Distinguished as he has been in his profession, it is neither the profound knowledge, nor the great eloquence of Lord Denman that has secured his extraordinary good fortune. It should rather be attributed to an indescribable but harmonious dignity of language, of person, and manner. You would think the senatorial throne had need of just such a man; M. Ravez himself was not more formed by nature for the presiding officer of a deliberative body. But this excellence, a little theatrical, of a majestic carriage and appearance, is not the chief merit of the noble Lord; his highest praise is that he remains the same man under the purple, that he was when dressed in the simple black gown of an advocate. A supreme magistrate, seated on the steps of the throne, he is still the affable and liberal counsellor of the court of chancery.
To the right of the speaker, and on your left, in a recess into which the glass of those folding doors permits but a doubtful light to enter, do you not see a confused mass of wax and ruddy faces, of white robes and black surplices? These are the three crowded benches of bishops and archbishops. Formerly they were not so eager to make use of their legislative privileges. At the present time every man is at his post; the church is supported by all its pillars. The Catholic emancipation has wakened up these millionnaire prebendaries from the lethargic sleep into which the gold with which they are stuffed, had plunged them. They keep strict watch around their heaps of wealth. It will not be their fault if some crumbs from their splendid banquet be thrown to starving Ireland.
If you have only seen these prelates in the House of Lords or in the pulpit in full dress, you have examined but half the picture. You must observe them in private, in their foppish and gallant city dress. Do you ask what dashing personage that is, in a frock of the finest black cloth, his head covered with a hat of the longest beaver fur, with broad brims fastened up by cords of silk, galloping along the pavements of Regent street? A singular cavalier, in fact; and one who will still more astonish you when he leaps from his horse, and enters his club-house, his riding whip in his hand, affording you a better opportunity for observing his masonic-like costume, his high black guetres and black apron. Behold a very noble and very reverend Bishop of England.
And this other person dressed, after the same fashion, who is leaping from that open carriage, filled with young women, whose fair skins and rosy cheeks cannot fail to catch your eye, as we are crossing Westminster place? This, too, is a bishop, whose wife and daughters have just accompanied him to the parliament house.
But let us follow these noble Lords spiritual to their seats in the hall of legislation.
Figure to yourself an old woman with a face yellow and lank; let her bend under the weight of fourscore years; wrinkle her forehead with as many furrows as you can; let her voice be sharp and broken; let her eyes be uncertain, restless and suspicious: would this creature not be a faithful picture of his grace the Archbishop of Canterbury, the first prelate of England, now seated alone on the highest bench of the church? Is it not the very image of superstition itself? Decrepid, crouching, shivering!
This venerable Archbishop, superannuated and unfit for all service as he appears to you, has strength enough to speak the moment that any question in the least touches the revenues of the church. Upon such occasions his speeches invariably commence with many laudable reflections on the advantages of tolerance, and as certainly end by wishing damnation to popery both on earth and in heaven. This is at least the object of these discourses, for it is no very easy matter to seize their exact signification. His grace, who holds his archbishopric of providence, has not however received from the same divine source, the gift of expressing his religious rancor with much ease or elegance. It always costs him a world of labor to put together his anti-Catholic homilies, incoherent and broken as they are. One would not say that gall flows from the lips of this mild prelate; he rather spits it out.
Do you not observe behind his grace, that little yellowish man with the eye of a caged tiger, constantly moving himself about, now leaning forward, now appearing so impatient, playing and jumping about on his bench: it is the bishop of Exeter, one of the sturdy pillars of the fanatic church militant. This man is the most cunning and dangerous foe to liberty; his evil nature clothes itself with all the seduction of the most amiable manners. No one among these noble and holy hypocrites has such exquisite politeness; or such gentle and insinuating address. Never did a cat better conceal its claws under the velvet of its feet.
The bishop of Exeter is not distinguished by the same quickness in replying to an adversary, that he is in attacking him; perhaps, I should rather say, that in his gentle warfare he never permits himself to act on the defensive. Listen to him, as he rises with the greatest humility, his little square black cap in his joined hands; his wallet is filled with denunciations—it must be emptied. Doubtless it grieves him, a man of peace, to have to war against temporal power! But why does temporal power presume to pare down the luxuriant dimensions of spiritual power? Oh! the charitable prelate, hear him! How his treachery smiles upon the lips! how ingenuously it scratches! Never had taunting so much onction—never was aggression so timid. Who is there that would have this trembling modesty in throwing discord in the midst of such an assembly? So soon as they are once struggling together, nothing remains for him to say. Whigs and tories tear yourselves to pieces, the good bishop will not interrupt you; he has discharged his duty as a protestant pastor. Tear yourselves to pieces. He sits down quietly, and contemplates the melée; tranquilly and at his ease, he laughs in his sleeve as he counts the blows that fall upon the minister. God forgive him! I believe his foot keeps time with the blows!
If I were to describe the thirty Protestant Bishops crowded together in this place, I would show you perhaps three or four almost whigs, and who rather more resemble christians, and among these particularly the brother of Lord Grey, the chief of this almost imperceptible spiritual minority; but enough of these specimens of the surplice. We will leave the bishops to our right. The first bench that we encounter after theirs, going towards the bar of the house, is that of the ministers. Here we will pause awhile.