lic man who professes to be their friend. And yet, in the face of this, "peaching" of his whole political associates, Mr Moore impugns the integrity of Mr Burke! He does not, certainly, attempt to underrate the wonderful mind and acquirements of that extraordinary man; but he speaks of him as so enthralled by his temper and irascibility, as to have been little better than a maniac-an inspired maniac he would perhaps be willing to allow. But what are we to think, either of the candour or the discernment of our author, who, with the visible demonstration before him of all that Burke's forecasting wisdom had predicted-come to pass-acted and done-described and recorded in the chronicles of every civilized nation

-yet ventures to insinuate that the influence upon the prophet himself, of the stupendous apocalypse with which he roused and alarmed the world, was the effect of a sordid calculation-the consent of his poverty to a crime! And, forsooth, because it was the opinion of those pure and precious reformers-those "Friends of the people," with whom he had acted, till they became such friends of the people as Mr Moore has in his simplicity described. In quitting them, it is alleged, that he sold himself to the ministry, when, in point of fact, except in the simple principle of hostility to France, it is matter of history and moral demonstration, that there was little communion of spirit, or common scope of intelligence, between Burke and Pitt, or any of the prominent members of the administration as it stood prior to the accession of the seceding Whigs. But Moore attacking Burke, is the antelope attacking the elephant-the war elephant, castled and garrisoned with all his gorgeous trappings gloriously upon him, as he comes forth from the orient gates of imperial palaces, amidst the Nabobs and Rajahs of the Indus and the Ganges.

Humiliating as the views of human nature are, which the Memoirs of Sheridan lay open, in the conduct of his political associates-there are yet passages which must awaken feelings of intenser mortification than even those which draw so much sympathy towards him, in as much as they affect the secret sentiments of every man of talent, who, without

family consideration or political energy, has the misfortune to incur the acquaintance of the great. Mr Moore touches the subject with the delicacy peculiar to his poetical pen, and considering how much he has himself experienced of that costly condescension, there is perhaps not another paragraph in his book so pregnant with meaning, as the few sentences in which he speaks of Sheridan's enjoyment of the proud consciousness of having surmounted the disadvantages of birth and station, and placed himself on a level with the highest and noblest of the land. But mark what follows, and let those who are possessed but of genius-remember the admonition it contains, whenever they may be honoured with the humbling situation of a place at the tables of the lordly.

"This footing in the society of the great he could only have attained by Parliamentary eminence. MERE WRITER, with all his genius,

As a

HE NEVER WOULD HAVE BEEN THUS

ADMITTED adeundem among them. Talents in literature or science, UN

ASSISTED BY THE ADVANTAGES OF

BIRTH, may lead to association with the great, but rarely to equality-it is a passport through the well-guarded frontier, but no title to naturalization within. By him who has not been born among them, this can only be achieved by POLITICS."-Vol. II. p. 73. This is well said; but Mr Moore might have gone farther-for he must have often observed-shall we venture to say felt?-that the author or the artist at the table of the great, is but as a dainty, served up for the entertainment of the other arrogant guests. There are not half-a-dozen tables in London of "the lovers of the arts," as Mick Kelly calls them, which a man of genius, unknown in politics, who has a right respect for himself, would desire often to revisit-so offensively does the spirit of the legislative caste reign at them all.

There is one part of this work which will be read with interest and with surprise-we refer to Sheridan's intimacy with his present Majesty-and we will venture to assert, that every word Mr Moore says regarding it will be wormwood and gall to many a proud and pompous Whig. One thing it makes out very clearly, viz. that there never did exist between the Prince of Wales and Mr Fox that entire and

free political and party friendship, which it has been so long the endeavour of Whiggery to represent first, as an inducement, prior to the establishment of the Regency, to draw recruits to their standard-and, second, as a pretext for the abuse, with which they have clamoured against him for his personal independence subsequent to that era. It appears to be matter of historical fact, that in the secret negotiations during the year 1789, when the Regency question first arose, Mr Fox was not even then the first person in the confidence of his Royal Highness; and that what has been called his Royal Highness's desertion of his early friends, is just one of those factious cries which require but a plausible show of outward circumstances to give them currency. That his Royal Highness, by daring to act according to the determination of his own judgment, did disappoint many expectants, and that their patrons ascribed the cause rather to his faithlessness than to their own overestimated influence with him, admits of no doubt whatever; but whatever may have been the social intimacy of the Prince his youthful companionship -with Lord Grey and Mr Fox, it by no means appears very clear that he ever did regard them prospectively as his ministers. That he contemplated the probability of having them about himself in the great offices of the household, is, we think, not to be disputed; but we suspect he had seen too much of the character of both the one and the other, ever to have imagined they were qualified for the offices of the state. For the one, by his dangerous facility of temper, however well, for the short time he was in power, he may have acted, as new brooms sweep clean, was unfitted to withstand the hydra importunities of a government like that of England; and the other, by his impracticable fastidiousness, was still less adapted for those details and daily obtrusions in office, to which the minister of a free people must constantly submit. There does indeed appear to have been a prodigious deal of double-dealing about the whole Whig party; and it is impossible to be grave, when marking the manner in which our biographer has exposed it. The account he has given of the views and principles of the leaders on the ques

