Tomline, let us not be supposed to deny that he conceived the design; nor even that many of the happier and bolder lines have been traced by his unguided pencil.

The speech informs us that

Mr. Pitt came to the University unusually young. Though his constitution was naturally weak, and from the age of six to fifteen the course of his education was frequently interrupted by actual illness, be had acquired, under the immediate eye of his illustrious Father, a degree of knowledge never surpassed at that early period of life. During a residence of more than 'double the time commonly passed here by persons of his rank, he was equally remarkable for the most diligent application to study, and for the most exact conformity to the discipline of his college: he spent not an idle day, nor was he guilty of a single irregularity. He made the greatest proficiency in all those branches of knowledge to which Academical honors are assigned; and at the same time he became intimately acquainted with every other subject which might contribute to qualify him for the profession of the law, his original destination, and for these important offices in the state to which his birth and talents gave him a right to aspire. His legal practice was of short duration: but sufficiently long to prove, that had he continued it, he must rapidly have risen to the highest stations in that honorable and laborious profession.'

It was a rare and distinguishing trait of Mr. Pitt, (as is here observed,) that at once, and from the first, he displayed a brilliancy of eloquence, a maturity of understanding, and a correctness of judgment, which excited the utmost astonishment in those who had been accustomed to consider these qualities, even in an inferior degree, as the late acquisition of age and experience; and we add that to him the description given of a renowned character of antiquity was eminently applicable;

"Scilicet ingenium et rerum prudentia velox

Ante pilos venit. Dicenda, tacendaque calles." (PERS.) We agree with the orator that the difficulties, with which Mr. Pitt had to struggle on his accession to office, were very formidable; if, as it is here well expressed, we reflect upon the inefficiency of his coadjutors, and upon the splendid talents, powerful eloquence, and commanding influence of his opponents; and we believe it to be equally true that the energy of his mind ever rose with the occasion, that dangers never depressed, and difficulties never embarrassed him.'

General praise is here bestowed on the East India bill; while the financial measures, and particularly the plan of the Sinking Fund, are more largely noticed, and receive those encomiums which none who are conversant with the principles of national prosperity will deny to them. We are told that Various projects for preventing a national bankruptcy were comunicated to him by ingenious and speculative men: but after a REV. MAY, 1897.

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careful and impartial examination he rejected them all, as inadequate or impracticable. Instead of any of these visionary schemes, which would rather have aggravated than lessened the evil, he adopted that plain and simple mode, the suggestion of his own mind, the wisdom and efficacy of which have been incontrovertibly proved by the experience of more than twenty years. In the course of this long period, its operation has been uniform and regular; no revisal, no alteration, has been necessary; no improvement, either in the principle, or in the application of the principle, has been even attempted. In the progress of this measure through the House of Commons, its merits were so obvious, as to extort the commendation and support of those who acted in systematic opposition to government; and this unanimous concurrence in Parliament was prophetic of that universal admiration which it has since obtained, among all political parties and all descriptions of men.'

This statement ought to be considered as founded on good authority but we believe that we are justified in asserting, è contra, that the principle and the plan were furnished by that eminent calculator of the day, Dr. Price. It is purely for the sake of historical accuracy that we advert to this fact. The merit of a minister, we conceive, consists less in devising beneficial plans, than in adopting and carrying them into effect, from whatever quarter they originate.

Mr. T. then proceeds to remark:

The active and comprehensive mind of this truly wonderful man was not content with relieving his Country from the pressure of present burthens; he formed another plan, so exclusively his own, that the idea seems never to have entered the thoughts of any other persou. By this plan it was made absolutely impossible to contract any new debt, without at the same time providing the means of discharging it within a moderate number of years. Having by his former sinking fund removed all danger arising from the existing debt incurred by past wars, by this new sinking fund, which was so contrived that it must necessarily increase with the increasing debt, he obviated, as far as the nature of the thing will admit, the danger to be apprehended from the expences of all future wars to the latest period of time. Can a more perfect system of finance be conceived by the imagination of man? Can human foresight be directed to a more useful political purpose? To the united effect of these two measures we are indebted for the power of carrying on that contest in which we have now been engaged for nearly fourteen years, in defence of the liberty and independence of our country.

That nothing might be wanting to our internal welfare, he was studious to improve our resources, by giving every possible encouragement to trade, navigation, and manufactures; and to the wisdom and policy of his regulations upon those important points, the commercial part of the community has been ever ready to bear the amplest testimony. Never perhaps was there a more favourable change in the general situation of any Country, than in the first nine years of Mr. Pitt's administration. The dejection and gloom which hung over

this kingdom at the beginning of that period, were gradually dispelled and were succeeded by a degree of prosperity far beyond the most sanguine expectations.'

We admit that history will incorporate with itself every syllable of this passage, and it certainly exhibits its illustrious subject in a point of view highly gratifying. Had his career ended at this period, he would have descended to posterity as a splendid public character a benefactor of his country, and a choice favorite of fortune: but like a great potentate of the last and preceding centuries, it was his fate, after a morning and a meridian of great effulgence, to have his evening agitated by fearful storms, and finally to set beneath a dark and threatening horizon.

Our interference in the affairs of Holland is next noticed. That measure experienced at the time the approbation of all parties at home: but facts have since shewn that it was inauspicious. It made the Anti-Stadtholderians our irreconcileable enemies, threw them into the arms of France, and generated in them that desperate hatred which made them behold with satisfaction the eventual subjugation of their country. Had we exerted our power to establish a good understanding between the parties, instead of giving to one of them the ascendancy, this incalculable evil might have been avoided.

