ance of Colonies called for the aid of a ready writer to combat the arguments of the Americans, and to give force to the reafons which influenced the conduct of Government, and he was selected for the purpofe. Among other things (of which we fhould be glad to receive a more parparticular account) he wrote a Pamphlet, which was circulated with much induftry, entitled, "The "Rights of Great Britain afferted against the Claims of the Colo"nies; being an Anfwer to the De"claration of the General Congrefs," 8vo. 1776, and of which many editions were published. He alfo was the Author of "A fhort Hiftory "of Oppofition during the laft Sef fion of Parliament," 8vo. 1779, a Pamphlet which, on account of its merit, was by many afcribed to Mr Gibbon. But a more lucrative employment was conferred on him about this time. He was appointed Agent to the Nabob of Arcot, and in that capacity exerted his talents in feveral appeals to the public in behalf of his client. Among others, he published "Letters from Mahommed Ali "Chan, Nabob of Arcot, to the "Court of Directors. To which is "annexed, a State of Facts relative to Tanjore, with an Appendix of "Original Papers," 4to. 1777 ; and he was fuppofed to be the Author of "The Hiftory and Management of "the Eaft-India Company, from its “Origin in 1600 to the prefent "Times, Vol. I. containing the Af "fairs of the Carnatic; in which the "Rights of the Nabob ate explained, and the Injustice of the Company proved," 4to. 1779. In his capacity of Agent to the Nabob, it was probably thought requifite that he should have a feat in the British Parliament. He was accordingly in 1780 chofen Member for Camelford, but we do not recollect that he ever attempted to fpeak in the Houfe. He was alfo re-chofen in 1784 and 1790. For a few years last past his health began to fail, and he returned to his native country in expectation of receiving benefit from the change of air, He continued, however, to decline, and after lingering fome time, died at his feat at Bellevue, in Invernefs, on the 17th of Feb. 1796. He appears to have died in very opulent circumftances, and by his will, dated June 1793, gave various annuities and legacies to feveral perfons to a great amount. He also bequeathed 1000l. to John Mackenzie, of Figtree-Court, in the Temple, London, to defray the expence of printing and publishing Offian in the original. He directed 300l. to be laid out in erecting a monument to his memory, in fome confpicuous fituation at Bellevue aforefaid, and ordered that his body fhould be carried from Scotland, and interred in the Abbey Church of Westminster, the city wherein he had paffed the greatest and best part of his life. He was accordingly taken from the place where he died, and buried in the Poets-Corner of Westminster Church. EXTRACTS FROM THE MISCELLANEOUS WORKS OF EDWARD GIBBON, ESQ. On Pride of Ancestry. A LIVELY defire of knowing and of recording our anceltors fo generally prevails, that it muit depend on the influence of feme common principle in the minds of men. We feem to have lived in the perfons of our forefathers; it is the labour and reward of vanity to ex tend. send the term of this ideal longevity. Our imagination is always acsive to enlarge the narrow circle in which nature has confined us. Fifty ør a hundred years may be allotted to an individual, but we step forward beyond death with fuch hopes as religion and philofophy will fuggeft; and we fill up the filent vacancy that precedes our birth, by affociating ourfelves to the authors of our exift ence. Our calmer judgment will rather tend to moderate, than to fupprefs, the pride of an ancient and worthy race. The fatyrift may laugh, the philofopher may preach; but reafon herself will refpect the preju. dices and habits, which have been confecrated by the experience of mankind. Wherever the diftinction of birth is allowed to form a fuperior order in the state, education and example should always, and will often produce among them a dignity of fentiment and propriety of conduct, which is guarded from dishonour by their own and the public esteem. If we read of fome illuftrious line for ancient that it has no beginning, fo worthy that it ought to have no end, we fympathife in its various fortunes; nor can we blame the generous enthusiasm, or even the harmless vanity, of thofe who are allied to the honours of its name. For my own part, could I draw my pedigree from a general, a ftatefman, r a celebrated author, I fhould ftu dy their lives with the diligence of filial love. In the investigation of paft events, our curiofity is ftimulated by the immediate or indirect reference to ourselves; but in the efispate of honour we should learn to value the gifts of nature above thofe of fortune; to efteem in our anceftors the qualities that beft promote the interefts of fociety; and to pronounce the defcendant of a king left truly noble than the offspring man of genius, whofe writings will inftruct or delight the latest potterity. The family of Confucius is, in my opinion, the most illuftrious in the world. After a painful afcent of eight or ten centuries, our barons and princes of Europe are loft in the darkness of the middle ages; but in the vaft equality of the empire of China, the pofterity of Confucius have maintained, above two thoufand two hundred years, their peaceful honours and perpetual fucceffion. The chief of the family is still revered, by the fovereign and the people, as the lively image of the wifest of mankind. The nobility of the Spencers has been illuftrated and enriched by the trophies of Marlborough; but I exhort them to confider the Fairy Queen as the most precious jewel of their coronet. I have expofed my private feelings, as I fhall always do, without fcruple or referve. That these fentiments are juft, or