re

tion of Parliamentary Reform, was bad enough for them all; but the light he has let in upon the state of their connexion with the Prince of Wales, is still worse. Who could have imagined that ever Shakspeare's knowledge of man would have received in any point such an illustration as the simple expression of-" Master Shallow, I owe you a thousand pounds!" obtained in the looks and feelings of the Whigs, when they found the Prince had resolved to betake himself to counsellors in morè esteem with the kingdom!

But the most interesting part of all this party history, is the constancy of the Prince's attachment to Sheridan. Of the talents, the practical knowledge of mankind, and of the tact of that singular being, his Royal Highness seems to have been uniformly sensible; and to have consulted and trusted him in what respected his own character towards the public, much more confidentially than he did any other of those who arrogated to themselves the title of the Prince's friends."

Mr Moore says little satisfactory on the subject of the well-known coolness between Sheridan and Fox during the Talent administration-We would ask, does he abstain from doing so?

He is not ignorant of the cause, or we must question the wonted faculty of his eyes and ears. The thing, however, is of no particular consequence; nor perhaps would it much redound to the honour of Mr Fox, were it known. It is enough that the world knows how inadequate the place of Treasurer of the Navy was to the station Sheridan occupied in the eyes of the country-a circumstance which might induce some to fancy that the alleged coolness was not, as it has been insinuated, altogether a pulling up into dignity on the part of Fox, in consequence of Sheridan's circumstances, but perhaps was rather a withdrawing from him and his new associates on the part of Sheridan, in consequence of being consigned to an office so unworthy of his talents. Be this, however, as it may, whatever the cause of coolness was between these two orators, it is evident that it did not extend its influence to the Prince of Wales; for we find that, on the eve of the regency, Sheridan was deepest in the councils and bosom of his Royal Highness-indeed so much so, that it

had the effect of preventing the Lords Grey and Grenville, from forming an administration. The manner in which they took the pet, because the Prince presumed to improve their draft of the answer to the House of Commons, and to make it more congenial to his own sentiments, was eminently absurd; but the tone in which they resented to his Royal Highness the consultation he had held with Sheridan on the subject, deserves, and will ever obtain, a stronger epithet than only that of foolish.

But after all that confidence, how, it will be said by the Whigs, did the Prince in the end treat this beloved Sheridan? We will state at once our own opinion, JUST AS HIS ROYAL

HIGHNESS AS A GENTLEMAN OUGHT TO HAVE DONE.

He bestowed upon him a handsome sinecure for life; and when apprised that he was reduced to extreme poverty by the consequences, less of his own imprudence than the backing he received from Whitbread, and other similar friends, in his embarrassed theatrical property, his Royal Highness, in the most delicate way possible, intimated that the means were ready to procure him every comfort. It was silly, nay worse-it was insulting and contemptible to reject the boonand then to cry out, that it was sent too late, especially when the parties who advised that most injurious step, perfectly well knew that the relief was offered in the very moment that the need was made known.

We wonder, however, in all that has been whined about Sheridan's poverty at the last, how so little has been said of Mrs Sheridan's conduct. What became of her separate settlement at that time, to which Sheridan contributed fifteen thousand pounds? Was it in pledge? We believe not. Surely it was not likely to occur to any person who knew her circumstances, to imagine that her husband would be allowed to perish, as it were, in want; and where, too, were all those splendid friends whose eleemosynary liberality enabled Mr. Fox to maintain the rank of his birth after he had squandered both patrimony and pensions? Poor Sheridan had no patrimony. The lordly income he acquired and spent with those friends was earned by his own talents. But, alas! he was grown old, and fallen into infirmities, and could no longer

