Memoirs of the Life of the Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan Volume II Part 13

The great promoters of the alarm were Mr. Burke, and those other Whig Seceders, who had for some time taken part with the administration against their former friends, and, as is usual with such proselytes, outran those whom they joined, on every point upon which they before most differed from them. To justify their defection, the dangers upon which they grounded it, were exaggerated; and the eagerness with which they called for restrictions upon the liberty of the subject was but too worthy of deserters not only from their post but from their principles.

One striking difference between these new pupils of Toryism and their master was with respect to the ultimate object of the war.--Mr. Pitt being of opinion that security against the power of France, without any interference whatever with her internal affairs, was the sole aim to which hostilities should be directed; while nothing less than the restoration of the Bourbons to the power which they possessed before the a.s.sembling of the Etats Genereaux could satisfy Mr. Burke and his fellow converts to the cause of Thrones and Hierarchies. The effect of this diversity of objects upon the conduct of the war--particularly after Mr.

Pitt had added to "Security for the future," the suspicious supplement of "Indemnity for the past"--was no less fatal to the success of operations abroad than to the unity of councils at home. So separate, indeed, were the views of the two parties considered, that the unfortunate expedition, in aid of the Vendean insurgents in 1795, was known to be peculiarly the measure of the _Burke_ part of the cabinet, and to have been undertaken on the sole responsibility of their ministerial organ, Mr.

Windham.

It must be owned, too, that the obect of the Alarmists in the war, however grossly inconsistent with their former principles, had the merit of being far more definite than that of Mr. Pitt; and, had it been singly and consistently pursued from the first, with all the vigor and concentration of means so strenuously recommended by Mr. Burke, might have justified its quixotism in the end by a more speedy and less ruinous success. As it was, however, the divisions, jealousies and alarms which Mr. Pitt's views towards a future dismemberment of France excited not only among the Continental powers, but among the French themselves, completely defeated every hope and plan for either concert without or co operation within. At the same time, the distraction of the efforts of England from the heart of French power to its remote extremities, in what Mr. Windham called "a war upon sugar Islands," was a waste of means as unstatesmanlike as it was calamitous, and fully ent.i.tled Mr. Pitt to the satire on his policy, conveyed in the remark of a certain distinguished lady, who said to him, upon hearing of some new acquisition in the West Indies, "I protest, Mr. Pitt, if you go on thus, you will soon be master of every island in the world except just those two little ones, England and Ireland." [Footnote: Mr. Sheridan quoted this anecdote in one of his speeches in 1794.]

That such was the light in which Mr. Sheridan himself viewed the mode of carrying on the war recommended by the Alarmists, in comparison with that which Mr. Pitt in general adopted, appears from the following pa.s.sage in his speech upon Spanish affairs in the year 1808:--

"There was hardly a person, except his Right Honorable Friend near him, (Mr. Windham,) and Mr. Burke, who since the Revolution of France had formed adequate notions of the necessary steps to be taken. The various governments which this country had seen during that period were always employed in filching for a sugar-island, or some other object of comparatively trifling moment, while the main and princ.i.p.al purpose was lost and forgotten,"

Whatever were the failures of Mr. Pitt abroad, at home his ascendancy was fixed and indisputable; and, among all the triumphs of power which he enjoyed during his career, the tribute now paid to him by the Whig Aristocracy, in taking shelter under his ministry from the dangers of Revolution, could not have been the least gratifying to his haughty spirit. The India Bill had ranged on his side the King and the People, and the Revolution now brought to his banner the flower of the n.o.bility of both parties. His own estimate of rank may be fairly collected both from the indifference which he showed to its honors himself, and from the depreciating profusion with which he lavished them upon others. It may be doubted whether his respect for Aristocracy was much increased, by the readiness which he now saw in some of his high-born opponents, to volunteer for safety into his already powerful ranks, without even pausing to try the experiment, whether safety might not have been reconcilable with principle in their own. It is certain that, without the accession of so much weight and influence, he never could have ventured upon the violations of the Const.i.tution that followed--nor would the Opposition, accordingly, have been driven by these excesses of power into that reactive violence which was the natural consequence of an effort to resist them. The prudent apprehensions, therefore, of these n.o.ble Whigs would have been much more usefully as well as honorably employed, in mingling with, and moderating the proceedings of the friends of Liberty, than in ministering fresh fuel to the zeal and vindictiveness of her enemies. [Footnote: The case against these n.o.ble Seceders is thus spiritedly stated by Lord Moira:--

