues of the primacy, he left an insignificant fortune, and his distribution of his patronage was equally disinterested. He was the last of the learned divines who have filled the highest dignities of the Church. (Life by Porteus, also Memoirs of Mrs. Carter, p. 402.)—E.
[125] Bishop Newton, after describing him as “the not unworthy successor of Secker,” says, “When he was a young man at the University he had the misfortune of a paralytic stroke on his right side, from which he has never recovered the full use of his right hand, and is obliged to write with his left; but, this notwithstanding, he has hitherto enjoyed uncommon good health, and never fails in his attendance on the multifarious business of his station. He has greatly improved Lambeth House, he keeps a hospitable and elegant table, has not a grain of pride in his composition, is easy of access, receives every one with affability and good nature, is courteous, obliging, condescending, and as a proof of it he has not often been made the subject of censure, even in this censorious age.”—(Memoirs, p. 121.)—This description might lead one to fear that the good Bishop’s standard of Metropolitan merit was not very elevated. Archbishop Cornwallis deserved still higher commendation. He seems to have had a true sense of his religious duties. When a party in the East India Company raised an outcry against the missionary Schwarts, then a friendless and obscure foreigner, he came forward with his public testimony on his behalf. The Archbishop died in 1783, aged 70.—E.
[126] The Count de Bernsdorffe was a Hanoverian. He had large estates in Mecklenburg, but had sought fortune in Denmark, where at that time foreigners were warmly welcomed, and raised to high posts. He had been Foreign Minister to Frederick the Sixth. His reputation and influence were considerable in the northern courts. Walpole describes him elsewhere (Letters to Sir H. Mann, vol. i. p. 400) as a grim old man, bowing and cringing at every word of the King with eastern obsequiousness—indeed a Mentor and Telemachus have never yet been seen in real life. Bernsdorffe died in 1772, aged sixty. His nephew, Count Andrew de Bernsdorffe, also an eminent name in the later history of Denmark, was Prime Minister in 1784, and died in 1797.—E.
[127] This piece of flattery was abruptly crushed. The poor King became on his return a mere phantom of royalty, first in the hands of his wife, next of the Queen Dowager. In 1784 his son was raised to the Regency, and succeeded to the Crown on his death, in 1808.—E.
[128] The Duke of Grafton’s Memoirs confirm Walpole’s account of this transaction, and he adds that “the Cabinet were unanimous in their resolution for the removal of Sir Jeffery Amherst.” It was in the manner of filling up the vacancy that they laid themselves open to the suspicion of having accommodated a private job under the pretence of reforming a public abuse, and people said, with some plausibility, “It was not Virginia that wanted a governor, but a Court favourite that wanted a salary.”—(See the clever letters in Woodfall’s Junius, vol. iii. pp. 89–123.)—Lord Bottetort’s being a follower and friend of Lord Bute, increased the cry against him.—E.
[129] The Hon. General John Fitzwilliam, had been Groom of the Bedchamber to William, Duke of Cumberland, when Mr. Conway was in the same post about his Royal Highness, and had long been intimate with Rigby. [He died in 1789, and left his fortune to one of his servants. He was uncle to Viscount Fitzwilliam (of Ireland), who founded the noble museum that bears his name at Cambridge; and on the death of whose brother the title became extinct.—E.]
[130] Afterwards the Right Hon. Sir William Lynch, K.B. He was the eldest son of Dr. Lynch, Dean of Canterbury, by the youngest daughter of Archbishop Wake. His family had long been settled at Groves, near Canterbury, and he represented that city in two Parliaments. He usually resided at Groves, where he had greatly embellished the house and park, and collected some fine pictures. He died abroad in 1785, leaving a widow, but no issue.—E.