At length, after a long struggle, Walpole gave way, and honour and profit were distributed among his conquerors. Lyttelton was made, 1744, one of the lords of the treasury; and from that time was engaged in supporting the schemes of the ministry.
Politicks did not, however, so much engage him, as to withhold his thoughts from things of more importance. He had, in the pride of juvenile confidence, with the help of corrupt conversation, entertained doubts of the truth of Christianity; but he thought the time now come when it was no longer fit to doubt or believe by chance, and applied himself seriously to the great question. His studies, being honest, ended in conviction. He found that religion was true; and what he had learned he endeavoured to teach, 1747, by Observations on the Conversion of St. Paul; a treatise to which infidelity has never been able to fabricate a specious answer. This book his father had the happiness of seeing, and expressed his pleasure in a letter which deserves to be inserted:
“I have read your religious treatise with infinite pleasure and satisfaction. The style is fine and clear, the arguments close, cogent, and irresistible. May the King of kings, whose glorious cause you have so well defended, reward your pious labours, and grant that I may be found worthy, through the merits of Jesus Christ, to be an eye-witness of that happiness which I don’t doubt he will bountifully bestow upon you. In the mean time, I shall never cease glorifying God, for having endowed you with such useful talents, and giving me so good a son.
“Your affectionate father,
“Thomas Lyttelton.”
A few years afterwards, 1751, by the death of his father, he inherited a baronet’s title with a large estate, which, though, perhaps, he did not augment, he was careful to adorn by a house of great elegance and expense, and by much attention to the decoration of his park.
As he continued his activity in parliament, he was gradually advancing his claim to profit and preferment; and accordingly was made, in time, 1754, cofferer and privy counsellor: this place he exchanged next year for the great office of chancellor of the exchequer; an office, however, that required some qualifications which he soon perceived himself to want.
The year after, his curiosity led him into Wales; of which he has given an account, perhaps rather with too much affectation of delight, to Archibald Bower, a man of whom he had conceived an opinion more favourable than he seems to have deserved, and whom, having once espoused his interest and fame, he was never persuaded to disown. Bower, whatever was his moral character, did not want abilities; attacked as he was by an universal outcry, and that outcry, as it seems, the echo of truth, he kept his ground: at last, when his defences began to fail him, he sallied out upon his adversaries, and his adversaries retreated.
About this time Lyttelton published his Dialogues of the Dead, which were very eagerly read, though the production rather, as it seems, of leisure than of study: rather effusions than compositions. The names of his persons too often enable the reader to anticipate their conversation; and, when they have met, they too often part without any conclusion. He has copied Fénélon more than Fontenelle.
When they were first published, they were kindly commended by the Critical Reviewers; and poor Lyttelton, with humble gratitude, returned, in a note which I have read, acknowledgments which can never be proper, since they must be paid either for flattery or for justice.