The chief works of Madame de Stael, and her peculiarities as an author, have already been spoken 119 of. One work, published after her death, and the most powerful of all, remains to be mentioned. In the “Considerations on the French Revolution,” she sought to blend the memoir with the philosophical history. The faults are what might have been expected. The details, too minute for the one, are too scanty for the other. In the selection of these she was biased by her personal feelings, but to a degree far less than was to be anticipated. Her feelings were warm and excitable; she had lived in the midst of the events of which she speaks; she had herself been an actor, and her father had borne a conspicuous part, in them; indeed, one grand purpose of the work is to exculpate him. That she should, under these disqualifying circumstances, have produced a work so temperate, and on the whole so impartial—one that exhibits such philosophical depth and comprehensiveness of vision—excites in us wonder and admiration. But it is not as a history that the work is interesting and valuable. It is that it exhibits to us the impressions made by the great events of which she speaks, and the scenes which she witnessed, upon a powerful and original mind. It abounds with profound reflections and brilliant remarks. The style, eloquent and impassioned, is in a high degree conversational, and, as we read it, we almost expect to hear the sound of the voice. The remarkable talent for discrimination and delineation of character, which distinguish her as a novelist, lead us to regret that it did not come within the design of the work to furnish us with historical portraitures of the distinguished personages of the period. The few which she has given us, increase our regret, and mark her as a mistress in the art.
LADY HESTER STANHOPE.
The third Earl of Stanhope, father of the subject of our present sketch, possessed abilities which qualified him for any station; yet he devoted his ample fortune, his time, and his thoughts, to mechanics and to experiments in science and philosophy; with what success, the Stanhope printing press, many improvements in the process of stereotype printing, and his various papers on the electric fluid, are evidence. He married a daughter of the great Earl of Chatham; and of this marriage, Lady Hester Stanhope was the earliest fruit. She was born in 1776.
LADY HESTER STANHOPE.
Genius was the only inheritance she received from her father. Upon the death of her mother, which happened when she was young, she was received into the house of her uncle, William Pitt, the younger, and was there brought up. Between this minister and his brother-in-law there was little sympathy of opinion. Stanhope was an enthusiast for the improvement of social institutions, and hailed the French revolution as the beginning of the change which he hoped for. So confident was he in those views, as to urge upon his children the necessity of qualifying themselves to earn a living by some honest calling. He could not 122 approve the measures which the minister now adopted; and, as his children adhered in principle to their uncle, he renounced them, saying, “that, as they had chosen to be saddled on the public purse, they must take the consequences.”
The genius and originality of Lady Hester made her an especial favorite with her uncle. She presided at his table, and he evinced his respect for her abilities, by employing her, after his retirement from office, as his secretary. Though to the multitude this great statesman appeared cold and unbending, with his intimates, and those whom he received into his private friendship, he was cheerful and affable; to women he was polite in the extreme, and, in the midst of his gravest avocations, would rise to pick up his secretary’s fallen handkerchief. Devoted to the affairs of state, Pitt paid no attention to his own pecuniary concerns, so that the only provision he could make for his niece at his death, was to recommend her to the favor of his king and country, who acknowledged their obligation to him by bestowing upon her a pension of twelve hundred pounds, annually.