"I cannot ever sit in a cabinet with the Duke of Portland. He appears to me to have done more injury to the Const.i.tution and to the estimation of the higher ranks in this country than any man on the political stage. By his union with Mr. Pitt he has given it to be understood by the people, that either all the const.i.tutional charges which he and his friends for so many years urged against Mr. Put were groundless, or that, being solid, there was no difficulty in waving them when a convenient part.i.tion of powers and emoluments was proposed. In either case the people must infer that the const.i.tutional principle which can be so played with is unimportant, and that parliamentary professions are no security."

--_Letter from the Earl of Moira to Colonel M'Mahon, in 1797.

Parliamentary History_.]

It may be added, too, that in allowing themselves to be persuaded by Burke, that the extinction of the ancient n.o.blesse of France portended necessarily any danger to the English Aristocracy, these n.o.ble persons did injustice to the strength of their own order, and to the characteristics by which it is proudly distinguished from every other race of n.o.bility in Europe. Placed, as a sort of break-water, between the People and the Throne, in a state of double responsibility to liberty on one side, and authority on the other, the Aristocracy of England hold a station which is dignified by its own great duties, and of which the t.i.tles transmitted by their ancestors form the least important ornament.

Unlike the n.o.bility of other countries, where the rank and privileges of the father are multiplied through his offspring, and equally elevate them all above the level of the community, the very highest English n.o.bleman must consent to be the father but of commoners. Thus, connected with the cla.s.s below him by private as well as public sympathies, he gives his children to the People as hostages for the sincerity of his zeal in their cause--while on the other hand, the People, in return for these pledges of the Aristocracy, sends a portion of its own elements aloft into that higher region, to mingle with its glories and a.s.sert their claim to a share in its power. By this mutual transfusion an equilibrium is preserved, like that which similar processes maintain in the natural world, and while a healthy, popular feeling circulates through the Aristocracy, a sense of their own station in the scale elevates the People.

To tremble for the safety of a n.o.bility so const.i.tuted, without much stronger grounds for alarm than appear to have existed in 1793, was an injustice not only to that cla.s.s itself, but the whole nation. The world has never yet afforded an example, where this artificial distinction between mankind has been turned to such beneficial account; and as no monarchy can exist without such an order, so, in any other shape than this, such an order is a burden and a nuisance. In England, so happy a conformation of her Aristocracy is one of those fortuitous results which time and circ.u.mstances have brought out in the long-tried experiment of her Const.i.tution; and, while there is no chance of its being ever again attained in the Old World, there is but little, probability of its being attempted in the New,--where the youthful nations now springing into life, will, if they are wise, make the most of the free career before them, and unenc.u.mbered with the costly trappings of feudalism, adopt, like their northern neighbors, that form of government, whose simplicity and cheapness are the best guarantees for its efficacy and purity.

In judging of the policy of Mr. Pitt, during the Revolutionary war, his partisans, we know, laud it as having been the means of salvation to England, while his opponents a.s.sert that it was only prevented by chance from being her ruin--and though the event gives an appearance of triumph to the former opinion, it by no means removes or even weakens the grounds of the latter. During the first nine years of his administration, Mr.

Pitt was, in every respect, an able and most useful minister, and, "while the sea was calm, showed masters.h.i.+p in floating." But the great events that happened afterwards took him by surprise. When he came to look abroad from his cabinet into the storm that was brewing through Europe, the clear and enlarged view of the higher order of statesman was wanting.

Instead of elevating himself above the influence of the agitation and alarm that prevailed, he gave way to it with the crowd of ordinary minds, and even took counsel from the panic of others. The consequence was a series of measures, violent at home and inefficient abroad--far short of the mark where vigor was wanting, and beyond it, as often, where vigor was mischievous.

