Horace Walpole

“ If the Crown can arrive at precluding Members of Parliament from complaining in print of grievances, no doubt the Crown could debar all other men, who are of less importance, and whose persons are guarded by no sacred privilege. Liberty of speech and liberty of writing are the two instruments by which Englishmen call on one another to defend their common rights. Liberty of speech is communicated but a little way; the Press gives wings to that voice, and all men may read what all cannot hear. ”

“ But the chief engine to conciliate favour was the King’s piety. The Princess, no doubt, intended it should be real, for she lived in dread of a mistress. But mankind was not inclined to think that her morals could have imprinted much devotion on the mind of her son: nor was any man the dupe of those professions but Secker, the Archbishop, who for the first days of the reign flattered himself with the idea of becoming first minister in a Court that hoisted the standard of religion. ”

“ Every friend of his country must lament that a Prince of so many great and amiable qualities, whom England truly reveres, can be brought to give the sanction of his name to the most odious measures, and to the most unjustifiable public doctrines, from a Throne ever renowned for truth, honour, and unsullied virtue. I am sure all foreigners, especially the King of Prussia, will hold the minister in contempt and abhorrence. ”

“ The House of Commons has not seldom made this attempt, like the rest. The Lords, as a permanent and as a proud body, more constantly aim at it: the Crown always. Of liberty, a chief and material engine is the liberty of the Press: a privilege for ever sought to be stifled and annihilated by the Crown. The ministers of the Crown and its lawyers must misrepresent the liberty of the Press before they can presume to request the suppression of it. Every grievance set forth in print is misnamed a libel ”

“ Rhodomontade had been too favourite a figure with Lord Granville to leave him the dupe of it in another man. He himself had made glory but a step to ambition, instead of making ambition a footstool to glory. He neither admired Pitt’s exalted diction, nor exalted views; and continuing to canvass the point with him, said, he had understood from Bussy—“From Bussy,” interrupted Pitt; “nor you, nor any of you shall treat with Bussy: nobody shall but myself.” ”

“ The moment of his accession was fortunate beyond example. The extinction of parties had not waited for, but preceded the dawn of his reign. Thus it was not a race of factions running to offer themselves, as is common, to a new Prince, bidding for his favour, and ready each to be disgusted, if their antagonists were received with more grace; but a natural devolution of duty from all men to the uncontroverted heir of the Crown, who had no occasion to court the love of his subjects, nor could fear interrupting established harmony, but by making any change in a system so well compacted. ”

“ Pitt, Beckford, Legge, Sir George Saville, Sir William Baker, and James Grenville defended the Constitution. Much was said on the danger to which every man’s private papers were now exposed, and more on the injustice of hurrying on this decision, when Wilkes could not for his wound appear to defend himself, when he was prosecuting both the Secretaries of State and the messengers, and when he was to be tried himself for the libel. What court, what judge, what jury, but must be prejudiced by a decision of the House of Commons against him? ”

“ George the Second, contradicting the silly presages drawn from parallels, which had furnished opposition with names of unfortunate Princes, who were the second of their name, as Edward, Richard, Charles, and James, terminated his career with glory both to himself and his people. He died, crowned with years and honours, and respected from success; which with the multitude is the same as being beloved. He left a successor in the vigour of youth, ready to take the reins, and a ministry universally applauded, united, and unembarrassed by opponents. ”

“ Conway’s or my own sentiments, Grenville persisted in the interview. I went accordingly to Mr. Thomas Pitt’s. It happened to be the evening of the riot on burning the North Briton. Grenville arrived in the most ridiculous and extraordinary disorder I ever saw. He could scarce articulate for passion. One would have thought the City had been taken by storm and the guards cut to pieces. Yet this was not a panic. It was rage to see authority set at nought while he was minister. His subsequent conduct gave evidence that this was his sensation: no man ever bore power with more pride. ”

“ Pitt, and the almost universal acquiescence to the Favourite’s influence, persuaded both him and his dependents, that they had but to give the tone, and prerogative would master all opposition. Nor did his partisans do more than was practised by the Favourite himself. If they insulted the nation, he ruled the Court with a rod of iron. The Queen, her brother, and the brothers of the King, were taught to feel their total want of credit. The Duke of York, as Lord Anson was dying, ambitioned the post of Lord High Admiral, but did not dare even to ask it. ”