To

serve the purposes of those cold and haughty peerages, over whom and whose cause the glory of his manhood shed such unparalleled lustre. have paid the debts of Sheridan by subscription, was an undertaking which those who reflected for a moment on the subject never conceived either practicable or probable; but the whole noble herd who deserted him in his utmost need, well knew that they themselves were the causes of the persecutions and the miseries of his last hours. His death-bed was beset by duns and bailiffs, in the hope of wringing from him a supplication to the insolent charity of those who afterwards so audaciously attended his funeral. But though the payment of his debts was not within the scope of any reasonable proposal, a composition to obtain the relief of a discharge might have been accomplished; no one, however, interposed to mediate such an arrangement with the creditors. But that was not surprising, for a rational man of business was not to be found at any time among the Whigs. How then, when the question was how to assist a man who had exalted them to such a pitch of consideration in the eyes of the world, were they likely to produce one, when the person to be assisted could serve them no more? And yet these same Whigs, with all their paper trumpets-the daily, the monthly, and the quarterly presshave never ceased to proclaim how much he was shamefully forsaken by the King, although it appears, even by Mr Moore's account, that of all the public friends of Sheridan his Majesty alone was true; and that, aware of his afflicting embarrassments, his Majesty actually offered to procure him a seat in Parliament, to protect him from the importunity of his creditors. That it was not accepted, and for the reasons explained by his biographer, reflects honour on the high-mindedness of Sheridan; but the offer does not detract, in any degree, from the character of the King.

There are, no doubt, spirits among the Whigs who will represent his Majesty's conduct in thus proposing the Parliamentary sanctuary for his old

friend as a misdemeanour in the trusts of the Regency; but the common sense of the world, that sense which considers not the theory, but mere practice amidst existing circumstances,

will vindicate the motives of the King. We feel, however, that upon this topic we are saying too much, and that we are taking a great liberty in presuming to offer any remark which might be construed into a defence of his Majesty, when the simple question is, whether the Whigs or his Majesty were in fault, as respected the latter days of Sheridan; when, in point of fact, the King to the last continued his friend; and at the last the Whigs would have allowed him to starve, and to die neglected. It is, no doubt, true, a melancholy truth, that for some time before the final extinction, that once brilliant spirit, whose splendour had dazzled nations, suffered a dark and disastrous eclipse. Few things in authentic story afford a scene half so touching as that of such a man as Sheridan sitting, in his old age, forlorn of friends and of fortune, weeping at the fire-side of the honest and faithful Kelly, as, with the trueheartedness of the 66 poor fool" in Lear, he sung to him his own tender and pathetic ballad.

"No more shall the spring my lost pleasure restore,

Uncheer'd I still wander alone, And sunk in dejection, for ever deplore

The sweets of the days that are gone. While the sun as it rises, to others shines bright,

I think how it formerly shone ; While others cull blossoms, I find but a blight,

And sigh for the days that are gone.

I stray where the dew falls through moon-lighted groves,

And list to the nightingale's song, Her plaints still remind me of long banish'd joys,

And the sweets of the days that are gone.

Each dew-drop that steals from the dark eye of night,

Is a tear for the bliss that is flown: Where others cull blossoms, I find but a blight,

And sigh for the days that are gone."

Of Sheridan's personal character as he left it at his death, it would be painful indeed to speak. But in his youth, and during some part of his manhood, it seems to have been in some respects estimable. It cannot, however, with truth be said, that he ever showed the possession of any true, warm, unselfish, and disinterested feel

ing, such as endear to us the character of a man for ever, and disposes or rather forces us to sink his many vices even in his few virtues. From the time he left school, he appears to have been a reckless lover of pleasure, and to have sought nothing but his own enjoyment. His birth did not throw him into the most reputable circles; and perhaps it is not going too far to say, that he never showed the soul of a perfect gentleman. There is much that is offensive in all that story of his first love; and it is not possible to find him afterwards, for one single week, unassociated in one way or other, with fiddlers, and buffoons, and players, and managers, and farce-writers, and melo-dramatic mechanicians, jobbers of all sorts, men of the town, the press, and the pri

son.