When we are told to regard his policy as the salvation of the country--when, (to use a figure of Mr. Dundas,) a _claim of salvage_ is made for him--it may be allowed us to consider a little the nature of the measures by which this alleged salvation was achieved. If entering into a great war without either consistency of plan, or preparation of means, and with a total ignorance of the financial resources of the enemy [Footnote: Into his erroneous calculations upon this point he is supposed to have been led by Sir Francis D'Ivernois.]--if allowing one part of the Cabinet to flatter the French Royalists, with the hope of seeing the Bourbons restored to undiminished power, while the other part acted, whenever an opportunity offered, upon the plan of dismembering France for the aggrandizement of Austria, and thus, at once, alienated Prussia at the very moment of subsidizing him, and lost the confidence of all the Royalist party in France, [Footnote: Among other instances, the Abbe Maury is reported to have said at Rome in a large company of his countrymen--"Still we have one remedy--let us not allow France to be divided--we have seen the part.i.tion of Poland we must all turn Jacobins to preserve our country."] except the few who were ruined by English a.s.sistance at Quiberon--if going to war in 1793 for the right of the Dutch to a river, and so managing it that in 1794 the Dutch lost their whole Seven Provinces--if lavis.h.i.+ng more money upon failures than the successes of a century had cost, and supporting this profusion by schemes of finance, either hollow and delusive, like the Sinking Fund, or desperately regardless of the future, like the paper issues--if driving Ireland into rebellion by the perfidious recall of Lord Fitzwilliam, and reducing England to two of the most, fearful trials, that a nation, depending upon Credit and a navy, could encounter, the stoppage of her Bank and a mutiny in her fleet--if, finally, floundering on from effort to effort against France, and then dying upon the ruins of the last Coalition he could muster against her--if all this betokens a wise and able minister, then is Mr. Pitt most amply ent.i.tled to that name;--then are the lessons of wisdom to be read, like Hebrew, backward, and waste and rashness and systematic failure to be held the only true means of saving a country.

Had even success, by one of those anomalous accidents, which sometimes baffle the best founded calculations of wisdom, been the immediate result of this long monotony of error, it could not, except with those to whom the event is every thing--"_Eventus, stultorum magister_"

[Footnote: A saying of the wise Fabius.]--reflect back merit upon the means by which it was achieved, or, by a retrospective miracle, convert that into wisdom, which chance had only saved from the worst consequences of folly. Just as well might we be called upon to p.r.o.nounce Alchemy a wise art, because a perseverance in its failures and reveries had led by accident to the discoveries of Chemistry. But even this sanction of good-luck was wanting to the unredeemed mistakes of Mr. Pitt. During the eight years that intervened between his death and the termination of the contest, the adoption of a far wiser policy was forced upon his more tractable pupils; and the only share that his measures can claim in the successful issue of the war, is that of having produced the grievance that was then abated--of having raised up the power opposed to him to the portentous and dizzy height, from which it then fell by the giddiness of its own elevation, [Footnote:

--"_summisque negatum Stare din_."

LUCAN.] and by the reaction, not of the Princes, but the People of Europe against its yoke.

What would have been the course of affairs, both foreign and domestic, had Mr. Fox--as was, at one time, not improbable--been the Minister during this period, must be left to that superhuman knowledge, which the schoolmen call "_media scientia_," and which consists in knowing all that would have happened, had events been otherwise than they have been.

It is probable that some of the results would not have been so different as the respective principles of Mr. Pitt and Mr. Fox might naturally lead us, on the first thought, to a.s.sert. If left to himself, there is little doubt that the latter, from the simple and fearless magnanimity of his nature, would have consulted for the public safety with that moderation which true courage inspires; and that, even had it been necessary to suspend the Const.i.tution for a season, he would have known how to veil the statue of Liberty, [Footnote: "_Il y a des cas ou il faut mettre pour un moment un voile sur la Liberte, comme l'on cache les statues des dieux_."--MONTESQUIEU, liv. xii. chap. 20.] without leaving like his rival, such marks of mutilation on its limbs. But it is to be recollected that he would have had to encounter, in his own ranks, the very same patrician alarm, which could even to Mr. Pitt give an increase of momentum against liberty, and which the possession of power would have rendered but more sensitive and arbitrary. Accustomed, too, as he had long been, to yield to the influence of Burke, it would have required more firmness than habitually belonged to Mr. Fox, to withstand the persevering impetuosity of such a counsellor, or keep the balance of his mind unshaken by those stupendous powers, which, like the horses of the Sun breaking out of the ecliptic, carried every thing they seized upon, so splendidly astray:--

"_quaque impetus egit, Hac sine lege ruunt, altoque sub aethere fixis Incursant stellis, rapiuntque per avia currum_."

