I may also add that an eminent statesman of the present day, who was at that period, though very young, a distinguished friend of Mr. Sheridan, and who has shown by the ability of his own State Papers that he has not forgot the lessons of that school from which this able production emanated, remembers having heard some passages of the Letter discussed in Bruton-street, as if it were then in the progress of composition, and has always, I believe, been under the impression that it was principally the work of Mr. Sheridan. [Footnote: To this authority may be added also that of the Bishop of Winchester, who says,—"Mr. Sheridan was supposed to have been materially concerned in drawing up this admirable composition.">[
I had written thus far on the subject of this Letter—and shall leave what I have written as a memorial of the fallacy of such conjectures—when, having still some doubts of my correctness in attributing the honor of the composition to Sheridan, I resolved to ask the opinion of my friend, Sir James Mackintosh, a person above all others qualified, by relationship of talent, to recognize and hold parley with the mighty spirit of Burke, in whatever shape the "Royal Dane" may appear. The strong impression on his mind—amounting almost to certainty—was that no other hand but that of Burke could have written the greater part of the letter; [Footnote: It is amusing to observe how tastes differ;—the following is the opinion entertained of this letter by a gentleman, who, I understand, and can easily believe, is an old established Reviewer. After mentioning that it was attributed to the pen of Burke, he adds,—"The story, however, does not seem entitled to much credit, for the internal character of the paper is too vapid and heavy for the genius of Burke, whose ardent mind would assuredly have diffused vigor into the composition, and the correctness of whose judgment would as certainly have preserved it from the charge of inelegance and grammatical deficiency."—DR. WATKINS, Life of Sheridan. Such, in nine cases out of ten, are the periodical guides of public taste.] and by a more diligent inquiry, in which his kindness assisted me, it has been ascertained that his opinion was, as it could not fail to be, correct. The following extract from a letter written by Lord Minto at the time, referring obviously to the surmise that he was, himself, the author of the paper, confirms beyond a doubt the fact, that it was written almost solely by Burke:—
"January 31st, 1789.
"There was not a word of the Prince's letter to Pitt mine. It was originally Burke's, altered a little, but not improved, by Sheridan and other critics. The answer made by the Prince yesterday to the Address of the two Houses was entirely mine, and done in a great hurry half an hour before it was to be delivered."
While it is with regret I give up the claim of Mr. Sheridan to this fine specimen of English composition, it but adds to my intense admiration of Burke—not on account of the beauty of the writing, for his fame required no such accession—but from that triumph of mind over temper which it exhibits—that forgetfulness of Self, the true, transmigrating power of genius, which enabled him thus to pass his spirit into the station of Royalty, and to assume all the calm dignity, both of style and feeling, that became it.
It was to be expected that the conduct of Lord Thurlow at this period should draw down upon him all the bitterness of those who were in the secret of his ambidextrous policy, and who knew both his disposition to desert, and the nature of the motives that prevented him. To Sheridan, in particular, such a result of a negotiation, in which he had been the principal mover and mediator, could not be otherwise than deeply mortifying. Of all the various talents with which he was gifted, his dexterity in political intrigue and management was that of which he appears to have been most vain; and this vanity it was that, at a later period of his life, sometimes led him to branch off from the main body of his party, upon secret and solitary enterprises of ingenuity, which—as may be expected from all such independent movements of a partisan—generally ended in thwarting his friends and embarrassing himself.
In the debate on that clause of the Bill, which restricted the Regent from granting places or pensions in reversion, Mr. Sheridan is represented as having attacked Lord Thurlow in terms of the most unqualified severity,—speaking of "the natural ferocity and sturdiness of his temper," and of "his brutal bluffness." But to such abuse, unseasoned by wit, Mr. Sheridan was not at all likely to have condescended, being well aware that, "as in smooth oil the razor best is set," so satire is whetted to its most perfect keenness by courtesy. His clumsy reporters have, in this, as in almost all other instances, misrepresented him.
With equal personality, but more playfulness, Mr. Burke, in exposing that wretched fiction, by which the Great Seal was converted into the Third Branch of the Legislature, and the assent of the King forged to a Bill, in which his incapacity to give either assent or dissent was declared, thus expressed himself:—"But what is to be done when the Crown is in a deliquium? It was intended, he had heard, to set up a man with black brows and a large wig, a kind of scare-crow to the two Houses, who was to give a fictitious assent in the royal name—and this to be binding on the people at large!" The following remarkable passage, too, in a subsequent Speech, is almost too well known to be cited:—"The other House," he said, "were not yet perhaps recovered from that extraordinary burst of the pathetic which had been exhibited the other evening; they had not yet dried their eyes, or been restored to their former placidity, and were unqualified to attend, to new business. The tears shed in that House on the occasion to which he alluded, were not the tears of patriots for dying laws, but of Lords for their expiring places. The iron tears, which flowed down Pluto's cheek, rather resembled the dismal bubbling of the Styx, than the gentle murmuring streams of Aganippe."
While Lord Thurlow was thus treated by the party whom he had so nearly joined, he was but coldly welcomed back by the Minister whom he had so nearly deserted. His reconciliation, too, with the latter was by no means either sincere or durable,—the renewal of friendship between politicians, on such occasions, being generally like that which the Diable Boiteux describes, as having taken place between himself and a brother sprite,—"We were reconciled, embraced, and have hated each other heartily ever since."
In the Regency, indeed, and the transactions connected with it, may be found the source of most of those misunderstandings and enmities, which broke out soon after among the eminent men of that day, and were attended with consequences so important to themselves and the country. By the difference just mentioned, between Mr. Pitt and Lord Thurlow, the ministerial arrangements of 1793 were facilitated, and the learned Lord, after all his sturdy pliancy, consigned to a life of ineffectual discontent ever after.