It would not be easy,-it would be impossible, to lay your finger on any one noble action of his whole private life. In the glow of triumph, when his genius was aroused, no doubt his heart warmed with many sympathies; but they led to nothing steadfast and permanent. His domestic affections cannot be said to have been cold-but certainly they were far from being either pure or deep; and many men, unfortunately as wild, dissipated, and unprincipled as himself, have retained amidst their vices, far more tenderness, truth, and sincerity of affection, in the most sacred relations of life. Bursts of feeling Sheridan sometimes showed-or rather bursts of passion; for regret, remorse, shame, and perhaps pity, were in his heart rather than love. The very triumphs of his genius had nothing affecting or august. Vanity and selfishness seem to be almost the necessary vices of every professed wit; and the most deplorable thing of all is, that a professed wit must perpetually be dependent on the frivolous and the foolish. For one man of real genius like himself, how many wretched creatures must Sheridan have sought to enliven with his fancy! He seems at last to have been driven, even in the prime of his talents-to study table-talk as a profession,-to have lain a-bed devising good things that should keep a party awake all the next night-and constructing spring-guns and man-traps, to set in taverns, or even private parlours, that they might go off upon some Bond Street puppy, or Essex calf, to shake the sides of

Yorkshire boobies with inextinguishable laughter. All this must, in the course of thirty or forty years, have become disheartening and debasing, and even in Mr Moore's account of the matter, one cannot help pitying poor Sheridan, reduced at last to attempt to do that with infinite labour and pains, which can be done effectually but by the unpremeditated power of genius.

Yet it can admit of no doubt, that in his best days, Sheridan must have been an admirable wit at the festive board. He had little or no learning; and was, therefore, wholly free from pedantry, the utter destruction of all convivial merriment. His knowledge of human life was just sufficient to render him not absolutely superficial, and, therefore, he never penetrated too deep for ordinary apprehension. He was intimately acquainted with all the varieties of what is called, with a somewhat ludicrous limitation of its latitude, Life-and, therefore, needed never to be at a loss for illustrations familiar to all his listeners. His animal spirits seem to have been just sufficiently irregular to give him in reality those occasional moods of comparative depression that serve to bring out the brilliancy of happier hours, and which would-be wits often wofully strive to forge in their penury. All his reading, and all his writing, lay where he had found perpetual opportunities of plagiarism. His taste was correct, and so was his judgment, at least in all conversational displays, and his was the cheering, inspiring, elevating name (well-earned), of the wittiest of the witty, so that all rivals quailed before him, and he was still looked up to as the leading star.

We cannot believe, to its fullest extent, the account which Mr Moore gives us of Sheridan's painful preparation for company. Whatever may have been his apparent slowness in boyhood, nobody can deny that he was in conversation one of the wittiest of men. Then, he had been a diner-out, and a supper-out, and a sleeper-out, for

many and many a long year, so that all the common-places of conversation were familiar to his mind. He was in perpetual training; and, can it be believed, that such a man, so living, crammed himself with all good things before he set out to dine and to dazzle? Latterly, he might have done so-no

doubt he did-but his spirits were exhausted; he knew, that even the inspiration of the goblet for him was gonethat the feeling had left the fancy to itself-that the brain was barren because the bosom was desolate-that the wine of life was on the lees-and, thus sick of the society he once delighted in, waxing old "and miserably poor," not much respected now by any one, and despised by himself-no wonder that Yorick, if he still were ambitious to set the table in a roar, should be driven to the dismal dernier ressort of the worn-out wit, when not one spark of his former fires could be otherwise awakened in the dead ashes of his imagination.

But although we think Sheridan was a brilliant wit, we never can believethat he was a great orator. In nothing so much as in oratory, may the world be abused by a man gifted with fancy and powers of speech. Sheridan had an ear for sonorous declamation; and his imagination supplied him with a multitude of figures of speech. He infused a certain fervour into his periods; and by gross exaggeration and falsehood, which the excited public feeling greedily swallowed, he no doubt worked upon the minds even of first-rate men to a degree that is scarcely credible, if we believe them to have been perfectly sincere in their emotions and their eulogies. For our own part, we shall never believe that Burke thought Sheridan the greatest of all orators. He expressed that belief in an odd fashion, when he said that Sheridan's speech was neither poetry nor prose, but something better than either-the severest criticisin that could have been made on all that fustian and rhodomontade. What remains of it-in all the forms alike-is execrably bad; nor is there any writer of any character who would not be ashamed to have written it; nor any orator who would be proud to have delivered it at a tavern dinner. But get the ear of your audience-nay, get their minds and their hearts, by means of some passion or prejudice not at all of your awakening-pour forth upon them wordswords-words-be apparently impassioned, rapt yourself-and having once got hold of them, never relax your hold-out then with tropes, figures, metaphors, and similies, in what appears to be one uncontrollable flood, or sudden blaze; but all of which has been