at leaft natural, I am inclined to believe, fince I do not feel myself interested in the caufe; for I can derive from my ancestors neither glory nor fhame. On Self-Biography. A fincere and fimple narrative of my own life may amuse fome of my leifure hours; but it will fubject me, and perhaps with justice, to the imputation of vanity. I may judge, however, from the experience both of paft and of the present times, that the public are always curious to know the men who have left be- . hind them any image of their minds: the moft fcanty accounts of such men are compiled with diligence, and perufed with eagerness; and the ftudent of every class may derive a leffon, or an example, from the lives moft fimilar to his own. My name may hereafter be placed among the thousand articles of a Biographia Britannica; and I must be confcious, that no one is fo well qualified, as myself, to defcribe the feries of my thoughts and actions. The authority of my masters, of the grave Thuanus, and the philofophic Hume, might be fufficient to justify my de fign; but it would not be difficult to produce a long lift of ancients and moderns, who, in various forms, have exhibited their own portraits. Such portraits are often the most interesting, and fometimes the only interefting parts of their writings; and, if they be fincere, we feldom complain of the minutenefs or prolixity of these personal memorials. The lives of the younger Pliny, of Petrarch, and of Erafmus, are expreffed in the epiftles, which they themselves have given to the world. The effays of Montagne and Sir William Temple bring us home to the houses and bofoms of the authors: we fmile with out contempt at the head-ftrong paf. fions of Benevenuto Cellini, and the gay follies of Colley Cibber. The confeffions of St Auftin and Roffeau difclofe the fecrets of the human heart: the commentaries of the learned Huet have furvived his evangelical demonftration; and the memoirs of Goldoni are more truly dramatic than his Italian comedies. The heretic and the churchman are strongly marked in the characters and fortunes of Whifton and Bishop Newton; and even the dullnefs of Michael de Marolles and Anthony Wood acquires fome value from the faithful reprefentation of men and manners. That I am equal or fuperior to fome of thefe, the effects of modefty or affectation cannot force me to diffemble. Anecdotes of the SOUTH SEA COMPANY in 1720. Mr Edward Gibbon was appointed one of the commiffioners of the cuftoms ; he fat at that board with Prior; but the merchant was better qualified for his ftation than the poet; fince Lord Bolingbroke has been heard to declare, that he had never converfed with a man, who more clearly understood the commerce and finances of England. In the year 1716, he was elected one of the directors of the South Sea Company; and his books exhibited the proof that, before his acceptance of this fatal office, he had acquired an independent fortune of fixty thousand pounds. But his fortune was overwhelmed in the fhipwreck of the year twenty, and the labours of thirty years were blafted in a fingle day. Of the ufe or abufe of the South Sea fcheme, of the guilt or innocence of my grandfather and his brother direc tors, I am neither a competent nor a difinterested judge. Yet the equity of modern times muft condemn the violent and arbitrary proceedings, which would have difgraced the caufe of justice, and would render injuftice ftill more odious. No fooner had the nation awakened from its golden dream, than a popular and even a parliamentary clamour demanded their victims: but it was acknowledged on all fides that the South Sea directors, however guilty, could not be touched by any known laws of the land. The Speech of Lord Molefworth, the author of the State of Denmark, may fhew the temper, or rather the intemperance, of the Houfe of Commons. "Extraordinary crimes, (exclaimed that ardent whig,) call aloud for extraordinary remedies. The Roman lawgivers had not forefeen the poffible exiftence of a parricide: but as foom as the first monfter appeared, he was fown into a fack, and caft headlong into the river; and I hall be content to inflict the fame treatment on the authors of our préfent ruin,”His motion was not literally adopted; but a bill of pains and penalties was introduced, a retroadiye flature. to punish the offences, which did not his actual guilt. One man was ruine exift at the time they were commit- ed becaufe he had dropt a foolift ted. Such a pernicious violation of speech, that his horfes fhould feed liberty and law can be excused only upon gold; another, because he was by the most imperious neceffity; nor grown fo proud, that, one day at the . could it be defended on this occa- treafury, he had refufed a civil an fion by the plea of impending dan fwer to perfons much above him. Alf ger or useful example. The legifla were condemned, absent and unheard, ture reftrained the perfons of the di- in arbitrary fines and forfeitures, rectors, impofed an exorbitant fecuri- which fwept away the greatest part ry for their appearance, and marked of their fubftance. Such bold op their characters with a previous note preffion can fcarcely be fhielded by of ignominy: they were compelled to the omnipotence of Parliament: and deliver, upon oath, the ftrict value yet it may be feriously questioned, of their eftates and were disabled whether the judges of the South from making any transfer or alien- Sea directors were the true and legal ation of any part of their property. reprefentatives of their country. The Against a bill of pains and penalties firft Parliament of George I. had it is the common right of every fub- been chofen (1715) for three years : ject to be heard by his counsel at the the term had elapfed, their trust was bar; they prayed to be heard; their