“ Such admiration of a hero was not likely to content itself with merely becoming his ally. Few men idolize heroism but they who feel the passion in their own breasts. Having obliged Sweden to make peace too, the young Czar turned his eye towards military exploits in a new field, and determined to attempt the conquest of the duchy of Sleswick from Denmark. Yet if he was dazzled by the martial talents of the King of Prussia, Peter had a heart susceptible of the most extensive humanity. One of his first acts on his accession was to bestow liberty on the Russian nobility. ”

“ The affection she conceived for the King softened the rigour of her captivity. Yet now and then a sigh stole out, and now and then she attempted, though in vain, to enlarge her restraint. What must have penetrated deeper, was, that policy did not seem to be the sole motive of the mortifications she endured. At times there entered a little wantonness of power into the Princess’s treatment of her. The King made her frequent presents of magnificent jewels; and as if diamonds were empire, she was never allowed to appear in public without them. ”

“ France said, let us both get out of Germany, for she felt the mischief of warring there. The manner indeed in which we had conducted our affairs there, had been too expensive; of which he produced instances: but speak out, cried he; will you quit all your allies? Two points must be obtained, the security of America and of our fisheries. We had already conceded too much: he was sorry for it—was sorry Mr. Pitt had softened at all. He would be ready to second Mr. Wilkes in moving for the Spanish papers, and to know if they avowed Bussy. ”

“ When a statesman ventures to be familiar, he must captivate his audience by uncommon graces, or win their good-will by a humane pleasantry that seems to flow from the heart, and to be the effusion of universal benevolence. This was the secret as well as character of Henry the Fourth of France: even the semblance of it stood his grandson, our Charles the Second, in signal stead, and veiled his unfeeling heart, and selfish and remorseless insensibility.
Men were puzzled to guess at the motive of so improper a choice as this of Sir Francis Dashwood. ”

“ The rhodomontade, to which he was addicted, was set off by parts and wit, or forgiven to his good-humour. It was very unlike the presumptuous ascendant of Pitt, or the lofty ignorance of Lord Bute. Pitt, unsociable and muffled in clouds, was adored from the terror imprinted by his lightnings. Bute thought distance and obscurity sufficient characteristics of divinity; but Granville, like Bacchus, rattled his car among men, and was but the more admired the more he familiarized himself with mortals. ”

“ This was a puny piece of chicane, the Ministers endeavouring to prove that the132 hostilities of Spain were subsequent in date to the period in which Mr. Pitt found it advisable from their conduct to attack the Spaniards. He had early detected their league with France, and was not of a humour to weigh dates against facts, or memorials against combinations. Nor Hardwicke’s forms nor Mansfield’s subtleties could persuade the seeing part of mankind that a war at our doors ought to be treated with the same literal circumspection as an action of trespass or battery at common law. ”

“ We must, say the French, have St. Lucia, for cela bouche Martinique; is that a reason to be given to a British Parliament? France should have given you Guadaloupe, or she and Spain, Hispaniola. She had given you more in Canada than she knew you could use, and more than he had contended for; but then she had got the fisheries. On the coast of Bengal we should never have suffered her to come; yet did she affect to cede all her conquests, where she had made none; but, alas! no nation had ever lost an opportunity so happy, so almost accomplished, of fixing its ascendant and commerce! ”

“ Pitt’s popularity. Prudence, at least, should have dictated to Lord Bute to await the conclusion of the peace, which, however good, would have given a shock to Mr. Pitt’s credit, from the impossibility of contenting all mankind. But the Favourite was as impatient to have the honour of making that peace, as if he had intended to make it an honourable one. His thrusting himself into administration at the moment he did, was so preposterous, that most men thought him betrayed into it by malicious advice. The Duke of Bedford, to pay his court, and from desire of peace, certainly counselled it ”

“ It is an observation a little foreign to the reflection with which I set out, but extensively victorious as that war was to Britain, she did not see one famous native general arise out of that war, except Wolfe, who died in the cradle of his celebrity; and unless we name Lord Clive, who was more a statesman than general, and in both respects not matched against equal rivals. I do not mean to detract from his merits; he was born to shine in the Indies: at home he never stepped beyond the common of mankind. ”