Where'er the impulse drives, they burst away In lawless grandeur;--break into the array Of the fix'd stars, and bound and blaze along Their devious course, magnificently wrong!

Having hazarded these general observations, upon the views and conduct of the respective parties of England, during the Crusade now begun against the French people, I shall content myself with briefly and cursorily noticing the chief questions upon which Mr. Sheridan distinguished himself, in the course of the parliamentary campaigns that followed. The sort of _guerilla_ warfare, which he and the rest of the small band attached to Mr. Fox carried on, during this period, against the invaders of the Const.i.tution, is interesting rather by its general character than its detail; for in these, as usual, the episodes of party personality are found to encroach disproportionately on the main design, and the grandeur of the cause, as viewed at a distance, becomes diminished to our imaginations by too near an approach. Englishmen, however, will long look back to that crisis with interest; and the names of Fox, of Sheridan, and of Grey will be affectionately remembered, when that sort of false elevation, which party-feeling now gives to the reputations of some who were opposed to them, shall have subsided to its due level, or been succeeded by oblivion. They who act against the general sympathies of mankind, however they may be artificially buoyed up for the moment, have the current against them in the long run of fame; while the reputation of those, whose talents have been employed upon the popular and generous side of human feelings, receives, through all time, an accelerating impulse from the countless hearts that go with it in its course. Lord Chatham, even now, supersedes his son in fame, and will leave him at an immeasurable distance with posterity.

Of the events of the private life of Mr. Sheridan, during this stormy part of his political career, there remain but few memorials among his papers. As an ill.u.s.tration, however, of his love of betting--the only sort of gambling in which he ever indulged--the following curious list of his wagers for the year is not unamusing:--

_"25th May, 1793._--Mr. Sheridan bets Gen. Fitzpatrick one hundred guineas to fifty guineas, that within two years from this date some measure is adopted in Parliament which shall be (_bona fide_) considered as the adoption of a Parliamentary Reform.

"_29th January, 1793._--Mr. S. bets Mr. Boothby Clopton five hundred guineas, that there is a Reform in the Representation of the people of England within three years from the date hereof.

"_29th January, 1793_.--Mr. S. bets Mr. Hardy one hundred guineas to fifty guineas, that Mr. W. Windham does not represent Norwich at the next general election.

"_29th January, 1793._--Mr. S. bets Gen. Fitzpatrick fifty guineas, that a corps of British troops are sent to Holland within two months of the date hereof.

"_18th March, 1793._--Mr. S. bets Lord t.i.tchfield two hundred guineas, that the D. of Portland is at the head of an Administration on or before the 18th of March, 1796; Mr. Fox to decide whether any place the Duke may then fill shall _bona fide_ come within the meaning of this bet.

"_25th March, 1793_.--Mr. S. bets Mr. Hardy one hundred guineas, that the three per cent. consols are as high this day twelvemonth as at the date hereof.

"Mr. S. bets Gen. Tarleton one hundred guineas to fifty guineas, that Mr.

Pitt is first Lord of the Treasury on the 28th of May, 1795.--Mr. S. bets Mr. St. A. St. John fifteen guineas to five guineas, ditto.--Mr. S. bets Lord Sefton one hundred and forty guineas to forty guineas, ditto.

_"19th March, 1793_.--Lord t.i.tchfield and Lord W. Russell bet Mr. S.

three hundred guineas to two hundred guineas, that Mr. Pitt is first Lord of the Treasury on the 19th of March, 1795.

"_18th March, 1793_.--Lord t.i.tchfield bets Mr. S. twenty-five guineas to fifty guineas, that Mr. W. Windham represents Norwich at the next general election."

As a sort of moral supplement to this strange list, and one of those insights into character and conduct which it is the duty of a biographer to give, I shall subjoin a letter, connected evidently with one of the above speculations:--

"SIR,

"I am very sorry that I have been so circ.u.mstanced as to have been obliged to disappoint you respecting the payment of the five hundred guineas: when I gave the draughts on Lord * * I had every reason to be a.s.sured he would accept them, as * * had also. I enclose you, as you will see by his desire, the letter in which he excuses his not being able to pay me this part of a larger sum he owes me, and I cannot refuse him any time he requires, however inconvenient to me. I also enclose you two draughts accepted by a gentleman from whom the money will be due to me, and on whose punctuality I can rely. I extremely regret that I cannot at this juncture command the money.