expired; and the four additional prayer was refufed; and their op. years (1718-1722) during which preffors, who required no evidence, they continued to fit, were derived would listen to no defence. It had not from the people, but from thembeen at first propofed that one-eighth felves; from the ftrong measure of of their refpective eftates should be the feptennial bill, which only can allowed for the future fupport of the be paralleled by il ferar di configlio of directors; but it was fpeciously ur- the Venetian hiftory. Yet candour ged, that in the various fhades of will own that to the fame Parliaopulence and guilt, fuch an unequal ment every Englishman is deeply inproportion would be too light for debted: the feptennial act, fo vicimany, and for fome might poffibly ous in its origin, has been fanctioned be too heavy. The character and by time, experience, and the nationconduct of each man were feparate al confent. Its firft operation fecurly weighed, but, inftead of the calmed the Houfe of Hanover on the folemnity of a judicial inquiry, the fortune and honour of three and thirty Englishmen were made the topic of hafty converfation, the fport of a lawless majority; and the bafeft member of the committee, by a malicious word or a filent vote, might indulge his general fpleen or perfonal animofity. Injury was aggravated by infult, and infult was embittered by pleafantry. Allowances of twenty pounds, or one fhilling, were facetiously moved. A vague report that a director had formerly been concerned in another project, by which fome unknown perfons had loft their money, was admitted as a proof of throne, and its permanent influence maintains the peace and stability of government. As often as a repeat has been moved in the House of Commons, I have given in its defence a clear and confcious vote. My grandfather could not expect to be treated with more lenity than his companions. His Tory principles and connections render him obnoxi ous to the ruling powers: his name is reported in a fufpicious fecret; and his well-known abilities could not plead the excufe of ignorance or error. In the firft proceedings again the South-Sea directors, Mr Gib. bon is one of the few who were taken into custody; and, in the final fentence, the measure of his fine proclaims him eminently guilty. The total eftimate which he delivered on oath to the House of Commons, amounted to one hundred and fix thousand five hundred and forty-three pounds five fhillings and fixpence, exclufive of antecedent settlements. Two different allowances of fifteen and of ten thousand pounds were moved for Mr Gibbon; but on the queftion being put, it was carried without a divifion for the fmaller fum. On these ruins, with the skill and credit of which Parliament had not been able to defpoil him, my grandfather at a mature age erected the edifice of a new fortune: the labours of fixteen years were amply rewarded; and I have reafon to believe that the fecond structure was not much inferior to the firft. He had realized a very confiderable property in Suffex, Hampshire, Buckinghamshire, and the New River Company; and had acquired a spa. cious houfe, with gardens and lands, at Putney, in Surry, where he refided in decent hofpitality. Character of the Rev. WILLIAM LAW. A life of devotion and celibacy, was the choice of my aunt, Mrs Hefter Gibbon, who, at the age of eighty-five, ftill refides in a hermitage at Cliffe, in Northamptonshire; having long furvived her fpiritual guide and faithful companion Mr Wm. Law, who, at an advanced age, about the year 1761, died in her house. In our family he had left the reputation of a worthy and pious man, who believed all that he profeffed, and practifed all that he enjoined. The character of a nonjuror, which he maintained to the last, is a fufficient evidence of his principles in church and state; and the facrifice of intereft to confcience will be always refpectable. Ed. Mag. July 1796. His theological writings, which our domeftic connection has tempted me to perufe, preferve an imperfect fort of life, and I can pronounce with more confidence and knowledge on the merits of the author. His laft compofitions are darkly tinctured by the incomprehenfible vifions of Jacob Behmen; and his difcourfe on the abfolute unlawfulness of stage entertainments is fometimes quoted for a ridiculous intemperance of fentiment and language:- "The actors and fpectators must all be damned: the playhouse is the porch of hell, the place of the devil's abode, where he holds his filthy court of evil fpirits; a play is the devil's triumph, a facrifice performed to his glory, as much as in the heathen temples of Bacchus or Venus, &c. &c." But thefe fallies of religious phrenzy must not extinguish the praife which is due to Mr William Law as a wit and a fcholar. His argument on topics of lefs abfurdity is fpecious and acute, his manner is lively, his ftyle forcible and clear; and, had not his vigourous mind been clouded by enthufiafm, he might be ranked with the most agreeable and ingenious wiiters of the times. While the Bangorian controverfy was a fashionable theme, he entered the lifts on the fubject of Chrift's kingdom, and the authority of the priesthood: against the plain account of the facrament of the Lord's Supper, he refumed the combat with Bishop Hoadly, the object of Whig idolatry, and Tory abhorrence; and at every weapon of attack and defence the nonjuror, on the ground which is common to both, approves himself at least equal to the prelate. On the appearance of the Fable of the Bees, he drew his pen against the licentious doctrine that private vices are public benefits, and morality, as well as religion, muft join in his applaufe. Mr Law's G master * Since inhabited by Mr Wood, Sir John Shelly, the Duke of Norfolk, &c. |