The speaker compliments Mr. Pitt on his insight into the nature and tendency of the French Revolution: but our own sentiments are widely at variance with this statement. It is our decided opinion that Mr. Pitt grossly misapprehended that awful event, erred egregiously in his estimate of it, and completely mistook the treatment which it required. On this occasion, he is to be classed with those who, cum obesse vellent, profuerunt. He added to the inveteracy and strength of the malady which he undertook to eradicate; and the effects of his prescriptions proved invariably the reverse of those which he predicted. Foreign pressure was not the remedy for which the mischief called. It was within her own precincts that a statesman ought to have found employment for France; he ought to have maintained a balance between the parties into which she was divided, to have assisted the La. Fayettes against the Brissots, and the Brissots against the Robespierres; and most impolitic was it exclusively to countenance the impracticable and half frantic devotees of the ancien regime. He, however, deemed it contamination to be in contact with any of the revolutionary parties; and thus he sacrificed policy to sickly sentiment, and made private feeling the rule of his political conduct. He acted, indeed, in unison with the passions of the day, and steered his course before the gale of popular clamour: but thus

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he plunged into the war in all the wild spirit of knight errantry, and sought to act a principal when a secondary part was his province. The effects of this precipitate interference in aggrandizing France, and in increasing our own burthens, do not require to be detailed: they are too generally felt to need description. The event fully shews that Mr. Pitt was thrown on a crisis to which he was not equal; and his failure on this occasion proves that, however transcendant his abilities were in other respects, and however well fitted he might be for all the rest of the higher duties of a statesman, his superiority did not discover itself in regulating the foreign relations of a great empire. In pronouncing the inaptitude of Mr. Pitt for this province, we feel the utmost confidence that our sentence will be ratified by the decision of posterity.

In justifying the late war, the eulogist observes:

He called forth the resources of the Country, and applied them with wisdom and success. He discontinued the practice of private loans and beneficial contracts, which had not only been a great loss to the nation, but the source of considerable influence to former ministers; and adopted new and far less expensive modes of conducting these branches of the public service. Having increased our army, and raised our naval strength to a degree it had never before reached, he shewed the greatest judgment in selecting proper officers to comsmand the different expeditions. Our victories at sea have been splendid beyond example: and our armies, whenever they have been engaged alone, have uniformly triumphed over the enemy. To Mr. Pitt we owe that admirable system for the internal defence of the Kingdom, which the patriotism and courage of the people enabled him to carry into full effect. This important measure while it restrained the disaffected at home, displayed to our enemy such a spirit of loyalty, and such a body of military force, that he has never ventured to execute his boasted threat of invasion.'

That Mr. Pitt called forth the the resources of the country, we feelingly admit; that he applied them with wisdom,' his admirers may contend, but how can it be said with success? At the time, we heard much of " negative successes," and were told that " we had gained all that we had not lost :" but with this language the ears of posterity will never be insulted. Success in the old fashioned sense of the term, the sense which it bore in the days of Marlborough and Chatham, ill applies to the war of the late Premier.

To the praise which the speech bestows on the Union with Ireland, we give our full assent: but that measure, great, and wise, and meritorious as we hold it to have been, will avail little unless it is duly followed up. Most deeply do we regret that we seem destined to look to the reverse of advances in this respect.

Mr

Mr. Tomline next refers to Mr. Pitt's secession from office. On that subject we profess ourselves to be somewhat sceptical; for the cause which he chose to assign for his retirement does not address itself to our judgment as the sole motive of his conduct on that occasion. The task of making peace, which in the actual circumstances he could not have much longer delayed, if it did not determine, we have no doubt greatly reconciled him to his plan of temporary abdication. He was glad to avoid the humiliation of ratifying terms so different from those which he long and confidently held out to the public as indispensible. Indemnity for the

past, and security for the future," could not be the fruits of the war which he had waged. By his subsequent conduct, it appears evident that he regarded the new minister as his mere locum teneus; and when the latter refused to re-admit him into power on his own terms, what was his behaviour? The opprobrious language which Mr. Pitt then applied to him and his colleagues, when contrasted with the panegyric which he passed on them at their entrance into office, fixes a stain on his memory which no art, no hardihood, no industry, on the part of his defenders and admirers, will ever be able to expunge.

The great measure of emancipating catholics and dissenters, though not very consistent with the former professions of Mc. Pitt, was highly honourable to him, since it shewed that he was capable of correcting early erroneous opinions, and of adopting political views suited to the necessities of the times. We wish that the speech had imparted some particulars of his plan for this purpose to which it alludes: we think that the public at this moment has a right to such a communication; and we trust that it will not be withholden.

Adverting to Mr. Pitt's behaviour to Mr. Addington, while the latter was minister, the orator ascribes to the former a disinterestedness of which there is no other instance in the history of political parties.' It is here forgotten that Mr. Addington was much more indebted to the co-operation of Mr. Fox than to that of Mr. Pitt. Such was the friendship of the latter, that, while out of office, he rarely attended in his place in parliament; such was his 'disinterestedness,' that, on the first invitation from his antient rival, he united with him to overturn his extolled and favourite protégé; and, farther to shew this disinterestedness, he turned to his own exclusive account all the benefits of this co-operation. It is here also asserted, that he did not obstruct the measures of the new administration, which must have instantly sunk under the weight of his opposition.' How favourable to the purposes of panegyric

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