"At the same time that I regret your being put to any inconvenience by this delay, I cannot help adverting to the circ.u.mstance which perhaps misled me into the expectation that you would not unwillingly allow me any reasonable time I might want for the payment of this bet. The circ.u.mstance I mean, however discreditable the plea, is the total inebriety of some of the party, particularly of myself, when I made this preposterous bet. I doubt not you will remember having yourself observed on this circ.u.mstance to a common friend the next day, with an intimation that you should not object to being off; and for my part, when I was informed that I had made such a bet and for such a sum,--the first, such folly on the face of it on my part, and the latter so out of my practice,--I certainly should have proposed the cancelling it, but that, from the intimation imparted to me, I hoped the proposition might come from you.

"I hope I need not for a moment beg you not to imagine that I am now alluding to these circ.u.mstances as the slightest invalidation of your due. So much the contrary, that I most perfectly admit that from your not having heard any thing further from me on the subject, and especially after I might have heard that if I desired it the bet might be off, you had every reason to conclude that I was satisfied with the wager, and whether made in wine or not, was desirous of abiding by it. And this was further confirmed by my receiving soon after from you 100_l_, on another bet won by me.

"Having, I think, put this point very fairly, I again repeat that my only motive for alluding to the matter was, as some explanation of my seeming dilatoriness, which certainly did in part arise from always conceiving that, whenever I should state what was my real wish the day after the bet was made, you would be the more disposed to allow a little time;--the same statement admitting, as it must, the bet to be as clearly and as fairly won as possible; in short, as if I had insisted on it myself the next morning.

"I have said more perhaps on the subject than can be necessary; but I should regret to appear negligent to an application for a just claim.

"I have the honor to be,

"Sir,

"Your obedient servant,

"_Hertford St. Feb. 26._

"R. B. SHERIDAN."

Of the public transactions of Sheridan at this time, his speeches are the best record. To them, therefore, I shall henceforward princ.i.p.ally refer my readers,--premising, that though the reports of his latter speeches are somewhat better, in general, than those of his earlier displays, they still do great injustice to his powers, and exhibit little more than the mere _Torso_ of his eloquence, curtailed of all those accessories that lent motion and beauty to its form. The attempts to give the terseness of his wit particularly fail, and are a strong ill.u.s.tration of what he himself once said to Lord * *. That n.o.bleman, who among his many excellent qualities does not include a very lively sense of humor, having exclaimed, upon hearing some good anecdote from Sheridan, "I'll go and tell that to our friend * *." Sheridan called him back instantly and said, with much gravity, "For G.o.d's sake, don't, my dear * *: a joke is no laughing matter in your mouth."

It is, indeed, singular, that all the eminent English orators--with the exception of Mr. Burke and Mr. Windham--should have been so little anxious for the correct transmission of their eloquence to posterity. Had not Cicero taken more care of even his extemporaneous effusions, we should have lost that masterly burst of the moment, to which the clemency of Caesar towards Marcellus gave birth. The beautiful fragments we have of Lord Chatham are rather traditional than recorded;--there are but two, I believe, of the speeches of Mr. Pitt corrected by himself, those on the Budget of 1792, and on the Union with Ireland;--Mr. Fox committed to writing but one of his, namely, the tribute to the memory of the Duke of Bedford;--and the only speech of Mr. Sheridan, that is known with certainty to have pa.s.sed under his own revision, was that which he made at the opening of the following session, (1794,) in answer to Lord Mornington.

In the course of the present year he took frequent opportunities of expressing his disgust at that spirit of ferocity which had so deeply disgraced the cause of the Revolution. So earnest was his interest in the fate of the Royal Family of France, that, as appears from one of his speeches, he drew up a paper on the subject, and transmitted it to the republican rulers;--with the view, no doubt, of conveying to them the feelings of the English Opposition, and endeavoring to avert, by the influence of his own name and that of Mr. Fox, the catastrophe that awaited those Royal victims of liberty. Of this interesting doc.u.ment I cannot discover any traces.

In one of his answers to Burke on the subject of the French Revolution, adverting to the charge of Deism and Atheism brought against the republicans, he says,